>>5368760Though your proprioception is handy for helping you circumvent possible encounters with patrolling guards or busy employees, rounding the next corner has your group skidding to a halt, as you find that you’re not alone.
Slightly taller than your ankles, a pair of small robots have taken their post at the entrance to the next corridor. While one looks like some sort of cross between a crab and spider (though wholly dissimilar to the odd, robot-like creatures you saw in Conduit’s dreamworld), it stares up at you with a pair of beady, red eyes. Rolling around on its arms, the second bot looks considerably friendlier than the first, its appearance reminding you of that VALL-E movie you watched ages and ages ago.
What’s the most surprising of this whole encounter is that both of them move with a fluidity that you’ve never thought would be possible in such devices– you would’ve thought that robots like these were at least a couple of decades away, and yet here FutureLabs is proving you wrong on that front.
If not for the fact that these robots were creations of FutureLabs, you’d almost find them cute in a weird sort-of way, but the suspicion that rises within your gut has you wary of both of these automatons.
“Stay back,” You warn the others, motioning them to stay out of sight. Standing at the forefront of the group, both bots’ eyes are on you and you alone.
Your motion has the movie-bot wheeling itself towards you, and, without one shred of warning, a beam of bright, red light is shined directly into your eyes. Your eyes feel pain for all-but a second, the light trailing its way down your form.
“SCAN COMPLETE.” The robot speaks with a joviality that’s wholly unfitting of its workplace. “NON-HUMAN SIGNATURE DETECTED.”
You blink, slightly offended at the unassuming robot, because last time you checked you were definitely a hu–
>(1/2) 