INTERWOVEN ADVENTURES | Circadian Earth: Book 1

Chapter 1

"Another failure..." Izzy sighed, starting to clean up the mess. Their twentieth attempt at making a satisfactory design for the second generation of Nasrics had resulted in a sudden outburst of the Nil energy that the robot species ran on.

Citrine, the first Nasric Izzy had created fourteen years prior, a twenty-one centimetre tall cyan and grey robot, stared at the scanner. "Readings here show that subject 2-20 was making use of unusually high amounts of Nil energy."

"How high?"

"Not entirely sure. This scanner doesn't seem to know the exact amount, but from the values I can see, it looks to be well over ten times the normal amount."

Izzy tossed the remains of 2-20's body into the scrap bin. They planned to take it to a scrapyard later on, to be eventually recycled. "Well... for 2-21 I think we'd be better off trying to find out a way to deal with this excess energy. Then maybe for the one after, we could figure out how to bring the usage down."

Citrine frowned. "Or we could accept the fact that we don't need a second generation."

"Nah, I'm not ready to concede that just yet."

"Of course."

Izzy then had an idea. "What if... I made a harmless way of releasing the energy? Like some sort of Nil fire that you can touch without issue."

"Nil energy isn't harmless," Citrine pointed out.

"But I can make it harmless, I think. I'm the Nil Circadian, I should be able to."

Citrine shrugged. She never really understood Izzy's abilities, but chose to accept them regardless. "Need another core?"

"Nah. I'll start work on 2-21 tomorrow. Where are the others?"

Right as Izzy asked, another smaller figure came through the door. This was Niko, Izzy's first working creation. She was made of two spheres, one rolling with the other, with eyes and ears, on top. On the lower sphere was a screen that Nerons like her typically used to display speech, however, Niko had her own voice module and didn't need it. "Izzy? Cybal can't find Alice."

"What?"

"2-14 says she overheard Alice saying something about exploring, so Cybal suspects she might've gone outside and gotten lost."

"Right. Citrine, you go and help Cybal find Alice, watching from above." Citrine nodded, doing as Izzy asked.

"Niko, go find 2-14. She can let me know what she heard."

"Okay!" Niko rolled out of the workshop, headed towards where she knew 2-14 would be. Sure enough, she was sat in her room, lost in her own thoughts. Niko tapped her ear on the door before entering. "Hey, 14?"

2-14, one of only three prototypes to survive alongside Alice and Cybal, looked up. At twenty-three centimetres, she was a bit taller than Citrine and Niko, and was coloured black and white with hints of indigo. On an indigo section of her lower torso was her serial number, which she preferred to go by. "What?"

"Izzy wants to know what you heard Alice talking about."

"Of course they want me there in person. Can't you relay a message?"

Niko shook her head. "I don't know the details of what you heard. Besides, Citrine's already looking for her, and you know how much she hates having her time wasted."

2-14 groaned. "Fine. I'll head to Izzy in a bit."

"Alright!" Niko happily rolled away. 2-14, unimpressed, headed to the workshop, making sure to take as much time as possible. She then came face to face with her creator.