83. The Crystal Room

In their cramped storeroom, the group took a moment to realise how far they’d come and what was still to do. Fureva-Yung was tired, having thrown herself about through the earthen tunnels. Nox was tired, the strain of mind controlling servitors and spider-rats taking its strain. Marcus, for once, was tired, the climbing up the earthen shafts taking more out of him than he would like to admit. And Jaden…she was just tired and was looking forward to when it was all over. Still, mutinous talk of leaving to rest up back at the Spire was quickly knocked on the head by the party.
“We just don’t know what we’ve still left to do,” Marius suggested.
 
In Marius' metal map of the Temple, he figured they were one level higher than where they wanted to be.
“Remember the crystal room in the Spire, it was double height, maybe it is here too,” Nox said with not a little wishful thinking. Marius' doom and gloom imagining may be a reality if they had to fight through two levels of servitors like the ones they’d already fought.
 
Nox lifted a mud-stained hand and started ticking off reasons for staying, “My mother is waiting for us to get her and the crystal down to the crystal room. The Shard already knows we’re here. Do you want to give them more time to prepare? And, you forget, we’re inside the thick walls where I can’t easily teleport us in or out.” She settled down beside the silent Fureva-Yung and Jaden.
“We take out the Shard, and the servitors go back to normal. Besides, I have an idea about absorbing some energy from some of the cyphers you’ve found.” She started rummaging around in her satchel, found a few odd cyphers, and tried to determine which ones she should drain.
 
Marius was not impressed with the idea of draining hard-scrounged cyphers.
“Seems a waste. I am happy to shoot you, though.” He said matter-of-factly, pulling out his laser pistol. It wasn’t the most powerful of his attacks and didn’t make it through the Protector’s heavy armour, but it was a good weapon and a reminder of their time on the Illustria.
“What?!” Nox said, huddling closer to Fureva-Yung. He certainly hadn’t worried when he shot Fureva-Yung, mainly because the blast did little more than tickle the armoured Lattimor. Nox knew that nerves were strained, but shooting your companions on the brink of victory seemed reckless, even to her.
“What? Oh, no, I mean, I shoot you and you absorb the blast. Saves destroying a cypher, right?
 
“I do not like the idea of you shooting Nox,” Fureva-Yung protested, but she didn’t make a move to interpose herself against Marius. Nox, on the other hand, couldn’t find a fault with his suggestion. The gun's output should be well within her ability to absorb and would save a cypher that may come in handy. At worst, he’d lose the pistol, which wasn’t doing a lot of good against the Servitors anyway. She glanced over at Jaden, who had taken the opportunity to nap. With only a weak protest from Fureva-Yung, Nox stood, laced her fingers together before her, and braced herself for blast.
“Okay, do it.”
 
Marius didn’t hesitate, aiming and firing in one smooth action. He hit his target, and all seemed well, until he released the trigger. The laser did not stop. The energy kept pouring into Nox from the gun.
“Marius! I can’t…” The power was too much, her eyes grew wide behind the laser light.
The gun started to burn in Marius’s hand. He threw it to the ground and fell on top of it, letting his armour absorb the energy. Too late for Nox, however. She couldn’t hold all that energy and was thrown back into the shelving and knocked unconscious.
 
While Fureva-Yung struggled to extract the limp form of Nox from the crumpled shelving, Marius could feel the heat build below his shielding armour. Taking a peek, he watched his gun glow white and melt into the ground, becoming just a crumpled piece of useless synth, glass and metal.
“I told you, I did not like the idea of you shooting Nox,” Said Fureva-Yung.
 
“I can fix it! I can fix it!” Marius said and started treating Nox for burns and bludgeoning damage. Moments later, Nox awoke, bruised and burn scarred, but feeling fully energised. As Marius healed Fureva-Yung, the Lattimor picked up the sound of wheels in the corridor outside their refuge.
“I don’t think we can rest anymore, “ She said, shaking awake Jaden and preparing for battle.
 
The door whooshed open, revealing one of the large repair drones, a basket fixed in front of it for picking spare parts. Ready for its arrival, Marius took it by surprise with the Molecular Rearranger. It melted into a puddle of liquid metal to the floor.
 
Leaving the safety of their storeroom, Nox was first to creep out and look around. There was no other servitor in sight, but she could hear a lot of activity further down the corridor. Passively using the noise, Fureva-Yung sensed a large chamber ahead where several servitors were busy working. Not far from their storeroom, Nox stopped at a closed door and listened. The snapping, crackling sounds of electricity showed something was busy inside. When the others had joined her, she opened the door.
 
Inside, a repair drone was fixing a gash in a Protector servitor. Having the element of surprise, Marius sent out a ray from his Molecular Rearranger. It missed the drone, hitting a shelf of cyphers above its head. The Protector, always ready, launched itself at Marius and tackled him to the ground. Nox sent a Flash into the room, hitting the drone, but missing the Protector. Unfortunately, the Flash hit a canister on the shelf, which started flashing.
 
Jaden blasted the Protector with her Heavy Blaster as Fureva-Yung stunned it with her electrified chain. Now dazed, Marius couldn’t miss and turned the Protector’s head to vapour.
“Weld that back on!” Fureva-Yung roared in victory as Nox’s face creased in worry. She scanned the canister, flashing a warning red.
“Ah, that is a pressurised gas cylinder of something very nasty,” She pointed at the cylinder.
“Really?” Jaden said, now interested in the cypher for the first time. She ran into the small room and grabbed the cylinder as Fureva-Yung smashed the drone with her chain.
“Oh yes, it's a gas highly flammable in the presence of a naked electrical spark,” She said as the blue gas started pouring.
 
The drone was still fighting and lashed out at Jaden and Fureva-Yung with its four arms. Jaden dodged aside, swinging it around as if she were dancing and planted the cylinder on the drone’s back. It hit Fureva-Yung, who was quickly losing patience with the weaker drone. Marius got a punch in, and he and Fureva-Yung pushed the drone out the door and down the hallway together. The corridor ended at a catwalk that encircled the large room Fureva-Yung had sensed earlier. Four servitors, two Protectors and two Squat Bots worked around a massive crystal two floors tall. Another Protector stood on the same level as them, ready to attack. With a run up, Fureva-Yung and Marius pushed the drone over the catwalk handrail and down to the floor below. A random spark from the destroyed drone ignited the gas, blasting two pairs of servitors and covering them, Marius and Fureva-Yung, in electric blue dye.
 
 
Brandishing her heavy blaster, Jaden ran up after them and aimed for the closest Protector. Her shot was wide, but Marius Molecular Rearranger didn’t, turning it into a puddle after a few steps. Snapping on his invisibility cypher, he waited in a side corridor as a Squat Bot and Protector climbed the stairs towards the party. Blue-stained Squat Bot and Protector clanked across the floor to the stairs as a repair drone appeared out of another room behind them. They were being surrounded.
 
Recognising the Squat Bots as the ones with the terrible sound weapon, Fureva-Yung pinned a shattering shout to it as Nox dashed towards the repair drone and touched its metal hide.
You’re mine! She told it, Now, make yourself useful and get in the way of the others. Nox directed it towards the nearest Protector-Squat Bot partnership.
 
From her position at the peak of the crystal room, Jaden took in the space. She could see the wall a level down, they were behind less than an hour before. On this side, it didn’t look very strong and probably would have collapsed under the force of…say…a huge stone boulder. She could almost see the boulder she had forever made weightless only metres beyond that very wall. Shrugging, at least she could put a spanner in the works on this side, and pulled out her communications jammer.
 
“We’re going to lose our network!” She called, catching Nox’s eye before setting off the jammer. Suddenly, the servitors looked confused, their link to their guiding intelligence scrambled by the Jammer. Taking advantage of their confusion, Marius snuck past the first pair of servitors and set himself up for an attack on the Squat Bot.
 
The first Protector had an enemy in sight, the creature that had turned their repair bot against them. It swung its huge fist against Nox. The repair bot raised an arm, blocking the attack as Nox scrutinised her new friend's memories for information about the Crystal Room.
She couldn’t turn it off, but they had found what they were looking for. This was the central Infrastructure for the Shard, and down a level, she could see the port for their crystal.
 
Beside her, the Squat Bot started up its humming attack. Distracted, she failed to block out the sound, and her mind was bombarded by the deep penetrating drone. Marius, invisible behind blocked it out, and chose his attack spot carefully.
 
Zzzzzzzzzboom! Fureva-Yung’s Shattering Shout went off on the blue-stained Squat Bot still climbing the stairs. She reapplied her Shattering Shout to the droning Squat Bot in front of Nox and ran to interpose herself between the Protector and Nox. Fuzzy-headed, Nox nevertheless flew straight to Jaden.
“I know where the Crystal goes, come with me?” She asked Jaden, holding out her hand. Jaden didn’t hesitate, grabbing Nox’s small hand in her calloused, and they bamfed away to the floor below, right in front of the port for the crystal.
 
Slowly, breaching the Squat Bot’s armour, Marius’s hand reached in and he sent the full force of his Molecular Rearranger into its chest. The Squat Bot and its Protector were taken completely by surprise, the Squat Bot rocked back from the attack, heavily damaged. The Squat Bot treid attacking an enemy it could not sense. It sent out a sonic blast which, Marius easily dodge before giving the servitor a pounding with his fists in reaction. The Protector swung wildly at where it thought the attacker was and missed, giving Marius a gap to stealth along to the second pair now at the top of the stairs. Marius punched the blue-stained Protector taking it completely by surprise. Fureva-Yung with help from Nox’s drone held back the first two servitors.
 
Below Jaden noted she could wire her Jammer straight into the Shard’s crystal infrastructure, boosting its effects.
“I can do it, “ She said to Nox as they both noticed a repair drone turning to attack them both, “But I won’t be able to help against that!”
“Leave that one to me,” Nox smiled, a wicked smile.
 
The drone on the ground floor swung against Jaden and Nox, missing both as Nox reached out and bamfed herself and the drone away. The appeared moments later in the earthen shaft. She fluttered, hovering in place as the servitor plummeted down into the darkness ending with an inevitable splash. Pleased, she returned to Jaden and their work connecting the crystal.
 
Jaden was busy connecting the Jammer. The task didn’t take as long as she’d feared and was soon jamming not just the room, but the whole Shard network. The servitors fighting Marius and Fureva-Yung once more looked around for commands as they were isolated from the Shard.
 
Zzzzzzzzzboom! The second Shattering shout went off damaging the Squat Bot and Protector. Replacing her Shattering Shout for another go on the blue-stained Squat Bot. Still invisible, Marius swung his fist and punched the Squat Bot. The attack his slammed into the humming Shattering Shout, and the Servitor exploded under the double attack. The blue Protector, now without its partner, swung wildly for the enemy, but failed to connect. Fureva-Yung, using the drone as a shield, was protected from attack. Swinging her chain around the drone, it smashed into the Protector, knocking it into pieces.
“Protect against that!” She roared in victory as she spotted an unharmed Nox return to Jaden’s side.
 
Meanwhile, Jaden noticed the car was riding up the nearby liftshaft. After so much experience hacking into different elevator control panels, it took only moments to slam on the Emergency Brakes. Just as the Shard had tried to do earlier, she locked the car in the shaft, stopping attacks, at least from that quarter.
 
As Marius and Fureva-Yung finished off the last of the servitors on the catwalk above, Nox took the key to the pocket dimension that contained her mother and the crystal. She called her mind-controlled drone down to help move the crystal into place as Jaden and Ariaxa made the final connections.
 
Before her control ran out, Nox focused on the spark of the Shard still hiding in her drone.
We’ll be seeing you very soon! She said with glee as she mentally snuffed out the spark, freeing her drone of its malignant presence. Marius searched the lower level and found another part storage cupboard, and the group took a moment to rest and prepare while he searched through iotum.
 
The crystal they’d reclaimed from the shipwreck and driven across country was finally in place. All was set for the group to make their jump into the datasphere. They’re journey from refugees escaping a Shard-dominated Celeron to revenging warriors was almost complete. As they took a moment to relax, they contemplated what they’re lives would be like beyond The Shard.