Chapter Text
True Awakening
I fell from the ceiling, attempting to control the fall but failing as I hit the ground. I stay waiting to be chastised by my squad mates before remembering they were dead, and I just sat there.
I stayed laying on the ground debating whether to stand up or not, on one hand the ground was cold and comfortable, on the other hand I needed to hunt down more rations. In the end I decided to get up.
I walked toward the opening of the spire, staring up at the moon and distant planets. It was an enjoyable sight but one that didn’t last long due to the constant storm. I spread my wings and jumped into the sky, intent on at least finding something tonight.
I flew over city ruins and cars piled high with snow, eventually landing on one of the taller buildings, gazing down below I eventually saw a worker running, which was odd, was there an disassembly drone nearby? I watched the worker run and eventually saw the drone chasing it, an older disassembly model, not the recent types.
I crouched low and with a forceful push I launched from the building, sending an echo throughout the city. I glided closer, and when lined up, I dove down, gaining speed and staying lined up to my target, just as a peregrine falcon would. The air split around me and the screech of my descent pierced the heavens, the two drones froze, trying to find the source, but when they did it was too late. I came down going near 400 km/h and struck the disassembly drone, disabling it temporarily. I turned to the worker, switching my hand for one of my long range armaments, before quickly dispatching my other target.
With the worker KIA I turned back to the disassembly drone beneath me, one of my tails came from behind and I lined it up at the center of its face, and within a second I had permanently disabled it, negating any sort of healing nanites it might have had available. My tail receded and I threw the deceased disassembly drone over my shoulder before doing similarly with the worker, securing them tight I jumped back into the sky to return to the spire.
My return was the same as the departure: Leaving craters in the ground. I walked inside, dropping the bodies on the ground before grabbing buckets from inside the pod and stringing the bodies to the ceiling above the buckets. I switched to my claws and cut the heads off both drones, pouring the oil from inside them before crushing and discarding them. A few minutes later when the bodies were empty of oil I laid them on the ground, using my claws once again to split open the chests of both. With the plate panels removed I was able to see the internals, same as always, filled with wires, pumps, servos and motors. And at the center of both as predicted was what I craved most: The cores. I severed the wires keeping them in place and tore them out, setting them in a bowl of their own, before dragging the bodies to the outside of the spire. The worker body was thrown with the rest that built the spire, but the disassembly drone was skewered by a makeshift spear before being planted in the ground.
I returned inside and sat down in front of the bowl, the worker core was the first to be devoured, and with the first bite the extra oil left inside spilt forth into my mouth and down my throat. The cores were arguably the best part of the drone, but for some odd reason all the standard disassemblers left them untouched. And next was the disassembly core, fatal to both standard models and workers alike due to the power potential of it and the nanites imbedded within to keep it undamaged, it was the ultimate retrieval of a hunt as they were hard to obtain not only due to the far and few disassembly drones but also their ferocity when fought head on, but thankfully it only got easier and easier the more I devoured, these cores empowering me beyond what they could ever hope to achieve.
I bit down on the core, my teeth tearing through the alloy casing as core nanites and oil remnants poured out, almost spilling over my face more than my mouth. My body went into overdrive to subdue the nanites, the feeling was euphoric, and when it all finished with the nanites now made my own, another tail fell from my body, stinger type like most the others but I was unsure what this one did. It was impossible to know until I tested it.
I wiped my face clean of any stains before standing once again, I grabbed the buckets and put lids on them, sealing them shut before putting them in the pod for later use. It was tempting to go on another hunt, but my chances of finding much more than a few workers was slim. Although attempting to breach one of the nearby colonies was always an option, it would be a good opportunity to test the newly acquired tail.
I left the spire again, leaping into the sky and making my way toward one of the many colonies I had found and left for when resources were dire. I neared the blast doors of the colony and saw another drone flying off, while it was tempting to hunt them down it would distract from the original objective, so I simply made note of their flight direction for later searching. If I could find another spire it would bring at least one drone core if not three for an entire squad. I landed in front of the doors and just stared at them, deciding on what tool to use. In the end I decided to just use my laser drill to dig through it.
My hand switched and began to heat up, emanating light before the focused beam shot out, I aimed it at the blast doors and it began to melt through the steel and concrete holding it together, and eventually after circling my entrance point, I cut off power to the laser. I switched back to my normal hand and kicked in the cut out portion, crushing a drone against the nearby wall it flew into. The other drones within panicked, apparently not noticing my entry, and started scampering around like roaches, running every which way.
I switched to my submachine gun and shot them down, while it’s wasteful not to put them into storage, it would be hard to drag a colony of workers back to the spire, so I’d settle with taking my fill in oil and devouring their cores. I continued my advance through the colony, shooting down workers and stabbing them with my various tails. My first tail was the standard one that injected nanite acid, the second one killed a drone both worker and disassembler by forcing it into a sort of bootloop state they couldn’t escape, essentially making them braindead and unable to continue on, the third one flooded the processors with junk data making for a great torture device, and the forth paralyzed a drone but kept it alive, making it great for taking a prisoner or two.
After an hour I had finished killing most if not all drones in the colony, I had taken my fill of oil and the cores all devoured, I exited and rushed back to the spire since the sun was beginning to rise and being caught would be painful. Returning back I cleaned myself up and jumped to the ceiling, latching into the corpses and the space between, and within seconds I was asleep again.