The brilliant light of the morning sun rising over Kaduna flashed over a lone figure trailing along a dusty path. He was dressed in a hooded jacket clearly meant to conceal.

The man walked with a limp, not one born of deformity or of drunkenness but of injury, yet everything about him said he was not one to be accosted. This man went by the name K.

As he walked, he raised his arm to his face and spoke in a tired yet firm tone. Speaking to himself yet not.

"Journal entry two hundred and nine. K here. My suit is damaged and almost completely out of power thanks dominantly to an act of foolishness and impatience on my part but I've unearthed a plot. Something sinister. Something big. In an attempt to discover more I was ambushed and barely escaped with my life. It was like they knew I was coming. I believe someone knows I'm here; more importantly knows I'm not supposed to be here, and I don't think they like me very much."

It was nearing five years since his arrival. Nearing five years since the crisis. K had spent those four years plus as he had been ordered to: watching from the shadows and keeping record. Records for whom he did not know because one thing was certain, if it hadn't already happened yet, his return to the future would set in stone the changes to the timeline and then no one would remember. Not even him.

It was a price he had prepared himself to live with. In what was now his past life, he had had no emotional entanglements—it was easy given his childhood. In this one he intended to still keep it that way.

It was after the fourth year—one year away from the end of his mandated time of watching and documenting everything: the evolved citizens of Nigeria who had been exposed to compound LXR and coping with the effects of it, the regular folks adapting in their own little ways to the new world around them; and keeping an eye on external forces who he knew were watching Nigeria, waiting to pounce on a country on its knees—that he discovered the plot afoot.

Powering up his suit which he had shut down to conserve power years ago, he followed on the lead. His discovery had taken him to a secret laboratory in the heart of Port Harcourt where he had almost uncovered the entire plot before he was attacked by a small army of soldiers with high tech weaponry—they had been prepared for him. His shield had barely lasted a minute before the bullets began to tear through it like paper. His armor didn't last much longer. It was by a hair's breadth that he had escaped. In doing so, K realized that this was not a job for himself alone. He needed help.

But that would have to wait. His suit took priority. Which was why only a few days from the assault—using the last of the suit's power to teleport him away—he was now far up north.

Beneath his jacket, hidden from view was the torn apart remnants of his suit, the nanites unable to slink away completely into the damaged, only partly functional core at his back as usual. The dust sweeping around him threw off his hood to reveal a worn face thickly dotted with the beginning of a bedraggled beard.

Eyes set ahead to a destination not yet visible, he concluded his entry,

"I have located a possible power source to recharge my suit and I go to investigate. In doing so I hope to find an ally or I fear all hope is lost."

Tapping on the gauntlet on his arm, he ended the recording. He was lucky that the gauntlet had its own power supply to ensure that in the eventuality of his suit failing he could still continue to maintain records and use a limited array of weapons and utilities. Like the GPS tracker that led him straight to a large warehouse at the edge of town, a mile away from the nearest building.

The only security measure on the giant doors was a ridiculously large padlock and chains which he promptly cut through with a high intensity laser beam from his gauntlet.

The doors slid open with a loud creak and he walked in, sliding it shut behind him.

The light was out inside the warehouse, indicating that the owner was away but with the help of a built-in flashlight, he could see that the warehouse was very much in use.

There were various heavy machine parts hanging from the ceilings by heavy chains—few of them were of automobiles, the rest he could not figure out at a glance—and various work tables with tools, gadgets and smaller machine parts strewn around with abandon, testament to constant use and the hyperactivity of one who liked to use their hands frequently.

K silently prayed whoever owned this place would be an ally. The person clearly knew his way around machines.

He was so distracted and awed that he momentarily forgot why he was breaking and entering what was clearly private property. It was in that distraction that his eyes skipped past a pair of red glowing eyes staring at him from the darkness.

A low growl set his eyes racing back to that spot in the dark, his flashlight following his gaze rested just as his eyes did on a hunk of metal that was the height and the shape of a dog. Matter of fact it was a dog. A big mechanical—very much alive—dog with red eyes.

It parted its jaws with a little whir of moving gears to reveal a set of razor sharp teeth capable of shredding through him—flesh, tissue and bone—in one savage bite.

K slowly opened his mouth, his eyes even wider open, and muttered what was to be his first word in days.

"Shit!"

The dog advanced slowly and K caught sight of its finely detailed form—in total awe and pant-wetting fright of both the monster and the mind that crafted it—all the way to the tail flicking silently from side to side. If he didn't know any better he'd say the metallic beast was happy to see him. Just not in a way that ensured his survival.

The jaws clamped together again and a low growl escaped from its mechanical bowels. K leaned away.

Moving so slowly he could almost hear his muscles creaking, he raised the gauntlet a little higher to his mouth.

"Engage weapon. Activate EMP," he whispered, barely making out the words.

The dog continued to watch him, putting a paw forward with each foot K dragged in the opposite direction. He tried to keep himself as relaxed as possible, keeping the dog; which seemed to be behaving like a real dog—further props to its creator—, from seeing him as a threat.

"Repeat command," the automated voice from the gauntlet spoke.

Something about it set the dog off. Maybe it was the tinny nature of the voice. Maybe it was the incorporeal nature of it. Or maybe it was the fact that the voice was incredibly loud in the otherwise silent building.

K threw himself to the side as the dog pounced, teeth bared and ready to take his face from the rest of him.

The claws he had failed to notice on those paws scraped noisily against the concrete as it landed just past where K had been standing and spun around to face him again.

"Good dog... Nice dog..." he muttered, a hand outstretched in a pacifying gesture as he started to rise to his feet.

It must not have been pacifying enough because the dog leapt at him again. This time K went down with it—his reaction time way off due to fatigue—, pushed to the ground under it's weight. As his back touched down, he rolled with the momentum and threw the dog off him, over his head—no mean feat as he found that the dog was as heavy as it looked.

He heard it hit the ground and rolled into a crouch before it could twist it's body back.

A third time, the dog pounced. Throwing caution out the window, K shouted,

"Activate EMP!"

He heard the tiny beep that said his command had been received and stretched his hand out, knuckles facing the dog. As the beast came down, a little slit opened and a small disc no larger than a coin shot out and stuck into its forehead. The second it made contact, the dog jerked once mid-air then went stiff as it fell against K. It's glowing eyes went dim.

With great effort, K pushed the dead weight off him and got to his feet, panting heavily and cursing himself mentally for slacking on his cardio.

He didn't get a chance to acknowledge his victory over the mechanical dog when he heard upbeat whistling punctuated by heavy footsteps. Both were coming from somewhere within the building and whoever the sounds were coming from was moving his way.

A moment later, a short spiky-haired girl rounded a corner several feet away and appeared directly ahead of K. She had a headset on and was doing a little jig as she walked, unaware that she was not alone. In the dim lighting, he managed to make out her appearance. She wore an unflattering overall with rubber boots and had a tool belt strapped around her waist and safety goggles around her neck.

She stopped at the sight of him and stared as one would at a lost animal that had wandered in.

Before he could decide on the best way to breach a conversation, she snapped her fingers and the entire warehouse was lit up in fluorescent white.

The sudden illumination had K shielding his eyes instinctively. By the time he grew accustomed to the light, she was looking at the dog on the floor next to him.

There was a clear look of hurt on her face as she pushed the headset down to her neck, her eyes never leaving the dog.

"Bass?" she whispered. She looked up at him, cold fury in her eyes. "What have you done to Bass?"

"That was an unfortunate incident and I assure you I have not damaged your bot. I need your help. You have something I am looking for and I must have it."

"You trespassed on my property,—"

"I apologize for that."

"—attacked my dog—"

"It attacked me first."

K could have sworn he had never seen someone so small yet so frightening as she fixed him a certain look that said if she wanted to hurt him—and she did, he could tell—her size would hinder her none.

"—and now you make demands of me? Shey you mad ni?"

"This is a grave matter. More important than a stupid robot dog."

And right then, K wished he could swallow his words.

She took one menacing step towards him before he had his hand up and pointed aggressively at her.

"Do not take another step," he warned. To the gauntlet, he said, "Gauntlet, set to stun."

The girl studied the gauntlet briefly then rolled her eyes.

"Gauntlet, go to sleep," she said.

He was halfway through a short mocking laugh when the screen went dark.

"What the...?"

In the process of tapping at it in confusion, K found himself the very unlucky recipient of a stunning blow to the side of the head that sent him careening off to the side.

"That was for pointing a weapon at me in my own workshop."

He had barely righted himself when she threw another punch, catching him on the same cheek for the second time. He staggered backwards.

"That was for my dog."

When he looked up her eyes were on the dog again. He followed her gaze in time to watch the EMP chip short-circuit and simply fall off.

The dog sprang back to life and turned to K, baring it's teeth.

"Down, Sebastian," the girl said.

The dog relaxed immediately and while giving K the mechanical dog version of the evil eye, it retreated to its mistress' side.

There was an unmistakable fondness when she looked down at the beast but when she looked back up at him, it was gone.

"Begin self destruct sequence." Another order. An order his gauntlet immediately responded to.

"What?" The panic in his voice was palpable.

The countdown clock appeared on the screen. Thirty seconds.

"You cannot do this!"

"I believe I just did."

"This gauntlet is worth more than my life!"

"It will be up to you to give me reasons not to let that timer run out."

"What do you mean?"

"Who are you?"

"K."

"K who?"

"Just K!"

"Who do you work for?"

"The Nigerian government."

"There is no Nigerian government."

"Not anymore but my assignment still stands."

The timer continued to run but while K's heart ran marathons in his chest, she was unfazed.

Five seconds.

"Who told you about this place?"

Four seconds.

"I found it myself."

Three seconds.

"That's impossible. This place is practically invisible."

Two seconds.

"I'm from the future!"

A raised eyebrow was all the reaction she gave.

The timer went down to one but it stopped there then the screen went black again.

"Self destruct deactivated," the gauntlet announced.

K let out a sigh of relief.

The girl continued to watch him. She retrieved a joint from behind her ears and with the aid of a lighter from her pocket, she lit it and took it to her mouth.

"The name is Titilayo and I do not like you, future boy." She took a drag then puffed. "Now...talk."