A Team Effort

"Hey Artie, just so you know, I'm pretty sure I saw one of your kids down on the beach. It's getting quite late now so thought you might want to know. We wouldn't want anything to happen to the little darlings would we?" Tara said, passing Artie in the corridor on his way to his room.

"By Science! That little... Thank you Tara." Artie sped off towards the beach, away from his kids. Away from their plight, in search of a scutter on a beach who wasn't there...

Archimedes wasn't one from bravery...or for doing anything other than trying to avoid being stepped on, really....but he knew that he had to do something. That crazy bitch was trying to kill his brother!

The little red skutter rolled out from under the sofa, and checked to make sure that the attacker was gone. He zipped around the room, trying to find a way to rescue Artie Jr. He pulled the plug on the microwave, to no avail, apparently the programmers of the resort didn't bother to make appliances shut down when their power was cut off.

He zipped around the room, trying to think of a plan. He could hear the faintest tapping coming from the bedroom.

Archimedes rushed to the room and followed the tapping to the wardrobe, his siblings were locked inside...tapping out a message in morse code.

"MOM? DAD?" They tapped.

"NO, IT'S ARCHIMEDES"

"OH, GREAT"

"WHAT'S THAT 'SPOSED TO MEAN?"

"PLEASE JUST GET US OUT!"

Archimedes pulled on the door, to his surprise, it was locked.

There was a tap from inside "IF IT WAS OPEN WE WOULDN'T STILL BE IN HERE NOW WOULD WE?"

Archimedes groaned.

"WHO SET THE PASSWORD?" Archimedes tapped on the door.

"I DUNNO, SOME OF DAD'S FLASH DRIVES AND MOM'S JEWELRY IS IN HERE THOUGH"

Archimedes pondered....Tara likely didn't know their father that well and likely ended up just hacking the door open....hopefully his password was still programmed in the room safe.

"DAD'S PASSWORD MIGHT STILL WORK" Archimedes tapped out.

"WHAT IS IT?!"

Archimedes thought....and started to panic when he heard Artie Jr. slamming against the microwave door, he was slowly running out of time. He had a combination of numbers between 5-15 digits long, with the numbers ranging between 1-50. Archimedes tried to think of the password....then it hit him.

19-3-9-5-14-3-5
S-C-I-E-N-C-E

The safe beeped, and the door popped open, Archimedes' six siblings came tumbling out along with the contents of the safe.

Artemis was a genius, but he was extremely predictable...especially towards the people that live with him.

The kids rushed into the kitchen, the microwave was beginning it's slow cook mode. The kids searched for a quick solution. Climbing onto the counter would take too long, they needed it off in the next 60 seconds or the rays would burn through Jr's shielding.

They searched through the foyer closet, discovering some hangers and a suitcase stand. Nikola chattered out a solution....pulling the straps off the stand and flinging one of the skuttlings onto the counter. Archimedes, being the smallest, was chosen.

He was wrapped with the strap, the other half being gripped by Plato the giant.

Plato slowly spun Achimedes, gradually gaining speed and eventually taking flight, flying into the sink.

Archimedes canceled the cook cycle and popped open the door, Jr came rolling out, off the counter, and into the claws of his waiting siblings.

The octet celebrated their victory. Had it not been for them inheriting their father's intelligence and their mother's wit (along with her processing power), they wouldn't have been nearly as successful.

Meanwhile

Artemis was searching the beach with the aid of Boyd and H-343, who was still mounted in his hull due to the lack of compatibility between the resort and his software (much of the tech was manufactured by Charon Labs, and was resistant against Serraco hardware).

"I don't think they're here Artie, you can like...sense their presence right?" Boyd asked, digging through the sand.

"Sense them? As in premonition? No. But I can pick up on their emissions using my scanner suite...I'm not getting anything around here though"

"Neither am I. Unless your children became 100% efficient and emission free I doubt they're here" H-343 replied.

A notification popped up on one of Artemis' monitors. It was a message sent from a terminal in his room.

"Huh...." Artemis read the message and became steadily more furious. "THAT BITCH! I'LL KILL HERE!"

"What?" Boyd and H-343 asked simultaneously.

"THAT BITCH TARA TRIED TO KILL MY KIDS! BOYD, COME WITH ME, WE'RE TAKING THIS BITCH OUT!" Artemis said, heading back to the room.

After retrieving his magna-gun from the bug-out bag, he, Boyd, H-343, and the Skuttlings searched the resort for Tara.

They tracked her unique hardlight signature to a far end of the resort.

“I’m not interrupting anything am I?” asked Dr. Ransom MacIntyre, a casual smile on his face.
Three bullets struck the side of his strange spacecraft, and one flew right past him. The other, though, grazed his left shoulder, slicing through the fabric of his clothes and leaving a red stain in its wake.
“Well, that’s a good start.”

Artemis, magna-rifle in hand, barged into the room with Boyd close on his heels with his pistol, and the kids wielding various blunt objects.

"TARA CLEAVAGE YOU PSYCHO-BITCH, COME OUT NOW BEFORE I BLAST YOUR LIGHT BEE BACK TO THE STONE AGE!" Artemis yelled, charging the rifle for a high-yield magnetic blast....now noticing the other Dwarfers in the room...along with the new fellow standing calmly in the center. "Oh what fuck is going on here?"

Meanwhile

The Missus sighed, trapped in her commode dungeon....her husband and children not noticing that she was locked inside. She knew that Artemis came back for the kids, and didn't hear her slamming against the door.

The Missus was going to kill Artemis when she finally got out.

<tag>

So now Artie and an angry mob have burst into the room ready to blast Tara to death..if anyone asks the Skuttlings will likely chime in with their tale. They can playback the incident from memory if asked politely.

Quite the clusterfuck we've got going on, eh?