Champion of the Bots ✔️

Chapter 19 ~ TOB

The Bot awoke to the sounds of clinks and clanks and cling-clangs.

"Let go of me! Get off!" A voice shouted and penetrated through the Bot's fuzziness as he sat up bemused and saw Rena kicking and heaving off two bulky guards.

"Hey!" The Bot shouted. "Let her go. She's mine!" He growled the last sentence, walking to the prison bars and attempting to rip them apart. He couldn't.

The two guards halted, so did Rena. Muttering, the taller guard pointed at the Bot to his stout companion and stalked towards the prison cell.

"Come," the man stated simply, unlocking the metal gate and pulling the Bot on his sleeve with his scarred fingers.

The Bot could've knocked the two men down—but he didn't. He scanned the two simpleton's minds and saw no need to. After all, he was with the girl now; all he needed to do now was find a way out.

Locking eyes with the girl, the Bot smiled politely as they walked in front of the guards, their chains jangling in a unsynchronized rhythm. She huffed away, her hair flopping onto her face. Her chains jingled as she attempted to swipe the stray hair off her sticky lips. The Bot chuckled softly and reached up to the girl's cheek—

"Get in," the shorter man with thinning hair barked out. "They're waiting for you."

The two chained prisoners entered a high-ceiling room with golden drapery and with a dozen people sitting on a white long table covered with steaming food. A man in a wheelchair sat at the top of the table, beckoning them to come in with his large hands.

The Bot could clearly scan him now—blonde hair peppered with grey, piercing blue eyes, button nose, lazy smile; but as the scanner reached his legs, the Bot could see the shriveled injury that seemed to eat away his body. The Bot almost lost his appetite. Almost.

"Have a seat," he gestured further to two velvet seats with golden lining. Glittering silverware sparkled underneath the bright chandelier and beside expensive dish ware. It seemed like a disgrace to eat upon such finery, smearing chicken grease and meatball-sauce-coated-spaghetti and white coleslaw and fried noodles and so much more food that the Bot couldn't wait to gulp down.

He took a step to the soft seat—

Rena gripped his arm. The Bot's eyebrows furrowed as Rena proclaimed, "Who are you?"

The people stopped eating and stared at Rena then at the Bot then at the man at the head of the table.

"Okay. Why don't we eat first?" The man suggested. "You must be famished."

"I sure am, after you just locked us in your stinking prison right when we got on your balloon... thing!

The Bot nodded mutely, remembering the sudden tackle of bodies and something sharp and something hard that knocked him out.

"I really am sorry." The man snaked down a string of noodle. "But we had to make sure you weren't spies of Eden."

"Eden?" Rena perked up. "You're against Eden, too?"

The Bot pricked his ears up and felt his insides rumbling.

"I am a Survivor," Rena exclaimed, bringing a hand to her heart. "I am—well... I was on the Savior."