Carmody and the Electric Dragon

“This is definitely the meeting point” Eric calmly assured Lilly, who was tired and sweaty and very hungry. She sat herself on a raised section of piping and regarded her companion in the glow of her headlamp.

“You said that at the last three places too” she reminded him.

Her eyes roamed over the chamber they were in, nearly twenty meters across and at least five meters high. It was the junction of four maintenance tunnels, every available wall and ceiling space covered in pipes, cables and metal junction boxes. It was like being on the inside of a piece of vast machinery. Gurgles, whines and rhythmic thumping noises came from all around as the arteries of the City sent their fluids and energy moving around its massive body.

“It is the right place” he insisted and pointed at an identification number stencilled in meter wide yellow paint on the central floor space. “See, that says this is location I-6-1”

Lilly looked at the marking on the floor and walked to the other side of it, facing back to Eric.

“Or it could be I-9-1” she said. “How do you know which way is up on the markings?”

Eric looked at his friend with a flat expression.

“You can be a very mean person sometimes, Lilly” he said to her.

Lilly was gobsmacked and regarded her friend with wide eyes.

“What is that supposed to mean?”

=====

“Little girl, you need to wake up now” said a young woman’s voice close to Carmody.

“Just five more minutes, mum” she pleaded drowsily and rolled over onto her side. Her bed felt surprisingly damp and quite firm. She couldn’t have wet the bed, surely? Maybe Vance had crawled in with her again after he had wet his bed? That made a lot more sense.

She felt something nudge her side so she pushed at it, annoyed that Vance was playing games so early in the morning.

“Knock it off or I am telling mum” she muttered. Her hand felt for Excalibur and the reassuring touch of his leather wrapped handle soothed her. She dragged the cricket bat to her and snuggled it close.

“I am serious, get up now please Miss” said the voice, much more insistent this time. “There are some machines coming and we need to get moving”

Carmody’s eyes shot open as she came fully awake. A pretty dark skinned woman, in her late teens she guessed, was standing over her, nudging her with a booted foot.

She was tall, not super tall but definitely taller than Carmody and her friends. Her outfit was amazing as she was dressed in a long black coat adorned with thick plates of some kind of armour, with long knee high boots sheathed in the same protection. Her long dark hair was hanging in a braided tail over her left shoulder, leaving two smaller braids framing her delicate face. Most incredible of all was the short sword hanging at her side in a leather scabbard, suspended from her right shoulder by a long leather strap. A silver crucifix gleamed on a short chain around her neck, inset with a small red gem.

“Thank goodness, now please stand up” the woman asked her. She kept looking worriedly over her shoulder into the distance, obviously the direction the danger was coming from.

Carmody climbed to her feet, using the arm offered by the woman. Her grip was remarkably strong considering she looked quite slender, almost petite.

“Ah thanks” stuttered Carmody once she was standing, holding her bat across her chest protectively. “Um, who are you?” she enquired, feeling a familiar blush creep over her pale skin.

“Introductions later” the woman said curtly, “First we run!” Saying this, the woman grabbed her arm and dragged the girl into motion, heading in the opposite direction from whatever had been approaching. Carmody stumbled and nearly fell, her legs feeling bruised and painful from her earlier fall.

Behind them came a strange, hooting call, like a bird using a megaphone, all electronic sounding. Carmody risked a glance behind her, seeing she had been in a large open chamber, a meeting point of some tunnels with an overhead shaft being the one she must have fallen down. The opening in the ceiling was a good few meters up, making her wonder how she had survived the drop.

From the tunnels she saw movement, lights gleaming from the front of machines as they walked and rolled into the space they had just left. Construction machines, worker robots, repair drones, all of them seemingly made from different parts of other machines cobbled together by some crazed genius.

“What are those things?” she shouted to the woman, still pulling her relentlessly along a tunnel.

“I call them Gremlins” she replied, her voice only loud enough for Carmody to hear her. Despite the urgency there was no sound of fear in her voice, only calm assurance. “They have grown to be a problem in the last few days so I came down here to investigate”

They were deep into the tunnel by now, overhead lights showing them the way ahead. Behind them the hooting noise had grown louder, echoing from the walls as the first machines entered the tunnel in pursuit.

“Look, I am Okay to run now” Carmody told her new companion. “You can let go of my hand”

The woman glanced at her, seemed to make an assessment and released her hand.

“Just make sure you can keep up” she said, a sudden smile on her face, her white teeth flashing in the dim light. “If they catch you they will eat you”

“Really!” shouted Carmody and looked back in horror at the following machines. The sound of their own racing footsteps was bouncing back from the concrete tunnel walls, a counterpoint to the ruckus from their pursuers.

“I’m kidding” she said “But seriously, those things are dangerous. I am taking you to a place where you can get back to the surface”

“What are you going to do?” Carmody asked her, breath starting to come a bit raggedly as she ran.

“Me? I am going to fight them. That is my job”

The two companions surged into another large chamber, filled with pumps and pipes and cables running in all directions. A shaft lead upwards with a ladder mounted to one side, a stencilled sign indicating it was fifty meters up to the surface.

“Quick, get up that ladder” the older girl said, “I will hold them off down here” She turned to face the tunnel opening they had just come from, drawing the short sword from its scabbard. They could both hear the rumbling noise of the approaching machines.

Carmody looked at the ladder, then back at the young woman standing so bravely at the tunnel mouth. She hefted her bat in both hands and went to stand at her side.

“My name is Carmody Brentwood” she told the other woman, her gaze fixed resolutely on the tunnel. “I am a student at the 10th District Junior High School”

The woman turned her head and looked at her in disbelief. Carmody did not waver, keeping her eyes locked on where the enemy would arrive, her bat held ready.

“Okay then, Carmody. I am Sister Impassionata of the Order of Michael. I am a Hunter, dedicated to finding and destroying the enemies of the innocents”

She glanced at Carmody and this time the girl met her eyes, a wide smile on her face.

“Wow, that sounds cool” Carmody said with genuine enthusiasm. “I am a Dragon Slayer myself, Sister Impassionata!”

“Is that so? In that case, please call me Nata” the older one replied. The noise from the tunnel indicated the Gremlins were nearly on them. Nata held her sword aloft and incanted a single word, “Lacerata!”

Carmody was in awe as the short blade lit up with a blazing blue light, the whole chamber illuminated by the glow. The first of the Gremlins, a large four legged robot with a square body and two heavy tool arms surged into the open space, that weird hooting coming from a speaker grille set below glowing red eyes.

It rushed towards the two warriors, one deadly looking arm tipped with saw blades swinging at each of them. In almost perfect unison Carmody and Nata stepped forward, blocking the attacks. Then they countered, Carmody first as her cricket bag smashed into the metal arm and crushed it. Nata’s glowing sword swung in a controlled arc and severed the other arm at the shoulder joint, sparks flying as it separated from the main body.

A metallic scream of anger came from the machine and it reared up on its four legs, looking to crush them both with its heavy body. Before Nata could stab her sword into it, Carmody bellowed a war cry and delivered a powerful upwards blow from Excalibur. In what seemed like slow motion the massive robot was lifted off its feet and flung in a high arc over the heads of the two behind it, crashing down onto a fourth that had just exited the tunnel.

Both those robotic machines were crushed, the red eyes fading to darkness as their internal systems failed. A wailing cry of metallic frustration could be heard from the tunnel as those further back found the way blocked.

The two Gremlins that had made it into the chamber paused as if assessing these dangerous human foes. In scant seconds they had destroyed two of their number without being scratched themselves. They moved to the left and right, forcing the human females to fight them one on one.

Carmody found herself facing a six legged robot that reminded her of an ant, in this case an ant that was three meters long. The legs were joined to a central body, with an articulated teardrop section at the rear fitted with heat exhausts, probably containing the power source. A front section had a small sensor head on top with a serious looking set of metal pincers projecting forwards. They seemed designed to feed things into the open mouth she could see on the head, lined with sharp teeth rotating like a food processor. Whatever purpose this robot had originally, it was absolutely terrifying right now.

The Sister Nata was being stalked by a giant ball nearly two meters in diameter, its outer layer criss-crossed by moving treads that allowed it to spin and move with incredible agility. Sensor eyes gleamed in clusters across the body, set into recessed sections. From other recesses she could puffs of flame emanating, as if the machine had flamethrowers built into it. Which in fact it did, built to control vermin and fungal outbreaks in the tunnels.

“Can you handle that one by yourself?” Nata called out to Carmody, worried for the younger girl.

“Absolutely!” Carmody responded and felt a thrill of terror mixed with excitement course through her body. She twirled Excalibur in her hands and with a shout charged the giant ant. The ant let out a hooting cry of its own and rushed to meet her, pincers snapping open and closed with metallic clangs.

Carmody met the first charge with her bat, knocking the pincers aside and shearing one of them from the head. However she did not slow it down and it slammed into her, hurling her backwards a good three meters. She yelled in pain and surprise as she hit the concrete floor, sliding across the hard surface and tearing the sturdy blue coveralls she was wearing.

Excalibur was knocked from her hands and went flying, landing somewhere in the shadowed corners of the chamber. The girl wheezed as she recovered her breath, just in time to scream as one metal leg reached forward to pin her to the concrete. With evil malice the giant ant-like Gremlin hooted in victory and brought its mouth down towards her face. Inside its open maw she could see the razor sharp teeth rotating, ready to mince her up like ground beef for a chilli.

Meanwhile, Nata was finding it hard to get close enough to strike the flame-spitting ball Gremlin. Each time she lunged in, the robot sprayed a burst of flame at her, forcing her to abandon the attack and dodge away from the fire. Her armour was solid and fire retardant, but the flames would engulf her and burn her unarmoured parts. She was fond of all her parts and was not keen to get any of them scorched!

Out of the corner of her eye she saw Carmody’s attack on the ant and was horrified when the girl was hurled to the chamber floor. Without care for her own safety, Nata turned away from her own Gremlin and charged at the giant ant, screaming a battle cry of her own.

“In the name of Michael, thou art destroyed!” she screamed and her short sword severed the machine’s head from its body. With a fading mechanical hoot of anger the head bounced away across the floor, the teeth slowing and stopping as it died.

“Nata! Behind you!” shouted Carmody, still trapped under the dead ant’s front leg. The other girl whirled as the giant ball crashed into her, taking the impact on her armoured coat and forearms. She was knocked back against the rear section of the ant’s body, trapped in place as the ball spun its tracks across her, the short sword unable to stab or cut as it too was caught against the robot.

Yet it was not trying to hurt her with its tracks, rather they were to hold her in place while it rotated the spherical body, bringing one of its flamethrowers into line with Nata.

“Impervioso!” Nata shouted a moment before the Gremlin spewed fire. A circle of symbol filled blue light appeared from Nata’s left hand, filling the tiny space between her and the flamethrower port. Fire erupted, washing back over the robot, yet some of it splashed across Nata’s right arm, the sudden pain causing her to drop her glowing sword.

The ball shaped robot rolled away from Nata, perhaps worried about catching fire from its own weapon. Nata dropped to her knees, the circle of light fading, and Carmody knew her companion was in trouble.

Sudden determination filled the young girl and she channelled power into her Kinetic Enhancer. She had only really practiced using her cricket bat as a focus, yet all the instructors at the Testing Centre told her she could send her power into any part of her body. With a shout of pure anger she kicked upwards at the inert ant body that was holding her down, focussing her Ability into her right leg.

With satisfaction she watched the headless body fly away from her, hitting the ceiling some meters above then crashing into a pile against the far wall. She did not know where Excalibur was right now, but Nata’s glowing sword was literally at her feet. Without thinking she leaned down, grabbed it by the hilt and ran at the big ball Gremlin.

Maybe the Gremlin was dazed by its own flame attack. Maybe it did not think the young girl could damage it with the sword, being smaller and weaker looking than Nata. Perhaps it was just too dumb to realise what was happening. Whatever the reason, it just sat there as Carmody swung the enchanted sword at the middle of the robot ball.

With a shower of fat blue sparks and the tortured scream of shattered plastic the Gremlin was cut in two. The eyes in each section seemed to blink in surprise, then the halves fell to the floor, wobbling like an apple cut by a knife.

Silence descended in the chamber and Carmody ran to Nata’s side, looking at her with concern by the blue glow of the sword. Nata was holding her right arm against her side, her dark face pale with the pain she was feeling.

“Well done, Dragon Slayer” she managed to say then collapsed to the floor.

=====

It had taken Sarah and Achmed what felt like hours to find an illuminated chamber with a ladder that lead them back to the surface. They had climbed what felt like a thousand rungs of metal ladders until finally they had opened a hatch and breathed the warm night air of the surface. They were on the side of a street, tall towers rising around them and the area lit by bright street lights.

“Oh, that air smells so good!” exclaimed Sarah, throwing her arms out wide and sniffing in deeply. Then she remembered her missing friend Carmody and felt ashamed. Her and Achmed were safe but they had no idea where the other girl had vanished too or what had become of her.

Sarah dug her phone out of a back pocket, noticing that Achmed had done the same. She tapped the ON button and since nothing happened, tapped it again and again.

“Hey, what gives?” she muttered darkly. “Achmed, is your phone working?”

Her friend looked at Sarah with obvious embarrassment. He put his own phone away in a pocket and glanced sheepishly down at the ground.

“Remember how I did that Electromagnetic Pulse to destroy the robot brains?” he asked, refusing to meet her eyes. Sarah suddenly had a bad feeling about what was coming next.

“Uh-huh” she said flatly. Achmed was still looking at the ground.

“Well, when it cooked the robot brains it may have cooked our phones too!” he blurted out.

Sarah punched him on the arm. Not a Sarah Special Punch, as he had saved their lives. But that phone had used all her saved allowance for a year to buy. Plus it had her favourite games on it and all the contact numbers for her friends.

“Ow!” Achmed said and rubbed his arm.

“Come on, we need to get back to the school. The Guards at the Post can contact Eric and together we can search for Carmody”

“Hang on, we don’t even know where we are in the City”

“I do” Sarah answered. She pointed to the tower over the road from them, a vast structure of modern glass, metal and concrete rising fifty stories into the night sky. “That is my dad’s office building. We visit him sometimes during school break to have lunch. I can find my way to the school from here”

With that she set off at a tired but determined pace. Achmed rubbed his arm once more and ran to catch up.

“Do you think Stanley can help too?” he asked when he got alongside the fast walking girl.

Sarah pondered this as she walked, her feet slapping down without pause on the sidewalk pavement.

“Maybe? He is getting a bit fat so he may not fit down there. Besides, who ever heard of a Dragon in a Dungeon?”

Achmed was a major computer nerd, one of the reasons he loved being a Scanner. He also loved computer games, especially those fantasy adventure ones.

“You are kidding aren’t you?” he said to his friend.