Giant pair of bucket grapples attached to thick yellow wires slid down slowly like a setting sun. The grapple caught one of the long metal rolls and descended above as the wire reversed. It scrolled through the storey and dropped it into a machine, there were like a dozen such hanging grapples distributing rolls.
The edges were occupied with giant pressers that stamped metals, saw-blades with sharp grapple cutting through metal tubes, drillers that sprayed cold water, and spinners that sprayed spark. The noise demanded to press the communicator to my ear whenever Edwin talked, the Knight Commander's announcement hardly reached my ear.
"How are they still running?" I shouted into the communicator.
"They have separate power controls excluded from the necessities," Edwin said.
"Why is that?"
"There are two power supplies and two controls for primary supply, if one goes down, the second back it up before there can be any latency," he said. "Running these machines on backup power wouldn't be conservative."
I spotted a knight walking before me, in perfect range and focus. I drew out the arm and unloaded its cylinder.
"No," Edwin commanded. "The machines are easily combustible."
I put my arms back, the knight was still in range, I sneaked behind him and launched myself. He hit the ground with my knees on his back and hands on his head. I saw another knight striding against us, I struck him before he could reach, his body smashed against the metal rolls and bounced back. My hands caught his head and got twisted as he fell. I pushed one and pulled the other, the neck cracked like a hard nut.
I spotted a few more heads holding torches. I quickly went behind the rolls and unzipped the bag just to realise I wasted the smokers. The heads came towards me, I started to move around the rolls and caught the last one in the bunch from behind, A bright beam of light blinded my eyes. It was like an element cylinder the size of a head, with slits like in the smoker. The cylinder smashed into pieces, pouring the element as I landed my knuckle. The body looked like metal armour the size of an orc but was attached with a metal skeleton underneath. I realised the other things kept striding without noticing the dead knights.
I jumped back behind the rolls as a rumbling alarm fainted by loud machine noises, and breezed through the storey. "What's that?"
"Leave there," Edwin screamed through the communicator.
I bolted through the storey blindly passing all the walking machines and noises but halted and retreated when a cry tore far ahead of me. Three knights, three only knights who existed in the entire storey other than the one I smashed, I assumed, were butchered into chopped meat. Smoke exhausted from the barrels, the three barrel guns spun slowly, waving to the corners. Six on either edge, each mounted and locked with the walls adjacent to one other, in such a way they didn't collide. A small metal-stripped window above it, for the smoke to leave I guessed, element cylinder peeped out from each gun.
The machines were gathered around the spilt element, grapples kept transporting the rolls, and the machines continued to make noise. One of the grapples came above me and slowly dragged down. In instinct, I grabbed the roll and climbed on it. It raised me to the ceiling, I could see the storey shrink below me, the walking machines were everywhere, equally spread across the storey. Suddenly the grapple stopped and scrolled through the storey. I was above a metallic stripped presser when it stopped again. Instead of waiting for it to descend I jumped into one of the three-barrel guns to avoid getting caught by it. The other guns didn't fire as expected. I waited for the grapple to drop the roll and jumped into it when it raised again. It was the worst mistake I made, it dragged me back from where it had picked me up. Before it could reach the tube, I jumped into another grapple carrying a tube. It took me back to the gun, and I made the jump again, but that time instead of jumping into the grapple, I jumped into the close by gun. It was a huge leap, yet I made it without getting caught. I was pretty sure I wouldn't do that again.
A breeze of dry air hit me from the slits, it was a ventilation shaft. The metal louvre came apart when I pressed it hard. It was big enough, I squeezed myself through the dry metal cave. I crawled straight and turned once I hit the wall, I moved towards the slits of light, the space stank in dryness, I kicked open the door and peeped out. Luckily there was no firing, there was a gun below. A bucket grapple scrolled before me, I immediately went out and jumped to it. I could see the stairs approaching, eight machines and exactly eight machines walked near it. I was stuck, the roll dropped, the grapple raised again and started to scroll back. Another grapple holding a roll approached me, I pulled out the arm and fired instead of swapping. The roll smashed the floor creating a heavy crack. All eight machines ran to it. I jumped down and landed behind them.