Cynophobia

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Slate set out to find any information on The Ancient. Loki was torn between setting out to find Zeta and staying here to help us. I would have encouraged him to find Zeta if we even knew where she was. She also saved our lives from her father, we owed her.

"Maybe The Ancient will know," Cairo suggested.

"Or maybe The Ancient is just a pile of scrap metal laying in a ditch somewhere," Loki said mournfully.

I frowned. "Hey, don't think like that. We don't know where Zeta is, but thats also good. That means that Alpha doesn't know where she is either, right?"

"What about her chip? She has a tracking chip," Loki whimpered.

"She knew about it, thats why she didn't come with us. She probably found a way to get rid of it before she ran," I replied.

Loki nodded. "Zeta always has been smart. I'm worried what Alpha is going to do to her if he finds her. Is he going to kill her? Take our pup? Both? What if he kills my pup too?"

"Don't think like that when there is nothing you can do. Do you know what type of Cynoid its going to be? What about their name?" I asked.

"I know nothing, I only know what Slate told me minutes ago," he whined. "I need to kill Alpha, I need to protect my family. We need to find someone who knows where the creator is so we can shut him down."

I know how Loki felt. We had something we needed to do before we could reunite with those we cared most about. I wanted to see Rose more than anything. Was she alright? Was she being punished for trying to escape again? I hoped that Dr. Williams would be able to protect her. You couldn't go against the only doctor in the Remnants.

I looked at Cairo with a sullen gaze. "Ray blames us for his eye. Were we the ones who betrayed him?"

"Ray put the Remnants before us. We gave him the chance to escape with us. If he had he wouldn't have gotten injured. We betrayed the Remnants, but he betrayed us," Cairo explained.

"I can't believe Ray tried to stop us," Loki grumbled putting his muzzle on his paws.

I thought of his speech prior to chasing us. "He thought he was protecting us. If Rose couldn't outrun him, she couldn't outrun a Cynoid. If we don't find the creator they will just keep coming."

"There are thousands of miners in hundreds of mines. And for every Miner there is a Striker," Loki commented. "The Remnants won't stand a chance unless we can shut them down."

Cairo put a hand on my back. "They should be able to hold them off while we are busy tracking the creator. I'm just trying to imagine what would drive anything to do this. Kids like Liam don't deserve the fate they got."

"He must be insane, I doubt we will get him to cooperate. We might have to..." I couldn't say the words. I had no problem killing Cynoids, but other humans? We weren't like the Remnants, we didn't have guns to kill other people.

"I agree. Cynthia you're clever, you should be able to hack into the computer once we get the proper cables,"" Loki barked.

Slate had returned, she looked uneasy. "Get up, everyone get up quickly. The Strikers are coming, they know you're here."

"What? But I thought they decided it was a cave-in," I gasped.

"They did. Alpha just stormed a human base. They told them you went through the tunnel. Storm is helping them clear the way as we speak. We need to go while they're busy clearing the rocks," Slate said urgently.