By David C. Daoust
Craiden awoke in a heap; his head was still pounding, though far worse than it had when he awoke that morning. He found himself in the corner of the tipped Personnel Carrier. It was dark, he could hear others moving about outside, his right arm sore, and he thought he may have a broken rib or two. The oily mucus though, seemed to be brought into check by the meds his mother had found him, which was a plus…
He had to assume a drone had targeted the APC.
This was the second wrecked vehicle he had to climb from since the day began. He found his mother, still breathing, though lying at an unusual angle, the rolled tank having deposited her unconscious form any which way it wanted.
Craiden was unable to wake her, so began to pull her out of the vehicle with him. Half crawling from the wreckage, he did his best to move his mother along with him. Once he made it to the door he collapsed onto it, and pushed himself out on his back.
The light stung his eye, or maybe the smoke and debris that filled the air. It took a moment for his eyes to adjust. Though when they did, he found the massive form of Vincent standing lifeless over the rolled APC, Craiden could only imagine what Vincent was doing there. A pair of soldiers seemed to be taking stock of their situation, as the dark haired stranger that helped them from their land speeder stood talking to a young girl. Craiden remembered his name was Colin.
“Ok, are you ready?” the girl asked Colin, “Just do it quick like, and don’t let anybody see how you did it.”
“I’m not sure I want to do this.” He said back to her.
“What? It was your idea!” she shot back, as though absurd.
“I know, ok, ok…” Colin said with his back to Craiden, and then made a large jerking movement followed by a rather unusual clicking noise. As Colin moved back around, the young girl was standing unnaturally still. Craiden had no idea what he had just witnessed. The girl’s eyes were wide, mouth still. Where once stood an emotive young girl, was now a frightfully lifeless statue.
It was not until Craiden noticed the small data sphere in Colin’s hand that he figured out that this girl was another bot. He’d never seen a bot so lifelike, though had swapped out Vincent’s data sphere enough to recognize what was going on. He wasn’t sure how he felt about them requisitioning Vincent’s form, though the situation was dire enough, and the pain in his head was bad enough, that he did not make protest as Colin climbed up and stuck the girl’s data sphere into the massive mining-bot, and forced the pedestal back down into the body.
The whole machine sprang to life, knocking Colin back to the ground as Margo began moving around oddly.
“Wow,” the young girl’s voice came out of the colossal form, “its weird being big!”
It was weird for Craiden to hear the girl’s voice in place of the rough gravelly voice he had come accustomed to growing up. She stretched as high as she could and then dropped into a crouch to test her joints. Rolling her shoulders, Craiden thought she may start a workout routine then and there.
“Who’s a little girl now, Onion!” Margo said with a laugh.
“Alright, alright,” Colin said as she picked a stray girder from the rubble and bent it in her hands, “You just need to right the APC, so we can see if we can get out of here.”
“Right!” Margo said, punching her fist into her hand, with remarkable force, Craiden noticed her wince as a result, “Ouch…
“Easy-peasy though!” she said as she turned on the flipped Carrier.
Craiden finally got to his feet just as Colin spotted him.
The two men managed to pull Mari out of the carrier. All else would have to wait until the vehicle was righted. Craiden found himself hoping no one else was harmed, as most of this madness was largely on his shoulders. The pounding in his head, pain throbbing in his side, and worrying about his unconscious mother made the whole ‘little bit of chaos thing’ a bit tiring…
