|Blaza's POV|

I tripped on a rock and landed face flat.

Ouch.

That caused a bot to investigate the noise.

That was fine.

The bot may or might've seen me duck behind a corner.

It's a chance that they saw you.

"2z/ 3z/ 4tw/ 4s/ 5t/ 1z/ 1tw/ 4s/—"
The bot chittered in their language that I couldn't understand.

Maybe this is fine, it's not like they know that I'm—

The city lit up in red and more chittering and computery noises blasted everywhere. My heart skipped. I heard the two bots positioned at the museum moving towards to where they last seen me.

Oh crap.

I dashed back further in the corner to enter an alleyway, I tightened on my oxygen tank and mask as I ran. Everywhere was just filled with toxicated air and filth, people could barely breathe down here anymore. That's why I had to make sure the mask wouldn't loosen while I ran and hid behind a large garbage bin.

"4tw/ 2s/ 2z/ 4z/. 5s/ 1t/ 5tw"

There were so many bots coming in and out of their lairs now. Their chittering and computery sounds became more frequent and loud. I took out a rusted circular necklace attached to my suit and clutched the ends of it.
A cold breeze of wind blew on my face as the air chilled around me. A smoke of cloud appeared out of the center of the necklace, and a figure, all transparent and slightly blue wearing a lab coat and a worn cyan costume faced me.

"Oh what did you do this time Blaza?"

The ghost spoke, their voice whispery and echoey while they looked around and saw the bots marching and searching through each corner of the city. The lights flashing red, cameras surveying.

"So... uh... Meme... I may or may not have attracted some bots earlier.... and nowIneedhelpbreakingintothemuseum."

I said those words quickly and smiled nervously at Meme. Meme let out an exasperated sigh and floated down next to me.

"You're not going to leave that thing alone are you?"

I shook my head.

"Nope."

"And what would you do for me if I helped you now in this desperate moment?"

He added a dramatic tone at the word desperate.

"I'll make you cookies!"

I offered. But Meme deadpanned.

"Are you serious? Cookies don't exist anymore and I'm dead."

He pointed at a bullet hole where his heart used to be.

"Fine, I'll let you play with my origamis to spook people with."

I rolled my eyes and sighed.

"Now that,"

He flew up in the air with glee.

"Is a good deal."

He laughed and exasperated into small steams of smoke and flew to a nearby group of bots. I took a peek at his direction from my hiding spot to see four bots already kneeling on the ground, twitching.

I don't know how Meme does this every single time but hey, at least it works for a while. I took this chance to get up and go past the bots, one of the bots spotted me and struggled to grab hold of their gun.

"Ooh, dont mind me taking this!"

I took the gun that the bot was trying to grab and ran into the other side of the street. When I took a glance back, I saw the mist surrounding the bots disappear and Meme floating right beside me.

"Phew, that's as long as I can hold them. And come on, you can go faster than that."

He floated in front of me and yawned.

"It's not like I can fly like you can I?"

I pointed at Meme'a transparent ghostly form.

"If you don't go any faster, I think you'll be joining me instead."

He snickered, his hands rested on the back of his head.

"You don't have to say it like that-"

I ran into an unsuspecting bot. I fell backwards and the bot balanced themselves before clumsily taking out a gun of their own and pointed it to my forehead.

"Intruder, you are instructed to stay where you are. You have been found. This situation can be dealt in a peaceful manner or a brutal manner."

The bot loaded the gun as I slowly stood up with both of my hands up.

"Okay... okay... ya got me."

I heard couple more bots coming from behind. Meme quickly grabbed a pebble from the ground and threw it at the bot that pointed their gun at me.

"BLAZA YOU BETTER RUN FASTER OR ELSE THEY WILL GET YOU."

Meme yelled and continued to throw pebbles at the bot, making them flinch and accidentally pulling the trigger. I ducked to the side and continued to run forward. I heard the laser hit another bot from behind, making a shut down whirring noise.

One down, thousands more to go.

I thought bitterly. There's just seemed to be so many of them! I ran faster and took a sharp turn into a street, my heart raced and my breath quickened. I wasn't sure how long I could outrun them for long.
If I remembered right, there should be a tunnel entrance not so far from where I was at...

BE BEEPP

A vehicle jerked up and stopped in the middle of the road, I didn't bother to look at anything else but the entrance to the tunnel. There was another alley way with cardboard boxes and junk. There was a garbage bin with the symbol I was looking for:

An arrow pointed downwards.

I heard lasers shooting behind me and the bots reaching out to grab me. I zigzagged my way to dodge all the bots' attacks and knocked over the pile of cardboard boxes to the street before going inside of the garbage bin.

This tunnel's going to be closed now.

My hands nearly slipped from the bars of the ladder I was holding onto when I went into the trash bin. I gripped on the gun that I stole from a bot earlier and climbed down the ladder to land on a smooth surface.

I stopped for a second there and took a breather before I was going to run again. I rested my head against the gray concrete walls and breathed in through my mask. I didn't have much oxygen left in the tank but I wasn't going to go back because of that. I was so close. Very close in finding what I needed.

Ba beep

I heard something land right behind me, I whipped around and without looking, shot whoever just entered the tunnel. I heard my shot miss and for a split second, a small green beam hit my shoulder.
When the beam hit, blood spilled from the newly formed wound and I stumbled to my knees. I placed a hand to the bleeding wound and looked up.
It was another bot, wearing a black suit with orange colored designs. Their eyes gleamed red behind their half gas mask.

Oh Nonono not like this...

I scrambled back up and pulled the trigger on the gun again, shooting another laser at the incoming bot. The bot easily dodged it and turned its weapon to a taser to shoot me with. I threw the gun at their face before they even had the chance to shoot and kept running despite the pain erupting from my shoulder.
Blood seeped from my suit as I kept running. I heard the bot repositioning themselves and shot another beam of bolts at me. Just as the bolts were about to hit me, a large gust of wind suddenly appeared and blocked my view, swallowing me into the seemingly endless pits of clouds.

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