Chapter 18: Chapter 17 - TANSTAAFL

The car radio, lying in the dirt, crackles in human tongues. “Last night a shocking occurrence echoed through Prophrecia, as the unthinkable happened.”

Sounds of wind accompanied the buzzing of a horde’s many hostile voices chanting in protest.

“With the clouds of smoke still roiling above SianCo’s G-coal extraction facility, commissioner of Home Defence Hyazilf Fencer has spoken saying that, ahem, ‘it is likely that this tragic, horrific event was an intentional attack, we are investigating the environmentalist organisations we believe are responsible.’ However. Some voices are objecting that only weeks after the ceasefire on Limbus such an attack has occurred, here protestors gather, demanding the government take action against the Limbusters who they feel are responsible for this violence.” Another voice chipped in, without background noise to suggest that they were from the radio station. “This message is brought to you by—”

078 leaned back against the leather car seat, though they barely fit on it. They rubbed their two big toes into the dirt, rubbing them into the grass, pulling up the roots, feeling the earth beneath hoof-like feet. “Can you get off the seat for a minute?” Asked 323.

“What are you going to eat it, too?”

Nothing remained of the car but the seats, radio, and the wire-frame internals.

“No,no, it’s just, the err.” 814, rifle in hand interjected,

“That’s called the chassis.” They locked eyes with 078, both tired of complaining of the usefulness of a vehicle that was so delicious. Arguing with the hungry was like teaching your dog to stop breathing.What is a dog anyway?

Behind the group other ground-units were leaving buildings (now stripped of metal or biomass) and carrying with them various metal parts, like small girders, hinges, joints. 073 was unsettled, seeing 804 holding what looked like a pelvis, they imagined themselves in the rubble of buildings fishing out parts just like that from the dust.

Manskin pointed. “Smoke, look, that’s our signal, PACK UP EVERYONE!”

Looky was ripping chunks of metal off the car’s corpse and holding them in a futile way of using their four hands as a substitute to a bag. The black figure stood, hissing painfully, but assuming their ability to walk depreciated the pain. The troupe had eaten well, guns, door-hinges, telephones, whatever was in the refrigerators and the refrigerators themselves, a night of nothing but feasting, and then on the humans themselves. Their bellies and their arms were full of junk that they didn’t understand the purpose of. Bellies heavy and arms loaded, suffering from success.

A second spot of smoke started. They waited.

“You’re warm.” Said someone to 804. Manskin checked immediately, and was concerned, they really were quite warm.

Then, a machine crested the cliff-face of a small, vertical hill. It was 605.

“We have to go!” They shouted. “There are things in the woods, monsters!” The soldier did not wait to collect their bearings or relax, but kept rushing past the buildings of the village, looking over their shoulder.

Manskin gave vague admirations of the fire-wielder’s fighting spirit and the group were organised into a jog ‘so as not to overheat’ although Manskin simply ached too much to run at that moment. They passed into a road with trees on either side, making for good cover, and followed their intention to run opposite from where the fires had begun.

With 614, complaining of their injuries, lagging behind as a lookout, and 814 eager as always, running ahead, they made a hunting party, calling out to eachother in low-tones. The sun rose from the west and so they were in the light, stretching their solar-leaves pleasurably, but still uncomfortable and warm, but they kept on, noting eachother if a car passed, or if they thought they saw humans. What they saw was an unusual emptiness on the green, like the little village they had ravaged was the only previously inhabited area, except by sheep and empty houses, obviously the neighbouring fields were tended, machines, piles of crops, all used and taken care of, but the lands were owned in spite of a thick sense of abandonment. They passed some large building, of clear importance, stone bricks and a spire which yearned upwards to the sky in a defiance frozen forever, corpse-like, unused wooden beams rotten, cold stone propped up by mush. ‘Seems like something has been eating at the humans long before we got to work,’ someone said, enthusiastically.

The seven of them found themselves at a cliff-face, facing the city, but with a large divot or ditch or something delving into the ground, like the cliff itself stretching deeper than the ground, or like some giant had chopped the soil with a huge shovel. 121 called it a ravine, then they leaned over the pit, seeing it made of nothing but sheer-cliffs and sharp heights some forty metres deep. “How are we supposed to get down?”

078 tried leading by example to dig a vertical shaft next to the hole, by which to reduce the distance, they tossed the loose dirt into the ravine to create a mound which they could fall onto. But of course, at first, the effort appeared futile. The soil was dug up slowly and the mound grew slower. 121 joined in, but 814 instead handed their rifle off to another, dug four sets of claws into a clay embankment hanging over the cavern and swung over it, flat against the wall. Their body visibly trembled in the slow crawl, then shuddered with the strain of holding themselves up. But unlike a hexapedal insect they were only heavy enough to creep a few metres of spider-like descent before dropping backwards, tumbling, catching the wall with a hand, painfully skidding across a line of scratched stone - claws scraping through the dirt, then bouncing off andesite. Legs threw themselves underneath a body which pounded against the floor, collapsing into a pile of limbs outstretched.

121 yelled down, “Are you alright?” to which 814 groaned loudly. The rest of the group was encouraged to keep digging, and with hours of thirty-six hands all pulling away, they eventually formed something of shaft besides the pit which could feasibly be climbed. They dropped themselves into the ravine in the side of the hill.

To these machines, the pit was pleasing, a blotted out sun, finally hidden, finally kept cool. A small trickle of water from a crop of softer rock, which 804 spread themselves up against, sighing pleasurably.

605 announced loudly, “there was a group of, like, giant monsters in the woods, one of them was like a human and it could move objects with its mind, the other was this huge thing made of stone, it was faster than me, and caught me and beat me until I blasted it in the face.” 078 listened attentively, but Looky interrupted.

“Did they have four limbs, both?” 605 nodded.

“The little one, it was blue, right? It had a big head like this-” and they motioned a big head. 605 nodded.

323’s head-fins sagged, gravely, they pointed at 804 but still faced 605. “you, hottie, move.”

804 protested but agreed to walk away. “We need to wash you, thoroughly, we need- we need water and anything like a brush, come here.” They motioned for 121, 323 grabbed their right forehand, splaying it out with a thumb, they rubbed one talon over the inside of 121’s three fingers, opening them. The inner-surface of the fingers had horizontal, extruded serrations to maximise grip, it also gave them potential for scouring. “We need to wash, err, sorry I didn’t catch your name.”

“I’m Six-oh-five.”

“Those meat beasts that attacked you, they might have scented you, meaning, you could be covered in an adhesive molecular marker.” 078 came closer,

“What do you mean by that? Can Oh-five have left a trail to our base?”

“It’s very possible.” Looky turned to face the sky, as if expecting a meat beast to clamber over the ledge. “I have to tell you, the meat beasts…”

“Go on.”

“They’re a much greater threat than the humans…”

“Go on…”

--

'They're planet-eaters.' Leader had said, explaining their actions. The words sat, diffusing into the atmosphere, and even when the pheromones had blown away, and Arms had beckoned the 'Armlings' to keep marching, and Wings started asking the larvae one-by-one what they liked most to eat, Noisemaker was still enraptured by the phrase. "Planet Eaters." They muttered, quietly, so no one would hear.

"What did you say?" Asked a larvae, coiled 'cross the neck of its mother, the clingiest of its clutch, yet unnamed. "Oh, not anything, little Spider."

"What's a spider?" The child smelled its parent's invisible smile.

"Little climber, it's a creature with eight legs that can climb very well, just like you."

"I have lots more legs than that!"

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The kind ignorance of youth made its way into Noisemaker's mind, though Noisemaker themself was just over half a month old, but a voice still spoke somwhere inside - deep inside, maybe in a secondary or even tertiary ganglion.

To the boat, to the boat. That’s all we keep saying to the children. The scrabbling, swarming children. How are we supposed to keep undercover. They kept shuffling forwards, a mass of bodies writhing across suspiciously empty fields, smoke still in the air. We must already be discovered.

A heard of hapless prey for humans, or worse. They had to hold back their anxiety or else it would be emitted and then, of course, everyone would panic. The group passed down the slopes of the hills and the finger-like mountains and the miniature valleys that carved channels in the soil. Beneath all the rising earth was the city, gazing upwards with a thousand lamppost eyes, downwards a splodge, a mass of grey concrete sprawling and reaching upwards with smokestack claws, clawing at the green pastures from behind twin walls, orange rubble, then blue river. And the river, running rapid in its symbol of deliverance. Their destination. They had to walk, exposed, in the fields, the fields like those of the small village only these ones were only fields of grass kept trimmed by sheep. Or grass kept low by seemingly nothing, as most of the fields were empty, empty barns, empty houses like husks of nuts, the careful flesh inside long-removed. They passed by a village, like the one they’d left no survivors from, and it looked as though more of their own kin had been in the area. There was no one there, a dead village, the only evidence of life being that the houses had ever been built at all.

Arms lifted up a trunk-like paw to stroke at their burned face, hooting softly in pain as two little boulders around nuzzled them affectionately.

The group walked for another hour and reached more empty houses.

But the grass was still low, this was still tended land.

Noisemaker flicked out their twin tails in opposite directions of one-another, pushed the youths forwards. Arms acted thoughtlessly, continuing at a slow pace, Wings looked from side to side cautiously. Leader, childless, walked onwards with a despondent look, using their staff as a third leg. For once, they were silent, and their natural smell came through, they smelled like a combination of dust and musk. ‘Speak, Leader.’ They did not respond.

The young engineers were unsettled, the palest of the clutch asked “What is wrong with Leader?” To Noisemaker, as though Leader could not hear. “I do not know, that is why I ask.”

‘You must not let us be caught. Everything is at stake.’ Then they added. ‘Or else Fifth died for nothing.’

This enraged Noisemaker. They stomached the rage. They did not need a reminder of what was at stake. And they did not need the grief of their lost sibling as motivation.

Noisemaker paced their eyes to-and-fro watching the little Winglets that carried flesh-creep in their hands, ready to plant it somewhere new. One of Arms’ children lifted up a thick back leg, shitting on the floor, it was a human jawbone worn down by digestion like a glass bottle after a century of ocean with all the creases and curves softened. Leader barked forth furious pheromones, ‘Don’t leave a trail, you’ll lead them to us!’ and Noisemaker scowled

‘Don’t be cruel, it was a mistake.’

‘We cannot afford mistakes at this precise moment.’

‘Don’t take out your anger on the larvae.’

Leader responded with command pheromones, ‘We will hide in this building by the river and wait for a boat to come by.’ Noisemaker grunted, grumpily. It was a house by the river, its purpose not clear.

Noisemaker realised, as they crawled up against the door-hole fit for humans, that they had actually grown in size quite measurably in the past few weeks, they no longer fit in the door-frame when erecting their torso like a centaur and had to hold their head horizontally like a snake on the ground. They crawled inside the building like a vulture’s neck shoved into the hole of a carcass, a bus’ length of carapace and legs sliding up the stairs and into the various bedrooms and storage rooms before exiting and announcing that it was safe. “How do I get in?” Arms hooted.

‘There’s a garage door you can fit through,’

“Hm?”

‘A door for big vehicles,’ Noisemaker used their arms to pull at the door but it did not move. Locked. Arms saw this struggle and decided to try their own tongue’s strength against the door, the tongue left Arms’ gullet, spreading out many frond-like endings which clutched the bottom of the door. Arms heaved, a massive “CLUCK” sounded out and the door broke, flopping loosely down to the ground. Arms pulled it back up, entered into the garage, then let the door back down after the infants had entered into the building. Noisemaker saw that the door was held together by springs which had snapped and tore some nearby cans of paint. A good thing that spring hadn’t hit someone.

--

814 watched the river, and the smoke. They repeatedly made motions to watch from the forests and the sky line – Looky had made it clear that many of these ‘meat beasts’ could fly – but the sentry couldn’t help watching as the fires in the distance grew out of control then died away. A column of smoke also riled up from the city, they wondered if it was more of humans blowing eachother up, then they thought of 078 and all the ground-units that had landed in that city, charred black or blown to pieces. A boat was travelling up the river.

“Wanna swap?” Called out 804, leaning on the pile of components the troop had made.

The rifleman laughed, “Are you feeling good enough to do sentry duty?”

'04 started saying something but then stopped, clutching their gut.

“Hello?”

The soldier fell to their knees and from underneath them dropped a pile of green sludge, trickling forth with ropes of clinging mucus.

814 was shocked, mouth agape, and yelled out in a vague sense of concern, but the other soldier seemed to have an understanding.

They grabbed the thing, swaddled in slime, and moved to a component lying around, a transparent orb full of plastic pipes. The soldiers watched 804 stuff the thing they had birthed into the matrix, then connect that orb against a metal scarab, which slotted against two sets of carbon tubes. It was like how the other infantry knew how to make guns once they had all the components, some of them just had the instructions in their minds.

804 linked in another set of tubing, wrapping in a spiral across a metal rack which was placed in between four rubber pillars atop a kind of carbon chassis. 078 caught them with what was obviously a vertebrae, pistons, hydraulics, linked into the digestion matrix, then against the scarab, a pelvis, a metal and carbon box slotted inside the chest, connecting to the tubing. 078 themselves felt their excretory valve dilate, to drop out a lower jaw and the rubber lining that protected the moving mandibles. 804, feverish, snatched it up, slotting it atop the spine, connecting it into the hydraulics. The newborn now had a mane of rubber under their jaws.

As the cytosteel skeleton was carefully slotted together like a jigsaw of hinges and ball-joints, carbon muscles were tossed loosely on the bones, and the organs, connected together by tubing, were dropped into the torso. Then the proud artist hauled up the remaining slop they had released onto the floor and began stretching it over the feet and legs, wrapping the body in synthetic afterbirth which dried in the open air.

Manskin thought of what 082 had said, nanites inside the body, fragile and dying in the atmosphere, that must’ve been what was happening.

They marvelled, 804 had planted the top half of the skull into the skeleton, clicked fins into the side of the back of the head, into the back of the wedge-shaped cranium six long cords of more tubing were inserted, these were those wires that dangled like hair from the infantry. The parent looked up from their knees, pleadingly,

“What’s their name?”

“I…” Manskin hesitated. “They don’t have one,” 804looked dissapointed, “yet.”

Indeed, they all expected the newborn to suddenly gasp and awaken like Frankenstein. Whatever Frankenstein was. And they watched, intently, even 814 who tried to maintain their role as sentry as best as they could.

Manskin grabbed the unmoving front-right hand, the one they were missing, and inspected its back. “Nothing yet, I think.” 078 looked around at the soldiers who watched intently, expectantly, wanting answers, even 804 had lost their mysterious confidence. Nobody was volunteering to guide them or answer their questions, it had to be someone, it had to be 078.

“Nanomachines, do you know what a nanite is?”

814 nodded, the rest shook their heads.

“A tiny machine, like us, that’s so small it’s too small to see except with special… err… optics.” They made hand gestures as they spoke. “And, you see, we’re made of metal and carbon and other things, but inside us we have these tiny machines, in our matrices.” They pointed at their gut. “Our digestion matrix, oh yeah, it’s like, a large chamber full of nanites, and they break down what we eat and turn it into waste as well as energy for us as well as new useful objects, like guns and new soldier-parts, and it’s kept cold and it’s kept safe to keep the nanites from breaking apart, because they’re very fragile. I think what’s happening with our friend here, is that we’ve made the body, and now the nanites from 804 will… make Them… are basically, fixing it all up to their standards, breaking it in, you could say. So.”

078 was learning what they were saying as they were saying it. “We should wait, it could take even days, and then our new soldier will wake up.” A few of them nodded to themselves, sensibly. “So let’s get to work people! Make our base as safe as possible so they wake up in a place much better than we did!”

Cheers echoed up the hill, 814 cheered from above too. Everyone was happy, everything was going well. 078 felt their coolant-pump pounding, they imagined bombs dropping from the sky and ruining everything, they wondered how they could avoid them, they felt like a failure for not knowing what to do to avoid the bombs.