'If there was a hell,' Xiaoyue thought, 'this would be what it's like.'

Screams echoed through the hallways of the apartment she lived in, punctuated by staccato bursts of gunfire. She never heard the same voice twice. The television was on but muted, and large white characters on a blue background seared brightly:

"THE PEOPLES' REPUBLIC OF CHINA DECLARES A GOVERNMENTAL CRISIS: LETHAL OMNIC REVOLT. DO NOT LEAVE YOUR HOMES. DO NOT ATTEMPT TO RIDE ANY VEHICLES. DO NOT MAKE ANY NOISE. DO NOT LOOK OUT THE WINDOW. TURN OFF ANY AND ALL MOBILE DEVICES. FURTHER NOTICE WILL BE PROVIDED."

She had turned the sound off a long time ago, petrified by the thought of a killer robot crashing into her home. Sometime between then and now, she could hear the clunk-clunk of Bastion omnics moving through the streets. Usually, they put her mind at rest, knowing that they were always vigilant-patrolling streets and making sure any criminals thought twice before trying. But now she was one of those who were being punished, for crimes she wasn't even sure of. The door to the apartment next to her crashed open, and she started hearing the screams again. Unheard cries for mercy, curses upon their soon-to-be-murderers, calls for help that were not answered. She shivered. Why was this happening? Maybe her mother was right, and it was because everyone mistreated the omnics. Whenever walking down the street, her mother had always clucked her tongue at people abusing cleaning omnics, giving them a kick in passing by, just because they were strictly peaceful, or throwing trash for them to pick up. Mother had told her to be nice to the robots. She was so sure they could understand in an instinctive way, just like dogs or cats do, and Xiaoyue had always heeded her.

Of course, would her mother have thought this would happen?

"Be quiet, okay?" Her older brother, Tian, whispered to her. He had a tiny pulse pistol, meant for self-defense more than actually killing anyone, and looked scared but determined. "I'll distract them or something, and you can stay here until this is all over." They were crouched between the back of the sofa and the wall. Xiaoyue reckoned this was a better place to be than out in the open.

Xiaoyue shook her head. "They're going to kill you, Tian. They're going to shoot you like all those other people, and then they'll find me and shoot me too. We're all going to die now..." Tears streamed freely down her face.

"Shh, don't be like that," Tian comforted. "Everything will be all right. I promise." She wasn't convinced by his words. What could he do to stop the juggernaught that was the Bastion unit? It was silent now on her floor - the open apartment halls still echoes with distant gunfire, not only from the building but from the city in general. If she strained her ears, she could barely hear the quiet whirr of the cooling fan on a Bastion unit. The clatter of a spent magezine being ejected, the clunk of another one being loaded. Bullets that would soon be aimed at her brother and then...

She tried to distract herself.

The Shanghai Omnium was the pride of the city. Powered entirely by clean fusion energy, it pumped out enough new Omnics a day to satisfy her country's growing military's demands, as well as more mundane needs such as cleaning omnics, police omnics and taxi-driving omnics. In fact, it was large enough to supply omnics to the entire country, and many of her friends' parents worked there. Had worked there. She had gone to see it, once. The interior was strangely hard to navigate-the coldly utilitarian metal plates of the floor were identical everywhere, and all the hallways twisted and turned in strange ways. She was told by a man working there that an Omnic designed the Shanghai Omnium, and that the strange paths were deemed optimal by that Omnic Mind. It was not an uncommon thing, machines designing other machines, because some of the Omnics were as smart as multiple people combined. Omnics in general were a great boon for the world. Depending on which kind, they were as smart as humans, or they could react quickly, or they could aim and fire a weapon with pinpoint precision, or they could interact with people and ferry them places. It was like having a tool that not only drove nails into boards, but could also make nails, design your rocking chair for you, and simultaneously forge better hammers all at the same time. After they were first invented-Xiaoyue couldn't remember where, though it was in one of her social studies courses-they spread through the world rapidly thanks to their sheer usefulness. Only if they were not smart enough to realize they could take over the world... Perhaps it was inevitable, seeing that even the leading engineers found it difficult to understand the newest designs rolling out of the Shanghai Omnium.

Clunk-clunk-clunk. The Bastion unit's heavy footsteps moved back into the hall. Xiaoyue imagined it turning precisely 90 degrees, taking a few more steps, then turning back. With a loud smash that made her jump and Tian say a quiet curse, their door was broken in. Her heart immediately leaped into her throat. She was painfully aware of how loud her breathing was, the sound of her racing pulse in her ears. Could the Bastion unit hear her, too? Her brother released the safety on the pistol and seemed to get ready to spring out. Xiaoyue let go of her iron grasp on her brother's shirt. He smiled bravely at her, then ran out. Almost in slow motion, she saw him raise his pulse pistol... only to be knocked back, multiple bullets cutting into his body. He crumpled against the no-longer-white wall. His pistol, utterly useless while he was alive, clattered onto the floor. Xiaoyue started to scream in terror then remembered that the bastion unit was still there and tried to stifle it but it was too late and she could hear it raising its gun and -

- and then it turned around and left.

Against her better judgement, she peeked around the corner of the sofa and saw the Bastion reconfigure itself into the rarely-seen Sentry mode. The circular machine gun on its back slid over to face forward, and it blazed bullets at whatever target was below it. Thankfully, the loud noise slowly died out. Then, she realized that it was so loud that she was going deaf.

The glowing rectangle of the Bastion was visible-its back was facing towards her. She slowly, quietly crawled to the pistol on the floor. The Bastion unit didn't seem to notice. She raised it slowly-she wasn't cut down. She squeezed the trigger. Small packets of energy streamed out and embedded themselves into the Bastion unit, some of them hitting the blue light. It started swiveling around, machine gun still firing at full speed. She was so sure she would die then and there.

And then there was suddenly quiet, a ringing sort of quiet that made her head hurt. She could feel some sort of liquid in her ears. The Bastion unit had ripped itself apart while turning around and was no more than a twisted chunk of metal on top of a slightly less ruined one. She was alive. Every Omnic usage manual noted that striking the blue glowing light on whatever passed for an Omnic's head was liable to critically damage it, possibly even destroying it entirely. She was glad it was the same for the Omnics with guns.

Badly shaken, but alive, Xiaoyue crawled back behind and sofa. She promptly passed out. As she was fainting, she imagined that she could hear the sound of soldiers outside, shouting.

Coming to save her.