Max and the Mechanical Army Chapter 4

It was 13:00 cosmic time, and it was late at night in Venus Port on Beijing β.

Venus Port is a semi-abandoned interstellar port with only a small number of workers left who receive meager wages from the government and come here every day to do basic maintenance.

At this time, it was a cold and deep night. There was no one around Venus Harbor. On a large open space, the withered grass, stained white with frost, was more than a person's height. It swayed back and forth lifelessly in the howling wind, making a rustling sound. Looking around, it looked like an uninhabited area, desolate and gloomy. The old buildings and launch pads of Victoria Harbor were displayed in it, like a scene depicted in an old science fiction novel, indescribably ugly.

There is a narrow road between white grass, which is probably the passage for workers to enter and exit the port. A group of homeless vagrants are walking along the path towards Victoria Harbour. The workers will drive them away during the day, but they can sneak in to take shelter at night.

A homeless old man with a hunched back was carrying a child, who was also dressed in rags, on his back. Suddenly, he stumbled and fell to the ground. The child on his back rolled down like a ball, turned over stiffly, revealing a small face covered in bruises and purples - it turned out that the child had died a long time ago.

When the roadside trash can detected the corpse of a carbon-based organism on the ground, it activated its automatic cleaning system, buzzed over, and extended its cold shovel and mechanical arm to shovel away the corpse. The old man quickly opened his arms like dead branches and pounced on it, trying to cover the child with his body, as if this could bring some life to the dead child.

Unfortunately, although the system of this trash can is backward, it is not so easy to deceive. He continued to shovel, and a cold tug of war started with the old man in a small space.

Without a doubt, the trash can won.

The frail old tramp was knocked down by the rude trash can and knelt on the ground, howling in grief. His companions looked from a distance and continued to walk to their destination without any care. Because here, it is not uncommon for dead people to be shoveled away by trash cans, and it is not worth making a fuss about.

The vagrants walked farther and farther away. Suddenly, a pair of hard-soled boots walked out from the white grass. The footsteps paused for a moment and walked towards the trash can.

This is a man, tall, with neat flaxen short hair, pale skin, and facial features that seem a little rigid because they are too standard. He strides forward with his legs, and each step is exactly equidistant. He keeps his shoulders and back straight when he walks. Although he is wearing casual clothes, he inexplicably has a military temperament.

The man silently reached out to open the background program of the trash can, bent down and fiddled with it for a moment, and the trash can made a "creaking" sound, and the shovel slowly flattened out, handing over the small corpse that had just been swallowed by it.

He didn't mind the dirtiness, picked up the child's body with both hands, and handed him back to the old homeless man kneeling on the ground: "My condolences."

The old tramp looked at him blankly. The man pointed in a direction again: "The detection is at three o'clock, about two hundred meters away from you. The soil is the softest. You can choose to bury your child there. I am sorry for the loss of your loved one again."

Not only did the man's stride remain the same, he also spoke one word at a time at a steady pace, with almost no ups and downs in his tone, like a machine. After reciting this set of accounts like reciting lines, he tapped his heels, bowed slightly to the old tramp, and turned to leave.

The old tramp couldn't help but ask: "You are..."

The old tramp regretted his words immediately after blurting them out without thinking, because the strange man was neatly dressed and exuded a low-key elegance, like a "superior person" in his eyes. In the old tramp's life experience, which was like floating duckweed and tumbling, it was best to stay away from these "superior people" tactfully, otherwise he would be disliked and often suffer physical pain.

Unexpectedly, the man stopped when he heard the question and answered seriously: "My identity is an encrypted file and cannot be viewed. My name is Max."

The old tramp looked at him in disbelief.

The man who called himself "Max" asked again: "Do you have any other questions?"

The disoriented old homeless man finally came to his senses, wiped his nose hurriedly, shook his head, and the man spread his long legs and followed the trail of those homeless people.

There is heating in the reception hall of Victoria Harbour. The vagrants took off their coats, rubbed their hands and feet to warm themselves up as quickly as possible, and seized the last bit of night before dawn, racing against time to fall asleep.

In less than half an hour, snoring sounds began to rise one after another.

At this moment, a stealthy, thin figure stood up from the corner, carefully avoided other people, and walked towards the port.

If the bad girl Huang Aria Lin was here, she would be able to recognize at a glance that this was the disguise of the "monster" who kidnapped children. He escaped from the back door of the "broken tavern", landed directly near Victoria Harbour through a small space field, mixed in with the wanderers, and planned to leave Beijing β Star from here.

The security passage between the reception hall and the launch platform was locked. The fake homeless man took out a palm-sized chip from his body and stuck it on the lock. Three seconds later, the door lock program jumped out silently, and the heavy door opened to both sides. He looked around cautiously and slipped in.

"It's me, Spider." There was no one else in the safe passage. The skinny "homeless man" peeled off his tattered coat, and his skeleton stretched and widened, returning to his original appearance. He lowered his voice and talked to his accomplice, "...I got nothing. I was targeted and I almost couldn't get away!"

The security passage was long and narrow, and very congested. Although he knew that the surveillance system had been blocked, the echo of his own voice still made the "Spider" quite anxious. He cursed, "A bunch of rubbish, they only know how to ask for people and things, they can't even copy the Fcuking silent call system, the Alliance dogs are almost popularized for civilian use, and they still want to subvert the Alliance? Dream on... I don't know, a woman---how do I know who she belongs to?"

"Spider" pressed his wrist a few times while speaking. An image immediately appeared on his wrist. It was a recent photo of Huang Aria Lin.

Then, the photo flashed, and Huang Aria Lin's identity information, address and other information were displayed in front of him in great detail. Spider glared at the girl in the photo with his bloodshot eyes: "I got her information. I don't know if it's true or not, but I don't think she's from the government... Well, it could be just a coincidence. The sewers of the Eighth Galaxy are full of cripples with empty brain syndrome..."

Spider reached the end of the security passage and quickly walked to the platform. There were only a few robot security guards patrolling the empty platform. Spider roughly confirmed the location of the robot security guards and pressed the jammer in his hand.

On the platform, the mechanical security and monitoring equipment jammed at the same time. The "Spider" confidently bypassed the stationary mechanical security and came to the outermost track, took out the small mecha parked in the space field, and the mecha landed steadily on the launch pad, and the hatch automatically popped open.

Spider walked in. The fluorescent light from the transmitter condensed into a layer of metallic cold light on his face. He said, "No matter who she belongs to, no matter if it's a coincidence or not, just to be safe, I'll kill her---"

Before he had even finished his words, the alarm system on the mecha screamed for no reason, and there was a "click" in Spider's ear, and the call was immediately cut off. He raised his head abruptly, and saw that the mecha on the launch pad was trembling like a living thing. The mental network in the mecha had not yet had time to connect with the owner, and the body of the machine suddenly shook violently, and "Spider" staggered backwards. At the same time, the mecha's mental network was sparking and emitting a smell of ozone - this was the result of the mecha being severely interfered with!

But in this remote and poor place called the Eighth Galaxy, most of the country bumpkins have never seen a mecha in their lives, so where did this kind of interference technology come from? !

Spider felt a chill down his spine.

The mental network inside the mecha was in chaos. If one was rashly sucked in, not to mention a human, even if it was a silicon-based creature, he would be electrocuted to death. So without thinking, he smashed the emergency safety valve with a punch, quickly switched to manual operation, forced open the already heated hatch, and rolled out with a yell.

Thick smoke billowed from the mechas behind him, and the security robots that he had just immobilized came back to life somehow. Seven or eight laser guns were pointed at him, but there was no one to be seen on the platform.

Those damn flies haven't been shaken off yet!

"Spider" broke out in a cold sweat, and reached a hand into his arms and pressed it on his left chest - there was a small implanted chip there, which was his last resort.

The security robot approached him---

"Trespassing! Trespassing!"

"Scanning for intruder identity failed!"

"Warning! Put your hands up!"

The next moment, the invisible field spread out like a tide with the "spider" as the center. The robot security guard's locator lost its target and the scanning result showed that there was no one on the platform. The robot security guard held the laser gun and turned around the "empty" platform for a moment, but found nothing and had to return to his patrol track.

"Spider" stood there, took a few deep breaths, and smiled with a smug look. He patted his left chest and whispered, "Finally, those rubbish are still useful."

With this "secret weapon", he can control the senses of all people and machines at will, just like making everyone on the city bus mistake a child for an old homeless man. Even if he encounters a "empty-brained" person like the little B!tch, he can fool them for a while.

"Come and catch me!" "Spider" shouted fearlessly and blew a sharp whistle. There was no sound. He laughed and raised his middle finger to the sky, ready to get back on the mecha.

Just as he turned around, a very thin red light suddenly shot out from the wall and went straight through Spider's neck. Before Spider could close his laughing mouth, he fell down without a sound.

Then, the wall that was blank just now suddenly bulged out, and a man with short flaxen hair walked out from the wall like a magic trick. It was the man who called himself "Max".

Zhan Lu stretched out his right hand, and his pale hand turned into a mechanical hand out of thin air, exactly the same as the one in the "broken tavern".

The robotic arm scanned the unconscious "Spider" from head to toe, and after a few "beeping" sounds, a strong energy field was found at the "Spider's" heart.

Zhan Lu tilted his head, and an extremely thin probe extended from the palm of the robotic hand. At the same time, a mist of disinfectant sprayed out from the fingertips of five metal fingers, briefly creating a small and narrow sterile environment. The probe was quickly inserted into the chest of the "Spider", and in less than five minutes, this minor operation was completed - a biochip was removed from the heart of the unconscious "Spider".

The moment the biochip was peeled off, the "Spider"'s metallic skin collapsed immediately, his body temperature, heart rate and metabolism dropped sharply, and he seemed to have aged by dozens of years, with his face almost wrinkled.

The robot made a sound exactly like Zhan Lu's: "Scanning unknown energy field---"

"Scan failed."

"Failed to scan again---Unable to identify---Warning---"

"Block it." Zhan Lu whispered.

Zhan Lu carefully put away the strange chip, and the mechanical hand turned back into a human hand. He searched all the electronic devices on the "Spider" and stripped him down to a primitive man. He bent down and picked up the man, then destroyed the encryption system of the mecha, took it away, and left Venus Port.

He had planned to return the same way, but when he approached the hall, Zhan Lu suddenly stopped, looked up and closed his eyes, and then, as if summoned by something, he turned in another direction and walked straight into the dense white grass.

A car stopped in the depths of the dense dead grass at some point. Fourth Brother leaned against the car with his arms folded across his chest, and it seemed like he had been waiting for quite a while.

Zhan Lu bowed to his fourth brother in a serious manner: "Sir."

Fourth brother raised his chin and motioned him to get in the car. Zhan Lu threw the captured man into the trunk and put his hand on the car body. Then, his "hand" actually melted, first the hand, then the body, the head... His whole body slowly disappeared and merged with the car body. At the same time, Fourth brother's dormant car automatically restarted.

This tall and handsome "Max" is actually an artificial intelligence that looks exactly like a real person.

Max's voice rang out: "Sir, where are you going?"

"Go back to the tavern." The fourth brother said, "Can you tell who this person is?"

"Prepare to activate the space field and locate the broken tavern. Judging from the model of the mecha, it should be someone from the 'Poison Nest'."

The "Poison Nest" organization is located at the edge of the eighth galaxy. Going further out, it is no longer suitable for human survival. The "Poison Nest" rarely interacts with other gangs in the galaxy. It is more like a cult than a gang. There are many cult organizations in the eighth galaxy, but they usually worship gods and ghosts based on ancient legends. At the very least, they worship cats and dogs, which are mammals after all. Organizations like the "Poison Nest" that worship insects are quite unique.

The fourth brother was a little surprised: "What are they doing on Beijing Planet?"