It was an impossible dream, I knew. Darkforce monsters had been in Animia for millennia and they were still around. If I wasn't convinced of the impossibility of my dream, I certainly was an hour later.

There was a huge crunching noise. It sounded like a building had just collapsed. A really tall building, at that. When I heard the clunking of huge robotic feet I knew who and what it was immediately: Doctor Freakazoid, the Guardian gone bad.

I ran down the stairs and opened the front door. I unbuttoned the small flap on the back of my coat (my clothes had transformed so that I could extend my wings. The pole part would unfold out of my back, go through the small hole, and I could extend the wings. It did not change the way the way the clothes fit, and the flap was practically invisible unless you knew it was there). I extended my wings and took flight. It didn't take long to spot the gigantic robotic fortress that was glowing with hundreds of white lights. It seemed to have emerged from under the park, because it was standing in a massive hole in the park. Strangely, however, there was no dirt or mud on the robot. Freakazoid must have some sort of base down there. It would explain how he had gotten the robot to the park without being seen on the day of my transformation.

I kept flying towards the park. Luckily, unlike on Transformation Day, people weren't already at the park, so as long as Freakazoid stayed there, nobody would be hurt. I had to make sure Freakazoid and his new contraption did not leave the park. If I could somehow defeat Freakazoid and the robotic fortress, even better. That did seem to be the only way to make sure he didn't leave the park, after all.

The robotic fortress was just that. It looked like a huge robot but I could see that there were rooms in the chest part. The head of the thing was like the top of a tower, and through a window on the front I could see a staircase, probably leading down into the other rooms. I could also see the terrifying machine's mad creator through the window, grinning as if he had won the lottery.

There was a loud beep and Freakazoid's voice boomed out for all of Anatoria to hear. "Good evening, Guardian. How do you like my new toy? She's beautiful, isn't she? You busted my old one, but luckily I was able to salvage most of it, and you inspired me to create this one!" My ears rang with the noise.

Two huge cannons extended from the shoulders of the building-bot. I saw Freakazoid create a ball of Lifeforce and he put it into some piece of machinery in the room. The two cannons made a whirring sound, and the next thing I knew, two huge balls of lifeforce were flying out of them...straight at me!

I only just managed to dodge them. Freakazoid laughed. "You like them? As I said, you inspired this new creation, what with your lifeforce-shooting antics on the day we met! I'll let you in on a little secret: there's Anatium inside the barrels, and as you know Anatium conducts lifeforce quite well! Simply do a bit of tweaking here and there and you can make the weapons amplify the power of the lifeforce!"

This was bad. No matter how much lifeforce went into those things, a lot would come out. Then I smiled. Freakazoid wasn't the only one with a shiny new toy, was he? I summoned Mechatina. The beautiful Anatium staff appeared in my hands. I hadn't really practised with it much but maybe the only way to counter those colossal cannons was to fight Anatium with Anatium. I summoned a ball of lifeforce. I sent it flying towards Freakazoid's building-bot. I knew it was probably going to be futile but I wanted to know if it would do any damage at all.

It didn't.

The only way the building-bot was going back down to where it had come from was if it was destroyed from the inside. Freakazoid's robot had been destroyed when its mechanisms were hit with lifeforce. That was probably why Freakazoid hadn't designed his new one with a fragile glass dome on top. I couldn't destroy the top of the building-bot because attacking the outside of it with lifeforce did nothing. I had to get inside it somehow and see what kind of damage could be done from there.

I circled the robot, dodging the huge balls of lifeforce Freakazoid fired at me through those deadly reinforced-Anatium cannons. I was trying to find a door or something. I considered breaking the windows but then Freakazoid would know where I was. I wanted to sneak in without Freakazoid knowing which room I was in.

"What're you playing at now, Divinata Automata?" Freakazoid yelled. That loud noise is going to do my head in in a minute, I thought. Then I saw it. A corridor at the bottom of the building
-bot's chest. Well, it wasn't really a corridor, but there was a path that a person could run along, and at the end of it I could see a small hole. I wasn't sure if I would be too big to crawl through it though. Since I couldn't see any other entry points, however, I didn't really have much of a choice. I flew towards the pathway, hoping Freakazoid wasn't paying attention to where I was headed.

I managed to land on the path without a hitch. I ran along the corridor (luckily the chest of the building-bot hid me from view). I retracted my wings and made Mechatina disappear as it would hinder my progress through the small hole. If I got stuck in there, I was well and truly...stuck. I didn't really have any other ideas though, so I crawled through the hole. At one point I nearly did get stuck, but after a bit of wiggling about I got myself through that tight section.

I emerged in what must have been a storage room for his inventions. There were contraptions of all shapes and sizes all over the place, most of them looking suspiciously like weapons. Like his automaton parts, the inventions were all very futuristic looking. My inventions seemed to match the "steampunk" style of my parts, even if they weren't made of Anatium.

I summoned Mechatina again, thinking to destroy all the inventions in the room, then thought better of it. The noise would alert Freakazoid to my location. I wanted to keep the element of surprise with me for as long as possible. I walked towards the door of the room. I wished there was some kind of map in here. I guessed the heart of this robot would be where the heart would be on a person. I was near the bottom of the building-bot's chest. As I walked into a corridor though, I saw a staircase a few metres away going down into the robot's right leg. I hadn't seen any windows in the legs, so I guessed the rooms down in the legs were for maintenance purposes.

I saw a staircase leading upwards behind the one going down into the leg. I figured this would be a good place to start my journey to the colossal machine's heart. I ran over to it (almost falling into the other staircase) and climbed it. Unfortunately, once I got to the top of it, I was confronted by my first obstacle: a pair of white and silver robots. Freakazoid had practically copied the design of his automaton parts when he had made them. Luckily, one cannot create robots that can manipulate Lifeforce. The robots fought with Anatium knives. The Anatium had a dark glow to it though. I realised what it was a split second after one of the robots whipped its arm forward and cut me on the arm. The knives were infused with darkforce. The injury hurt more than I thought it would. A wisp of lifeforce seeped out of the cut, along with some gleaming gold-coloured oil. The cut bled like a normal cut would, and I hoped it would stop like a normal one would somehow.

I created a ball of lifeforce and sent it flying towards one of the robots' heads. It hit it, but the robot did not fall down. The two robots moved as one, lunging towards me from both sides. I jumped back, narrowly avoiding being stabbed by both knives. I used two balls of lifeforce to knock the knives out of the robots' hands, which were clearly designed to hold the knives and not much else (the hands were like the hands of Lego people). As the robots bent forward to pick up their weapons, I focused my power, and instead of making it flow to my hands and out, I sent it through Mechatina. The staff glowed, and a beam of lifeforce shot out of the end, hitting both robots and sending them to the ground.

Using that power had made me feel a little tired, so I decided to rest a moment. I had used a lot of power, sending more of it through me to the staff than I usually did. The power must have been a little strong for me, I figured. My cut had stopped bleeding, and the sleeve of my coat had a gold patch on it where the cut was. I examined my injury more closely. There was a small part where the darkforce-infused Anatium knife had cut through the metal, but the rest of it was like a scratch. I reached down to pick up one of the robots' knives. The instant it touched my hand I felt a nasty zap, like an electric shock. I managed to hold onto the knife, but after a few seconds I had to let go. The pain was too much, and one injury was enough for one night. My hand was a bit duller where the knife had touched it. Darkforce was powerful stuff, of that I was certain.

I noticed a piece of paper on the ground near one of the robots. It showed a basic map of the rooms in the robotic fortress. It seemed I had entered at "weapon storage" and then gone up the stairs into the "laboratory floor." Every room was marked. There was no sign showing where the heart of this machine was though. I decided that my only option was to get the location of the machine's "heart" from its creator. My next confrontation with the mad scientist was nigh.

After a couple of minutes, I stepped over the robots (which had smoke coming out of them) and continued my journey to the top of the building-bot. As I got higher up inside the thing, the robot squads increased in size, but all the robots were the same as the first two: silver and white, futuristic-looking and holding darkforce-infused Anatium knives. Three staircases and fourteen robots later, I arrived at a silver door. Surprisingly, it was unlocked. Beyond the door was another staircase leading up into darkness. Slowly, I ascended the staircase. I knew it led up to the top of the building-bot.

When I got there, Freakazoid was facing the doorway. His blue eyes were icy. His skin was unusually pale. His metallic fists were clenched. A ball of lifeforce hovered in front of Freakazoid's forehead. Unlike my lifeforce, this ball of lifeforce was dark around the edge. There was white mist coming from it, which was perfectly normal. However there was also black mist coming from it. This lifeforce was tainted by darkforce. I remembered the burning pain I had experienced when I held the darkforce-infused knife. Freakazoid's lifeforce would probably be just as painful if it touched me. I remembered the story Anatia had told me in the dream earlier that day. The darkforce that Freakazoid had swallowed had consumed him, just as he had consumed it.

The light of the ancient Guardians and Manipulatives was the only thing that could destroy the demons and monsters born of pure darkforce. It made sense then, that darkforce could overcome lifeforce. It was like an eternal game of tug of war, where both sides were pulling at the world, trying to dominate over each other. And now, it was time for me to pick up my end of the rope again. Time to prove to Animia that I was the Divinata Automata. The Divine Automaton of Life.

Freakazoid did not hesitate. As soon as I held up Mechatina and began charging up a lifeforce attack, Freakazoid moved his right hand behind the ball of impure lifeforce and made a pushing motion. It flew at me faster than my lifeforce flew at things. It was as if the darkforce in it made it angrier and more determined to destroy me. Freakazoid truly was one with darkforce. I shielded myself with the only thing I had: Mechatina. As the ball made contact, I pushed forward a little with the staff. The ball bounced off the sphere on the end of the staff and hit part of the building-bot's control panel. The lights on the control panel went out, and smoke started to emanate from it. The rest of the robot seemed to be fine. I would not have surprised me if Freakazoid had used Anatium in the building-bot. His first one had been pretty weak, and Freakazoid had not expected much resistance on Transformation Day. No wonder it took him so long to send this one out. If it had Anatium in it, this robot would be more durable.

The two of us fired ball after ball of lifeforce at each other. I scored a couple of hits, but Freakazoid almost hit me a few times too. His mechanical parts looked heavier than mine (his limbs did have the extendable parts inside them) which hindered his ability to dodge my attacks. Nevertheless, he had clearly been practising. I used Mechatina to use some more powerful attacks, which were harder to dodge. Freakazoid picked up a bulky-looking gun thing after a while and used it to fire balls of lifeforce at mr. I guessed it worked like the building-bot's cannons, because the balls of lifeforce he put into it cane out bigger through the other end. These attacks were harder to dodge, but the bulkiness of the lifeforce gun meant that it was easier for me to land hits. When I destroyed his gun with a large ball of lifeforce from Mechatina, Freakazoid finally called it quits for the night. As I summoned the final ball of lifeforce of the night, Freakazoid threw down what was left of the gun and said, "Impressive, little Guardian. I had better go home to improve my technique, hadn't I? It's been fun, but-" I threw the ball of lifeforce. Freakazoid leapt to the ground, but the ball hadn't been anywhere near the scientist. Freakazoid laughed, but not for long. There was a bang. A white box in the corner of the room exploded. There was a burning smell in the air. Freakazoid cried out in pain, as the wires coming out of his shoulders burned away. Freakazoid turned around to look at the White box, which was about the size of a microwave. I could see that there were two small flaps in his lab coat on the shoulders, a bit like the flap on he back of mine that I used when I wanted to fly. The metal of Freakazoid's shoulders showed through. It looked damaged.

There was no "heart" to the building-bot. Freakazoid's own heart had been powering the machine. He had bound it to his own lifeforce with technology. Something only a few Guardians had done, according to legend. At least that physical bond was destructible. If he had known that which it seemed only Arithmius knew, how to give lifeforce to a machine and create an entirely new life.... Well, Anima might not have survived much longer.