"Maybe we should," Kira said. "I think they're keeping the walls of this rift from collapsing. Without them, the arctic ice and water would flood this place."
"You don't know that," Yoshi said.
"We saw them working on the wall, fixing it. There's a reason we named them maintenance robots. Tell the group that!"
"We're calling them sand mites now," Yoshi replied.
"Who cares? Tell them!"
Yoshi sighed, then passed on Kira's message. Anna nodded in agreement, but then, she was the only other one of the group who had already seen these things in action.
"Kira thinks these robots are keeping us alive?" Oliver asked. "That's a big favor from the same group that probably brought our plane down in the first place."
"They're blocking the trail into the desert," Kira said. "I think they want us to go to the right."
Yoshi looked where she was pointing. It was true. The sand mites seemed to be clearing rocks to form a new path off to the right. If the team went in any other direction, they'd either have to scale the large mound of rocks ahead or cross the green-goo river to the left.
"Where do you think that new trail goes?" Akiko asked.
"Back up the hill," Yoshi said, nodding at the line of robots farther ahead. "They want us to turn around."
His natural defiance rose inside him. If the robots wanted him to go back, then he was determined to go forward. He'd climb a pile of rocks twice as high as what they'd built, or simply use the device to jump over it. He'd do anything but follow the orders of some little brick with mechanical whiskers and legs.
Oliver turned back to the group. "You're right, Yoshi. It's not only the robots we should worry about. I don't trust whoever programmed them."
"Neither do I," Molly said. "We shouldn't trust anything we find in this rift until we have evidence otherwise."
"Then we might be missing out on a lot of help!" Anna said. "We were chosen to survive that crash--all of us felt something save us. Why would they save us and then try to kill us once we landed?"
"I trust them," Akiko said to Yoshi. "If they wanted to harm us, they'd have attacked us already. They must know we're here."
Yoshi nodded, then turned to the group. "Akiko agrees with me. We don't trust them."
Molly glanced doubtfully at Akiko, then looked over at Javi. "What do you think?"
Javi considered his answer a moment, then said, "I like robots. That's not helpful, I know, but I just like them."
Yoshi leaned in. "We're the Killbot team, right? Then I say we go kill us some bots."
Anna shook her head. "That's not the reason for our name."
"Well, it should be! You saw the way that pincer robot went after us in the cave. The only reason we survived was because we turned on the heavy gravity and brought an avalanche down on its head. What will we do if one comes at us across the flat desert floor? No desert I've ever seen is going to spawn an avalanche!"
Anna opened her mouth, but no words came out. Yoshi knew he was right about the avalanche and about the pincer bots. They had bragged plenty about how tough their soccer-playing robot was, but it was nothing compared to the technology she'd seen in that cave. And that said something about whoever had built this whole environment.
Someone had designed it. Someone had trapped them here. And they were undoubtedly more advanced than the entire Killbot team put together.
Javi must have been thinking about their soccer-playing robot, too. It had been in a makeshift backpack he had fashioned out of a flannel shirt he'd found among the plane wreckage. Now he withdrew it and set it on the ground. A toaster on wheels--that was how Javi had described it to Yoshi.
"We're programmers," Javi began. "We told this robot to kick a ball and to destroy any other robots who tried to get the ball. We did a good enough job that some international competition wanted to see our work. So why don't we just change this little guy's programming? Tell it to treat those bug robots like a soccer ball."
Anna scoffed. "Well, there is the problem of it being completely broken!"
"For now," Molly said slyly. "It could be fixed, if we had the right parts."
Yoshi smiled. "If we could capture a sand mite, maybe we could salvage it for the right parts."
Anna shook her head. "You got mad when I kicked one of them in that cave. Now you want to capture one and rip it apart?"
"I say we do it," Molly said. "We need the parts, and besides, dismantling one of them might teach us a lot about whoever built them in the first place."
Yoshi stood and rubbed his hands together, then instantly regretted being so eager. Just in the time they had been considering the soccer-playing robot, the number of mites ahead of them had doubled or even tripled in number. He felt like a fly in a den of spiders.
They were doing more than barricading the trail now. They were erasing it, making it seem like the only reasonable path was back up the hill.
Molly stood beside him. "They don't want us crossing that sand. We know that for sure."
Then Anna stood. "And I'm sure that if we try to steal one of them, there's gonna be consequences."
"We'll deal with them. Together." Yoshi spoke with confidence, but he had major doubts. If they were about to start a fight, then he just hoped it was a fight they had any chance of winning.
Javi volunteered to capture the robot.
Why him?
Maybe because he had gone crazy in the jungle, that was why. Maybe because Yoshi had a big sword and a bigger ego, and Javi just wanted to prove that he could do some of the tough-guy stuff, too.
But neither of those was the reason.
It was because Molly had also volunteered, and he didn't want her to go. She pretended that the wound on her shoulder was fine, but it wasn't fine. The last thing she needed was to stir up some robots.
Who was he kidding? That was the last thing any of them needed! Yoshi had a bandage around his knee and walked with a limp, especially when he thought no one was looking. Everyone who'd been in the plane fire had minor burns, and the skin on Javi's arms was a checkerboard of cuts and bites. If he ever came across another mock-me-bird, he'd ... well, he'd invite it to dinner. As the main course.
"Just grab a bot and go!" Anna called from behind him.
Yes, but which one? Were they all identical, or did they have differences based on their unique duties? Maybe Anna was right and it didn't matter. Nothing was gained by standing out here among them.
The sand mites weren't large. They were significantly smaller than the Killbots' soccer robot. Anna had described the cave mites with eight legs beneath their frames, but these also had roller wheels, far better suited for traveling on sand. They didn't have hands, but each robot had a pair of whiskers that could extend and grab and work like a hand would.
Like a hand ... or like tanglevine. A disquieting thought.
As numerous as the mites had seemed while he was with his teammates beneath the overhang, that was nothing compared to how it looked now that he was walking among them, tiptoeing with every step to avoid their whiskers. There were more robots here than he could count, and trying to estimate their numbers only made his heart pound worse than it already was.
They continued working as if he weren't there, erasing the trail beneath his feet and replacing it with more rocks, more barriers into the desert. Those that weren't creating an alternate trail up the hillside were widening the green-goo river. Wading through it definitely wasn't an option. When the robot whiskers touched the goo, it ate away at the metal. If the goo dissolved metal, Javi could only imagine what it'd do to human skin.
Each robot continued working without interruption, just like ants, no matter what they had named them.
Javi remembered once hearing that an ant could carry fifty times its weight, the equivalent of him carrying five thousand pounds over his head. He had the sudden image of these robots carrying him aloft, back to their evil programmer boss. He really didn't want to think about that.
The mites were in constant
motion, and though their movements were orderly, Javi couldn't take everything in at a glance. He focused on one robot in particular as it made its way forward with its stone. Once the robot deposited its rock on the growing pile, it turned right, using its whiskers to smooth out the new trail ahead. Orderly. Deliberate. Just like an ant trail.
"Hurry!" Molly hissed from behind him.
Well, that was fine for her. The robots probably didn't even know she was there. They were definitely aware of him, though. They hadn't attacked ... yet. But he was getting nervous.
"Hey, Javi, let us know when you've got one," Yoshi hissed. "Until then, I'm gonna take a nap."
Javi made a face at him, then turned his attention back to the sand mites. Crouching in position to run, he picked up the one he'd been watching and tucked it under his arm.
It didn't like that. The mite wrapped its whiskers around Javi's arm, squeezing tightly, pinching off the blood flow to his hand.
"Argh!" Javi shouted. He tried to drop the bot, but now it was entangled past his elbow, so he started shaking his arm, dancing around wildly to force it to let go.
It did, but only after he shook it so hard that he ended up falling onto his backside, already sore from the cactus. He yelped in a totally undignified way.
Javi was sure he heard laughter coming from beneath the overhang. He hoped they were enjoying this, because he definitely didn't think this was funny. He was having a bad day.
Or a bad week.
He jumped to his feet and picked up a new bot, this time in both hands with the legs downward and whiskers facing away from him. Its legs wiggled as if it was still walking, then they shuddered and went still.
That was better. Javi turned and took a step toward his friends, but stopped again when a giant thud shook the desert floor.
As a rule, any thud large enough to shake the ground had to be bad. He turned, slowly, dreading to discover what might have been the cause.
Every sand mite that had been carrying a stone piece had dropped it, hundreds of large rocks all landing at the exact same time. The bots had frozen in place, and every metal whisker in the valley was pointed in his direction.
They didn't have eyes, but Javi had the sinking suspicion that they were all looking right at him. A chill ran up his spine.
Slowly, Javi began backing up, the captured robot still in his hands. Then he stopped. The other mites were following, closing in around him on all sides, abandoning their orderly paths as their whiskers extended like long, skinny arms reaching out for him.
Arms that could probably snap him in half.
"Don't just stand there, Javi!" Molly yelled. "Run!"
Yes, obviously he should run, but which way? Back up the steep hill, on the new trail? No, that was what they wanted, and they didn't seem very friendly right now.
Should he try scaling the mound of rocks? They'd overtake him in only a few steps. He wasn't about to dive into the green river. He was desperate, but not stupid.
As the sand mites surrounded him, Javi kicked at anything within range, using the one in his hands like a battering ram when necessary. But there were too many, and as soon as one figured out where he was going, they all shifted course to follow him, keeping him surrounded.
Keeping him trapped.
"What should I do?" Javi shouted. "Guys? Hello?"
There was no answer. Javi didn't dare turn around. The mites were closing in so thick, he'd never escape on his own.
Where had his friends gone?
As soon as Javi's robot theft turned sour, Molly had ordered everyone back onto the hillside for their safety.
"Javi needs help!" Anna cried.
Molly was already working on her device, so Anna pulled hers out as well. "Dial it to low tech," Molly said. "Let's turn those things off."
"The last time you experimented with tech, I seem to recall an exploding airplane," Yoshi said.
Molly barely glanced up as she adjusted her disk's settings. "That was the high-tech setting, which raised the plane's capabilities beyond its limits. This is different."
"Maybe tech isn't the right setting to use," Oliver said. "Why don't we just do a low-grav jump over to Javi and pull him out?"
"Because of the wind, obviously." Anna made no effort to hide her annoyance with Oliver and Yoshi for second-guessing the plan. Javi needed help, and this was their best solution.
"Ready?" Molly waited for Anna's nod, then said, "Go."
Simultaneously, the two girls powered on their devices and a massive winding down sound echoed toward them, like the sudden silence in a house when the power goes out.
Javi craned his head around until he found them again and gave a wide smile.
"Told you it'd work," Anna said to Yoshi and Oliver.
Javi started toward them, playfully kicking a sand mite out of his path.
That was a mistake. The instant he kicked it, it exploded, knocking Javi to the ground. Where he landed, other small explosions ignited, leaving enough smoke around Javi that Anna couldn't see him anymore. More explosions rippled from the area in a domino effect.
"They self-destruct in low tech," Molly cried. "Turn it up again, turn them back on!"
Each exploding machine was sending metal debris into the air. If any of that debris hit Javi--
Anna powered up the device and the robots buzzed to life again. Still lost in the smoke, Javi cried, "Make up your minds! Whatever you did nearly blew me up. Now you undid it and they're mad!"
Anna started to point out that robots were not capable of becoming mad, but she was interrupted by Yoshi, who ran into the fray. "I've had enough of those devices," he said. His sword remained sheathed at his side, but he was clearly eager for a fight. Oliver and the sisters followed, kicking aside robots, or grabbing them and turning them onto their backs, where their wheels spun around uselessly in the air. The randomness of the Killbot attack created confusion among the robots. They seemed unable to determine where to focus their attention.
"I'll get Javi," Molly said to Anna as they loaded the devices back into their backpacks. "We're not taking the mites' trail. Find us the best way into the desert."
But they'd only taken a few steps before Oliver yelled, "Pincer!"
Everyone turned to see a pincer robot making its final descent off the slope. Anna gulped. She had seen one of these things in action.
Pincer robots were much larger than the sand mites, and the pincers that served as their hands were lined with teeth, making it clear what they were designed to do. The machine also had four powerful legs that left deep impressions in the ground, even in this hardened clay, which told Anna how heavy it must be. Like the mites, it had no head, but this one did have a light on the front that seemed to function as an eye. Or, for all she knew, it was a laser, or a camera through which its programmer could watch them. Study them.
That creeped her out, big time.
"We have to cross the river!" Molly yelled. Javi was with her, his face smeared with ash.
The river was too wide to simply step over, and everyone was too spread out to jump with the help of the devices. They'd have to gather near the edge of the river before they could attempt it.
Anna shouted out for everyone to run, and the team followed her, each of them dodging the mites that tried to trip them with every step.
"Get that stupid bot to the other side!" Yoshi yelled at Javi. "If you don't, then all of this stupidity was for nothing!"
Ignoring the fact that Yoshi had just insulted the group's plan--and insulted robots in general--Anna angled toward Javi, to help him if necessary. Yoshi was right. Javi had to get his captive safely across.
Kira was the first to break through the robots, and she held Akiko's hand to pull her along. Molly had been gripped around her ankle by a sand mite, but now it was only bouncing along behind her as she ran.
Anna pushed forward to Javi, shoving him toward the river. He resisted at first, shouting, "Stop! That's acid, Anna!"
"Yes, and I have a
device!"
Now he ran with her, though it was easier to dodge the robots than she had expected. Too easy. Despite the fact that Javi was still holding a captured robot, most of them were veering toward Oliver.
Molly must have noticed it, too. She had dived back into the sea of robots, trying to clear the ones that were gathering around Oliver.
"Kick them!" she shouted. "Like Javi did."
"I can't!" he cried. "There's too many!"
"Do it!" Anna yelled. Maybe Oliver didn't realize how close the pincer robot was to him. Both pincers were extending outward from the robot's frame, and if they clamped down on Oliver, they would do some serious damage.
Molly grabbed a few rocks from the ground and threw them at the pincer robot, but they only bounced off it without even leaving a mark on the metal.
Next she picked up one of the mites and threw that. A pincer intercepted it, snapping it in half with one pinch.
Anna gulped. It had cut through metal like it was a sheet of paper!
At least Molly had slowed the pincer robot, so she picked up other mites and tossed them, too, which finally gave Oliver the opening he needed to run toward her.
As soon as Oliver got close enough, Molly grabbed his arm and pressed the button of her device, then they jumped, the sand mite still dangling from her leg. She finally kicked it off as she tried to steer them toward the river. Hopefully not into the river.
By then, Anna had gathered the rest of the team. The pincer robot was advancing on them far too quickly. There was no time to tie everyone together. "Okay, everyone get a hand on the device and jump on three," she said. "One, two, three!"
"Matte!" Kira shouted.
Once on the far side of the river, some of the group collapsed to the ground, exhausted but relieved. Anna turned to Javi, who was wrestling with the captured bot, trying to find an off switch. She and Oliver joined in to help him.
Kira and Akiko were chattering in rapid Japanese, their voices in high alarm. Kira finally grabbed Molly's arm and spoke one word: "Yoshi."
Everyone stopped and looked around. He hadn't crossed the river with Molly and Oliver. Panic filled her chest. How had she missed him?
"Where's Yoshi?" Javi asked.
Anna found him first, facing off against the pincer robot near the base of the hill. Taunting it, really, with personal insults such as, "Your mother was a mailbox." It was clever--sort of--but not the kind of strategy a person would use if they understood anything about robot programming. Robots didn't respond to threats or challenges. They responded to their code. Nonetheless, the robot was slowly advancing on him.