Like a Bat Out of Hell
Gliding down to Fraud, the wind rushing past them like it had a hundred times before, V1 fiddled with their different weapons. They had just decimated the Earthmover, the pathetic thing. It basked in the knowledge that it was practically invincible. V1 thought they had been falling longer than usual, but what was weirder was that the air around them slowed down before stopping entirely.
A deep, distant rumbling reverberated in the enclosed space. Before they knew it, they were now being shot upward, with the rumbling turning to a loud growl. They were spit out into a new environment from its ground. Landing with a thud, they looked around. An alley, full of trash bags and blood stains.
Where were they? It looked like a city, similar to the ones back in Lust, but darker and redder. Were they still in hell? Looked like it, red sky, red buildings, red everything. V1 stepped out of the darkness of the alley, spotting several demon-esque entities, but they didn't look… right… They looked like many different things, animals, plants, objects??? Whatever this place was, it was not the hell they were in before.
Enough looking around. V1 needed fuel and needed it now. Pulling out the Electric Railgun, it shot down the sidewalk and pierced through several demons. V1 slid up to a weird bell-looking demon on the floor gasping for air. They grabbed her by the throat and squeezed, her head making a funny popping sound as her blood sprayed all over them.
…
What? Why wasn't the blood absorbing?
V1 looked down at their hand, the blood pooled in it. They turned their hand, and the blood fell to the ground. Huh, the blood was thicker than normal. Was it too dense to absorb into their system?
Well, that's not good. They still needed fuel, and with no way of actually absorbing any they were kind of screwed. V1 looked around for another type of blood-having being to purge for fuel. It looked around, ignoring the screams of pain of its would-have-been victims. Its yellow optic illuminated the dark alley like a torch. Nothing…
That's not good.
…
V1 was going to power off sooner or later. It didn't want a painful death.
The world went dark as it turned off its optic, going into its control program to power down in a last-ditch effort to survive just a little longer.
Start fuel_save.exe? Y/N
-y
Executing fuel_save.exe…
LIMB_MODULE (0/4) ON
WING_STORAGE (0/8) ON
NERVOUS_SIMULATION (0/12)
ORGAN_SUSTAINABLITY (0/5) ON
BLOOD_FLOW (0/34) ON
…
fuel_save.exe is finished, goodnight V1.
-close program
-------------------------------------------
V1’s audio haptics turned on, the sound of metal clattering near its head before it heard a gasp.
“Ahah! Finally! If the lightss on, doess that mean you can atleasst hear me?”
Silence.
“Oh, I guesss you can't ansswer that quesstion if you have no voice module thingy.. But no matter!” The voice was… strange, to say the least. Who slurs their S’s?
V1’s body was in a limbo state, not able to move but able to feel. This damn guy was practically wrist deep in its wires! It could feel everything, from the screwdriver resting on its head to the feeling of its organs being messed with. It felt something being unplugged and plugged back in, forcing its optic to turn back on.
“Oh- thatss probably a good ssign!” the voice said mirthfully as if he wasn't forcing all of V1's systems back on. It could see the person's head peeking over the corner of its optic, unable to move in to get a better view as they kept unplugging things inside of its abdomen. Its diagnostic program popped up, a wall of text filling the side of its vision before text appeared right before it.
Manual power on/restart
LIMB_MODULE (0/4) ON
WING_STORAGE (4/8) ON
NERVOUS_SIMULATION (7/12)
ORGAN_SUSTAINABLITY (2/5) ON
BLOOD_FLOW (17/34) ON
Turn on HUD? Y/N
-y
Turning on HUD, stand by...
V1's weapon menu and fuel bar flicked on, the text on the side of its screen disappearing. 15% fuel left. It grabbed the hand of the… snake guy who turned it back on, sitting up. “Uh.. Hello!” he said, a nervous smile plastered on his face. It looked around the room, systems still fixing themselves in the background as it kicked its legs off the table.
“My name iss Ssir Pentious, and I fixed you! You were in an alley in Downtown Pentagram City, sso I decided to grab you and bring you back with me!” V1 glared at him as they stood up, looking around before looking back to… Sir Pentious. It's a dumb name, but whatever.
“Your engineering is abssolutely incredible if I do ssay sso myself! If you’d allow it, I’d like to examine you another time,” he said with a smile. “Well, what iss your… model name?”
V1 started signing to him, using the feedbacker and its gun hand. “I don’t undersstand ssign language.” Sir Pentious informed, scratching the back of his head. It rolled its optic, making a writing motion. “A piece of paper? Yeah, that makess ssensse.” He slithered over to the desk, opened a drawer, and pulled out a beat-up notebook, flipping to a blank page before grabbing a pencil out of the desk and handing both of them to V1.
It whiplashed the pencil, grabbing the notebook simultaneously before scribbling down something and handing the notebook back. [V-MODEL 1 OR JUST V1] Sir Pentious read it for a second, placing the notebook back in its hands “Ssplendid name, my friend!” V1 started writing again, [I NEED FUEL]
“Like oil or ssomething? I have a can around here, ssome-” V1 cuts him off by pushing the notebook towards him [BLOOD] Sir Pentious gave him a funny look, sweating a little. “I-I don’t have any blood jusst lying around… but you could go out and kill ssomeone-”
V1 held its hand up. [MY PLATING DOESNT ABSORB DEMON BLOOD I NEED SOMETHING THINNER] it wrote. “Thatss inconvenient… well, I could ssee about getting you human blood, would that work?”
[YES THAT WORKS BUT HOW WOULD YOU DO THAT] Sir Pentious thought for a second before his eyes lit up, “I ssaw a billboard somewhere in Pentagram City about a businesss that goess up to the human world and takess hitss on the living they are paid to!” He explained.
That confirmed something. V1 definitely wasn’t in the same hell as before, let alone the same dimension. It nodded, [SO YOUR GOING TO PAY THEM TO COLLECT SOME RANDO HUMANS BLOOD]
“Yes, I don’t exactly have grudgess with any living persson anymore.” He shrugged, slithering around V1 to grab his tools off the desk he had them on earlier. Sir Pentious certainly was an… interesting character. Why was he even going through the trouble of helping V1? It's not like people in hell are inherently nice. It was strange, to say the least. He stopped putting his tools away at the sound of V1 writing, looking over at it. [WHY ARE YOU HELPING ME]
“You are a marvel of a creation! No way would I just let such an impressive machine go to waste, that’ss an insult to creation in general.” Of course, it was for a selfish reason, he was a demon after all. IM GOING TO POWER BACK DOWN I DONT WANT TO WASTE ANY MORE FUEL] he went back to cleaning, “Undersstandable, I won’t be gone for long anywayss!”
He tossed his toolbox in an already dirty corner, slithering over to a door. He opened it to reveal a red hallway, a stark contrast to his mostly yellow room. “Tatah, V1!” he said, slipping through the door and shutting it sharply behind him. No need to stay powered on for now, V1 started its power off program, and the world went dark again.