Faithful encounter (2)

Ruintracker is nowhere to be seen. It's it can't fit inside a hole and already left from a lack of activity. The old world door seems stronger than before.

The boy gets up. Despite his weak body, his regenerative ability is on the high end of a normal human. Looks like a few years of beating and some poor quality nutrient pack has done something to his body. Complete darkness governs the area at the bottom of the elevator shaft. Velo needs to stick to a wall to find the light. He steps on a lot of things. A wet floor? A hard structure with something mushy inside?

He can only speculate on what did he step on and it's not like he wants to know either.

The weak body continues onward. He makes two-turn until he sees a light coming from a sign on the door.

'Bophus?'

This is only a speculation of him. A slum boy like him doesn't have the money to learn how to read or write after all.

He walked up to the door and press something that lit up at random, hoping it'd open. He tried for some time but it seems to have no effect. As he is about to give up, he saw that and hand shape line lit up beside the keypad so he touches it.

The door opens.

"Subject detected turning on the facility"

He can hear a robotic voice while the facility inside lights up. Showing its outer world-like appearance with a Flawless white structure. A thing that looks like a control panel and a massive tube with some kind of blue liquid in it.

This room looks suspicious and, with no people using it, makes it weirder. It is an unfamiliar place to him.

"Subject observe to have undergone extensive damages. We recommend accepting a healing producer"

Velo jumps when the A.I. reports to him again. He hears the voice but can't see it.

"w...What are you!?"

"I'm an A.I. administrator of this facility. For further information, you do not have enough authority for that information."

"w...Where is this place"

"This a Dumo tower in the center of Dumo city, the 21st city built for transport from earth to ringworld."

"What is this place?"

"You don't have enough authority for it."

"What is your job then?"

There isn't enough authority for more information.

"How do I leave this place?"

"You don't have enough authority for it."

"..."

The answer he gets frustrated Velo. It seems like he would not get anything from questioning it. He looks around a room finding a 3 pill shape structure on a wall. The text is written in an old-world format. He can't read it but a cross sign could be seen by the pill pod.

Even a dumb slum kid knows that they use this sign for medicinal stuff. Velo doesn't trust it one bit. He's in a middle of a ruin where a powerful monster can eat him at any second. Do you think he would believe an A.I. building manager?

No chance! Velo didn't know they programmed most of the A.I. managers to help humans. He drags his body off, but he's about to go out...

"Subject is not advisable to leave. Your life expectancy is at around 15 hours or lowers in this condition"

It's true that at this rate, his wound would kill him. It also didn't help that the past few days, he only got leftovers for meals. He reluctantly looks back and asks.

"w... What does the healing pod do?"

"The healing pod regenerates your body to ideal condition. This includes missing limb, cancer, or any other condition that is documented in the universal illness categories. Unless you have an augmentation that can not cure through biological means, the pod and cure anything that's in U.I.C. You can even customize your preference if you want to leave your illness untouched.

Velo is clueless about what the A.I. is saying.

"Is it safe?"

"The success rate of our latest procedure is 100% with 0% mortality rate out of 3223 subjects who use it. The last people who undergo this program 2699 years ago leave a 5-star review saying "It's like I have a new body" so we can guarantee that this procedure this safe.

Again, he doesn't understand half of what it's saying, but all the safety talk convinces him a bit. He ponders the choice he has if he leaves and takes a gamble elsewhere or gets healed by the healing pod.

Velo concludes that taking the pod was safer even if he doesn't fully trust it. The kindness of this situation makes him feel uncomfortable. He carefully steps into the pill shape pod. It closes on him and he feels a little panic.

Soon, the inside lit up.

"Please don't panic. The producer will be harder if the subject doesn't cooperate. We will administrate the sedative will now."

Velo suddenly feel sleepy

"Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh"

He screams so loud it be heard through the healing pod. He felt like his body got eaten inside out by a lot of ants.

"WARNING! WARNING! WARNING! the subject is not compatible with the procedure adjusting the nanite the used...-..... Processing body scan....-....."

The A.I. analyzes the body of the subject. It detects that the subject has an abnormally high toxic waste in his body. So it attempts to adjust the amount of nanite needed to reconstruct the body. Meanwhile, Velo can't bear the pain anymore and starts banging the glass door of the healing pill with his head.

The amount of pain surpasses the effect of the sedative. The A.I. tries to use a more potent one, but because of the amount of toxic waste in his body, it has little to no effect.

"GET ME OUTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTTT!!!!!"

Velo screams and keeps banging his head on the glass. Steam of blood is flowing down his head and the glass.

"ERRRRRRRRRRRRRRRORRR the subject issssssssssss dying... requesting permission to use Chronus procedure...Permission received. Beginning the process. Due to the change in your body, we request the subject's permission to process."

"GET ME OUTTTTTTTTTTTT!!"

"Sorry due to a law set by the Global United paragraph 322 about consent. The subject is required to sign a contract. The term is as follows. 1. We can take...."

"I ACCEPT!!!! NOW LET ME OUTTTTT"

"Permission received. Beginning the procedure in 3...2...1"

Blue light flashes from the middle of the room, blinding Velo's eyes. The pain stops for a second, then it returns shortly after. Causing more pain than before, he eventually blackout.