MBryO: The Escape Read Online Free Page B

were seated comfortably before he attempted to use his rough vocal chords.
    “Nyla 6 is a forgotten Terran experiment.”
    “Just one of many, I assure you!” Melara drawled firmly. Terra’s government was continually shifting from one powerful leader to another these days. They were notorious for their inability to pass new laws and enforce them too.
    “My forefathers were part of a team that was sent here to establish a star base. They erected the bunker, built the shuttle bays and furnished the laboratories. They were supposed to be the first wave of colonists. When the shuttle returned to Earth for the next group of immigrants and supplies, it never returned. My ancestors assumed the Terran government had written them off. They never came back for us.”
    “So you live here all alone?” Melara quizzed. “Or are there others?”
    “Except for Stanley and the other robots that keep the bunker running I am the only remaining humanoid being on the planet,” he told her.
    “Is there is no way off this rock?” Joshua asked telepathically.
    “Not that I have found,” Pax returned.
    “Don’t you at least have a shuttlecraft or a terrain-hopper?” Sasha asked incredulously.
    “Are you referring to the ship you came here on?”
    “Among others,” Joshua intoned.
    “No, I have no space craft. I travel by zip line.”
    “But you mentioned landing bays, so am I correct in thinking there might be some tools or parts stored there?” William intoned.
    “We could check it out anyway…right?” Joshua asked.
    “Be my guest,” Pax told him. His native language, long unused, was beginning to return. “As the old Terrans used to say, ‘make yourselves at home’. You are welcome to stay here as long as you need to.”
    “Well, on the bright side,” Melara said tiredly, “we should be safe here for a while. MBryO doesn’t know where we are.”
    “Father will just keep looking until he finds us!” William stated with the sure knowledge he had gained at the hands of a tyrant such as MBryO.
    “But crashing here on Nyla 6 might have bought us some time. Maybe we can come up with a plan to outwit Father and destroy MBryO once and for all.”
    “And then we must rescue as many of our brothers and sisters as we can!” Joshua added hopefully.
    “Joshua and I will begin working on the shuttlecraft in the morning,” William told her. “We set her down as gently as we could, but she was too heavy for us to land in one piece.”
    “That sounds like a good idea William,” Melara smiled proudly. “You all did a wonderful job landing the ship without any of us being seriously hurt.”
    “Why does this MBryO want to harm you?” Pax inquired.
    The question went unanswered as the louvered doors swung open.
    “You guys should really see the food prep center,” Ian exclaimed following Stanley back into the room and flopping down on the couch beside Melara.
    The golden robot set two large trays loaded with food and beverages on the coffee table. “There’s this machine that turns brown packages into food. It can replicate anything you want.”
    As Pax watched the young telepaths reached hungrily for the thick cheeseburgers and bottles of root beer. Stanley had added a collection of raw vegetables and julienned potato chips. Their mental chatter echoed through the portals of his mind bringing a smile of pure pleasure to his normally grim face.
    So this was what friendship felt like? For the first time since his parents had died he did not feel alone. This rag-tag group of telepaths had absorbed him into their unit as if he had been born to it. Pax knew that he would die before giving human contact up again.
    And he had a feeling that it might come to that. This MBryO sounded like a monster. He could be bad business.
    But so was Pax when it came to taking care of what was his. And when this group had crash landed on Nyla 6 they had involved him in their situation whether they knew it or not.
    His dark gaze collided