The End Result... (Chapter 10 - Frozen in the Tracks)

[dragondream]

The End Result

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Chapter 10 – Frozen in the Tracks

“Bobby... Bobby, wake up!”

Robert could feel himself being slapped on the back hard and being shaken in frustration. He was too tired and too cold to do so much as open his eyelids to see who had come to wake him up.

“For the love of the Sol System... wake up Bobby!”

Robert could not stand the interruption from his sleep any longer. He sat up straight and rubbed the sleep from his eyes and tried to focus his eyesight on his abrupt visitor. His vision soon cleared up when he saw Saria’s horrified expression on her face.

“What’s the matter with you?” he asked puzzled. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

“It’s not far off,” she replied looking even paler. “I saw something sneaking round the tents... it definitely was not human...”

“Ok, ok. Don’t worry it’s probably just some harmless animal or something.” However, Robert picked up his Sidearm, proving that he did not fully believe in his own words. “Stay in the tent, ok? I’m going to go check it out.”

Saria did not object to his instructions, for she did not want to come face to face with whatever it was. Robert slowly exited his tent, his Sidearm drawn and ready to fire. He carefully snuck round the perimeter of the tent, watching carefully for any movement. He could hear the sound of some shuffling and moving along the ground. Putting his finger on the trigger, he crawled steadily towards the noise. Feeling that he was extremely close now, he backed up against the nearest tent and switched on his torch, aiming it into the darkness.

With the camp fire directly behind him he waited breathlessly for the intruder to appear in the light of his torch. A chill went down the spine of his back and acting on instinct he switched the torch back off. The fire, now being the only source of light, now lighted a massive shadow completely covering the shadow of Robert. Within a split second he drew the weapon into firing position and spun round flawlessly pointing the barrel right at the intruder. Before he could fire the weapon, something hard and metallic hit him right in the face at bone breaking speed and agility. He was thrown back against the wall of ice, left staring into the intruder’s eyes. It was a robot about twice the size of him, with a deadly resemblance to the Xenon. With the same heartless cruelty that the Xenon possessed the machine launched himself again at Robert. Within seconds of being struck, Robert ducked out the way and fired five laser blasts right at the centre of the robot.

The blasts hardly made any impact on the robot as it flung itself into an upright position and prepared himself for the next strike. Robert prepared to fire more blasts on the robot, but found that the trigger was stuck. He hopelessly tried again and again to fire the Sidearm but to no avail. He dropped the gun and was about to run away when he heard the shout of a war cry and watched as the robot’s eyes disintegrated by repeated laser blasts. The attack on the robot was caused by Harold who had heard the commotion outside and came running out with his semi-automatic Polarized Laser.

“Now let’s finish him my old foolish friend,” said Harold with a wide smile of accomplishment.

Without being told twice, Robert ran into his tent and grabbed his Polarized Laser, leaving Saria watching frightened and clueless after him. He ran up to robot monster and fired his weapon wherever he could find exposed wires or microchips. Harold fired immethodically at the robot wherever he felt like. Soon the robot fell to his knees, his body bellowing smoke of fried electrical circuits and chips. Robert took one last shot at the centre and kicked the robot lightly, but hard enough to send him down completely. A small explosion finished the robot off, bringing him offline instantly. At that same moment, Saria came rushing out the tent to see what all the noise was about and scattered backwards when she saw the Xenon-like robot. Robert dug his hand into the machine, much to the shock and fear of Saria, feeling around for a specific chip and pulled it out. He held it in the air, closely examining it.

“Yep, just what I feared the most,” Robert said depressingly.

“What?” said Saria and Harold simultaneously.

“This chip. It’s a smaller copy, a perfect replica of the communications chip Xenon ships use to coordinate actions with each other. This robot, it’s a smaller land vehicle of a Xenon. I think the Xenon put these here to populate the terraformed land with AGI.”

“So the little abominations not only had to destroy out planets but have to live on them as well?!” Harold said throwing his weapon down on the ground furiously.

“It’s the only explanation,” Robert replied calmly. “This means we have to have round the clock guards and keep your weapons close by. There’s going to be danger on this cub scout trip. Tell everyone to wake up and pack their stuff. If this Xenon has sent a warning signal to any other Xenon robots we gotta move quick before more of them start piling up here.”

Harold picked up his gun and strode up to the other tents, loudly waking up everyone to get up and pack their stuff.

“Are there really going to be more Xenon like that?” Saria asked.

Seeing the fear in her eyes Robert kindly touched her shoulder. “If there are, they won’t get you. I’m here and I’ll make sure of it,” he said smilingly.

Saria however was not comforted by his words and began to regret coming along in the first place. Without another word she returned to her tent and began to disassemble her tent and pack her and things. It was not long before everyone had all their tents and goods squashed into their backpacks and were marching again through the unbearable blizzard. Robert clenched his teeth as the cold furiously bit into his eyes and onto his skin. He tried shielding it with his arm, but the agonizing pain of cold ice freezing his face kept persevering. He looked back to check on the rest of the group to see how they were progressing. He then noticed Saria limping again, but this time with much more difficulty. He slowed his pace down to match up with Saria. He put his arm round her and spoke soothingly into her ear.

“We will not travel far before we make camp again. We will go on for another two hours or so. Think you make it till then?”

Saria nodded her head, desperately trying to hide her pain from him. She clutched her knee as she felt the cold stiffening her bones which she already had great difficulty moving.

“Are you sure you will be alright?” Robert asked, feeling very concerned.

“I’ll be fine,” she said.

Robert made his way to the front of the team again to lead the way through the ice. The blizzard had grown increasingly stronger and colder. Harold appeared next to Robert to speak with him. He grabbed Robert’s shoulder to get his attention.

“Saria is struggling to make it through the storm,” said Harold, barely audible in the gusting wind. “She looked as if she was in pain of some kind.”

“She fell and hurt her knee yesterday while we were travelling through the blizzard. Think she might have strained it or something.”

Just as Robert finished his sentence a cry of pain was heard as Saria collapsed into the snow, still clutching her leg, unable to get up. Robert and Harold both rushed back to get to her. Robert felt her wrist.

“She’s got a really weak pulse. She won’t make it on her own. Come you pick her up on her right arm and I’ll take her left arm.”

Robert and Harold picked up the unconscious woman and fought through the snow to carry her along. By now the group were out of sight and had travelled far ahead of them.

“We’ll never catch up in time,” Harold said in dismay. “They’re too far...”

Harold’s sentence was cut short when he noticed in the snow another pair of tracks in the ice besides those made of the group. They were much bigger and deeper tracks and were recently made. He turned to inform Robert but saw that his gaze was fixed on the tracks too.

“Oh no,” Robert said in horror. “If we don’t catch up with the group in time, that Xenon will...”