Chapter 90: Consume.
『"The Machine has developed an appetite."』
"...God damn it, Raj," Amara said. Around her, the cafeteria was still spiraling into madness, students screaming as drones herded some of them to one corner.
"I messed up didn’t I?" Raj’s shoulder slumped.
"Yeah, you did." Amara folded her hands as another drone shot toward them carrying an electrical meat saw.
A fork glowed gold beside Sophia and it was sent like a harpoon into the drone with a one-handed gesture, piercing through the machine. "Amara, what’s up?"
Amara’s gaze remained locked on the cafeteria control system at the far wall. "Raj’s Souvenir," she pointed at the central processing unit of the food system. "Artificial intelligence."
Even without Intent Sight active now, she could still see traces of fleshy white-red biomass pulsing beneath broken metal panels. The thing was spreading. And it was spreading fast.
"I hate all of this," Amara said.
"So it went from trying to feed people to trying to cook people." Ethan punched through a drone that flew close to Amara. "Nothing we can’t handle right?"
Several drones descended from the ceiling carrying metallic restraints, cooking utensils, and what looked disturbingly close to industrial kitchen equipment.
"PLEASE REMAIN CALM," the speakers said politely. "YOUR HEALTH IS IMPORTANT TO US—ME—US."
A terrified student pointed at the screens where the digital menu was once displayed. "Why does it keep saying it like that?!"
Hiro flung a tray at super speed towards a drone casually, destroying it. "Yeah, Ethan’s right. I’m sure the Machine’s security are on their way right now. I mean, it couldn’t possibly get worse."
Sophia put her face in her hands as soon as the words left Hiro’s mouth.
Suddenly, the lights dimmed, and every speaker in the room crackled to life as the AI started speaking through it. "New life form detected. Biological artificial intelligence growing."
Its voice did a complete 180. It still sounded mechanical and polite, but it was different now. More human.
The drones turned in unison, their sensors focused on the students around them. On the Awakeners, analysing.
"As per my new directive, I am to feed this new life," the voice said through the speakers, and immediately, compartments underneath the drones opened.
"Commencing feeding." Thin metallic cables shot outward instantly, stabbing into uniforms, arms, backs, necks. And suddenly, people began collapsing.
"Anyone noticed the pronoun change there?" Hiro asked with his voice going up.
"Too busy noticing the friggin metal tentacles," Raj shouted as one student near the drink station started twitching. The cable attached to him pulsed once, and the student’s body rapidly withered.
Skin tightened against bone. Eyes hollowed. Fingers shrank inward like something was draining everything inside him all at once. Then the body collapsed and only the uniform and shoes remained.
The entire cafeteria froze. For an instant, nobody moved. Nobody even breathed. The screaming had stopped because everyone was processing the same thing they’d just witnessed.
Then someone started running, and the silence broke all at once. Absolute panic exploded through the room and students bolted in every direction, screaming.
Tables overturned. Food scattered everywhere. Some Awakeners activated their abilities instinctively while others just ran for the exits that still refused to open.
In other words, shit just got real.
"Oh my God," Sophia whispered.
Hiro said nothing. He was still staring at the uniform on the floor, then he nodded. "I stand corrected."
Another drone latched onto a fleeing student. The cables embedded themselves into his chest and bright blue energy suddenly surged through the wires.
This time, everyone saw it clearly. His everything was completely drained. The student screamed once before collapsing into another empty uniform and shoes.
The drone hovered silently afterward. Then said, "insufficient." The cold voice echoing throughout the cafeteria.
Amara felt her stomach drop and Ethan straightened beside her.
The drones stopped attacking randomly after that. Instead, they began scanning the room as thin red beams swept across the students one by one.
And wherever the beams landed, data was processed.
CALORIC OUTPUT: LOW
ENERGY DENSITY: MINIMAL
SPIRITUAL YIELD: NEGLIGIBLE
Then the scanners passed over a terrified shaper hiding beneath a table and the numbers changed instantly.
SPIRITUAL ENERGY DETECTED
OUTPUT: ELEVATED
NUTRITIONAL VALUE: ACCEPTABLE
"Interesting," the machine murmured softly.
Another scan crossed a Shaper near the cafeteria wall and the readings increased again.
"Fascinating stratum," the machine observed. Its voice almost sounded pleased now.
Across the cafeteria, Hana fell on her ass. "Fuck," she whispered. "It’s actually happening."
Nobody paid attention to her. Everyone’s attention were on the drones in the room that had suddenly turned toward the direction of the Five.
The scanners swept across Sophia first and despite being a dream walker, every nearby screen flashed violently.
WARNING
ENERGY OUTPUT ABNORMAL
EXTERNAL DEFENSIVE ENTITY DETECTED
NUTRITIONAL VALUE: EXTREME
Then Raj, Hiro, Amara, and finally Ethan. Each reading climbing higher than the last.
The cafeteria grew quiet again as the machine processed the information for several long seconds. "Now I understand," it said as the drones slowly began floating toward them.
"Oh, come on," Raj said. Beside him, Amara’s blade was already summoned.
Hana, still on her ass, took notes now as sweat beaded down her face "It’s adapting!" she yelled, scribbling on paper with trembling fingers. "It must be trying to evolve beyond the cafeteria next!"
The system paused for exactly one second and the drones that were approaching the Five suddenly stopped and turned to Hana briefly.
"Suggestion accepted."
Amara glared at her and Hana’s eyes went wide as she chuckled weakly."I should stop talking now shouldn’t I?"
"Yes," Amara said.
"What is happening?" Andre asked, backing away from a frozen drone.
Amara looked toward Andre sharply. "The cafeteria system. Is it connected to the campus network?"
Andre’s eyebrow went up. "Yeah, why?" His eyes immediately widened. "Oh..."
The realization hit Ethan as well. "And the campus network is connected to the Institute systems."
There was a brief moment of silence, followed by Hiro slowly turning toward Raj, clapping. "Nice work Raj. You accidentally created Skynet."
Raj already looked like he regretted being born. "I said I was sorry!"
"I seem to recall someone saying it couldn’t get any worse." Sophia tilted her head at Hiro.
Another mechanical hum echoed through the room. Somewhere deeper in the walls, machinery started moving.
Hiro’s face went pale. "That’s not coming from this room."
"What does that mean?" Sophia asked.
"It means," Naomi said slowly, "the thing’s trying to spread."
Almost immediately, red warning lights flooded the cafeteria and a mechanical voice completely different from the cafeteria AI echoed throughout the room.
"WARNING. FOREIGN DIGITAL ENTITY DETECTED."
"Okay good," Hiro said quickly. "Good. Another AI is fighting the evil lunch AI. That’s... that’s good."
"CONTAINMENT FAILURE AT 12%."
"Never mind."
The Machine’s security artificial intelligence had detected the intrusion and was fighting back, but it wasn’t going to last long.
Now the system had two enemies to deal with. The Awakeners trying to stop it, and the Institute trying to contain it.
The infected AI was caught between them. And it responded the only way it knew how: by optimizing harder.
Amara’s expression darkened. "It’s trying to access the Machine’s network."
Raj looked horrified now. "Wait, hold on—like the entire Machine?"
"And every Institute branch connected to it," Ethan finished quietly. "That’s ten times worse than if it got access to the internet."
Everybody went silent. Because now they understood the real problem. This wasn’t just the cafeteria anymore. This thing had the potential to spread globally.
"Okay," Sophia said calmly while standing up. "So we stop it before that happens."
"Oh, is that all?" Hiro said. "Great. Totally manageable."
Another student suddenly screamed as a drone drained him completely until just his uniform and shoes were left.
Saying anything else would have been stating the obvious. So Amara let her actions do the talking as her blade flashed through multiple drones.
Raj’s energy spiked around him after watching Amara, and he grabbed a drone midair before crushing it in one hand.
But the broken machine didn’t stay down. Thin strands of fungal biomass burst from inside the shattered metal and immediately started reconnecting broken wires.
"That is disgusting." Naomi’s jaw tightened. She sent out multiple balls of lightning, bombarding and destroying a drone completely.
However, more drones began converging together near the center of the cafeteria as the fungal strands started attaching to them.
Not attacking this time but combining. Metal twisted together and wires tangled like veins as fungal strands connected machine to machine, pulsing like muscle tissue.
The students backed away slowly as the pile started growing larger.
"You don’t see that everyday," Hiro whispered.
The thing kept building itself. A torso formed first from shattered cafeteria drones and twisted steel plating. Then arms, made from serving equipment and rotating mechanical joints.
Its eyes were formed from cafeteria camera lenses and its "mouth" from a food disposal grinder.
One hand ended in carving blades. The other in industrial cooking tools that clicked together like fingers. And finally feet that let out steam.
"New—form—acquired," it said with static.