About an hour later, the dust cloud from the shattered meteorite was still gradually descending. Occasionally, one could hear a wail or loud grunt of pain coming from those who were still alive and conscious. There was fire all over, sparks of electricity from broken lines and poles. A few individuals were also emerging from the buildings around and looking around to make sure it was safe to move.
MK 2 prime rose from the rubble, its mechanical body was completely disfigured and looked like something out of a futuristic sci-fi horror. The rock that had fallen on it seemed nigh molten as the machine slowly crawled on the ground like a dying animal. Gradually, it got on what remained of its feet. The once majestic suit of armor had been reduced to sentient scrape by the carnage of space.
Fire fighters and civil servants in hazmat suits showed up and began searching for survivors. The area that suffered damage had about a two kilometer radius. The fires were still blazing but abnormally, it would be safe to assume the contents of the meteorite were messing with things, potentially acting like fuel.
From the rubbles within the entrance of the building that Jude had been thrashed into emerged the boy. He seemed to be in shock, he walked out with a face and body full of dust, his clothes completely burnt and ripped into smoking rages. Eyes wide open, one could say he had the a thousand yard stare.
His ears ringed with a deafening constant metallic ding, all he could do was see and even that sense was obscured. There was a sort of red tinge to everything. It was almost like he had developed a nictitating membrane like contacts that changed the shade of his vision. There were bright yellowish figures of different shapes and sizes and varying in visual intensity all over the place.
"Jordan! Jordan!?" He called for his dear friend as he remembered what they had encountered minutes before impact. His arms were spread out like those of someone who could not make his way around their surrounding reality, but in his case, it was all confusion. Lack of comprehension to what was occurring within and all around him, what he failed yo realise was he was perceiving it all using electromagnetic waves instead of light.
Instinctively, he avoided any figures he spotted that seemed to be moving or humanoid in nature. Eventually he walked out of the dust and proceeded to find his way back home to his house. Even while there he seemed distraught. A short while after getting there, he picked up the house phone and dialed Jordan's number before calling her.
"Hello?" He greeted her with a slightly shaken and whispery voice like that of a scared little boy.
"Hello?! Jude! Oh my God, Jude! You're ok, wait, are you OK?!" She proceeded to ask very worried about her best friend.
"I'm...fine, I think, just...dirty, I guess," answered Jude.
"Dirty? You were within range of the meteor crash, are you injured? What about your arm, did you get medical help?" She proceeded, by then she was in her mother's extravagant and luxurious penthouse in Hawaii. The machine that had forced her there standing a distance from her following her movements like a motion sensing security camera.
"No ah...I'm fine, I think, I don't feel hurt, I'm not bleeding, my hand is" he said looking at it" healed? ," the memories came back as he realized his crushed hand was completely healed and not even a single bruise on it . He himself could hardly believe or explain what had happened, he remembered being tackled by a cannon ball sized rock that should have bore a giant hole through him and ended his life yet...there he was, alive, well and dusty. For the most part, it was slight shock holding him from freaking out.
"Healed? What the fuck is going on? Ok, ok, as soon as I'm able to I'll come see you ok? The robot, it was my mom's, it took me to one of her penthouses, I'm safe but i need to check up on some of my other friends," said Jordan. She seemed almost disappointed at the fact that she was, almost like she would have wanted to be at the location where calamity struck, or rather she felt guilty, guilty at the fact that she had a rich, billionaire mother who never failed to make her feel out of place. To her, that day, she did not feel saved, instead she felt detached from her friend. It was as if her whole life there was always this huge margin that separated her reality from those of her peers, one created by Yui and her riches, and she hated it. Coupled by the fact that the machine had hurt Jude in its pursuit for her, it was a lot to take in.
"Its alright," said Jude before ending the call. By then, he had not realized it but his vision had gone back to normal, he was however too deep in the void, one full of confusion that he barely even thought about it.
Back in the city, the MK 2 prime also slowly dragged itself out of the dust cloud. Molten metal was dripping from it as a huge surface area was covered by small rocks and pebbles from the meteor. Sparks occasionally came from it's crevices as its eyed flickered, it's movements were especially uncanny and would have been unfathomable to the average human being. It was a scary site to behold.
"Re-re-re-turn...to-to-to...Yui...Nakamura," said the machine as it locked on to her location back in her office. It then slowly ejected itself off the ground, occasionally there would be a burst of thrusting force caused by a minor explosion by its thrusters under its feet. The machine was severely damaged but, as instructed, it had to at any cost return to its maker, and so it flew away navigating towards her.
In a sort of abandoned and unfinished building a couple of miles from the city was a group of individuals, some seeming to be Native Americans, some black and some Asian, they were all in civilian clothing and it was quite a large group of individuals. Amongst them was a big man standing at about seven feet tall. He was walking around looking at them with pitiful eyes.
A young girl, also native American rushed to him with a phone in her hand yo show him something.
"Calian! Look!" She said to him showing him on her phone, news reports from the incident that had occurred due to the meteor and the after effects, there were presenters at a long distance from the point of impact speaking on it. The dust cloud was at that point being sucked away by sort of vacuuming machines brought there by the fire brigade.
"Look what happened, we should've been there," said the girl.
"No, we're fine where we are Nakoma," he answered dismissively like he did not want to further engage in the conversation. He had a bit of visible agitation on his face and in his eyes.
"People died!" She yelled at him in a pleading manner, she seemed sad by gestures and words.
"Peope have always been dying! Our people have always been dying and if it's only now that you're realising it then you're more out of touch than I thought, I was not going to send our people to the front lines, to their deaths for ingrates who would've persecuted them for their sacrifice. Look around you Nakoma! We have more important matters to deal with, charity begins at home, we have our own problems here, let them solve theirs," said Calian as he walked off from her leaving her behind him. A few steps up front and his agitation dissolved into remorse.
This base was home to a lot of homeless people and hideout to a group of super heroes turned vigilantes called the Modern Warriors. Most of them were superhumans born with innate abilities, for the most part, these abilities were not necessarily ingrained in their genetics, at least not biologically. It was more of a spiritual matter, hereditary abilities that could not be scientifically explained.
They, however had for the most part retired from a life of fighting crime and or "evil". This was after the United States government released a rather sort of rule against their kind. This rule denied them from using their abilities unless as civil servants, this was against their nature since they would have to give up their identities and allow the government to perform research and potentially unethical experiments on them. That coupled with the fact that the general public was always extremely discriminatory towards them despite their selfless acts of courage to help and save them from clearly life threatening situations, they grew tired of fighting for the opportunity to help people against their own will and the persecution.
Back in NakaTech, MK2 prime had arrived into its premise. The robot still seemed like it was on its last lap. It flew into the main building crushing through a window. Most of the guards around barely had time to even pursue it. It sent commands towards every door in its trajectory towards Yui and opened them before hand to remove obstacles.
"Madam! MK2 prime is headed your way at alarming velocities!" Reported NAI clearly concerned by the suits weird behaviors.
"Alarming velocities?" She thought to herself, " Well then stop it, I don't want the damn thing causing calamity around here, command it to slow the fuck down!"
NAI began pushing commands in the form of code at the suit but it seemed to have no interest in slowing down or stopping. It was as if the machine had developed a mind of its own, for the most part, NAI could only read it's motives. It was able to read it's through the instructions it was following and immediately reported to Yui. The present guards were also of no use, the machine was moving too fast.
"Madam, MK2 prime is blocking any and all commands I send towards it, it seems to have a firewall that for the most part blocks me out. I was however able to read through some of its code, it's instructions are to reach you however it seems hostile and unclear," the artificial intelligence said to Yui who was slowly getting concerned. NAI had also set off an alarm for lock down turning Yui's office into a mini bunker. As for Yui, her own machine turning hostile against her? Was it hacked? A bug maybe? So many questions were running in her mind. She was nervous but knew what she had to do.
"Send five suits to intercept and stop it," commanded Yui.
"Affirmative," said NAI as she released five MK2 suits towards the intruder. The robots wasted no time immediately locating MK2 prime and charging towards it. Three clashed with it trying to tackle it it while the other two aimed for crevices that exposed its body shifting their hands yo blasters before shooting at it. Two by its sides and one holding its neck and face. This was barely enough to stop it, it grabbed two of the ones that had gotten a hold of it, by their heads and smashed them against the last one in the middle holding its face immediately putting them out. The last two still valiantly shooting at it, it dodged their blasters before piercing it's arms through their chests putting them out.
After finishing its enemies off it dashed through one of the doors on its left side, now nearing it's target. NAI sent a couple more but they were immediately shut down by MK2 prime after it released a powerful electromagnetic pulse that for a brief moment shut down even NAI leaving everyone in darkness and Yui at its mercy.
Yui however for a moment was confident, she was already in her bunker, tonnes of food and water, in fact she could survive there for a while before she figured out the solution go her predicament. What she however failed to realize, is this was the best of her creations, at least leading to that point, MK2 prime was a very powerful weapon that could easily take on an army of heavily armed men and come out on top and unscathed. In simple terms, she underestimated herself and her own desire for immense power.
The machine finally reached her bunker and slammed it. After the loud thud that had shaken even Yui's bunker, there was a short silence. Yui took a deep breath and smiled, she was safe, there was no way that thing was going to piece through layers of thick steel alloy reinforced with carbon fibres.
Well, she thought wrong, the machine began melting through the walls of the bunker like hot iron to butter using a later beam from it's right deformed arm, occasionally the laser would flicker and switch off before proceeding on. A short moment later she saw a red line appear on one if the walls of the bunker, it then burst into sparks and molten metal, it was MK2 prime.
Yui stared at it in disbelief, why was it behaving as so, it was her creation, she made it, it was supposed to follow her commands however there it was pursuing her like it was assigned to kill her. Her heart was pounding, at the very least she hoped that it would, as instructed find her and stop since those were her instructions to it.
The machine then proceeded to start punching the crevice it had created, forcing the cut into a dent that was quickly getting wider and wider with each blow. Every single blow sent shivers down her spine, at that point, she could see it on the other side through the opening and it was terrifying. It still had molten metal dripping from it, sparks from it lighting up the darkness all around as occasional flashes that exposed its grotesque nature. It's eyes however, glowed red on constant as it stared her down never breaking eye contact.
"MK2 prime! Shut down!" She commanded but the machine completely ignored it. Then and there she knew it was no longer following her instructions but it's own. She was in danger, she suspected it of course and kind of assumed it all this time but the sense of comfort she had granted herself by the delusion of power she thought she had over the machine had calmed her down a little bit, not anymore.
"Boom!" The wall blew open creating a hole wide enough for MK 2 prime to walk in. It slowly stepped into the room still staring her down. Her eyes fixated on it, heart pounding so hard it was almost painful. It stopped...
The machine stopped moving, it was not off though. It just stood there, motionless, staring at her. She heaved a sigh of relief, smiling, realising that her earlier suspicions were right, it was in fact following her commands just...aggressively, or so she thought.
The machine proceeded to dash towards her, collide with her so hard the two, crushed into her desk as one unit. Then and there the lights came back on and NAI began warm booting. Yui was on the ground releasing screams of anguish and severe agony. Molten metal was on her skin couple with sharp shards and open electrical parts all from MK2 prime. It was pressing itself onto her as she tried fight it off. In her attempts to escape she ended up touching more of the molten metal and screamed even more. Part of her flesh was melting off exposing her bones that were immediately covered by the molten metal once more. The sounds she was emitting at that point were no longer human.
A short while after the lights came back on, Arrya ran into the room to find Yui on the ground between two halves of her broken desk. Most of her skin burnt off or covered with metal, her hair burnt off and face resembling a soggy slice of pizza with teeth and eyes. Smoke with the smell of burnt flesh emmiting from her, almost immediately upon seeing her, Arrya vomited.