System Overclocked 3 -ch 9-

Chapter 9

Wrench shifted his weight around and felt odd.

He briefly considered if this was how the Grae probably felt. Watching the Hume moving about below them.

They were more kind about it than I’m going to be.

In fact, Grae only used to get involved when you had something they wanted.

Otherwise they’d hiss, honk, and run off.

The four people moved under Wrench and stopped at the hall.

There were three ways to go from here.

Forward, right, and back the way they came.

Wrench figured this would be the most likely spot that they’d split the team up, even if it was just for someone to remain and guard the hall.

As he had suspected, they did indeed split the team.

Surprisingly though, they moved apart in two person teams. Leaving no soldier by themselves and keeping them paired.

Nodding his head, Wrench couldn’t fault them for that. It wasn’t a bad idea and he applauded the choice.

As the two pairs moved away, Wrench lightly slipped down from above and reached the floor.

Pressing his palms and shoes to the wall and spider-climbing his way down the eight-feet rather than dropping.

Doing so with barely a noise at all when he made it to the floor.

Pulling out his socket-wrench Wrench glided forward behind the two soldiers. Their flashlights illuminating the darkness in front of them.

Wrench ghosted up to the soldier in the rear and he took the opportunity to inspect their weapon over their shoulder.

It seemed more machine than weapon to Wrench and at a glance he got the impression it operated in a very similar way to a bow.

As there was no string, and nothing at the front of it that would indicate any type of lever, Wrench could only deduce that the operation was based on the small trigger at the rear at the weapon.

Beneath the soldier’s finger.

Ramping his systems up to the maximum Wrench felt the world slow down even more so. To the point that things felt as if they weren’t moving practically.

Hopefully I don’t break my brain again.

It’d be weird to rush off to Squeak.

‘Oh hey, my brain kind of exploded. I can’t talk about it, but could you fix me?’

His hand flashed down and he put his socket-wrench back into the loop. Reaching forward, he grabbed the weapon around the person in front of him.

Given Wrench was significantly taller than them, it wasn’t that hard.

Swinging the front of the weapon toward the person in front of them, Wrench jammed his finger down atop the other person’s. Forcing the trigger down.

The resounding boom of the gun felt prolonged and genuinely explosively loud.

Followed by multiple booms as the weapon continued to discharge into the back of the other person. The bright flashes from the end of the device seemed comically out of proportion to the small pipe-like barrel.

Fascinating.

It is certainly like a bow, but it works through explosives I suppose.

Or something of that nature.

I wonder if this is what they would call a gun.

I always wondered about them. It fits, in many ways.

Though the size seems odd.

Surprisingly, the weapon stopped firing even as the person Wrench was holding onto continued to jerk and pull. Trying to get the end of it pointed anywhere else other than their partner.

Not sure why it stopped firing, but realizing that it didn’t matter, Wrench grabbed his socket-wrench and then clubbed the man’s helmeted head.

In rapid succession he slammed it down three times in the same spot.

There was no outward display that he had broken the helmet nor did it seem to be damaged at all, though Wrench got the result he wanted.

The person he was struggling with went limp, their knees going out from under them and collapsing to the ground.

Wrench noted that there looked to be a smaller version of the ‘gun’ on the person’s hip.

Taking it, Wrench pointed the front of it at the now laid-low person, right atop the odd looking visor that covered their face, and pulled the trigger.

It fired.

Though only once.

Releasing the trigger, Wrench tried again.

It once more fired.

Ahhh, this requires repeated trigger pulls.

Wrench gleefully began pulling the trigger as fast as he could.

His extreme reflexes had carried him to this point in the span of seconds. From start to finish, it hadn’t taken long at all.

It was surprising to him when the top of the weapon locked backward and further trigger pulls did nothing more.

The gun had worked though and the individual had been shot in the face after punching through the armored helmet.

Tossing the gun aside Wrench looked upward.

There were no missing tiles here unfortunately.

Moving ahead as he dialed his systems back down to a pre-ramp status, Wrench exited the hall and entered an empty room off to the side. There was a hole low in the wall here that would lead out of the building.

He could get back into the overhead space from there.

Doing so he briefly winced as he exited. The sun was rather bright in comparison to the indoors.

Thankfully the pain was momentary as he re-entered the building, once more from above.

The remaining pair of soldiers were likely now with their very comrades. Wrench could guess at this given the sounds but he wasn’t completely sure of it.

Creeping along the metal beams he worked his way back to the hall again. Right in the spot that the other two would need to get to, to take the exit they “knew” was safe.

Because moving forward was uncleared and be problematic.

Or so Wrench reasoned.

These people felt like highly trained Brawlers to him, and pairing that with his resistance training ever so long ago, he felt like he had the right idea of how they’d act.

In no time at all, the two soldiers came back into the hall. One of them was just about walking backward as the other looked forward.

There would be no dropping down on them for Wrench this time.

Except he didn’t even get a chance to consider doing something different either.

Somehow, the person looking backward had an inclination to look up.

Their flashlight landed right on Wrench and blinded him.

Leaping to the side and dialing up his system, Wrench shot through the space, his hands pulling him across the metal infrastructure rather than letting his weight settle on the fragile beams below.

Behind him there was a momentary blast as the person fired their weapon into the spot Wrench had been. He didn’t think for an instant he could remain in the above-space anylonger though.

They’d be watching for that.

Reaching the end of the crawl-space, Wrench kept going.

He burst right through the wall and came right back outside with an explosion of a strange type of material. He didn’t know what it was but it didn’t seem very strong.

Shifting his eyesight down to normal Wrench hit the ground, pivoted, and sprinted around the side of the building. No sooner than he hit the corner than he came to a halt.

Peering out around the corner, he looked around.

There was no one immediately here and it gave him a chance.

Shooting out from the corner Wrench sprinted across the open space and quickly slid into a wooden porch. One side of it had been knocked out due to age and the other was intact.

If the two individuals went back to the rest of their team, they’d pass by here.

Should the team come to here instead, he could wait for them to all pass by and reposition again.

After all, he didn’t think for a moment that they’d suspect he had already exited the building and was now already lying in wait for them.

A minute later and the two people came out of the house in a strange gait.

Only for Wrench to once again realize everything was moving normally to him, but the world itself was slow to his perceptions. In a way that was strangely not uncomfortable to himself.

I wonder if Squeak did something to fix me up.

Or… did… my brain fix itself?

Hm.

Something to look into.

I don’t even feel a headache coming on.

Not even bothering to maintain their security, the two people gave up on looking backward.

In fact, both of them began running forward.

Sprinting all out, in fact.

To Wrench it seemed like they were just jogging slowly.

Surprisingly, the two managed to stay closely to one another, though one was a few steps ahead of the other. It wasn’t much, but Wrench thought it was enough for him to take action.

The first ran by and as the second did, Wrench shot forward. Leaping out at the individual.

Wrench tackled them at the waist as he flung his system beyond the max he’d set for himself. Pushing right past it into a category he had never considered before.

He struck the person with such force that they crumpled around Wrench’s shoulder. Folding in half and just not being able to stand anymore.

Surprised, but going with it, Wrench took them right out of the courtyard and into a small drainage ditch.

He promptly threw them onto the ditch, snatched their weapon out of their hands, spun it around, and pulled the trigger while pointing it at their face.

This time he watched carefully.

Once the visor crumpled and the individual started taking the explosive discharges to the face, Wrench let go of the trigger.

Turning, he raced back out to where he’d collected this person from.

The last soldier was rushing away down the dirt back toward where his team had come from.

Wrench lifted the weapon and pointed it at them. Trying to line the barrel up with their back.

As he did so, he accidentally looked through the small device on the top of the weapon.

There was a red circle with a dot in the middle in the device.

It was nearly atop the person who was running so Wrench moved the weapon till it was, then held down the trigger.

The jarring of the weapon caused him a momentary idle thought as he gripped it tighter and prevented it from moving at all.

In no time at all, he saw the armor crack and blow apart. Whatever the gun was propelling so explosively was working quite well.

Then the weapon stopped working, clearly out of it’s ammunition again.

Tossing it to the side, Wrench didn’t need to stick around. He could already see that the individual he’d attacked was already falling to the ground.

Wrench shot off perpindicular to the direction the people were running toward. Gaining distance quickly to the point that he was at the high and heavy walls of the compound.

With a casual jump he grabbed the top of the rather tall wall and levered himself up.

Getting to his feet he ran down it and straight toward the point that the enemies had entered from. The wreckage of where the wall had been blown up was rather visible.

There was also six people standing around it with weapons similar to what everyone has had.

Pulling his socket-wrench back out of the loop again, Wrench cocked his arm back and then hurled it forward. He felt reasonably assured that it’d hit the target.

The whine that came off it was surprising, however.

When the tool connected with the target, the handle struck first.

And buried itself in the person’s torso. Sinking halfway up the handle almost immediately.

All five of the others looked to the one who suddenly crumpled.

It was all the chance Wrench needed.

Leaping forward off the Wall he landed with a thump behind one of them.

Once again, Wrench snatched up the weapon and aimed it at the closest two individuals, all while manhandling the third he was wrapped around.

The boom of the weapon was loud and Wrench was not a fan of it at all.

Once he saw the armor crumple after several rounds, he walked it over, from person to person.

Unfortunately when he got to the third person, that one and the remaining individual, had both turned their weapons on the one Wrench had been holding onto.

Falling flat to the ground, Wrench rolled, kicked off the ground, and sprang upward. Taking the goal of “anywhere but here” as his wish.

He ended up crashing into a nearby tree and got hung up on a branch.

Both of the people who had turned their weapons on their companion didn’t even seem to notice Wrench was gone. They fired until their weapons couldn’t anymore.

Surprisingly, Wrench watched as they detatched the rectangular boxes from the bottoms of their weapons. They fit new ones in, then pulled back on the upper part of the weapon.

Is that how they put new ammunition in?

Curious.

I want to pull one apart.

It’s an interesting machine.

Very interesting.

Snapping off a wrist sized branch with a turn of his hand, Wrench dove at the nearest person.

In a split second for Wrench he was there, atop them.

The tree branch worked well enough it would seem if enough force were applied. It came around and slapped into the person’s legs with enough force to send them flipping toward the ground.

Their visored face slamming into the ground with a bam and their legs coming up behind their head.

Stomping down on their back, releasing the branch, and grabbing the person’s ankles, Wrench jerked forward and down.

There was a hideous crunch as he quite literally folded the person at the waist. To the point that the backs of their knees were nearly on their head.

The last person had managed to bring their weapon around and leveled it at Wrench.

Dodging out to the side he planted a foot on the wall just as they began firing, launched off it, and redirected himself at them.

He closed the distance fast enough that they didn’t have enough time to train their gun on him.

Wrench bowled them over and sent them to the ground with a thump. Landing atop them.

Leaning back, Wrench grabbed at their shoulder then twisted their arm around till it had made an entire rotation. Satisfied that they wouldn’t be able to do anything further with the big gun, he let go and snatched their left arm.

Jerking at the wrist he bent it at the elbow in the opposite way that it should go and was satisfied to find that it now hung limply.

There!

Edmund will be happy.

At the worst, there would be one left to question.

Though… do I need to break their legs? I don’t think they’d go anywhere but… I’m not one to take chances.

With a sigh, Wrench stood up, bent down, and neatly broke the person’s ankles.

Both of them.

Going to one of the people who had been gunned down without getting a shot off, he took their weapon in hand. He found a number of the rectangles that would hold more ammunition and stuffed them in his coverall pockets.

Then he went to another and took even more of them.

Pausing only to take the socket-wrench, he was now done with this area.

Contemplating what action to take next, he assumed that the team inside would likely return to this area to try and exit. If they had a different exit, then it wouldn’t matter to Wrench anyways.

His only real concern was being able to get back to work.

Wrench let his system fall back to the pre-ramp and turned to look at all the equipment nearby.

He spotted what could only be a radio setup.

Not all tech on this world was that different than his own, it just didn’t seem to have the same types of things.

One shocking example to Wrench was apparently everything here was made by hand or machine.

Nothing was made by a fabricator.

Now paying attention to the radio, Wrench realized there was people talking on it.

“— order you to report in!” said a voice over it. Wrench wasn’t sure if it was his own language or something that his implant was translating, but either way, he could understand them.

“This is fucked. We need to get out of here now. It’s an unknown force and an unknown number!” said someone over the radio. “We need to leave. Now! This is nothing like what the intelligence said!”

“Fuck just-fuck, team three, report in!” demanded the first voice.

Hm, this was planned and they were expecting something.

That’s rather curious.

I wonder what Edmund will think of it.

Wrench couldn’t help but note the fact that his response to the situation wasn’t quite right. Even despite the fact that he’d tuned his mental ability to handle such a thing as combat, this felt more than what he’d ever experienced before.

I really need to talk to Squeak about all this.

This isn’t what I was used to and it leaves me feeling like something important has changed. Something that I really need to get a handle on and understand.

“Fine, we’ll get out. Use the secondary extraction. We can’t-can’t risk route one,” ordered the voice. “Radio silence after this except for local proximity.”

A single snort was Wrench’s only response to that. He didn’t like that he couldn’t listen in but he couldn’t fault the response. It was appropriate after all.

It just didn’t matter to him.

Looking into the depot, Wrench unfortunately couldn’t find anywhere that was significantly taller than the rest. If he could, the first thing he’d want to do was to get up on top of it and look to his surroundings.

A stupid idea popped into his thoughts.

He wasn’t sure it’d work, but realistically speaking, he was feeling somewhat strange. As if he weren’t even a Hume anymore and was beyond the limitations he’d suffered from previously.

Racing back into the depot Wrench made it back to the warehouse near the center of the depot. He hadn’t seen or heard anyone on his way either.

The depot was deathly quiet.

Throwing the weapon around his shoulder with the fabric the strap that was at the front and back of it, he grabbed up a twelve foot ladder.

Sticking it to the side of the same scaffolding he’d climbed up earlier, he shot up to the top of it.

Reaching the end he grabbed the ladder and manhandled it up to the top of the warehouse.

Plunking it down right there he unfolded it partially, climbed up to the top, and stood at peak of it. He looked around as quickly as he could as he didn’t want to make himself such an obvious target.

He was betting against the idea that the enemy wouldn’t be looking toward the interior, but toward the exterior. Toward their exit and safety.

Wrench was only half right.

He spotted the enemy, twelve or so of them, all rushing to the far corner of the depot.

Several of them had been looking backward toward where he was and spotted him.

Their weapons were already raised up.

Before they could fire, Wrench dropped down off the ladder, hit the warehouse roof, and scrambled down to the side of it.

He had his direction.