Chapter 2: Hold up... what?

let's turn the dial back a bit so we can understand what's going on. in the cold steel of the brig a lone child sat nestled between 2 massive pipes a small alcove that he called home. left alone by everyone who was too busy saving themselves to care for a poor boy left all alone. he made his way sneeking through the corridors of cold dead grey on little adventures of his own only his overactive imagination to comfort him. it's not that he was abandoned or anything no his reality was far worse than that, he simply had no aptitude making him worthless in others eyes. the others walked stiffly with purpose to bring about greatness to the colony, desensitized by the nano machines that filled their brains and moved them like puppets. with no will of their own they moved like ants carrying out all the tasks asked of them, barely flavord slop dropped to their trays and they gobbled that shit down like it was a five coarse feast. his body was too weak to go through the stress of the nanobot transplant without dieing painfully. so like any functioning society they cast him out for being different, for being able to think for himself. He spent his days hiding from patrols waiting to throw him out onto the blistering hot, baren sands of his homeworld. he scraped together what little things he could salvage from s caps and garbage left from the kitchen. surprising the food he found in the garbage heaps was mildly better than the slop fed to the common worker.'must be the scraps of the higher ups' he thought the common masses treated like disposable cattle. each one a highly train machine mor powerful than he could ever hope to be, the price of such an incredible rise in power being their own humanity. he sat upon a pile of rough woven sacks and threadbare sheets, junk and peices of old machines hanging from the walls. in his hands was the favorite of his inventions, made from a rare antique he found in the scrap dumps in the Bowles of the cold steely colony. an old radio that still had a track buried inside its playes slot he ripped out of an old stereo system. the old vcr tape was worn and scratched requiring thurough cleaning and splicing on his part to return it to a somewhat functional state. the dull hum and scratchy sound of it's music was soothing to him. it was magical in its purest sense he listened to it slowly play in his hands,voices filled with excitement and hope the words a melody that soothed him to sleep but it was not to be. one day in the quiet halls of the brig a group of armored personnel stomped their ways through the halls. gleaming with a cold blackish grey metal, their Armour, with sharp lines and angles jutting out just enough to provide maximum protection without sacrificing mobility. the figures of the 10 sentinels on patrol were almost identical their heads covered with a grey helmet its front half covered in a large split of blackened tinted glass to protect their brains, all except of course the lone woman in front. her hair auburn like a setting sun with great streets of pale orange and purple doting the undertones of her hair. her pointed jaw adorned by a single longways scar from her left ear all the way to the cusp of her neck. her eyes oddly vibrant and filled with something not so mechanical and dead. suddenly they all paused hearing a faint allmost non-existant sound ring out through the corridor the hum of music, something so forgen in the sound dead halls. all 10 of the sentinels quickly turned with the firey woman whose hair rung of a setting sun at their helm. they faced 2 giant vertical pipes carrying water and other fluids was a gap from which a quiet wisp of light poured out just enough to make out a worn away alcove. suddenly a forget heat signature was registered by the sentinels all but the woman talking in unison a cold dead monotone voice."intruder detected Initiate protocol B-27 eliminate threat." the woman's eyes had become fixated on the small figure of a boy no more than 14 curled around the box making the light and sound. engrossed in his figure while some semblance of forgotten emotion ran through her she almost did not hear the others words. pulled back by their monotone cold voice she quickly recoiled and screeched at the top of her lungs "HOLD YOUR FIRE!!"guns trained to kill the sleeping figure quickly fell back to their sides, and the boy who was just startled awake by her booming voice began shivering in terror. To him they marked his end they would kill him and toss away his corpse to feed the flames in the power core not even ashes to remain. the woman forced herself through the much too small opening into the hollow the boy called home. her sparkling hair like a fire threatening to burn away all his hope and hard work. her piercing gaze landed upon his most prized possession the box that sat in his hands. an amalgamation of all the 'best' things he could find, it's top side contained a nano particle accelerator pulled off a old ship and repaired to power his 'home' wires sprung off of it like cords reaching an old lamp and a few small display screens covered in line upon line of code and schematics of tools and parts. home made tools scattered across the floor and mismatched inventions hung from ever surface in this small room. the other sides of the cube were covered in patterns and intake holes, on its right side lied the source of the noise, an old mp3 and vhs player with a lone small speaker releasing the noise. the bottom of the cube covered in controls and buttons,dials, and knows that pulled themselves back into the cube and pushed out at seemingly random intervals."Boy what is all this did you make it?..." her deadpan tone flowed over the boy making him only weakly nod unable to pull himself together under the gaze of a sentinel captain. His body shuddered as her gaze fell over his creations that filled the room and the black box filled with inscribed runes and patters that covered its surface."Get up boy your time in hiding is up... come quietly before we put you out of your misery." her voice like nails against a chalkboard sending his whole world tumbling down he slowly crawled to his feet. a firm hand held his shoulder and pushed him out of his hiding place and forcing him down the corridor. a quick glance back at the room watching the sentinels pry their way into his home ransacked it and tearing his creations from the walls. the wires connected to the box tugged at him trying to pull away his only possession left in his hands. through a force of sheer will his pull snapped the wires leaving the box in his hands and the once bright room to die of it's light and color. the wired limply dragged across the floor before the box itself reeled them back inside itself after detecting the cease of energy flow. the box dimmed as he was forced through the endless corridors of the brig, it's life and music grew quiet leaving the only light it produced a faint glow from the shining ring of cyan particles flashing faster than the eye could see impeded in the boxes top face. As he was forced down the corridors by the female gard captain she stayed quiet contemplating her reasons for saving this boy from his instant animation. 'was it pity? no such emotions are futile its confusing why did I do that?"in some revelation of the final wisps of morality or motherly love she shattered her emotionless bindings in her mind if naught for a second. she overcome with some mysterious force seized the child and his machines and now was going off course from her predetermined patrol route. an unexeptable violation of orders that might have her head if proved meaningless. she dearly wished for mercy from their lord as she came upon the grand double doors of black stone that were carved with runes and patters that seemed to even pull in the light around them. it was their lords chambers, with a light knock a booming voice came from the other side."Come In This BetteR BE GOOD!"his words tensed on the last part sending shudders down both their spines as they walked into the grand throne room. great pillars of blackened steel rose up to holt the ceiling almost 100ft above them.a pale yellow orange liquid flowing through clear piped that adorned the ceiling and walls shone light onto the gargantuan roughly hewed throne of cold metal their leader sat upon. his fingers laced tightly together just below his mouth his eyes not amused by the unwelcome intrusion of his throne room. his grayed skin from so many years of mechanical mutation and his figure larger than any mortal man sat atop his cold throne. his chilling voice stabbed like daggers into the small ants called people that lied before him."Vessi You Best Have An explanation for your insubordination lest I end you right here." his hands tensed as he cracked his knuckles the sound resounded throughout the quiet hall slaping the boy and Vessi out of their stupor. she quickly dropped to her knees her hand grabbing the back of the boys he'd forcing him quickly to the floor. "My Leige I have brought with me a rat we found crawling through the hollows of the ship."sweat trailed down her forehead as the child beside her began quivering cluching onto the black box as tightly as he could. to him this box was like the family he never had and the love that existed naught a place in this cold dead world of metal and bolts. it sang him to sleep comforted him when he wanted to cry, it gave him light in the darkness and allowed him to see the hope in this God forsaken world."That still does not explain why you are here without orders do our rules mean nothing to you you BRATTY GIRL" his anger only flared after she spoke her words worth naught to him only her task of disobeying orders. her insubordination mad him want to strike her down this very instant. the yellow glow of his eyes sharply increasing and becoming brighter as his rage fostered within him.