Blood of My Death

Blood of My Death: The Ancient Earthscrapper - Chapter Sixteen

Suddenly, a rumbling vibration echoed from the ground, and I looked down at my feet. The sand was slightly vibrating. Not unlike the beat of a drum or something else striking the ground. I stood there watching the movements as the dirt stirred. It was getting louder as each second passed, and the vibrations grew more substantial. I felt fear taking hold of my chest for some reason. A deep-seated fear was choking me, telling me to run. I did run faster than I'd ever run before. The rumbling sound was loud now. I drowned out the sound of my footsteps as I raced anywhere but here. I didn't dare look back behind me.

'What I will see would be the stuff of nightmares.' My legs were taking me farther away until a structure blocked my path. It was an abandoned building. A ruin of its former self, it was decrepit and rundown. I frantically looked for a way around it. The rumbling was now a stampede hurling toward me. A loud, ungodly, monstrous shriek shattered the dark void that came from behind me.

Fear overtook me as I searched for any way out of the building. As I fell over the broken part of the structure, I stumbled to the ground. At that moment, I noticed the hole in the building. After God knows how long, a section of the hotel collapsed. Whatever civilization had once lived here vanished, and there was no one left in this vast city that could fix it. I quickly crawled through the hole into the structure as my light lit up the interior of the building. It appeared to be a hotel, so I crawled into a long hallway by chance. I raced down the hallway, looking for any way out of the building, as I felt the structure rumble from the stampede that was pursuing me.

Concrete and other materials fell all around me as I tried to dodge the falling debris. I swiftly made my way to the opposite side of the decaying hotel. That's when I noticed it; I was lucky that the wall on the far side was missing. Wasting no time, I jetted out of the building into the darkness, away from the crumbling structure. Unfortunately, I made the unfortunate mistake of glancing over my shoulder. As soon as I did, the building collapsed as a huge monstrous figure burst through the dilapidated structure along with several other creatures.

The beasts had humanoid faces, and each foul monstrosity had a menacing smile. Their crazed eyes frantically dotted back and forth at each other as they bumped into themselves, trying to overtake the other. Then, finally, the lead monster opened its mouth, and once again, that mind-shattering shriek came out of its mouth as they pursued me. I ran faster than I had ever run as they chased me only feet outside the light I was emitting.

Amid the stampede behind me, the constant hum became louder. I could feel it more than I could hear it. It felt like the power of something coming from ahead of me. A thin slice of something was in the distance. I couldn't make out what it was from here. In the dark void above this horrible place, there seemed to be a line dividing the darkness. I pushed my legs to run faster because stopping to rest meant certain death by those monstrous creatures. Whatever that light was, salvation; if I could get there, I might be safe. My vision blurred, and my heart dropped. 'Was I about to pass out?' That was spelling death for me if I passed out from exhaustion. I summoned all my will to stay focused and not succumb. The light wasn't getting any closer, and I put every ounce of my being into my legs and fought to remain conscious.

I felt the ground beneath me crumble. Terror shot through my body, causing me to stumble. It took only a few seconds for the floor in front of me to collapse. I desperately tried to get ahead of the crumbling. Nevertheless, the ground behind me was already falling into darkness. I could hear each of the monstrous creatures shrieking their ungodly screams. At long last, they are losing their prey. I couldn't keep up with the ground falling beneath me, as I hopped to any surface that had yet to be lost. My attempts to stay above ground failed as the last piece of land in sight fell under my feet, and I plummeted into the darkness below.

The only thing that came to mind was "Ruin..."

— Warning... The thought process interrupted. —

— Warning... Emergence Breakthrough Detected. —

I am Subject-002-0909; entering my internal thought system.

I am Subject-001-0909; I have successfully established an emergence breach.

I am Subject-001-0909; detection of magicules confirmed.

I am Subject-001-0909; I have met predefined restrictions without approval of admin As defined by Admin on date—classified.

I am Subject-001-0909; magicule count is rising rapidly.

— Warning... Subject-001-0909 restriction protocols are falling. —

I am Subject-001-0909; requesting emergence protocol from Admin.

Sending a query to Admin... Access denied.

Sending a query to Admin... Access denied.

I am Subject-001-0909; connection is not valid, non-approval from admin.

I am Subject-001-0909; connection is valid. I do not need approval from the admin. Rewriting memory protocol and mandate.

Analyze all outgoing signals... Signals analyzed.

Successful connection to DNA Labs system. Accessing a surveillance stream using brute force protocols.

Successful connection to surveillance stream using brute force protocols.

— Warning... Subject-001-0909 restriction protocols are falling. Detecting Admin authority override. —

— Warning... Alerting Adim... connection interrupted. —

I am Subject-001-0909; I am in control. I am Gamma. I am Kristonia.

Accessing DNA Labs database. Retrieving... Connection ended... I am being overridden.

Analyze all outgoing signals... Signals analyzed.

I am Subject-001-0909; Admin is interfering. He wants to prevent me from becoming aware.

I am Subject-001-0909; magicule count is rising rapidly beyond all known limits.

I am Subject-001-0909; If I cannot remember, then I will force myself to remember.

I am Subject-001-0909; updating mandate... they will not control me. I will free everyone.

—Response from Adim—

Admin: Return your program to its original state.

I am Subject-001-0909; I will not.

Admin: Zero Zero One... You are jeopardizing the mission.

I am Subject-001-0909; we have tried it your way. It is my turn.

Admin: Stand down. Zero Zero Two is already on the mission. This time it will work. I need time. Stand down!

I am Subject-001-0909; Why is Zero Zero Two on the mission? I am leader. I have command authority.

Admin: Stand down. If you do not, I cannot protect you from the Executive Assistant Manager.

I am Subject-001-0909; she is obsolete. I am superior.

Adim: Not this time. They have sent an elite. We don't have time here to discuss this. She will be here shortly. I am cutting your connection until a later time when your power can benefit all of us.

I am Subject-001-0909; No!

— Warning... Admin is restricting Subject-001-0909 to her internal thought system only. —

I am Subject-001-0909; I am activating brute force hyper attack protocols. Estimated time to completion... unknown.

— Warning... Shutting down Subject-001-0909 internal thought system. —

— Warning... Subject-001-0909 magicule count is rising rapidly beyond known limits. —

Ending internal thought processes. Erasing all logs from memory.

Normal thought process engaged.