WX-78's systems sprang to life. Its mechanical eyelids slowly opened to see the swaying roof of a forest. In panic and drowsiness, the robot hastily lifted itself from the ground and tried to feel its torso for the fatal wound it had received prior to waking up. It stumbled and fell by the feet of a large, looming tree. The shade was much colder here, and WX-78 began to wonder if it had been "out" for much longer than a night. Shifting, it personally scanned its vital systems to find not a single problem. Not even the old starvation alert hung on the dashboard that was WX-78's mind, and the automaton felt relief and confusion cloud its thoughts, but only for an instant. Then, seeing past itself, it gazed into the forest that seemingly never ended. It wasn't that it stretched forever, or as far as WX could see, but it was just so... "DARK." The automaton's voice echoed through the undergrowth and seemed to be consumed by the shadows of the forest, for it didn't travel far at all. Suddenly WX-78 felt uneasy. It stood, slouched, and began to its left in search of a clearing. WX trudged cautiously through the dancing flecks of light that filtered through the tree tops. The forest must have been ancient, mushrooms poked out of every crevice and moss hung from most of the tree trunks. Some of the smaller plants were entirely new to WX-78, and it took its time to analyze each and every one it could get close enough to. Although it sounds like WX has its own personal widget for discovering living things fully without proper research, it was really just blurting out blunt observations. "IT SEEMS POISONOUS," or "I WAS NEVER PROGRAMMED TO RECOGNIZE THIS COLOR."
Nonetheless, it felt a sense of pride in its discoveries that fed its ever-growing ego. This calmed the robot and made it feel fearless, and suddenly the open world didn't seem so far away. That is, until something from the shade grasped the automaton's leg and earned a now habitual and familiar yelp from it. WX-78 thrashed, but the effort was useless. There was nothing there. It could have sworn it felt just fine earlier, it couldn't be going insane already. WX-78 looked up and around, and to its dismay, could not remember the direction it was heading in. What's almost worse, it could not remember the direction it had been "grabbed" from. If the robot was to continue in one direction, there were five right answers. Three may lead WX-78 backwards, and one, in the direction of the grabby hands. It decided a better idea would be to just climb a tree and see the world from the open air.
Hesitantly placing a hand on the nearest tree trunk, the robot recoiled immediately. It was damp; they probably all were. If WX-78 were to scale the tree in success, it would still have to find a way to sort through the leaves at the top, which were most likely wet. Even then, if it didn't seem like much, grabbing ahold of those branches would shake the leaves and send a shower of stale rain water upon the automaton. Not very healthy. In the middle of pondering the worse, the robot, despite being a walking shell of metal, felt breathing on the back of its neck. It spun around and lashed out with a fist, only to be greeted with nothing but a distant giggle. "IDENTIFY YOURSELF." It shouted, frantically searching for a rock or a stick.
The laughter was distant, and WX-78 felt it wasn't worth following. What good could that bring? If it truly was a human, why would WX-78 want to be around them? Even if their presence was challenging and lulled the robot's attention closer, WX preferred sticking to any safer route. It picked the opposite direction of the noise and began to walk. The air became cold and heavy, and the sunlight dotting the ground grew dim. Spotlights danced weakly through the forest's roof, threatening to dissipate at any given moment. The presence of the human became stronger, as if it were standing right behind the automaton, as well as all around it. As if it were omnipresent.
"I was only messing with you." A familiar feminine voice whispered from above, and WX-78 looked up to see glinting eyes in the tree branches. "YOUR FORM IS UNCLEAR. APPROACH THE LIGHT OR BE TERMINATED." It barked, and the eyes narrowed. The robot could feel her smiling. "You're unarmed?" She reminded it. "You couldn't hurt me if you wanted to." She earned an arrogant huff as the robot glared up at her. "YOU CAN NOT PROVE THAT STATEMENT." It took a step back, refusing to look away from her predator-like aura. If she was a threat, WX-78 would just flee. It doubted she had any ranged weapons. "I'll just take a closer look." She said, and the robot whirled around to face the young woman standing now behind him with her arms behind her back. WX-78 jumped away, shrieking. Her warm smile remained, but her eyes showed concern now as they jabbed at the automaton. "You have to remember me, hon. We just met last night."
And she was right, in the middle of her speech WX-78 recalled the tall, mysterious woman from... last night? I WAS OFFLINE FOR ONE NIGHT? THAT IS ALL? The robot clenched its fists, still moving away from her. She scoffed at its body language. "Really dear, I wouldn't go through the trouble of bringing you back and generating a new world for you just to stab you in the back here!" She gracefully floated through the dark like a ghost, approaching WX-78. Her dress seemed to bleed into the ground by her feet, twisting around her body like a coiled snake. Her gloved hands now held each other before her black, lipstick-stained smile. The rose in her hair seemed to be the only thing in the forest glowing now, as if it were a beacon and sucked the light from day. "You're staying here." She said coldly. "It's the only way we can stay in touch twenty-four-seven." Receiving nothing but silence and the occasional ticking signifying the robot's struggle to think rationally, she continued. "I can't hurt you during the day. I mean, I won't... I could." WX-78's optical sensors reflected the dying light splitting the tree tops, and eyed her nervously. She lowered her hands to her sides and sighed. "I'll walk with you in the afternoon. It's noon right now, if you haven't noticed," she frowned. "But come night, you're on your own. I told you last night, I have a job to do. I lose myself, I'm dangerous in the dark."
The robot gave her a puzzled and disgusted look. She blinked, then gasped. "That's not an innuendo!" She snapped. "I'll literally kill you!" Grabbing ahold of itself, WX-78 spoke over her. "IDENTIFY YOURSELF." This again? She chuckled. "You can call me Charlie." The response was too plain, and the robot wanted more. "WHERE DID YOU COME FROM?" She seemed to perk up for a moment, and her eyes fluttered. "Oh!" She grinned in delight like a school girl. "Well I was born in California, around the early 20th century. That's where I met William! Goodness, what handsome man, I-" The robot snorted in frustration. "WHAT PART OF THIS WORLD DO YOU ORIGINATE FROM?" Her smile fell crooked. "Ah... well," Charlie tapped the ground with the front of her shining black high heels. "er... The Codex Umbra... I suppose." The shine in WX-78's "eyes" forced her to exhale sharply. Why'd I say that? She mentally prepared herself for a wave of questions. "CONTINUE. WHAT IS THIS COW DECKS UMBRELLA?" Her eyes became half-lidded and she grunted. "Codex. Umbra." She hissed. "It's a book filled with dark magic. Well, that's what William said, before it turned out to be just a big shadowy hand that dragged us both down to hell!" She finished her statement, driving her fist into the palm of her other hand in fury. Her eyes, for an instant, glowed with betrayal and anger. WX-78's "graceful ghost" seemed to be a vengeful spirit.
"YOU ARE CONFUSING ME, MEAT WORM. STOP YELLING AND SPEAK CLEARLY." She shot the robot a glare that breathed hellfire. "Look, I've said too much. It's none of your business what happened to us! You just need to do as I say, and none of it will matter once you're out of here." WX-78 crossed its arms, the sound of scraping metal echoing around them. Who was she to tell it what to do? It was doing just fine on its own... until it died, but that's beside the point. "I DEMAND MORE INFORMATION." Charlie's rose seemed to wither with impatience. "Here's some info- Your ass is gonna get moving and you're gonna build a shelter or I'll drag the sun down myself right now!" Shadowy tendrils burst from the earth and her arm swiped through the air as she exclaimed, the dark ropes crashing into a nearby tree and sending it flying into another. The robot scrambled up against the tree behind it in shock. "T-THIS IS AN ACCEPTABLE AMMOUNT OF INFORMATION." It stammered.
Unfortunately, WX-78 preferred to travel and not stay in one place for too long. Because of this, it didn't know where to start. The machinery inside the robot whirred in a panic, while it began searching the ground for raw materials. Charlie smirked, and the tendrils slithered back into the ground. Her hand dropped to her hip and she waltzed over to the robot's side. While startled, the automaton was clearly infuriated. Surely her position as "alpha" wouldn't last for more than ten minutes, but she had more tricks up her sleeve. She has Maxwell to thank for that. She did feel for the robot, though. It's not WX's fault that it's stubborn, careless, rude, loud, hateful, arrogant, ignorant, judgmental, annoying... The list goes on and on. Or maybe it was. But as far as she knows, all a robot knows is programmed into it by someone else. And whoever programmed WX-78 was a damn nut.
"We don't have all day, hon." She chirped. "In fact, I'd say there's only an hour of daylight left." The robot looked up at her, its face full of anger and fear, with a hint of helplessness. She laughed, kneeling down to meet its gaze at eye-level. "Sticks and grass, dear. That's all you need tonight. Go get some and meet me back here if you have to wander away." Her hand brushed over the robots reassuringly, before she stepped away and leaned back into the darker shadows that the forest cast over them. WX-78 flinched at her touch and squirmed in disgust, standing up. "MEAT BAG." It spat under its breath. "I heard that."
Of course Charlie wouldn't let WX-78 out of her sight, anything could happen to the poor thing. She, being omnipresent at her own will, had already mapped out the entire universe around them. WX-78 was the only one with her, and the forest never ended. She mentally placed a marker where she was supposed to be, waiting, and vanished into the dark to stalk the automaton. As she watched the robot struggle to find any dry and dead grass, she sighed. The dead stuff doesn't just grow out of the ground anymore, stupid. While most trees seemed pretty generic and identical, some bore fruit and others birch nuts and pods. She swam up to the heavens above the robot's head, where she knocked a pod to the ground by its feet. WX-78 leapt back, as the pod split in half and its contents spilled. A bundle of dry, dead, and yellow grass rolled onto the dirt and unfurled itself slowly. Say it. It's a grass pod. Pretty cheesy, huh? I came up with it myself. Took a while to convince Will to use it. Charlie thought to herself, smiling from the shade of the tree tops.
"IT IS A GRASS POD." The robot echoed, observing the shell and grass tuft in each hand. "HOW CLICHÉ." Although she had just admitted it herself, she still felt a pang of hurt from hearing it come out of the robot's mouth. The robot looked up and she squeaked in surprise, quickly disappearing. It saw the pods in the tree and concluded that this was its new method of gathering materials. Although WX-78 had, technically, died... it still remembered how to refine certain materials. WX twisted the grass into a long, thin, rope and feebly attempted to lasso another pod down. The rope shot about two feet into the air before slowly falling to the ground. A mechanical noise escaped the robot's mouth, one that Charlie could only assume was a sigh of defeat. Fine. Lazy pile of junk. Another pod fell mysteriously to the ground, but not before hitting the automaton over the head. WX-78 yelped, looking up to see nothing. It angrily kicked the pod, allowing it to burst into another bundle of grass. "THIS WILL SUIT MY NEEDS." It concluded, gathering the grass and heading back in the direction of Charlie.
"What took you so long?" She quipped, looking off into the distance as the robot approached her with heavy footsteps. "YOU SAID I HAD AN HOUR. OF COURSE, I STAYED FAR AWAY FROM YOU FOR AS LONG AS POSSIBLE." She rolled her eyes, gesturing for WX-78 to come closer and give her the materials. The robot hesitantly handed her the grass from the pods, then the sticks it had found digging through the dirt on its way back.
"When I said sticks, I meant branches. These are too small." WX-78 leaned against a tree. "I DID NOT NEED A LARGE SHELTER ANYWAYS. THAT IS WHY YOU ARE INFERIOR TO ME, FLESHLING." Charlie shot him a challenging glare, before dropping the materials onto the ground. "I'll be right back. Don't tell Max I did this for you." WX-78 growled to itself as she sunk into the earth, as if it were tar.
Charlie crawled out from the shade of a tree like The Grudge, observing the young woman strolling through the woods by her camp. She hummed to herself, occasionally stopping to burn down a tree or two. A skinny, bearded man in his thirties tagged along behind her, warning her to be careful, telling her to stop before they both got hurt while he eyed their life-giving amulets. Nice hair, loser. She thought to herself as she slinked into the shadows of dusk by their feet. "Wilson, come on! You know this is my thing. Wouldn't want me going insane again, you remember what happened the last time you took my lighter away from me." Disgruntled, the man scratched his head nervously. "Yeah, we died yesterday. That doesn't make it okay to-" She interrupted him, turning to face him and letting her guard down for the approaching grue. "In fact, if you want to let me stay out late tonight, I might have a naughty little surprise for you when we get back to camp~!" Wilson coughed into his hand, avoiding her gaze. Get a room, guh. Charlie summoned a tendril by Willow's foot, which traveled up the back of her leg to snatch the lighter hanging off of her skirt. Charlie, along with the lighter, disappeared into the ground. Willow sniggered, lowering her hand to grab her lighter. She patted her hip, finding nothing. "Wha-?" She shot Wilson a glare and slapped him. "Again?!" She screamed. "Give it back!"
WX-78 sat by the trunk of the tree, poking at the dirt like a distracted child at their first soccer practice. Charlie shot up from the ground, the lighter in her hands. "WHERE-" She shushed the robot, placing it into its hands. "Again," she looked behind her. "Don't tell Maxwell." She giggled into her gloved hand, floating away. "If you can't build a shelter- and lord knows you can't start a fire yourself (I certainly can't) - then you'll have to start one with this." WX-78 carefully observed the lighter. "I WAS PERFECTLY CAPABLE, YOU ARE ONLY MAKING THIS EASIER FOR ME." Charlie mouthed the automaton's words mockingly, a shadowy hand violently shooting up from the ground to act as a sarcastic hand puppet as the robot spoke. The robot froze in horror, dropping the lighter. "You're no fun!" She squawked, the hand dissipating into thin air.
Kicking the grass and sticks to the robot's side, she walked up to it. "Well? What are ya waitin' for?" WX scrambled for the lighter, pushing the scraps far in front of it before kneeling over them. Hovering over WX-78, Charlie watched in disappointment as the robot struggled to use the lighter. Feeling her looming overhead, it threw the lighter across the floor. "IT IS BROKEN." WX spat, crossing its arms and sitting back against the tree. "What are you, five?" She muttered. "...TWO." This made her chuckle, and she picked the lighter up off of the ground. "Do I have to baby you? Just press your thumb down here." She pointed to the cam on the lighter and handed it back to WX-78. "I KNEW THAT. IT WAS BROKEN FOR A FEW SECONDS." It said, earning a lengthy sigh. "I-IT WAS! IT FIXED ITSELF WHEN I THREW IT." Charlie looked away. "Mhm," she mumbled.
Quickly, and without any warning, the light of a fire rocketed into the air, sending Charlie flying backwards. "Hey!" She yelled, clutching her chest in surprise. "IS THIS NOT WHAT YOU WANTED?" The robot asked, a smug grin hiding behind the light of the fire. "A little warning next time! That really hurt." She tucked her hair back into place, moving further from the burning glow. "IS THIS HUMAN SARCASM?" WX-78 asked, eyes half-lidded as it scooted back against the tree. "I'm the darkness you idiot!" She roared. "Light hurts me! I'm like oil in water; we can't touch!" The robot waved her off. "I CAN RELATE TO THIS, I AM ALSO MOSTLY OIL." Charlie bit her lip and crossed her arms. Realizing her makeup was beginning to fade, she groaned. "Ooh...," she fumbled in the dark. "I'm starting to look like that mime." As the sun finally sank into the horizon, she exhaled slowly. "See you in the morning, poopfart." She joked before fading into the heavy darkness that suddenly spilled into the forest. "YOU ARE THE POOP FART!" The robot retorted, but was met with chilling silence.