MARKI5578 Part 5

I stared at the slabs for what might have been hours. I wasn't keeping track. There had been a few more mechanicals aside from me that woke up in the scrap field. The red metal sign was from another civilization entirely. There were probably other mechanicals there, shut off. There might be some inside of the metal slabs I was standing by. I wanted to know what happened to the previous people that occupied this city before Tower designed this one.

I wanted to know what happened to me.

There was no information about me that I didn't already study. I thought about my old coworker. I wanted to know where they had gone. I wanted to know why YT119U said things to me. They would be able to tell me something. The thought of being near them didn't comfort me, but I didn't know why I wouldn't want to see them. I had no idea how to get in touch with them again. I was given no information about that.

I eventually decided to go to my chamber. There was nothing else to do. I didn't have any reason not to follow my schedule. I didn't even know how to feel about my thoughts. I wasn't used to being able to feel. I wasn't even sure if that was the thing making me confused. I wasn't sure about anything in that moment.

There were other mechanicals nearby who did not notice my slight panicking. They could only see my physical form walking around. I wanted one of them to distract me.

A loud sharp boom shot off near me and I fell to the ground. A few lesser cracking sounds followed. I stayed on the ground motionless until I was approached by one of the low creeping four legged mechanicals. They gave me a list of instructions after examining me. I watched them get closer to the source of the sounds and examine other mechanicals. They were also laying motionless on the ground.

I stood up and noticed warnings flooding my news feed. I turned the app off and focused on following the directions given to me. When I reached the place my list informed me to go, I was ushered in to a room and had the door closed behind me. I was told to remain until someone came to question me.

There was a place beneath my chest that had been scraped off. I examined it and came to the conclusion that I was incapable of repairing it without tools. Luckily it was nothing that couldn't wait. An event like this had never happened before. Or at least, not that I knew of. I searched for similar instances and caught information about the religious group again. My mind buzzed. An information group based on sharing their knowledge was also focused on attacks. That made no sense to me.

Someone walked into the room. They were something I had yet to encounter. A very simply shaped biped. They had a very thin structure and very smooth edges. They were taller than me, but definitely smaller in every other way. I could see that they had one pulsating light on their chest and their coloring was reminding me of Tower.

They demanded I stand there and allow them to examine me without a fuss. I did so. They put their hand on my face plate for a few minutes and I remained still. They seemed to be done with their objective and loosened in posture.

Then they grabbed my sides and examined my abdomen where the top layer had been removed.

“We will get that patched immediately,” they said, almost happily. They stood straight again and had another mechanicals come in to 'patch' me. When they were done I had a new layer of softer material where the hole was. The color did not match the rest of me and they apologized before telling me to return to my chamber and continue the rest of my week as usual. The idea of being in my chamber comforted me and I left quickly.

On my way, I saw the place that was attacked. The area was blocked off and being covered by canvas. There were quadrupeds guarding it on every side. I couldn't see any of the damage. Nobody smart would want to stay too long, I thought. Those smaller mechanicals didn't look intimidating, but there was something off about them.

In my chamber, I could see the blasted area as my door closed. I plugged into the system and searched for all information regarding what had happened. According to my findings, there were four other attacks which happened at the same time. Witnesses claimed there had been one mechanical at each site that got to their positions and stood until there was a blast. They had been turned into bombs. I marveled at the thought of someone allowing themself to be destroyed in that way. My confusion only grew as I realized this attack was meant to cause harm. There were plenty of mechanicals injured in the event, but there were also some that went permanently offline. There had been fire caused by the attacks that were fueled even more by the state of the air. I couldn't figure out the reason behind wanting to do anything like this.

I stopped searching and listened to the very soft humming noises that came from the power station that was my chamber. I didn't know if I could keep up with the amount of energy it took to process all the new information that was being shared. I decided it was better to ignore it until I was finished charging and let myself go into standby.

The next day I ignored all information being passed around. I wanted to focus on my work. There I was reminded of my personal discoveries and all the questions I had that would never be answered. My coworker was in a good mood, even though they made a few mentions of the attacks. It didn't bother them. I decided it couldn't be helped and that I was bound to get over the fears I had eventually. So that evening I did as much research as I could about the past few days.

It was apparent that all of these attacks were definitely from those infected with religion. There were images of known religious mechanicals being contained. There were plans of having software removed or replaced, but nothing was permanently decided on. I wondered if my acquaintances were part of those who had been captured. The thought of not being able to discuss my questions with YT119U caused irritation.

I considered that if they were involved with the attacks I would have to return some kind of favor for scraping my abdomen. The thought wasn't able to comfort me. Then I wondered if they had been one of the mechanicals that were turned into bombs. There would be no chance of learning about my previous life if that were the case.

I remembered that they had wanted to show me something. I couldn't figure out what that was supposed to be. They never told me the entire story. It was something about Tower. At that moment I realized that I didn't remember how I knew that YT119U was religious. I thought about the last time I was with them. I remembered they had promised to take me to see my old coworker.

The door to my chamber opened and I unplugged myself. Being in such a cramped space had become unbearable. I recalled the last time I saw them and their friend. They did something to me. I remembered being in the Hallway of Knowledge and following them around. We went into a room and they were acting strangely. That was when other mechanicals grabbed me and held me to the floor. I was incapable of fighting back, either because I didn't think to or because they had made it impossible to.

YT119U had left the room and me with these other mechanicals. The last thing I could recall was being put in hibernation and waking up in my chamber the next day. I turned around and stared at it. Part of me wanted to get back in and try to think about what I was remembering, but something in my processes urged me to walk. I was going to the Hallway of Knowledge to figure out what had been done to me.

That time of the night had caused the atmosphere to be darker and colder. I realized that it was similar to the night I went out with YT119U and my friend for the first time. Those two seemed to be very familiar with each other. I wondered if YT119U had known our friend wouldn't be in the religious building. The idea that they had lied to me was highly frustrating.

As I approached the area where the building was, I noticed a four legged mechanical walking around. I crept up to the clearing slowly. They saw me before continuing their patrol. There were more of those mechanicals surrounding the over sized door. The curtains past it had been removed or pushed to the side. There were canvases being out around this building like there had been for the places that were attacked, but there were no signs of damage here.

No entry was allowed into the building and everyone that frequented that place was probably being held with the other religious people. Hopefully nobody had seen me there the other night. By the way the patrolling mechanicals acted, they could care less about me.

Disappointment, I decided to investigate another place that was bombed. It was nearby and I was nowhere close to needing rest. YT119U was somewhere. I did not know where, but I knew they weren't being held somewhere. They couldn't be. I had a need for them that I felt was more important than Tower interrogating terrorists.

The place I was headed was where I had been taken on my first viewing of the city. It was past Tower, right before the buildings merged into a giant maze of hallways. There had been canvas tents thrown around there too, to cover everything unseemly. Nobody else was here. I considered that maybe they were done finding suspects. Most mechanicals would simply follow orders and completely avoid the damaged buildings. I was not content with not knowing what had happened and remained determined.

There was no reason to investigate the areas. I knew that, but seeing those places was at least better than waiting for morning in my chamber.

I was slightly startled by another mechanical's presence. The stranger was big. I estimated that they were almost a dozen feet high. I didn't count the rods coming from their shoulders. Although they were biped, their legs were fashioned differently from my own. I had seen some like that before, but only on smaller citizen mechanicals. They were also analyzing the wreckage and seemed surprised to find someone else there.

Before we could exchange words, they turned and walked back to the other side of the building. I followed but made it around the entire building before realizing that they had left. That stranger hadn't been the most complicated or strangely shaped person that I had ever seen, but something about their size didn't seem normal.

I considered that they might be from parts of the city I had never entered before. There might be areas that need larger bodies for construction instead of using vehicles. The thought had occurred to me in the past that certain hardware upgrades would be more efficient than driving other machines in the scrap field. I had long since decided it wasn't an efficiency matter but a matter of using what was already provided. The newer parts of the city were capable of having specialty mechanicals as residents.

I realized that I had stopped focusing on my objective. Although I strongly felt the need for tracking down YT119U, I pointed out to myself the inefficiency of wasting time and energy with the way I had not planned my search. I turned around and started going back.

I passed Tower on my way and stopped only for a moment before continuing. They were exactly how they had always been since I saw them. Dwarfing the rest of the city with ease. Possibly being hit by wind and other types of weather at the very top. Knowing that there was a constant, unchanging protection took away most of my other concerns for that night. Tower wasn't something I could find myself questioning, but I could not give up my search for answers.