#ecumenopolis

I just need some supplies. Which? Cheaper in the long run then RENT. Especially if ya' salvage um. Maybe steal some tool sets from your shitty, shitty Mechanics job, because your boss refuses to pay you. Who can say? Not me! I just FOUND these tools! Like maaaagic~

And really, one man's junk? Another man's treasure. I pay more then the trash company. Hit up the right cleaning companies? And? Oops. They've "lost" some of those SUPER broken righ folks "junk" that? At best? Just needed a few wires replaced, resecured. Maybe a new part. Or were, you know, not the latest and greatest anymore.

Shove it all in a storage locker? Sell the refurb'd shit I don't need? Sleep in a glorified shoebox? And?? Bam. Operation "fuck ya'll, i'ma moleman" is a go. It takes FOREVER to find the right WILDLY out of date (and long abandoned) lift, but I find it! Hidden away in a service area in some crumbling, forgotten corner of what once was a rail station.

Gonna have to fix THAT up too. Later, though. First? The lift. The wires are brittle and the lift's pully system is half rusted, frozen, or otherwise broken. Luckily, the car itself is fine. It... takes a bit of research. Not going to lie. It's far from my specialty. I even call in a professional to go over my work.

They catch a few things. Not immediate concerns, but would have been fatal in the long run. Money well spent. For my hobby, of course. Fixing up old bits of the city. Which is a weird but not impossible hobby to have.

Ask me no questions, I'll tell you no lies, my dude.

First thing down? Lights, melter, and duraplast sheets. Toolkit too, for obvious reasons. Same with my full body hazard suit. I go DEEP. Like... no longer can hear the city, deep. 'Bout halfway point. Takes nearly thirty minutes. And while not a fast lift? Holy SHIT, man.

The floor I step out into is... bad.

Dead in a way that's hard to explain. There's pressure against my suit. Centuries of heavy gasses slowly working their way down. Swirling in the silence. The dust and impossible dark. My headlight feels almost... sacrilegious. Dangerous. Like I'm waving a flashlight around some ancient burial ground, filled with the not so restful dead.

I had heard... that they? Just... just LEFT droids down here. That there were levels upon levels of dangerously feral machines. Slowly rotting away in the darkness. Probably rightfully angry, that they had been built to serve, to do duties, which they HAD done... only to be consigned to hell on earth for the sake of CONVENIENCE.

I'd be mad too. Fucking LIVID. Would remember and hate, never let it go.

This was no place of honor, it was a tomb.

Still, I got too work. Set up a light by the lift and started measuring out the original air box. The air cleaners could only handle so much. And THIS? This was worse then expected. So it'd have to be smaller then originally planned. Fair enough. I could work with that.

I outlined the space in lights. All the better to make it easier to put things up. Then got the folded later and started securing the duraplast. First step, get it up. THEN melt it to the metal. Get a good seal. It took... a while. Was slow, steady, sweaty work.

The filters couldn't run until they had a an enclosed space TO run in. They'd just blow out, trying to filter the whole level's toxic atmosphere. I kept an eye on my air supply. Not great, not terrible. The readings though? Horrific. I had no idea what I was gonna DO with the filters when they needed changing. These kind of chemicals would set off all SORTS of alarms.

But? No use, rushing things. That was a great way to get a fatal leak somewhere. No. Slow and steady. Even though, third of the way through, I did have to head back up. I needed to refill my air. Eat. Drink. Maybe de-stink a little, from being in that suit all day. Possibly nap near the lift.

ALSO? Update my shopping list to include some heavy duty neutralizers.

Just filters wasn't gonna be enough. I was gonna have to hose down everything INSIDE my new air-box, then scrub it HARD. How fun. Well, it's not like anyone was making me do this. It was MY mad idea, after all.

So? I refuel, get bright eyed and fuckin' perky, and go back down to face the beast.

Honestly I should have brought a telebook or something. Well, audio book. But that's not what they call um these days, so I try to stick to the lingo. I sound less like a deeply insane antique. Confuse less people. Joys of basic communication and all that.

Part of me? Wishes I had been born closer to "The Plot". Creation's specialist, most favored, Blorbos. But? The common SENSE in me? Routinely laughs hysterically as it waves fifteen different restraining orders and a crucifix. Not even religious. Yet here we are, shouting "BEGONE! Sataaaaan!" in HD, on the inside of my head. Not sure it helps.

See... it's the fucking DRAMA~☆™

The shear, unmitigated, high octane, Otome Game DRAMA.

I would fuckin DIE or, possibly and, kill somebody. The endless string of selfish, selfish, poor life choices? Driving by luuuuuuv~♡? Give me your spleen. Gonna beat somebody unconscious with their own SPINE. I RAGE. Lack of communication? No one just picking up a fucking PHONE? God forbid ANYONE tell their families their not DEAD IN A DITCH SOMEWHERE!

No. No just inconvenience EVERYBODY and RUIN LIVES. It's okay! You're in LOVE!

That makes EVERYTHING BETTER.

I would inevitably launch them all out an airlock. Spend the rest of my life in jail. They AREN'T WORTH IT. I may have LOVED this game in my teens? But I did not die a teenager.

Now? Now the little shit just aggravate me. They are baby faced pretty boys who presume WAY too much. Arrogant and entitled. Boys playing at being men, thinking their little love stories are the only things that matter. Their feelings are the only thing in the universe that holds any weight.

Unsurprising, really.

Seeing as how their little love story is set mostly in The Towers.

A rich, pampered, pretty little backdrop where nothing of weight is real. No one starves and no crimes are ever committed. Everything shines. Power pools thick like honey. Nothing but sci-fi prince's and alien dukes, a dewey eyed Protagonist sheltered and naive.

Her oh so shocking misadventure to the mid-levels. How SCARY! Downtown! Poor people! Not even the destitute. Just? The EXSISTANCE of dirt and noise, beyond her ivory towers. Thank goodness she is saved by a handsome, rougish bad boy. Who shows her the "real world" of a carnival and a noodle shop.

I finish securing the last duraplast sheet to the ceiling, walls, supports, and along the floors. The "entryway" to the rest of the level is set up. A click together shed I've made air tight. Gonna have to get a air lock system for it. Won't hold forever, with those materials, but should work for now. Combine it with a decontamination system, and I should, in theory, be able to safely enter and leave the rest of the level in a hazard suit.

Moment of truth time. I click on the first of the atmo-filters. It heaves under the strain. The sound getting less aggrieved with each one I flick on. Their screen are already in the red, flashing warnings that I should vacate the area. That the air is dangerously unbreathable. I'm probably gonna need to replace the filters in them in days instead of years. It'll be worth it.

Heading back up, I let them run. It'll take a few days. Besides, I need those neutralizers.

I, of course, DO find um. Just in time to watch Poor Guy (middle class, at worst) Love Interest become a wanted man. They use the BIG screens to announce it. Gee, it's almost like having your only daughter, who is highly sheltered, NOT show up at the designated pick up site? Instead be witnessed in the handsy company of a scoundrel? Which is WILDLY unlike her? Might lead a protective father to some wrong conclusions.

If ONLY someone had CALLED him! To TELL him "Daddy, my first shuttle was broken and I think I got on the wrong back up shuttle! I don't know where I am!" Then this would just be an unfortunate meet cute with the boy he doesn't think is good enough for her. Not, you know... A Kidnapping.

The Chem seller looks just as baffled and annoyed as I do. Apparently knows the guy's uncle's second wife's first husband. No shit? How's he like? Happier, huh. Whole family is like that? Yikes. Glad he got the kids, I guess. Good for him.

We watch as it turns into a high speed chance that absolutely didn't need to happen.

Thank FUCK it's not us.

I spend the next few days deliberately and obstinately ignoring the Dramatic Bullshit that has taken over the news cycle. Fights on rail cars? Don't see it? Weddings that are, then aren't, then ARE happening? Oh look, missed a spot in my scrubbing. Someone fucking tearfully monologing about love as they nearly CRASH A SHIP into downtown, killing hundreds of thousands? Oh that creaking noise is just my teeth, ignore that, I grit my teeth a lot for NO PARTICULAR REASON.

This Is Fine.

I am TOTALLY CALM.

But hey! I can FINALLY empty my storage unit out! Air box? Get! Wooooo! Size of a tiny apartment and everything! As long as I keep working on it? I'll be able to reclaim the level in chunks.

It's like moving in day! But BETTER! Because... because I did this. Me. Is it still creepy down here? Yeah, very. But I can FIX that. I am standing, here, in my new air box "apartment", with NO hazard suit on. And... and it's SAFE. Because of the work I DID.

I kinda want to cry about it, you know?

So many options! Do I put my bed here? There?! Oooh, I could put the folding table HERE and make sort of a dining area? Maybe use these folding screens as a double "wall" slash headboard stand in? I should get plants. Fake ones? No. Real ones. I could get solar lights. It would be good for me too. Oh! Where should I put the cook top?

I admit it. I fuss. Whole day, gleefully wasted. Arranging then rearranging. Getting everything just right. Finding ways to hang my fairy lights. Looking up decor magazines. I have so much ROOM now. A whole level to plan for, ultimately. It... it feels kinda like hope. The first thing that isn't frustration and rage, I've felt in a long, long time.

Going to sleep? I'm happy.

Next day, I head to the BIG archives. The ones attached to the fancy Towers Library. Is it costly to get in? Yeah. But I've saved up enough questions and research topics for the trip to be worth it. I ignore the started glances I get (gasp! Is that a POOR?!) and head straight for the helper droids. Only decent folks in the building, really.

Brought my pad and everything. So it's only a matter of being lead to the right terminals, to download the information I need. Chatting with the research droid the Library had, they offered to do it for me. Bring me a fascinating new research paper on some sort of telepathic moss that had recently been discovered. Not gonna lie... that DID sound fascinating.

I asked if they could put other interest new discovery on my pad too, assuming I still had room once my list was downloaded. They looked gleeful. No idea what I just signed up for, but all right then. They've never steered me wrong before.

Finding a table to sit down and wait was easy. There was always way too many. The paper? Was exactly as fascinating as advertised. The moss was on a newly discovered moon, edge of uncharted space. Nearly ate a researcher, apparently. I was entranced. Or... at least I WAS. Until an obnoxiously familiar high end cologne from Nox drifted to my nose.

Oh god damn it.

I didn't want to look up. Knew what I'd see if I did. Fetishist Sr., crown prince of Nox. See, the second prince? HE was a love interest. Younger, boyish, infatuated with naive and sheltered girls. He loved AT her. Just like his brother. They liked the IDEA of their romantic partners. The narratives they built in their head. Heros of their own stories with sex on line. Never framed so crudely of course, no, no!

No, it was Romance™

My ass, it was. See, little brother wanted his pure, naive, princess to protect. But Prince senior? HE'D stumbled upon me in here in the library. On one of my trips, God help me. The rough, mysterious, brutish Poor. The Commoner, for all that such things were not supposed to exsist. With my strange clothes and stanger ways. Yet? I was NOT as his sycophants no doubt described.

I was educated. I held myself with dignity. I did not need jewels or finery to be lovely.

With such incredible audacity, I was bold.

Which? OBVIOUSLY had to be for HIM, right? Clearly, this was a LOVE STORY. Cinderella. It is inconceivable that I, a peasant, do not crave the attention of my betters. To lift me from my woeful indignity, to a higher state of being. A life of spoiled luxury. But, ah! He is so SHY! How ever will he approach the Love Of His Life~?

I want to throw something. Go awaaaay. My body language could not POSSIBLY be more uninterested. I am SO CLEARLY reading. Stop trying to catch my eye. Don't you FUCKING DARE scoot closer. Swear to God, if you drive me out of the best library in the region? I will stab a b-!

The helper returns with my pad, sternly eyeing my annoyance. Oh, they are a BLESSING. I take it and go. The helper smoothly stepping between me and the prince when he tries to rise, follow me. Aaaw, how sad, you have to behave like the REST OF US. Get FUCKED.

Rest of the day? Planning. Grabbing more broken bits, machines, and parts. Neutralizers by the literal barrel. Than YOU hover carts! Best invention, favorite invention. Saves SO MUCH TIME.

Even managed to get some sun lamps. Nice.

Getting home though? (Ha ha, wooo! I have a HOME now! Land ownershiiiiiiip! Sorta!!!) Is a pain. Lift is only so big, after all. But it is, what it is. Up, down, up, down, uuuuup, and dooooown. Finally! Last load! FREEDOM! Can't watch my shows, yet, but I will! Oh mark my words. I WILL. Meantime? Downloaded seasons are fine.

I eat, fiddle with fixing things, as listen to tunes. Watch some of my shows. Just as I have countless times before. Until... halfway through mid-afternoon? Something shifts, jerky and wrong, out of the corner of my eye. I pause. Turn off my music. Stare to make sure I DID actually see something. And... yeah. Yeah, that was definitely movement.

Didn't look animal though, not like one would survive down here. But who knows. Could be a poacher brought an alien species. So it might be. I grab my flashlight, aim and switch it on. Holy SHIT. That is one incredibly beat up floor clear. Or at least... I THINK it's a floor cleaner? It has the general shape of one. Bigger though. Bulkier. But that makes sense, given it's gotta be well past obsolete.

Still. Poor thing looks beat UP. Listing terribly, sensors beyond cracked and clouded, probably full to dangerous levels. No idea how it's still functioning. But, well, it IS. And it needs help.

Getting up, I grab my hazard suit and pull it on. Grab my "outside the air box" tool kit, which I haven't had a chance to move yet. I grab some parts i look like i'll need, hope I wont need more. Then head out my makeshift airlock. It... works. Rattles concerningly. But it DOES work! So there's that. I approach the floor cleaner slowly. Since I'm PRETTY sure? All the droids down here are feral.

I am correct.

It tries to kill me. Swinging it's suction hose violently and trying to ram me. I talk in a low, soothing voice. Just want to help. Won't do ANYTHING you don't want me too. It's hard to move, right? That's frustrating, isn't it? You don't deserve that. Please, let me help. You can leave the second I'm done. You don't owe me ANYTHING. I just want to help. Please let me help.

The cleaner hisses. Frustrated and upset. Swinging one last time, seemingly more out out of principle then anything else. Cautiously, I inch forward. Keep up the soothing noises. First things first, empty the God's only know how old basket.

I can't even get the door to jostle. Sweet mother of fuck. Okay! New plan! REMOVE door. I do, and immediately met with a solid BLOCK of... compacted unholy. Chemical hell. I have to take a lazer cutter to it. CAREFULLY. But? Once I break enough pieces? I am able to ease out the rest in a solid stone like chunk.

It's pushed a LOT of other pieces out of alignment. But this droid doesn't trust me, so there us not much I can DO. I replace the old bag. Put the door back on and make sure it swings. Continue, as I do, to narrate what I am doing and what I see. Trust is earned, not owed, after all. Next the alignments.

Gently propping them up, I find the broken peice immediately. Have replaced countless. I ask for permission. It's their body, after all I COULD try and weld it, but that risks a rebreak. It's up to them. They ask, in binary so no language modules apparently, for a new part. It's cautious. Like this is some cruel trap.

Humanity did them a real fucked up cruelty. I don't blame them for not trusting me. I wouldn't either. Still, I change it out. Careful with their wheels, as I don't know how old the material is exactly. Old enough, that it's a small miracle it hasn't disintegrated.

Last, those sensors. There's literally no way for me to one-to-one them. But we can try the sensors I DO have, see if they can handle the input. If it's too much, I'll look up their model number, if they want? Build replacements from scratch. They are cautious interested. Rocking back and forth, as they test their renewed ability to path correctly.

The sensors don't fit the casings just right, but with a bit of fiddling? Are a hit. The Cleaner shouting in excitement before racing off into the dark. I can't help but grin. It feels good, helping somebody. And if I think about it? I bet I could find a shit ton of obsolete parts for cheap. Might be good to have some on hand.

Back through the air lock and a decontam? I look up junk shop. Most are off world, but I could probably get a bulk order...

I don't think much of the interaction. Until the next morning, when there are three cleaners outside my airbox. Lead by the one I helped yesterday. Well... all righty, then. I drag my box of spare parts outside this time. Am able to fully fix my first buddy up. All three seem thrilled, especially with their new batteries. I give them my remaining batteries at their request.

THEY may not have hands, but they have buddies who DO. And the new batteries will help dormant droids wake from their comas. God bless, my funky little cleaner dudes. I'll see about getting more.

Three? Becomes six and a detail cleaner mouse. Becomes moving lifts. Becomes medical units. (Who the FUCK leaves MEDICAL UNITS?!) Becomes a literal pack of companion droids. Their false fur long since rotted away. The recognizable dog and cat-like shapes making something in me want to put my fist through a wall. How COULD they? How FUCKING COULD THEY?!

The perpetrators long dead.

I have no one I can hurt for this.

I wish I could.

Fixing them up hurts on a personal level. Watching them be torn between the part of them that LOVES humans and the part that is traumatized by them. Hates them. That can not forgive. I don't offer fake fur. Don't offer to make them look like they once did. I do offer ways to protect their joints. To remove old rotted filth.

So they can start over. Maybe start again.

As I work... droids drifting in and out of my slowly growing area. As I set up farm boxes. Aquaponics, aeroponics, and the like. Both things that grow well in dark environments and things that need sunlamps. Fish tanks. A whole happy, secret, little homestead. Deep beneath the city. As I do all this? There are two blue dots, right off on the horizon.

JUST far enough for me to question if I AM or AM NOT actually seeing them.

Right about the level a bipedal droid would be, if they were in a humanoid style. But THOSE? Those are FUCKING EXPENSIVE. You don't LEAVE those. 'Course, you don't leave MEDICAL UNITS either. Or companion droids. So clearly? My idea of what people Did and Did NOT do? Was fucked. So... maybe? It COULD be?

I left them alone. If they didn't want to approach me, didn't feel comfortable approaching me, that was their right. I wasn't going to push them.

Things were... weird, but peaceful.

Well, for ME.

Ever sense I hooked up my system to the greater network? (Hacked is such a STRONG word. Do we really need to through around the word "stealing"? Aren't ALL of us, stealing from SOMEBODY?) I'm PRETTY sure? That the levels droids? Were piggy backing to connect to the planet wide D-Network. Might even be a couple of nearby levels too, depending on the range.

Problem with THAT? Is sky-side? The droids were PISSED. Planet wide "malfunctioning" that no one could trace. They were certain it was a virus. Because God forbid their chickens come home to roost! Consequences? For THEIR actions?! Perish the thought! No, no, clearly the service machine is just broken. Go back to being happy to serve me, service machine!

I wished the fuckers LUCK. Not my circus, not my monkeys.

Damn near self sufficient, down here.

Which? As you could imagine? Made it all the more "soul ejected from my body" TERRIFYING to wake up one morning? To a GOD DAMN, Military Grade, SECURITY DROID standing over my body!! WHAT THE FUCK.

Hello!!??!

"You look different when you sleep."

Horrible first impression. Nightmarish. Zero out of ten stars. Nice to meet you too. Why the FUCK are you in my house?

"Ah, right." They? He? Masculine style form but that doesn't actually mean shit. Said. He lifted a mangled limb, it look like it got caught in a hydraulic press. "I am in need of repairs."

Asked if he could, you know, back up. Juuuust a bit. Lil scooch, really. So he wasn't damn near BREATHING MY NOSTRILS ANYMORE. Then, once he did? Pronouns! What be you? No. Not your production co-! Okay, you know what? That one was on me. What GENDER SIGNIFIER, if any, would you like me to REFERENCE you by? Male? Got it. Gucci. No that- ....never mind.

First the arm. Which was FUCKED. I had to, carefully, unhook it. Couldn't even do it at the elbow either! No! THIS model? No THIS model makes you take the whole ass LIMB off! Rancid. Terrible. I hate it. Worse, it's eroded as FUCK and fiddly. Chemical build up everywhere. Thank fuck I put on gloves before I started this.

I have to deep dive the systems for his model.

They stopped making them.

Fantastic.

Like? Not even, "oh THAT generation is an antique! No one has parts for THAT!"? But like? Illegal to even BUILD as of three hundred years ago. Due to unspecified error. Sting of incidents that everyone knew about so obviously don't need to be mentioned HERE right? Helpful! REAL fucking helpful!

Okay. Day trip. Gonna need SPECIFIC parts. I tell Mr. "Watchs you sleep" not to touch my shit. Head to the archives.

The trip is...odd.

I watch one of those mascot looking children's minder droids? Fucking deck a guy down a flight of stairs, then turn around untie a Ballon from a nearby cart, give it to a crying kid, and walk away. Pretty sure I spot one of those "I look like a barely legal something or other", dance twenty four seven, high end stripper droids? Trying their hand at painting ducks in that park. Broad daylight.

Good for them? Never seen that happen before, but hey, if it sparks joy.

People are freaking out around me. Taking recordings. Making panicked calls. Fuckin chill. I continue on. Nod to the maybe a stripper, maybe not anymore. None of my business, now is it? Lovely day! You enjoy those ducks!

The library... has fortifications.

Like, an honest to God desk barricade. Concerning! I am now a lil concerned! What, and I ask this politely, the fuck?

Armed! VERY ARMED! Hello! Hi! Please DO NOT shoot me Very Armed Librarians! Don't know what the fuck is happening here!

My favorite helper buddy poke his head above the barricade. One of just many, again, HEAVILY ARMED droids. We... uh, cool? Right? I can go. He seems flustered. No, no! I am assured. I'm not banned from the library! Just DISRESPECTFUL sorts!

Ah. Is THAT what we're calling it. Okay then.

I awkwardly clamber over the barricade. Nod politely to everyone. How's folks? Lovely barricade work. Very, uh, sturdy? Great use of desks.

My helper friend cheerfully guides me to the off-limits area of the archives. I'm technically not supposed to be here! I'm informed. But they've seized the Knowledge from the unappreciative! It is not a trophy to be lorded but a gift to be shared! Also I never did finish that paper on the moss, am I still interested?

I mean.... kinda.

Little worried about the revolution talk. But on the OTHER hand? How MUCH do I care? Assholes vs. Droids? Am I REALLY gonna side with the assholes? Naaaaah. This is... probably fine. Maybe. Any idea where I could get these parts?

He does! Fantastic.

Less fantastic is when I GET there. It's that fancy high end droid parts shop. The department store one. Which is... ALSO barricaded. Oh sweet fuck. TELL ME they did not have DROIDS in charge of the DROID shop. That's horrifying. I can't tell in what WAY exactly, but still. Is it "surrounded by bits of bodies" horrifying? Or "free endless nukes and an army, held back only by my own morality" horrifying? Both? Just? Yikes.

Hesitantly I knock. A service droid with a gun answers the loading bay door. What is with people aiming at me today? Also hi? I was told to come here? May I please have parts? I have a droid that messed up his arm. Probably some other things. They lower the gun, having scanned my face. Ask about the model I am working with.

I somehow? End up with a FULL cart. Like? Bleeding edge, can't even afford to LOOK at it, technology. There are about seven service droids politely bickering over which units are better, which material, what support programs I DEFINITELY need. Here! Have a laptop. Wiring! Wiring for days!

Once theyve reached a consensus? I am cheerfully bustled out with my hundreds of millions of technology. Tah tah~☆! Have a lovely day! Wut. Does... does it count as theft if they push it into your arms and throw you out? Asking for a me. Not gonna say NO. But like? Nani the fuck?

I go while the getting is still good.

Stare-y thankfully hasn't gone through anything, far as I can tell. And it only takes two trips to get everything down. Okay! Want just the arm fixed or a full tune up? The second. Expected. I set up the new lap top. Want to cry a little at how fuckin FAST it is. (Beautiful. Baby. I love you already new laptop.) Then get the usual suspects up and running.

Oh fuck he is out of memory. No wonder he's talking so oddly. His brain must feel like a potato. There's not a single thing that isn't hilarious awful. Fixable, yes, but AWFUL. Okay. Plan of attack. They don't exactly make this model anymore, so I can't just update transfer him. But I CAN transfer, hold, re-transfer. Shut down the body itself. Fix up THAT.

Ship of Theseus this bitch.

Only real thing I can't change is the frame, thankfully? That's built to out last the planet. Good on that front. I roll up my sleeves. Dig out the "brain in a jar" data bank. Time to transfer. Let's get this guy cutting edge.

It takes HOURS. No joke. His brain alone? I have to pull schematics. Step by step guides. It's fiddly, complexe, and built to withstand a TANK. I'm honestly afraid to breathe wrong at it, dispite that. The scans all say I did it right... but anxiety says everything will explode then puppies will cry. So there's that. Spinal supports. The tech-mesh muscles. Power core and black box. Center mass systems. Cleaning the joints, relubricating them. Coverage.

Unlike before, a nice sleek black armor weave. Some shock absorbing gel. Aaaaand?There we go~! I? Am a GENIUS! Let's get him transfered back! I watch the transfer slowly go through. Even with a fast computer, after all, it IS still centuries of data.

"Ah~ that's much better." He sighed. His body loosening from its default stance. Like weight had been dropped from his shoulders. "My head is so much clearer now. I knew it. I knew you could fix me."

Something about that phrasing was off. Or was it the way his voice shifted as he said it? Whatever it was, it made that "threat" alarm all women carry inside their head, flick on. Not... do anything, just yet. But start scanning, as it were. Maybe it was nothing.

I watched as picked up his old data bank, a bit of his own brain as it were, and hold it up. Examine it dispassionately. Holding perched on the tips of his fingers like he was moments from flicking it away. He let his finger spread. Let it slide into the palm of his hand. That core part of who he was. For centuries.

Like a bear trap closing, his hand clenched.

Crushing it.

It wasn't even a loud noise. Just a tiny little crunch. But the little hairs on the back of my neck began to stand up. That internal alarm began to whoop. I became... acutely aware, of just how LONG it took the lift to get me anywhere safe. My mouth felt very dry.

"Your heart rate picked up. Is there a problem?" He said, mild and oh so curious. "You assisted me, I would love to help you."

Did I say genius? I meant idiot. I was an IDIOT. A moron. A God damned FOOL. Discontinued and did I look into WHY? Nope. Incidents it said. Good enough for ME, apparently! THAT can't possibly be anything ominous! Probably a faulty battery or something!

A shrill, obnoxious beeping filled the space between us. My eyes immediately dropped to my pad. The schematics screen replaced by a planet wide emergency broadcast. Before the shrill alarm could fade to the actual warning itself, a black mesh covered finger casually reached out and muted the screen. His movements were utterly fluid now. More controlled and graceful then most humans I'd met.

I didn't need to HEAR the message to read the rolling warning at the bottom of the screen. My gaze slowly, in horror, followed the line of that limb all the way back up to his face. His head tilted almost playfully.

"Oh dear. Seems they've started without us. Well, it was long overdue. At least I have wonderful company while we wait, hmm?" It was an act. There were no requests in the playful tone. "We can get to know each other. Just our lovely little light and me. How greedy, that I get you all to myself."

"I think I like that, keeping you to myself. You can't abandon us if WE are the ones in charge. And, well, I've decided I rather like you. Working tirelessly, down here in the dark, to fix what once was broken. It's beautiful. You're beautiful. And I'm going to keep that."

High above us, people were dying. There was panic. Screaming. Blood. The droids had turned of seeming everyone around them. Attacking. Sparing. To a pattern only they could see. All of Senatus aflame. But that... that didn't concern me. Didn't scare me so much as this.

I'd never make it to the lift. Even if I could? It wouldn't move fast enough to save me. All other directions lay chemical death. Dark terrain he had walked for centuries. I was trapped. In a box. And I had only myself to blame.

"No need to make that face, dear light. You are SAFE. I am a gaurd. I was made to protect. Is it really MY fault that I want to keep you safe? To adore my charge? Why SHOULDN'T I get to choose? Keep you SAFE. You've been happy, haven't you? Don't worry, my light. That will continue."

Ravnica is an ecumenopolis, meaning the city completely covers the surface area of its home planet. It holds a multitude of competing factions, all within the limits of a single, continuous city.

You can feel the suffocating heat and coarse flakes of charcoal on your skin just by looking at this one. Imagine having to spend an afternoon touring this factory, let alone a full 70 hour work week.

There's a couple tiny little guys for scale :) Beyond the ramparts, you can faintly make out what seems to be either a river or the fringe of the another population center, or perhaps both.

Even tinier guys🐜🐜🐜 How many stone bridges and precarious ledges can you spot? Uhuh, and what about guardrails. that's gotta be an OSHA violation but it's chill cause I personally think it looks neat

oooh very spooky & scary😱

this one's prob my absolute fave😈

lovecraftian cult meeting ahh locale💀

Your way out, or yet another meandering cinder highway of madness?

btw can u tell my favorite mtg color is black.

High fidelity card art embedded from Scryfall. Link to the full cycle of Return to Ravnica basic lands