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Sweat dripped from Ayma’s brow as she dragged the heavy form behind her. The plastmetal flooring provided sufficient resistance to make the task challenging; at the same time, it seemed to not provide nearly enough friction for her padded boots to make any kind of quick progress back to the base camp. Her feet lost purchase yet again and she fell painfully to one knee. She was certain the bruising would be impressive, yet Ayma knew she would not require any first-aid. In fact, she was loathe to use any of their perishables until a way could be found to supplement their meager stores. This was the very reason she found herself dragging the crumpled form of the engineer behind her.
Struggling once again to her feet, she resumed her slow progress to the service entrance to the empty structure she and Haiden used as their base camp. From the outside the mid-sized complex looked complete, yet the interior was essentially unfinished. Basic walls, floors and ceilings were roughed in with extensible alloy frames, configurable skeletons around which the flesh of the building was laid. Pre-installed transmission ducts allowed power, water, and air to be delivered to and from the inside rooms, but the individual units were incomplete, both various and unspecific.
The complex itself sat amidst a vast forest of pre-fabricated constructs that seemed to hunch like broken skeletons over the flat region. Work had obviously been stopped centuries ago—likely due to a reallocation of workers somewhere closer to the city core—and so there was an abundance of supply crates and machinery to explore, scavenge. Much of the last few days had been spent lurking among the frozen beams, looking for things that would make life amidst the quiet jungle of plasteel bearable—survivable.
Just inside the entrance Ayma passed a seemingly non-descript comm interface; the covering sat untouched in a corner of a makeshift hallway, so the panel was exposed to the air and light from the open door. Her eyes brushed across the row of inline memory inserts, and she relaxed at what she saw. Haiden had not removed one of the modules. They had created a series of makeshift codes using the panel, so that each would know if the other was already back, had found supplies, or discovered danger.
The hallway was itself incomplete, essentially a mix of beams and plates that headed directly into the belly of the unfinished complex. Dragging the unconscious man behind her, Ayma had the impression that she was plodding inextricably down the throat of some giant creature. Soon only emergency lighting allowed her to find her way; the poor footing made progress slow, but she heaved and dragged the larger android behind her. Sweat poured from her, stained her formsuit, as she finally emerged from a zig-zag side hall into the main chamber she and Haiden had selected as their home. The room was roughly oval in shape. Large jointed beams rose vertically against various points in the wall, arched inward, and met high atop the chamber in an elongated oval ridge. An immense lens-like crystal was housed in the rim, and it carried light from various points into this room, suffused it with a passive radiance that felt somehow reassuring. The construction of the chamber sometimes gave the lens the appearance of a giant spider, its elongated legs splayed protectively over the eclectic contents of the room. Coils of cable, plastic tubing, and large spools of wire served as chairs. Several empty crates had been dragged into the room as tables or storage, and folded sheets of photoelectric cloth had been piled into makeshift beds.
Max Haiden sat hunched over a small machine—a power tool of some kind—in which he was so absorbed he did not look up when Ayma entered.
“Find anything?” he asked?
“Just trouble.”
At that he did raise his head, and a look of sudden horror clenched his features.
“What in…”
“He’s still alive,” Ayma interrupted, leaning heavily against one of the arachnidan pillars.
“What happened?” he asked.
“I was surveying about 500 meters that way.” She nodded abstractly at one of the western walls. “He was working quietly under some stacked plastmetal plyboards. I came around the corner, and… boom. I gave him a shot with the charge pistol, but the plyboards took most of the impact. It didn’t kill him, and I didn’t know what else to do.”
Haiden checked the figure’s pulse. It was a male, somewhat shorter and stouter than himself. What were they going to do?
“Can you remove his geas?” Ayma asked hopefully.
Haiden couldn’t look into her eyes. “We’ve been through this; I just can’t do it. Something else has to trigger it.” He paused before adding, “It’s like I lose control.”
Ayma regarded him oddly, almost coldly. Drawing the charge pistol from its holster, she pointed it at the unconscious form. “Then he’s dead.” Haiden was on his feet in an instant, clutching her arm with the charge pistol in one hand. Neither of them moved.
Haiden spoke slowly and deliberately. “We have to decide what we want to become.” His hand slipped frictionlessly up along her arm, lubricated by the sweat beaded on her skin. Her body was warm to touch, and he could feel her pulse in the soft flesh on the inside of her elbow. Her bicep flexed nervously against his fingers.
“We need to survive!” She exploded, still whispering. “Are we going to set him free, or leave him here to report on our location?”
Eyes locked, the two engaged in a silent battle; no blows were exchanged, no wounds were rent into mortal flesh. Yet, in the short distance between them, the air was charged with the impact of this battle. His eyes were pleading, demanding, while hers were wide with fear or anxiety. Haiden looked into those orbs filled with hazard and portent, and found he could only arrive at one answer. After several intense moments, he relaxed his grip on Ayma.
“I’ll try.”
As if on cue, the newcomer crashed into Haiden and Ayma in a headlong rush. Both were sent to the ground, and the charge pistol skittered across the floor as breath exploded from Ayma’s lungs. The unknown android’s grip was as hard as iron, but Haiden managed to twist around, face his attacker. Rolling, he managed to disengage himself from Ayma. Helplessly retching for air, she watched as the two combatants rolled into a large crate. Haiden was pinned beneath his attacker; the heavier android had managed to grasp his throat with one calloused hand while the other hand searched frantically around for some kind of weapon.
Spots of light began to smatter Haiden’s vision; bursts of colored webs spun across his sight and were replaced with an encroaching darkness—darkness that brought with it a cold, final fear. The hefty android’s free hand caught hold of a section of plasteel piping. He lifted the bludgeon high above his head, aimed to split Haiden’s skull with one fierce blow.
In an instant, Haiden’s fear gave way to passion. As it had once before, his emotion seemed to travel outwards, coruscated through his heart and limbs as if it were charged with power. This time, however, Haiden retained enough consciousness to catch the widening of his assailant’s eyes, the slight slackening of his mouth into a surprised ‘oh!’ just before Ayma leveled the charge pistol at them both and fired.
The low-level blast flung the two combatants sideways. Haiden was freed as the android on top of him rebounded against the crate and fell sideways off of him. The blast had done nothing for the condition of Haiden’s head; the stars that had assaulted his vision returned with a renewed virulence, and he wondered if he was going to black out.
Slowly, painfully, the spangles behind his eyes vanished, allowed him to roll to his stomach and onto his knees using the crate for support. Ayma still stood with her charge pistol fixed on the newcomer who was now shaking his head groggily and pushing himself to his feet.
“Get up very slowly,” Ayma hissed. She didn’t know, Haiden realized. Whatever had happened, there were no visual indicators for a casual observer to follow. But he had done it…again.
“It’s ok, Ayma,” Haiden stated flatly. “He’s one of us.”
Copyright © 2004-2005 Jay and David Steele. All rights reserved.
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