The place was an old warehouse in a dying industrial district. The air reeked of mold, mixed with some sharp, unknown chemical tang. This was Dr. Anya Vex's base.
"Remember, this is only recon," Lena whispered through the comm in my ear. She was on the rooftop of the opposite building, watching from her perch. "See what you can get, then get out."
My Rustbucket stood hidden in the shadows, its misshapen frame blending with the dark. I felt a little more confident today. At least I'd managed to make it walk without falling apart.
Through Rustbucket's grainy visual feed, I saw Dr. Vex through the grimy window. She was busy at a workbench, surrounded by glass flasks and distillation gear. On the shelf, glowing blue liquid—exactly like the reports—sat in bottles.
She looked… harmless. Just a clumsy nerd.
"Lena, this is pointless. She's just making illegal supplements," I muttered.
"Wait," Lena shot back, tension creeping into her voice. "Something's off."
Suddenly, Dr. Vex turned toward the window. Directly at me. She smiled. Not the shy smile of a bookworm, but a wide, victorious grin.
"Looks like we have a guest!" she called out, her voice carrying through the walls. "Why don't you come in?"
The warehouse doors opened by themselves. My stomach tightened. A trap.
"Kaelan, pull out. Now," Lena ordered, urgency in her tone.
But it was too late. From behind a stack of containers, an Artifact stepped out. Not a standard military model. A civilian 'Hauler'—designed for heavy lifting—heavily modified with haphazard armor plates, drills and plasma cutters bolted onto its arms. And its eyes… they glowed with the same unnatural blue as the liquid in those bottles.
"Subject Kaelan," Dr. Vex greeted warmly. "The male pilot. I've been expecting you."
She knew. She knew everything about me.
"The Foundation sent you, didn't they?" she continued, her gaze sparkling as she studied my Rustbucket. "They want to see what you can do. Fine… let's give them a show."
Her modified Hauler snorted, black smoke spilling from its exhaust as it lumbered forward.
The fight was short and humiliating.
I tried to command Rustbucket to dodge, but it was slow and clumsy. Vex's heavy Hauler easily caught up.
DORR!!!
A massive metal fist slammed into Rustbucket's chest. The cockpit shook violently, my teeth rattling. Pain stabbed at my temple.
I have to strike back! I focused, commanding a punch. Rustbucket's arm swung forward, but slow and predictable. Vex's Hauler easily caught it and twisted Rustbucket's wrist.
The screech of metal filled the air. I screamed in pain, the same pain echoing from Rustbucket's joint into my own nerves.
"Your control's so crude, darling!" Dr. Vex laughed. "Like a child tearing butterfly wings! Let me fix that!"
Her Hauler shoved me hard. Rustbucket, already off-balance, toppled with a humiliating crash, smashing into wooden crates.
I lay trapped in the cockpit, hearing the heavy footsteps of her Hauler approach. Over the comm, I could only hear Lena's ragged breathing.
"Help…" I whispered.
No answer. Only the hiss of pneumatics. A small robotic arm extended from her Hauler's wrist, holding a syringe filled with that same glowing blue liquid.
"Don't worry, darling," Dr. Vex crooned, mock affection dripping from her voice. "This is just… a little test."
The needle pierced Rustbucket's plating, found the gap, and stabbed into my skin.
Cold. That was the first thing I felt. Then fire, racing through every vein.
I woke tied to an iron chair inside Dr. Vex's lab. Rustbucket stood silent in the corner, its eyes dim.
"Good, you're awake," she said brightly, holding another syringe of blue liquid. "I just want to make sure the dosage is right."
"What… what is that?" I mumbled, my tongue thick.
"Oh, this? Just a totally legal stamina supplement!" she said, holding it to the light. "Sold to all our lovely young pilots. For them, it's like vitamins. Refreshing! But for you…"
She plunged it into my arm. The same electric sting, but deeper, nastier. My muscles tightened like cables, then convulsed. I vomited onto the floor.
"See?" she said, eyes bright with curiosity. "Fascinating, isn't it? Your body reacts like it's poison. Your primitive 'Grit' resonance sees it as a threat, amplifying the effect!"
She injected me again. And again.
Each shot a new cycle of hell—convulsions, vomiting, blinding headaches, blurred vision. Between tortures, she'd interrogate me.
"How does it feel? Describe the pain! Does your Rustbucket feel it too?"
I tried to hold out, but the pain was too much. I screamed. I babbled. I begged.
In the background, Lena's panicked voice came faintly through the hidden comm. "Hold on, Kaelan! Backup's coming! They need time!"
But time was the one thing I didn't have. Each injection shredded the line of my humanity. Dr. Vex wasn't just torturing me—she was mapping the boundary between my body and the machine, searching for the point where pain turned into something else.
Another injection pushed me to the edge of blacking out. The world spun. Dr. Vex's voice was far away, like down a long tunnel.
But then, through the thick fog of pain, I heard it.
…thrum…
A low, gritty sound, like stone grinding on stone. Not in my ears, but deep in my bones.
…hurt…
It was Rustbucket. I could feel it. Not in words, but in sensation—the same alien confusion, the same anger at the pain forced on us.
"No reaction anymore?" Dr. Vex whined, disappointed. "Maybe the dose needs to go up."
She approached with another syringe, its liquid darker, thicker.
And in that moment, something snapped. Instead of blocking the pain as I always had, I let it in. I opened myself to it completely.
WE, I thought, pushing the thought toward Rustbucket. WE HURT.
A new wave of pain hit, but this time it didn't just crash over me. It rebounded between me and Rustbucket, a vicious feedback loop.
Then the world exploded into painful clarity.
My vision blurred, but my hearing sharpened like a blade. I could hear every sound in the warehouse—every creak of metal, every hiss of pipes, every footstep Dr. Vex took. I could hear the electric hum inside her Hauler, tracking its position just by sound.
And then came an instinct I didn't recognize. A pure survival impulse.
PROTECT.
With a grinding roar, my Rustbucket moved. Not clumsy—fast, furious. Plates on its arms shifted and locked into a new configuration, forming a thicker, angled shield in front of it.
Dr. Vex gasped, stepping back. "What? That's… that's not your command!"
No. It wasn't my command. It was our need.
The warehouse doors blew inward, splintering apart. A standard Aethelgard military Artifact—a Guardian—stood there, Lena in its cockpit.
"Dr. Vex, stand down! You're under arrest!" she shouted over the external speakers.
But Dr. Vex just laughed. "Too late, darling! I've already got what I wanted!" She leapt into her Hauler's cockpit. "This data will be priceless to my client!"
Her heavy Hauler turned, smashing through the side wall of the warehouse to escape in a storm of metal.
Lena didn't give chase. Her Guardian strode toward me, and she climbed out, face pale. Kneeling beside me, she undid my restraints.
"Kaelan? Kaelan, are you okay?"
I couldn't answer. My body still shook from the drug and the Resonance. But I looked at her, and for the first time, I saw deep guilt in her eyes.
"Backup… too slow," I croaked.
She narrowed her eyes, jaw tightening. "They… they held it back on purpose. I was ordered not to interfere unless the situation was 'critical.'" She looked at me, at my trembling body, at my Rustbucket now bearing its new shield. "I wasn't supposed to let this happen."
She helped me up, most of my weight on her. As we walked through the wreckage, she leaned close, her words cold and clear:
"They sent you here on purpose, Kaelan. They wanted to see how far she'd push you. They wanted to see what would happen."
Before stepping away, Lena's face hardened, her lips flat as she spoke with deadly seriousness:
"Oh, and one more thing… if you really want to beat them, Kaelan, you'll have to train yourself—and that Rustbucket of yours—with every mission you get. Remember. This is just the beginning."
Her words cut deeper than any needle. This wasn't an accident. It was engineered. I was the test subject, and Dr. Vex was the tool.
As they loaded me into the ambulance, I looked at Rustbucket. Under the flashing emergency lights, its new shield glimmered faintly. It no longer looked like a heap of junk. It looked like something waking up.
All that was left was pain.
And a resolve to take that pain and use it AgaInST ThEmM—ONE DAYYYYY!!