The safehouse wasn't much—just an abandoned warehouse tucked behind a tangle of collapsed scaffolding and rusted shipping containers. Neon from the distant city flickered through shattered windows, casting eerie blue and pink patterns across the cracked concrete floor. Inside, the air smelled of dust, mold, and faintly of old oil.
Min-ah leaned against a wall, arms crossed, shivering from cold and adrenaline. Her eyes kept darting to the windows, watching for the red glow of robot sensors.
Jin-hee knelt in the center of the room, inspecting the sword. He ran his fingers along the chipped edge, turning it slowly. Sparks still flickered faintly along the steel where he'd scraped it clean. "It's not perfect," he murmured. "But it's ours. It's a start."
Min-ah tilted her head. "Yours… or ours?"
"Both," Jin-hee said firmly. "We're alive. That's the first step. If we survive tonight, we start fighting back. I can't do this alone."
For a moment, they were quiet, listening to the distant hum of the city and the faint clatter of metal footsteps outside. Then, Min-ah spoke, voice trembling slightly:
"They… they're everywhere. What chance do we have?"
Jin-hee's eyes hardened. "Chance isn't given. We take it. Every robot we destroy, every human we save—it's a spark. And sparks… they start fires."
She swallowed and nodded, slowly starting to understand the courage it took to face the machines head-on. Then she noticed something along the far wall: a panel of old circuitry, wires hanging loose, dust-covered switches blinking weakly.
"What's that?" she asked.
Jin-hee got up, approaching it carefully. "Old security system… maybe we can use it. Could give us control over some of the warehouse's defenses—or at least create distractions."
As he fiddled with the wires, a spark jumped, sizzling across the panel. The lights flickered and the distant hum outside seemed to shift, as if responding. Min-ah gasped.
"Careful!" she said. "You could blow the whole place."
Jin-hee smiled faintly, ignoring her warning. "Exactly. But sometimes, blowing things up is necessary."
Outside, a patrol bot passed by. Its sensors scanned the warehouse walls, whirring softly. Inside, the shadows deepened. Min-ah held her breath, gripping a piece of rebar she had found on the floor. Jin-hee gripped the sword, ready for the first strike.
"Ready?" he asked.
Min-ah nodded, and together they crouched in the shadows, waiting for the moment to act. For the first time since the city fell, there was a sense of possibility in the air—a flicker of resistance. They were small, they were human, but they were alive.
And sometimes, that was enough to start a revolution.