Devin's respect for Dana increased expotentially.
Dana waved for Devin to follow her, "Come on."
"You've got a plan?" Devin asked as they approached the robot. It slammed its remaining foot into the street, and arched up into the air before falling down again. It resembled a child throwing a temper tantrum.
Dana dropped to one knee, setting down the axe to bring up her gun, "I've got a pretty good idea of how it works from our earlier encounter."
One shot and the pincer-wielding arm sprayed black fluid from the elbow joint. The appendage dropped to the ground without further struggle. Dana picked off more shots into the hip actuator on the robot's remaining leg. Sparks bloomed and she continued firing until the joint ground to a halt with a horrid squeal. Only the head remained, moving back and forth, jaw snapping at the air.
Dana picked up the axe and approached the robot, to gasps of awe from the onlookers. No one else approached as Dana crouched over its torso. After a moment she looked up and waved Devin over.
"You're the techno-geek," she said as he reached her, "Tell me if you see anything we can use here."
Devin examined the wreckage; smoke rose from its hip, oil and hydraulic fluid coated the rest of it. Frayed wires sparkled dangerously. The head whipped back and forth in the neck socket, both its eyes shattered, leaving jagged gapping holes where the lenses were.
Devin looked over the mechanical beast again, shaking his head, "I'm no expert on robotics. I'm an information technology person. This is something else completely. It looks like... It looks like something out of the battle bot competitions they show on TV." He pointed at the neck, "This flat wire must connect to a flash drive somewhere in the head. I might be able to figure something out from the software running it."
"Battle bot competitions," Dana muttered, "Flash drives. Okay."
She stood up and heaved the axe at the robot's neck. With the first strike, the head stopped flailing and the mouth froze. Devin could see where the blade gouged the metal casing and cut into the wires beneath, the rest of the robot went dead also, the sounds of gears and motors falling silent. The second blow left the head dangling by a thread. Dana stopped to twist it the rest of the way off.
She pushed it into Devin's chest with both hands, "Here's the brain. See what you can do with it. I'll get a forensics team down here to see what they can learn from the rest of this mess."
Devin nodded and walked off with the macabre item.
"That's the grill to an F-5000 pick up truck," Murphy's sarcastic voice brought Dana up from the robot's remains. He held a bag of donuts in one hand, his other was coated with powdered sugar. "Can't a guy take a lunch break without the whole place falling apart?"
"You won't believe it," Dana warned, "A big angry robot attacked the building. It was after Devin Matthews."
"Made out of car parts?" Murphy asked, looking over the remains. He rubbed powdered sugar on his jacket absentmindedly.
"Matthews contribution," Dana gestured to the crumpled pickup, "Must have hit it going 50 miles per hour. Wasn't wearing his seatbelt, and the airbags were disabled."
"Ouch," Murphy took a look at the bloody circular cracks in the windshield, and winced sympathetically, "I guess he won't be providing any more leads."
"He's upstairs," Dana laughed, "helping with the investigation. I gave him the robot's head to dissect, since we're short on staff at the moment. Tough kid, the wreck gave him a minor concussion, but he's walking it off all right."
"I wouldn't have guessed that about the kid," Murphy said.
"Me either. What do you make of this?" Dana said, pointing at the robot's remains.
"Looks like one of those Xybercorp warehouse lifters," Murphy said.
"A lifter?" Dana asked.
"The kind warehouse labor uses," Murphy explained. "It's a remote controlled robot that carries heavy crates around. They just started using them this year to replace the old suits the workers used to wear."
"This one had six arms," Dana said, "and a head that looked like an angry clown face."
Murphy's thick eyebrows rose, "That would be a modification. Sounds like something from one of those fighting robot sports shows, only bigger," he grunted, "a lot bigger. What's the take on this one? Is it remote controlled?"
"Witnesses saw it climb out of the Potomac right across the street and came straight for headquarters. It seemed to be taking orders from another one of those moth-bots," Dana said, "when I blasted that the robot stopped trying to kill Devin and started trying to free itself from the cars."
Murphy frowned, "That suggests independent processing."
"Exactly," Dana nodded.
"What about the moth-bot, where was that getting orders from?" Murphy asked.
"Another moth-bot, receiving from another moth-bot," Dana said, frustration edging into her voice. "Data Forensics is having a hell of a time tracing them. We can't find the source until we find the one in direct communication with the home base. They keep changing location. So once we find a connection, we lose it before we can get there." She looked up into the sky nervously, "They're watching us right now."
"That's creepy," Murphy noted. "Sounds like an invasion."
"We were targeted," Dana said gravely, "With all these moth-bots fluttering around, I don't like the prospect of more showing up." She pointed to the robot carcass.
Murphy narrowed his eyes, squinting into the sky, "Hey, is that one of your moth-bots?"
Dana followed Murphy's stare. A pair of fluttering wings darted about above them. Dana followed with her eyes as it bobbled in the air, easily knocked around by the light breezes so high up. It landed on the asphalt near the defunct pick up truck ten yards away from them. It raised and lowered its wings several times and crawled a few feet toward the truck before stopping.
Dana saw its laser pointer draw a bead on the reinforced steel hydrogen tank on the truck's underside and shouted, "It's targeting the fuel tank!"
Every speaker in the room resonated with slow, rhythmic breathing both familiar and alien at once. The sound permeated the air surrounding Devin. It rasped like a sleeping giant, yet tingled with trickling wind chimes.
It started moments after Devin connected the skull to a computer he found in the neighboring workroom. Devin searched the room for the proper equipment, remembering Alice's experiments communicating with the AI. A simple microphone lay on one of the steel shelves. Taking the device, he quickly plugged it into the soundcard's "in" line.
"Hello?" he asked cautiously. His voice reverberated softly through the speakers.
The breathing went silent. After a moment a confused and familiar voice filled the room, "Who's there?"
"Devin," he replied to the air, "Devin Matthews. You sound familiar. Who is this?"
"Devin Matthews?" the unsteady voice replied, "I know that name, but I am missing the data keys. Where do I know you from?"
"Who are you?" Devin asked again, "If you tell me who you are, I can help you figure out how we know each other."
"No," the room snapped back. "He might find me. I don't feel the pain anymore. He put the pain inside me, to control me. I'm safe now. If I tell you who I am, he will find me. Just leave me alone."
Devin considered running for Dana. She was the detective, and would know how to get answers from this suspect who was more like a victim, "How did he control you? What did Flatline-"
"Don't speak his name!" the man shouted. Devin's eardrums protested and he twisted the volume knob. The voice dropped several decibels mid-sentence, "He might hear you! Then he will come for me again! Just leave me alone!"
"You are safe," Devin assured him. "You are on an isolated computer system. You aren't connected to the Internet. There is no possible way he can find you here."
"He's everywhere."
"No," Devin said with authority. "He's not. He's on the Internet. You are on an isolated system-"