Outside the city, a battle still raged. He looked through the binoculars again to see
if anything had happened. "The robot factory is about to
collapse! Keep up the battle! We've almost won!!!!" Some men cheered when they heard this, but
most just kept concentrating on destroying as many robots as they could. He was standing right under the path of a
helicopter as one of the robots shot at it, bringing it crashing down. He didn't survive.
Babe glanced back each time the two objects behind
him moved, but they always seemed to vanish right as his head turned. Once, on a return trip, he saw the glint of
metal. "Robots. More damned robots." He muttered.
He set down his two current passengers with Aaron and went back to get
two more. To his surprise, there were
four missing. "Where'd they go?"
He asked a small child that was huddled against his mother. The mother replied. "Two
other robots came by and picked up two passengers each. There are six of us left." Babe looked about the room, counting the
six. He picked up two children and flew
back to Aaron. As he returned again, he
saw the other robots. The sight made him
go speechless. He almost forgot to turn
around and nearly crashed into a building!
He swung away, barely missing the building, and added a little extra
speed to catch up to the two figures. "MAX?!!
CHRIS?!! How the--where--WHAT
HAPPENED?!!!!!!!!" He landed
and waited for them to do so as well.
Neither answered, just pointed to a building close by. Max took to the sky and started blasting into
it. Chris did the same. Babe shook his head and flew after them. The ammunitions factory fell within minutes
after the robotics one. Babe waited
until the noise had died away and asked them again. "Will
you explain NOW?!!!!!" Max
shook his head while Chris spoke. "We still have to destroy the commands
unit. It's hidden somewhere in this city. We take it out, then
over half the robots that have been made will be useless." "But--but what about YOU?!!! Tell me what happened!" Max finally spoke. "Babe,
we'll explain AFTER we find and destroy the commands unit. Work before play, you know." Babe sighed and started scanning. If Max was still the same, then they wouldn't
say a THING until Max had finished his mission.
A single human was operating the commands unit when they found it. Two shots, one for the human, and another for
the machine, were all it took to destroy the last piece of the army. Babe watched Max and Chris as the unit
exploded, fearing that they might deactivate as well. Neither did, to his relief. Cheers could be heard outside the city as
Babe and his two friends flew away. When
they had traveled half the distance back to the village. Babe landed.
Max and Chris followed. "NOW will I get some
answers?" Chris smiled and
hugged him. "Damn, but it's good to see you, Babe." Babe could feel the tears welling up inside him,
and let them come. "I thought you were dead...
what happened?" Max
joined in the hug, then let go as he spoke. Chris let go as well, still smiling and
crying just as much as Babe. "As it stands, Chris somehow survived
being transformed into a robot. He saved
my life and changed me as well before I had a chance to die. And here we are. I wanted to contact you sooner, but we had to
make sure you'd go after Yann city first.
I'm sorry for everything we did." Babe smiled weakly as he wiped away the
tears. "Sorry for what?! I
thought I'd lost more friends to the robots.
I--I really missed you guys..."
"And we missed you. We had
to stay in hiding for a while to make sure we weren't being controlled by the
humans. Oh, that reminds me. Here's a present from Steve for you." Babe grabbed the rifle as it was tossed to
him. He scanned it. "This
is the napalm rifle he tried to use on me..." "Yeah, and we have a tank still. One of Mitchels." Babe's eyes shot up. "You're
serious?!!!!" "Yes, my friend. We are serious." "YES!!!!!!!!" Babe squeezed them tight and shouted. "You
guys HAVE to come back!!!! Everyone will
be so happy!!!!!!" Max cleared
his throat. "Uhh...
but we're robots now... Like it
or not we can't go there." "Why not?" "Because
each robot is made with a homing device in case it falls into the rebels
hands. You never had one built into you,
so you're fine, but Chris was built like an ordinary robot, and didn't know how
to build me without attaching one himself.
We can't go any farther than this or we'll show the location of our
biggest army. I'm sorry Babe." Babe smiled.
"You forget about Mitchel! He can fix
you!!!!! Wait here and I'll get
him!" Babe flew the rest of the
way before either had a chance to say anything else.
Mitchel sulked and toyed
with a small watch. So far he'd added a
tiny laser that couldn't harm a thing, made the hour beep last nearly five
minutes long, and completely rewired the entire thing. He felt bored. Babe shot into his room laughing happily. "Mitch,
you have GOT to come with me!!!!!!!!!"
"What is it, Babe?"
Mitch sighed and set the watch down.
Babe wouldn't let his spirits be dampened. "C'mon
and see!!!!!!! Get Jesse and Dana
too! Bring Jimmy and the rest of the
village! This is great!!!!!!!!!" He flew about in tight loops. Whatever he was so happy about,
he wanted everyone to see it. "Babe, we can't let everyone go at
once! Who'd protect the village!" "I
will! Just go and see them!!!!!!!!!" He quickly gave Mitchel
the coordinates and started flying above the city, always switching his gaze to
one specific direction and laughing, overjoyed.
Mitchel decided to see what it was Babe was so
happy about before he told anyone and looked through Max's old binoculars. Using the binoculars made him feel
worse--until he saw them. He ran out of
the city, not even listening to the shouts of the worried anthros
behind him. Dana, who had fianlly been able to get rid of her wheelchair, chased
him. She caught up with him right as they
topped the last hill. Her gasp stopped
her from going any further.
Jesse slowly answered the radio signal that Dana was
sending. "What is it?"
"Jesse, it's MAX!!!!!!!" Jesse nearly sat up in his bed at the
news. He grabbed some binoculars and
scanned the area where Mitchel had run off to. At first, Jesse a smile broke out on his
face. He slowly started laughing, then let it grow by itself.
Someone came up to see what was wrong with him, and he feebly pointed to
the binoculars. The anthro picked them
up and looked through. A gasp, then a
cheer, and soon the news was all over the
village. Max was BACK!!!!!!!
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