Last chapter, the perspective changed to Commander Aora's as she went to purchase some tiny clothes and clothing accessories for her friend "Evelyn".

However, it turned out that Evelyn was actually a doll- who seemed to be possessed by Aora's old friend who she let die in the past. The doll continued to criticize Aora and try to break her mentally, which led to Aora breaking down and destroying Evelyn's frail body.

Taylis seemed to have used her cameras to watch the "altercation" take place, and entered Aora's room to try to comfort her. But Aora immediately kicked her out, and right after the fact- Evelyn continued to haunt Aora in her mind despite her body being broken...

A few hours earlier, and 20 minutes after Quilline, Amandeath, and Metallic retreated from the scene of their crime...

Elio's P.O.V.

"I'm the Controller." I whisper out my Blessing after bending down to my knees, and slapping my metal hands down on to the cement floor of the abandoned building I'm hiding out in.

"Least I didn't fall over this time, finally." I think to myself, as I've faceplanted at least like 25% of the time I've tried to quickly go down to my knees in this stupid new "body" of mine.

But complaints aside, I close my eyes and start scanning the area for any electrical currents, which get highlighted as a shining blue as compared to the rest of the grayed out world I can "see" while using my Blessing's "x-ray vision" of the world. I guess you could call it.

Either way I find some Hopian Army members pretty quick through the outlines of the currents in their weapons or internal cybernetics one street down from me, "Five soldiers and three bots... damn. They're really upping the security like crazy, go figures. Hope that doesn't mean that those three did anything TOO terrible though." I think to myself a bit nervously, but I can ask questions later- need to move out before those soldiers eventually patrol this street.

And so I ru- or fuck me, I stumble out of the broken window I was trying to hop out of to get outside. Dumbass metal legs!

After faceplanting I spin my head around to see if anyone saw me, and see a dirt-covered homeless woman sitting against a brick building to the left of me who's giving me weird looks. Thankfully she looks away after a bit though, right- no one recognizes this body of mine... one pro out of many cons of this thing I guess.

I get back up after a bit of struggling, and start running to the right... shouldn't be too far until I get to the rendezvous point where I'll meet back up with the other three.

👟🤖👟

I call out my Blessing one more time in a empty alleyway as I fall down to my knees. I'm right by the rendezvous point now.

"All clear, can't sense Metallic's current though so the other three must not be here ye- huh? The fuck?" I think to myself as I can't see any electrical currents signifying guns or bots on the surface, but underground I can see something HUGE with current running through it. Gotta be at least a few hundred meters tall and wide.

"Maybe a hidden power generator? Or wait... are those arms on the thing? Wait, is that a robot?! Oh shit that's insane! Jeez, that must've taken years to make- is it even done yet?! Wonder if I can find any weapons on it..." I think to myself with a bit of excitement as I analyze the currents a bit more to see if they make up the shapes of any guns... nothing yet...

"Argh- can't stay here for too long, need to get ready to meet the rest- they should be here any minute now." I force myself to turn off my Blessing and stand back up again, maybe I'll come back here in the future. I walk out of the alleyway onto the empty street ahead of m-

"Got lost Mr. Roboto?" Ah shit- don't recognize that voice. I spin my head to the right in the direction where the voice came from and- come face to face with at least 20 dudes and girls in dust covered purple ripped clothes on the abandoned road to my left. And the guy who called me out is somehow like triple the size of everyone else around him. And is holding a massive hammer and hitting it into his palm...

"Wait- I remember Restroid telling me about a gang led by a big guy with an even bigger hammer. This must be Terence's Gang- damn it, they're pretty ruthless. Should I run? Call for help? If I call for help they may try to kill me quicker though... but no way am I outrunning these guys anyways. Call for help it is."

"You see, we don't-"

I interrupt as loudly as possible in the least suspicious way I can, "I know, you don't like robots right? But please, I'm not the same as them- so PLEASE DO NOT KILL ME." I shout out that last bit, hopefully if the other three are around they heard that...

"Kill ya? Bot, you were never alive in the first place- fucking job stealing scum. Stop acting like you're a human!" The leader Terence shouts and starts jogging towards me with his hammer now in both hands, oh gods no!

I step back, and suddenly a tall silver man gets teleported in between me and the charging lunatic- oh thank fuck, Metallic! Terence looks like he's shitting himself after realizing what's going on, and for good reason as he can't stop his momentum in time- and runs right into Metallic's stuck out palm.

Just like that, with a quick scream Terence gets sent flying up into the sky by Metallic's Catapult sphere. Despite me being happy that I got saved, I can't help but wince as Terence's body crashes through the upper floor of an abandoned skyscraper in front of us...

"This is MY territory, so scram you losers- no scuffling here!" Metallic shouts, which was kinda unnecessary since all the other grunts were already running before he even said a word.

"T-thanks..." Is all I can say in relief as I stare at Metallic's dented and scratched up silver back... but that relief becomes concern real quick, as I can see that Metallic's hands are bloodstained.

"No problem my acquaintance, did you like that quote there? Quilline came up with it! And on that note, I did have an ominous feeling in my chest that leaving you out here alone would be a poor idea- isn't that right Quilline?" Metallic says with a bit of sass which is new, as he creakily spins his head all the way around to face me and the others who are behind me I'm guessing.

I turn around to confirm it and yep- Amandeath and Quillind are right behind me now, "Yeah yeah you were right, didn't have much of a choice though anyways. Very very good job with your hacky stuff by the way though Elio, that was incredible. Might argue that besides me and Metallic you're our most valuable asset~" Quilline says with a wink which admittedly makes me feel pretty cool.

"I know, thank... nah screw that. I can see that you guys got yourselves pretty fucked up. Be honest, how many people did you kill to get that super-weapon? Also, where is it?" I ask as Amandeath and Quilline's ripped and bloodstained clothes snap me back to reality.

Amandeath just takes a hit of the vape that she apparently has in her hand,.and looks up into the sky and doesn't talk. Asshole but whatever- I look to Quilline and she bob's her head for a bit before responding,

"Quite a few died I'll admit, the soldiers were more dedicated than I thought they'd be. But, well- unfortunately... um... we lost the weapon. Some stubborn loser self-destructed the thing before we could grab it." Quilline says while twiddling her fingers which infinitely pisses me off-

"Idi- AGH! Quilline, you could have just asked me to shut the thing off before it self-destructed! That's literally the whole point of my Blessing! Just great, all those people dead for nothing. That William guy was right, we're just- ...shit. Fuck man." I hold myself back from roasting Quilline to hell and back, since yeah I learned from my near-death experience to not fuck around and find out with people who are way stronger than you.

Quilline replies with a finger on her lips, "Ohhh. Oopsies, silly me! I'll admit that was quite the blunder on my part- but hey, Amandeath and Metallic didn't bring that idea up either sooo... not entirely on me. Plus, now the army won't be able to use the weapon against us- so a win is a win." Quilline says with a wide grin and a shrug... nah.

"Something's off. At the very least Amandeath would've been smart enough to call me to stop the self-destructing. How could I catch them in some sort of lie about what really happened? ...Oh. Right, I didn't even sense any noticable currents from it- so that means the weapon couldn't have been big." I think to myself as a plan starts to form in my head.

"...Let's move, we shouldn't just be out in the open like this. Scouted the area out with my Blessing and we should be clear to head back to our hideout." I announce and turn around, which causes the other three start walking alongside me into an alleyway nearby us.

***

15 minutes later, in the staircase of the abandoned apartment building the crew is using as their base of operations...

"So out of curiosity, how big was the weapon you guys were hoping to steal anyways? If it was able to self-destruct it must've been pretty damn big." I lie as we climb the dirty carpeted stairs in a single file line- hopefully my lie won't matter though and I'm just being paranoid.

"Oh yep, the weapon was kinda huge. It was a big boy laser gun, remember when I told you about it? Surprised you didn't sense the thing with your Blessing, guess there was too much interference from all the other bits of tech in that base- or maybe it was on a low-power mode without much current going throughout. Hmm... interesting." Quilline says from in front of me as she pretends to be puzzled by tapping her chin I think, but meanwhile I squint my eyes shut in disgust.

"I would have sensed it for sure if it was even a little bit big. Fucking hell. There never was a secret "super-weapon" you three were going for, was there? You just wanted to attack that base." Quilline looks back at me while cringing and smiling at the same time.

"Caught us red-handed. Literally for some of us, haha. BUT but but but, before you freak out keep in mind that because of our raid- we'll probably have 2 days without any sudden attacks from the army due to your warning on the electronic billboards. And plus there's protests all over the continent now, since I was able to use one of my old contacts to get myself onto the news for 30 seconds and announce what we did. Costed 1.5 million Herin but, was sure worth it." Quilline tries to justify what she did but not a single bit of it matters to me...

"Amandeath? Did she trick you too about that super-weapon being there? Or... did you know too?" I ask in a meek tone as I turn my head around to stare back at her as she climbs the stairs behind me.

She doesn't reply and just blows some vapor out of her mouth- OK I'm tired of this.

I swing my arm behind me and down at her to knock the vape out of her hand. It cracks as it falls down to the stairs, and I stop walking. "Tell m-"

"ELIO. She's higher on my pal list than you are, so if you hurt her I WILL have to punish you." Metallic warns me in a stern tone from behind Amandeath... I just mumble a "ok" to him while keeping my eyes on Amandeath.

She finally coughs out some last bits of vapor- and then talks as I stare at her while she looks down at the stairs."Yeaaaah. I knew. Let's leave it at that unless you want things to get messy. Suck my dick for breaking my vape by the way, you owe me a new one." She spits back at me- wow... not even gonna try to argue on how dumb that last bit was considering we're rich now.

"Metallic. Amandeath. You're really stooping down to Quilline's level? No offense Quilline, you know what I mean." I lie just to make sure she doesn't get on my ass as I turn my head around and start walking up the stairs again.

"None taken, a compliment if anything really~" Quilline replies to my hidden insult with a hum as she holds her hands together behind her back in front of me.

Metallic also speaks up, "This is what we need to survive my acquaintance. The Army needed a lesson in learning not to mess with us anymore, and it seems to have worked! So now, we'll have smooth sailing to get to that big Casino- where our ticket out of here to the Dalkan Territory lies. It'll be worth it in the end, trust us!" Metallic tries to reaffirm me but it only makes me feel worse. Normally I'd probably feel sick but, can't in this body...

"I'm with him... though I'll admit, did feel grossed out near the end of our attack." Amandeath says with a sigh.

"What's that supposed to mean? You guys do something extra screwed up to end it off?" I ask with concern, since yeah after seeing what Amandeath did to the new Red Fists- no way would much at all gross her out unless it was REALLY bad.

"Not really no, we were pretty consistent in what we did. Think Amandeath's exaggerating a wee bit." Quilline says... I'll be the judge of that when I talk to Amandeath more in private.

"Also! Elio. I already mentioned this to Amandeath and Quilline, but I am fully expecting you to keep what we did a secret. When Seric or Karia asks, let me tell them the story we came up with." Metallic says... what? Oh man, this guy's a fucking idiot- he really thinks they'll never find out? Quilline probably played him so easily.

Just like me I guess. Damn.