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“C-c-c-c-corporal,” the robot said. It slid itself across the floor to Sarge using its tentacles. “H-h-h-h-h-h-help. T-t-t-t-t-t-take t-t-t-to m-m-m-m-mainframe.”

“Take to your mainframe?” Sarge asked. “I don’t mean to be a bother, but there are better equipped people for handling this kinda stuff. I’m just a civilian.”

The robot reached upward with two of its tentacles.

“You want me to pick you up?” Sarge held a hand out. The robot lowered its tentacles onto his hand. He could feel the hard, cold, metal plates of its shell as it began to wrap the tentacle around his fingers.

Sarge did his best to hold his composure. Though the situation had calmed down, his heart was still pounding. Usually, in a situation where he dealt with a potentially hostile entity, he’d be on his own. He could even shift into Chomby if he needed, but now he had an audience.

Did any of them notice the image the robot made on the ceiling? Sarge knew he created a cover-up that he was just a fan, and a friend, of Chomby’s. That’s what he played his jacket off as for the longest time. He felt one of the best disguises was making himself appear as closely related to Chomby as possible without fully showing the two shared the same body.

For the most part, it worked. Though, he didn’t account for robots recognizing him. Did they actually recognize him as Chomby, though? They seemed to recognize his logo, but that was something Sarge created. Not Chomby. Chomby just happened to be a living creature with the patterns of the jacket Sarge designed. He could probably explain this as a coincidence if it ever came up.

Sarge craned his neck to look behind him. He could still see the child nearby but noticed an adult was approaching very carefully. Their eyes were set on the kid, but seeing Sarge move made them freeze for a moment. They now locked eyes with him, seeming to wait for his instructions.

“Go on, grab the kid,” Sarge said, gesturing to the child with his free hand. The adult nodded and quickened their pace. They grabbed the kid and started backing up to the crowd.

“G-g-g-g-g-g-grab…. Kid?” The robot asked.

Sarge turned back to the robot, which was now trying to lift itself off the ground and into his palm. “No, not you. There was a kid here. I was scared you were going to hurt him. That’s why I stepped in the way.”

“H-h-h-h-h-hurt. N-n-n-n-no, S-s-stop h-h-h-h-hurt.” The robot finally fully placed itself in Sarge’s palm. Despite its center being the size of a basketball and all its tentacles being three feet long, it was surprisingly light.

“It’s a thing humans do.” Sarge stood up. “When scary things happen, they band together to help each other.”

“H-h-h-h-h-human m-m-m-m-m-mainframe?” The robot began sliding its way up Sarge’s arm. He watched.

“No. We don’t have a mainframe, nor a hivemind. We’re all just people with our own thoughts, desires, goals… everything.” Sarge did his best to smile. “I suppose all you robots function under one central command, though.”

“A-a-a-a-anomoly d-d-d-d-does n-n-not. E-e-eradicate.”

“Right.” Sarge let the robot climb to his shoulder. It seemed to stop moving. He assumed it found a good place to rest. “Comfy?”

“C-c-c-c-comfy?” It asked.

“Uh… is that spot suitable for us to travel?”

“Y-y-y-yes.”

“Alright,” Sarge nodded. “We’re probably gonna talk to a lot of people, so I feel I should know your name. May I ask what it is?”

“A-a-a-a-aerial U-u-u-unit D-d-drone_23”

“Hmmm. That may get confusing to us humans. Can I call you Starfish?”

“S-s-s-s-starfish u-u-unit i-i-identification r-r-registered.” Starfish said.

“Cool. So, Starfish, uh…” Sarge turned to stare at the crowd. He could see some people were looking at Starfish with horrified expressions. Some people seemed worried. All the soldiers were talking among themselves. He could hear radio static as they seemed to be communicating with someone offsite.

“Uh, stay with me and don’t move, Starfish.”

“A-a-a-affirmative.”

Sarge took a deep breath and tried to speak loudly. “Please do not mind this little guy. His name is Starfish and he’s just wanting help from… uh….” Sarge bit his tongue. What was he supposed to say? He knew fully well these people were terrified and anxious. They didn’t know what to make of this tentacled, metallic creature. They didn’t know what to make of any of this situation.

A thought struck Sarge. Though everyone here was terrified, they all had one thing going for them – hope. When the person you’ve seen and grew to accept as a heroic figure happens to be in the vicinity, you tend to feel an air of safety around them, even if it’s minor. With how many times Sarge and Chomby had appeared on the news, they had garnered that reputation. People had been less fearful while Sarge was around because they recognized him as a protector. Someone they could rely on when a situation became dire.

Yet, that’s where the problem was. Sarge never felt like he deserved any praise for his ‘heroic’ actions because he was just doing what he always did. He helped people. He couldn’t stand the thought of people going through something traumatic, or losing a loved one, or even just being inconvenienced. It always upset him to know someone else was hurting… and he couldn’t do anything about it. That’s why he helped people. That’s what it had always been. He never wanted there to be a fanfare for his accomplishments, but it started turning into that while he turned a blind eye to it.

In this moment, though, he knew his reputation would be needed here. “He just wants help from the local town hero!” Sarge finished, bolstering a big smile for everyone to see. “Detective Sarge is on the case!”

The crowd stayed silent, but he could see people’s eyes brighten up. A few of them smiled.

That act was a bit gaudy, and Sarge certainly flushed warm with embarrassment, but he felt they needed to hear that. He only wished he could also give himself that same confidence. Right now, though, he was feeling a large deal of stress weigh on his shoulders. He didn’t want to do this.

He began walking toward the crowd. The soldiers noticed this and immediately raised their weapons, aimed at Sarge and Starfish.

Sarge stopped. “Stand down, please. If you’re worried Starfish took over my mind or something, he didn’t. He’s just resting on my shoulder.” Sarge gestured to Starfish. Starfish didn’t move. Sarge realized it was because of his command. The soldiers, however, lowered their weapons. “He needed information on something.” Sarge looked around at everyone. He then looked at the nearest soldier. It was a slender man with an unreadable expression on their face. “Can you get in contact with Corporal Lunar? It seems we have some information that’s kiiiinda important.”

The soldier looked to the other soldiers around them. They all shrugged. He pulled out a radio and asked for civilian and robot clearance.

Sarge closed one of his eyes while waiting for an escort. He wanted to get Chomby’s opinion on all that was happening. Upon materializing into the mindscape, he quickly mentioned everything he saw and asked what Chomby thought.

“Honestly, Sarge, we really shouldn’t get involved.” Chomby folded his arms. “You said so yourself, we’re out of reserves. We can’t get hurt at all or we’re screwed.”

“Seems to be diplomatic, though?” Sarge said, though he toned it as a question. “Starfish wants to take us to the computer mainframe. We can communicate with them. We can do what I was wanting to do from the start!”

“We don’t even know if it can be trusted… or if it’s just trying to get rid of us.” Chomby huffed. “You said you saw a picture of me. It recognized your jacket and immediately wanted your help.”

“I said I would help before it said anything about it.” Sarge folded his arms. “And don’t think I’m not being cautious Chomby, because I am. I’m scared to death right now.”

“Then get someone else to solve the problem! Get someone more diplomatic than you are! You’re just a guy who likes being a detective! You’re not supposed to delegate peace treaties between warring factions! You’re just a guy who’s already been through too much!”

“What am I supposed to do, then?” Sarge questioned. “We’ve got an entire network of computers that have a lock on us as some sorta ‘defeater of anomalies’. We keep bumping into all these issues surrounding a robot apocalypse. And when I thought I could finally get away from it, we’re pulled right back in!”

“Most of that was self-caused, you know.” Chomby huffed. “In fact, all of this is self-caused. We’re in this mess because you and I can’t seem to get the hint to stop saving people and just let ourselves be bystanders.”

Sarge smiled sadly. He was fully aware that he had a tendency to stick his nose in the business of others, but he was glad that Chomby admitted to doing it as well. “Thanks… for not pitting all the blame on me.”

“You’re a goody two shoes, and I’m a goody polyester jacket.” Chomby stuck his tongue out. “But… my point still stands. We need to find someone else to deal with this. We literally cannot.”

“What do we do if we can’t get someone else to do it?”

Chomby rolled his eyes and folded his arms. “Heck if I know. You’re the idea guy, Sarge. I guess we just go with the flow? See where it takes us.”

Sarge could see two, armed soldiers walking down the hallway. They beckoned for Sarge to follow them, so he did.

Sarge and Starfish were taken back to the corner of the school grounds where the line of vehicles had been located on Sarge’s first night here. Now, there appeared to only be one vehicle, the portable table, and the familiar figure of Corporal Lunar sitting in a chair and scribbling down notes.

When Sarge arrived, Corporal Lunar looked up. His eyes widened for a moment, but then he narrowed them. “Well, I was told I’d be talking to a robot, but I didn’t expect to see you, detective.”

“Yeah, sorry….” Sarge saw the two soldiers that escorted him took a few steps back and readied their weapons, but kept them lowered. Probably a precautionary measure. “This is Starfish. He was on a scouting mission to find a ‘lifeform’ that could give him information.”

“Information? I thought we were getting information from it.” Lunar clasped his hands together over the table and looked Sarge square in the eye.

“Yes,” Sarge nodded. “It told me that there is an anomaly that didn’t follow the new command the computer’s mainframe had declared.”

“What was this command?” Lunar asked.

Sarge realized he needed Starfish to speak for itself. Without its input, everything was just based off of Sarge’s word. “Starfish, can you tell him what the new command was?”

“S-s-s-s-s-stop H-h-h-h-h-h-hurt.” Starfish said.

“Stop hurt?” Lunar repeated.

“When I found the first destroyer-” Sarge started.

“The one you destroyed with a sonic blast?” Lunar cut in.

“Yes.” Sarge nodded.

“A-a-a-a-a-a-affirmative. F-f-f-f-f-found C-c-c-c-c-corporal.” Starfish chimed in.

“Yes, I am the corporal,” Corporal Lunar nodded.

“N-n-n-n-n-no.” Starfish lifted a tentacle and placed it on top of Sarge’s head. Sarge looked up and arched a brow. “C-c-c-c-c-corporal. H-h-h-h-help. S-s-s-stop a-a-a-a-a-anomaly. D-d-d-d-destroyed unit_01.”

Sarge looked down at Lunar. “Miscommunication. It thought I was referring to myself as corporal when I was saying we could talk to you.”

“Ooooh, right.” Lunar nodded. “Continue?”

Sarge continued explaining more details about the computer and its job to oversee the production of Robot Destroyers. Sarge avoided saying his or Chomby’s names when he said he communicated with it, and it then realized what it was doing was hurting people. It ended up empathizing, somehow. Thusly, it created a new prime directive to “Stop Hurt”. The process made it to the mainframe, but apparently a unit in the factory, which Sarge assumed was unit_00, didn’t accept the new directive, or never received it. Sarge assumed it was because the computer controlling it was destroyed.

“So, you need to go back to the factory to find this ‘unit_00’ and shut it down?” Lunar asked.

“I think so, yes. Or, well, maybe you… or someone else could do it?” Sarge asked, remembering Chomby’s words. “I don’t know if I can hold my own right now. I’m all out of reserves.”

Lunar looked at Starfish. “Alright then, Starfish? Or whatever your name is, are you able to track down unit_00? My men already dismantled the entire factory and saw no signs of other, activated robots. Some were in production, but we dismantled them, too.”

Starfish took a moment to speak. “C-c-c-c-c-c-corporal s-s-s-s-s-speak w-w-w-w-w-with m-m-m-m-mainframe. T-t-t-t-talk.”

“I’m the corporal,” Lunar gestured to himself. He then pointed at Sarge. “The guy you’re attached to is Detective Sarge. He’s not able to help you.”

“D-d-d-d-detective S-s-s-s-sarge,” Starfish said. “O-o-only D-d-d-detective S-s-s-s-sarge s-s-s-s-s-speak w-with m-mainframe. N-n-n-no o-o-o-other l-l-lifeform p-p-permitted.”

Sarge’s stomach tied in knots. He wasn’t liking where this was going.

“No one else can go in his place? Why?” Lunar asked.

“D-d-d-d-d-detective S-s-sarge i-i-i-is a-a-a-anomoly.” Starfish said.

Sarge and Lunar looked at each other in surprise. “Wait, what?” Sarge asked. “I’m the anomoly?”

“I thought you said you wanted to destroy the anomaly!” Lunar added.

“N-n-n-no. D-d-d-detective S-s-s-Sarge i-i-i-is d-d-d-d-different a-a-a-a-anomaly.” Starfish stood up. Lunar scooted his chair back. The soldiers behind Sarge raised their weapons. Lunar motioned for the soldiers to lower them and the soldiers did as ordered.

“A-a-a-a-anomaly.” Starfish shined a red light on the table, showing the same picture from before. “D-d-d-d-defeated Unit_01.”

Sarge’s heart rate increased.

Lunar looked down at the image and placed a finger on Chomby. “Isn’t that the Chomby fellow who DJs in this city?” Lunar looked up at Sarge, then down at his jacket. “So, it seems this robot’s got you two confused, I take it? Why are you wearing a jacket with the same logo?”

“Oh, uh,” Sarge looked down at his jacket and frowned. “We’re friends. It’s a business I own. Fluffmaster’s Bakery. I open it up on Thursday nights when I don’t have work. I sell pastries, donuts, the like. Chomby helped me out there.”

“Where’s Chomby right now? Do you two live together?” Lunar asked.

Sarge stayed quiet as he tried to think of an answer. He knew fully well that Chomby was still alive, but aside from himself, Xenon, and Squandered, no one fully understood the situation that Sarge and Chomby had been in for a while. Sarge had done his best to cover any tracks leading to the two being the same person. He knew there could be a few flaws that he’d discover later down the line. This happened to be one of them.

“Sarge, I think you need to tell them that I died.” Chomby said through the earpiece. “It may be the only thing we can do.”

Sarge closed one of his eyes to look at Chomby in the mindscape. “You know it’s gonna make me cry.”

Chomby nodded. “I’ll be right here for you when you’re done. Remember that.”

Sarge opened his eye back up. “I apologize, Corporal. I will get emotional here, but… Chomby died.”

“Oh,” Lunar looked down at the table. He was silent for a moment before he folded his hands together. “My condolences, Detective.”

“Unit_01 fired off an EMP that apparently degraded Chomby’s body. He…” Sarge felt his tears begin to come out. He tried to stop them, but he knew he couldn’t. “He sacrificed himself to save my life. Because of him, I’ve been able to continue this investigation that lead us to this point.”

Sarge wiped his eyes and pointed at Starfish. “Remember what I told you five days ago?”

“Remind me, please. Been running on fumes the past few days. Cleanup after the fight with the, uh, ‘Unit_02’.”

“Unit_02 Eradicated,” Starfish said.

Sarge nodded to Starfish, then looked back at Lunar. “If we can talk, then maybe we don’t have to fight… at least, not on the scale we thought.” Sarge felt himself begin to choke up. He was feeling overwhelmed.

Lunar’s eyes lit up. “Oh, I see.” Lunar turned around and lowered his head. “Your friend, Chomby, sacrificed himself, so that you could come to a peaceable conclusion to all of this?”

“Y-yeah,” Sarge nodded. Feeling his tears return at the mention of Chomby’s sacrifice.

“That explains why Starfish wants you to talk to the mainframe, then.” Lunar sighed and spun around on one foot. “It seems we’re on a two-fronted battle then.”

“W-what?” Sarge failed to disguise the panic in his voice. “N-no! No battling! We just need to talk to the mainframe!”

“YOU need to talk to the mainframe,” Lunar said as he pointed at Sarge. “Yet, there’s still some errant Unit_00 out there that could potentially cause more chaos if it isn’t stopped. You can’t deal with that one, yes?”

“Not again, no. I barely survived the first unit, and only survived the second unit because of Xenon.” Sarge gritted his teeth. “I can’t fight anything right now.”

“Then I propose to you, Starfish,” Lunar said, “let the human military handle this unit_00 you mentioned. If it needs to be destroyed, we can do that.”

“O-o-o-o-only D-d-d-d-detective S-s-s-sarge. M-m-m-m-mainframe. T-t-t-talk.” Starfish said.

“He’s in mourning right now. Can’t you see he is stressed? He’s not trained to deal with this sort of stuff. I am!” Lunar patted his chest.

Sarge realized what Lunar was trying to do. From everything that Sarge told him, Lunar must have felt a sense of responsibility. To Lunar, Sarge would seem to be only a civilian who was given an ever increasing load of responsibilities that were beyond his own capabilities. Lunar was trying to take those responsibilities off Sarge’s shoulders. This compassionate action was something Sarge wasn’t expecting from someone in the military, but it was welcomed.

“D-d-d-detective S-s-s-sarge. M-m-m-mainframe. T-t-t-talk.”

“Then fine! Have him go talk to the mainframe! Let him give you the information your mainframe needs! But from how it’s sounding, you’re wanting him to fight, too?”

“Y-y-y-yes. D-d-d-detective S-s-s-sarge e-e-e-eradicated Unit_01. D-d-d-detective S-s-s-sarge. A-a-a-anomaly. N-n-n-not h-h-h-human. N-n-n-n-not m-m-m-machine. A-a-a-a-anomaly. S-s-s-strong.”

Lunar walked over to Sarge and grabbed one of his hands. He hoisted it up to Starfish’s eye. “Skin and bones, just like me! Human! Stressed! Tired! He’s been through too much! Please, show some compassion for this man!”

Sarge blankly stared at Lunar. He was unsure what he was feeling right now. All along the way, everyone told Sarge to stop, but he felt he couldn’t. He felt he needed to do something, whether to get clarity for himself or because people expected this of him. He was fine with helping people when they needed, but in the grand scheme of things, this was too much for even him to deal with.

Even if he didn’t choose to go back to the warehouse and inadvertently go up against Unit_02, he still would have been thrown back into the mess by Starfish, or another aerial unit, because Chomby defeated Unit_01. No matter how he looked at it, he was trapped. He got himself tangled in a web that he never meant to get tangled in. As optimistic as he may have been before, he only felt his stomach turn. He knew that, because of his and Chomby’s actions, they became the linchpin that prevented an all-out war between robots and humans… all because they tried to talk to a computer that was creating killer robots. He didn’t want all that pressure on himself.

“C-c-c-c-compassion?” Starfish asked.

“Yes!” Lunar yelled. “It’s a thing humans do to understand someone else’s pain!”

“P-p-p-p-pain. D-d-d-detective S-s-Sarge is hurt?”

“Yes. He is hurt. You said your directive was to stop hurt? Then let us help so we can stop hurt!” Lunar pointed at Sarge again. “Detective Sarge is hurt! He is hurting! Let us stop him from hurting!”

Starfish looked between Sarge and Lunar. It spent a long moment processing information. After its eyes zipped around rapidly for a while, it stopped and stared at Sarge. “M-m-m-m-mainframe. S-s-s-speak. T-t-t-t-to. D-d-d-detective. S-s-s-s-sarge. N-n-n-n-no O-o-o-other.”

Lunar looked dismayed. His eyes saddened as he looked at Sarge. “I’m sorry, detective. I tried. Seems you’re the only choice they’ll go for. Personally, I don’t want you to have to deal with all this, but if you can hold out a little longer, maybe you can convince them to let us help.”

“T-thanks,” Sarge said. He wanted to cry. He knew he was going to have to do this – continue being a linchpin. It scared him to no end to feel the fate of so much resting on his shoulders. But he was also thankful to Lunar for trying… and for helping Sarge understand why he was having trouble letting things go.

Lunar ripped a piece of paper off the desk and quickly wrote on it. “My phone number. Call when you can. We’ll be on standby.”

Sarge took the paper and nodded. He felt his eyes begin to water, but he squinted them shut. Now wasn’t the time to cry.

“M-m-m-m-mainframe.” Starfish said, leaning backwards to displace Sarge’s center of balance. Sarge stuck his foot behind him to stop himself from falling.

“What about the mainframe?” Sarge asked through gritted teeth.

“T-t-t-talk. M-m-m-m-mainframe. R-r-r-ready.” Starfish leaned backward again. Sarge had to correct his posture again.

“Where?” Sarge asked.

“May we give him a ride there?” Lunar asked.

“D-d-d-d-detective S-s-s-sarge o-o-only.” Starfish leaned back again. Sarge took another step back.

He felt like throwing up. Even if the mainframe was ready to talk, he wasn’t. He didn’t even know what it wanted. He couldn’t handle this stress.

“Seriously?” Lunar growled. He then lifted a hand and saluted. “Alright then, detective, call me if you need help. As stated, we will be on standby.”

“Thanks,” Sarge choked out, barely managing to prevent himself from throwing up. Before Starfish could try and force his movement again, he spun around and began walking away.

“Sarge…” Chomby said. “I’m sorry you’re being forced to do this.”

Sarge closed an eye and looked at Chomby. “Occupational Hazard,” he squeaked out.

“Crime-fighting Detective,” Chomby finished, rolling his eyes. “I know. I can just… feel your stress. It’s more prominent now than I ever remember it being.”

“Try having the fate of the world rest on your shoulders alone.” Sarge felt himself shiver. “I think I’m gonna throw up.”

“But Sarge, aren’t you forgetting something?” Chomby asked.

“What?” Sarge replied, holding a hand to his mouth.

“I share your shoulders, too.”

Sarge looked away.

“So don’t you dare think I’ll let you do this on your own.” Chomby bent over and placed his hands on Sarge’s shoulders. Sarge remembered Chomby doing this a year ago. “You’re my best friend, Sarge. I love you.”

Sarge felt his eyes water again.

“Despite what that robot says, you aren’t alone in this.”

Chomby wrapped his arms around Sarge and squeezed him tightly.

“You have me.”

~~~~~

Next part of the continued story. I may be getting ahead of myself, but I've got a lot of chapters to the story now, so yaaay. XD

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Sarge/Chomby/Story/Art (C)  Juntarhenogu Me