It was a rather monotonous two hours, Ava spent most of them sitting on the cold metal floor with his eyes closed, analysing the internal architecture of the supercomputer with his newfound control over the machine. It was still too vast and complex for him to comprehend. Whoever had created it was a being far beyond his understanding.
So obviously Mother had made it. He'd spent the time wondering why she'd felt the need to create a Serv production facility only to come to the rather obvious conclusion. That she was going to build her own Servs to help in the battle, or that she was making infiltration units. Either way if that was her plan she'd never managed to put it into place, the Servs didn't have any problems with Evo-produced Servs. She must have given up on it, or perhaps it was taken over by the Heretics before she had time to put her plan into action.
When the Class-1 exited the final gestation pod it looked completely different. Actually, Ava had never seen a Serv that looked like the Class-1 before. Ava didn't have any control over the facial model that the Class-1 would have, his assumption was that he'd have the same face as himself, but, no, it was different. Rather than the rather yellowy beige face that all Servs had, this one was a shade of light pink. His facial features were different too, an angular face, a more prominent jaw, and his default hair wasn't white, it was brown.
Why?
The Class-1 looked at Ava for a moment and examined his reaction, he then took a look at his reflection in the glass of the tank that he'd just exited from.
"This feels familiar," he said,
"So, this is how you always saw yourself?" asked Ava,
The Class-1 paused for a moment, he seemed to be postulating on what the answer to the question should be. This time, it was actually possible to read his emotions through his facial expressions. His eyes were squinting, his teeth clenched tight, "Yeah, I think so. But, I don't remember ever thinking of myself this way. I guess it was subconscious." he threw Ava a smirk, "heh, you're one hell of a guy Ava, I didn't think you'd actually help me out."
"Well, didn't you say you'd help me? I don't wanna take away anything from the gesture but. Y'know, you promised." Ava frowned for a moment, it was a typical question, starting to get cliche but he had to ask, "so now that you've got your own face. Do you have a name?"
"A name?"
"And not some bullshit name derived from Class-1, no cop-out like that. Who do you feel like you are? What should I call you?"
"Oh. Right." The Class-1 looked at his reflection once again, "I haven't decided yet. Gimmie time to think."
Ava shrugged, although his face exuded more warmth and sympathy than before "Fine, I getcha. I guess we'll come up with something eventually." in reality it was a bit of a breath of fresh air meeting someone who was sort of similar to him. Ava wondered if it'd be possible for the Heretic to defect and maybe join the Serv side once this was all over. Having a friend that wasn't an amnesiac or a hot headed human would be a breath of fresh air.
"Well, I'll uphold my end of the bargain Ava. I'll take you through the quickest route to the exit. There are still other Heretics around though, so we'll need to stay in the shadows." he stretched a little to get his body's joints back in shape and then ran to the door, "c'mon!"
***
Half an hour running down thin corridors, Ava recognised them slightly, so he had trust in the fact that the Class-1 was sending him in the right direction.
It was a steady run and the two seemed to be avoiding the Heretics that were prowling around pretty well, but then suddenly a security alarm began to sound. A loud shriek wailed across the entire facility and all the lights turned red. All the Heretics that were just minding their own business became alert. Ava stopped dead in his tracks.
"Shit! What happened!?" he exclaimed,
"It wasn't me!" the Class-1 responded,
Ava used his control of the computer to disable to security systems, it was stupid of him not to turn it off originally but he was worried it'd be noticed. The alarm siren and red lights all subsided, but unfortunately it was too late, alarm or not, all the Heretics had been alerted to some sort of intruder.
Ava and the Class-1 hid in the shadows as they saw all the Heretics Evos of all shapes and sizes, giant spiders, tanks, small midgets, all of them rushing past on full alert.
"They're heading to the main entrance," said the Class-1 "from what I can tell."
"So someone else must have caught their attention?" Ava knew straight away who it was. "Shit!"
"What is it?"
"Listen I can get to the exit easily if I follow the trail of Heretics now right?"
"Sure..."
"In that case we'll have to part ways for now. I need to rush ahead." Ava tensed up, there was no doubt about it, Aphrodite and Sylvie had come to try and find him, they had no idea what sort of lair they were entering at the time of tracking him. The supercomputer looked like it was deserted from the outside, from what he remembered it was surrounded by tall and empty buildings. The two probably thought he'd been lost in one of the abandoned settlements.
There was no way they'd be able to take on a swarm of Heretic Evos.
A swarm this big would be way too much for Ava to handle too. At least, at the level of power he was at now.
He concentrated for a moment, thought about what Aphrodite had done to his body. She'd changed his limiters and modified his joints to make it on par with The Major. The level of power would be insane.
Would he be able to handle it? He wasn't sure, and it'd mean he'd have to sacrifice his hacking ability for quite a while. He'd be left vulnerable.
No choice. Ava closed his eyes and concentrated. He could feel a fire build up from inside him, he let it spread through his body. An insane heat raged inside of him, and at a single moment something snapped. Every single joint, every single ligament, his mind and his soul, it all felt liberated, it was as if he'd been held down by chains this whole time, and something had given him the power to break free.
He'd broken his limits and transcended to another level.
It took a moment for him to fathom.
"Hey, didn't you say you were going to leave? What happened anyway, you've got steam coming out of your body," said the Class-1
"Huh? Oh, right. Don't worry about that," Ava smirked, "I'll see you outside." in an instant, he disappeared, leaving nothing but a crater where he was originally standing.
***
Half a second later, having mowed through the army of Heretic Evos he'd been following, Ava found himself at the entrance of the supercomputer. He dashed to the main doors, which he found out were huge ten story high iron slabs. They were probably locked, and he could probably have unlocked them himself if he was still hacked into the machine, but a much quicker way was to crash into the lock in the middle like a meteor and making it slam open. The force of his attack was such that the doors immediately broke their hinges after opening, and crashed down onto the ground.
Ava landed on the ruins of the city that lay on the other side. It looked just like he'd expected, an empty metropolis. The afternoon sun was creating god rays of light as it passed through the large gaps in between the dilapidated towers. Hauntingly beautiful.
And, as he'd expected, Aphrodite and Sylvie were there, outside the supercomputer, both wielding guns, both completely helpless. It was hard to see the two completely because of the crowd of Heretic Evos that were surrounding them, but it looked like, aside from a few Evos they'd managed to blow up with their guns, they weren't able to do much damage at all. No big surprise, they were surrounded by at least twenty Heretic Evos.
The next few seconds were a blur.
With just the use of his fists and baton Ava managed to reduce them all to scrap. His technique was sloppy, his form was poor, but his power was incredible. Tearing through the Evos was as easy as pulling apart tissue paper.
Was this what it was like to have the sort of power the Major had? How? How in Mars did she control so much power? And how was it possible for Serv bodies to generate so much?
Did Ava like it? No... the tradeoff wasn't worth it, he was feeling naked without his hacking ability, but that was neither here nor there, either way the threat was neutralised in an instant.
He walked out of the steaming heap of debris that he had created and approached Aphrodite and Sylvie. Sylvie had a look of awe on her face, while Aphrodite had a smirk and a raised eyebrow plastered on hers.
"You two ok?" asked Ava,
"We're fine." Aphrodite put her gun away, "don't look so smug Ava, it was me who unlocked your limiters you know." a devilish smile, "Looks like my discovery yielded better results than expected."
"...You're welcome." Ava frowned.
"Ava that was incredible! I had no idea you could do that!" Sylvie exclaimed,
"Neither did I!" Ava wasn't very used to compliments, so it made him blush somewhat,
"Hey," Aphrodite nudged Sylvie, "don't stroke the guy's ego too much." she looked at Ava with a more serious look on her face, "Ava, don't get too used to that ability, we don't really know what the long term ramifications of using your body in that way is. In the short term, I know it cuts off your hacking ability for hours and drains your battery massively. But-"
"I get it." Ava turned to look at the supercomputer, at the carnage he'd left behind, "this isn't really my sort of thing anyway." he muttered.
Ava sat on the cold concrete ground and then lay completely flat. He started off at 100%, after only five seconds of use he was already at 80%. That was insane, 20% battery would last him several hours usually.
He lay on the ground gasping, the clasps that held him tight started to grip him again, his body felt stiffer, he could feel everything contract. But it was fine, the sun beating down on his body refreshed him, it made him feel better.
"Are you ok Ava?" Sylvie sat next to him. Meanwhile Aphrodite seemed to be holding some sort of tablet with a map on it. She was probably getting the lay of the land.
"I'm fine, thanks. As long as you guys are ok."
"I'm sorry, I'm useless with this body Ava. If I had my Block-2 body I could've used stealth to get in." she sighed, "and my hacking ability is impaired somewhat."
"It's ok, things turned out fine in the end."
Sylvie moved her hand to Ava's and clutched it,
"I'm not letting you go out on your own anymore." she said, "us three, we're going to end this conflict together. Right?"
Ava threw an apologetic smile, but before he could say anything urgent footsteps from inside the building interrupted his thoughts.
Ava sat up to see who it was.
The Class-1, he'd finally made his way out. He stood at the shattered doors, a look of desperation on his face.
"Ava! Hey!" the Class-1 shouted,
"What is it?" Ava shouted back
"You need to run! Go!"
"What?! Why?"
"Because-" the Class-1 grit his teeth "She's coming. And if you cross her path, you're as good as dead!"