Ava and Aphrodite: The First Human in 8000 Years (Featured)

Chapter 31: The Heretic City

The main entrance of the Heretic's city was a massive gate that stood at least thirty feet tall, it was most likely ripped off of one of the goliath ships and stuck to the colony's wall. It was odd for the colony to have a wall at all, what were they trying to keep out? There weren't any people to antagonise them on the plates, so there didn't seem to be any need for protection. The moment the group walked up to the door a booming voice started to speak:

"State your name and designation!" it said, a blunt and robotic voice buzzing through the air, Ava looked around, oh, there were cameras and speakers hastily attached to the sides of the doors. He didn't know what to respond with, Locke jumped in:

"We are not located on your registry as residents, we're in your guest registry. Aphrodite, the Queen of the scrapyard, and Locke, the caretaker." he said in an authoritative manner, the most colour he had in his voice all day.

There was silence for a while, as if the Evo on the other side (or maybe it was just an AI in the speaker?) was processing all the information.

"There is a third being with you," said the voice,

"Designate him as a guest please. As per our request." again, very commanding, as if he was so certain they'd listen to him,

"He's technically the owner of this planet," said Aphrodite to Ava, "they respect him no doubt!"

"Right." Ava acknowledged. Still, he didn't really like this lack of control, two Evos communicating with each other, both about to invite him straight into what could be a lion's den. Sure the Evos in the scrapyard seemed harmless enough, but the Heretics... and Locke himself. They all gave him an uneasy feeling. It was unprofessional of him as a Serv soldier to go this route, a Block-3 would've gone alone. No. A Block-3 wouldn't even bother rescuing Sylvie, it wasn't part of any mission directive.

"State your business here." the voice didn't show any hint of intimidation though. Actually it hadn't shown any emotion at all, that fit in with Ava's expectation of what an Evo would act like. Somehow this surprised him though. He was expecting some kind of difference, seeing as it was supposedly not taking orders from Mother.

"Your community apparently found some wreckage here, we'd like to investigate it. Can we talk to your-" Locke paused for a moment, didn't he know how this community's governing system worked? Come to think of it, how did they govern themselves without Mother? "Your leader."

"We will send a vehicle at the entrance for you to enter. We will take you to our leader from there."

So they had a governing leader too. Interesting. The discourse ended there, no thank you or goodbye. Just silence. And indeed, after a few minutes, the gates slowly opened outwards, making the group run back a few feet to get out of the way. Pretty badly engineered wall to be honest.

What greeted the trio inside was surprising to say the least. An intense heat, a barrage of sounds of crowds stamping and treads hitting metal, a gray haze in the air that so easily mixed with the ash fluttering down from the sky. All the towers were so tightly stuck together, ableit in a messy and almost primal manner, the roads were all distorted because of the damage caused from the city's amateurish construction. These Evos weren't guided by mother, they'd created this town for themselves with the little knowledge they had. But, it was quite a sad sight to see, because what they'd created was nothing more than a distorted recreation of the residential areas in Europa.

These Evos were having trouble letting go of their way of life. They'd left Mother, but they hadn't left the society that they were used to.

It took a moment for Ava to notice that there was indeed a vehicle waiting for them, a rather busted up looking tank that had its roof ripped open to be a makeshift passenger vehicle, Ava recognised it as an Evo drone he'd seen in skirmishes before. The same voice as before now came from the vehicle.