Chapter 20- Shadows of the Ruin
The tunnels were growing darker as the crew continued their decent into the deepest regions of the ruins. Trigger's eyes were still adjusting to the darkness as he scanned the empty cooridors.
"I've never searched a ruin this deep before." Bola said anxiously. "It seems to go on forever."
"Quiet" Trigger whispered rashly. "It's places like this where things can get really ugly, a digger like you should know that."
Bola shook his head in frustration. "Yeah, I should" he whispred softly. "Sorry about that"
"What do you mean things can get ugly" Aaron whispered.
Trigger charged his bustergun to maximum output and turned his gaze to Aaron.
"The deeper a ruin goes, the more dangerous things become. The resistance we faced farther up was nothing special. Reaverbots closer to the surface typically range from D to C class in terms of threat level with the occasional class B if your unlucky."
Trigger turned his head once again to make sure the hallway was still empty.
"...But it's only in the depths of the deepest ruins, ruins like this, where you can expect to run into an A-Class reaverbot... and we do not want that."
"What's so bad about an A class." Griff whispered
"I guess your memory hasn't fully restored yet, Griff, or you would know. I suppose you could say that if one of us gets killed down here, it will more than likely be a class A that does it."
Griff tensed. "I see your point" he said nervously peaking over his shoulder
"Baabuuu" Bon muttered
"You're telling me Bon" Teisel stammered. "We should probably tread a bit more lightly from now on"
"I really hope you do, for your sake" Trigger said walking to the front of the group. His eyes narrowed as he looked down the dimly lit passage stretching forward into the darkness.
"From now on, everyone stays behind me. Walk slowly and quietly. If we're lucky, we might be able to slip past some of the bigger ones unnoticed."
The party of diggers started their careful advance through the ruins. Every once in a while, Trigger's hand shot up, motioning everyone to stop. A whole minute would pass before his hand would slowly decend and they would continue on.
"So," Aaron whispered hesitantly, "suppose we do run into one of these A-Class reaverbots. What then?"
"If that does happen, whatever you do, don't run."
"What? Why not?" Griff whispered from the back of the group."
Trigger looked back at Griff apprehensively.
"The second you turn your back on one of those things is when they'll attack most brutally. There like wild predators. They'll attack at any sign of weakness. Your best bet is to stand your ground and pray you don't slip up."
"Well," Aaron whispered "It really can't be that bad can it? I mean, we have a first class purifier unit with us. That has to count for something right?"
Trigger froze in his place. Everyone stared at him curiously
"It gets worse than that" Trigger said gravely.
"What?" Griff said, surprised at how it could possibly be worse than what he had just described.
"Well...like Bola had mentioned earlier, I've never been on a dig inside a ruin this deep before. It's very possible that there could be... an S-Class reaverbot lurking down here.
"S-Class..." Tim whispered in horror
"I guess you would know wouldn't you?" Trigger said to Tim. "you were, by the way, the one who designed that class weren't you?"
"Wait a minute," said Griff, "what's the difference between an A and S-Class."
Trigger sighed. "I'm not really sure. I've never actually faced one before."
"You haven't?" Aaron said, surprised.
"There aren't very many" Tim cut in. "I remember that we had only created a few of them due to their massive lethality."
"Yeah" Trigger added, "I remember reading the reports of what happened during the testing trials when I was going through Elysium's archives. I read that one completly annihilated everything around it...even fellow revearbots, a few of them being class A's no less. What was even more suprising was the fact that they were no larger than the average carbon, and yet, they were able to cause so much destruction."
Tim nodded. "Despite their impossibility to control, we didn't want to waste such a valuable creation, so we placed the S-Class reaverbots in the deepest ruins, where they would be best contained."
"So then if there really is a class S down here, and if it finds us..." Aaron whispered.
"Then we will most ceirtantly die" Tim said solomnly.
My sincere apologies for any innaccuracies to the story. If their are any, let me know and I will fix them immediately. I also strongly encourage others to contribute to this story. Axel(Dragge) shouldn't have to do this all by himself
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Did you see that. Your making the servbot cry! He's crying. Doesn't that make you feel sad?