Sairi produced the light sword. Fortunately for him, the robots had paid it no mind, as when deactivated, it collapsed into a small, innocuous rectangular piece of metal he hid in his cloak. He handed it to Ares, not surprised that he knew he possessed such a thing because he was spying on him. Ares took the sword with practiced efficiency, then severed the head of the deactivated robot on the floor. He carried the head to the nearby cells, using the robot's eye to open the locks one by one. The prisoners streamed out, scarcely believing it was real. Women, young men, the elderly, and children. Ares freed them all, and they showered him with thanks and gratitude for their liberation. He kept repeating that there was still much to do before he could get them out, and only then could they thank him as they wished. He then ascended the helical staircase, opening all the unbreakable glass prison doors until everyone was free.
Tears of joy streamed as a mother saw her young daughter again. A grandfather reunited with his grandson. Friends embraced. They wept openly in a great, familial reunion. Of course, there were many who had no one they knew here.
"All of you, silence, now!" Ares called out, his voice ringing through the chamber.
Everyone fell silent. All eyes turned to him, and the voices quieted. He looked at them and promised he would find a way to get them out. After a few moments of self-imposed silence, he broke it again.
"I do not wish to lower your morale," he began, "but we still have a very long way to go to get out of here. We are, unfortunately, deep underground—or to be more precise, in a facility beneath the sea. To escape, we will face many obstacles, and we may not, in the end, be able to reach safety. I truly do not know where we are, or which way we must go."
A murmur of unease rippled through the crowd. Voices of panic and protest began to rise. Some said there was no hope, that they would all die sooner or later, and that they should have accepted their fate from the beginning.
"Stop this wailing like children!" Ares roared, silencing them with his angry tone. "We will get out of here, I promise you that. We will discover everything we need to on our way out, but we must cooperate. No one gets left behind. Who here can fight?"
A number of young men and some of the older men raised their hands. Their numbers exceeded one hundred. Ares surveyed them carefully. "That is a good number. There is hope, then. Now, we have the elderly, women, and children. Their number does not exceed..."
Ares paused, counting them quickly, then finished, "Their number does not exceed fifty. This means a ratio of two fighters to protect each one of them. That is more than excellent. Now, this is our plan: I infiltrated this place and I know the way out of this facility. But when we emerge, the situation will become more difficult, because we will have to pass through the robot city and escape it somehow."
A dissenting voice came from the large crowd, a young man in his twenties. "And how are we supposed to escape their city? They will swarm us, attack us from everywhere. Besides, Atlantis has been completely destroyed by those bastards!"
Ares was silent for a moment, recalling everything he had seen. Then he said with confidence, "No, they will not be able to wage war on their own city and cause the destruction of it and their people. In a way, the machines living in the city appeared to be sentient, like us. As for Atlantis, it has been protected and was not completely destroyed. Many soldiers are working right now to destroy the remaining robots and drive them out."
A sense of reassurance and hope spread through the humans when they heard that Atlantis was still safe. Ares deduced that they must have been kidnapped when the robots first attacked Atlantis.
A female voice called out, "Sentient?! What do you mean by that?"
Ares clasped his hands together, his tone becoming speculative. "They were feeling anger, they were laughing, they were doing things similar to what we do. If they possess emotions analogous to our own, it means they will also be susceptible to fear and panic when they see us. They will turn and flee, just as humans do when they see an unknown danger. Because of this, their soldiers will not endanger the lives of their people, which will lead them to let us escape in an attempt to fight us outside the city limits. We will use this to our advantage, steal some of their vehicles, take some hostages, and escape to Atlantis."
Ivanov stroked his chin, considering what he'd said. "It sounds like a viable plan. It might succeed if executed correctly."
Murmurs of hope began to ripple through the prisoners. They whispered amongst themselves. A man in his forties with a thick beard and long hair spoke up. "How will we fight the robots? We don't have any weapons."
Ares gestured to the robot weapon lying on the floor. "Like any facility in the world, there must be an armory. As I was descending in the elevator, I saw many floors, and I saw an emergency staircase in a room next to the elevator. We will all take those stairs. We will search every floor until we find the armory, and then we will fight our way out of here."
Ares began to shout, rallying the prisoners. "Who is with me? We will teach these bastards a lesson! That we are the masters, that we are their creators, and the creation must respect and honor its creator!"
The voices rose in cheers, applause, and intense enthusiasm. Amidst the noise, Ares picked up the bladed weapon, which was split into two parts—an upper and a lower section—with a gap between them that terminated in a glowing blue sphere at the weapon's base. He whispered to Ivanov and Sairi:
"Follow me, now. I have two weapons nearby that I will give to you."