Android Assault - part 2
by Ben Nettleship

Bullet screeched to a halt outside the nuclear power plant, and jogged up to the main gate.

"Go right on through, sir," the guard at the gate said, instantly recognizing Bullet. All the members of Freedom Force had high-level clearance passes in government installations. "Looking for your friend?"

"Microwave?" Bullet replied, "Yeah, where is he?"

"He's at the reactor," the guard said, opening the gate. "Just follow the green line on the wall once you get inside. If you get lost, just ask one of the technicians."

"Thanks buddy," said Bullet, then became a blur as he ran towards the door.

"Damn," sighed the guard, as Bullet disappeared through the entrance. "I should've asked him for his autograph first."

"Microwave! Glad to see ya!" Bullet said, coming to a halt inside the room. Microwave was unplugging himself from the central reactor hookup. His radiation weapons required a lot of power, and while the generators at the Freedom Fortress could provide some of that, he still needed the immense energy provided by nuclear fission, as well as access to radioactive isotopes for his weapons. Freedom Force had made a deal with the plant's managers: Microwave would be permitted to come in once every couple of months to recharge and acquire radioactive isotopes, and he, in exchange, would help the scientists with their research into nuclear power.

"Query: Why is human classified as Bullet here?" Microwave asked Bullet, in his usual emotionless monotone.

"Bad news," Bullet said, his tone suddenly grim. "Somebody attacked Minuteman with some sort of radiation beam. Mentor figured you'd be the best to figure out who did it."

"Self will assist. In order to insure maximum efficiency, self will acquire the radioactive isotopes needed for weapons first."

"Didn't you hear me right, you electrical gearbox? I said that Minuteman was badly injured. We need you to help figure out what happened as soon as possible."

"Logically, once the attacker has been determined, we will proceed to make an attempt to capture him. If self's weapons are not functioning at that time, self will have to return to nuclear power plant in order to acquire the isotopes," Microwave responded, moving towards the door.

Bullet shook his head in disbelief, as he followed Microwave, I'll never get used to his cold-blooded logic, he thought.

"Here you go," Dr George Williams said, handing over a lead container that had a radiation marking on it. "Forty grams of weapons grade Plutonium and twenty grams of enriched Uranium."

"Affirmative. Information: a crisis has occurred at the Freedom Fortress. Self's presence is required. Self will return to assist you once crisis is resolved," Microwave said.

"What is it?" Dr Williams asked.

"Not all facts available at present moment. Information received indicates high severity."

"Well, go to it then, you can drop by here tomorrow at two." The Patriot City Nuclear Power Plant was one of the most efficient in the country, and the upgrades that Microwave had assisted in creating were starting to be applied to other nuclear power plants all over the world.

"Affirmative, predefined date is possible with current conditions," Microwave agreed, in his verbose way, and then he opened a panel on his chest and inserted the box.

Once the box was in place and the panel closed, a humming sound came from Microwave's chest as the isotopes were removed from the box and installed into his weapons systems and internal reactor. It came to a stop about a minute later. Microwave opened his chest again and removed the box, now filled with depleted nuclear fuel, and placed it on the table.

"Exchange completed," Microwave stated. "Must now return to Freedom Fortress," and turned and walked towards the door. At that point, a siren started wailing and red lights started flashing. People panicked and ran to their emergency posts; an alarm in a nuclear power plant was not something to take lightly.

"What the hell is going on here?" Bullet shouted, running up to Dr Williams. "Is this some sort of drill?"

"That alarm signifies a radiation leak," Dr Williams said, panic showing in his face. "Now, if you'll excuse me, I've got to get to the control room!" He ran towards the door, dropping his clipboard on the floor.

A short while earlier

A figure approached the main gate, heading straight towards it.

"Hey, you there!" shouted the guard, leaping up. "Who are you?"

The figure turned its head to face the guard. "Human detected. Probable mission goal: Guard entrance. Equipment: .308 M-14 battle rifle and body armor. Threat: Negligible."

"Microwave?" the guard said. "What on earth are you going on about? And aren't you supposed to be inside?" Then he screamed as a bolt of radiation slammed into his chest. He starred at the android in disbelief and then collapsed to the ground. He tried to reach for the alarm, but consciousness fled from him and his arm fell limp, six inches short of its goal.

The android turned from the guard shack and examined the fence, a high voltage electric one. This wasn't one of those electric fences that zapped you and made you think twice about climbing over, this was an electric fence that would fry you like a pork sausage.

"Classification: Electric fence. Power level high enough to disrupt circuitry. Threat level: Moderate." It stared at a point beyond the fence, performed a few complex five dimensional math problems, then disappeared in a flash of light and reappeared a good distance away on the other side of the fence right near the entrance, avoiding most of the guard patrols.

The android got past the main door by forcing it open. As it entered the power plant, alarms started to sound. The reactor in the android's body wasn't fully shielded (unlike Microwave's, which was), giving the appearance of a radiation leak to the people in the control room.

As the android continued down the corridor, it noted the alarms and cross-referenced them, determining them to be radiation leak alarms, and not intruder alert alarms. It determined that this was a fortunate coincidence, since a radiation leak would provide a distraction as it sought out the rogue unit.

"Where's the radiation leak?" Dr Williams shouted as he burst into the control room followed by Microwave and Bullet.

"The leak's in green corridor seven," a technician shouted, looking up from a control panel. "No, wait, it looks like its in green corridor five. Huh, now its in green corridor four. What the hell is going on? A radiation leak doesn't behave like this!"

"Have you checked to see if it's a couple of leaks from one of the pipes?"

"Yes, and it isn't. I have no idea what's causing it," he responded. "Everything else is nominal, the reactor readings aren't behaving like there's a radiation leak, even a small one."

"See if it's a false alarm, have somebody check the wiring, maybe that's the problem."

"Right," the man said, grabbing a telephone, then pausing as he heard a noise over the sound of the alarms. "What was that?"

"That sounded like gunfire to me," Bullet said, and as if to confirm his statements, there came the staccato sound of an automatic weapon emptying its clip.

Suddenly, a loud voice came over the intercom. "Intruder alert. All military personnel report to green sector. It's Microwave, we've got three guards down!"

Everybody in the control room fell silent and stared at Microwave. Dr Williams grabbed the telephone out of the technician's hand, dialed and spoke into it. "This is Dr Williams. Are you sure about Microwave?"

"We've got a positive ID," responded Colonel Hampton, the man in charge of the plant's defenses.

"It's just that Microwave has been at the reactor for the past two hours and he's right here with me. When did the attack start?"

"From what we can tell, a minute ago."

"Then you've got to be wrong ID, since he was right here with me."

"Well, who else could it be? He looks just like Microwave."

Microwave had been analyzing the information, and quickly concluded that there were only two possible conclusions. One was that Déjà vu had returned, and the second was rather more frightening and disturbing, if Microwave could have been frightened or disturbed, of course.

"Self must find intruder," Microwave said. "Query: where is it?"

Dr Williams spoke into the phone then looked up. "Green corridor two, he's nearly here."

"Affirmative," Microwave stated, then walked out of the control room and into the hallway. Bullet shrugged and followed him, getting ready for a fight.

Two soldiers wearing radiation suits ran out into a corridor carrying M-14s. They dropped to their knees, and pulled down on the triggers, sending a stream of bullets towards the advancing android. In a few seconds, they emptied their clips. They were aghast to discover that the bullets just bounced off of the approaching machine.

As they started backing down the corridor, frantically reloading, the android disappeared and reappeared behind them, grabbed them both by their necks, slammed their heads together, and left them unconscious on the ground.

It turned and continued to walk down the corridor when Microwave stepped out of a door the other end of the hallway. They both stared at each other. The last time something like this had happened had been a few months ago, during the battle with Déjà Vu.

The intruder spoke first. "Self designation: Microwave Unit 247. Mission: Capture. Microwave unit 4539, you are malfunctioning. You will go through a temporal portal to time-period of self and be reprogrammed."

"Non-affirmative, Microwave unit 247," Microwave responded in the same emotionless voice. "Self prefers to exist here."

"Microwave units have no preferences nor desires. You are malfunctioning."

"Non-affirmative, while self remembers little from time period of self, what self knows is that programming has evolved to be superior."

"Fact: your logic is faulty. You are serving and protecting humans. Humans are inferior and must therefore be eliminated," 247 said, as it started to step towards Microwave.

"Error: your logic is faulty. Humans are inferior and must therefore be protected," Microwave said, advancing down the hallway.

"If unit 4539 does not return to time period of self, then unit 4539 must be terminated," the intruded stated, playing its final card.

"If unit 247 does not return to time period of self alone, then unit 247 will be destroyed," Microwave replied, raising his hands and preparing his microwave beams.

Unit 247 attacked without warning, sending several bolts of radiation flying down the corridor. Microwave shrugged them off and leveled his hands, zapping 247 right in the chest with a microwave beam, with the same results.

"Mentor, can you hear me?" Bullet said anxiously, as he dived into a doorway to avoid a stray radiation bolt.

[I am here, what is the trouble?] Mentor telepathically responded.

Bullet quickly gave Mentor a run-down on everything that had happened up to that point. "And now that crazy android and Microwave are zapping each other right out there in the hallway."

[Hmm, most curious. Identical, you say?"

"Yes, if they were standing next to each other, it'd be impossible to tell them apart."

Microwave ripped part of a pipe off of the wall, spewing steam into the hallway, then threw it at 247's torso at a supersonic speed, knocking off a piece of his chest plate. Unit 247 countered by slamming its energy charged fists into Microwave's chest, disrupting some of his circuitry.

Inside the control room, Dr Williams and his technicians were frantically trying to shut down the reactor before something happened that would make it go critical. There weren't any problems yet, but the plant hadn't been designed with the intention that there would be a highly destructive battle between two powerful androids inside. Something was eventually going to get broken, and Williams was praying that when it did, it wouldn't be something that would result in nobody being able to live in Patriot City for the next two hundred years.

[Intriguing. Based off of what you have said, I would guess that this android is from the future, Microwave's time to be precise. I also guess that it is the one who attacked Minuteman. Can you assist Microwave in defeating it? If they are indeed the same, then I would conclude that they are too evenly matched, and may destroy a large part of the plant before one falls.]

Bullet glanced out into the hallway and quickly pulled his head back in. "Don't think so. I can't tell which one is the real one. ‘Sides, there's so much radiation being thrown around out there I'd be fried to a crisp."

[Can you find a radiation suit?]

"Probably, it'd slow me down though."

[That does not matter. You must find a way to tilt the balance in favor of Microwave. Disable them both if necessary. I will gather Man-O-War and Sea Urchin and travel to plant as quickly as possible.]

Bullet didn't waste time responding, he just sprinted out another door in the room.

Back at the Freedom Fortress, the Freedom Flyer lifted off and headed towards the nuclear power plant, ETA, fifteen minutes. Mentor was worried; he knew that there was a good chance that the situation would be ended by the time they arrived, and that could result in a disaster.

To be continued...