A new day bloomed in the shallow Out Skirts of the Waste Lands.
The sunlight stabbed through the musky clouds, and warm breezes filled the damp gray air. Out Skirts was the fine line between the land of junk and where growth finally kicked in, it having an unusual combination of rusted metal among sweet clumps of grass, shrubs and orange wild flowers. A large mound of debris here and there, but it was rather a beautiful place. Well, a rotting carcass would be beautiful compared to the Waste Lands.
In Out Skirts, many have adapted to living there and they're many towns and small villages scattered along the quiet land, before it transformed into dense forest.
One town called Autumn was waking to the day. The houses were nothing much, having a rusted old appearance, but had a strong sturdy feel to them. They were tall and twisted in shape, many to a family and one small house to many, and only about five of the quirky structures filling the town, in the center a huge maple tree. To match the name and leaves, the houses were painted mostly reds and brandy oranges, or not needing to because of such rich rust.
A small girl ran over to the roots of the arching old tree, to a small wildflower which a Monarch butterfly had chosen as a perch and snack. The girl's flowing white and pink dress rippled along with her, her bright orange hair sliding over her freckled face and piercing blue eyes.
With a high pitched giggle she slowed to a stop and squatted down to the flower, the butterfly paying no attention to its' fan. The odd branches seemed to reach down to her with every small breeze, as if wanting a precious hug from the child. Of course, it barely got one. Her breath made the flower sway until the Monarch's oversized body made it bend, and took off. Another laugh echoed through the village as the girl jumped to her feet and took chase. She stumbled past her own home, a woman standing under the small shade of a splotchy balcony.
"Don't go too far, Lillyian!" she called, rubbing her swollen belly gently.
She was a gorgeous woman, her apple cheeks very rosy and full of freckles like her daughter and pale green eyes. She wore a blue tank top with a withered white garden patterned shawl around her arms, flowing in the breeze. She breathed in.
Peace.
To make the moment, a middle aged man stepped out from the house, his footsteps leaving squeaks behind him. He smiled at the woman, leaning over and stroking her pale forehead. She hung an arm around his shoulder, ruffling his brown shaggy hair. He leaned forward and planted a small kiss on her lips before both of them turning to little Lillyian, the man standing behind and grasping her hand as she rubbed her belly with a grin.
"But I want to be friends!" the girl gasped as she leapt for the butterfly for the third attempt to catch it. The Monarch swooped low, and then out of grasp, as if playing her games. The parents chuckled, sharing another small kiss.
"Maybe he already has friends, sweetie!" the man called out. The girl pouted to him and put her hands on her hips with a 'are you serious' look.
"Daaaaaad! It's a GIRL!"
She huffed off. The couple laughed and watched Lillyian disappear around a large junk mound.
"She's such a sweet girl…" the wife whispered back.
"Gets it from me." She chuckled.
"Uh-huh."
"Should we called her back?" he asked. The woman spun around to face him.
"Look who's the cautious one now?" she said with a grin.
"Remember last time she came back with a live toad?" he said.
They both took a slight moment of silence to remember that wet soggy day, and then laughed at the thought of that poor, poor toad.
"Yes!" she laughed. "Who knows what she'll find today…"
Humming a nonsense tune to herself, Lillyian happily pranced among the spiky bushed and tossed out junk. She started to wonder into more densely polluted grounds, until coming to a final stop at the end of the Waste Lands. At least seven mounds surrounded her before the ground started to be covered in junk, the shrubs and grass being swallowed up by the hungry metal.
She bended down low to examine a lone Dandelion, the song still sounding from her lips, making up words as she went. It isn't un-common to see children singing what they are doing, it seems to keep them all the more in their own world. Makes you think of the genius you once were, before you got an education.
"A little dandelion, swaying in the breeze…what will I find today? What will I find today…" feeling the soft powdery petals with fingertips, the girl looks up and glances around in thought. She lowered her voice to a whisper. The entire world is silent.
"What shall I find today? What? What? What?..."
RUSTLE.
A sliding junk sound went off, near. As if waiting for the cue, Lillyian leapt up, plucking the Dandelion from the ground. She raced over to where the sound came from, until she came to the foot one of the biggest mounds. She was cast in shadow, as she looked up to the top of the mound, clutching the yellow flower close. "I ran, I ran, up to a mound…I wait, I wait…for another sound…"
"SSSSS…"
A strange hissing sound came. Lillyian glanced up to the top of the mound. There, sleeping in the sun, sat a proud little gecko. With a squeaky gasp the small child rejected the flower and started to climb up the side of the clunky hill. With a tiny grunt she fell back, but regained control and pulled herself up onto an old rusted microwave, sneakily looking up to the dumb-founded face of the gecko.
Licking ones of its eyes, it turned away with no bother for the curious child. With a giggle Lillyian reached out and poked it softly on the back. It quickly darted away down the side of the mound.
"Aww," the girl whined, climbing extremely un-gracefully to the top of the hill. Sliding onto her belly, she pulled over to get a view of below her with a final groan.
"I look, I look, I glance to the ground…"
She glanced bellow to supposedly find the lizard, but instead her eyes lay on something else. They widen and she grins.
There, lay a rugged boy with no t-shirt, just his dirty jeans and thick duct tape around his left arm. His face was filthy and his eyes were closed. She giggled at his hair, two spikes of black sitting on his head.
To make the scene look even more suspicious, he had a slim girl entwined in his arms. She had spiky black hair with hints of purple. Her cloths were dirty as well, and some scars showed on her pale skin.
As she looks around more, she finds a shaggy blue haired boy lying awkwardly on a ripped mattress, with half the springs showing. He laid with his arm twisted under him, his body on its side. He was sleeping too, she thought. An old looking bag lay just at his fingertips, as if he had raced over to it, and fainted just at the finish line. She looked at all of them and grinned again, her eyes glistening with wonder, and whispered,
"And then the things were found…"
The circus grounds were just starting up.
There were many things to prepare for the crowds, and robots mixed in with rushing children were carrying stools, props, makeup, mirrors, lights, electronics and costumes, racing to where they should be. The atmosphere was frantic, this was the first night they would perform to the people of Sunset City. The Big Top was put up, the stalls were ready and the acts were polished. Now they just needed to add the finishing touches for the performances.
Perched on a tall striped chair, sat Hamegg. His black mustache twitched at every mistake or trip the children or robots made. He hopped off his perch and gripped a whip from his pocket, clenching his fingers, eyeing all of them.
A lash should get them going…
Taking the whip, he lashed it on the ground. The horrifying sound made everyone jump and make their bodies tense, even the robots. "MOVE FASTER! We gotta show to run!" he said with a proud laugh.
Not proud at his workers. Not proud at his robots. Proud at himself, of course.
Sunset city goers loved to spend money, it was one of the richest cities on the Surface. They were sure to get some good money this month. Hell, Sunset citizens would spend shit loads to see how horrible something was!
"Hamegg, you king of the world, you…" he grinned, stroking his greasy mustache as if it somehow granted him luck, which he probably thought it did in some way.
Cathy sighed a long, sad sigh. She was one of the eldest in the circus, and had carrot orange hair, ruffled and spiked. today she wore a pink and white striped t-shirt with scarred old blue jeans, a white French hat planted on her head. She looked up to the chart, located around the back stages of the Big Top, by the costume bay. The black board was a long one, it had to be to list all the children.
Rubbing her shoulder as a rush of cold swept through her, Cathy held up a piece of white chalk, and crossed out two names:
Zane.
Cora.
They had been declared lost. In other words, dead. Hamegg didn't care in the least, he was only concerned that maybe the preparation would be slowed, for they were some of the strongest, and Cora was the best cook. Well, the only cook.
When a take-out building wasn't near, or if they were on the road, Cora would prepare vegetables, chips, chicken and puddings. There was never enough to go around, there has been records before of children only five leaving this world due to starvation.
Those poor, poor children.
A small girl raced up, a boy about her age running beside her. They both shared the same eyes (green), the same hair (brown), and were about the same height. It didn't take a genius to know they were twins.
The girl stood on tippy toes to examine the list. Cathy stood to the side with sorrow on her face. The girl let out a horrified cry. She turned to Cathy with drenched eyes. "Cathy!" she sobbed. Cathy flung her arms around her.
"Shhhh…" she comforted.
The girl burst into tears, burring her face.
"They can't be dead! They can't!"
The boy gulped and glanced to the list. Seeing the crossed out names, his eyes stung and his chest heaved, but he dare not cry in front of his sister, especially not Cathy, which he secretly admired.
"I know, honey…"
Cathy pulled the girl away and looked into her eyes, for the small girl to see that she was in tears, too.
"It just…happens, okay? Sometimes people do foolish things, like forget maps, or venture too far-"
"THEY WERE NOT FOOLISH!" the girl sobbed. The boy went up and patted her on the back.
"Widget, it's…okay."
Widget flung her arms over her brother.
"Oh Sludge! What are we gonna do? They can't be dead, they just can't be!"
Cora, Zane, Sludge and Widget had stuck together like glue as soon as they met each other. Zane and Cora had known each other much longer, them being like brother and sister. But when Widget and Sludge came along, they were picked on by the older kids, Sludge getting beaten up, Widget getting teased to tears. Cora had stood up for them every time, until the respect got passed down from her into both of them and that was the end of their bullying. Some of the kids snicker at the thought that Zane and Cora are married, and Sludge and Widget were there kids. But they all were just best friends. Inseparable.
Well, except for now, of course. It's hard to be together when you're in two separate worlds.
"Its nature," Cathy reasoned, but knowing there was nothing natural about being killed by insane robots, or getting lost in the land of junk. Widget continued to cry.
"But why? Why them? Why not Arrow?"
Cathy smiled a little as she spoke her worst enemy's name.
"No one deserves to die, honey."
"Then why did they?" she asked quietly, looking up to Cathy. She sighed, and a moment of silence grasped the air.
"Fate has a twisted mind, sweet. Who knows, maybe they're in a better place."
Widget and Sludge took a deep breath.
"Will we see them ever again?" they both asked.
Cathy smiled and crossed her arms, rubbing her shoulders once more.
"Maybe," she whispered.
Lillyian slipped down the side of the mound, bouncing off clumps as she fell. "Whooooaaa!" she screamed in delight as she fell head over feet and tumbled down, landing with a squeaky grunt next to the spiky haired boy.
She quickly got to her knees and leaned over him and the girl. She reached out to the girl's hair, and stroked one of her purple highlights. Her hair felt straw like and un-kept. She giggled. She shuffled over to the boy. There was something strange about him, she thought to herself. His skin was too perfect. To clean. She leaned over and poked his button nose.
TWITCH.
The boy's finger flinched. Lillyian let out a high pitched laugh. She reached out to tap the spike on his hair, but hesitation drew her away. They looked dangerous.
She looked back to the girl. She had a beauty spot on her lower cheek. She reached out and poked that too.
The girl didn't move.
Lillyian gasped at the thought she might be dead. She grabbed her hand an started to shake it, in somewhat trying to read her heart beat like she had been told. She couldn't feel anything.
She must be dead, there was no way she could have been doing it wrong. "Poor girl," she whined. She leapt back over to the boy. She plucked up some courage and slid her finger along the side of his hair spike until she came to the tip. The boy groaned and turned his head to the side. Lillyian giggled and tapped him on the forehead.
"Hmmmm…"
TAP TAP.
"Hmmmm…stop it…"
TAP TAP TAP.
The boy's eyes opened slowly. His vision was blurred and pixilated, but soon the form of human came. A…a little girl, in fact. The boy groaned and pulled him up with his good arm, Lillyian smiling at him. Their eyes met and the robot tilted his head.
"Oh…hello…" He said with a little frown.
The small girl gasped and nodded her head.
"HELLO!" she screamed.
The robot boy looked down to the girl on his lap. He gasped and pulled himself from under her, squatting over her limp body.
"C-Cora?" he whispered in hope.
"Cora? Is that her name? Well, I think she's dead. Sorry..." Lillyian mumbled.
"No…" the boy breathed, softly touching Cora's pale face. He reached down to her wrist and softly picked it up, searching for a pulse.
"I already tried that. And you're doing it wrong, anyway." The boy robot's mind wondered back to the dreadful night before, when they had fell.
"Cora!" he yelled to the screaming teen. He reached out to her, stretching his fingertips as far as they could go. Cora couldn't see anything; even though he had his eye lights shining, they just appeared as a blur. He griped out and took her hand quickly, pulling her close and holding her tight to his chest. He had maybe thought she would foolishly kick away, with that rage she had with him and being so stubborn, but she had grasped hold of his arms so tight he thought maybe she had the super strength for a moment, as they went plunging down. Maybe she thought he was Zane.
While waiting for a sign of life, the robot's mind then went from Cora to her friend. He looked around the ruins, and finally found the old pale blue mattress with Zane twisted on it. "Zane…" he would have to check if he was still in a living state as well, he was lucky to land on something soft…The boy smiled widely as a healthy pulse thumped against his thumb.
"She's alive!" he cried in delight. Lillyian gasped in joy.
"YAY!" she squealed.
Cora finally responded. A small response, but one enough to send relief flooding through the robot's circuits. Her head moved slightly towards him, a raspy groan escaping from her lips. He grinned.
"I knew she was alive."
"M-me too!" Lillyian lied. She shuffled forward, eyeing his taped scar. "You have a very bad nurse." She muttered. He diverted his eyes from Cora to the small girl.
"Excuse me?"
She nudged her head to his dead arm and giggled. "You have gray sticky tape on your arm."
He glanced over to the injury. Lillyian jumped up and treaded behind the boy and over to his arm, squatting down to lightly touch it. "Well, we were on the road, kinda…" the robot held out his good hand to lift his dead one for her to examine. She looked up.
"Really?" she said with a smile. He nodded. She ran her fingertips along his skin, coming to a stop at the duct tape.
"Yeah, we were walking along the Surface…Wall, I think it was? No, the…Ridge. Surface Ridge."
But his voice was already muffled out in Lillian's head as her eyes met a smudge of the robotic scar poking out from the sticky muck. The boy looked to the girl. She wasn't talking in that nervous, squeaky voice of hers.
Her eyes widened.
She must have seen his scar.
He didn't act surprised, he thought it would be the same gig with Cora. Person acts surprised, asks heaps of questions and hopefully invites him to where she lives. Kinda made him feel important, now that he thought about it. But as he looked at her, he noticed her eyes were stricken with fear. She slowly took her hands off his arm. He tilted his head.
"Are you o-"
She screamed in horror and raced behind the junk mound. The robot jumped up and looked around to the hill, hearing whimpering from the girl. "W-wait! I-I don't mean any harm!"
Under the balcony, the mother still sways back and forth with her beloved husband, while the rest of the village was getting to their daily work.
A teenage boy and his farther get to work on a small veggie patch by their house. The man has black, grizzly hair with a matching goatee, and wears a blue and red checkered top. His son has his brown hair shaved to a small stubs, many parts of his face pierced. He wore a rugged singlet with some sort of street design imprinted on it, along with black shorts and a striped tie, adding to the school rebel look.
More young children were out, three angel blond-haired girls and one light brown haired boy. He was sitting on a wooden porch, straw hat snuggly on his head, a large revolver in lap.
Lillyian's mother looked around the village.
"Breakfast?" she asked.
Suddenly Lillyian's horrified scream echoed over thought the village, sending everyone to be cast in silence, like someone had replaced them with statues. The mother was the first to respond. She leapt out of her husband's arms and raced towards the scream.
"LILLYIAN! Lillyian, I'm coming dear!"
Seeing his pregnant wife racing to where there must be danger, the man leaped over the balcony railing.
"Shit!" He ran after her as she disappeared behind a garbage heap. The black-goatee man swung his arm in their direction. "Come on! Let's go!" he signaled.
The village came to life once again, the small boy nodding and racing down with the gun in hand, almost dropping it twice. The teen was sure to handle it off his before proceeding, as much to the boy's anger. The three girl stayed behind with their mothers, worried looks as they stroked the wildflower petals.
The band of people raced over to where Lillyian had screamed. The mother looked to the black haired man. "What do you think?" she puffed.
Her face was starting to go red.
"You are in no condition to run, Abigail!" the man warned.
"For my Lillyian, Lennox, I would run a thousand miles." Lennox gave a worried smile at that. They all came to a stop in the maze of the seven mounds. The teen loaded the gun.
"Could it be a snake?" he asked in a thick Aussie accent.
Lillyian's scream came again.
"This way!" Abigail declared, racing down to the left.
The robot boy edged closer to the mound, Lillyian's face looking out from the side.
"I don't want to hurt you…" he said calmly, holding out his hand. The girl's face scowled.
"Robots are mean…" she said darkly, a tear streaming down her face. "Robots hurt people…" she glanced down to Cora. "You hurt that girl…" the robot glanced back.
"No! that wasn't me! I-"
"STAND BACK!"
The boy jolted back as he was suddenly confronted with a band of humans. Very furious humans, at that.
Abigail ran forward.
"MUMMY!" Lillyian cried.
The small lady scooped her up in her arms and held her tight, the small girl clinging around her neck. Abigail scowled at the robot boy. He glanced at the teen, cautiously stepping on the spot, aiming a gun right at his face, while Lennox was firmly standing his ground, and a small boy about Lillyian's age was giving him his best evil cowboy look, threatening a spade forward. He meekly raised his good hand.
"Uh…?"
"What were you doing to my dear Lilly?!" the woman confronted.
"You know what we do to robots here, mate," the teen said, stepping forward.
"I-I…" the robot looked to Lillyian. "I-I just woke up!" Small snickers arose, but Abigail's face remained as old as ice, Lillian clinging tighter.
Lennox scoffed. "Just take a look at this…" he murmured. "They creating humanoid robots now? Try and make you look all innocent?"
The robot took a step back, only to cause the teen to edge closer.
"I haven't done anything wrong! Seriously, what do you have against robots?" he asked desperately. More scoffs.
"Would that make these robot too, then?" The robot boy jolted around to another man, leaning over Cora and nudging her shoulder.
"Stay away from her!" the robot suddenly yelled out. He didn't know where the sudden rage came from, he would just hate to see those teens get hurt. The man looked up.
"Why? They your gang? You little terrorist human looking-robot gang?" He took a knife out from his belt and held it close to Cora's hair, making the breath clog in the robot's throat.
"She your girlfriend?"
"JUST LEAVE HER THE HELL ALONE!" he could hear the revolver the teen had load and he gulped.
After some close examining of the girl the man shot his head up.
"They're human!" he accusingly pointed to the robot boy. "You've harmed them! Tortured them, most probably!"
"I DIDN'T-!"
"Sick things, you robots…" Lennox spat. "No hearts. No mercy. Let's see how you like it."
The robot slowly turned around to the other humans.
"Look, I know how this looks, but would never hurt a-"
He never finished the sentence when the teenager fired the gun. The gun shot could be heard all the way back to Autumn, where the mothers looked around in fear. Everyone eyed to watch the robot fall down dead, for another victory, another threat to be over. But instead, as the gun smoke cleared, the robot boy was still standing fine. Looking frazzled and shocked, but not a scratch on his skin. Their mouths gaped open.
The boy lifted his hand to dust off the grit from his cheek, but the teen fired again. At much closer range, the bullet just shot right off his arm with a slight 'ping'. The teenager growled and went to fire a third round, but Lennox stepped up and shoved the gun down.
"That's enough, Scooter!"
Scooter looked at the robot, and then up past his shoulder. With a grin he lowered the gun. "By all means…"
The robot tilted his head.
"So- AHHHHHRRRRGGGGGG!"
The man from behind had come up and hauled the knife in his shoulder, right in the groove where his limb connects. The robot boy froze for a second, looking deep into the eyes of frightened Lillyian and the laughing Scooter, then fell to his knees.
Glitches and blue electricity lashed all over the boy's poor body. He felt like his insides were on fire, every movement like sharp pins twisting in his skin. He lurched forward onto his hands and knees, Scooter keeping alert again and aiming the gun close.
"H-h-h-he-help…"
He landed on his stomach and his eyes slowly closed. Dusting his hands together, Lillyian's farther waltzed over and tugged the knife from the robot's shoulder, releasing from the textured skin with a sickening slicing sound. He squatted down to his face. Hearing the nervous shuffling of grasses and metal, he looked up to the group.
"Is it alive, Damion?" Lennox asked.
"I don't know. We better take it back to town." He slowly rose. "Well, what are you waiting for? Let's go help those kids!"
They all sprang into action, racing over to Zane and Cora; their bodies still cast in silence. Abigail placed Lillyian down with a weary groan and hobbled over to help.
Lillyian stroked her red hair sadly, looking at the robot boy. He had been so nice, but she had heard of some robots pretending just as she liked to, to lure them into a trap. But she couldn't help but look at the lifeless face with pitied eyes. She sighed slowly like her mother does, somehow trying to clear her muffled mind like it helped her.
She saw the robot boy slide slightly back, and gasped and jolted her head up, only to find Scooter was tying his red boots together. He looked up and winked playfully at her and Lillyian faked a smile.
Sweet straw.
Lavender candles.
Old grease and oil.
These scents weren't from home.
Cora stretched her body and opened her eyes. She looked around while rubbing her shoulder softly as it ached. She was sitting on an old wooden frame bed, with a scratchy purple blanket and a flat pillow. The small room was dimly lit, with a few rays seeping from the pale blind that covered the only window.
"Where…?" she flipped her feet from the covers to lightly touch the fluffy textures of a mauve carpet. She looked to the end of her bed to see her dusty grimed cloths. She then examined herself. She was wearing her original underwear (thank god), along with a pale violet tank top and blue night shorts. On her arm was a tight bandage, and several band aids covered her legs. She rubbed her temples for a moment, feeling like a headache that had been lasting for over decade had finally started to wear down.
"Hmmmm…" she groaned. Suddenly the old door to the left opened with a creak and Abigail walked in. Cora turned to her, slowly lowering her hand and standing up. Abigail welcomed her with a smile. Cora didn't think to return it, first thing's first:
"Where the hell am I?" she asked.
The woman stepped forward."I suggest you stay seated, those injuries won't heal as easy as you think."
Cora sat.
"Where am I?" she repeated.
"You're in Out Skirts, in the town of Autumn. I'm Abigail, and we found you by the scrap mounds. Are you okay? Did it hurt you bad?" Cora tilted her head, her eyes turning to slits.
"What do you mean, it?" Abigail sighed sadly.
"I know, you probably would call it more than just an it. A monster, a threat, a-"
"Wait," she cut Abigail short, standing up. "What are you talking about?" Abigail gave her a strange look.
"The robot," she answered.
Cora's eyes widened. That night. We fell! Is Zane okay? And that robot boy…dangerous? Abigail must have got the wrong idea. Stubborn, sure, and a little hard-headed, but he was programmed to act like a human, therefore he wouldn't hurt a fly.
"The robot who harmed you. Lillyian, my daughter, said she found all of you unconscious, even the robot, and you were in its arms. I don't know what she was saying…"
Cora scoffed a small astonished laugh. He had saved her. Became her landing pad. She should be dead right now, if it weren't for him. She wondered, if he had only saved her…she turned to Abigail.
"Is Zane okay?" she asked.
Abigail smiled warmly and led the way out the room and into a kitchen/diner. There was wooden cupboards in the right hand side of the room in a box formation, a door next to it leading to outside. A small table was in the center and an array of different patterned couches lay near the bedroom which she had left.
On the burgundy carpet was Lillyian and Zane was sitting on the couch, his left arm cast in a sling and wearing a black t-shirt with old jeans.
"Zane!" Cora cried, racing towards him.
Zane looked to her and his eyes lit up.
"Cora?"
Cora ran up and carefully hugged him close, sure to not harm his arm. He lifted his hand and grasped her hair in an attempt to hug back. Abigail returned to Cora's room to do some tidying up. They heard each other's sniffling and Zane soon felt hot tears on his cheek. Lillyian jumped up and watched from where she stand, until they drew away and looked down to her.
"Oh!" Zane said. He cleared his throat and stood. "This, is Lillyian Chrome. Daughter of Abigail Chrome and Damian Chrome, and keeper of all…"
"CHICKENS!" Lillyian yelled.
"Yeah, those things…" Cora giggled. Lillyian jumped up.
"And defeater of all ROBOTS!"
She ran around the room gleefully, punching her arm in the air. Zane laughed and smiled, while Cora looked at him with a confused expression. Zane looked at her and started to inform.
She wasn't sure how long he had been up, but he seemed to know a lot already. She guessed that Lillyian is a big talker. Anyhow, it was great just to hear his voice again, humming in her ears.
"Isn't it amazing? A whole thriving village without technology! They grow their own foods, their own produce…their own eggs! Did you know chickens are actually living animals, not just a food?"
Cora looked to Lillyian, still running around the room, pretending to stab imaginary objects and slash away at ripples of cool breeze.
"DIE, ROBOT! DIE!"
"Um."
"Oh yeah. They also hate robots."
Lillyian screeched to a stop in front of them, laughing. Cora snapped her head to Zane.
"Zane. If they hate robots, then…where's ours?" she was starting to wonder if he even remembered why they fell in the first place.
Abigail entered the room once again, carrying both Zane and Cora's cloths. She turned to her, giving another smile. "Abigail," Cora started, standing up and dusting off her pants.
"Yes?"
She gulped. "Where is our robot?" Abigail frowned. She wasn't sure what his girl meant by 'her' robot. But her warm smile soon returned.
"Why, we tied it up by the balcony."
Cora gaped.
Tied up?
"Damion is working to destroy it, but it's extremely hard, nothing seems to open that thing-"
Cora had heard enough. She raced over to Zane and started to pull on his t-shirt neck.
"Hey! What gives?" he complained, getting tugged from his seat.
"Zane, we gotta problem!"
"What problem, dears?" Abigail asked sweetly.
Cora was getting sickened by her overly sweet nature. She ran over to the door and swung it open, Zane following close behind and Lillyian stumbling over. Abigail frowned as they all raced out the house, but her mind quickly switched to more important things like lunch and she retreated to the kitchen.
They burst onto the balcony with a squeak following every step and glanced around. Scooter was with Lennox again, leaning against their house with cool beers in hand. With sweaty foreheads and puffing chests, they looked like they disserved them. All around the town was small children and their mothers, older teens and men working.
And right down at the right hand bottom of the porch, was the robot boy, arms tied around a steel post. His ankles were bound by barbed wire and tape, so was his stomach.
Cora gasped and jumped down to kneel in front of him. He was unconscious and she was glad. He looked so battered and beaten, she couldn't bear the thought of him being awake to suffer from it.
"Oh my god…" she whispered to herself. Zane's eyes widened and he too leapt down to Cora. Many people looked from where they were and smiled at the new comers. Scooter's eyes widened as he saw the pair and ran over to the two.
Cora reached her arm out and softly touched the robot's face. His arm was almost fully disconnected from his shoulder, and his artificial skin had deep scars all over and his lower cheek had a black scorch mark smothering it.
Zane shuddered.
Lillyian beamed and stood proudly on her tippy toes. Scooter walked up with smile. "Your awake!" he said gladly. He roughly reached out and tugged on the robot's hair. "Yeah, he's a tough bugger, but we'll find a way."
Cora jumped up and started pounding her fists on Scooter's chest.
"You monster! What have you done to him?" she screamed.
Scooter frowned and stepped back, holding his arms up in a gesture of surrender. Cora's punches didn't seem to have any effect on his muscular chest.
"Whoa! Hey!" Lennox sprang into action, jogging over.
Lillyian ran up to Abigail as she came out to see what the matter was. Lennox grabbed her shoulders and held her back.
"Hey! Slow down now, missy…"
Cora spun out of his grasp and looked up at him.
"It's CORA." She spat.
From a small battered brown shed came Damion, stepping out with goggles on his face and a blow torch in hand. That must have been the cause of the burnt cheek, Cora noted sickingly. Zane stood up.
"What did you do to our robot?!" Damion dropped the tool and ripped the goggles from his face.
"Your robot?!" he asked.
The whole town was silent now and most were making their way over to the scene. The small boy raced up, holding onto his straw hat.
"Yeah, our robot!" Zane continued to protest.
"Maybe they're a little weary from the hard day, honey?" Abigail said from the balcony. Cora twisted to her.
"No, we're NOT! Look, thank you for your hospitality, but he is not a threat. Seriously, we found him in the Wastelands and-"
"Another bot from the Wastelands!" Damion growled. He pointed to the robot boy. "Do you know what they do?" he asked darkly.
Cora and Zane frowned.
"They kill!" yelled someone from the crowd that was forming.
"They harm!"
"Destroy!"
"WE KNOW!" Cora screamed, casting silence across the town. She took a breath. "I saved him from them. The Scavengers were going to destroy him." Everyone gasped.
Lennox stepped forward. "Scavengers?" he quivered. Zane nodded. "They've been terrorizing this town for years…" Abigail stepped down.
"They first came when we did." She sadly lowered her head.
"What do you mean?" asked Zane. Damion stepped more towards them.
"What we mean, is that Wasteland bots can't be trusted. The bloody Scavengers have been visiting us more often now days, stealing our produce, picking off our houses, killing our-" He stopped short and took a moment to stare down at his boots, then over to the blow torch. He wiped his face and started to breath more heavily. After some staring seconds he turned again to look at Cora.
"They…" he pointed to the boy once again. "THAT, they all can't be trusted. All as bad as the Scavengers, all as bad as each other…" he walked over and picked the blow torch up. "Bad, just bad…"
Cora took a moment for her mind to wonder why he seemed so passionate about hating the robots, but soon stood tall.
"Well, you don't have to worry about them anymore." She said boldly. They all looked at them with a strange and confused expression.
"Yeah!" Zane yelled out. "Our robot destroyed them!"
More gasps.
Almost everyone was looking at the boy robot now. Until Scooter laughed.
"That little bugger? Get rid of the Scavengers? HA! Don't make me laugh!"
These words immediately eliminated any chance of the thought from the people's heads and they too started to chuckle. Damion was the only one who didn't even crack a smile, just turning to them.
Cora scowled. She sharply turned to them all.
"It's true!"
More laughter.
She even saw some men holding their sides from the pain. It was Zane's turn to try and convince them.
"Seriously! He saved Cora!" The laughter died down a bit as Damion came to make his point.
"Exactly! More terrorist Wasteland bot threats!" The laughter twisted into yelling in agreement.
Cora and Zane just looked at each other and groaned. These people were going to be tough to convince. Impossible, even. Cora decided to decipher the means of why they hated machines so much.
"Why?" she called out, once again shadowing silence.
"Why what, missy?" Lennox asked.
"Why hate robots? Did something happen?"
"Yes." Damion answered. They all looked at him with sorrow. Cora eyed him for a finished answer. But he hid back into his shed. Cora frowned.
"Yeah, so what happened?" Abigail looked sadly down to the ancient pine wood of the creaky balcony and felt her eyes swell.
"WHY?" Cora demanded.
"HEY!" Lennox yelled to her, adopting the two teen's full attention. He took a breath. "Just, some things are kept in the past." He glanced over to the shed.
"Exactly," Zane answered. "The past. This is a very advanced robot. It has more on its mind then just 'kill." Damion stomped out from the shed.
"You think you can just come to our town and change our sufficient ways!" he said angrily.
Zane knew they shouldn't have pushed it. If they had just left it, then maybe they would get a bed for the night and maybe some directions, but that would come with the price of letting them torture their robot, the reason they were here in the first place. No, they couldn't just go through all this and have nothing to travel back with. And if they were going to give him up, they would at least want heavy pay, not just taken from them because it was their 'policy'.
"We don't live with robots any more, okay? If you don't agree with our ways, then get out of my town!"
"Give us back the robot first!" Cora screamed to him.
"I'm not just gonna let that monster go!" Damion argued.
They yelling once again up rose and Cora just buried her head in her hands. But Zane's mind was diverted from the yelling to something else. The air was getting slightly musky, he noticed, and a strange smell was filling the air. A smoky smell…
"Is something burning?" he asked over the top of the crowd. Abigail overheard Zane's question and her eyes grew wide, remembering the roast chicken she had put in the oven a few minutes ago. Even though it was a town that didn't favor high technology, Abigail had managed to get her hands on a Metro City oven, which could cook anything to a delicious crisp in under five minutes. She couldn't remember how long it was since she had put it in…
"Oh!"
She hobbled quickly back into the house. Damion looked up to her as she disappeared through the door, but quickly returned to the fight. But noticing the two teens covering their ears, he declared in his head that they have given up. Not like they had a chance, it was a whole town against two…two…
"Where did you come from?" Damion shouted to them.
As soon as his voice was heard, it was once again like a rare bird had called and silence showed the respect for his words.
Cora and Zane looked to each other. You see, if anyone knew there was an entire circus run by just children, things would get hairy pretty quick. There would be reports of abuse, stealing and even manslaughter that would be thrown at Hamegg and he would all too soon be the latest criminal. Look, it wasn't fancy or perfect, but the kids there were family. Cora's family. And she didn't think anyone favored foster parents, or being chucked back into the life they so much wished to forget. Like her own life…
Damion and the whole town was waiting for an answer. Each second of silence just was being collected as more and more suspicion.
Abigail perked her head around to the kitchen oven to check if the chicken was too burnt or not. To her dismay, a cloud of continues smoke was rising above the appliance. Her face was struck with shock and fear as she then noticed a lone bottle of scraped off petrol and petrol from Damion's last ride into town.
It was sitting on the shelf just over the cooking oven, and above it was a glass of water she must have left. The window by the sink was open, and the blue curtain was flowing nearby it, tilting it with every breeze.
A particularly strong one sent the glass to be knocked over, the water spilling from its hold. The drops fell on the jug of disaster, some sizzling onto the oven.
Finally finding her legs, Abigail raced over to the wobbling bottle, but the smoke was over powering and attacked her sight, making everything around her swirl with blur. She wouldn't have made it in time anyway, as the glass fell and knocked the jug…
Right onto the fiery oven.
Now, firework explosions are pretty and all that, just make it ten times more powerful and dangerous, and take out the fun little smidges of color and you got what happened next. Cora thought sickingly that maybe she should thank the turn of events, so she couldn't stand there any longer to be watched by what felt like the entire world.
A giant explosion, that shook the whole town and made the people wobble on their knees.
It only took a matter of seconds before the whole house was ablaze with dancing flames.
Damion ran as fast as the teenagers had ever seen, racing towards the house with an expression of such misery and pain, Zane thought he might kill him to help the mood.
The whole town screeched in alert and the mothers quickly picked up their young and sprinted to safety by the maple tree.
"ABIGAIL!"
Damion screamed. Scooter and Lennox along with many other strong men and women were busy collecting buckets of water from the old well behind the tree, and then chucking it on the fire with a hiss of smoke and steam. Zane had ran straight away, but Cora just took slow steps backwards, her mind whirling…
"CORA!"
The tiny girl flicked her head to the burning house. It used to be quite grand, with its' cream wood walls matching the picket fence, and the three stories of time and brilliance.
Now all used to feed the monster, eating away at the wood with its flames.
Then she saw it.
Two pairs of hands, banging their fists on the window of the second story. She recognized them straight away.
"Mummy? Daddy!"
The fire man placed a hand on the girls shoulder as they both watched three enter the building. Cora wasn't in distress, she knew those super heroes in yellow coats could save them.
But the pounding on the glass continued.
A face appeared, black soot covering it, mixing in with the drench ness of the tears. She gasped.
"Mummy!"
Then dear farther showed, his glasses cracked and sizzled. Cora stepped forward, but the large gloved hand tightened. She looked up to him. He sadly shook his head. Tears started to form on her eyes and she looked back to her parents. They kept on pounding on the glass, looking at their little girl from the hell that was burning.
The three fire men suddenly escaped from the house, coughing and spluttering.
"WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!" she screamed. "THEY'RE STILL IN THERE! WHAT ARE YOU DOING?!" With a final look to her parents, she made out the mouthed words before the entire house came crashing down.
'We love you'…
"Cora? CORA!"
Two hands came crashing down on Cora's shoulders and she was pulled away from the grasping fire. She shook her head and stumbled along with the person to the crowd by the arching tree. She turned her head to Zane.
"What the hell were you thinking?!" he yelled at her. "You could have died! You're supposed to run!"
Run…
With a teary cry she squeezed Zane into a long hug. Cora noticed Zane's sling was starting to un-fold, ambers of glowing ash pricked on it. He hugged her back, a little confused- Cora wasn't the cuddly type.
They looked back to the house, the flames just growing. Damion was in full tears, yelling for only one thing:
"ABIGAIL!"
The mothers around them had their hands covering their mouths and shaking their heads, most little kids in screaming messes.
Then, they heard it.
"DAMION!"
Un-clear, but with no doubt.
Abigail was still alive.
That was all the response Damion needed, before rushing into the burning house.
"DAMION, NO!" Lennox reached out to grab his jacket cuff, but far from reach he failed. Frustrated, he kicked the ground and ran over to fill another bucket. "Idiot, bastard!" he yelled, but everyone knew he wasn't angry at Damion, but more to himself, knowing he wouldn't be able to save him if he didn't get out.
And those chances were pretty high.
Lillyian scrambled over to Cora and Zane, tears streaming down her face. Cora knew only too well what she was going through. She glanced to the house. "Mummy! Daddy!" she screamed.
Cora flung her arms around her as she burst into tears, hugging back. "They're going to be okay!" she more of told herself. Cora let a tear of her own drip onto her red hair.
"Oh, shit!" Zane groaned. Surprised at her friends bad tongue, Cora and Lillyian glanced to him. He had his navy hair scrunched up in his hands, looking regretfully to the house. Lillyian wiped her nose.
"What?" her voice quivered.
"Our robot…" he moaned.
Cora flicked her head at the robot boy, still bound to the post. It hurt to watch the fire get closer, and still to see the calmed expression on his face, as if still in his dreams. But it was a robot. They don't have dreams.
Lillyian gasped, which made Cora frown to the thought that she liked to pretend she was the greatest robot killer in Autumn. "He's going to melt!" she cried. Cora looked to him with hesitated eyes, wondering how to react when the flames finally reach him.
"What will we say when we return empty handed?" Cora elbowed him. He looked to her.
"What?"
"More important things to worry about, Zane!" she hissed. Zane's eyes softened as he collected the wrong thinking's in his mind, and his eyes scattered over to the house.
No more yelling from within was heard yet.
Damion was searching the rooms, dodging past debris of smothered couches, downed pillars and clumps of wood that was being devoured by the fire. "Abigail!" he called, as more of the roof was collapsing. He suddenly hears a groan, and looked over to one of the giant pillars that held up the entire structure.
A hand was scraping on top of it.
"ABIGAIL!"
Damion tripped over one of Lillyian's melting toys, and reached the black scorched piece of wood. Hot ash rained down on him as he looked down to the red face of Abigail, half buried by the pillar. He gasped, both horrified at the difficulty it would take to free her, and relief that she was still there to free.
"Damion…" she gasped. He stroked her flustered face.
"I'm going to get you out, okay?" he looked away from her for a moment, settling his palms under the pillar, then looked at his wife once again. She watched his every move with swollen eyes from the deadly black smoke and hell's ash. Before tugging, he comforted her with, "Lillyian's safe. You're going to be fine."
With a groan Damion started to lift the pillar from her poor body. It lifted for one grand second, then came crashing back down like a wave of fire.
Abigail let out a cry.
The scream reached the ears of a terrified Lillyian, who gasped and jolted her head up in alert. Cora and Zane looked towards the house and clenched each other's hands.
"Holy Mother Lord…" Cora whispered.
More of the house came crashing down to the towns dismay, everyone's hopes sinking.
…except for Lillyian's.
Zane looked down to where Lillyian was, only to find a vacant patch of grass. He nudged Cora.
"What?" Cora whispered, praying for the best.
"Lillyian? Where did she go?" They quickly darted their heads around the town in search for the small girl. "Fricken hell…"
Lillyian was making her way over to the boy robot. He was her only chance to save her family.
It was still not moving, some of the barbed wire turning black from the expose of the heat. She ran over it, the other hurrying people not noticing.
She leapt over a rolling bucket and kneeled down in front of it. The heat was immense, a thousand times more scolding then her bath water could ever be. Some of the burning ash flickered onto her dress and she was quick to dust them back. She focused on the robot's sleeping face.
All the stories.
All the threats.
All the warnings.
…meant nothing now.
She reached out to his face.
TAP.
Nothing. But she wasn't going to give up that easily.
TAP.
TAP TAP.
A small twitch.
TAP TAP TAP.
TAP TAP.
"Hmmmm…"
"WAKE UP!" she screamed. But the robot's head just fell to one side, the eyes squeezing closed tight. Lillyian shook it's shoulders with a crying groan. "WAKE UP! WAKE UP I BEG OF YOU!"
TAP TAP TAP TAP TAP.
"What?"
With a relieved sigh the robot's eyes suddenly snapped open. Lillyian jolted back a little with a watery smile.
"Oh…hello," She said, morphing the first words he had said to her. The robot boy looked up to her, everything becoming extremely un-clear.
Who was this girl? Why is everything so black? Red? Flames… what?
His mind whirled in confusion. Another shake from Lillyian sprung his senses together. He jolted his head around. "W-what? Where…?" he glanced down to his arms, tied with tape and wire. "What the-?" He tried leaning forward, and then immediately glanced down to his bound middle.
Cora and Zane watched from the distance, wondering what was Lillyian going to do.
"He's awake!" Cora cheered. Zane beamed.
"But, what is she doing?" Zane asked.
"I-I…" Cora sort of knew, but didn't know how to put it.
Suddenly a cracking voice arose.
"THE ROBOT IS AWAKE!" it screeched. The whole town was looking over to Lillyian and the moving robot now. Strangely enough, Cora didn't see any sort of hatred from the villagers this time. She wondered if all their thoughts were directed by Damion.
The robot boy groaned and softly touched one of the deep scars on his face. A harsh sob leapt from his throat and horrible, horrible cries fled from his mouth and echoed through everyone's ears, and Cora knew what was going on.
The robot was awake and the pain was finally kicking in.
Lillyian held his thrashing head still.
"WHAT DID YOU DO TO ME?!"
"I'm sorry!"
She knew she had done nothing to cause the scars, but she still had let them occur, and it was her farther who was responsible, which gutted in her as bubbling guilt. She was still cautious of robots, but this one she just knew wasn't harmful.
The boy robot pulled its good arm, snapping the barbed wire like toothpicks. The youngster gasped and watched as he grabbed the bindings across his stomach and ripped them off as well as his boots.
Shakily getting to his feet, the robot continued to let out small grunts and cries of pain. Lillyian steadied it as it wobbled when he caught sight of the leaping fire beside him.
"Oh my God…" His eyes widened like deer captured in a spot light.
Lennox raced up and pulled Lillyian away from him by her shoulders, looking menacingly at the robot. But Lillyian acted like he wasn't even there, and continued her conversation with it.
"My parents are in the house!" she cried. "SAVE THEM!"
The robot looked at her as if she was crazy, then back to the fire. Lennox just awaited to what the machine would choose to do. The boy was thinking about his choices, counting all the events that had accrued so far:
Firstly, he had been accused of harming humans, insulted and called a threat.
And then he was aggressively shot twice, and knocked out by a knife struck in his arm.
And then waking up, obviously tortured and tied up to a post next to a blazing fire, sentenced to melt along with the house.
And now this small girl was begging him for a favor. So what was he going to do?
The answer was obvious.
Holding his arm and with a raspy groan, the robot made its way over to the entrance of the burning house.
Most of the town gasped in amazement, the water carriers pausing for a few seconds to watch as the small machine disappeared into the black sooty archway that used to pass as a door. Cora started to walk forward but Zane stopped her in her tracks. She didn't need to look at him to know his expression. She knew him too well to know he was just as scared and shocked as her.
The robot traveled deeper into the clutches of the house, leaving the whole town frozen with shock and silence.
Damion let out a glass shattering yell as the pillar fell for the third time on top Abigail, who was losing hope. His knuckles were swollen and bleeding from uncountable splinters, his eyes were red and burning, his skin was starting to peel and he was losing oxygen.
Feeling defeated, he collapsed on the structure and looked into Abigail's eyes, slowly closing. Seeing her desperate state, he reached out to her chin and lifted her face to his. "Oh no…no, Abigail!" he cried. Her eyes grew heavier. He leaned in close until their noses were touching. "Stay with me…" he whispered. "Stay with me or I'll come with you…" Abigail coughed as the flames started to climb down and grab for the edges of the pillar, attempting to pull it into its dance of destruction. She opened her mouth and a hoarse, raspy whisper of words poured out.
"No…no, no Damion. You dying…Lillyian …I will never be in peace if you abandon her…"
"And while I'm still alive you shall never die!" With another groan he steadied his hands on the bottom of the heavy piece of wood for the fourth time. He looked down to her, breathing as well as he was able.
"I'll get you out…" he said. He looked to the roof of the room, that was half gone. It was like staring into a Black hole, the entrance to the underworld. He closed his eyes and nodded to himself. "I'll get you out…I'll get you out…"
With a pray, he started to haul the pillar off of his wife, with as little success as any other time, maybe even less as he was horribly weak. Abigail let out cry as a flame had started on her shall and was eating away, traveling to her neck. Her poor voice gave Damion strength, and he lifted it until he felt like his arms would drop off.
Then a hand.
It was a small hand, perhaps a boy's, and had a scar across the thumb to the end of the palm. Seeing the robotic glitches that erupted from it, Damion's head sprung up to the robot boy, staring deep into his eyes with determination one would only see from the eyes of a grown man.
"What-you-?"
The only response was a small groan as the robot lifted the pillar. He stumbled back a little with a heavy frown woven into his brows, looking at the robot boy's strong single arm and his brave eyes.
His human eyes.
The creaking of the weak wood screamed through the house and the pillar got thrown off Abigail and thumped on the ground which quickly gave way to a patch of splinters and ash.
The boy leapt forward and leaned down to Abigail, pulling her up from the ground with an arm around her shoulder. Damion just stood there, his emotions too mixed to make of the moment. Abigail stared wide eyed, being tugged from the scolding ground. The robot groaned and led her to Damion.
"Take her!" he yelled.
He nodded quickly and caressed the crying woman into his grasp. The boy robot pushed him towards the door leading to safety.
"GO!" He glanced at the machine before steadily walking over burnt and burning obstacles with Abigail locked in his arms, the robot following close behind.
But just as they left past the kitchen, the boy ran past a nail stabbing out of the wall. The wires from the boy's dead shoulder latched around the deadly pin, pulling him to an aggressive halt and he bit out a cry.
Damion looked back to him at the door way. It looked up at him with desperate eyes…just as Abigail had shown.
"HELP!" he begged. The man looked at the struggling robot. "HELP ME!"
Suddenly the reality flashed through his mind:
Robots were bad, robots were trouble. Robots can't be trusted.
The boy tugged on his arm, putting pressure on the wires. The circuits started to snap and twist and he screamed. He looked once again to Damion.
"HELP ME! HELP!"
Abigail coughed and slumped a little. Damion looked to her, and then to the robot. And with a frown, almost a smirk…
He disappeared out the door.