Diamonds Are a Robot's Best Friend

A "My Life as a Teenage Robot" Fanfic

Chapter Ten – Bad Moon Rising


Sirens wailed, and red lights flashed overhead.  Workers scrambled to thick concrete bunkers in the walls of the mineshaft.  The massive black-and-yellow striped doors started to slide together.  That was when one of the fifty-gallon barrels sitting at the side of the tunnel did something unusual.  It sprouted four spindly silver-green legs, stood up, and jumped through the blast doors, just before they slammed closed.

The barrel bounced a few times, and with a gurgling schlorrrp, sloughed into a silver-green ball of taffy.  It stretched and oozed into humanoid form a few moments later.  Drew took a few tentative steps, trying to take in his surroundings.  Now where the heck is that red-headed twit – then he saw the towering rocket ship, lit up with floodlights.  Holy schnikey!

"HELP!" shouted a frantic voice.  "Come on, Jenny!  Somebody!  Anybody!"

That was Brad's voice!  It rose from a deep concrete pit, in the direction of the rocket.  He sprinted to the edge of the pit and peeked over – and there was Brad, at the bottom.  "What are you doing down there, you nimrod?!?"

Brad's head snapped up, and a huge grin of relief broke out on his face.  "DREW!  Where the heck have you been?!?  Get me out of here!!!  Hurry!!!"

Drew jumped down, landing with a thud a few feet away from Brad.  He laughed, and straightened out the lapels of Brad's tuxedo.  "Having some problems, are we, double-oh-doofus?"

"Forty-five seconds and counting," boomed a deep voice from a loudspeaker.

"Forty-five seconds until what?" asked Drew.

Brad twisted his face in frustration.  He just pointed straight up, to the giant hissing rocket nozzle.

Drew's face nearly fell to his knees.  "Oh," he weakly croaked.

"C'mon, c'mon, break these chains!  Use some of that new and improved robo-muscle!"

"Better idea," Drew said, with newfound urgency.  He grabbed a strand of chain in each hand, which immediately started to flow into a silver-green sludge.  Silver tendrils spread along the chain links, and the nanobots started to consume Brad's metal bonds.

"Where were you – how did you get here?!?" shouted Brad.

"I stowed away in the gas tank of the helicopter.  Yes, it was as nasty as it sounds."  The chains dissolved through, and fell to the concrete floor.  "Oh man, oh man, oh man, oh man …."

Brad looked around the cavern for a means of escape, but every door and window he could see was sealed shut behind thick metal shielding.  "Oh, for the love of – we're locked in here!  We're toast!"

The vibrations from the Moonsword started to increase, and the whining shriek of the turbo-pumps grew loud enough to become uncomfortable.  Jets of white vapor started to pour from the nozzles.  "Thirty seconds and counting," boomed the PA system.

Brad covered his ears, trying to think.  "Look, the safest place to be is probably up there.  On board this rocket!"

"Sure, that makes a ton of sense!" shouted Drew, rolling his eyes.  "Let's go!  Hop on my back, like you did last night in the alleyway!"  Brad wrapped his arms around Drew's neck, while Drew knelt down into a deep crouch …

And jumped as high as he could, grabbing onto a tail fin jutting out from the Moonsword.  He clumsily scrambled onto the top of the fin, and leapt again, flailing his arms to catch the lowest steel arm stretching out from the launch tower.  Brad held on for dear life, as they swung and leapt up the steel arms, climbing them like the rungs of a giant ladder.  They were twelve stories in the air now, with only one arm to go, the one leading to the crew compartment.

"Fifteen seconds.  Terminal count commencing.  All systems to internal power."

With a sharp crack, the steel arms started to rotate away from the body of the Moonsword, which shuddered and rumbled like a dragon coming to life.  Drew sprang to his feet and wildly sprinted along the three-foot wide arm, carrying his well-dressed passenger, and flung himself towards an access hatch on the side of the rocket … which he missed.

But he did grab onto a pipe running down the side of the fuselage.  Drew and Brad dangled precariously from the side of the Moonsword, one hundred fifty feet in the air.  "Ten seconds!  Nine … eight …"

Drew frantically climbed the pipe towards the access hatch.  "Just trust me, Drew.  Nothing's going to happen, Drew.  We're not going to get in any trouble, Drew."

Brad reached out and found a handle.  "Yeah, yeah, so sue me."

"… Four … ignition sequence start … three … two …"

Brad swung the hatch open, and slid his body though the narrow door into an equipment section of the ship.  The giant rocket engines ignited, sending four sharp punches thundering through the body of the Moonsword.  Drew fought to maintain his grip as the rocket shook like a bucking bronco.  With a motivated surge of effort, Drew flowed himself inside the rocket, and closed the hatch behind him.

It was dark and cramped, and it felt like riding in a washing machine.  "Jenny's above us somewhere!" shouted Brad.  "We've got to get that necklace off of her.  If we can save her, then she can save us!"  They braced themselves against the vibrations, and started climbing up the equipment tunnel.

With a billowing plume of exhaust, and a deafening roar, the Moonsword rose out of its launch silo on four pillars of shrieking flame.  Shock waves rocked the countryside as the mammoth rocket climbed into the night sky, faster and faster, shooting through a layer of clouds with the brilliance of a miniature sun.


Maximillian Marquis sank back in his chair, and allowed himself to simply enjoy the moment.  The thick padding helped cushion against the vibration and acceleration generated by the Moonsword's booster stage.  He gazed at the semicircle of human specialists and robots sitting attentively at their stations – his loyal crew – as they tended to their duties and monitored critical systems.  Through the windows, against the inky black sky, the horizon took on a curved appearance, as the rocket gained altitude.

"Altitude forty-one miles, speed is Mach 8.  Everything normal so far," reported the pilot.  Rojack sat emotionless, unfazed as usual, but he kept one eye on XJ-9, as if he didn't fully trust the mind control.  But Jenny sat rigidly at her station, staring at her monitors.  Marquis wasn't concerned, and besides, she wouldn't be needed until they actually arrived at their firing location.

Marquis thought he heard a sharp clang from the aft portion of the crew compartment.  It might have been launch vibrations – but a flight engineer shouted back at him, over the noise and shaking, as an alarm flashed on his console.  "Mister Marquis, we have intruders on board!"


The hatch slammed against the back wall – which was now actually the floor – and Brad and Drew dragged themselves into the crew cabin of the Moonsword.  Brad pulled himself to his feet, straining against the acceleration, his teeth chattering from the intense shaking.  Drew flowed himself up a bit easier, but still felt the need to take a breather.

"Okay – suggestion.  We lie low back here until the engines shut off!"

Brad's eyeballs sunk back into his sockets.  "I have … ugh … no problem with that!"

Suddenly one of Marquis' droids poked its head out, two bulkheads up, and spotted them through a doorway.  "Intruders located," it announced in a synthetic voice.  Buzzing alarms began sounding through the length of the cabin.

"Oh, crud," groaned Brad.

"No rest for the wicked," shouted Drew, as the droid dropped down on top of him.  It tried to wrestle Drew to the floor.  But between the buffeting of the rocket, and Drew's fluid body, it proved difficult to hold onto him.  It lunged at Drew again, and missed awkwardly, falling on the floor next to the still-open hatch.  Drew shoved the droid's head into the hatch and slammed the door shut – shredding its head off with a crunch.

"They know we're here," grunted Brad, "we … might as well go for it!  Let's find Jenny!"

Drew wrapped an arm around Brad, and started shimmying his way up the corridor.  It was a bit disorienting, since floors were walls and walls were floors, but they just kept climbing up, pursued by a few more of Marquis' droids.  Finally they came to the top of the Moonsword … the bridge.

Brad collapsed on the floor, feeling triple his body weight.  Marquis managed to turn his head to see what was causing the disturbance, and saw a tuxedo-clad teenager flattened against a bulkhead, next to a pliant, silver-green android.

"YOU!" he screamed, his eyes mixed with equal parts fury and disbelief.  Strapped into their flight seats, fighting the G-forces, none of his crew was in a position to go after them.

Brad saw the back of a glittering, diamond-painted robot head.  "There's Jenny!"

Drew lunged upward, climbing towards Jenny's chair.  Jenny sat ramrod-straight, paying perfect attention to her instruments, just as she had been commanded to do.  Drew stretched an arm forward, towards the back of her neck …

But he was brutally slammed against the wall as Rojack lunged out of his seat.  He landed a pair of punches to Drew's midsection, kneading him like a giant ball of dough.  Drew pushed back and the two robots clattered off the wall, crashing backwards.  They slammed into a control board and destroyed a monitor screen, filling the interior of the cabin with the sound of shattering glass and minor alarms.

Rojack grinned, and reared back his left arm, which crackled with paralyzing energy.  Drew was getting mighty sick of that arm.  But as Rojack swung, the rocket shuddered briefly, and he lost his footing.  He fell face first onto the control board.  Drew wrapped a few coils of silver-green around Rojack's arm and pinned it against his chest.  Rojack shuddered wildly, suffering from his very own paralyzing beam.

Marquis growled, and turned to Jenny.  "XJ-9!  Eliminate that android nuisance!"

Jenny jumped from her seat and dropped down, her eyes glowing a frosty blue.  Drew looked up just in time to see her slam down on top of him.  She grabbed him by the arm and flung him clear across the cabin, smashing him into the wall on the opposite side.  He stumbled to his feet in a state of near shock.  Jenny glared menacingly, and started marching towards him.  With a flick of her wrists, three long, sharp blades deployed from each hand.

"Jenny!  What are you doing?" he shouted.  "It's me!  Drew!  Remember?  Mr. Silver Pizza Dough?  I'm trying to help!"

"Eliminate him, XJ-9!" shouted Marquis, rapidly losing his patience.

Jenny halted her approach.  "D-D-Drew?" she mumbled, in a shaking voice.

Marquis grabbed the diamond on his walking-stick, and gave it another twist.  A flash of blue flared in Jenny's eyes.  Then she lunged at Drew with arms and blades swinging.  He flowed himself into a surreal shape, desperately trying to avoid her attack, and grabbed her by the wrists, trying to hold her off.

All of this was happening just a few feet to the left of the pilot, who was nervously trying to focus on flying the rocket.  "Coming up on booster separation!  Altitude one hundred and eight miles!"

Brad got an idea.  "The walking-stick …"  He turned on his stomach, and started crawling towards Marquis' chair.  "Drew, hang on!  And remember, Jenny's being controlled!  Don't hurt her!"

Jenny shoved Drew against a console with a loud thud.  She wrapped a fist around Drew's metallic neck, and started slamming his head into the control panel, shattering dials and video screens, and gouging out a large dent.

"I'll try … clang … to take it … clang … easy … clang … on her," Drew babbled.

Jenny pulled her arm back, and converted it into a giant mallet.  She raised it over her head, preparing to deliver a crushing blow … but Drew lunged from the control panel, using her own momentum against her.  Drew and Jenny tumbled across the cabin, pinballing off of chairs and bulkheads – Jenny trying to deploy her weapons, Drew trying to wrap her up and slow her down.  Finally, Jenny flung out her arms, breaking free from Drew's grip and sending him flying against the hull …

And splattering against a large, striped door labeled Emergency Exit.

Brad grunted and crawled closer to Marquis, whose chair was now only a few feet away.

Jenny flew across the cabin with a large electrical prod deployed from her arm.  She jabbed it into Drew's back, filling his body with surges of high voltage, causing his arms and legs to flail about like silver-green spaghetti.  Then she braced herself, reached for the emergency handle, and pulled it.

The door blasted off its hinges into space, and a deafening hurricane-force wind roared out of the cabin with hideous force.  The crew of the Moonsword screamed in fear as emergency klaxons shrieked, and bulkheads groaned from the strain.  Loose debris shot out into the vacuum, flying into Drew's face as he clamped his hands into the edges of the door.

Jenny prepared to deliver another high voltage shock …

Brad looked around frantically, and found a fire extinguisher strapped to the side of Marquis' command chair.  Straining against the gravity and loss of oxygen, he yanked it free, and swung it towards the walking-stick.  The extinguisher hit Marquis right in the knuckles.  He howled in pain, and lost his grip on the walking-stick that operated Jenny's mind-control.

"NOOOO!!!" shouted Marquis.

The air was still screaming out of the ship, and the force of the wind sucked the cane towards the emergency exit.  Drew reached out with his arm, and grabbed the cane out of mid-air …

Which was all the diversion that Jenny needed.  She jabbed Drew again with her electrical prod, and he lost his remaining grip on the doorway.  He plummeted out the door and into outer space, watching Jenny's sparkling diamond form climb away from him.  The body of the Moonsword shrieked past, and he was about to plunge into the inferno of the engines' fiery exhaust … unless … one chance …

Jenny stepped back and closed an emergency bulkhead, to the relief of the crew.  The wind died down, and the air pressure started to rebuild.  But Marquis was still in an agitated state.  "The walking-stick … if he figures out how to operate the controls … he could still deactivate the mind-control necklace!"

A loud clang sounded through the hull of the Moonsword.  Marquis turned to his most faithful, most loyal employee.  "Rojack!!!"


Drew's arms were wrapped around one of the booster's tail fins.  He hung on desperately, thirty feet away from a column of fire longer than two football fields.  He still held onto the diamond-topped walking-stick, more by instinct than anything.  The noise, the flames, the shuddering, and the vibrations made it difficult to focus on anything other than the gut-wrenching terror that filled his android brain right now.

"Okay … okay … if I can turn this thing off … Jenny will get back to normal."  Marquis had just twisted the diamond.  But it wasn't that simple, apparently.  Drew couldn't get the diamond to budge.

He felt a new vibration in the fuselage of the rocket, clanking down from above.  Drew looked up …

Rojack was climbing down towards him, on all fours, with powerful clamps deployed from his hands and feet to grasp the fuselage.  He had that same vicious, cocky grin that he always wore – it seemed to say I'm really going to enjoy hurting you.

Drew fiddled with the diamond capstone, pushing and pulling it, but he still couldn't get it to twist.  Rojack got closer and closer.  He raised his right hand, and deployed the diamond-tipped boomerang.  He took aim, and got ready to let it fly …

Rojack wobbled and fell forward as the rocket lurched.  The vibrations died away, and Drew suddenly realized that it had become very, very quiet.  The four massive rocket engines had shut down, and the Moonsword was simply coasting along in space.

Twelve loud cracks sounded around the midsection of the rocket, and the entire lower half, the booster section, dropped away.  Retro-rockets fired, pushing the now-empty booster away from the Moonsword.  Then the Moonsword's main engines flamed to life, and it accelerated on its way towards the moon.  It shrank into a dazzling white dot, like a diamond, barely distinguishable from the millions of stars in the perfectly black sky.

Drew and Rojack watched the Moonsword fly off, stunned, then finally turned to face each other.  Drew laughed awkwardly.  "Ah, heh-heh … you know … I'll bet you wish you had a rocket engine stuck in the middle of your back right now.  Because I sure wish I did!"

The continent of North America spun in slow circles around their heads, as the empty booster tumbled lazily through space.  Rojack, ever silent, seemed to summon a new wave of rage and hatred.  He took his boomerang, and flung it towards the tailfin that Drew was clinging onto.  It sliced it off neatly, and Drew started to drift away from the rocket, into the void …

But the tailfin gave Drew something to push against.  He lunged off in a weightless jump, and clattered back clumsily against the fuselage of the booster.  He grew short claw-hooks from his feet to hold on, and turned his attention back to the walking-stick.

"Come on, come on … turn already … this is worse than a bottle of aspirin!  Come ON, dangit!"  There must have been some trick to it, or some magic amount of pressure to use.

Rojack lumbered towards him, eager to complete his master's orders even now.  He swung through space with a vicious punch.  Drew folded himself over backwards to avoid it.  Rojack grabbed onto the walking-stick, and tried to pull it out of Drew's grip.  But Drew wasn't letting go.  If there was still any way to save Jen and Brad with this thing …

The two robots lunged and flipped awkwardly, trying to orient themselves in zero gravity without losing their grip on the booster's surface.  Neither of them would release their grip on the diamond-capped walking stick.  Rojack tried to wrestle it away from Drew with brute strength.  Drew tried to snatch it away with speed and agility.  Finally, Rojack pulled Drew loose from his grip, and slammed him back savagely into the fuselage.  Pinning him down, he drew back his left hand, which started to crackle with intense paralyzing energy.

Drew struggled to escape from Rojack's grip.  He grew weary and hot from the effort, holding off the monster's attack, but still clung desperately to the walking-stick.  Wait a minute – why am I getting so hot?  I'm an android.  I don't sweat anymore …

They were both distracted as a small glowing blob shot past them.  They glanced up and saw another one, slightly larger this time.  It was a shard of metal – it was a piece of the booster.  The front end of the booster section was beginning to glow a dull red.

They were re-entering the atmosphere.

Dancing streams of pink and green plasma hissed and screeched around them, as they started to descend into thicker layers of air.  A white-hot shock wave wrapped itself around the booster section.  Chunks of metal skin peeled away in the heat, raining back on Rojack and Drew like a shower of lava droplets.  They could feel the structure of the booster starting to buckle and twist beneath them.

Internal alarms began to go off in Drew's android brain.  The temperature was already up into the hundreds of degrees.

It would soon be in the thousands.


Continued in Chapter Eleven