The desert sand was rendered scorching hot by the baleful sun overhead. There was only a little wind which didn't do much for the local wildlife, which consisted mostly of bristling saguaros and the occasional spiky lizard-thing or a scorpion. One of them crawled over a small mound of sand, searching for food. What it got instead was a metal foot from above.
Overlord Gamma ignored the crunching sound and looked around. The party had reached the point where sandy desert gave way for rocky wasteland. The stony earth would be easier to fortify. The sand could provide glass for optical instruments. The magma pipe not far from the end of the desert would provide plentiful power.
Gamma glanced at Marvin, the tech-bot, who managed an apathetic shrug. "Should be far 'nuff. The Glazed Council won't find us here. Maybe. Like I care. Wouldn't make a difference if they were aiming global-range railguns at us already. Wouldn't have to put up with-"
Everyone automatically tuned his complaints out. All of them had learned to do so as soon as possible. Nobody wanted to listen to his rants, and even Vélmenni, an old and often oblivious model, actively avoided conversation with him. Vélmenni had been a bit of a problem. Both Spelguru (assembler and heavy construction bot) and Froginator (sawbot) showed open disdain of having to drag an obsolete lump of steel around and Vél sulked often because of that. But no-one else was available to be in charge of the fuel cultivation chambers, so the task was left to Vél.
They brought a TBM as well to excavate underground areas and assist in planning certain structures. The group was rounded out by 'Billy'. Everyone shied away from him due to his record. He had been a warbot, but due to his over-enthusiasm in making enemies (and sometimes friendlies) suffer as long as possible by severing all of their limbs and kicking them around he was reassigned to organic processing. Gamma was relieved that purely military weapons were hard for civilians to acquire back home. Who knows what Billy would have done if he'd gotten himself a powerblade?
On the other hand they had a hard time finding suitable self-defense weapons in case of organic raids or the Natural Glaze taking interest in their group. Being accosted by wetware 'bots would have been very unpleasant. Thankfully they had managed to get a hold of a pair of sawdiscs along with the drills, a stock of unrefined fuel and the...wagon. To avoid detection by both the Glaze of Dangers and the Natural Glaze they had to leave most high-tech stuff behind. No generators, no long-range communication...no motorized vehicles. They had had to steal an organic wagon with organic engines. Gamma made a mental note to have them processed as soon as possible now that they were no longer useful.
"TBM, Spelguru. Excavate there and set up an enclosure. We will need to make this place secure. Set up a fuel cultivation chamber on the desert side. Froginator, disassemble the wagon. Vél, set up the refinery. Billy, start processing the biomass. The sooner we can secure this spot, the better."
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Topic: Grip of Steel - Robot community fortress (Read 2398 times)