Hostiles
GrayCris's automated facility defenses; most are destroyed, but the last combat bot kills Miki before Murderbot cuts it down.
Story so far
The facility's automated defenses, combat bots supported by drone swarms and a spidery bio-sampler, prove to be original GrayCris equipment, left in sleep mode to destroy any intruders as the facility collapsed. Beyond guarding the site, one combat bot boards a work zipper on the assassins' encrypted signal and flies out to destroy the tractor array. Murderbot whittles them down: it destroys one with explosives, hijacks their drones, and later uses the diggers to crush another at the docking port, while Don Abene's crew knocks the zipper-borne bot off course.
But a final combat bot pursues the fleeing shuttle, breaches its lock, and forces the last stand. Murderbot kills it by driving a core cutter clean through its processors, yet in the same moment the bot crushes Miki, ending the brave bot's life. Implacable and self-repairing to the last, the combat bots are stopped only at terrible cost; a lone bot is left behind on the abandoned facility.
Appearance
Combat bots: three-meter four-armed humanoid machines with chest and back weapon ports, cutting and energy hand mods, self-repairing; supported by armored energy-armed drones and a fast red eight-fingered bio-sampler.
Role
The book's mechanical menace, defeated at the cost of Miki's life; GrayCris's automated executioners.
Relationships
Sources — 3 recorded facts, by chapter
- Fast, silent red spider-limbed things haunting the abandoned facility; they snatch humans by the head from the dark.
- The facility's automated defenses: a spidery bio-sampler and towering four-armed combat bots with drone swarms, woken to kill intruders.
- GrayCris's automated facility defenses; most are destroyed, but the last combat bot kills Miki before Murderbot cuts it down.