Neo was laid on the metal bed once again. But this time, he could hear voices surrounding him. Not only one but many. He forced his eyes to open, but it seemed like those eyes of his were not under his control anymore. Realizing that, Neo focused on increasing his hearing system and tried to hear what the conversation was about.
“What did you do to him? You promised me he would no longer suffer. But, what was this?”
A woman's voice. It was very soft and gentle. Neo could feel the emotion from her, a thick emotion. She was crying while speaking.
“You can have my word. He’s fine. It was just the side effect of a special weapon implant. His immune system is too strong, it rejected the weapon.” Neo breathed slowly. He remembered the second voice. It belonged to Corine, the only woman he could remember.
“I would never sign that agreement if anything bad happened to him.” Said the crying woman. Her presence close to Neo brought a warm feeling that Neo couldn’t understand. It comforted him.
“I know, Alison. Don’t worry. He’s already here with us. He heard everything.” Said Corine as if she knew Neo was there, silently hearing the conversation and trying to remember anything that had already been forgotten.
“Open your eyes, Neo.”
At that moment, Neo once again tried to open his eyes, and he made it. As easy as breathing the air. Now he could see clearly another new face, a beautiful woman with black hair, crying in disbelief.
“Ash─”
“No! His name is Neo.” Corine tapped the black-haired woman's shoulder before she could continue her sentence.
The woman stared at Corine with a displeased look, but she nodded. She walked closer to touch Neo, still lying on the silver metal bed, staring at her while trying to remember if he knew her.
“Neo, how are you? Are you in pain?” she asked, trying her best to hold her tear.
Neo didn’t know why the woman couldn’t stop crying. All he knew was just the comfort he got from this woman's presence. It was very warm and the anxious feelings he got before were suddenly gone. The emotions that he couldn’t get from the other woman who addressed herself as his mother.
“I am not in pain,” Neo answered. He tried to move his hands, his legs, and his body. All was good. He couldn’t feel any pain. He was just as fresh as waking up after eight hours of sleeping.
“I’m really glad to hear that. I hope you’re always healthy. You already have too much pain in the past.” The woman, Alison, grabbed Neo’s hand but only a second. Because after that, Corine pulled her body away from Neo.
“Do not mention the past. It has been written in our agreement.” Corine hissed.
“Argh … I- I am sorry.” Alison was a bit scared. But she was in pain. Corine’s long nails scratched her shoulders till it bleeds.
“Who are you?” asked Neo, suddenly interrupting. His eyes locked on Alison’s face.
“Me?” Alison asked back.
“She was just another Creator. Probably the best one.” Corine answered. “Doctor Alison.”
Once again, Neo tried to remember, but he couldn’t. Ultimately, he would just give up because everything in his memory was gone. He didn’t know why and by whom. But it was strange. The word .. Creator … he could remember clearly what it meant.
“The Creators, The HumanBot.” Neo mumbled.
His reaction made Corine smile in relief. “Now you got the important memories back. I’m glad you made it, Neo.”
Neo forced her body up. And when he made it, he suddenly felt both hands were like burning on fire. His skin turned red, and a second after … it was a glitch appeared surrounding his hands, and finally, two black-shining-gloves appeared there. Covering both of his hands with metal. The powerful metal.
And then, Neo’s left eye turned red. A notification popped out.
[Special Weapon has been activated]
[Name: Transformer Gloves]
[Activating the artificial intelligence system, please wait]
[A.I. has been activated]
After several notifications, Neo suddenly could hear a robotic voice inside his head. It was soft, a woman’s voice.
“Hello, Subject 888, how are you? My name is Transformer, your personal assistant. I am here to help you understand how the special weapon work.”
[Transformer Gloves has been signed for Subject 888]
[Subject 888’s identity]
[Name: Neo]
[Gender: Male]
[Age: 17]
[Height: 185 cm]
[Weight: 79.9 kg]
[Breed: 1st Gen HumanBot]
[Strength: unlimited]
[Weakness: rare biological complications]
[Title: None]
“Great, now your body can work together with Transformer.” Said Corine with a smile. A weird smile that made her look weird in Neo’s eyes.
Neo didn’t say anything after he read several pieces of information that he already knew before, yes, it was strange because he could remember that part really well. He just stared at those black-shining gloves in amazed. The gloves look amazing and powerful at the same time. But still, he didn’t know what those were for?
“Now get up! Everyone is waiting for you.” Said Corine. She pushed Alison away to give Neo space.
“Everyone?” Neo asked, confused.
“Your people, Neo. They need their leader.”
Neo still didn’t understand. But he jumped down from the bed and stood there, very close to Alison, who was standing in front of him like a statue.
“Alison, give him space. Your visitation is no longer needed here. Go back to your place.”
Neo realized that Corine didn’t like Alison at all. She even didn’t bother to hide her hate toward Alison. And what made everything interesting to Neo was that Alison didn’t like her either. But the relationship between them, Neo didn’t know any.
“Ash─ I meant Neo, please take care. You have to know that you always be loved.” Alison grabbed Neo’s arms and stared into Neo’s eyes.
Neo was confused. The touch he received brought strange comfy feelings that he couldn’t understand. It started to scare him.
“I’m ok.” Neo pulled his arms away from Alison. He was scared of that weird feeling whenever Alison did something to him. And thus, he chose to create a distance.
Neo just didn’t know that there was no greater power than the power of blood’s bond in the world.
Alison left Neo and Corine alone.
After that, Corine asked Neo to follow her to another room. While walking, Neo could see many people wearing lab coats busy doing their job. Neo didn’t need to ask who they were or what they were doing because he remembered those parts already. In his memory.
And suddenly, another notification popped up and made him stop.
[Warning!]
[You have 0 DNA essence in your bank]
[No DNA sources available at this moment]
Neo was startled by those notifications again. Suddenly he remembered the thing that he had read before he collapsed. Something called the mutant system. One thing that, so far, still hasn’t been explained by Corine.“What’s happening? What are you waiting for? We have to hurry.” Corine looked back to Neo after she couldn’t hear any footsteps behind her.Neo stared at her, thinking. Then, he decided to ask. After all, he somehow believed that Corine knew everything.“Where can I get DNA essence?” he asked carefully.But Corine didn’t give him an answer right forward. She remained silent and looked like she was battling with her own mind.“What are you talking about? DNA essence? Did I make another mistake during the upgrade, causing you to start talking non-sense?”The answer he got made him even more confused. But, before Neo lost his memory, in his past … he was already known as one of the brilliant HumanBot.Neo was sure that the notification he got before passing out was different
“INFINITY!” shouted Neo.Of a sudden, all those empty eyes glitched. Shining-red lights blink from their robot eyes as if the code just reactivated their system. Everyone started to grasp their breath. Many of them looked terrified, but the remaining looked calmed down.Neo just watched what was happening in front of him and stayed silent. He felt relief when he saw Tony back to normal, breathing easily while his eyes found him, then smiled.However, although everyone there had received their consciousness back, they didn’t move from their line as if they were still under the control of the program or something. Neo looked at Corine. His expression clearly hid many questions.“What was that for? The code?” Neo realized that the code Corine’s gave was somehow activating the HumanBot as if they were under his control. Knowing that fact, Neo once again felt that Corine was just using him and the HumanBot.“An army should work properly. Somebody should give them an order. And that somebod
Corine left all the HumanBot inside the hall without any more words coming from her lips. She walked out like a ghost while Neo was still trying to push his body to move like he wanted. But he couldn’t.Neo found out that his body was controlled by someone else who was not himself. The same fate that all the HumanBot also faced. It was strange, but remembering the latest upgrade that he still didn’t know the detail, made him feel robbed. Not only him but all the HumanBot. They lose their freedom before they even realize it.“Neo, how you doing?” Tony ran to Neo. After the metal door hidden on the wall closed entirely, all the HumanBot were suddenly free to move on their own.Neo stared at Tony from head to toe as if he was investigating him and trying to find what’ things had changed. But as long as he could remember, Neo couldn’t see any changes in Tony’s physical.“Do you get it too?” asked Neo, a strange feeling made his throat itchy. It feels like it’s been a while since the last
Zink!Zink!Zink!The hall suddenly became noisy because of the sound of alarm rumbling from every corner of that giant room. The enhanced hearing system that almost every HumanBot have causes them to struggle to stay balanced while standing on their feet. They tried to cover their earlobes using their bare hands to reduce the annoying sound from the alarm.Neo seemed to be struggling a lot. He fell to the ground while lying on the wall, trying to manually reduce his hearing system because he was the most sensitive HumanBot in terms of that system.“Arghh …”[Mutant body received damage from unknown object]Another notification popped out and confused him.[Warning!][The host might collapse]“What was that for? Arghhh …” Neo complained on something that he could only seen from the notification on his robot’s eye.“Neo, are you okay?” Tony ran toward Neo and gave him a hand. He held Neo’s arm to push him to stand.Zink!He turned it off, and suddenly, he could not hear anything. Even
Neo and the others couldn’t see anything inside the darkness caused by the black smoke. As the training section has been officially started, Neo, who already set the hearing system back to the highest level of sensitivity, began to hear the short breathing system of the HumanBot hidden inside the darkness.“Transformer, do you think the infrared gonna work?”“I have activated the Infrared’s eyes.”Immediately, Neo’s eyes color changed to red as the infrared function had been activated by Transformer. And now, he could see everyone in the darkness, including their facial expression right now when they were lost in the dark and didn’t know what to do next.Neo knew that not all the HumanBot have the infrared system planted in their eyes. Any kind of superior system that normal humans could not have was planted in HumanBot. Still, not all of their body could accept it. Some rejected it, and thus, the system could not work correctly or could not even work.In front of Neo was Hope. She lo
Darkness. Neo could not see anything except the darkness that surrounded him. He was sure that both of his eyes were fully opened, but there was still nothing there. Only darkness. Started to wonder what was happening to him, he suddenly felt like his body was flying. He was lying, but he could not feel anything holding him back, as if he was there lying while flying.“Is this what they called dreaming?” he whispered to himself. His voice sounded weird, as if he got a sore throat.“Hello? Is anybody here?”Neo was trying to find the answer himself. The notification was the only thing he could remember before everything turned into darkness. When the countdown reached 0 seconds, suddenly, everything turned black.“Hell─.”A transparent screen suddenly appeared in front of his face. The light from the screen blinded Neo’s eyes for a second.[Rebooting in progress (10 minutes left)]A weird loading scale inside the screen started to count down the time. Neo tried to touch the screen, but
Neo could no longer speak as if a lock system was placed on his lips. He was trying to free himself, but still, he had no power to move at that moment. A second after, the darkness in front of him started to move like a mini tornado that sucked everything in that room, including Neo’s body. But however, whatever holding Neo’s body was much stronger than the mini-sucking tornado. Neo was still there while he could feel the strong sucking sensation moving to the mini tornado's center. Wondering what was going on, he could only be taught to himself to stand still and calm down. But the movement of the mini tornado was powerful, thus, Neo started to lose consciousness. “Am I really going to die now?” he said to himself. And suddenly … Neo’s body started to feel hot as it burned from the inside. He tried to scream but could not do that because of something still shutting his mouth up. The burning sensation was still there, while a painful feeling started to join the party. Neo could ha
The Greenish race was not originated from Planet Earth. They have their own planet before invading the Earth and destroying everything, converting it to another place suitable for their new home.Humans did not know the reason why The Greenish came out of nowhere and never left because no human could interact with the Greenish. They could speak, of course, but their language and human language were not the same.One important thing about The Greenish that everyone already knew was the fact that they were all shapeshifters. The original appearance of The Greenish was just something covered in green color. They were fully alive.They do not have skin like a human; their skin is as dry as reptiles. But they do not have scales on their body, nor fur. Only Skin. Their body was slim without any curve, just as linear as a ruler. They have three eyeballs colored black attached to the front of their face. They did not have any nostrils, but their mouth was just a big round-shaped cavity with h
It was an attack from Trish hands. She threw a twin chakram blades that suddenly appeared when she summoned them. Her special weapon. The twin chakram was too big for the girl, but she could use it easily as if her hands were made to control them. Its sharp black blades successfully separated the rattlesnake’s new head in a second before the snake even realized that it was in danger. Whooosh! The chakram spun back to the girl and she could just catch them without getting any cut. “Thank you, Trish. That’s amazing.” Neo could not hide his amazement toward Trish’s movement. He quickly jumped forward to grab Tony’s shoulders and pulled him back before the rattlesnake monster grow back its head. “You did well. We will never know that the snake could regenerate like that if you didn’t do anything. Pull yourself together, okay?” Neo shook Tony’s shoulders to get his attention back. And he made it. Tony nodded and gulped his saliva. He looks confused but at least, his confidence was bac
The rattlesnake monster was less aggressive compared to the Tarantula. Its huge and long body moved out from the box. The green smoke was still circulating around the snake, covering the tip of its tail as if the smoke was continuously secreted through that body part. Neo and the other survivors of HumanBot moved backward to give a space for the snake in front of them. They do know that the upcoming battle required huge space because after all … anything could happened to them. Anything bad like poisonous spit from the snake or something else. They need to stay aware. “What do you want me to do?” asked Trish, her eyes widened after realizing that her strength would help Neo. She could not even stop staring to Neo’s eyes with a spark on her eyes as if she was staring at the person that she most adore. “Fight with me, by my side. Wait for my-” Neo did not continue his words because suddenly the notification distracted him once more time. [Automatic-weapon controller is ready] [Wait
An explanation about the automatic system planted to Neo’s body suddenly made all the HumanBot inside the hall silenced. In their mind, it would be very cool to have such a power that can defeat the Greenish as big as the Tarantula Greenish alone like Neo did. However, after hearing to Hope’s point of view, almost half of them changed their mind. Knowing that they will become a fully robot fighter scared them. After all, freedom was the greatest thing that they can dream of. “All right, what’s next? It is over, right?” Aaron broke the silence with his mocking voice. He glanced to Neo who stood in front of him, battling against his own mind. Neo thought that Hope was right. Hundred percent right and it made him felt like a joke. Because he was the one who already have that system and he did not even realized that he lost control over his own body. But before Neo could think about it any further, suddenly the sound of the annoying alarm was back … ZINK! ZINK! The lights inside the
Neo had finally understood what was going on. Even so, he could not tell the true story to anyone inside that hall because he still had a lack of trust toward the others, including his best friend. Using his creative mind, Neo tried to find an excuse to tell them before their curiosity led to something bad happening.“It was Corine’s special gift.” Neo answered to question of Aaron.Everyone who still could stand on their feet was now looking at Neo. They were having a big curiosity toward him now. After all, they never saw Neo do such a thing during the training against something. Besides, this time was the first time for all HumanBot to fight against the real monster, the Greenish. Usually, they only have to fight the low-quality robot with integrated AI in their system.“Special gift?” Aaron could not believe it. But however, his voice sounded like he was jealous, as usual.“Yes, it’s a special gift for me. That’s why she asked me to be the leader. Because of that gift.” Neo starte
“Neo!”“Neo!”“Neo, wake up!”Neo could hear a soft voice that he knew belonged to Hope. She called his name hundreds of times, and now … her call could be heard by Neo.The teenage boy started to move his eyelids, trying to open them. A bit hard to do, as if both of his eyelids were sealed by something.“What happened?” Neo groaned as his body felt ached. He was confused by the looks of four different faces. They looked worried.Hope, Tony, the one girl with short hair like a guy that must be Trish, and another guy with a pale face. Neo did not know what they were thinking; thus, he pulled his back to sit, and once again … he found himself on the floor.“Gosh, you scared me!” Hope moved backward, creating a distance. Her body was covered by sweat. Same as the others three.Neo did not ask for more questions. In fact, he looked around and discovered that the view was totally different from the previous one he could remember.In front of him, five meters away, there was Tarantula’s car
Neo could feel his body refreshed as if he had just woken up from eight hours of sleep after having such a nutritious dinner before bedtime. The feeling he got came from absorbing the DNA essences from the Tarantula’s leg into his system bank.It was only a low amount of DE, but the effect made Neo feel spoiled. Even so, he did not have such a long time to enjoy the treatment from the system because the Tarantula right in front of him was starting to find a way to stand up with one leg gone.“Come on, Greenish. Give me more.”Neo started to understand now. He learned very well.The system inside his body that never stop asking to be fed with something containing DNA could be everything. Especially the living things. All Neo had learned from the academic school he got as the HumanBot, every living thing have DNA.But however, the system was like only recognizing the Greenish DNA at this moment. Ignoring DNA from the human or even the HumanBot. Because the notification showed that there
The Greenish race was not originated from Planet Earth. They have their own planet before invading the Earth and destroying everything, converting it to another place suitable for their new home.Humans did not know the reason why The Greenish came out of nowhere and never left because no human could interact with the Greenish. They could speak, of course, but their language and human language were not the same.One important thing about The Greenish that everyone already knew was the fact that they were all shapeshifters. The original appearance of The Greenish was just something covered in green color. They were fully alive.They do not have skin like a human; their skin is as dry as reptiles. But they do not have scales on their body, nor fur. Only Skin. Their body was slim without any curve, just as linear as a ruler. They have three eyeballs colored black attached to the front of their face. They did not have any nostrils, but their mouth was just a big round-shaped cavity with h
Neo could no longer speak as if a lock system was placed on his lips. He was trying to free himself, but still, he had no power to move at that moment. A second after, the darkness in front of him started to move like a mini tornado that sucked everything in that room, including Neo’s body. But however, whatever holding Neo’s body was much stronger than the mini-sucking tornado. Neo was still there while he could feel the strong sucking sensation moving to the mini tornado's center. Wondering what was going on, he could only be taught to himself to stand still and calm down. But the movement of the mini tornado was powerful, thus, Neo started to lose consciousness. “Am I really going to die now?” he said to himself. And suddenly … Neo’s body started to feel hot as it burned from the inside. He tried to scream but could not do that because of something still shutting his mouth up. The burning sensation was still there, while a painful feeling started to join the party. Neo could ha
Darkness. Neo could not see anything except the darkness that surrounded him. He was sure that both of his eyes were fully opened, but there was still nothing there. Only darkness. Started to wonder what was happening to him, he suddenly felt like his body was flying. He was lying, but he could not feel anything holding him back, as if he was there lying while flying.“Is this what they called dreaming?” he whispered to himself. His voice sounded weird, as if he got a sore throat.“Hello? Is anybody here?”Neo was trying to find the answer himself. The notification was the only thing he could remember before everything turned into darkness. When the countdown reached 0 seconds, suddenly, everything turned black.“Hell─.”A transparent screen suddenly appeared in front of his face. The light from the screen blinded Neo’s eyes for a second.[Rebooting in progress (10 minutes left)]A weird loading scale inside the screen started to count down the time. Neo tried to touch the screen, but