Chapter 01: He is the Omnissiah!

Rex woke up with a dull ache in his head, blinking himself awake. The air felt heavy, and a strange, acrid scent lingered. He pushed himself up, realizing he lay on cold metal ground. He'd never smelled anything quite like it, and wherever he was, it sure wasn't like any city he'd seen before.

Taking in his surroundings, he realized he was in a dimly lit alleyway made entirely of metal, filled with piping and strange conduits running along every surface.

This was not Providence, and definitely not anywhere he'd seen on Earth. As his senses sharpened, he realized he was in the middle of a city, and the rust-red skies over his head told him one thing: he was not in America.

He sat up to check if he was safe. So far, it was just an empty alleyway. He stood up and walked toward the open street, hoping to find someone who could tell him where he'd landed.

As he stepped out, he was greeted by a strange, breathtaking sight. The city sprawled before him, dark towers of steel and circuitry stretching high and deep, glowing with faint, amber light. Bridges connected rooftops, giant cogwheels slowly turned above him, and a mix of steam and hissing gases hissing gases hissed from vents.

Immediately, he noticed that many of the people looked rather destitute. However, some were dressed in tattered, heavy robes of red and gold, some with multiple mechanical limbs and faces obscured by strange apparatuses. They murmured to each other in bursts of static and clicks, a strange language that Rex could barely process. Still, somehow, his nanites attempted to interpret the binary-like snippets of language.

As he walked, a few robed figures glanced his way, their mechanical eyes scanning him curiously. A few of the figures glanced in his direction, but seeing nothing overtly hostile about him, most dismissed him with an indifference

Rex wandered further, taking in the city's strange atmosphere and wondering how he'd ended up in a place like this.

Eventually, he noticed more of the robed figures surrounding a large vehicle. Rex blinked at the sight. He did a double-take as he realized they were praying to the vehicle's thrusters. They held candles and vials of oil, which they carefully poured on the metal exterior, as though anointing it.

Rex tilted his head. "Are they…praying to the engine?"

Rex's brow furrowed, but he watched as one of the Tech-Priests, dressed in elaborate robes and trailing small metallic sensors, approached the vehicle's engine.

One of the priests stepped forward, poking around the thruster with a spanner in hand. He twisted a bolt, and suddenly, the entire engine began to sputter and emit thick black smoke. Sparks danced along the machinery, and a high-pitched whine grew from within the engine.

"Oh, great." Rex could tell things were about to go south fast. Without hesitation, he dashed forward, summoning his Block Party as he ran. His arms transformed, covered in navy-blue metallic gauntlets. He slammed his fists together, creating a dome of highly energized particles around himself and the tech-priests just as the thruster erupted in a blinding burst of plasma.

The dome of highly energized atoms absorbed the blast, and when the smoke cleared, the Tech-Priests stared at him, their mechanical eyes widened in unison. Rex lowered the shield and let the gauntlets dissipate as he looked around at the stunned priests. Rex turned to one of the robed figures who had been closest to the explosion.

The man—if he could even be called that, given the tubes and metal augmentations coming out of his face—looked utterly stunned.

Rex, with a casual grin, patted the figure on the shoulder. "You good there?"

The tech-priest didn't respond immediately. Something strange happened as his hand made contact.

Blue circuitry patterns flared across Rex's skin, glowing with the cables and implants in the Tech-Priest's body. Rex felt a strange tingling as his nanites began interfacing with the tech-priest's systems, sparking a link between them.

The priest's voice came out in the same binary-like tone, stuttering but filled with awe. "Who…who are you?"

To his surprise, Rex understood it perfectly. "I'm, uh…Rex Salazar," he answered, stumbling over his own words. "Just, you know, passing through."

Rex turned back to the damaged hover transport, now fully aware of the tense silence around him. The robed figures were watching his every move, their mechanical eyes glowing faintly, and even the city's faint hum seemed to still be in anticipation. Rex figured he needed to make a gesture of goodwill—if these people thought he was some kind of threat, things might get messy.

"All right," Rex muttered to himself, rolling his shoulders. "Let's see what I can do."

He touched the vehicle's scorched hull, and his nanites sprang to life. Immediately, his mind was flooded with information about the transport. The engine was fusion-powered, and the nanites eagerly translated its structure and function into something he could understand. Broken metal sections started to liquefy and fuse back together, wires reconnected and aligned themselves, and the engine's warped components straightened into perfect form. Rex optimized the connections as he worked, almost instinctively improving its efficiency far beyond its original design.

Finally, his nanites jumpstarted the engine. The transport floated back off the ground. Rex stepped back and wiped his hands.

"Good as new." He flashed a grin as he turned to face the group. He hoped that fixing their vehicle might help smooth things over, maybe even earn him a chance to figure out where exactly he was and how to get back to… wherever he came from. "So, uh, now that that's sorted, anyone wanna explain where I—"

Rex stopped mid-sentence, taken aback. One by one, the robed figures dropped to their knees. They bowed and raised their hands in reverence before they started chanting. Some clutched sacred-looking tools and devices, holding them like relics. Others placed their hands on the ground or pressed their foreheads to the floor.

"THE OMNISSIAH LIVES!"

"HE IS THE OMNISSIAH!"

Rex blinked then held up his hands. "Whoa, hold on! I'm not—what's an Omnissiah?!"

The chanting only grew louder, and the fervor in their eyes was almost overwhelming. They swarmed closer. One of the Tech-Priests stepped forward as he spoke in a mix of binary and broken Low Gothic. "You have restored the sacred machine and perfected its form. Only the Omnissiah can perform such miracles! Praise be!"

"Miracles? No, no, it's just—" Rex started, but he trailed off, realizing the more he tried to explain, the more fervent they became.

Another voice rose from the crowd, high and trembling. "The Omnissiah has blessed us with his presence! He walks among us, flesh and machine united!"

Rex stepped back, hands raised in surrender, his usual confidence faltering in the face of their overwhelming worship. "Okay, cool that you guys are happy, but I think there's been a mix-up. I'm not—"

The chanting continued unabated, their voices now a thunderous harmony of praise.

"THE OMNISSIAH!"

Rex sighed, rubbing the back of his neck. "This is gonna be one of those days, isn't it?"

#

AN: Special thanks to Seana, Jebest4781, Mecha Destroyer98, vividlearner744, OmegaDelta, Henry Stickman, fearmegu, Kitsune Robyn, Dragon lord, Shooter1344, Alexander, Ajax Roranson, trey, Asaf, DJC, $hane-08, Daniel, nighnight, decimator, Roswell, SpeX, Smoking_ash12, Giorgie Baramidze, Kyan Christian, Professor Xivass, AF360!

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