Bruce would like to think he was prepared for the scream, but nothing really makes you prepared to hear something like that. He winces, his hands twitching to slap over his ears, but he forces his hands to stay at his sides. Calm. It's not real. It's a synthesized recording.

But now both of the robots are screaming. The little boy voice babbles pleas and attempts to reason. Like the robots have figured out their intentions and intend to torture them into complacency.

"Break the chassis and I can disable them," he repeats, having to raise his voice over the noise, making an effort to take long, deep, meditative breaths. Block out the screams. He's done it many times before. Not too different from tending to large groups of sick and dying people, really. Block out the screams of families, work as hard as you can, move on without thinking if the current patient dies so you can save someone else.