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The cat jumped up onto a railing and looked over the dead city. He could see everything from such a height. The infestation plastered across the skyscrapers, the dimly lit, hundred feet walls cusping the city’s radius, even the slum where he was just a few days before.
It was ominous. It gave him a sinking feeling. He was already closer to his destination than ever before, yet so far at the same time. What lied ahead of the cat? He did not know. He did not want to think about it.
The cat faintly heard servos churning as he tilted his ear to approaching footsteps. The footsteps seized and he turned his head. A robot. One of many that populated the neon covered district that the cat now occupied.
“What’s a small creature like you, doing in a place like this?” The robot asked lumley. The “face” that was attached to this robot’s head was a screen with animated facial features. It emitted a dim aroma onto the cat’s face as he stared at him, blinking a few times. The cat silently stared back.
A little bot flew out of the cat’s black-silk harness and hovered a few feet from the screen as it sent communication signals to the robot’s internal system. The text read,
Log: B-12 >> Omni
B-12: Hello.
Omni: Hello. What are you and this creature doing here?
B-12: We are on a mission.
The robot quickly responded back,
“...What sort of mission?”
B-12: Departure.
Omni: Departing where? The city?
B-12: …
The robot noticed in the corner of its eye that the cat had begun grooming himself as he continued to text,
Omni: I am unsure how to respond to that.
B-12: …
B-12: Yes. The city.
Omni: …
The robot thought to himself,
‘You poor, naive soul.’
Omni: It has been 376 human years since anybody has left the city.
B-12: I am aware.
Omni: …
>>Close log?
>[Yes] [No]
The robot looked at the small hovering bot, almost in pity, then shook his head. The little bot had no response apart from retreating back to its nook in the cat’s harness.
“Mreow.”
The cat stood up and stretched on the railing. The robot thought that was quite the risk, being up this high and this close to the edge, but he could only assume that the creature knew what it was doing.
The cat looked at him one more time before jumping to the ground next to his metal feet, and trotting away. Omni watched the cat fade into the distance before he turned a corner, out of sight.
‘What an odd night…’