The Drachen Chronicles

The experiments

Quinn quickly looked at her brother and phased into the shadow behind her completely invisible now.

The thudding was now right outside the door and the thing responsible for it showed its metallic face. Its face was hollow, a faint light glowed from its eyes and throat. Its body was bulky, shoulders rounded along with elbow joints. All along his arms were lines that seemed to indicate panels. Covering the hydraulics and the lifeblood pulsing through it. The legs were covered in thick armor; its feet looked Squarish with two toes. In a voice like iron if it could talk it said, "Hostile detected deploying suppression device." Holding out its arm it seemed to open up on the back of it and two metal cuffs were sent pinning Quincey to the wall. The robot walked forward each step like thunder hitting the floor. Quinn jumped out of the shadow, her glave over her head and she swung it down toward the robot's head, but before it could hit the robot lifted its arm to block.

The glave went a half-inch into its arm; the robot's other arm the plates lifted toward the hand completely covering it making a hammer-like object. It began to spark with electricity and he swung it right back at his attacker. Quincey screamed,

"Look out!" He was pulling and jerking against the restraints to no avail. The hammer made contact with Quinn's side, sending her flying into the wall with a loud crash. The robot turned towards her now she was laying on the ground coughing just getting her arms under her. She got up and started shooting ice spikes from her hand toward the robot, each one hitting and then shattering with no effect. Now that Quincey could see the back he could see that there was a cable from the back of his neck to the spine. It was clear in some places and black in others. The dark orange light was pulsing up from the spine to the neck,

"If you can get behind it and cut its power I'm sure it will stop; just get behind it!" Suddenly the dark orange light began to pulse faster and faster till every clear spot was now dark orange. Quinn saw the robot lift up the arm that she had hit with her glave still impeded into its arm as if it meant nothing to the iron beast. Its hand seemed to pull back from the middle of the palm revealing a circular object with a hole in the middle glowing slightly from the inside. It pointed it at Quinn and before she could react it moved its arm to fire, but the glaves hilt hit the wall before he could reach the center mass. The laser fired just missing Quinn's stomach; the robot stopped and looked at the glave that saved its victims' life and transformed his hammer hand back to normal and began yanking it out.

Quinn quickly took this to look around. She saw a shadow right next to her brother and one a little to her left. She dashed for it, but as soon as she did she heard her glave hitting the floor and the robot began to power up again. Boom the sound of the laser cannon firing again; this time Quinn made a wall of ice appear in front of her stopping the laser just enough for her to dodge before it melted its way through. She jumped into the shadow and disappeared. The robot looked around, "Hostile fled engaging infrared vision looking for heat signatures." Quinn quietly stepped out of the shadow next to her brother and mouthed to him,

"Give me your dagger." Quincey looked at both of his hands that were currently cuffed to the wall at the wrist and shrugged. Quinn rolled her eyes and then grabbed one of them and quickly detached it from the cable. She snuck up behind the robot to cut its power cable. Before she could, the robot quickly moved its head and started to turn to look at its caught prisoner.

Ice crystals began to form around Quinn's free hand as it turned into straight ice. The robot saw Quinn before his whole body was turned but Quinn in a flash grabbed the robot's face as it began to freeze, the metal becoming brittle and weak. She stabbed Quincey's dagger straight through the frozen side of the robot's face. The dagger pierced its iron skull and stabbed through one of its memory units and also its jewel. The jewel or a robot controls its ability to use magic. Some robots have their jewel hidden while others wear them proudly. It just so happened to be that where the brain would be for this robot was its jewel.

All of the sudden the robot started glowing dark orange and pulsing faster and faster. Quinn ran to her brother and with his help yanked one of the cuffs off the wall,

"three," the robot began to count down, "two," Quincey and Quinn were now yanking and tugging at the final cuff,

"one." The cuff came off just in time Quincey instantly made a forced field which Quinn reinforced with ice around them as the robot blew up sending shards of metal everywhere. Sending a piece that slammed against the side of their forced field.

Quincey let down the shield when everything settled; he walked through the rubble bits of metal stuck into the wall. The elven body had several new chunks of flesh ripped out of it looking at it, he remembered the cassette. He pulled it out of one of his cargo pants pockets. He stashed it in after he heard the sound. Quincey handed it to Quinn and she put it in. The Gnome appeared, but something was off about him. He seemed ragged and had a red spot on his side,

"He has escaped. I don't know how he did, but the only way to-'' there was a crash in the background followed by screaming. The screaming stopped and then a burst of loud laughter filled the room,

"You need to kill him. Whoever found this. It may seem impossible, but if you aim for the source of their power, aim for the runes." Another crash followed by the gnome looking backward and then he disappeared,

"I guess we found out what took this place over." Quincey looked at Quinn and sighed, "A human with runes on him. This should be illegal, but there are no laws on this planet."

Quinn scoffed and said out loud, "Less civilian casualties my butt. They only did it on this planet to avoid breaking the no experimenting on sentient being law." Quincey sighed and started to walk out of the room. Quinn followed quickly after him,

"Gotta head towards the lab. The map says that the artifact is there then we should talk with General Nolan." As they made their way over the PA they heard a voice,

"Ooo look here we have some new friends. They want to play. I hope they are better at playing than the others. It is such perfect timing I just ran out of paint and was about to get into my reserves but I have been blessed. Come closer little ones."