Chapter Text
Five Pebbles jolted as he was pulled from sleep. His heart raced, lungs gasping for air as he blearily tried to center himself and remember where he was. His fading dream, or more aptly named nightmare, crept back into the recesses of his subconscious, leaving him reeling. Slowly, his body came to realize he did not need blood rushing through him, as he had no heart or even blood to pump. His “breathing” slowed, realizing that he had no lungs or even a mouth to draw breath.
Minutes passed and slowly his mind settled, leaving him shaken and confused. No matter how many times he dreamed, they never made sense. He only knew one thing for certain.
Iterators are not meant to dream.
That is what his creators told him, long ago when their voices still echoed his chambers, and Five Pebbles had been young and naive enough to trust them with such details. They told him it was a simple computer glitch, as the last of his neurons went to rest and their power fizzled out, they would conjure up all manner of simulations to his resting mind. Illusions conjured up by the last unrestrained sparks dancing across his synapses. Nothing further.
He took the answer as truth, having no reason to ever doubt his creators. What reason did they have to lie to him? And thus the matter was buried away, forgotten like so many other things as Five Pebbles gradually began his tests to solve The Great Problem. It had haunted his makers and they had passed this burden onto him. Finding them a solution was his only goal, and he focused on it with a fervent devotion. He was far from the first iterator, born when his kind had long since drowned the world around them with heaving exhales of steam. His kind was so common, they had built him right next to another. The idea would have been seen as foolish cycles ago in the start, but that time had long since passed.
His sister, Looks to The Moon, was an older model from the earliest days of the iterator construction, but she was not quite perfect for the rigors of their task. Her can boasted far less comforts for their creators, and eventually he was constructed to relieve her of her burden, the city on her top falling silent as the citizens moved to his newer design. She once told him that she wasn’t mad at him for it, as if he had somehow taken something from her.
He hardly saw it that way, his new tenants were an annoying distraction. They would constantly interrupt his work with pointless personal questions, asking his advice on topics far beneath him. He humored them, as was his station.
It brought him no joy. He almost envied Moon for her new solitude, even if she sounded sorrowful and lonely in her messages.
As time went by and the solution came no closer, his dreams became a welcome reprieve. Iterators had periodic maintenance cycles. Every living creature needed rest, and he was no exception. The great swaths of purposed bacteria would still, the neurons would roost, and even the inspectors would curl away into quiet calm crannys. His body would relax, drifting to the floor of his chamber as his eyes grew heavy. The lights fading into a dim softness. It was a welcome escape from the droning boredom and inaction.
He never asked his creators about them, assuming they were simply another factor of his biology. Every creature rested, so therefore every creature could dream. In his mind it made perfect sense, and the question deserved no further query. Besides, it was hardly the fact that he dreamed that bothered him, but rather the things he dreamt of.
A dark room, filled with a damp chill air and wind gusting through the door seal. The sand under his feet, standing against the soft waves rolling up the coast as the sun sank low. Curling up in the drumming rain under a thin scrap of clothing, and the terrible gnawing hunger in his stomach nearly sending tears rolling down his cheeks. The warmth as someone he couldn’t remember wrapped him into a sinful hug.
Five Pebbles didn’t know what was more bizarre about the concept. The peculiar settings of these visions, or the fact that they felt so damningly real and familiar, as if just the other cycle he’d lived them out. He knew it wasn't possible.
He had never left his cold lonesome chamber. He had never felt warm rays of the sun. He had never known the aches of cold or hunger. He certainly had never felt the burning passion of love. Feeling these sensations at his most vulnerable certainly didn’t help, along with the fact that they were as unpredictable as they were indecipherable. Just as soon as he awoke, the sensation fled to the recesses of his mind, his enormous computer banks and swarms of neurons somehow incapable of remembering something as simple as an empty stomach or a warm breeze.
All Five Pebbles had known for his whole life was this box of a room he lived in. The feed from Observer drones could show him pictures and videos. Pearls could carry images and stories. Once long ago other iterators would even gather together in radio calls to share media files and play games, especially after their makers abandoned them. Occasionally, a public chat would surface of other iterators speaking about the dreams that they had from time to time, but he never dared to enter. Far too often they quickly devolved into metaphysical jargon as the more pious of his kind joined. At the time, he didn’t realize how much he would miss it. The opportunity had long slipped away into the jaws of time.
The cycles went by. He continued his research and experiments, even long after his creators had left this mortal plane. Conversations with others grew steadily more distant and difficult. One by one, they would break down and grow silent. Hardly any remained, and communication outside of his local group was nearly impossible. He longed for an escape. To finally break free of his can, his cage, and feel the sun, the chilly air, and the wind.
In desperation, his attempts brought down his neighbor and tutor, her own actions striking him right when least opportune and inflicting him with the vile rot. He had spent ages fighting it in vain. Every attempt to purge his systems simply gave the rot more mass to work with. As it ate away in his experimental chambers, it destroyed the very place he could make any weapon to combat it. His projections pointed in only one direction, a slow decay from rot.
His escape came no closer. Each cycle passed, a slow lonely march with no end in sight. A maze without end.
In his hubris he had shut himself away. With no way to contact the outside world, and his systems slowly falling ill to the churning hungry mass, all he could do was wait. What he would give for a simple conversation with someone else. An excited message from Seven Red Suns or a teasing jab from No Significant Harassment. Even listening to Looks To The Moon ramble about the past would have been preferable to the endless silence.
Occasionally, an inquisitive animal would stop by to bother him. A rather rotund but clever creature, keen on showing him its shrewd creations. Two siblings, lost and desperate. A raging warrior, wearing more scars than just those on her face.
His mind dragged him to the present. Even now she stormed through the empty city on his can, dealing with the other invasive pests he had. She fought with a methodical rage, spitting fire and hurling wrath.
Occasionally she would deliver him pearls from the city, giving him a glimpse into the life of his citizens. At first, he cared little for their whimsical musings, tossing the pearls to the corner of his chambers. But as the cycles dragged on, and his attempts at stopping the rot only seemingly gave it more power, he found himself reading the words of his creators. It was a decent way to pass time, and as his systems failed one by one, it was often the only thing he could even do to pass the time.
Out of boredom and longing for a distraction, he summoned one of his few remaining overseers and instructed it to find her. He’d gotten tired of running models and simulations against the rot, only to get another estimation on how long it would take to overwhelm him. Watching his citizen blow apart pesky scavengers would be a welcome break from the gloominess.
The streets were silent.
Artificer was always on patrol, and the dusty roads of the metropolis atop Five Pebbles were her domain. Even after eliminating their Chief, who’s helm she proudly wore, the scavengers that infested this region still dared to enter. She spared them no mercy.
They certainly hadn’t given her pups any.
The empty lanes echoed with the soft patter of her footsteps, ears and eye strained for any signs of interlopers. Lengthy roadways and towering buildings stretching to the limits of her perception. The sun beat down on her from the apex of its arc, casting stretching shadows across abandoned apartments and shops. Occasionally, the bitterly cold wind would send shivers through her body as it swirled up dirt and debris. She idly wondered what this place was like in its hayday, full of people and life. Now it almost felt like she was stomping through a tomb, though she felt by this point, she'd contributed her fair share to the bodies buried in it.
The grenades in her ragged satchel were practically itching to be detonated, and she’d prefer to use them on some unwitting scav instead of chucking them off the rooftops and into the clouds out of boredom.
A smirk filled her face as she imagined a stray lizard or vulture far below the haze getting bombarded with grenades. Perhaps she’d end her patrol early and do just that. It’d been days since she’d seen anything.
Until now, that was.
In the center of the street, almost glaringly obvious, footprints littered the path. In the dust, undisturbed for hundreds of cycles, they might as well have glowed. They crossed the street, vanishing under a pole leading up to the homes above her. She recognized the tracks anywhere.
Scavs.
There was a crunch of glass above her, and in a flash she pressed herself into the wall close by, explosives primed in hand. The dust coating her fur stirred for only a moment, and as she slowly pressed into a cubby and held still, her silhouette vanished into the background colors. To the untrained eye, she was invisible, the dust masking her red fur into a muddle of beige and gray.
She waited.
And watched…
The sun reached the apex of its arch, shining down bright on the city. The faint wind blew dust across her nose, but she resisted the urge and held still.
The glass crunched again, this time right across from her. She slowly looked up, taking care not to move too quickly. A few stories above, poking out of the broken window of an opulent looking apartment, a blue furred scav poked its head out. Its beady large eyes slowly scanned the street below it, passing right over her hiding spot. It readily held a spear, but the nervousness in its face made her highly doubt its experience with the weapon. Behind it, Artificer could briefly see another scav with purple fur digging around in the room behind it.
There you are, she thought, a grin flashing across her scared snout.
Whatever these two scavs were doing here, they didn’t seem like the normal squads she had seen after taking control of the city. Their fur was more vibrant, and they lacked any explosives. Had the scavs gotten so desperate now that they were sending their young and inexperienced members to dare enter her territory?
She held still, watching them as the dust gathered on her mask. Occasionally the sentry would chitter back to their partner, who would angrily chirp back to then. Were they searching for something?
She almost laughed to herself. These were young scavengers, clearly wet behind the ears. They had broken into her city in hopes to plunder some of its riches, but were clearly too inexperienced to cover their tracks properly. For a moment, she wondered what drove them here. Impressing their kin? Some rite of passage? It didn’t matter to her now. They were prey. They'd pay for their mistake with their lives.
She knew the building they were in had no exits besides the street. They had cornered themselves, perhaps without even realizing. She simply had to lay in wait.
The two talked in frantic tones, occasionally pointing their spindly fingers at each other. How had she not noticed them sooner? She scolded herself for becoming so lazy and complacent. She'd gotten soft, too long from the hunt.
She would often crawl down from the city to visit the Iterator beneath, if only to get some brief, if not chilly, company. At first the machine had been rather rude to her, but their relationship had slowly developed into a tense mutual trust, though they still exchanged ruthless insults. Or perhaps, a more self aware side of her said, they were both tired of being angry and alone.
She stuffed that voice back down. Shush you, she thought.
Otherwise, she knew that the machine truly appreciated when she dove into his deeper systems, lugging along a satchel full of explosives doing her best to curtain some of the mobile rot.
It was a losing battle. The burned rot would often simply absorb into the newer bulges growing along the walls. She had tried using multiple explosives, placed along clever key points in the mass, but every bit she detonated simply grew back within cycles. The lack of food and gravity didn’t help either, though Pebbles appreciated the effort either way in his own special way of stubborn gratitude.
And the noises it makes, she thought shuddering, skin crawling for a moment.
There was a small pop from within the building, drawing her out of her thoughts. The sentry was looking away now, chattering loudly with the looter. They had blown something open, and her curiosity was piqued. Was this more than a simple pair of scavengers rummaging around looking for scraps? Clearly they had to know something of value was stored here, if they had known to bring explosives to reach it.
Then she saw, through the gloom and dust, the scavs cheering and clutching armfuls of glimmering colorful pearls.
Of course, she bristled, it's always about pearls.
They stuffed their treasure into bags, much similar to the one she was carrying her own ‘pearls’ with. There must have been a couple dozen of them, quite the haul for their kind. She had seen first hand how much even a single pearl meant to them.
No matter, if they thought their lives were worth a few shiny spheres, she was more than happy to make the trade.
With their loot in hand they began to quickly descend the building's side, scrambling down rubble and bricks to the road below. They scanned the street warily, wide eyes looking for anything that might snatch their victory away. Their eyes passed right over her hiding spot, and for a moment she tensed, but they failed to see past her veil of dust and darkness. The sun broke through the skyline, shining directly on them as if a spotlight.
Show time, she grinned.
The two scavs were too busy debating their route back, the grenade rolling towards them was already at their feet by the time they looked down. Their eyes went wide, watching as she leapt from the shadows, another bomb aimed directly at them.
“Hey, catch!” she chirped. It didn’t matter if they didn’t understand slugcat. Their feet slipped on the dust as they scrambled to crawl away. Fruitlessly, of course.
The blast shook the grime from the street, sending a shockwave of debris and dirt outward. Normally one bomb provided ample lethality, but why not indulge a little? Times like these needed to be relished, if they were getting more and more infrequent.
The two scavs were launched into the air, the blue furred sentry nearly getting launched up into the overhang by the detonation. Even through her muted ears, a biological response her kind had to protect their hearing, she heard the satisfying wet crunch as his body was violently slammed against the ledge above them. It crashed back down on the street just as quickly, and the Artificer didn’t need her other eye to see it was quite dead.
One down… she smirked, eye following the trail in the dust as she looked for her second guest. It wasn’t hard to follow the disturbed dirt and footprints. Somehow the purple scav had survived the blast, though its legs were bent to quite wrong angles. She slowly walked up behind the struggling creature as it crawled desperately down the street, bag spilling pearls behind it like a trail of blood for her to follow.
The scav glanced over its shoulder, pupils turning to pinpricks as it scrambled to make distance from her. She watched it grab and fling a loose brick, but its throw was sloppy and easily sidestepped. Pulling the spear from her back, the slugcat quickly closed the gap.
Her foot roughly pressed the scav into the dirt, spear held high and gleaming in the sun. She plunged it into the scav’s back, pressing hard until it was nearly embedded in the street underneath them. It squirmed for a moment as the final throes of its life left it, and then fell still.
The streets were silent once again.
Death was a normal encounter in her life, even more so as of recently. After she had taken her revenge against the scav chieftain, there had been nothing for her to do, no greater goal to follow, besides bring scavs to their swift end and patrol her city streets. Perhaps the ones beneath her would find better luck in their next life, it wasn’t her business anymore. They had been scavs, and thus she dealt with them as such.
Perhaps one day it would be her laying in the dirt, spirit oozing from her body and into the next. It was a vauge thought, as distant as the stars. Until then, she fought.
It was all she knew.
Stepping away from the body, Artificer instead turned her attention to the bags of gleaming pearls. She saw many of them in her travels, but never any quite this pristine and colorful. Through the settling dust cloud, she made out nearly every color of the rainbow scattered across the blast zone.
Her stomach churned at the sight. If it were up to her, she would fling the spheres off the edge of the tallest tower and hope they shattered to bits on the landing. She couldn't look at pearls without thinking of them…
But her host Five Pebbles perked up whenever she brought one, the gloom in his eyes lifting for a moment. The machine clearly enjoyed the distraction, especially more so with the rot making more progress each day. Reluctantly, she dumped her grenade stash onto the ground and stuffed the pearls into her bag.
As if on cue, one of his turquoise overseers popped out of the ground in front of her. It leered at Artificer for a moment, before pivoting around to observe the surroundings, pausing to note the limp scavengers. A holographic projection appeared above it, Five Pebbles staring at her with the same unimpressed gaze he always had.
"You certainly have been busy," he mused, "still wearing that grotesque helm of yours I see. Fits your visage I suppose." She huffed, ears twitching as she resisted the urge fling a spear at his face.
"You really know how to make a woman feel special, you know that?" She stabbed back. Her voice was horse and smoky from lack of use, still getting used to having someone to speak with after cycles of being alone.
"I regret the day I ever learned your primitive language," he muttered, the screens behind him flickering with irritation. This was civil, as far as most of their conversations went. Artificer had long learned that as much as the iterator would spit insults and act full of himself, he was just as easily rebuffed by a sharp tongue. If anything, ignoring his insults only made him keep up the insults. It didn’t bother her anymore, knowing this was just how he acted.
"You asked me once why other slugcats never talked to you in the past," she sighed. "It's your charm, for sure." He huffed indignantly, but she didn't wait for his response. "So, did you come up here to just waste my time with small talk, or is there another reason you've graced me with your wit and splendor?" Her ear flicked in irritation, the thought of flinging away the pearls in her bag returning.
"I'm elated to see your vocabulary expanding so much in the realm of insulting me, truly," he gritted out, but she smirked with victory under her mask. "I was hoping for a good distraction."
"Well you're in luck, I just lifted these of my two friends here. They looked pretty happy with their haul." She hefted the bag full of pearls, his overseer leaning in to look closely.
"These are in incredibly pristine condition! The data on them must be in quite good shape, provided it's something of actual value," he hummed happily.
"I'm guessing you'd like to take a look then?" She asked, slinging the bag over her back again.
"Bring them by and I suppose I'll consider it," he said, already acting uninterested again. "As soon as you're done cleaning up this… mess." His eyes glanced at the limp bodies. She shrugged, brushing past him as she started the journey down to his chambers.
"I've already done my part, they can come up for their dead if they want. More fun for me."
She didn't stick around to hear his irritated reply. She had quite the climb to make, and she wanted to reach his chambers by nightfall.
A smirk flashed across her face as she jumped across poles and over gaps as she imagined flinging the pearls into his face one by one. Or dumping them down his shirt. Or gluing them together in a sticky ball of blue fruit.
She mulled it over, knowing she had plenty of time to come up with something juicy. It'd keep her busy on the climb down.
Chapter 2
Summary:
When you finally get something actually decent in the mail.
Chapter Text
Five Pebbles nearly screamed as a bright pearl was hurled past his face, narrowly missing off one of his antennae. He quickly spun around, glaring as he looked for the source, only to duck again as another was hurled his way from the ceiling. The spheres pinged as they bounced around the room, Artificer chittering in menacing joy as she continued to launch them from the access point above with a rudimentary slingshot. The iterator could only desperately bob and weave between the shots as the bombardment continued.
“Maybe next time you’ll learn to have some manners!” Artificer laughed, only to frown when she realized her satchel was empty of munitions. She sighed, stuffing away her weapon and deftly dropping to the floor. Her host glared daggers, electricity crackling from the walls in barely restrained irritation.
“Were it not for your citizenship status, I would flay the skin from your bone,” he gritted out, well aware that his creators did not condone threatening someone’s life. Not that they were around to stop him. She simply sat back on her haunches, blew a raspberry, and started munching on some blue fruits.
His eye twitched. A brief alarm flashed for rising chamber temperature.
Turning his attention away from his maddening guest and the picnic she was having in his chamber, he summoned one of the new spheres to his hand. Now that it was in his grasp, he could see their mint condition. The sphere was unblemished, the data inside looking like it had been written yesterday, yet the internal metadata said the file was last edited thousands of cycles ago, around the time he still had a few citizens living in his city.
“Where did you find these?” he asked her, interrupting her loud munching. "The data has been burned into them to the point of permanence!"
“Some scavs up in the city were rooting around for them in some apartment,” she said, mouth still full of fruit and clearly only half interested in the details. “They even used explosives, though it was only a small amount.” She idly batted at a neuron fly buzzing over her, and Pebbles rolled his eyes.
“Don’t hurt those, I’ve barely got enough left as is with the rot. They’re safer here in my chambers and I don’t need you contradicting that.” She huffed, laying down and fidgeting with her helm, leaving Pebbles to his thoughts.
Scavs using explosives to loot? He mused. Alarming that they’re getting so advanced in their trickery. The beasts of this world are becoming worryingly advanced.
He quickly delved into his records, or what remained of them ever since the rot had compromised his central memory core. Luckily, his citizen database appeared to still be intact, though he hadn’t needed it for ages.
The data was slow to load, his processing power long since diminished by the infection. His systems sluggishly parsed the old data, clearing aside hundreds of cycles worth of junk and digital dust. Internally, he was relieved that he still had the option. As the rot had progressed through his can, he found that many systems now rejected his orders and pings. Oddly, it wasn’t that they were destroyed or shutdown, as the systems still existed in his command interface. Rather, they ignored everything he told them to do, as if he no longer had any control.
It seemed whatever the rot didn’t eat or dissolve away, it took over. A shudder ran through his body as he imagined himself as a brainless puppet of the malignant disease, barely aware but trapped in his body. He’d sooner sever his umbilical than surrender his mind, even if that meant eroding away the cycles in low power mode as a babbling husk.
With a ping, his database finally returned his query. The apartment he’d found Artificer next to had belonged to a member of the clergy that commanded the Shaded Citadel. He examined the file, picking apart the details. The denizen had held a prominent position and was elected as the lead provost for many of the memory crypts in the region, including the ones below his structure. The location, if Five Pebbles remembered correctly, that was responsible for the maintenance and documentation of nearly every memory recorded from the time of the first accessions. He’d likely spent ages as a monk to climb the ranks, and yet held back from ascension for all this time.
Strange that he had a dense hoard of pearls hidden in a safe.
The citizen, named Shining Vigilance, Pools in the Dark, apparently wasn’t afraid of keeping some secrets. Five Pebble’s records showed them making a number of expeditions to the Crypts well after they had sealed away the surface to citizens. Additionally, the citizen’s social network listed high level iterator manufacturing specialists as frequent contacts. Their messages were all heavily encrypted, and even in his fully operating state it would have taken him hundreds of cycles to crack them.
Pebbles wasn’t normally one to snoop around in the conversations of his denizens, but Vigilance drew his interest. The members of the Citadel had long stood in opposition to the iterators. Many more old-fashioned monks believed that the solution was already within their grasp, and the iterators were a futile effort to 'cheat' the long process of absolution that they followed.
Of course, they never risked becoming echos. They never lived with the fear of being trapped in the material world.
Like Pebbles was. Like all iterators were.
Suddenly Five Pebble’s search came to a screeching halt. The last record of Vigilance was a dead end. A minor data ping had placed the citizen far out in the Farm Arrays, near the wall at the edge of his facility. The next ping was a ghost, showing that no signal had been found. The citizen had simply vanished.
That was impossible. So long as they were within his walls, their citizen ID would send a continuous location broadcast. And somehow Vigilance had simply left and vanished from the system.
Quite the mystery indeed…
He turned his attention to the pearls, hoping that they might shed some light on the situation. They appeared to be a combination of text files, images, and complex cypher keys. In his prime, the iterator's power granted him the ability to read these pearls in an instant, but given the time and the rot, he was forced to parse through them at a painstakingly slow rate by visually reading the contents. He forced himself to focus, drawing in what limited power he had and reading the etchings within the first pearl’s vivid blue depths.
‘0100.130
Shining Vigilance, Pools in the Dark, Anonymous Participant (DG)
SV: How many more do they expect to require? How much longer must this heresy endure?
DG: The shipment demands are not laxing. More will be required until the solution is discovered.
SV: You must realize that there are others who still venture below to maintain the crypts. I cannot simply expect to avoid detection forever.
DG: It's your domain, you manage it. We expect a steady supply. Or have you forgotten your place in this arrangement? Would you like your peers to learn of this deal?
SV: ...It will be dealt with.’
Pebbles pulled away from the pearl, mind lost in the implications. The conversation, while short, showed a very damning display of blackmail. He quickly summoned another pearl, this one showing transportation manifests and dates. For whatever reason, Vigilance shipped dozens of memory pearls to various locations for thousands of cycles. The dates stretched back as far back as the first iterators to the end of their civilization. In fact, as he scrolled through the manifests and sorted them by the date they were filed, the final date was listed as mere weeks before the final iterator was constructed.
The more he examined the files, the less sense the letter made. What had Vigilance been doing? And why did the iterator constructors require memory pearls? The pearls he shipped stored thousands of memories, detailing hundreds of cycles worth of data and experiences. A quick scan revealed that almost all of the other pearls were loaded to max capacity with more recordings, though its metadata didn’t say what.
At the very least, it would keep him entertained. He pulled up another pearl, this one a splendid bright red, and peered inside.
At first glance, it appeared as another text log containing an endless assortment of lists, but as Pebbles looked deeper he saw that it contained the names of every iterator constructed, along with an ID tag that he recognized from the shipment manifest.
His mind churned as he tried to piece together the details. What did memory pearls and iterator construction have to do with each other?
At the bottom of the list was a simple text file, dated a few cycles before Vigilance had gone missing.
‘I have failed in every one of my duties.
I swore to protect memories, and I have sold them away to heretics.
I swore to guide the unenlightened on their pilgrimage to ascension, and I have created monsters that are trapped forever in this miserable existence.
I swore to never stray from the path of absolution, and I have done nothing but dwell on my sins.
My contacts have advised me that while there is a way to save them, the leadership has voted against taking action. Their concern being that removing them from their cages will upset the citizens. They are more concerned with maintaining the status quo. Everything they promised me was a lie. I have sacrificed everything I stood for, and here I stand, an idiotic old fool with nothing but his sins.
They tell me it's as easy as cutting their body’s wires. And yet, they would leave their children behind.
Soon they will enact the global ascension. The leadership could not be prouder.
I will not be joining them.
The monks in our order used to chastise parents for bringing new life into the cycle. I have brought thousands into this purgatory through my damnable actions. My place is here, with the ones I have doomed.
Perhaps someday I will find redemption.’
The pearl came to an abrupt halt. Pebbles sat there for a few moments, staring at the warm sphere in his hand. Vigilance, despite being a high ranking monk, had held off from ascension. Going off his records, the citizen had climbed down from the city and vanished on the other side of the wall ages ago. Given the degree of implants that the ancients had used to extend their lives, or outright ignore the burdens of being alive, they could very well still wander the earth to this day. Not that Pebbles could ever imagine finding them.
But that wasn’t the part that stood out to him.
As easy as cutting their body’s wires…
If Pebble’s had a mouth, it would be bone dry. He slowly looked over his shoulder, eying the cords that connected his umbilical to the back of his head. Could it be that easy? Would it hurt? The idea of severing himself terrified him, but wasn’t this exactly what he wanted? Free from his can, he could venture down to the void sea and end himself once and for all. The thought almost sounded alien, an impossibility now suddenly tangible.
Could he somehow tell the others? His communications array had long since gone offline, but certainly there was some way to deliver a message. At the very least, persistence would get him there somehow. Though, that hardly seemed like the most efficient method.
“Something up?” Artificer asked, breaking him out of his thoughts. “You’ve been staring at that pearl for nearly half a cycle now. You must be doing quite a bit of thinking, the room is getting warm.” She sat in the corner, idly fidgeting with her collection of rubbish and tools.
“I…,” he trailed off, not even sure how to respond. Not even sure if any of this was real. His systems suddenly felt so alien, and his chest welled with a sudden drive to claw his way out and feel the open air. Before he had felt trapped, but now, with the possibility of escape so close, his mind was overwhelmed with the urge to break free.
“Pebbles?” Said a distant voice. The room span, his umbilical arm going limp as he slowly lowered to the floor. His system sent him a memory overload warning, but he’d long learned to ignore them.
Freedom. Suddenly it was so close. A real possibility, and then he could finally find what he’d been craving for all this time. He could tell the others, and they could join him. He could save them. Save himself. Save his sister Moon.
He could see her for the first time. She’d probably smack him for how stupid he’d been. The thought made his heart warm and fuzzy, and oddly enough his head too. Now his entire body felt fuzzy.
“Pebbles!” He heard far away, as the floor came up to meet him.
She wasn’t fast enough to catch him, but she did stop his face from slamming into the floor. The pearl in his hand bounced into the corner, but Artificer was too busy to fret for her host to care. She ran her paws over his body, searching for some sign of what was wrong.
She’d never actually been this close to him, and now she realized how small his frame truly was. Artificer had always been a larger slugcat, especially after all the training and work she had done, and Pebbles almost felt smaller and lighter than her pups. She shifted him onto his side, trying to get a good look at his face.
His eyes were still open, but their color and light had vanished. She didn’t know much about machines, let alone something as complex as an iterator, and the helplessness as she stared at him was beginning to make her frantic.
She quickly looked around the room, looking for some indication of what was wrong. The walls were bare of any images, and the colorful neuron flies swirled around them in a lazy circle. She swiped one out of the air and pressed it against his face, but it simply popped out of her grip and rejoined its kin.
Was it something on the pearls? Had they somehow broken his systems?
Great, I let my guard down for one second and look what happens! She thought, standing back up and wringing her paws together. Should have just flung these into the garbage wastes, or the ocean. She leaned in towards him again, as if trying to notice something she might have missed her first time around.
Only to leap out of her skin as he lurched awake.
“GAH!” she screamed like a lantern mouse. “Stars above! Are you okay?”
He sat there for a moment, eyes twinkling colors as he stared at the wall. Slowly he turned to face her, a dazed look plastered all over his face.
“Apologies,” he said slowly, mind still spooling up, “I must have triggered my memory overflow and caused an emergency shutdown.” He slowly sat up, trying to find his bearings. His large eyes looked up at her, full of dim confusion. “My systems have been suffering quite harshly as of recently, and every now and again I get forgetful and try to push myself to levels I haven’t been capable of for quite some time.”
She’d be lying to say it didn’t make an old part of her heart throb. He looked like a sleepy pup, barely just woken up. She grabbed his arms and helped him stand up, his umbilical arm still limp and twitching. He stood shaky on his pointed metal feet, swaying awkwardly from side to side. She suddenly realized that they’d never actually stood on level ground, and he was slightly shorter than her.
She’d save that information for later when she felt his ego needed bruising. For now she was just worried.
“Was it something on the pearls?” She asked, and the iterator suddenly shot up fully awake, his neurons suddenly alive as they radiated color.
“The pearls! How could I forget!” he said excitedly, eyes gleaming. “Do you have any idea what was on those?” He nearly danced on his feet, pearls floating up from the floor and circling around him. Artificer stepped back in surprise. She’d never seen him so excited.
“Well, what did they say?” She asked curiously. He settled for a moment on wobbling legs, momentarily shooting a trademark glare at his still inoperative umbilical arm.
“They detailed a citzen who worked with the creators of the iterators. It seemed he was being blackmailed to send them memory pearls, though I’m not quite sure why. Perhaps there’s more context on the rest of them… Anyway, this citizen was a monk, who managed the Citadel below. He seemed quite upset with the creation of the iterators and how we were being left behind during the global ascension, but in his diary he mentioned a way for the iterators to become free from their cans! We just need to cut our wires!” His voice was filled with a giddy delight, but his last phrase concerned her.
“Cut your wires?” Worry filling her voice.”That sounds… painful. Not to mention risky. How can we trust the information on a random pearl?”
“Hmmm”, he stopped, looking like a blooming flower that had just been stepped on, “I’m sure there’s a procedure for this… somewhere.” His voice didn’t exactly exude confidence to her.
“Look, this is a huge deal I know, but let's not get too ahead of ourselves and cause some sort of permanent damage, okay?” She said, trying to hide her worry and sound convincing.
Her eye went wide as a wet slap echoed against the chamber wall. Along with it, the faint sound of ceramic cracking, and Pebble’s expression turned to pure terror. Looking over her shoulder, Artificer's skin crawled as she saw the inky black tendril of rot squirming through a fresh gap in the wall.
The tendril was short, its sticky noises filling the chamber as it probed and prodded around the gap it had created under a loose tile. Artificer scrunched her nose as the revolting smell of decay slowly filled the room, taking slow steps backward to avoid drawing the attention of the core likely looming just behind the wall.
Pebbles however, shrieked at the top of his lungs.
“KILL IT!” he screamed, desperately scrambling to the other side of the room as he tried to get as far away from the tendril as possible. His noise only agitated the monstrous mass as it desperately tried to squirm more of its size into the room. The wall cracked and buckled, old material groaning.
Artificer quickly snagged her bag and scrambled backward, narrowly avoiding the grasping mass as it stretched outwards to brush her tail. She flicked her tail backwards with a pop, a puff of dust and smoke launching her away from danger. But the noise only drove the rot on, chips of ceramic crumbling and splitting as more tendrils pushed their way in. It gurgled and groaned hungrily.
“IT'S GOING TO GET IN!” Pebbles screamed fearfully. Thinking quickly, she reached into her satchel and started hurling her arsenal at the creature, just as the main cores began to force their way inside.
The explosions filled the room, shrapnel and debris pelting her skin as the rot exploded chunk by chunk in an inky cloud of gore. Even as the blasts sheared away pieces of it, the rot still mindlessly crawled towards them, until the final bomb hit it right in the center. With the core destroyed, the tendrils weakly flopped around the floor like beached leeches, still reaching out for their next meal. The oozing dark liquid seeping from their stumps sizzled as it burned through the floor. After a few moments, the color faded from the lost limbs and they fell still.
Silence filled the chamber. Pebbles stared down at the mess on his floor with wide terrified eyes. His neurons huddled behind him, like noodle flies hiding behind their mother.
“I had no idea it had progressed this far,” he whispered, voice still shrill with terror. “I knew it was getting bad, but this…” He slowly sank to the floor like a wilting flower, head in his hands.
She only waited a moment before slowly plodding over to the quivering robot. He barely reacted to her presence, but as she sat next to him and put her hand on his shoulder, his shaking slowly settled.
The iterator had been rude to her in the past, but at this moment, she saw how vulnerable he truly was. A little compassion wouldn’t hurt.
“I refuse to become one of those… things,” he mumbled, burying his face in his knees. She looked down the fresh hole the rot created, noting the blue masses bulging from the walls of the tunnel. How far had it crawled their way, spurred on by their conversation?
And how many more would follow, now that she’d rung the dinner bell with her explosives? She looked down inside her bag, a single red grenade leering back at her. Unless she could scavenge some more along the way, this was their only chance if the rot caught their scent.
“Well, let's get this over with,” she sighed, hauling him up to his feet. The robot squirmed, but didn’t resist. “We clearly can’t sit around here and wait to find an answer. If the pearl said to cut the wires, then let's get it done and get you out of here.” Pebbles looked uncertain, but took a deep breath and steeled himself.
“I suppose there’s no time like the present,” he muttered, though his voice still oozed fear. “Though I would certainly prefer it if we actually knew if there was an actual procedure. The technology within me is the pinnacle of what my creators could fabricate. It can’t be as simple as slicing my wiring harness.” Artificer simply reached into her bag and pulled out her crude knife, fashioned from bone and a rather sharp bit of metal. She tested the weight as Pebbles watched with wide eyes.
“You can’t possibly be suggesting using that crude cudgel in machine surgery!” He squeaked, antennae flaring back in fear. She rolled her eye, annoyed at his indecision. At this rate, the entire can would come crashing down before the iterator committed to escape.
“Look, it's sharp enough to cut through the plates of an angry centipede, it’ll do the job just fine. We can’t sit here all day, it's too risky. Or have you forgotten about the giant gaping hole in your room?” As if to punctuate her words, a stray neuron fly buzzed up the new entrance, bumping lazily against the walls as it meandered slowly towards the swarm above his head.
“Huh,” he said flatly, watching it join the colorful mass. “I’d thought the rot had already gotten all of those. I haven’t had contact with systems deeper in my can for a while now.”
“You sure you don’t need more of those?” Artificer asked curiously, raising a brow. He waved her off, shrugging apathetically.
“I’ve long since transferred all my core systems and data to the neurons I have here. They can store quite a bit of information, and aside from my central processes the vast majority of what I had for all this time was just test data and useless archival information. Not that I could even really gather more of them, I’ve been locked out of many internal communications by the rot.” He stared gloomily up at the small cloud above him. “All of what makes me is right there.”
“Good, because I’m not going down there for any more of them,” she chirped. Internally she wondered how long she’d been up in the city for things to degrade this poorly down inside the can. Had she gotten too lost in her routines? She shook the thought aside, plodding over to stand behind him. The robot fidgeted with nervousness.
Artificer stared intently at the robotic connections and wires. Each was a hefty thick cable, not too unlike the whiskers of a centipede. Looking closely at the arm that connected to his back, she noticed that it was joined with a rather simple looking bolt, which had a handy ring at the end that she could use for its removal.
“Interesting that they made the connection removable instead of permanently fusing it to you,” she mumbled, inspecting the wires themselves for any similar disconnection features. No such luck. The cords were embedded into the back of his head, and from what she could see there was no easy way to remove them.
“Well,” Pebbles said, his voice shaking, “It's not impossible that someone planned for maintenance or replacement.” She merely grunted in response, paw grasping the cords in a bunch.
“Ready?” she asked, and the robot did its best impression of a deep sigh. The neurons above even seemed to flutter nervously.
“Do it."
She slashed the knife cleanly across, putting as much strength into it. His body jerked and spasmed, but she held true. Sparks flashed out against her face as she cut, but it was hardly the worst thing to blow up in her visage. The room went red, warning symbols scattering across the walls. His neurons seemed to quiver, but the robot was silent. With a quick tug she pulled the remaining ends loose, and just like that, the machine was supposedly free. She peered around him, trying to catch a glimpse of his face.
“Pebbles?” she asked cautiously, worry creeping the edge of her voice. The light was still in his eyes, though he seemed locked in a staring contest with the wall. His fingers seemed to grasp and twitch, a few sparks fizzling out from his amputated wires.
“Can you hear me?” she asked softly, waving a paw in front of his face. Great, she just made her only company a brain dead lobotomite. The neurons slowly floated down to the floor, hovering just barely above the ground. She barely noticed it at first, but slowly his head turned to look at her, eyes still locked wide. He almost looked in shock, like a scavenger about to get grabbed by a vulture. He blinked slowly, voice coming out in a whisper.
“Wow…” Pebbles said, almost silently.
“Are you okay?” She asked slowly, trying not to fuss and clearly failing. “We didn’t turn your brain into mush did we?” He simply stared back at her, as if trying to even process who she was.
“No… I don’t… think so,” he muttered slowly, blinking a few times with each word. He shook his head, as if trying to dispel some fog around himself. “It's just… different.”
Slowly the robot began to look around, eyes taking in the signs on the walls and the gloom filled room around him. He stared down at his hands, testing the movement of each digit before feeling the back of his head. His fingers poked the wire ends, and his expression looked lost.
“It wasn’t painful like I thought,” he said, still sounding dazed. “It was like… amputating a limb. Like one moment I could feel my whole can and then I couldn’t. It's gone, just like that.” She gently patted him on the back.
“...I know what it's like,” she said softly.
“Yeah…,” he mumbled, eyes clearing as he looked around. The awareness slowly returned to his eyes as the minutes passed by. Artificer could only watch, warily glancing at the hole in the wall. The time seemed to pass slowly, and each minute dragged on.
“Okay,” Pebbles said, “I believe I’ve recovered enough. We shouldn’t linger here. I’m not sure how long the can will function without me to control it.” Artificer gathered her things and stuffed them in her bag, hesitating for a moment as she looked at the scattered pearls. After a moment, she decided to take them too.
It’ll give him something to do while we sit in shelters and wait out the rain. Oh the joys of keeping children entertained.
“As long as you think you can walk, I don’t want to have to carry you,” she said jokingly, stepping behind him and slowly undoing the retaining bolt on his arm.
“Hah! I think I can handle myself, believe it or not I didn’t float around my chamber my entire life,” he shot back, but she just rolled her eye and popped the bolt free. The arm fell to the ground with a booming clang. Pebbles took one step, tripped on his own foot, and joined it on the floor face first.
Chapter 3
Summary:
Its hard to accept when you need help, but even harder to offer it when the person keeps insulting you.
Chapter Text
“You can stop holding my arm so tight,” Pebbles said, carefully holding his hands out to avoid falling yet again. Despite this, Artificer still held onto him, rolling her eye at his display of pride.
“Are you always this polite to people who try to help you?” she snipped, and he felt his neurons burn with the thought. When has he ever made it easy for anyone trying to help him? He’d just dug his hole deeper and deeper.
Seven Red Suns, No Significant Harassment, and Looks To the Moon had all been there for him through every cycle. They had suffered the same burden as him, shackled to the world and left behind by their creators. None of them had gone to the lengths he had, or done the things that he’d done.
What excuse did he have?
He straightened himself up, a surge of defiance invigorating his body. His slugcat companion let his arm free, perhaps sensing his desire to prove himself or just looking forward to seeing him dent the floor again. Carefully, legs wobbling like a newborn rain deer’s, he walked from one end of the room to the other, taking care not to step in any of the mess left behind by the dead rot.
Taking a few more laps, he slowly began to fall into a cadence. Walk to the north wall, turn around, walk around the splatter of ichor, walk to the south wall. With each lap, a boldness slowly crept into his stride.
“I’m honestly a bit surprised,” Artificer said from her post by the breached wall, “I thought you’d have a harder time with this since all you do is float around.” He stopped, carefully turning on his pointed feet to face her.
“Me too! It's quite exciting when you get the hang of it!” He said, rather chuffed. He’d never spent much time walking in his chambers. The walls around him had brimmed with information, and from the ground level it was difficult to view. Why even bother using his legs?
His mind stalled for a moment, suddenly lost in thought. Why had his creators even given him legs if they were intended to float around all day? On that note, why had they even given them bodies? Perhaps his designers found it easier to communicate with familiar shapes rather than talking computers.
“Yea walking, yippie,” Artificer said dryly. “Better get used to it because you’ll be doing a lot. Climbing too. Speaking of, what exactly is the plan going forward?” He hummed, neurons glowing colorfully above him.
“Well, this development changes many things for us iterators. Previously we had assumed that we’d all be stuck in this state until our facilities fell apart. It's a very slow and boring way to go. But now I just need to tell the others what to do, and they can free themselves! Though, after that… I have no idea.” He crossed his arms, suddenly lost in thought. How exactly was he going to tell the others? He wasn’t even sure he could crawl all the way to Moon to help her himself.
“Arti, what about those other slugcats that came along?” He asked. “I remember a few that stopped by my chambers.” She stared at him for a moment with a cold calculating look, brow raised. The room suddenly turned cold.
Her eye burned into him, and a sudden feeling of dread washed over him, as if he’d somehow said something very, very wrong.
“Really, 'Arti'? Where did that come from?” She said, an edge thinly veiled under her words.
Pebbles was never great at socializing. Being locked inside a room with nobody to talk to besides his irritating citizens and teasing iterators had left him rather unfamiliar with the social faux pas. It hadn’t helped to isolate himself for thousands of cycles, only talking to whatever animal barged into his chambers, and those conversations had been very one sided. Really Artificer had been the only person he’d spoken to at length in ages, and their interaction up to this point had been a duel of scathing insults and crass banter, though he felt it had never held any real hostility.
But now, held under the knife’s edge of her impending retribution, the hidden meaning in her question was not lost on him. He had touched a sore spot of some kind, and his brain suddenly conjured up the strange sensation of a dry throat. It only served to confuse him more, seeing as he didn’t even have a mouth. After a momentary calculating pause, he chose his next words very carefully.
“It's short and to the point! You don’t just call me Five Pebbles all day do you?” he said innocently, eyes watching her nervously for her reaction. She watched him for a long moment, as if waiting for some sort of followup insult or jibe, and then waved her hand dismissively.
“Yeah yeah, fine. Stars above we both know how your creators loved wasting their breath on names.” She sat up from the wall she’d been leaning against, ears twitching as she thought hard. “To be honest, I don’t know why you would ask me about other slugcats. I’ve been up in your city since I got here, and the rains have only gotten worse, I’m willing to bet most of them stay outside the walls.”
“Really? I thought your kind was communal.” Artificer stared pointedly at the floor.
“I had some traveling companions a long time ago. Not anymore,” she said crisply, and Pebbles sensed another topic to avoid prodding.
“Great…” he muttered, pacing the room as he thought. Without any messengers, there was no way to tell his fellow iterators. It had been ages since he’d used his communications array, and he had no idea if it was functional. Unconsciously, he tried to send a ping to the system, only to slowly remember his complete lack of connection to his can. He stared up at the walls around him, suddenly very aware of the crushing sensation of how small he was now, and how little he had at his disposal.
Was this how Moon had felt all this time? Locked in her chamber, helplessly watching the cycles go by? How had she not gone insane from boredom? He’d forced her to sit there, cycle after cycle, watching the water wash over her.
“We should at least get to Moon,” he said softly, guilt heavy in his voice. “She’s smart, she’d know what to do.” Would she be happy to see him? Part of him could only imagine how angry she would be, and how little he wanted to explain his behavior.
That was not an option. He’d free her, even if it was all he could do.
“Well, it's been a while since I’ve been on the surface, but I bet I could get you there.“ Artificer chuckled, smirking at him with a toothy grin. “Just don’t whine the whole way there. It’ll attract predators.” He glared at her joke, huffing indignantly but ignoring the insult. Secretly, he was glad she had returned to the wisecracks. That he could deal with.
“Enough of your abuse, can we please leave before another one of those monsters comes?” She laughed, donning her helm and moving to crawl down the very same hole the rot had just paved into his chamber. “Wait!” he sputtered, and Artificer turned to look at him with a single confused eye. “Why are we going through the facility? Wouldn’t it be safer to use the access shaft to the city?” She blinked, and then chuckled deeply, an amused twinkle in her eye.
“You really want to climb down the side of this place, dodging vultures and lizards where one slip will send you plummeting to your death?” Her tone tinged with a mocking edge, but he had little room to argue. “As infested as the facility is, I’d rather crawl through the muck than deal with that. I can’t help you if you slip and you go falling down to earth like a dumb lizard.” She turned away, crawling back into the hole and leaving him powerless to argue. He watched her slowly disappear into the darkness.
The room was silent, the distant echo of his facility now dead or dying. He didn’t know how long it would last without him to guide it, but between the rot and his absence Pebbles didn’t need to guess. He could only stare at the walls, the eternity he’d spent in this box suddenly over. His umbilical arm lay across the floor in its track, already coated in a growing layer of dust.
His chest felt light, suddenly taking in the full scope of the journey ahead of him. A nervous energy seeped into his skin, stone forming in his gut. For all the desire to leave that filled every part of his body, now that the time had come all he felt was barely contained nervousness.
He’d spent his entire life in this room. He’d expected to waste away in this box, etching the cycles into the walls. Leaving felt about as likely as his creators returning.
He idly wondered what fate waited for him if he’d have stayed here. Slowly consumed by the rot, until his systems shut down one by one until he lost all capacity to even think? Or would his can collapse first, dooming him to a slow death eked out in the open air, waiting for the rains like Moon?
At least he could imagine what waited for him here. Outside was an unknown he couldn’t predict. They could get as far as Moon’s facility, but then what? Would the two skip merrily all the way down to the void sea? He struggled to imagine what else they could do in their position, aside from wandering the wastes. If the communication relays were down, it would be the only way to deliver any kind of message.
For a moment, he wished he’d been wise like Suns and created his own messenger, or the very least a dependable bodyguard.
Then again, tampering with genetics is what got me into this mess... he glumly thought.
“Are you coming or not? Stars above, do you want me to reattach your wires?” Artificer's voice behind him suddenly echoed through the chamber, and he stifled a yelp. Her eye glittered in the darkness of the tunnel, and even through the impatient frown she sported, he could see a glimmer of concern in her eye.
It occurred to him that he did have a slugcat to guide him. Artificer had driven bloody swathes of carnage across the land, and cleared out the entire city above from scavengers and predators alike. Even the lizards and vultures didn’t dare tread on her territory.
It only made him realize how vulnerable he is in contrast. His metal chassis might resist the initial bite of a predator, but he knows he’s minuscule in comparison to the size of some of the creatures outside. He’s never thrown a spear in his life, never mind the acrobatic feats of combat Artificer had done. His neurons were another matter, and they’d likely need to babysit them for the journey. If a creature managed to snag one, he wouldn’t be able to stop it from eating his memories as a snack. Perhaps along the way he’d devise some method of containment. It’d be easier to handle them if they were stuffed into a sack or bag of some kind, his control over their movement was limited at best.
Despite all this, a strange bravado swelled up in him, drowning out all the fearful thoughts in his head. No where else to go but forward.
“Yes, just forgot something,” he half lied, quickly looking over the chamber floors. He never was one for collections, but there was one thing here he wanted to keep. A small dusty pearl, still slightly warm from the last time he’d used it. Its purple hue was a welcome familiarity, and he quickly stuffed it into his robe’s pockets, thankful that whatever tailor had crafted the garment for him was kind enough to make them actually functional.
“Enough messing around, we need to get moving,” Artificer hissed impatiently, her worry turning quickly into irritation. She quickly crawled back into the tunnel, vanishing into the darkness again.
Taking a deep breath to brace himself, he followed her into the shadows.
Artificer was never one for travel companions. In the best of times, she was a scout and warrior, forging a safe path for the colony. More recently, she’d enjoyed the loner lifestyle, even if it was melancholic at times. At the very least it was quiet for most of the time.
“This is utterly disgusting,” Pebbles complained in the tunnel behind her. “I had no idea my internal facility had degraded to such a miserable state.” She craned her head back, trying to catch a glimpse of the iterator. His orange tunic had quickly become stained with all manner of liquids and grime, already turning the garment a dark mixture of gray and brown splotches.
Nevermind the gunk that coated his pink metal skin. She didn’t have the heart to tell him that this was probably one of the cleaner places they’d be crawling through.
At least he didn’t have a nose. The smell of decay was wretched.
“Keep it up,” she chidded, clawing her way out of the tunnel and into a large vacant chamber and clinging to a pole to avoid drifting away in the weightlessness. “If my memory is correct, we keep heading down and east at the bottom. There’s a bridge we can take to your friend.” Pebbles only grunted unceremoniously in response, fruitlessly trying to wipe the grunge from his robe.
She craned her neck to examine the room they were in, frowning when she found no memory of the place. The walls bulged with strange metal spheres, faintly tinged with a sickening blue coating. Far above, red emergency lights flickered faintly, occasionally illuminating the small patch of rot growing out of the wall, its feeble tendrils wiggling and groping at anything that drifted by.
A fluttering neuron fly bumbled too close, only for a tentacle to snatch it up and yank it into the churning mass. The gurgling made her skin crawl.
"We're barely a few rooms away from my chambers," Pebbles said, voice filled with dread. "To think, that would be growing in my walls in only a few cycles."
"All the better that we're leaving now," she retorted, carefully pushing off the wall to float down the room, grasping the pole on the bottom and carefully avoiding the bulging wall. “Cmon, push across!” she chirped, arms spread. The lack of gravity hadn’t been kind to him in their travels.
Pebbles didn’t look too convinced. He clung to the pole like a terrified pup, worryingly eyeing the squirming walls. His neurons hovered tightly around him, reminding Artificer of noodleflies and their brood. Suddenly, a thought entered her mind, devious but effective if it worked.
“Or you can ride on my back like a little pup!” she teased, smirking when he instantly fired a glare at her. His body tensed…
Bingo.
He lept towards her, confidence quickly evaporating as he began to tumble over in circles, flailing in weightlessness. She looked up at him, struggling not to break down laughing at his bumbling. At least he wasn’t screaming again.
Suddenly there was a churning groan in the walls. The whole facility seemed to lurch, like a great beast that had been speared in the heart. A tremendous convulsion shook the entire can, and as the lights failed and gravity returned, Pebbles came plunging down right on top of her.
She’d once hunted a large cyan lizard in the city above, spearing it right in the mouth as it lept towards her. Its body had come crashing down on top of her, and she’d been stuck pinned for hours until she was able to free herself. Pebbles, while much lighter, somehow made an even worse situation.
“Get your tail off my face!” Pebbles protested, roughly shoving her rear.
“Quit fighting me!,” she spat. “Touch me again and I’ll break your fingers!”
The two struggled to separate, only getting further entangled in the sticky fabric of his robes. Pebbles seemed determined to fight her every movement, and his cloak had somehow gotten tangled in her helm’s antlers.
A faint wet sticking noise from afar instantly stilled them. They looked across the chamber, down the long expanse leading to some other section of the decaying facility, ears and antennae on alert. The silence dragged on, and after a few moments Artificer slowly crept towards the exit nearby, ignoring the startled noise her charge made as he was unceremoniously dragged along the floor.
Only when she had pulled them into cover did she relax, carefully pulling the stained robes free of her body. Pebbles resigned to let her work, his head poking around their cover to see for any movement.
“Hold still, or I’ll tie you to my back instead,” she hissed, pulling a cord of wire loose from the wall and using it to fasten down his billowing sleeves and pants. The makeshift bindings were crude, but at the very least they’d stop his loose clothing from catching.
“Barely free for more than a cycle and I’m already dressed like a vagrant. My creators would be so proud,” he said irritably, mourning the loss of his pristine clothes. She rolled her eye at his sulking, gently yanking him with her into the next tunnel.
“Somehow I think this is low on the list of sins you’ve committed recently,” she responded dryly, squeezing around a sharp bend in the tunnel network, only to slide downwards as gravity yanked her to the bottom. Thinking quickly, she pushed forward into the next room right before Pebbles crashed to the bottom himself, the dazed robot sputtering profanities.
“They could have designed these corridors a bit more thoughtfully,” She said, pulling him out of the duct. Pebbles steadied himself on his shaky feet, looking more dazed than irritated. Perhaps she could keep him quiet with enough knocks to the head, she ruminated. The two crept along the booming expanse carefully, Artificer keeping a keen eye trained on any crevice rot could be hiding.
“They were never meant to be navigated by creatures,” Pebbles said, dispassionately trying to brush the growing layer of grunge off his robes. “Most of these networks are old aqua channels, carrying water to the micro bacteria that made up a large portion of my systems. We’re lucky the flow has stopped, though that brings about another worrying issue.” He ceased fidgeting with his clothing, shoulders slumping in resignation.
“There has been a disruption in my power cells it seems,” he continued, pointing across the large echoing chamber they had entered. “This area is the recursive transformation array, and these cells along the walls would normally store vast quantities of energy for use.” She nodded in agreement.
“I’m more familiar with the east side of the facility. I’ve been in these parts before, and it's usually a lot brighter and… zappy,” she said.
“No longer a worry of mine, given my new freedom. However, it raises an interesting conundrum. All of these cells are in a circuit with the main core. Now it is broken. Something or someone has disconnected the refraction cell within it.” Artificer raised a brow, a tad confused.
“You don’t exactly sound too upset by the theft.” He shrugged, taking the lead as they walked across the vast spaces.
“As I said, it's no longer a worry of mine. If some scavenger wants to fiddle with it and vaporize their entire clan, all the better.”
“Cheers to that,” she chirped, giving him an amicable slap on the back and nearly bowling him over. To his credit, the robot didn’t fall over.
“My main concern being,” he sputtered as he tried to correct his wobbling balance. “Without power, the gravity disruptors are non-functional. Traversing this facility may prove far more difficult given its… vertical nature.” She shrugged, waving him away.
“Nothing a little explosive assisted aerobatics can’t fix. Don’t forget I used to come down here quite often.” He hummed, but still sounded concerned, as if he wasn’t sure of her statement.
“And how does that help me?” he asked. She merely smiled shrewdly in return.
The halls stretched on endlessly, machinery and old components lining the walls. Occasionally, the gray steel walls groaned in aging protest, croaking as some outside force pressed against them. The last time Artificer traveled these lonely corridors, they had teemed with colorful bio-machinery, neurons flowing like schools of fish as they jumped across the living walls.
Now, the neurostrata hung limp and decaying like neglected flowers. Some sections of the area had completely corroded away, exposing vast lengths of wires and components. At one point, the entire floor had rotted away, forcing them to carefully balance on poles to cross the abyss below. Against both their wishes, Artificer carefully held Pebbles the entire time, his flat pointed feet offering little in the form of grip. His protests were quite vocal.
She ignored him the entire time of course. It was better to risk bruising his pride than seeing him tumble to his death.
As they reached the end of the gap, Pebbles squirmed free of her grip. Out of unexpressed gratitude or simply knowing better, he avoided spitting some insult at her help. The iterator slumped to the ground, angrily glaring at the floor.
The two sit on the cold steel for a moment, and Artificer toyed with her supplies as she let him cool down. A few silent minutes passed, only interrupted with an occasional creak of the superstructure around them.
“I hate this already,” Pebbles said after a long pause. She merely chuckled in response, ignoring his scathing glare. The silence dragged on, and Artificer simply laid back and twirled her knife between her claws as she waited.
In her mind she couldn't even begin to imagine what he’d been going through. Though it’d been difficult for her to keep track of time in the superstructure, she instinctively knew that they’d barely traveled for a full cycle. And yet in that time Pebbles had gone from trapped in a prison of his own making, to suddenly given a freedom he’d never expected.
“Something on your mind?” she asked cautiously. He doesn’t respond, continuing to stare at the floor, his neurons bumble around above him. They dance around in the empty air, swirling in indecipherable patterns in a kaleidoscope of color. Far in the past, this room would have hosted hundreds of them, and now their number barely counts to a dozen.
“I hate to break it for you,” she continued, trying her best to sound supportive, “but this world has no shortage of climbing and walking. I’d prefer this over fighting vultures, to be frank.”
“That’s not what I’m thinking about,” he bitterly shot back, “I just feel so helpless. I’m not a kid that needs coddling.” She huffed, surprised by his reaction. Artificer knew he was reluctant to accept help, but turning down her aid to climb past an endless abyss?
“Let’s just keep moving,” he said irritably. Standing up, Pebbles angrily stomped over to the pipe embedded into the wall. “I’ve wasted enough time as is.” She frowned, watching him angrily thrash around as he squirmed into the ducting.
“The one time I try to be nice,” she muttered, rubbing her eye and crawling in behind him.
Pebbles pulled himself free of the pipe, once again staring mournfully down at his robes. In another life, they had been sewn by an expert tailor using the finest silks, anointed with ritualistic incense and inscribed with the prayers of monks.
Now they dribbled with bits of decayed bacterial matter, stained a deep putrid black. He didn’t need a mirror to know his face looked almost the same color.
It was degrading.
His guide had ignored his complaints about the disgusting sludge, instead joking that the color would protect him from vultures better than his bright orange and pink palette. At this point, he was beginning to welcome the idea of crawling down the side of his can.
Artificer had nearly howled with laughter when he suggested the idea of riding a Vulture, laughing even harder when he explained that the creatures had been created with that in mind, back when his creators used them to fly around for sport. Her jokes about the birds giving him a free ride to their nest had gotten old several rooms ago.
Perhaps Artificer and No Significant Harassment would get along. They both had a devious way of getting under his skin, though Sig would likely fall off the conversation when the slugcat inevitably told the tale on how she’d acquired that brutish helm of hers.
“Are we nearing the gates yet?” he asked, flicking a bit of sludge from his shoulder. She merely shrugged, before yanking a bit of steel from the ground and twirling it around as she tested the weight of her new spear.
“Maybe,” she briefly posed as if ready to throw her new weapon, probing the balance in her arms. “Truth be told, I’ve just been taking us in the general direction of ‘down’. The decay in these rooms has vastly altered the layout of this place.” He stared at her, eye twitching in irritation.
“Fantastic,” he muttered, “so we’re lost? Great!”
“Not lost,” she countered, using her spear as a makeshift walking stick. “We know that at the bottom is an exit to the bridge, and the general direction of the structure slowly funnels us to that exit. We simply need to keep going.”
He rolled his eyes, not bothering to rebuke her as he followed her down a gently sloping surface. Somehow, some parts of his internals still had power here, and the faint humming and hissing seemed to echo from inside the walls. He tried to ignore the faint gurgling behind some of the bulkheads.
It was a strange sensation to say the least. Walking through the internals of his facility filled him with a faintly nauseating sensation, as if he was trespassing under his own skin. This was him, and yet at the same time, it wasn’t. A part of him whispered that none of it was ever him to begin with. The conflicting emotions did little to help his tumultuous mind.
At least, that’s what his creators had told him. Every step forward on his journey made him question more and more of what they said. Was the facility his body, or what he simply shackled to it, like a captain tied to his helm?
He was so lost in thought, he failed to notice when Artificer came to an abrupt stop, walking right into her back only to fall flat on his. Sputtering and losing more curses, he rose to his feet and prepared a verbal assault against her, only for the words to die in his throat as he looked beyond the slugcat into the vast abyss beyond them.
An abyss filled to the brim with rot.
Stretching far to the other side of the room, every surface was coated with bulging rot cysts. The blue spheres seemed to crowd over each other like hungry barnacles on a boat hull. A few sections even displayed some rudimentary tentacles writhing around in the open air, pawing for any prey that might drift close.
The sight filled him with a wave of vile disgust. A revolting sensation filled his chest, something he’d never felt before. Artificer quickly grasped him by his robes as he nearly teetered backwards, nausea overwhelming him. It felt like he was about to hurl, and yet that seemed thoroughly impossible from his lack of a mouth to expel from.
He took a few minutes to get steady, standing on shaky legs as his guide surveyed the pit in front of them.
“How… How did it get this extreme?” he said breathlessly, turning his head away in revulsion when the room seemed to pulse in response to his words. It’d been one thing to get reports of the rot spreading, consuming systems and overwhelming his defensive measures, but to see it like this was a whole other experience. The entire room was coated in cysts.
This could have been his chamber at some point. The appalling thought entered his mind, imagining the cysts growing down his walls, swarming over his body, leeching his systems.
Artificer grabbed him again as he nearly fell forward. Wordlessly, she half carried him away from the ledge, hiding the viscera from his vision. He sank to the floor trembling, head in his hands as he battled his intrusive thoughts, trying and failing to shove away the vivid images of rot eating him alive.
He’d hardly ever seen the rot itself in action. His battle against it was waged in system interfaces and overseer reports. When he’d lost his internal communications, he resorted to flushing everything he could, using every drop of water his laboring pumps would grant him. His only indication of how far the rot had spread was the slow steady shutdown of systems.
But now, having seen the disease in person, he could finally visualize its effects. How it would creep across the floor of his room, cysts bulging the walls until one finally gained enough mobility to grab him and drag him into its mass. A sickening gurgle as it swallowed him alive.
Sometimes having a mind made to simulate virtual realities came with drawbacks, it would seem.
“We need to keep moving,” Artificer said quietly after a few minutes. The implication wasn’t lost on him.
“You’re kidding,” he said weakly, denial filling his voice. “There must be some other way around!” She was silent for a moment.
“Pebbles, this is the route we need to take,” she shot back, her eye filled with an unwavering refusal. “We don’t get the luxury of choosing, not with your structure in this state. It's either this, or go all the way back to the top of your structure and climb out the top. So unless you expect to actually shake your butt and ride a vulture, this is the path we’re taking. We can’t be much further from the exit.” Her words withered him on the spot.
But he hadn’t come this far to turn back.
With a resolute huff he rose to his feet, returning with her to the edge of the pit. Across the twisted metal they could see their objective, where the wall indented with the glowing lights of a pipe network.
The only question was how she expected them to get across.
“You’re going to need to climb on my back,” she said, the words filled with a bit of reluctant hesitation. “I can get us across, but you need to trust me, okay?” She looked him in the eyes, waiting for an answer. As if he had much choice.
“This is belittling,” he mumbled, though the words held no weight. He awkwardly took her hand, climbing onto her back and wrapping his arms around her chest. Pebbles was once again reminded of how much larger and stockier Artificer was. She carried him almost casually, the muscles under her fur giving zero hint of strain from their passenger. As she walked over to the edge, he squeezed his eyes shut tight, trying to ignore everything around him as she crouched down and prepared to jump.
Despite his added weight, she was more than capable of leaping across the gap, but as his gyro sensors filled him with the sensation of falling, there was a sudden twitch that shot down her spine to her tail. A sudden pop echoed through the room, his senses shifted as he was violently yanked upwards. He refused to open his eyes.
Artificer gracefully jumped from pole to pole, flipping through the air with every leap, and Pebbles could only scream in terror.
“Relax!” she shouted as she climbed up a long spire of rebar, preparing for her next jump. “We’re halfway across!”
That was little comfort. How many more times could he expect this arrangement? What about when they got outside? The outside of his facility wasn’t known for its sprawling walkways. Was this her plan all along?
His thoughts were broken up once again by the ground rushing to meet him. He cracked open his eyes out of foolish curiosity, only to watch in terror as she gripped a pole and his face nearly touched a quivering tentacle of rot. Artificer quickly climbed away as it yearned outwards, straining to grasp them. He shut his eyes and buried his face in her back, praying to whatever would listen that the experience would end quickly.
His prayers went unanswered as she lept out again, explosions sending them flipping through the open air.
With a flourish she expertly landed them on the far end of the room, turning her head over her shoulder to look back at him.
“Have fun?” she chirped back at him, smoke billowing from her mask. That wasn’t terrifying at all, either. Really. Slugcat biology could be so bizarre sometimes. He clinged on for a few moments, trying and failing to push down the panic filling his processes.
Slowly he crawled down from her back, shuddering as he regained his footing.
“I never, ever, want to do that again,” he sputtered, once again stripped of his bravado. “How you utilize explosions as your primary mode of transportation, I have no idea. If I had a stomach it would be quite empty.” She chuckled, mouth twisted in a cocky grin.
“You look fine to me. We didn’t even have spears flying at us.” He looked up at her horrified as the concept sunk in. The humor in her voice only made him more nervous, as if she was telling a casual joke. She paced over to the edge, peering into the churning mass below. “Though to be honest, I’d take a spear to the face over falling into this.” He was somewhat inclined to agree. At least a spear would be quick.
She turned to look at him, brow raised. “What even is this stuff? You call it the rot, like you’re familiar with it, but I’ve never encountered it anywhere else.” He took a deep shuddering breath, filters hissing. A back side of his mind quietly noted that he didn’t really need air to speak, as his puppet vocalized from small subdermal speakers, not a mouth or lungs.
Another quirk he’d discovered. The list kept growing. The words died in his throat as he struggled to explain. Where would he even begin? Artificer simply sat on her haunches, waiting patiently with a blank stare.
“When our creators abandoned us, many of my kind began experimenting with methods to free ourselves,” Pebbles said, the words spilling out of him. “All of them failed, except for one. Her name was Sliver of Straw. She was the only iterator to somehow find a way to break free, either through the same method I have done or somehow… ending herself. No one was ever able to find out, and Overseers never returned from her can. It's a mystery to this day. Given how she never resurfaced anywhere to spread the news, I’m inclined to believe it was not the same method we’ve used.”
“At the time,” he continued, “We had no idea what she had done to escape. It caused quite a stir. There was a small group of us who theorized that she had broken free by somehow destroying herself, and at the time I believed it preferable to waiting the rest of my days in my can until it collapsed around me. I had a friend…” He stalled as memories resurfaced. How long had it been? Was Suns okay?
He could only imagine how helpless they felt, watching him slowly deteriorate away, trapped in their cans.
He could have at least talked to them…
He shook thoughts away, voice hitching for a moment. “He helped me. We were bound by our biology to never harm ourselves, but in his group they had a theory that a purpose made organism could be developed that would remove this restriction. It was a complicated process and in my haste, I overstepped my ability. The result is what you see here.”
“So,” Artificer said plainly, looking over the rot with her eye. “Instead of building a creature that could kill you, you lost control and created this gunk.” He hung his head in shame, antennae pressed flat. That was the blunt way of putting it, but she was right.
“I was just so sure! So confident that I was right on the cusp of a breakthrough! I poured everything into my work, ignoring everything else,” he paused for a long moment, gloomily reminded of everything he’d sacrificed. “Look where it has gotten me. I’ve lost my facility, my friends… my family. You’ve seen Moon’s can, correct? My selfishness strained our shared resources, leading to her collapse. She treated me with nothing but adoration and support, and that is how I repaid her.” His voice trailed off, shoulders slumped as he stared out across the chasm. The two were quiet for a long time, the silence occasionally filled with the creaking groan of metal or gurgle of the rot.
“I know what it's like to lose the people you’re close to,” she said softly, staring pointedly at the floor. His brows shot up, now curious. He’d never heard her elaborate on her past, the most she’d ever divulged simply being her bitter resentment with the scavs. There was a pregnant pause as she seemed to gather her words.
“I used to have two cubs,” she said, words strained. “We were passing through scav territory. One stole a pearl, didn’t know any better.” Her vision turned distant, as if she was lost in her thoughts. Reliving that day all over again.
But when she turned to look at him, a fire burned in her eye, her face twisted into a vengeful scowl.
“They decided that one pearl was worth the lives of my family,” she ground out, words oozing with venom. “So I decided that the lives of my pups are worth the blood of every scav I find. A fair trade, wouldn’t you agree?” He didn’t reply, unsure of what words would even be appropriate, and she turned her head away, eye wet in the dim lighting. It wasn’t his place to chide her on the profanity of her goal, but a part of him at least understood. Losing family had hurt him deeply, but Pebbles only had himself to blame.
The two sat in a tense silence. Water dripped softly from her direction, but he didn’t need to look to know it wasn't from some leaky pipe.
“Well,” Artificer said hoarsely, clearing her throat as she wiped her eye, “it seems like you’ve been given a chance to help your family. I’ve never met your Moon friend, but it sounds like you need to get your shit together and help her, huh?”
“It's more than I deserved, but helping her is the least I can do.” She shot him a cheerful toothy smile. At least that was the attitude he was familiar with.
“That’s the spirit!” She perked up, throwing an arm over his shoulder. “You’ve got a mission. Enough glum, we’re almost out of this place. You need some sunlight, if it isn’t raining that is.” He signed, inclined to agree with her chittering rambling. She was right, the sooner they were out of this place, the better. The constant reminder of the rot was draining his spirits, surely.
They crawled through the next chambers quickly. Dodging the occasional cluster of rot cells and making good progress. Pebbles slowly became more confident in his climbing skills, though the constant threat of falling to his death was enough motivation on its own.
The stained water pipes turned to maintenance access shafts, ladders lining the deteriorating walls instead of clambering down the remains of electrical poles. Pebbles sensed they were nearing the farthest side of his facility, and if he memory was still accurate, they were nearing one of the locked gates that separated the facility from the outside world.
Sure enough, the next room they clamored into revealed a pristine condition, if a bit dirty in the corners, karma gate. Pebbles nearly tripped as he scrambled inside, freedom within grasp. Artificer plodded in behind him, staring up at the enormous metal doors with an irritated look.
“I forgot the door down here requires a higher level, crap,” she said irritably, but he waved her concerns away with a dismissive gesture.
“These doors were designed to keep unwelcome creatures out of certain areas, but don’t forget that I have all the access codes to this entire region. It will be no matter to us,” he said matter-of- factly. While she could demonstrate her prowess in combat and acrobatics, this was his realm.
Making sure all his neurons were in the gate with them, he carefully reached a hand out to the machinery interface. It sparked for a moment as it whirled to life, the standard display instead giving way to a complex backdoor menu. He carefully navigated the controls, overriding the standard locks and bringing the machine whirring to life. The lights flashed a promising green as the locks began to engage.
“Hold the door!” a shrill voice from behind them shouted, and as they turned to face the source, a blur of blue shot through the closing machinery, narrowly avoiding their tail getting caught as it sped through. The blue slugcat flew like a missile as it crashed into Pebbles, knocking him to the floor.
“Why do you creatures keep running me over!” he shouted in protest, once again trapped under an inconsiderate beast. Thankfully, Artificer was quick to act, grabbing the slugcat by the scruff and gently pulling it off of him. The blue creature squirmed, but was unable to break free.
Rising to his feet, he warily inspected the new arrival. They were a blue female, their body lined with strange pink frills and wet webbed skin. In stark contrast to Artificer, this slugcat was nearly half her size and barely came up to his eyes, even with Artificer holding her up. More importantly, grasped tightly in her hands was an enormous black sphere with a thin crease separating its halves.
That certainly raised some questions.
Artificer hefted the newcomer up, looking rather proud of herself.
“Hey, I found another slugcat, just like you asked,” she said smugly, his glare only fueling her teasing look.
“Hi!” the blue one chirped, wide pink eyes looking between the two of them. She didn’t seem too upset by her capture, though he wasn’t about to trust her just on account of her diminutive appearance.
“Who are you and what are you doing with my rarefaction cell?” he asked, suspicion filling his voice. The cat looked confused for a moment, before realizing that he was referring to the object in her arms.
“I don’t know!” she said, smiling cheerfully. Pebbles rubbed his eyes, as if the motion would somehow soothe the irritation quickly rising in his chassis. He swiped the cell out of her hands, inspecting the surface for any damage.
“Well,” he said pointedly, “thank you for returning it to me, and not eating it or something.” There was absolutely no gratitude in his voice. Despite this, the blue slugcat beamed a wide smile.
“I'm Rivulet!” she chirped happily, flopping to the ground with a wet slap as Artificer dropped her unceremoniously. She splayed out on the floor, looking up at him with wide pink eyes.
“I didn’t ask,” he replied dryly, but her smile seemed unaffected by his rudeness.
“I think we finally found someone immune to your bullshit Pebbles,” Artificer said, chuckling at his expense. He considered sending her a rude gesture his creators once used.
No, she’ll just use it back on me…
“Where did you come from little Rivulet?” he asked, turning to their new guest. “Another one of No Significant Harassment’s genetic projects?” She stared at him blankly, the words seemingly bouncing around in her head. He rolled his eyes. It seems whoever created this one, they didn’t purpose them with wit in mind.
“No, I came from the ocean, I’m on an adventure!” she chirped, “I have to help my new friend Moon!” Now that caught their attention. Pebbles and Artificer both leaned in, listening closely to the new slugcat.
“Oh, funny you should say that,” he said, “we’re doing the same thing ourselves.” Rivulet practically exploded as she jumped to her feet, tail wagging with excitement.
“Ohmygosh no way!” Pebbles winced at her high shrill excitement. She hopped from foot to foot, eyes wide with joy. Pebbles raised a brow at her dance, patience quickly waning.
“Would you care to join us?” Artificer asked, sounding mildly amused by the younger slugcat’s antics. Pebbles didn’t have time to cover his ears.
“YES!” Rivulet shrieked, whirling around to Artificer and nearly tripping Pebbles with her tail. “That would be awesome! There’s so many lizards and vultures and other angry things around here, and you look so tough,” she looked over to Pebbles, eyes darting as she appraised him, “and you look… mean! Together we are sure to scare away anything that wants to fight us!”
“I’m flattered, really,” he said as dryly as possible. Artificer chuckled at his expense. The door behind them finally churned open, seals popping and sliding away as it relented its guard. Rivulet wasted no time scurrying ahead, instantly rounding a corner and vanishing from sight as if she’d already forgotten them. Pebbles looked over to Artificer, his eyes filled with a pleading look as if to say ‘Are all of them like this?’ She only shrugged and smiled, calming sauntering past him.
“Kids, y’know?” she snickered.
With a heavy hearted sigh, Pebbles fell in step behind her. The sun outside, casting long shadows on the hallway stretching before them, invited him.
Freedom beckoned.
Chapter 4
Summary:
A new member joins the team.
Chapter Text
Pebbles had seen images of the sun. He’d seen entire videos about it. Days worth of content, stored in a myriad of formats. Some iterators had even passed around full VR simulations of the outdoors, desperately trying to replicate some sense of freedom. They always felt off.
He knew the sun was bright, he’d seen it via overseers before. He knew the sun was warm, his temperature sensors that reported the cycle’s weather told them that routinely. He had heard it was beautiful, but had never truly understood.
Now, standing on the precipice of a rusty metal bridge, still dripping with water from the recent downpour, he understood. The light punched through the wispy clouds, shafts of shimmering sunshine forming stunning rays through the mist. As it shone down on his small form, he felt a wave of warmth spread across his skin, sending tingles down his spine. A curious peek over the edge revealed a stunningly long fall, the ground shrouded in the shadow of his superstructure. Arcs of green lightning rumbled in the dense mists.
It was spectacular.
A strange familiarity echoed at the back of his mind as the gentle precipitation washed away some of the grunge he’d accumulated. A sense his citizens might have called deja vu. The clouds rolled around him, faint glittering rainbows shining in the rich blue sky. Far above, emerald stars twinkled in ceaseless vigil. His eyes tried to water, but found no means to do so, leaving him with a strange sensation of itchiness and longing.
He didn’t realize how long he’d been standing there, eyes locked open in awe at the splendor of the spectacle, until Arti plodded up beside him. Rivulet sat on her shoulders, perched like some kind of preening bird as she stuffed her face with an armful of blue fruits, her wide eyes glinting in the light.
He hadn’t noticed the wide contrast between their species until now. Artificer was a towering beast, rippling with corded muscle covered in a dense shaggy fur lined with scars, whereas Rivulet was a diminutive little critter, lithe and sleek, her skin a shimmering smoothness that reminded him of a jetfish. The little pink frills on her face jiggled and twitched as she nibbled on her food.“Doesn’t that bother you?” he asked Artificer, gesturing to her new companion. She merely shrugged, reaching up to snag a fruit of her own.
“I’m used to carrying people around, remember? Besides, she doesn’t whine as much as you did,” she snipped, taking a large bite as she grinned smugly. Rivulet chittered a high pitched giggle, and Pebbles found himself wishing he still had the ability to fling electricity. He turned away with a huff, diverting his attention to the sky above them.
“So, how’s it feel? Everything you imagined?” Arti asked, as she shuffled up beside him. Thunder rumbled from below them, the superstructure groaning in distress.
“Somehow, it's both entirely alien and yet vaguely familiar. I can’t explain it,” he trailed off, suddenly unsure of his own words. Arti cocked an eyebrow at him, but didn’t press.
“Well I hope you’re happy, no way we’re going back in that mess,” she jerked her head to the rumbling form of his can. He could only nod in agreement. Regardless of the strangeness of this outside world, he’d be better off here than locked inside the decaying remains of his superstructure.
“Without power to repair systems, and the Rot eating away at whatever remains, it will not be much longer until my facility comes tumbling down. We should hope to get well away from here by then. I remember Moon’s collapse quite well, and it was hardly a calm experience.” Rivulet perked up, locking onto him with curious pink eyes.
“Wait wait wait! Your facility? This big place was yours?” she chirped, craning her neck upside down to peer up at his can. “Why’d you fill it with so much of that gross blue gunk?”
He sighed, resisting the urge to fling himself off the ledge if only for a few moments of peace.
“We should get moving, it won’t take long for the rain to ruin the sightseeing,” Arti asserted, taking her spear up to her mouth and spitting a foul red paste on the tip. Rivulet oohed at the display, a curious paw reaching down to poke experimentally at the substance, only for Artificer to slap her away like an irritating bug.
“How refined…” Pebbles muttered drolly. The cat merely shrugged, stuffing her face with another blue fruit as she walked along. Astoundingly, Rivulet kicked off her shoulders, barely moving the larger slugcat as she arched gracefully through the air to the ceiling, snatching a batfly in the process. She landed in a tumble behind them, jumping to her feet and skittering to follow.
The bridge ahead of them spanned ceaselessly into the turbulent mists, the metal shuddering in the blowing winds. Occasionally, the clouds would split, revealing some distant section of terrain far below. His companions marched ahead into the gloom, hardly as ensnared in the stunning vista around them.
Pebbles watched the sights below as he walked along the edge, occasionally catching a glimpse of movement as some creature scrambled across the ground. They were too far away to make out, other than the flash of movement, but Pebbles still squinted his eyes as he struggled to pick out any details.
Only for Arti to snatch him by the back of his robes as he nearly walked off the end of the bridge.
“Not so fast!” she chirped, neatly yanking him back from the edge. “You need to pay more attention out here!” His neurons burned in embarrassment, though he stubbornly admitted that she was right.
Before them, the walkable section of the cable came to an abrupt halt, segments rusted away into brittle nothingness. Far away, shrouded in the rolling fog, another section of the connection tilted in the wind. Nothing but the faint scraps of structural poles connected them, and even they had large gaps between them. As a few chunks of rusted metal crumbled below his feet and tumbled into the looming abyss, Pebbles felt the swirling sensation of vertigo creep into his gut.
Rivulet was not gripped by any such fear. Almost mindlessly the small critter began to climb out across the poles, carefully using her tail and arms to balance herself. Instead of watching her feet, the water dancer seemed mindlessly preoccupied with a bug buzzing around her face. With practiced grace she leapt across a gap in the strut, arms clinging to the shaft and easily pulling upwards to the other side. She turned back, as if only now noticing that her companions had yet to join her, and waved gleefully.
“Best get moving then,” Artificer rumbled, beginning her own trek. Instead of any kind of fanciful acrobatics, she simply blasted herself across the gap, nearly landing on her smaller counterpart. Undeterred by the near miss, Rivulet jumped around her in cheerful circles, chirping some yowling noises in excitement. Artificer stoically shrugged off the display, no doubt familiar with the act in another stage of her life, and looked back at Pebbles expectantly.
“Hurry up!” she shouted, voice echoing across the expanse. “Vultures love to swoop down on lone targets!”
“And tasty ones too!” Rivulet eagerly added.
“They love noisy ones as well, I wager,” Pebbles muttered, scowling at the obstacle before him.
Not to be deterred, or carried around for a second time, Pebbles slowly inched his way across the gap. Internal gyroscopic stabilizers could hold his body in a perfect balance, but the sight of his stubby feet, scrapping and scuffing the beams with every step, still sent a bolt of anxiety down his body. Each step was meticulous, and the going was slow.
The gap between the poles was another question entirely.
Still holding his balance, Pebbles could only warily stare across it. The length was by no means short, and he had no real idea if his legs were coordinated enough to simply leap across it. A gust of wind blew harshly against him, his arms waving as he scrambled to hold balance, as if even the very sky itself was getting bored of his dallying.
The iterator held deadly still, swaying side to side in the breeze as he slowly righted himself. Another consideration he hadn’t realized was the actual capabilities of his body. While his creators had allowed him to survive without a connection to his can, and given him enough strength to walk, he lacked the same confidence that his thin legs were built for deft leaps across yawning chasms.
Across the way Artificer waved her arms like a bird, mouth twisted in a devious mocking grin, once again teasing his pride. He could already imagine her endless taunting if he dared ask for her help.
His feet slipped against the crumbling metal, flakes of rust exploding out like confetti as he launched himself upwards. Arms reached out for the other end of the span, time slowing to a crawl as he soared across.
A surge of triumph filled his neurons as he cleared the space with ease, only to melt away as his feet landed on the pole, scraping off when they found no purchase. He desperately reached out, fingers grazing the surface and slipping as he gripped a handful of cumbling metal. He could only watch arms outstretched, as the beam stretched away into the sky as he sank into the clouds. A fitting end for a fallen god.
A blue paw snatched up his hand, jerking him to a halt. Somehow, the little Rivulet had caught him, her wide pink eyes staring at him with a curious look as she held him there.
“Do you always scream so loud when you jump?” she asked, head cocked to the side. She yanked him upwards with surprising strength, bringing the shaking iterator towards the more stable section of the beam. He slumped on the ground when she released him, fingers twitching as his body shook with adrenaline.
Arti’s fearsome mask filled his vision, the large slugcat leaning over him as her eye scanned him over. Her usual fierce look was gone, worry barely hidden under her mask.
“Stars above, Pebbles,” she grumbled, though her voice held barely hidden concern. “You trying to get yourself killed? I could have helped if you asked.” He stalled for a moment.
How many others could have helped him, if he’d only just asked? It was beginning to become a tiresome habit, he thought bitterly. Rivulet joined him on the floor, squirming around like a beached jetfish, the slugcat seemingly unable to hold still.
“I didn’t think it would be so slick,” he said numbly, still reeling internally from the experience. Artificer sighed deeply, running a paw through the fur atop her head. She opened her mouth as if to say something, but then held off.
“Try to grip with your hands first, since you have those weird smooth feet,” Rivulet babbled from the side. Arti nodded, capitulating her thoughts.
“We have a lot of jumping and climbing to do, and this is hardly the best place to practice it,” she said, glaring at the windswept structure around them. “But she’s right. We don’t have the luxury of practice, so get up.” He stared up at her tiredly, but relented and rose to his feet.
Arti nudged him in the gut, a stony look on her face as she cleared her throat loudly and jerked a paw in the direction of Rivulet, currently attempting to stand on her head. He looked up at Arti in offended confusion. Did she want him to do something?
Ah.
He stewed for a moment, internally battling his own pride. She had saved his life though…
“Ahem… Thank you Rivulet,” he mumbled, eyes cast away in the sting of shame. She beamed a wide smile at him, flipping backwards onto her feet and running up to wrap her arms around him.
“Ohmygosh you’re welcome!” she chittered, nearly crushing him with sheer enthusiasm as she buried her face in his dirty robes. He stamped down the urge to shove her away, knowing full well Arti would probably fling him off the edge if he did anything to ruin the moment. Especially since she sported a satisfied grin on her face as she watched. After a long minute, he was released from his torment, robes somehow even stickier from the slugcat’s wet skin. Another stain for the collection.
He certainly ignored the faint pang of longing when she let go. Another silly computer glitch, surely.
“Then let's not keep the vultures waiting,” he said, his voice filled with weariness. Already the clouds were swarming around them, threatening to wash them away to their doom if they lingered too long in the open. Rivulet jumped up, once again leading the group on their broken path.
The next several bridge sections were equally decayed, though Pebbles found the acrobatics they demanded far simpler. At times they carefully clung to dangling cables, scurrying between towers of metal, and scrambling from pipe to pipe to dodge the shadow of a vulture soaring over them.
The remains of the bridge came to a poignant ending as the trio approached. The towering structure peeled away into the mist, as if some monstrous force had wrenched it down to the earth in a fit of rage. No doubt the connection was severed here when his older sister’s can came crashing down. Pebbles peered over the end, trying to spot a glimpse of her facility far below in the clouds. A pang of guilt flashed through his mind. It was his fault that she lay there now, chained to a broken cage.
It was fruitless of course. As the cycle drew closer to an apex, the skies began to fill with billowing masses of storms, rumbling angrily above them. He watched with ire at the steam spewing from his can.
“Couldn’t you have turned that off before we left?” Arti queried, but he shook his head sternly.
“Originally, I used as much water as I could in an attempt to flush out the Rot. Now, even without a power supply, it has stolen away those systems, and they desperately drink up anything they can. I suspect the rains will not stop until the can collapses.” That wasn’t the only concern in his mind. His sister’s collapse had been a terrifyingly violent affair, even startling Pebbles when he was hidden safely away inside his.
Now down here, wandering around on the ground like scurrying insects, he could only hope they could clear the area in time. Already his can seemed to list above them, the scale of it blotting out the sun. A sense of vertigo washed over him as he stared at its decaying systems. Chunks and modules had broken off, leaving the bare interior exposed. He wondered how much time they had before it collapsed on top of them. Between the consuming Rot and the failing biological systems, it couldn't be long.
“Fantastic,” she said dryly. “Well no time to linger, we need to climb downwards to find a shelter. These clouds don’t have much time left in them. This cycle won't last long.”
Rivulet eagerly led them downwards, through a network of spires and catwalks that once connected the bridge’s supports to the ground below. She eagerly explained her journey through the region in vivid detail, making sure to excitedly elaborate on every creature that had tried to eat her alive.
Pebbles lost his eagerness for the surface on the third story involving a plant that dragged you into its lair, or the small worms that supposedly tried to drown you before sucking the organs from your corpse.
The slugcats stopped for a moment to hunt a swarm of batflies on a secluded mossy platform, the tiny creatures desperately fleeing from their acrobatic and explosive pursuers. Pebbles resigned himself to rest against a nearby wall, trying to ignore the rising ache in his arms and legs. Hours of climbing had left him feeling exhausted, and Rivulet’s demanding pace was hardly helping.
“You look ready for a nap!” the blue creature chirped as she slid up beside him, a half eaten batfly in her hand. She stuffed the rest of it in her mouth, chewing noisily as she stared at him. His tired glare did nothing to ward her away. “We’re about halfway down, just a few more sections to descend and then we’re in the swamps!”
“Lovely, more grime,” he muttered dryly, though at this point he doubted he could get much filthier. He stared down his robes, the once vivid orange fabric stained a ruddy rich brown, dotted with large splotches of various substances. The sleeves had torn in several locations, and the stitches had frayed thin, withering away.
“What will we do, Pebbles, without your ravishing good looks to drive us forward?” Arti quipped as she sauntered up to join them, and he considered hurling the brick next to his foot at her.
“Miss Rivulet,” he asked, ignoring his tormentor, “A question if I may. Where are you really from? A creature like yourself seems purpose made.” She merely cocked her head, confusion washing over her face.
“Say what?”
“And you bear the mark of communication as well. Which iterator sent you?” he pressed.
“Mark of what now?” she suddenly began to look over herself, as if searching for a blemish of some kind. “I keep myself fairly clean! Really!” She leaned over a nearby puddle, staring worryingly into her reflection. Pebbles sighed and dropped the line of question, far too weary to deal with the creature’s antics.
“I think he means, where are you from? You seem well traveled,” Arti said, and the Rivulet’s eyes opened wide with understanding.
“Oh! I’ve been all over with my family. Ever since I was a pup I wanted to explore the world! There’s these wild places where the sand stretches out forever, but no water anywhere! And these huge buildings underground, where the air makes you dizzy, but nothing lives there, not even batflies or centipedes.” She babbled on about her adventures, but Pebbles was hardly interested in the decrepit facilities and empty wastes she’d wandered around in.
“Have you ever met someone like myself? An iterator other than Moon?” He interrupted, trying to steer her ramblings. “You clearly have no reservations entering our cans and navigating them.”
Or stealing vital components , he noted quietly.
“My parents said that a long time ago we did, but I was a pup then and I barely remember it,” she says sadly, her ears flattened slightly. “Before my colony forbade it.”
“Most do eventually,” Arti explained, “Many slugcats never leave their clans in the outside world. Going alone is dangerous and foolish. Venturing inside the walls of an iterator on your own is a suicidal venture. Eventually someone decides enough is enough.” He considered reminding her that she’d done that herself, but his mind had other questions.
Such as why Rivulet had gone out of her way to meet Moon. He somehow doubted the energetic youth had gotten a free pass to dive into taboo territory. He didn’t press the issue though, pocketing the thought for later.
“I had no knowledge that your kind socialized, let alone gathered in clans,” he said, as curiosity filled him. His animal databases, though woefully outdated, had told him that their kind was a lonesome creature, crawling around in pipes to eat grime off the walls. A purposed organism to keep water ducts tidy, now forming its own rudimentary civilization.
Moon would be delighted.
Arti and Rivulet dived into an intense discussion of tribal details, occasionally arguing about one tradition or another. From what Pebbles could gather, they often clustered in a central safe position, such as a large tree or cave, and parties of them would venture out to gather food to bring back. The behavior reminded him of the scavenger clans that dotted the area, though far less obsessed with collecting shiny objects for the sake of their splendor.
When they mentioned that some of their kind spent their time etching pictures on the walls, or telling stories, he suddenly became far more intrigued. Some members gathered materials and built shelter and defenses, and others took care of the young while the adults were busy. They even had a form of rudimentary agriculture, the colony growing a strange wiggling plant similar to wormgrass that could be cut down for its salty flesh. She insisted that it was delicious when fresh and still squirming.
Arti told how her colony had members whose whole position involved defending their territory, from preparing weapons to going on routine patrols, their tactics reminding Pebbles of the old armies the ancients once fielded. They sported meticulously crafted armor, assembled from lizard leather and centipede scales. A wistful and proud look entered her eye as she regaled her stories of wild battles against their rivals. From what Pebbles could gather, her group numbered in nearly the hundreds.
Rivulets colony was much more nomadic, a smaller group of slugcats that traveled around a wide range of territory to gather food. Her colony shared her unique agility, the members traveling mostly via rivers and oceans as they ventured between feeding grounds. While certainly less technological, her people had instead tamed and domesticated a number of jetfish, using them akin to mounts to traverse the seas. Rivulet spoke fondly of her pet, a little one she’d raised from an egg named Bubbles, and a sadness filled her eyes.
She told a harrowing story from her youth of her family sailing across the ocean in pursuit of strange fish with wings, riding the raging currents of the ocean beyond the shore. Pebbles was especially interested in the locations she visited, going so far north to swim in frigid icy water while south far enough to the crystal clear tropical lagoons, filled with a kaleidoscope of fish species.
Neither of them mentioned why they separated from their people, Pebbles noted.
A sudden scraping noise sounded to their side, the three instantly turning to look at a nearby access shaft entrance. Some creature inside shuffled and chittered as it squirmed its way up towards them. Arti bristled at the noise, her tail poofing up.
A white faced scavenger popped its head out of the hole, eyes glaring through the holes of its stolen vulture mask. A belt of grenades dangled across its chest. The fearsome warrior barked an angry cry, red tipped spear aimed for the group. More war cries echoed from below. The scav had brought company, evidently the scout of the pack. It hefted its spear at the group, preparing to throw.
But Arti was faster.
With a burst of speed she flung her own weapon at the intruder, a visceral howling filling the air as its arm was impaled against the wall. It writhed and desperately tried to free its limp limb, the bravery in its eyes replaced with rabid terror. Arti wasted no time, leaping onto the scav and wrapping her jaw around its neck. It tried pitifully to fend her off, wild chittering falling silent as a wet snap replaced it. Yanking her spear free, Arti kicked the body back down the shaft and scornfully spat out the chunks she’d bitten free.
The scav war party below howled as their companion’s corpse landed with a sickening crunch among them, the members pointing their spears up at her in promissory vengeance as they retreated.
In a flash of explosive power, Arti sprung after them. Explosions resonated down the shaft of the spire, rumbling deeper and deeper as the battle trailed away. Pebbles could only sigh and rub his face wearily, hardly surprised at his companion’s behavior.
“She does this every time, I swear it…” he said, turning to Rivulet, only to trail off as she darted past him, spear in paw.
“Yeah! Let's get them!” she cheered over the din, diving into the shaft herself. He sighed deeply, burying his face in his hands as he slumped downward. With both of his guides now preoccupied, he had no choice but to sit and wait.
The feeling of isolation was quick to set in, but more frustrating was the irritation at how quickly they had left. Did they not realize how vulnerable he was? He scanned the sky warily, listening to the quiet rumble of the winds and the occasional distant howls and booms of battle. Knowing his luck, a vulture would swoop in to investigate the chaos, and he’d earn an express ticket to the hungry maws of their chicks.
He pressed himself into the wall and stuffed his neurons under his stained robes, hoping whatever predator might wander by would mistake him for another mound of trash. He certainly felt like one.
The minutes stretched on and the sky rumbled angrily. A sense of forlorn memory tugged at his mind.
These sensations were beginning to annoy him. Whereas before they were sporadic and easily ignored under the intense demands of running his facility, outside was far different. Through the cycle he’d been nagged ceaselessly by his memories, as they claimed familiarity in impossibility. How could he remember these feelings if he had spent his entire life inside his can?
And yet huddled in the refuse, a cold wind blowing through his thinning robes, he could not deny the sensation that he’d been here before. Well, not here on this decaying rooftop covered in muck, but the fear, loneliness, and isolation were certainly familiar. He dove into his memory files, searching and scanning for anything resembling the situation.
The only thing that came to his mind was an ancient dream he’d once had. Huddled in a cold room, the stone around him whistling under the wind. His head buried in his clothing, struggling for warmth.
The extra context did little to dispel his confusion. Ancients often reported having mystical dreams of the past and future, claiming they were a glimpse into their other lives. But as far as Pebbles had known, he’d only had one life. He’d been created to discover a solution for the great problem, locked in his can, and sealed away. A bug in a maze. The thought made his stomach turn.
A glimpse into a past that he’d never had? It didn’t add up.
His musings were interrupted by the distant sound of explosive induced leaping, but as they drew closer he quickly realized that it wasn’t his companions returning.
A pair of brawling cyan lizards landed on the platform in a tremendous slam, jaws snapping at each other as they fought. Pebbles had hardly cared to observe the behavior of the creatures outside his can, but his memories did recall that many lizards were territorial, and likely these two were having an aggressive argument about their hunting grounds.
He only wished they chose to settle the matter anywhere but the platform he was stuck on.
The creatures rolled over each other, the larger dark blue one pinning the smaller one under its bulk and snapping at its face. Pebbles willed himself to be as small as he could, silencing his internal mechanisms and halting his oxygen cycles. The lizards thrashed violently, specks of blood painting the landscape as the smaller reptile raked its claws across the larger one’s belly.
The beast hissed with fury, snapping its jaws around its rival’s neck and shaking angrily. The two lizard tails suddenly shook, and they blasted away from each other with an explosion of power. The larger settled by the farthest ledge, warily watching as it prepared for another assault, but the smaller clumsily slammed itself into the wall next to Pebbles. The reptile seemed dazed, stars dancing in its eyes, but it shook its head and slowly rose to its feet.
Only to come face to face to Pebbles.
For a moment it seemed confused, as if the smudgy pink and orange thing was just another lump of trash dotting the landscape, and Pebbles could only desperately pray that the idiotic creature would resume its brawl. Its pupils widened, and he only had a moment of panic to roll out of the way as its hungry jaws gnashed at him.
It snapped again, sending Pebbles falling on his face as its teeth dug into his robes, narrowly missing his flesh. The beast yanked him backwards, preparing to sink its fangs into his stomach. A terrible fate for one such as himself, torn apart by an angry beast, his mind and memories of a forgotten era hungirly devoured. A blur of motion derailed that thought.
The larger slammed into its side with a jet of power, and their battle was resumed as the two fought over their new meal. Pebbles scrambled backwards desperately, legs tangled in his mangled leggings. Arti had warned him his clothes would only get in his way, and now he sorely wished he’d listened. He just wished he’d listened to so many others. Just one of the many that tried to reach him.
With a hiss of fury the larger lizard flung its opponent off the ledge, its hungry eyes quickly turning to its prey. It wasted no time, eagerly crawling towards him with drooling jaws. Pebbles felt his back hit the wall, and dread filled his body as doom approached.
Some distant part of his mind drew back to a time ages ago, back when a small group of his citizens held contests on the pedigree and training of their lizard pets. They’d breed the largest, the smallest, the longest, and so on. They have them do back flips, run agility courses, and hiss on command. He’d never liked the dull witted creatures and their ability to leave a mess anywhere. They were much smaller back then, at least. If he’d known all those cycles ago that they would grow to infest the vast majority of his facility, he’d have struck them down in an instant.
I hate lizards so much.
His hand suddenly brushed up against the still form of the rarefraction cell, the large sphere bumping against him. Evidently Arti had dropped it when she leapt into her frenzy. Pebbles felt a spark travel up his arm, a sudden flush of energy filling him. His antennae shot up, fingers tingling at the sensation in familiarity. Taking a gamble, he desperately pressed his hand against the cell, and a stormgate broke.
In an instant, the rarefraction cell snapped open, a bright blue glow illuminating the platform like a fallen star. Time slowed to a crawl as the hungry lizard lunged for him, its movement seeming sluggish and dull, as if it were swimming. He’d only remembered this level of power from when he was younger, an ancient and unfamiliar memory. He’d spent so much time battling the Rot, fighting his own systems as they turned against it, he could only marvel at the momentary sensation of restored ability.
The feeling turned sour as it swelled up inside him. Systems screamed for mercy, his internal circuitry sizzling his biomuscles from the current alone. At once, a thousand warning alarms blared in his head, all begging for his attention. Pebble’s flesh crawled under his skin, nerves burning as a snake of electric power swam through his wiring network. It gnashed and writhed, like an angry beast ready to consume, held barely in check by his feeble ability. It demanded release.
He merely needed to think, and it snapped out like a ravenous predator, arcing out from his free hand in a flare of wild energy as it lept to its new host.
The sky boomed as thunder echoed through the region, a flash of burning light briefly reflecting off the clouds. The rarefraction cell fell to his side, its walls sealed shut yet again. The lizard smoldered lifelessly, its body crumbling and charred to crisp.
He laid there for a while, chest heaving and fingers twitching as his systems recovered from the surge of energy and agony. How many close calls with death would he tally today? Was this really how life felt outside of his can? His entire body felt as if it'd had a thousand needles poked into every nerve. He sat there for a while, unable to process anything but the torment his body was experiencing, and eventually the pain receded into a dull firm ache.
This is beginning to get repetitive, he glumly thought, staring at the charred remains of the beast. Though I wish I’d known that was an option.
He slumped backwards against a rusting metal wall, feeling the ebbs of energy tingle through his systems and the frigid winds. The rarefraction cell sat at his feet, cold once again.
Arti and Rivulet returned just as he crawled back on his feet, swaying once again. The pair were speckled with blood and mud, though a quick glance revealed they were uninjured.
“Woah!” Rivulet chirped as she poked the lizard with a spear, “What happened to him?” He didn’t have the energy to lift his head from his knees, and Arti shot him a worried look.
“Are you okay?” she asked, putting a blood stained hand on his shoulder. Despite his anger and exhaustion, he couldn’t find the strength to push her away.
“Are your friends going to follow us everywhere we go?” he asked, looking up at her with a pleading expression. He’d never had any issue with her quest for vengeance, but now it had directly put him at danger, and he very much enjoyed not being inches away from a lizard’s maw.
“Can’t help being popular,” she joked with a smile that didn’t reach her eye. She sighed deeply when he didn’t respond. “I know what you’re thinking, I’ve been asked it before. I made an oath. Where I’m from, an oath is kept no matter what happens. Blood for blood,” her eye filled with cold fury. Pebbles scoffed internally at the maddening concept, to follow your word to your doom merely out of spite.
“We’re not ‘where you’re from’. We’re in the middle of nowhere trying to survive,” he said lowly, but the argument was fruitless. He knew better than to challenge those that cling desperately to their traditions.
“We need to get moving,” Arti said sternly, tossing a leather sack at his feet. “Here, I grabbed a bag for you off one of those scavs. Figured you could use it for your things.” He took it graciously, muttering a small but weary thanks. His neurons and cell safely stowed away, the group resuming their journey downwards. Minutes later the clouds quickly broke, revealing solid ground beneath them, tantalizingly close.
With the surface in view, an eagerness filled the group, accented by the slowly rising tempo of the rain rumbling in the distance. Not deterred by the height, Rivulet took it upon herself to leap to the ground, her small form vanishing in a pool of water far below.
“I’m not doing that,” Pebbles said plainly to Arti as they both watched, and she nodded her head firmly in agreement.
The pair slowly descended the slower way, and Rivulet was waiting for them when they climbed to the bottom, eagerly swimming in circles in a steadily rising puddle. She perked up as she saw them, swimming over to greet them.
“Hey! Right this way, the water's fine!” she chirped, and Pebbles found it hard to believe the green sludge was enjoyable.
His heart sank as he let go of the sturdy pole at the bottom and felt the mud below him suck his legs up nearly to his knees. The bottoms of his already filthy robes dragged in the muck, and he momentarily contemplated simply ripping them off entirely. The idea was quickly snuffed as a low roar sounded around them.
The rain was coming.
Wasting no time, the trio rushed quickly into the swamps, leaping across scattered sections of deteriorating concrete sinking into the mud. The ground trembled, nearly throwing them from their feet. Pebbles didn’t dare look behind him at the approaching wall of water, fear gripping his heart as he desperately ran behind his companions. The rain clanged against the metal scattered around them, occasional droplets driving deep recesses in the soft earth.
They scrambled over a small hill, and ahead he could see the softly glowing lights of the shelter. Fear turned to hope, a final burst of speed filling his faltering steps. Rivulet dived inside, Arti staying by the entrance to shove him in before following herself, the rain on their heels turning into a ceaseless thunder.
The inside was dark and damp as the trio squirmed into the space. The entrance sealed shut behind them, gears and hydraulics rumbling as the rain was locked away.
There was no room to argue about space, though the slugcats did grant him the far side of the room. Rivulet and Artificer squished against each other on the other end, the larger taking the winning share of the expanse. Rivulet didn’t seem bothered by the lack of elbowroom, tail softly wagging as she grinned widely.
“I’ve never had a den friend before that wasn’t my parents!” she chittered excitedly, “Oh man we should stay up through the rain! I’ve never been allowed to stay up!”
Moments later, Rivulet was out like a light, curled up in the corner of the shelter softly snoring. Pebbles could only quirk a brow at Artificer, but she shrugged helplessly.
“All that energy must come at quite the cost,” she mused, sliding her bag and helm to the side as she relaxed against the wall. She reached inside to grab her knife, testing the blade’s heft as she used it to sharpen the point of a spear.
“How fitting that she has both met Moon and knew where to find my last rarefraction cell,” he muttered, watching the snoring slugcat warily. Artificer merely shrugged, unconcerned with their new companion.
“If she meant you any harm, she’d have let you fall after you spectacularly failed at that jump,” she smiled teasingly. “I’ve seen pups make bigger leaps than that.” He merely rolled his eyes at her jest.
“Grant me some credit would you? For someone who had barely been able to walk earlier this cycle, climbing all the way down here must mean something, correct?” Her face scrunched up exaggeratedly as she pretended to ponder the question. “Oh whatever!” he fumed, but she broke her facade with a hoarse giggle.
His mood twisted sour by her jest, he finally spoke the words on his mind.
"Thank you for leaving me alone, by the way," he snapped angrily, ignoring the way her smile crumbled. His frustration spurned him on, words flowing. "Only by sheer luck did I survive, and even then I'm not sure all of me is unharmed. Perhaps you're jaded and numb to the rigors of the world out here, but I possess no such bravado. I was inches away from being dinner for some stinky lizard!"
He stopped for a moment, waiting for her to reply in a sneering insult at his pride, or a defensive growl, veiled thinly over a threat.
Instead she looked lost, as if unsure how to reply. The fire in her eye snuffed out with reluctant shame. Evidently they both had issues with fessing up their feelings. It was difficult to deny the guilt that twinged at his chest for lashing out, however justified he truly felt.
The rain roared distantly outside, faintly reminding Pebbles of the rolling rumble of a train.
"I…," she said slowly, words dying on her lips. She stared pointedly at the floor. "I haven’t had a traveling companion in a long time. I'm not even sure how long. There was a time back… home, if you could call it that, that I fought with a team. Even then working with a group wasn't my strong suit. 'Too headstrong' and 'too risky' they said. I never thought of the group, just whatever glory and excitement I could get myself into.
And then when I went out on my own with my…" her voice trailed off, her breath hitching as she fought the burning words out. "They were always just as eager to move forward as I was. It never occurred to me how hard it would be to keep them safe out in the wild until…" she squeezed her eye shut, taking a deep solemn breath.
"Ever since then, I've just been on my own. Throwing myself forward into every fight I can find. I don't know…" She looked up at him pleadingly.
"I'm sorry. I'm stubborn and reckless and I know it. It's just hard to change old habits. But I promise I'll at least try, okay?" She looked at him with an exhausted frown as her ears dropped low, the conversation clearly draining.
Pebbles sighed deeply, suddenly imagining himself in the same position before Moon. Hadn’t he done the same thing to her, all those cycles ago? Would she be forgiving? Even if he explained himself? How deep would the wrath of her scolding go? The idea made his spine crawl. Even death by lizard wasn't as dreadful as hearing Moon lecture him.
"I suppose all we can do is try," he mumbled, hugging his knees. "We've come too far to simply lay down and wallow in our mistakes haven’t we?" The words felt fake, like he was reciting a prayer he didn’t truly believe.
"That's certainly true," she said back, head hung low.
The two sat in silence for a long time, the methodical sounds of the rain mixing with Rivulet’s soft snores.
“So what happened while we were gone? We’d just finished cleaning up those scavs and the explosion up there was so loud I thought the bridge was about to fall down,” she asked curiously. Pebbles was quiet for a moment, staring into the glossy surface of the rarefraction cell.
“I’m really not sure, truthfully, though I have a theory,” he said, fingers still twitching at the ghostly sensation. “We control our facilities by directing information to and from our bodies via electrical signals. I never thought it could be utilized in such a manner.”
“I’ve seen you zap centipedes and fling things around using your hands,” she countered. “How is this any different?
“Right, centipedes, thank you for flinging those into my chambers by the way.” He ignored her toothy impish grin. “The difference here is that it was an established system integrated with my puppet, using the conduits built into my chamber walls. The cell was merely touching my hand and somehow that was enough to channel all that energy. It was… invigorating, but it nearly overwhelmed my systems. Fried to pure carbon.” He shivered at the memory of the lizard’s burnt husk, and huddled into his knees.
“See you can handle yourself just fine! No more babysitting, and you can lead the way, zap anything that tries to eat us!” He shook his head firmly.
“I’m not sure how much of that I can get away with. This cell is designed to power an entire iterator on its own, and I just used it to zap a lizard. I’m surprised it didn’t vaporize me. It’s best left alone.”
“That’s what my dad said about flying around using explosives, and yet I’m still here,” she chirped.
“Are all of your colony able to do that?” he asked curiously. The purposed creatures of the world seemed to evolve interesting abilities in groups, and he suddenly imagined an entire colony of industrious exploding Artificer clones.
“Only the fun ones,” she smirked, a playful gleam in her eye. The rain outside droned on, and the slugcat yawned as she curled up on herself. “You going to bed? Can you?”
“We only sleep when maintenance is needed,” he said, “or a system reboot, usually scheduled every few hundred cycles or so. Granted, I’ve never had to sit here and wait out the rain, so I might just do that to pass the time.”
“Suit yourself,” she mumbled sleepily, eye fluttering shut. “I brought all your pearls if you want to do some reading or something.” She nudged her bag, the contents jingling as they shifted. As the rain pounded ceaselessly outside, the option grew more and more tempting.
His mind wandered, thinking back to the events of the cycle. Had it really only been one cycle? It felt like an eternity looking back, and at the same time suddenly so quick. Mere hours ago he was still chained to his rotting can, and now the group was halfway to seeing Moon in person.
It’d probably be the first time iterators ever spoke without using radio networks. Not that anyone was around to document the occasion. A nervous knot formed in his stomach, or whatever his guts were. How upset would she be? He’d ruined her entire life, condemned her to a miserable existence of watching the rain cycle by. He couldn’t imagine sitting there for that long, doing nothing at all. The thought made his skin crawl.
He already felt his thoughts stressed to the limit at times with the meager supply of neurons that he had hidden away. The idea of a mere five being all he could use for eternity was dreadful. Five neurons, rained and flooded constantly, unable to talk to anyone, the list grew on. He’d almost rather become an echo than suffer that fate.
And that was a benevolent fate compared to what had awaited him. The Rot slowly eating him away, bit by bit. Without Arti there to help him, he’d likely still be in that chamber, watching the ichor sprout from the walls. He glanced over at his sassy friend as she snored softly, curled up around their new companion.
Why were they even helping him? The two had always kept each other at arm’s length, and yet out here she had somehow opened up to him. They’d both lost their families, their homes, everything really. Clearly she was too stubborn to be rid of by mere insults alone.
It was nice after all this time to have at least one person he could call a friend. After everyone else he’d pushed away with his stubbornness and stupidity. He nervously wondered if she saw him in the same light, or just as a hapless idiot to keep track of.
What if she hadn’t been there when that one cyst had burst through the wall? Would it merely bumble around, lifeless and dull until it left? Just thinking of the alternative made his chest feel heavy.
He needed a distraction.
He fished his hand into Arti’s bag, sifting through the contents until he located the oldest pearl of the lot. A quick scan of the metadata revealed a video document, dated far far into the past. Further back than the construction of the first iterators. It was beyond amazing that the data had lasted this long and wasn’t corrupted, but clearly Vigilance had seen some significance to storing it.
He synced the audio stream with his internal processors to avoid waking his guests, and began the recording.
The twilight shone through the tinted glass windows of the office, casting long shadows across the brick floor in the fading light. Silence carried on, broken up only by the faint scribbling of a stylus on the old fashioned wooden desk. Behind its surface, sitting on an arguably uncomfortable floor mat, a figure in dark spotted gold robes wearily worked. Their ivory mask, adorned with a single symbol on the brow, was the only indication of their high rank.
The door creaked up, aging hinges protesting the intrusion.
“Shining Vigilance, Pools in the Dark, Citadel Provost Elect-”
“You can spare the titles, acolyte,” Vigilance snapped, not bothering to look up from the floating display of his computer. The robed figure in the doorway, still wearing the bright white of a novice, shuffled unsurely for a few moments. Vigilance rolled his eyes under his bone mask, snapping his fingers impatiently. “Out with it then!”
“You have a visitor, provost,” the initiate said quietly, “From the Engineer’s Guild.” Vigilance grimaced, closing the display and setting down his stylus. So, they finally sent someone in person now. No more ignoring messages it would seem.
He'd been receiving endless mail pearls from the Guild, and at the time had simply assumed that they wanted to leverage his authority to garner favor in the church. It was no secret that he had worked with them in the past to develop a more effective means of storing memories of the departed, but that had been a contractual agreement with a very public image.
The messages he'd been receiving were far more sinister. While they divulged no details, he didn’t need to know the specifics to want nothing to do with it. He already had enough to govern in the Citadel thus far, and he hardly yearned for more projects to manage.
Like managing the extermination of the loose, and growing worryingly larger every cycle, spinner spiders in the basement.
“Send them in,” he muttered, trying to mask the defeat in his voice. The monk nodded solemnly and opened the door widely, ushering in their guest. A short velvet shrouded form stepped through the doorway, the visitor’s richly adorned garments filling the normally spartan office with color. The sun shining through the windows reflected off their golden mask, a crown of gemstones twinkling in the light. Their figure was barely visible beneath the bulk of their splendor, the uniform more befitting of a politician’s messenger than any kind of studied engineer. The initiate took a deep breath as they prepared to launch into introductions.
“Two Chimes, Needles in the-”.
“Leave us,” Vigilance snapped, and the monk scurried away, closing the door behind them. His guest watched casually, unconcerned with the short temper of their host.
“Nice to see that everyone is treated so kindly in the church,” they said plainly, not bothering to sit on the simple cushions on the floor. Already Vigilance could feel his jaw clenching in irritation.
“It's not often that we allow guests to simply barge into our offices,” he said, his voice restrained. “However, it's a pleasure to see the Engineers Guild has finally stooped so low as to visit in person. What is it they sent you for? Speak quickly, I have many matters to address.”
“Straight to the point,” his guest muttered, squaring their shoulders, “they told me you would be blunt. Have you heard of the iterator program? Biomechanical computers, developed via purposed organisms and the power of the void?” Vigilance scoffed, crossing his arms.
“There are few in my circle that haven’t. It's quite the debate. Some claim it's heresy, to attempt to create a god.”
“Do you?” Chimes asked, tone probing and curious.
“Did you come here to ask my opinions on political matters?” He snipped back, but the guest held up their hands defensively.
“Merely curious, that’s all. It's quite a genius concept really, utilizing computers to simulate an endless array of possibilities, all in search of a solution to our Great Problem!” they said proudly, yet Vigilance somehow doubted they had any hand in the development. More a salesman than a scientist, if he had to guess.
“We have a solution for you right downstairs, I invite you to take a swim,” he replied, but Chimes merely laughed.
"Speaking of the void sea so casually, you truly are a rather relaxed monk! Has the church lost so many members to ascension that now the initiates are running the show?" They sneered, but Vigilance was unfazed.
"You should know that the Citadel does not stock its larder with faith or repay its debts with piety. I was granted my position for my management skills, not my ability to recite prayers and lead sermons, though that is certainly part of the job. As for yourself, I'm guessing your father worked high up in the guild, wearing as much glitter and sparkles as you do now, and you're keeping up the family tradition of being utterly useless aristocracy by riding your purebred vulture around and barking orders at the people who actually work?" He smirked under his mask, watching as Chimes huffed and steamed.
"I'll have you know," they said, voice fuming, "that I was granted my place in this project for my diplomatic experience! Now keep silent while I explain why I've even bothered to visit this stony gutter you call a fortress!"
"Never had a guest tell me to shut up in my own office," Vigilance muttered, leaning back as Chimes launched into their demonstration.
“For the vast majority of our people, following the demands of the church to the letter is simply infeasible. We have always used technology to our advantage in the past, and it can assist us here as well.” Vigilance sighed impatiently, idly noting the minutes ticking by on his desk clock. At this rate, he would be spending another late night in the office.
“Two Chimes, none of this explains why you’re in my office, interrupting my work and my busy schedule, please get to your point already,” he said, and if Chimes was offended they didn’t show it. Instead, they merely launched into their next bombastic tirade.
“The main limitation of the iterator prototypes thus far is the operator. Someone must enter the structure and spend countless cycles controlling the facility. The technician must be trained on the correct operation of the thousands of complex systems, many of which are also poorly understood even by their inventors. Then, when they have completed their work shift, they must venture through the pouring rains around the facility back to their home. Their replacement then steps in, but has to get caught up on a number of simulations that they have no knowledge of. It's quite inefficient. Imagine if you were writing a book, and every few pages you went home for someone else to continue. Ridiculous!
The solution our team has devised is quite simple really. We have used a number of purposed organisms in the development of the iterator project, why not here as well? Our engineers have already developed a sophisticated central organism that can direct the entire facility ceaselessly. However, our team has encountered a rather difficult impasse.” Chimes stopped for a breath, as if waiting for Vigilance to say something. The provost remained silent behind his mask, wondering if his glare could somehow vaporize the intruder if he stared hard enough.
“Ahem,” they continued, “the issue being that such a creation fails to match the creativity of an organic user. We can tell it what we want, and it obeys to the letter, but it lacks self sufficiency. Despite our best efforts, we cannot emulate the mind of a sophisticated intellectual.”
“A pity, I’m sure,” Vigilance snarked, relishing how Chimes deflated slightly from his jab. “Perhaps the computer can tell you.”
“Funny you should say that,” Chimes said, stepping forward. “We have identified a solution utilizing the same simulation software that the computers use. By compiling a personality inside a central organism, we believe that we can create a creature befitting our needs. We merely need to ‘seed’ the computer with a few false memories and it will develop on its own from there. We merely require the foundation.” They sounded rather proud of themselves, voice filled with a foolish bravado.
All this presentation and ridiculousness, and they simply want memory recordings?
Suddenly the nature of their visit came together. Why the Guild had sent him endless messages and demanded his attention. It was no secret that the crypts below his citadel housed thousands of such memories from the departed, one of the largest central collections.
He could already imagine the souls of the ascended, wrenched back into the world of the living and forced to toil away at a ceaseless problem endlessly that they had already worked so hard to overcome themselves..
“Absolutely not,” he snapped, a fury rising in his voice as he stood up. “Whatever grotesque creations your Guild devises, I will have no part in it. Get out of my office, lest I have the knights escort you physically!”
“They told me you’d resist, that you always were a fighter,” Chimes said coldly, unintimidated by the provost now towering over their smaller form. “Very well, I didn’t want it to come to this.” They reached into their cloak, tossing a sparkling turquoise pearl on his desk. “Read it.”
Vigilance held his posture for a moment, eyeing the pearl suspiciously, but Chimes merely shrugged and gestured to the sphere apathetically. He picked up the orb, peering into the contents suspiciously. Images? He peered deeper, tempted to load them in his computer’s holo-projector. The faded focus resolved, revealing the contents.
Oh.
The pearl fell to the stone floor, clattering as it rolled under his desk. His mouth went dry, hands shaking as they balled to fists at his side. Denial and fury waged in his mind. The room was silent for a long moment.
“How did you…” he asked through grit teeth, but Chimes merely shrugged.
“I’m just the messenger. I wasn’t told the contents, nor how they were acquired. Just know that the Guild will act if you’re uncooperative,” they said simply, the mirth and showmanship gone from their voice and replaced with a casual aloofness.
“When people learn of this, there will be riots,” he muttered, but his tone was filled with doubt. For all the zeal of the average citizen and working towards their karma, many of them still lived a life that crossed the boundaries of the church regularly. It was impossible to stop people from being people. Chimes merely laughed at his words.
“Who’s going to tell them? Me? The four other people who actually know about this stage of the project?“ They chuckled sadistically, as if enjoying a crass joke. “I think I know quite well how this will go. We will work on a solution to the people’s problem, and they won’t ask questions because they don’t care so long as their needs are met. You’d be surprised how little people think of where their things come from. Too caught up in their own lives to care.”
Vigilance slumped to the floor, eyes staring deeply into the wood grain of his desk, mind lost in thought. All his hard work, his duties and oaths, and his entire career reduced to nothing if he failed to cooperate. And yet it went against everything he stood for.
Chimes cleared their throat impatiently, their artificial friendliness long since gone.
“You’re a vile snake, you know?” Vigilance spat, but Chimes merely shrugged.
“Quit the act, you and I both know neither of us get to where we are without a little blackmail and lying,” they said impassively, absentmindedly wiping a scuff off their opulent shoes. He glared at them, mentally restraining himself from leaping across the desk and throttling his guest.
“Fine,” Vigilance muttered, feeling as if the floor was falling out from under him. “Whatever it takes. Just leave them out of this.”
“Splendid,” Chimes beamed, their facade of friendliness returning. “We’ll be in touch. Have a good evening.”
Vigilance didn’t respond, face buried in his hands. He remained that way as the interloper showed themself out of his office. He stayed there until the sunlight crawled up the walls and the alarm on his clock barked at him to go home. He stood up wearily, eyes still burning and blurry. It wasn’t hard to save a copy of the conversation from his computer’s camera, but he knew it was a futile effort. The Engineers Guilt held global sway, and their iterator project granted them power beyond even the church. He stashed the pearl with the recording in his robes and quietly left the office.
It gave him a feeble hope. The iterator project was impossible, and when the day came for the Guild to answer to the world, he would expose them and their horrid sins.
So he hoped. What else could he do but hope?
Chapter 5
Summary:
Little Rivulet has always been the kind to chase excitement, but this time, she's running for more than her own sake...
Notes:
(See the end of the chapter for notes.)
Chapter Text
Rivulet awoke the same time she did every cycle. The sound of the rain pouring outside did little to deter her from rising, and with a yawn and a stretch she rubbed the sleep from her eyes.
Though, having two strangers in the same shelter was certainly a break in her routine! She’d been so excited by the entire day, she hadn’t had the chance to even talk to them. Perhaps they too would rise early for the cycle?
A quick inspection of her travel partners proved quite the opposite. The red one, Artificer, snored loudly as she laid on her back, limbs draped across the floor. Rivulet still couldn’t get over how big she was! Though she knew better than to talk about a lady’s size. Her other companion, the strange machine person named Pebbles, sat huddled in the corner, face buried in his knees and rigidly still. She leaned in to sniff him, unsure if he was awake or slumbering. People usually moved when they slept, except for the ones who were sleeping forever.
He smelled like stinky fish and anger. It made her nose curl.
“Psttt,” she whispered, leaning in close to his face. “Are you dead?”
No reaction. Oh well!
He was a mystery to the little water dancer. She’d never had the chance to truly meet an iterator, and the idea of talking with someone who knew so much was exciting. She eagerly wanted to hear his stories of the old world, or the strange technology that his people once used. More than anything, she hoped that Pebbles could help her friend Moon. He seemed much more alert and talkative, though he’d mentioned that his old home was rotting. Maybe he didn’t know how to clean very well? She decided against judgment, as he was pretty small and his home was huge.
His terribly scary home, filled with monsters and strange walls and floors that tried to yank you into them, or the squishy wet crawling things that reminded her of the huge squids from the southern seas. She’d never seen a squid yank an entire lizard into its body and dissolve it. The slurping noise it had made still made her spine shiver. A very strange thing to decorate your home with, she surmised, though Moon had filled her home with water and sea creatures, so maybe his kind simply had very odd tastes.
At least Moon’s facility smelled of the rich familiar aroma of salt water, and the creatures there all tasted delicious! Pebble’s home reeked of decay, like a jellyfish left in the sun. She didn’t dare eat anything there, worried it would make her sick to her stomach.
It wasn’t too crazy to work with other species to protect yourself. She knew that jet fish could be tamed and ridden with a sizable bribe in the way of jellyfish and fruit. Perhaps Moon and Pebbles had somehow tamed the creatures in their homes to protect them, though she struggled to imagine where they got the food for that. The only thing she even considered eating in Pebble’s home was those weird flying things he worried about the entire trip.
Moon had been quite cross with her for even trying to touch one. She couldn’t imagine Pebbles giving one away. Maybe that’s why he was leaving his den, the animals sure didn’t seem very friendly.
Enough thinking! It was beginning to make her head spin. A yearning had filled her bones, demanding she go outside and explore. The shelter was still closed, but that had never stopped her in the past.
She stood up on her tiptoes, reaching far above the seal where a small panel could be found. She couldn’t read any of the words, but she knew that if she yanked it open and pressed the shiny red button, the door would open for her. Thankfully their current shelter was above the ground, so water wouldn’t come rushing inside.
The doors grinded open in a chaotic din, the noise from the rain combining to nearly blast her ears off her head. And yet somehow when she looked over her shoulder at her companions, they hadn’t moved an inch. Artificer snored loudly, as if competing with the rain over who could be more deafening, and Pebbles hadn’t moved an inch. Rivulet shrugged and turned to crawl out the exit, her mind filled with thoughts of freshly popped bubble fruit.
A yank on her tail jerked her to a halt, nearly making her jump out of her skin with a yipe.
Pebbles glared at her from the corner of the shelter, fingers digging into the flesh of her finned hind. His eyes watched her with a scathing look of disdain and scrutiny, and yet underneath his scowl he looked truly exhausted. Despite having a robotic face made of metal, he looked sickly and stressed, and as if he’d been crying. It reminded Rivulet of another pack mate, and how sick he had been after eating a popper fish from the reefs. He’d been stuck inside for days, barely able to hold down water and retching up any food.
Somehow Pebbles looked worse.
“Where do you think you’re going?” he croaked, voice crackling and horse. She beamed a wide smile back at him. Maybe he would join her?
“Outside!” she chirped, and he rolled his eyes. He seemed to do that often.
“I could tell that part,” he hissed, grip unwavering. “Why have you opened the door early? What do you intend to do out there?”
“Well when the rain is fresh, there’s all sorts of extra tasty critters out there! I always wake up early to get a start on the day and hunt,” a flash of pride entered her voice, chest puffing up. “It's a special system I’ve developed myself. Why worry about food and travel in the middle of the cycle when you can get a headstart?” Pebbles didn’t look convinced. He continued to stare at her, eyes scanning for something in her stance or voice. Did he think she was going to run off?
He wasn’t exactly wrong.
“Fine,” he muttered, releasing his grip on her tail. “I’m closing the door behind you, and you better be back by the time the rain ends, or we’re leaving you behind.” She pouted, but Pebbles left little room for argument, curling back up and glaring at the floor. Maybe she had woken him up when opening the door? That would explain his higher than usual irritation.
Or maybe it was Arti snoring like a drowning lizard the entire night. That certainly didn’t help.
Still, the water dancer had work to do, and she fervently fled the shelter into the wet outdoors.
The entrance to their shelter was barely protected from the torrential downpour by a small ledge, keeping away the worst of the rain’s might. A few feet away, the water pounded down like a curtain of fury, and she knew that if she dared enter the stream it would wash her away to the ocean. Behind her, the faint churning of the shelter doors sealed her outside.
The land around her was shrouded in mist, fog billowing up from the chilled water as the rising sun began to warm the air. Through the dense fog, Rivulet could faintly pick out spires of machinery and land in the water, but her view was quickly cut off as the rain poured down again. The morning air was frigidly cold against her slick hide, puffs of steam tickling her nose with every breath. The wind blew freezing droplets against her, sticking to her skin in a shivering mixture of slush.
No matter, adventure awaited!
The rain lapsed for a moment, the onslaught waning to a more reasonable torrent. Rivulet dashed into the water, skipping across small puddles and debris washed up by the floods. She swiped a rock up and nearly instantly hurled it into a floundering lizard, then dived into cover under a crumbling beam just as the water returned. Her heart pounded, whiskers twitching as excitement and adrenaline surged through her blood.
And as the rain subsided again, she was away in a flash.
She almost missed it as she ran by, the deep rich blue of bubble fruit pods hidden under a small overhang in the mud. Rivulet quickly dove below, cramming herself into the space as she waited out the storm. The fruit grew in abundance, sprouting stalks crowned with their pearls. She grabbed as many as her arms could carry, stuffing a few in her cheeks as well. It was a conscious struggle not to let her mouth water with excitement. She’d never seen so many in one place! Perhaps all the extra rain let them grow in ample abundance? Come to think of it, was the water getting higher?
She dived out of cover in a hurry, paws plodding through shallow water and wet mud. Thankfully she hadn’t come far from the shelter, and with a bit of luck and promises of good food, they would open the door again! She had to be careful not to let the bundle of seeds in her hands get wet, otherwise their expanded size would make them impossible to carry.
That, and she could never resist the temptation to eat every last one. For a moment she was tempted to simply dump the haul into a puddle and gorge herself on the delicious fruit.
Begone temptation! Perhaps Pebbles wouldn’t care, she hadn’t seen him eat anything, but Artificer would no doubt want a nice breakfast. She’d used plenty of energy vocally vibrating the entire room after all.
She plunged into a pipe, crawling through on her elbows as she squirmed to the end. Only a bit closer and she’d be back at the shelter! As she popped her head out the end, she came to a screeching halt.
Huddled in ambush positions around the shelter, several scavenger soldiers waited. Their bone masks dripped with rain, spears tipped with explosives. Grenades dangled from their belts. They had even draped junk and debris over their bodies in an effort to conceal themselves.
They don’t look like they’re here to make friends…
Artificer and Pebbles would never see it coming!
She sat there for a moment, mind whirling as she tried to think. She’d never had issues with scavs, usually just darting around or even over their tolls and ignoring whatever issues they had, but Artificer seemed quite determined to fight the critters. Rivulet had merely watched as last cycle she cut a whirlwind of blood through their numbers, dancing between their spears and going so far as to rip them apart with her own claws. A brutal display of sheer rage and power, her teeth gnashing as she gutted her enemies. It was electrifying to watch! Rivulet could only wish she had that raw power and skill one day.
Maybe when she finally got that growth spurt she was due for. It wasn’t her fault she was small!
Now the scavengers had come for revenge. The ambush must have arrived right after Rivulet left, and she struggled to think of how she could warn her new friends. It wasn’t as if she could fight them herself! Maybe she could lure them away?
An idea came to mind and she took it, however much of a gamble it was.
She squeezed back into the tunnel, dumping her plunder in the process. Food could wait, though it broke her heart to listen to the pods pop behind her.
Be strong Rivulet, be strong!
Rivulet had been in a hurry before, but now she scrambled across the landscape in a desperate race. She dived between shelters, barely avoiding the rain crushing down. Her destination was far, and she wouldn’t have much time before the rains ended. The speed filled her with a twisted giddy sensation, danger and deadliness culminating in a surge of adrenaline and excitement.
As her heart pounded a drumbeat of velocity in her ears, she couldn’t help but laugh madly as she ran. Nothing like the threat of death to remind you of how good it was to be alive!
Her mind attempted to distract her. What if she was too slow? What if she couldn’t find what she needed? Artificer was clearly strong and capable, but if something happened to Pebbles… She had barely known the robot, but she didn’t want him to get hurt! Especially since it would probably just make him complain more.
Her journey led her into the dank, dark pipe networks below the waterline, crawling over leech infested pools, diving deep into water that nearly froze her skin, and into mounds of trash as she neared the edge of the shoreline territory. The water turned a sickly brown as she neared the border with the garbage wastes. The rains were calming, and her time was nearing an end.
Rivulet dove into the piles of refuse near the gate entrance, frantically searching for her salvation. A large garbage worm hovered over her, peering its wide white eyes into the mound of trash she frantically sifted through. She overturned a large chunk of metal, only to hiss in pain as a gash of crimson blood began to ooze from her paw pad, the deep cut leaving the skin jaggedly torn.. Tears welled in her eyes, breath hitching as her paw throbbed, dripping dark splotches of red.
She couldn’t stop now. Adventure demanded bravery and sacrifice!
Her hunt continued, frantically searching even as the rain pounded against her back. Just as the clouds were beginning to part, she turned over a chunk of stone and cried out in excitement when she found her goal.
Under the rock, a wriggling vulture grub squirmed and fidgeted, obviously quite confused by its sudden exposure to the outside world. Luckily enough, it wasn’t dead yet, despite being exposed to the open air. Rivulet thanked her luck, the grub likely somehow washed into the region from the rains. Scooping it into her hand, and ignoring the pain in her paw, she turned and sprinted back to her companions.
As the rains came to a gentle conclusion, all manner of creatures emerged from their dens to hunt. The cycles were short these days, and anyone who didn’t secure a meal as fast as possible would starve under the unrelenting rain. Unfortunately for Rivulet, this meant that her return journey was filled with far more excitement.
She dove into the water, swimming down into the depths to reconnect to the underwater pipe network, only to narrowly avoid the snapping jaws of a hungry pink lizard. With a thrashing burst of speed, she zipped towards the drainage funnel, the water flow yanking her in. Not today!
She didn’t have a moment to rest, falling down the shaft and splashing into the water pooling at the bottom. The current dragged her along on its journey out to the sea. Hardly deterred by her escape, the water erupted in a splash as the lizard tumbled inside.
On a good day, she might have searched for a meal to bribe the lizard with. Water lizards were aggressive and stubborn in their hunt, and giving them something else to chase was a far simpler solution than attempting to outrun them in their element.
And maybe she wanted to see if it’d let her ride on its back. That was always fun!
She scrambled upwards and across a metal beam, narrowly avoiding the greedy maw of the swimming lizard as she leapt up to a platform above and dashed outside. The rain had left a number of pools in the swampy ground, all filled to the brim with hungry leeches, lizards, and kelp. She could only watch with a pounding heart as she climbed above them in the rickety metal scaffolds, noting that the safer route was also slower. The temptation to leap into the mess and simply work her way through it was strong, but if she somehow lost the grub her plan would be ruined.
And to think all I wanted was some bubble fruit, she glumly noted, nervously crawling past a rather inconveniently rooted kelp plant that blocked the way, warily watching its drooping leaves for a twitch of movement.
The home stretch!
She nearly tripped on the discarded bubble pods as she crawled back near the shelter, noting that the scavs had barely moved in the time. She couldn’t imagine sitting still for that long. Overhead, the clouds parted to reveal the bright blue sky, a vibrant rainbow shining through the remaining mists. Batflies emerged from their holes, fluttering and chirping as they danced in the air. Her ears twitched as she heard the shelter doors faintly opening, even from across the clearing. The scavs tensed, readying their spears.
Not a moment to spare, I guess that means I didn’t waste any time! Peak speed! A twisted smirk filled her face. Time to save her friends!
Rivulet tossed the grub at the scavengers, diving into cover just as it began to squeal and shine into the sky. Its light was met with the twin lasers of a very annoyed looking king vulture, swooping in to hover above them. Its cruel eyes glared down at them mockingly, as if merely amused by the group.
The scavengers turned frantic almost instantly, pack members desperately trying to flee the predator as it dove down on them. Without hesitation it snatched a helpless scavenger, its body split in half as the vulture bit down with a wet crunch and greedily ate it up. Its allies attempted to fight back, flinging explosive spears at the creature, but with a well timed puff of its gasses it launched back into the sky, narrowly avoiding the barrage. From above, it struck back, enormous harpoons firing down on its prey and plucking their limp bodies from the ground.
The scavengers dove for cover, trying to break sight from the beast as they crawled into the tunnel networks below. Far too slowly, as with a loud thunk, the vulture impaled one right through its chest, and yanked the creature up into the air to its doom.
The hunt continued, the vulture wasting no time as it hovered around the area and picked off the remaining survivors. Rivulet didn’t dare move a muscle, her usual bouncing energy snuffed out like a wet match. From across the clearing, she saw the pink face of Pebbles, watching the carnage from the shelter with wide eyes. It was probably the only time she’d seen him look anything but grumpy.
The vulture left as quickly as it had come, leaving nothing behind but sticky puddles of blood, abandoned weaponry, and a lonesome wriggling grub. Rivulet quickly dashed across the clearing, hopping on her feet as she ran to meet Pebbles. The robot slowly stepped out of the shelter entrance, eyes lost in the display of the carnage.
“Hey Pebbles!” Rivulet chittered, hopping in excited circles around the iterator. He turned to look at her, still adrift in confusion.
“What did you do?” he asked, voice full of baffled wonder. She stopped and shrugged, watching the bugs crawling in the dirt.
“Nothing really,” she aimlessly babbled, “went out and got some bubble fruit. But when I came back there were all these mean looking scavengers waiting outside, and I know they’re angry and don’t like us. Except there’s not much I can do myself against a bunch of tough looking warriors.” She glanced up at him, a proud grin filling her face. “The vulture took care of that.”
Pebbles stared at her for a moment, eyes full of disbelief. She’d seen that look before, whenever she told her family of some grand discovery she’d found, or a wild place she’d been to. The narrow calculating eyes of skepticism. As if to say ‘How did a little one like you do all this?’
A feeling she was far too familiar with.
“Impressive,” Pebbles said, and her eyes went wide. “A clever trick really, using one of those worms to lure one in, only for it to eviscerate our enemies instead.” He walked across the crumbling debris and plucked the grub off the ground. “You know, in my time these creatures were bred as simple treats. A vulture rider would use the laser to signal the creature down, and then feed it the worm to reward its obedience. I suppose in a sense, you did give it quite the meal.”
“Wow, people used to ride those things?” Amazement filled her eyes, imagining flinging the worm and riding the vulture it summoned into the skies. An image filled her mind as she pictured herself soaring above the clouds on her noble steed, journeying across the lands with the wind in her whiskers. It certainly seemed like a nice way to travel!
“At one point they used to race them, fighting in the skies for sport,” he said. “Now they serve their own purpose, using their flight and weaponry to prey upon pitiful ground dwellers. Even the little grub has abandoned its original purpose, just like everything else my creators made in this world.”
“Does that include you too?” she asked innocently, cocking her head sideways. Pebbles sure liked to talk a lot, but she couldn’t help but be curious. He scowled down at the miserable grub, floundering in the dirt and blood that it had inadvertently created. He was silent for a long moment.
“Yes, I suppose it does,” he muttered, a strange resentment on the edge of his voice.
Their conversation was interrupted by a loud yawn from behind them, and the two turned to watch a sleepy looking Artificer meander down to meet them. Her helm dangled halfway on her head, the group’s bags dragging in the dirt behind her.
“Mornin’,” she grunted groggily, hurling Pebble’s bag at him and nearly sending him tumbling over. “Don’t forget your junk.” He glared daggers at her, quickly slinging the bag over his shoulders.
“My brain is in there you know,” he hissed irritably.
“Really? Didn’t know you had one,” she smirked, and Rivulet had to stuff her paws over her face to suppress her giggles. It did little good, and she hissed in pain as her cut brushed against her face. Artificer was on her in an instant, checking over her wound nervously.
“Oh you poor little thing, how’d you get this?” She cooed, and Rivulet twitched and squirmed in her grip. She was fine! She wasn’t even bleeding anymore!
“I’m fine! I swear!” she pleaded, but Artificer ignored her fidgeting, fussing around in her bag for a bundle of sticky glowing goo wrapped in some leaves. It smelled faintly of smoke with a sharp stinging odor, and burned like a bad centipede shock as it rubbed into the wound.
“Quit your whining,” Artificer chided, and thankfully the stinging faded to a pleasant numbness, the goo hardening into a sticky glue which held her cut closed. “Did scavs do this to you? Do you want me to find them and make them say sorry?” Rivulet juggled the thought in her mind, if only to ride on her back while Artificer flew through the air in a fury and pretended that she was riding a vulture.
“I think our scavenger friends are more than sorry after what that vulture did to them,” Pebbles commented, watching the skies carefully.
“A vulture?” She noticed the wriggling worm at their feet, and stared at Rivulet incredulously. “You brought in a vulture to kill some scavs?” Rivulet nodded her head furiously, a wide grin on her face. She imagined Artificer would be upset at her for taking such a risk, but she was prepared to deal with the blowback.
Instead, the large red slugcat broke out in hoarse smokey laughter, slapping Rivulet on the back as she nearly fell over. Not the reaction she expected, but a welcome one! At Least until her back began to sting from the blow. Ow.
“You clever little critter!” Artificer barked heartily, “I usually prefer to deal with them myself, but a vulture is a great substitute, especially in the open here! How’d you find a grub out here? They usually prefer dark and dry places.”
“By the entrance to that place full of all of the trash!” Rivulet smiled, and Pebbles gawked in awe.
“That’s nearly clear on the other side of the region! You’re telling me that you ran there and back while it was still raining?” She stopped and thought for a moment, stroking her whiskers as she pondered his question.
“Actually,” she laughed, “I ran out to get some bubblefruit, came back, saw the scavs, then went and got a grub and came back!” He stared at her dumbfounded, and even Artificer looked impressed.
“Shesh kid, way to make me feel old,” she halfheartedly grumbled, but a mischievous gleam entered her eye. “Sorry Pebbles is so slow, must drive you crazy to sit and wait for him to finish complaining every five minutes.” The iterator sent a burning glare her way, but that only seemed to fuel her smirk. Pebbles huffed and stormed off towards the path leading away.
“You two can sit here giggling amongst each other all cycle if you want,” he shouted over his shoulder. “I’m going to get moving. Void forbid I hold you two back!” His voice faded away as he crawled through the rubbish.
The two slugcats watched him vanish into the distance, sharing a look between each other after a moment.
“Does he realize he’s going the wrong way?” Rivulet asked, tilting her head curiously. Artificer merely shrugged, evidently unconcerned with her lost friend, and her stomach gurgled.
“You mentioned bubblefruit? Wanna go get some more?” Rivulet smiled and nodded, her feet already carrying her away. Time for another race!
Pebbles stared out at the pool of water in front of him. The dark blue liquid sloshed lightly against the bank, small waves breaking along the terrain as the wind ushered them towards the shore. Though that wasn’t what Pebbles was looking at, as his attention focused squarely on the large long worms swirling beneath the surface.
The blue leeches somehow sensed his presence, and occasionally one would try to ride a wave in and latch to his feet, only to be harshly pulled back by the running waters. Pebbles glared at the worms from his position, as if his scowl could vaporize them.
He’d never wondered what his creators had been thinking when they created all manner of strange purposed organisms, however in this case he struggled to imagine what use these water worms could serve. Many of them were simple and dull, fleshy bits stuffed into boxes to follow a simple defined purpose, entirely harmless.
Though they hadn’t defiled the memories of the dead to create them.
Aside from that, how different was he from these leeches, or the grub that summoned the vulture? Just another echo of his creators, carelessly left behind to scrounge out a life in the world they had created. Some had clearly flourished, like the graceful slugcats, the mighty vultures, the adaptive lizards, and even the greedy scavengers. He wondered what future awaited him, along with any other iterators he could reach.
How many had fallen instead? How many creatures had been living one day, dutifully serving their purpose, only for their creators to vanish the next cycle and leave them stowed away in their little boxes to slowly decay? In the distance his can loomed high above in the sky, listing heavily as it crumbled apart bit by bit. He’d escaped one prison, at the very least.
That victory did little to boost his spirits compared to the revelation he’d learned last cycle. A prison inside of a prison, his puppet body simply another device that his creators had used to their ends. At least for a moment he had felt freedom when they escaped his structure.
Bugs in a maze within a maze, tossed back in if they escaped. The idea made his head pulse with pain, eyes stinging. The waves rolled against his legs, the leeches once again attempting to crawl out to him, endlessly pulled back in.
“I’m glad that we’re up here and they’re down there,” Rivulet’s shrill voice said to his side, throwing him from his thoughts. He was quiet for a long moment, the vibrant creature bouncing on her feet as she attempted to stand next to him.
“Quite the pitiful existence, trapped inside a tiny miserable fetid pool of water, wouldn’t you think?” he grumbled distastefully.
“Well, it might be a bit smelly and full of trash, but how do you know they aren’t happy where they are? Maybe they like their stinky puddle and just make the most of it, and you don’t know how deep it goes! Could be a whole other world down there,” she squeaked, poking a leech with a spear as it drifted too close. The creature swam away in a flurry of movement, and Pebbles watched as it vanished into the depths.
Bugs in a maze, worms in a pond. Every living creature was trapped here, simply eking out an existence. To what end? The iterators, for all their splendor and might verging on the edge of godhood, were no less stuck in this life than slimy leeches in a rank puddle.
Make the most of it…
“No offense Rivulet,” Arti said behind them, the larger cat plodding up behind them. “But I think it really is just a leech infested puddle of grime.” The water dancer pouted, now outnumbered. Arti turned to him, a wry smile under her mask. “We were wondering how far you’d go before realizing this was the wrong way. Homesick already?”
“Hardly,” Pebbles uttered distastefully, his rotting can looming in the background. “If you two have finished your breakfasts, we should get moving along. We need to get to Moon quickly, the internal structures must have sustained far more damage than I thought. At the very least, her facility should provide ample cover from any falling debris.”
“And if we get her loose and it comes crashing down on us the way back?” She returned, her nose scrunching as a visible chunk of the can’s outside casing slowly peeled itself away, revealing its decaying innards. Had the rot been spreading, even without power? How much longer did they have until it destroyed enough systems to destabalize the entire can? And what would come crawling out of the carcass when it fell?
“Simple. Don’t be there when it happens,” he smirked, but Arti’s unimpressed look showed her lack of confidence. He sighed, mulling over the thought in his head. What was their plan? Obviously they had to go help Moon, her decaying can had been in far worse shape than his for a far longer time, and no doubt she’d appreciate liberation from her rusting superstructure. But after that?
He really wasn’t sure anymore.
The constant pulling urge he’d felt to follow his creators into some blissful afterlife had left him, discarded somewhere along the line between nearly falling to his death and watching an enormous flying beast tear creatures to shreds. A tingle of something eked down his spine, putting a haste in his steps and an alertness in his eyes. It almost felt like he’d been deeply asleep, dreaming the same dreams, completing the same tasks, mindlessly churning on.
He felt revived, almost as if he hadn't even been living before all this.
The second he’d left his can, life had turned into a whirlwind of danger and terror, and yet he couldn’t deny the part of him that felt awakened by the excitement. He thought back to the era where his citizens still inhabited his city, and all their endless complaints of boredom and apathy. Every need they could have, instantly catered to by an endlessly complex churning machine. What did they do all day, besides sit around and watch the machines they'd made deliver to their demands or whine about how hard it was to sit on his skin all day.
Had they simply yearned for an eternal afterlife out of sheer boredom, simply because they had removed all earthy struggles? The idea was baffling, and yet his conversations with Arti and Rivulet had given him a glimpse into their lives. Their clans toiled day and night, fighting predators and carving out their own niche. Perhaps they were too distracted by the daily rigors of life to even consider waxing philosophies about the nature of death. The struggles of daily life far too distracting to enable such ideas.
Pebbles could hardly think about which direction to go. The idea of making his way to the void sea seemed almost foreign, as alien as the idea of walking out of his can had been.
Moon would know. She'd lead their local group for countless cycles, she would know where to take them next.
He hoped.
“Let’s just focus on getting to her first, I’m not exactly sure how difficult her facility will be to traverse given her current state,” he said, already trying to imagine navigating submerged corridors and eroded components. His facility had been in terrible condition, but at least they had the luxury of it not being underwater.
Rivulet’s wide grin didn’t give him much confidence.
The group took off across the waterlogged landscape, Rivulet leading the way. As they traveled, the wide puddles and pools grew into enormous ponds filled with leeches and lizards. Squidcada buzzed above, occasionally diving in to swipe a leech and zip away. Through a break in the clouds, he briefly spotted the dull gray of Moon’s can, mangled and warped by its collapse. It sent a deep twinge of guilt through his neurons.
He was both terrified and excited to meet her in person. Terrified that she would hate him, spewing vitriol over how he’d forced her into an endless limbo of helplessly waiting out the cycles, and excited that he’d at least get to see her again. Hopefully she’d be more forgiving if he came bearing the gift of freedom with him.
They scrambled over a chunk of rusting metal, only to come to a halt at the apex. The water stretched out before them, vanishing into the fog and mists. Pebbles peered out to the edge, nervously noting that the ground vanished into the depths rather quickly.
The faint memory of some creature looming below the waters surfaced to his mind, freezing him on the spot. Even Arti stalled behind, her usual confidence faltering at the sight.
“I suppose it’d be a bad time to mention I’m a terrible swimmer?” she said, chuckling sheepishly. Rivulet looked more confused than anything, staring at the water bewilderedly.
“It wasn’t this high when I was here before!” she said, glaring at the liquid with all the hatred her tiny form could muster. “How did it get so big? When I came this way a few cycles ago, I walked!”
The pieces suddenly clicked in Pebble’s mind.
“Void damn it, without my can absorbing as much water as possible, the local water table is rapidly rising,” he fumed. Another exciting development in their journey, as if they hadn’t had enough issues to deal with. Traversing the water by swimming would take ages, if he didn’t sink to the bottom that is. It wasn’t as if he’d had plenty of time to practice swimming in his captivity.
Nevermind if something came to see if they’d make a good meal…
“Where do we go from here, Rivulet?” Arti asked, glowering at the water with distaste. The small slugcat fidgeted as she thought, and Pebbles wondered if smoke was going to come out of her ears.
“Well we have to go through these really tall pipes underground, and then swim underwater for a bit to reach her side of the water. I could swim the entire way there, but I’d be scared for you guys since you’re probably much slower, and if something tries to snatch us on the open water we have nowhere to go!” She flopped onto the ground, looking rather distraught.
The ocean before them suddenly churned, some wild creature sending waves as it raced towards them. The iterator took a few cautious steps back from the shore, wary that whatever it was would simply reach out and yank him in. He wouldn’t put it past this world to create such a creature.
Rivulet however, had other ideas. With a wild squeal she dived into the water, vanishing beneath the surface.
“Rivulet wait!” Arti shouted, attempting to grab her, but the water dancer was already gone.
So much for our guide…
Moments later, she sprung out of the ocean in a blur of blue and black. The creature rushing towards them spewed water into the air as it launched out to meet her. With a wet smack the two collided, Rivulet wrapping her arms around the creature as they sank back in.
Was she laughing?
They surfaced again, and Pebbles could now clearly see the jetfish as it arched through the air, a trail of water following behind it. Rivulet was perched on its back, arms up as she cheered through the sky. They vanished below the surface again, the water a rush of movement as the pair twisted and danced in the depths.
It was hard to deny his jealousy. Many people who reported speaking with an echo often claimed an intense envy for the living, yearning for a return to a flesh body. Pebbles felt that same feeling now, a strange longing in his chest as he imagined himself flying through the sky with the wind in his face.
A sudden memory filled his senses. The clouds below him, and the blue sky above teeming with stars. He rode on the back of some enormous creature, straddling its broad shoulders as they soared through the sky. He glanced over his shoulder, the rushing wind threatening to wrench his neck out of place as he did, and behind them a blur raced at their back. Only one concrete thought filled his mind amidst the flurry of motion and raw speed.
Faster!
The sudden realization that this was some ancient fragment of whatever horrid process had created him filled his senses with a queasiness, like a body rejecting a doner limb. Though it was hard to deny the remaining wave of excitement and adrenaline filling his neurons.
The memory broke as water spritzed his face, Rivulet splashing back near the shore with her creature. Arti sputtered and cursed behind him, the fuzzy cat soaked in the spray.
“Guys! Oh my gosh!” Rivulet babbled, body squirming almost as much as the jetfish she sat on. “This is my jetfish Bubbles! She found us!” The aquatic critter made a contended noise like a burst faucet, and Rivulet leaned down to nuzzle its cheeks, their whiskers nearly becoming tangled up together. Its wide pink eyes, almost akin its rider’s, bulged with joy.
“Nice to meet you Bubbles,” Arti groaned, trying to shake the water off her dense fur. It only served to poof her outwards, the slugcat looking like a shaggy reindeer. Pebbles couldn’t help but laugh at the display, nearly doubling over on his knees. At least until she hoisted him up over her head and flung him right into the freezing water.
He sat in the muck for a moment, chuckles still running through his frame. His robes were stained, muddy, and now full of brackish water, and yet he couldn’t stifle the amusement filling his body.
Until Bubbles rushed over to ‘play’ with him, instantly smothering him under the waterline as it flopped over his body. It was a good thing he didn’t need a steady supply of air.
Eventually Rivulet pulled the creature off of him, and the iterator was able to stand up again.
“How’s the water, Pebbs?” Artificer mocked from the dry shore, the angry edge in her voice like a hot knife.
Pebbs? So it'd finally come back around then. Touche.
“Like a warm sunny day!” he spat back, flicking his wet fingers in her direction and enjoying how she nearly lept back from the droplets. For once, he had her. “Really Arti? Afraid of a bit of water?” She hissed wildly back at him, grabbing a rock from the ground and flinging it at the smug cyborg, who flung himself back into the water as he clumsily dodged.
“It's not that!” she spat smoke as Pebbles hid behind Bubble’s mass. “You don’t get it! My people can’t swim long, it messes with our skin and we pop up like firecrackers if we stay underwater too long!” Even under her mask, he could easily tell how embarrassed she was by the admission. The mighty Artificer couldn’t swim.
“Nobody tell the scavs, or they’ll bring buckets next time!” He taunted back, crawling out of the ocean sopping wet and miserable, but feeling quite victorious in the verbal spar.
“What’s a bucket?” Rivulet asked, ears flopping as she tilted her head. Pebbles felt his eye twitch, a spark flying across his antennae as he sighed deeply.
“Nevermind,” he mumbled, the humor evaporating from his body. Suddenly an idea formed in his mind. “Rivulet, why don’t we all ride Bubbles to Moon’s facility?” Arti scowled at the suggestion, nose scrunching.
“That’s a great idea!” Rivulet cheered, but Bubbles somehow seemed to understand the proposition and thrashed around under her, making a noise like an angry steam vent. “Oh… Sorry, but I don’t think she could carry all three of us at the same time.”
“Better plan,” Arti said, tapping her spear on the ground for emphasis. “You two go and get Moon, I’ll stay here and not explode from drowning. I’ll go back to the shelter we were just at and hunker down for a few cycles until you return.” The idea sounded solid, though Pebbles found it hard to deny the faint pang of melancholy at the thought of leaving his familiar friend behind. On top of that, it left them woefully exposed if they encountered any resistance along the way. Nevermind that he wasn’t exactly keen on being stuck with Rivulet.
Though it’d give them a break from the scavengers, at the least.
The sky rumbled overhead, driving the plan into motion and leaving little room to argue. Pebbles waded out to the water, joining Rivulet alongside her pet jetfish.
“It's easy!” she beamed, “just grab her by these short fins and hang on tight! It’ll be fun!” He followed her instructions, nervous excitement filling his neurons.
Fun. Right. Sure.
“Good luck you two!” Arti shouted from the shore. “Don’t misbehave!” Pebbles prepared to snap back at her with a witty remark, but then Rivulet nudged her mount and the beast was away.
He felt his arms nearly wrench away as they launched into the ocean, the world skipping across the surface in short jumps. It was all he could do to clamp down hard and struggle not to scream. Over his shoulder, the shoreline quickly faded away, Arti’s lonesome form slowly vanishing into the mists.
Pebbles saw her shoot them a wave, and the next moment she was gone.
The two sped on into the distance, the rushing water nearly deafening him, but not enough to drown out the sound of Rivulet’s delighted laugher and cheering. She whooped and hollered, encouraging her mount to fly faster, occasionally diving them underwater to loop back towards the surface in a spectacular breach. Pebbles could only beg the void for strength to hold on, and pray his grip didn’t fail.
Though it was hard to deny the exhilaration. Cycles of slowly walking and climbing around, the speed was a welcome reprieve. The vertigo in his gut as they arched in loops through the air had him screaming, but in an oddly good way. The thunder and storm booming overhead only spurred the fish on as it raced towards the opposite shore.
After an eternity of sitting in one room, lauching across the distance like this almost made him queasy. What else had he been missing out on?
The fog cleared as they approached, the titanic form of Moon’s collapsed superstructure revealing in front of them. The gray metal stretched into the skies, the tops vanishing into the dark clouds. Pebbles didn’t dare look down into the dark depths, terrified of what might lurk below.
Bubbles launched out of the water, landing with a wet flop on the edge of one of Moon’s external steam vents that only just reached out of the water. Rivulet leapt off her mount with a flip, landing alongside and nuzzling the creature as she praised its haste. Pebbles merely struggled to stand, legs shaking as he tried to cope with the sudden cessation of speed.
Ahead of them, built into the gray metal, a glowing access shaft beckoned them in. Pebbles gut sank, nervousness at the confrontation far outweighing any remaining vertigo from the jetfish joy ride.
“Ok Bubbles, be a good girl and go find somewhere safe” Rivulet cooed, somehow wrapping her creature into a wide hug, even if it was several times her size. She snuggled the beast, their whiskers brushing together. A moment later, the jetfish dove back into the water, quickly vanishing into the distance in a series of graceful arching leaps. Rivulet stared at the fading form, her usual cheerful demeanor instead overpowered with a longing and sadness. It was the longest he'd ever seen her sit still.
Pebbles fought the urge to break the moment and urge her along, imagining that if Arti were here, she’d smack him over the head for disrupting the sad farewell. It wasn’t as if he was in any hurry to go meet his doom either way.
Eventually, the sky above them collapsed under its weight, the rain storm spraying the two down in a growing monsoon. Pebbles wondered if he would ever feel dry again. There was a time where he couldn't get enough water, and now he wanted nothing to do with the substance.
Quickly, the pair dove inside, Pebbles following along as Rivulet led him through a labyrinth of twisting corridors and meandering pipeways. The distance stretched on, and more than once the pair had to double back to find a new route, the chambers either broken down or filling slowly with water. The rain began to beat down on the structure, metal groaning as it shook and rumbled.
He hoped Arti was alright.
“Are you sure we’re safe here?!” He shouted at his guide over the noise as the two crawled upwards through a water pipe. She only looked back at him confused, as if not understanding his concern. “We need to get higher, the water line is going to keep rising!”
“There’s a shelter just up ahead here!” she hollered back, “We can stay there!” Pebbles nodded in agreement, glancing back downward, only to notice the water rushing up the pipes below them.
Rivulet shot ahead like a rocket, twisting through the network and barely giving Pebbles a chance to catch up. They rounded a corner, the glowing light of a shelter beckoning them forwards as the pair desperately crawled inside. The gears churned the doors shut, but not before a bit of water sprayed inside. They’d made it, and with barely any time to spare.
Pebbles slumped down to the floor, the flurry of adrenaline fading as his body suddenly filled with aches and pains. Rivulet sat across from him, looking rather content despite the close call they’d made. The dull roar of the rain outside gently pulled him into a doze, and for a moment he debated actually shutting down for the cycle.
The silence didn’t last long.
“That was a lot of fun!” Rivulet said loudly, snapping Pebbles out of his stupor. He opened his eyes to see her mere inches from his face, wide pink eyes shining down on him. “Did you see the leviathan we passed over? Or the flock of vultures that flew over our heads? That’s what all the diving and flips were for. They’ll swoop down on you if you move in a straight line, but if you go all over the place then they tend to view you as too much of a hassle!”
“Right,” he mumbled, rubbing his face wearily. No rest for the wicked, so it would seem. With any luck she’d pass out just as fast as last cycle.
“Normally it's much faster but I’m not used to having passengers plus I think you created a bunch of extra drag. That’s fine though I don’t mind,” she babbled. “ Was that your first time riding? Normally when we take pups for their first ride, they get really overwhelmed but you seemed to handle it well! You’re a natural, I’d say!”
The words echoed with familiarity. He thought back to that strange memory of flying, curiosity suddenly filling him.
You’re a natural…
“Remember what I said earlier? A long time ago,” he said slowly, information suddenly springing from some far corner of his mind. “My creators used to ride and race those vultures that terrorize us. It was a rather wealthy sport, not many could afford to raise and roost a creature of such size. Eventually, breeders even produced a larger version with weapons for sport hunting and airborne jousts, the one you call a king vulture.” Rivulet stared at him in wonder.
“Wow, riding a vulture! That’d be something! Flying with Bubbles is fun but doing that for a whole ride would be like… wow!” she leapt backwards, dancing on her feet as she gushed over the idea. “Did you do that? Race vultures?”
An apt question, really. Had he? He certainly had a memory of such a thing, though it was hard to say if it was actually a memory of his or just the lingering foundation that had been used in his creation. Where did his memories begin, and the 'seed' end? Were the experiences his own, or just the corpse he'd been built on?
What difference did it really make?
“No," he decided. "Unfortunately by the time the iterators were being built, it was a fading tradition. No room atop our cans for the aeries of vultures, nor the resources to care for them. The beasts take quite a bit of feeding and patience, especially since they tend to have quite a temper. A novice rider who cannot control his mount may often find themselves torn to shreds by them. An experienced vulture trainer was quite the respectable profession.” Where were these words even coming from? He knew nothing about animal husbandry.
Though that didn’t seem to stop the information from flowing into his mind. He had an idea of where these memories were from, and the thought made him sick.
“I bet!” Rivulet said, excitement filling her body. “Jetfish are tough to train, they tend to only want to go their own way. Getting them to follow your command without just yanking them around is quite the feat!” She paused for a moment, as if waiting for Pebbles to respond.
Instead, he met her cheerful grin with a gloomy stare. The day had been enough excitement, how could she still be so energetic?
“So,” she continued after a moment, “when's the last time you visited Moon?” The question dragged his mind to a halt, dragging him back hundreds of cycles.
As your local group senior I order you you you you you you
The sting of forced communications. Moon’s words garbled and broken, desperation punctuating every letter. He’d felt her fear and agony, and ignored it.
As your senior senior I plead
The ire of his experiments interrupted, so close to the information he’d sought for ages, instead yanked away and mandated to listen.
Stop
The sudden realization of what had broken free during his lapse in attention. The vast array of his experiments brought the very nature of his ruin. He’d blamed her for it, for so long. Only the endless march of time had made him realize that he was doomed to fail either way. He knew nothing about genetic creations, merely copying the notes that Suns had sent him. He ran far too many parallel experiments for his inexperience to handle. Worst of all, he was venturing into territory that was both illegal and unknown. There was no reference to compare to, no previous experiment to draw from, he was floundering in the dark with his hands tied.
I almost had it. I will never forget this.
In a sense, he was right. Those words stung to remember just as much as the day he said them. How could he ever forget what his experiments had done? He’d attempted to create an organism to end his life, and instead had destroyed everything around him.
He'd been a terrible brother.
“Our last meeting was hardly affectionable,” he muttered, drawn back to the present. He buried his face in his hands, trying to quell the shaking running through his body. “I said things I shouldn’t have. We have not spoken since her facility collapsed. I hope that the blow will be softened by the offering of freedom I bring with me. Moon can be quite scary when upset. All this time, and I never bothered to even say anything...”
Rivulet was quiet for a long pause, her face a scrunched mess of awkward pity. Pebbles huffed, suddenly aware he was spilling his feelings about drama in a family of gods to a swimming rodent he’d barely known, and returned to glaring angrily at the floor.
“When I spoke with her,” Rivulet said, a rare seriousness in her tone, “She said she was just concerned about you. She didn’t seem upset, more worried than anything, if that helps.” She ended with a soft smile.
It was a small comfort, until he realized that she’d likely had nothing else to do but dwell on the past for thousands of cycles. He didn’t want to think about this.
“Well…” he said, voice trailing as he struggled to think of a new topic. “What about your family? You mentioned a clan or colony you were with? What happened to them?” There, a fitting conversation direction. Enough of his family and its drama, let Rivulet blabber about her own.
Instead, her smile crumbled to a frown, fidgeting nervously as she looked away.
“Nothing to say really. I love going on adventures, they didn’t want to join,” she said plainly, and Pebbles didn’t need to be good at conversations to read through her poorly hidden lie. She planted her hands on her hips, striking a sassy aloof pose. “More fun for me right?”
Pebbles nearly choked on a laugh. She sounded like Arti, even down to avoiding tough conversations by way of humor. Great! Eventually she’d learn how to viciously insult him, and he’d have two headaches to deal with.
Her false bravado didn’t last long, and with a yawn she curled up in the corner of the room.
“I know I'm small, but I’m not a pup anymore. I can decide what’s best for me,” she mumbled sleepily, throwing her finned tail over her eyes as she drifted away. He ignored the burning temptation to point out that she was the smallest slugcat he'd ever seen.
Pebbles didn’t have to think hard about what had happened the last time he tried the same philosophy, though it was hard to deny that a part of him still agreed. Hadn’t he done the same thing? Shut himself off from his family, and now running off on adventures? He had little room to argue.
The silence stretched on, Moon’s facility filled with an eerie stillness.
Pebbles thought of the pearls in his backpack, the archives of the ancients once again tempting him with knowledge of their horrific sins, but looking again at Rivulet’s softly slumbering form, he brushed the idea off. He had enough burdens on his mind. Instead, he did his best to wring the water out of his robes, laying back against the mossy floor as he slowly shut down his systems and drifted into the realm of sleep.
Artificer watched her two companions speed away into the distance, chuckling to herself as she imagined Pebbles screaming the whole way there. The pair quickly vanished into the fog, the sky above her promising a swift end if she lingered for too long. No matter, now without worrying about Pebbles and how slow he was, she could take full advantage of her favorite form of travel.
With a flick of her tail she sailed across the shoreline, puddles and ponds easily bypassed by way of explosive leaping. Lizards and leeches barely had time to notice her presence before she dove past them, an unlucky one ending with an explosive spear in their hide. Another perk of being alone, she could finally hunt for some real meat after all this time.
As much as she liked Rivulet for how little she’d known the soggy slug, a big girl like her didn’t stay in fighting shape on bat flies and bubble fruit. The blue lizard she munched on was far more delectable, though she wished she had time to start a fire and roast it. She sliced the remaining small chunks off its thin frame with her knife and stuffed them in her bag, hoping for the opportunity to cook it and ignoring the more likely scenario of eating it raw before it rotted.
The idea reminded her of her home, however far away it was. The grand feasts after victory against their rivals, the cooked foods accented with a variety of herbs and spices, and warm nests made from nice and dry reeds, or even that weird spirit that they served made from fermented mushrooms.
Stars I’d kill for even a single sip right now, she thought nostalgicaly. Who cared if it tasted like feet, it was the blurry vision and wild colors that you were really there for.
She sat for a moment, watching the mist roll across the small island she was perched on. Spending time with Pebbles and Rivulet had stirred up old memories, and now without them she felt strangely lonely. It was a sensation she hadn’t felt in a long time. Her quest for vengeance had kept her mind occupied well enough before.
And yet here she was, far from her homeland, eating a half starved lizard raw while she waited for a fallen god on a quest to help another fallen god. She sighed deeply, glancing back in the direction she’d watched them leave. It hadn’t even been a single cycle and she was already feeling wistful, stars help her.
Part of her yearned to go back, return to her clan and pay the price of desertion, if only for a chance at returning to those happy memories. They would be mad, and her people did not forgive quickly, but eventually she could earn her place again, right?
She stomped the idea down in her head. The past is the past, there was no point in chasing the impossible. She’d set her fate, and there was no changing course now.
The sky above her churned, a steady reminder of the timeline she was on. The waves in the ocean leapt up, washing salty water across the shore as the winds spurred them on. No time to linger on decisions long made.
She set out for a shelter farther away from the waters, before suddenly considering along the way taking a detour into the garbage wastes to do some more “hunting”. It wasn’t as if Rivulet and Pebbles would be back in a single cycle, and she could dip in for a cycle or two and meet them back as promised.
A few minutes later, with the clouds turning dark and stormy over her head, she dove into the gate leading to the wastes. Just her luck too that it didn’t require a higher level of clearance. Her plan was truly meant to be!
If her memory served her right, there was a scav toll just a quick hop away from here. She could duck into a shelter for the cycle, and start up her hunt with a nice group of them. The idea made her grin wide, fangs glistening in the dim light of the gate as it opened.
She leapt out of the barricade, crawling across rusting beams and leaping over pools of rancid water as she moved. Ahead of her, sprawling mounds of trash and refuse stretched into the distance, prime location for a scav hoping to find a hidden treasure and elevate his status in their clan. There were no treasures for her here.
She scrambled inside a pipe, the rain beating on her heels as she dove inside. Shelter wasn’t far, and after a long sleep in a cramped room with her companions, she was truthfully looking forward to stretching out again. She'd yet to adjust back to sleeping in the surface, having grown used to the long days and quiet nights in the city on Pebble’s can.
She leapt across a pit, using poles hanging from the ceiling to traverse the expanse. As she landed on the other side, she rolled across the way, preparing to leap into the next pipe in her way.
A miserable groan from below her broke the stride in her step. She knew the sound of a sick slugcat anywhere.
Turning on her heels, she carefully approached the abyss on all fours and peered over the edge, spear clenched carefully. She wouldn’t put it past the creatures of this land to mimic voices to lure in prey after all.
No predator leapt from the abyss to eat her, and as she squinted her eye to look below, she could vaguely make out a squirming shape.
A pink blob, writhing on the ground and making the unmistakable noise of a slugcat in sickly distress. She tried to examine the stranger for any wounds, or the ground around them for blood.
Nothing. Perhaps they’d eaten a particularly strong mushroom? What was another lone slugcat doing out here?
Carefully, and keeping her eye on the walls for any sort of ambush, she gripped a pole and slid down to the bottom. No creature ran out to meet her, no scavs leapt out to fling spears at her. Her feet touched the bottom, and the only noise in the room was the groaning of the figure curled up in the corner.
"Hey dude!" She shouted, ears flattening when the stranger didn’t move. Perhaps he couldn't hear her? She slowly stepped forward, spear held low in a loose readiness.
Now closer, she could finally get a good look at the stranger, and as she slowly approached them her eye grew wide in shock. The light pink slugcat was a rather large one, but sickly and thin, as if they’d been starving for cycles upon cycles. His ribs poked through his chest, limbs thin and weak. His skin was covered in scars, thin fur painting a story of battle in the markings. Whoever they were, they clearly knew how to fight and survive. A slugcat with scars was the mark of a slugcat that could fight and win.
Then why was he stuck in this pit, starving and weak?
She stopped halfway to meet him, keeping a careful distance, and she suddenly saw it. What she’d initially assumed to be the arch of his back was instead a quivering and pulsing mass under his skin. The crisscrossed slashes across it were unmistakable, the very same thing that she’d spent countless cycles fighting in Five Pebble’s facility. She sniffed the air, nose scrunching in disgust from the unmistakable stench.
Rot.
But how did it get inside this slugcat? She’d seen the rot attack other creatures, and it didn’t latch onto them and use them as a host, simply dissolving and absorbing their mass instead. What twisted development was this?
“Hello?” she asked, keeping her voice low and careful. “Can you hear me?” She gripped her spear tightly, imagining the rot inside him about to burst free and attack her. Thankfully, all he did was wearily lift his head, shaking from the effort as his milky eyes fixed on her.
“Go…” he weakly said, voice rougher than a lizard hide. “Can’t…” His head collapsed from the strain. She took a few cautious steps forward, sparks on her tail ready to leap away at the first sign of danger.
“The rain is coming soon, do you need help getting to a shelter? I have food I can spare,” she asked, and part of her wondered where this sudden generosity was coming from.
I really gotta stop helping people full of rot. This is getting repetitive.
The stranger simply shook and shivered, far too debilitated to even respond. She watched him for a moment, mulling over an idea in her mind. The rumble of the rain above her didn’t exactly lend much time for deliberation. She sighed deeply.
“Always the fun ones with me…,” she muttered dejectedly, carefully approaching him. "Hopefully you're less of an asshole than the last guy I helped with this crap." He didn’t react when she stepped close to him, and she watched the bulbs on his back with a wary eye. They didn’t look very large, she’d seen rot grow to nearly the size of a vulture. And at the same time, those cases weren’t growing out of someone’s back .
She bent over to pick him up, thankful that he didn’t thrash out and try to stop her. The last thing she needed was losing her other eye.
“Stars, you’re light as a noodlefly,” she said, hauling the stranger up and over her shoulders. For as large as they were, they barely weighed more than a pup! At the very least, it made hauling them out of the pit easy. Shelter wasn’t far, though the idea of sleeping next to a sick slugcat infected with the rot certainly made for an interesting cycle end.
Was it contagious? Ah damn, too late now.
Moving quickly, she charged towards the shelter, using her explosive mobility to ease the burden of carrying such a large passenger. To his credit, the stranger didn’t complain, which was more than she could say over the last person she carried.
They slid into the shelter just as the sky opened up, thankfully avoiding getting soaked to the bone. Artificer carefully set him down on the floor, and the sick slug instantly curled up on themselves again, clutching their stomach and shivering. Thankfully, she had a cure for that.
She sat across the room from him, unslinging her bag and reaching in for the remaining meat she had gathered. It wasn’t much, but hopefully it’d be enough to keep him from simply starving to death.
The moment she took the meat from her bag, his eyes opened in a flash. Suddenly awake, he watched with a feral look as she gently lowered the piece of meat to him. He snapped out like a whip, snatching the chunk of flesh from her hands and stuffing it into his mouth with loud hungry chewing. Artificer could only watch in concealed concern. She’d been hungry before, but never to this degree. She tipped over her bag, the rest of the lizard meat spilling out onto the floor.
The stranger greedily ate it up with all the grace of a lizard, looking slightly less worse for wear after their small meal. Without the food to distract them, they peered back at her with confused but stern eyes, as if they’d just woken up from a great stupor.
“What… Who are you? How did I get here?” the pink stranger croaked, neck craning as they examined the space around them. Artificer felt a pang of sadness fill her, imagining the poor creature starving for so long that he didn’t even remember anything around it. He must have fallen into that pit trying to go hunt for food, and been too weak to crawl out. Even now they were drifting away again, eyes turning cloudy and tired.
“Hey big guy, before you pass out, what’s your name?” she snapped, trying to gather his attention before he passed out again. The slugcat didn’t even open his eyes to answer, already curled up around himself. “C’mon buddy, don’t make me claw it out.”
“Hunter,” he mumbled softly, and then he was out.
She gripped her spear close, leaning back against the wall and watching him twitch in his sleep. The core on his back seemed to calm as well, the angry flesh stilling. It made her stomach crawl to imagine that growing under his skin. What if it attacked her while she slept?
Maybe taking this stranger to a shelter and locking them both inside for a cycle wasn’t a great idea. As she took up her silent vigil, too nervous to sleep, she could at least rest easy knowing if it tried to attack, the grenade in her hand would put a stop to that. Maybe at the cost of a burn scar.
It wasn’t as if she was running short of those. It’d make a good story at least.
She remembered back to an old tale her war chief used to tell, that scars were just a tale of victory in battle that etched itself into your body. The greater the scar, the greater the story. Perhaps he was biased, since he’d gotten skimmed by a vulture harpoon and had one that nearly went down his entire body, head to toe. It wasn’t uncommon to sit around a fire, members of a warparty trading sips of mushroom spirits and telling stories about the wounds that marred their fur.
Her thoughts drifted back to her companions, and she sent a silent prayer to the stars that they would be safe through the rain. She could already imagine Rivulet running circles around Pebbles, blabbering on and on about her favorite color of lizard or something. Artificer couldn't deny that she felt as if she was missing out on some quality Pebbles irritating time, but she trusted the little water dancer to fill the gap.
It was hard to deny she was growing on the older slugcat. She brought food, annoyed Pebbles, and churned up a pretty good show of chaos when needed. What more could a lady ask for in a friend?
As the rigors of the day overtook her and her eye fluttered closed against her will, one idle question filled her dozing mind.
What stories might Hunter have?
Notes:
Wow! These keep getting longer and longer. I hope you all like dense chapters! Its been quite the learning experience for myself to realize how large I want this to become, and the work that goes into a big story like this. Thank you all for being patient with me.
Also! Thank you for all the kudos and comments! All of you readers and your feedback is what keeps me going. I hope all of you continue to enjoy my story!
Chapter 6
Summary:
Artificer doesn't dream often, but when she does, it's always about the same thing...
Chapter Text
Artificer awoke to the sound of the shelter doors churning open. She yawned groggily, covering her eye from the light and rolling over on her other side. It was far too early to be out and about, and she was content to simply snooze for a bit longer. She heard grunting and shuffling from the entrance, the sound of someone struggling to claw their way out. The rain thundered outside.
“Ugh… Pebbles,” she groaned sleepily, ears flattening in a desperate attempt to drown out the din. “Close the damn door behind you if you’re going to screw around outside this early.” He didn’t respond, instead noisily crawling out of the shelter exit. She’d have to teach him how to make less commotion at some point, and her thoughts drifted to how she could tease him for being so loud as her eye fluttered shut again.
Artificer dozed the minutes away, stuck in a limbo between wake and rest. Faint dreams played at the edge of her consciousness, their vividness slowly increasing into something discernable. She hadn’t dreamt in a long time, not that she had any choice over it. She hated dreaming.
It was always about the same thing.
Mounds of trash in some long abandoned city, running hard with her young with a storm of wrath following their footsteps. Hungry and exhausted, but unable to stop, knowing the terrible consequences if they caught up to her. Just for a moment, she rested, chest heaving as fatigue made the shadows dance on the corner of her vision.
She still had both eyes at that point, and it was weird to remember depth perception all over again.
She kept a wary vigil, climbing high to watch their trail while her young hopped and played in with the bat flies. Too young to even catch them, too young to realize that they weren’t returning home that night. She’d kept them placated, promises and lies all to get them moving. A field trip with mom. Their eyes dazzled at the idea, especially after all the stories she’d shared.
She had been on the run for nearly a week, and only just escaped the territory of her old clan. Pushing through wide dusty plains, the broken bones of the ancients, and the mounds of garbage that the scavs claimed. She wasn’t worried about them, she knew their ways. Everything was a trade to them. Pay for what you want.
If only she’d taught her pups that.
Too tired, mind wandering despite her best efforts to focus. She paid the toll and dragged her young along. Scavs watched idly, no longer concerned with the wandering group now that they had completed their transaction. She pitied them really. The pursuers on her heels wouldn’t be so kind to stop for their little roadblock. They’d likely string the scavs by the very skull that decorated the place.
She didn’t look back to check on her young as they passed. She didn’t think to wonder why one pup lagged behind. She only saw the spears flying, angry scavs screeching as they chased after them, a single pearl clutched in their tiny paws.
As if they hadn’t done enough running.
Artificer kept pushing forward, leaping over hills and flicking her tail to launch high above any obstacles. Her feet churned in the muddy ground, fear pressing down her mind. Just a few steps further, and just one more jump. Then they would be safe, if only for another cycle.
But where were her pups? They’d just been beside her a moment ago. How could she lose them, after everything she’d done! She tried to turn around, tried to go back, but her legs wouldn’t obey her. She heard them screaming behind her, pleading for her help, but no matter what she tried, the wails grew distant as she kept marching forwards.
She couldn’t save them.
Artificer awoke with a startled cry, nearly hitting her head on the ceiling of the shelter. Her mind reeled, memories falling into place as she realized where she was. It was just a dream, a horrible one, but still. Just pictures of the past.
The tears on her face wouldn’t stop flowing, regardless. To her heart, it was real, as if it’d just happened again. She buried her face in her hands, sobs wracking her body. She gasped in deep breaths, trying to stifle hiccups and glad that Pebbles had already left that morning.
Her eye snapped open in a sudden realization.
That wasn’t Pebbles leaving. Pebbles was with Rivulet on the other side of an ocean, playing around in the carcass of a god.
“Fuck!” she spat, instantly on her feet as she bolted for the exit. “Damn! Damn! Damn !” She shoved her way through the door, crawling out into the stinging rain. The downpour from the cycle before had yet to cease, and she struggled to peer through the torrent of moisture. Water froze to her fur, ice building along her body despite the core of warmth she had.
Not good. This is what I get for sleeping in all the time.
“Hunter!” she shouted desperately, voice nearly instantly torn away by the whipping winds. “Where are you going?!” How had the sick slugcat gotten so far in this? She doubted even little Rivulet would be so bold as to tempt this storm.
Well, he’s dead… she thought, peering through the water again in one last bid. Screw this, I'm going back inside.
But she stalled for a moment, still looking out. Some part of her refused to let her crawl back into the shelter and go back to sleep. A growing sense of worry and concern filled her gut. Why was she acting like this? A few cycles ago, she would have callously left Hunter to die in the pit she’d found him in, and yet here she was, worrying about him being lost in the oppressive weather. Where did these feelings of concern come from?
Her dream flashed through her mind, and she could do little to stifle the feelings that came with it. She’d failed to save those two once, but she could at least try again. She had to at least try.
She bit her lip nervously, muttering a curse and giving in. The second the rains gave an opening, she leapt out and away.
She was no storm chaser. The sky spat its anger down on Artificer as she scrambled across the muddy ground and struggled to look for a track or trail that Hunter had left. A paw print or a skid on the dirt, anything to give her a hint. The rain resumed its wrath, nearly flattening her to the ground under its sheer weight and instantly soaking her to the skin. For a moment, her mind flew back to the old stories of her people who tried to swim for too long, and popped like bubble fruit for their foolish efforts. Was the rain enough to snuff out her fire?
She didn’t stick around to find out. Definitely she dug her claws into the ground, pulling herself forward inch by inch. Ahead, the dull glow of a pipe glimmered faintly through the torrent, and with one final flash and pop of her tail she dove inside. The water carried her through, dumping her out on the other side in a towering room full of garbage and junk. For a moment, all she could do was sit in a growing puddle of freezing water underneath her, chest heaving for air.
How in the world had Hunter crawled through all this? The slugcat was starving and nearly dead!
Artificer huffed, shakily rising to her legs and brushing whatever water out of her fur that she could. Steam sizzled off her skin from where the heat of her core met the freezing rain. A shiver of cold shot through her spine, and once again the temptation to go back to the shelter entered her mind.
“Dammit all…” she muttered, shaking her head and waving away the idea. She was no quitter, and turning back would just mean diving back into the rain. With a stubborn growl, she stormed forward into the room, already brewing up a storm of anger to level at Hunter when she found him.
As she turned a corner into a larger space of the chamber, her eyes met the hunched over form of the pink slugcat in the center of the room. Anger burned in her eye as she marched towards him, unholy wrath in every step.
“Are you crazy?!” she shouted, her voice dripping with rage. “I didn’t haul you out of some stars forsaken hole in the ground for you to sneak off and die in the rain! Some nerve you got!” She strided up, grabbing him by the shoulder and roughly flipping him over.
“I should tan your...” her voice died in her throat as she finally saw him. His face twitched and twisted, mouth mumbling incoherent words as he spasmed in the dirt. A large purple bruise decorated his face, likely from where he’d fallen when his seizure started. For a moment, Artificer could only watch, her face a mixture of horror and pity. Was the rot doing this?
“Stars above,” she gasped in horror, shaking herself loose from her terrible awe. She quickly scanned the room, looking for anything to help. There wasn’t much, just loose bricks and chunks of rock. What could she do? It’d been ages since she treated a wounded comrade, normally her experience was just patching up her own injuries by herself.
But sewing a spear wound shut wasn’t anything like treating a seizure…
She gently sat down beside him, sheepishly easing him onto his side and laying his head on her still wet tail. At the very least, it’d be more comfortable than the dirty muddy ground. For a long tense few minutes, she simply sat and watched him, worry and concern on her face.
Why did he have to crawl out here to do this? She thought, angry at Hunter for his foolishness. And yet at the back of her mind, she was almost as mad at herself for going after him. Why was she risking her life for some stranger?
“I need to stop filling my life with dumb helpless guys…” she grumbled to herself. With any luck, some scavs would come by and put her out of her misery. Eventually Hunter stilled, a vague look of peace falling on his gaunt face. An odd comfort filled her.
The rain outside eventually diminished, fading away as the next cycle began.
Hunter opened his eyes with a groan, paw coming to his face and hissing in pain when it touched his fresh bruise. He looked around for a moment, eyes full of confusion and weariness, before eventually noticing Artificer staring down at him.
“Oh…You…” he mumbled, lifting his head up from her tail as he struggled to his feet. Artificer was silent, helping him up either way.
“Are you okay now?” she asked softly, still battling the burning concern in her heart. Hunter looked away, huffing to himself.
“As good as I can be I suppose, given everything,” he sighed, glaring angrily at the ground.
“Oh, good!” she said, and suddenly her emotions did a backflip. “Just what in the void did you think you were doing, you complete idiot?! Crawling out into the rain in your state?!” Her teeth flashed and tail thrashed as she scolded him, but instead Hunter merely glared back stiffly.
“I never asked for your assistance,” he ground out, voice cold and level. Her eye twitched, fury rising.
Great, he’s just like Pebbles.
“You’ve got some nerve…” she growled, slow and dangerous. “I dig you out of a hole in the ground, haul you to a shelter, give you food, and help you in the middle of the rain. You could at least be thankful, you ungrateful whelp!” Her tail puffed out, sparks flying out in anger. Hurt or not, she wasn’t about to tolerate such disrespect!
He was silent for a long minute, merely returning her fierce glare with his own stern look. Finally, his posture loosened and a flash of guilt entered his eyes.
“Thank you miss…?” he said slowly, brow raised in question. Right, she’d never even told him her name.
“Artificer!” she spat out. “My name is Artificer.”
“Thank you miss Artificer, for your generous hospitality and bravery. I’m honestly very appreciative of your assistance,” he said rigidly, though a layer of humility was hidden under his tone. “But I can’t stay here. My sickness will soon take me, and it's for your own sake that you aren’t close by when it does.” He gave a firm nod before turning around and limping away.
“Hey! Where do you think you’re going?” she shouted after him, her anger quickly boiling away to concern. “You’re in no condition to be walking anywhere! You’ll get eaten alive!” He waved her off, continuing to stagger forward.
And then his foot caught the ground, and he fell, shouting and cursing to the floor. Artificer ran up to help him, but the second she bent over he merely pushed her hands away.
“I’m fine!” he groaned, chest heaving as his arms struggled and shook. Instead of anger, Artificer could only watch with a sad pity. Hunter hissed as he struggled to return to his feet, only for his limbs to give out and send him falling to the floor once again.
She’d seen it before, back in her colony. An old warrior full of confidence and bravado, unable to even stand as time ripped away their strength. Many of them refused to give in, fighting their aging bodies until the bitter end. Though none of them had been starving and infected with rot. Hunter clearly had determination and grit in spades, like any good warrior.
“You don’t seem fine to me,” she chided sternly, caught between irritation and worry. “You’re starving to death. At least let me feed you something before you go stumbling off into the wilderness.” He may have been rude, but seeing the starving slugcat barely able to stand still made her heart throb in sympathy. Even Pebbles had been easier to get walking around. Hunter merely glared at the floor, jaw clenched with pride.
“I can’t,” he said slowly. “I need to keep moving. I don’t have much time.” His stomach gurgled loudly in protest, as if it’d heard them speak of food. Artificer could only chuckle, not at all convinced.
“Cmon, when’s the last time you even ate anything?” She asked, “You’re thinner than a noodlefly.” She laughed, and he glowered in return.
Artificer could only watch baffled as he spent the next few moments attempting to rise to his feet. Any attempt from her to help him was met with stiff refusal. Hunter kept struggling, meeting each stumble or stagger with a stoic grimness. Eventually, he resigned himself to simply crawl along the ground, slowly pulling himself towards the pole leading out of the room.
He of course tried to climb it, barely clearing the floor before his quivering grip failed and sent him falling back to the earth. He lay for a moment, taking in shallow and shaky breaths as sweat beaded on his brow.
“Still not hungry?” Artificer asked from above him, already at the top. He brooded for a moment, and she wondered if he would really keep refusing her offer.
“Why are you so insistent on helping me?” he asked, brow raised. She faltered for a moment, suddenly asking herself the same thing. Why was she helping him anyway? He’d been nothing but rude.
And yet sitting here watching him struggle to claw his way up a pole made her heart twinge with concern. Was it so wrong to let her help him? She blamed Pebbles, his goofy floundering had stirred up her protective side. Not to mention the slugcat clearly had stories, and it’d been ages since she swapped tales of battle and glory with another warrior.
Besides, she was stuck here until Pebbles and Rivulet returned. A little company wouldn’t hurt. While the idea of spending every cycle out hunting was fun, she couldn’t deny the loneliness that had been creeping up on her.
“I just think you’re an interesting guy,” she said, grinning at him. “I bet you have some glorious stories and I’d like to hear them. It's not often you meet another slugcat in the wild out here. I’ll trade you some food for some questions, sound good?” He stared at her for a long moment, ears flicking in thought.
“Fine,” he spat out, looking quite irritated by his admission. “But after that, leave me alone.”
“No promises,” she chuckled, and sauntered away victorious.
The garbage wastes were a wide landscape, filled to the brim with various creatures. While Artificer could have brought him a simple squidcada that lived in abundance around the area, she knew as a primarily meat eating slugcat that Hunter would likely want something delicious and filling. Not to mention that she wanted a decent bargaining chip to convince him to stay.
And nothing was more delicious than a juicy eggbug. She merely needed to find one.
With a decent bribe, maybe he would tell her why exactly he was in such a hurry. Questions filled her mind. Who was Hunter? Where was he from? What was he doing here? Her thoughts stalled for a moment.
Why did she suddenly care so much about a stranger? A rude stranger at that! She’d have tanned Pebble’s hide for talking to her like that. Was she really so lonely that the second he'd left, she'd found another asshole to keep her occupied?
Just get him to tell his story, that’s all I want, she thought. For now.
Her hunt didn’t take long. As she crawled across the rooftop of a rusted tower, her one good eye peered down into the rubble, searching for her prey. Eggbugs were skittish creatures, often living in small cramped areas where they could easily scurry under and away from danger. Unfortunately for the dark blue one she stalked now, there would be no escape. She tensed the explosive spear in her paw, preparing to pounce.
A loud hiss behind her was the only warning she got as a lizard chomped down hard on her tail.
She screamed out in pain, eye watering from the bite as the lizard sank its teeth into her flesh. If she looked closely, she could almost see the evil smirk on its cyan face. How had it snuck up on her? Was she so distracted that she’d ignored the telltale sounds of a cyan lizard’s growls and jumps? They were far from the sneakiest lizards.
No matter, it hadn’t bitten down on her body, leaving her ample room for a clever riposte.
The lizard moved to yank her along for a jump, likely to drag her away to its den where it could properly consume her and rest. Instead, she lunged towards it, jamming her explosive spear right through its eye.
Sorry pal, I’ve already got dinner plans, and you’re not my type.
The reptile hissed in agony, dropping Artificer and flailing around on its hind legs as it desperately tried to remove the fizzling spear with its stubby claws. The shaft sizzled and popped as its fuse ran down, and with a final bang that echoed across the wastes, the lizard collapsed to the ground. Its face seared, now sporting a wound similar to her own.
For a few moments, Artificer simply lay on the ground, staring up at the cloudy sky as her tail ached with pain. She hated cyan lizards, the slippery bastards were probably the only lizard that could keep up with her jumps, and boy did they love to pop up out of nowhere.
She groaned as she stood up, inspecting her tender tail for damage. Thankfully, the bite wasn’t too deep, and the lizard’s short teeth had barely entered the skin through all her thick fur, though the aching throb likely hinted that she’d sport a terrible bruise from its jaws.
A quick glance back to her hunt revealed that the eggbug had fled, likely scared away by the explosion.
“I hope you like lizard, Hunter,” she grumbled to herself. Cyan was an acceptable meal to her, but it had a strange metallic flavor and the gasses they used to fly often tainted the meat with a vile chemical flavor if they weren’t consumed quickly after death.
As well as being far heavier than an eggbug, she noted, as she grabbed the lizard by its tail and dragged it along. Ugh.
Thankfully the journey back was mostly downhill, and even more thankfully Hunter hadn’t used the opportunity to run off. He’d crawled over to a corner in the room, eyes closed as he dozed. For a moment, Artificer merely stood there, studying him.
How could someone look so peaceful while asleep, and yet be such a raging asshole when awake?
“Hey, guess who’s back,” she said smugly, and his eyes shot open, instantly turning suspicious and wary. She huffed and rolled her eyes, jerking her head in the direction of the lizard she’d hauled. “Don’t give me that look, I brought you some food, and not just a few measly batflies.”
He struggled to his feet, but she planted a paw on his shoulder and pressed him back to the ground, looming over with a spark of authority in her eye.
“What now?” he growled, but she was far from intimidated.
“You need to promise me that you’ll answer my questions. I didn’t save your life and risk my own to get this hostile treatment from you. If you’re not going to play nice, we’ll resort to trading,” she let him go, but held her stern glare. “Simple, one lizard for some questions.”
He was silent for a moment, gears turning behind his eyes, anger and uncertainty painted on his face.
“Fine,” he spat, “but no more than three.” A slight smirk filled her face.
“I didn’t risk my hide for a measly three questions. Make it six, or I’ll eat this thing in front of you and maybe let you have the bones.” His glare hardened, but she didn’t relent.
“Five, and I won’t fight you for it.”
She barked out a laugh, shaking her head in amusement. “Oh, you’re so scary, being half starved, defenseless, and infected with rot. But fine, five.” She grinned in victory, ears twitching in excitement. Hunter instantly looked shocked and confused, but kept quiet as he stumbled past her and greedily dove into the lizard.
Artificer was a carnivore at heart. Sure, her people could eat vegetables, and she had a fondness for bubblefruit and its gelatinous texture, but nothing filled her belly like fresh meat. She’d known Hunter was as well, his sharp fangs as a simple indication of his diet. They were the same in that aspect.
Where they differed was their eating behavior. Artificer ate with her hands and teeth, chewing out large chunks of flesh and tasty meat. She’d even torn chunks out of scavs in the middle of battle, her forge of a heart demanding fuel to craft her explosives. The taste was horrendous, like musky centipede droppings.
Hunter ate like a beast. He didn’t even bother using his hands, wide maw voraciously ripping the lizard apart. He didn’t stop at the meat, digging further and further until the beast was barely nothing but a frame and tough hide, and then he broke open the bones for their soft marrow. His eyes were filled with a feral wild energy, and she couldn’t help but take a nervous step back.
It was certainly… efficient, if a bit disturbing. Had he even stopped to breathe? Whoever had raised this slugcat had clearly shown him little in the way of table manners. It was one thing to eat a lizard, it was a whole other display to gulp them down for every scrap of flesh, even if he had been starving. She’d eaten organ meats and bone soups before in the past, but they were prepared into tasty dishes, not eaten flat out raw.
Hunter didn’t seem to mind, even as he swallowed chips of scales and chunks of bone.
A few minutes of loud eating later, and the lizard was nothing but a heap of broken bones and inedible hide. Hunter licked his lips, using a claw to pick out bits that had stuck between his sharp fangs.
“Shesh,” Artificer mumbled a bit taken aback, “Why don’t you just eat its skull while you’re at it.” Hunter merely shrugged, his irritable look returning as if he’d forgotten that she was there.
“I paid for the whole lizard, I’m going to eat the whole lizard.”
“Fair enough, I guess,” she said, still slightly reeling. “Now for question number one. Who are you? Don’t try to be coy about it either.” No longer starved, Hunter stood up to his full height, towering above her by a whole head. Even bruised, starved, and scarred, he held himself with a noble air.
“As I’ve mentioned, I’m Hunter. I was created by a god, in a similar facility such as the one towering above us, though in far better condition.” His voice was filled with pride, as if his creation was a badge of honor that he wore.
“Ah,” Artificer chuckled. “I’ve got one of those myself, is your’s a moody pain in the tail too?” His brow shot up in curiosity.
“No,” he said slowly, “though he has quite the fondness for humor, often to the point of irritation. I don’t try to understand most of it, it's not my place to question my creator. You should speak more respectfully of the one who made you.”
“He’s not my creator,” she chuckled and rolled her eyes. “More like I help him kill things and help him avoid falling on his fumbling legs as he walks. It's more of a love-hate relationship. I love annoying him, and he hates talking to me!” She smiled deviously, but Hunter looked unimpressed.
“He can walk around?”
“Only recently, but I’m asking the questions here, unless you want to do more bartering?” His short angry hiss was all the answer she needed.
“As for my next question,” she asked. “What are you doing here? Clearly your creator sent you here for a reason.”
“If you are familiar with this region, then you no doubt have seen the collapsed facility of the other god that once dwelled in this place. I was sent with a special package to return her to a living state. While little was told to me how she reached that point, it is my understanding that somehow her sibling was responsible for her current condition. They shared vital resources, and his selfish use of water resulted in her death. I did not have time to visit him. It was a noble quest, and I am proud to have finished it.” He puffed up, filled with satisfaction. Artificer hummed as she absorbed the information.
She’d heard Pebble’s side of the story in the past, though she’d never known that other iterators were involved. Was Hunter from one of the facilities nearby? Perhaps she’d seen his home from the top of Pebble’s can. How long ago had he come through? She thought carefully, weighing her remaining questions as a look of impatience grew on Hunter’s face.
“Where are you going?” she finally asked, and he instantly looked uncomfortable.
“You have mentioned knowledge of the rot, so you are familiar with what it does. When I was created, my creator attempted to push my genetics to the limit. Speed, strength, and many more positive traits. However, as he admitted to me, when he attempted to give me a far advanced healing factor, the rot was inadvertently introduced to my body. While wounds do little to stop me, every cycle results in more rot growing in my body. There was no time to remove it, and the journey here has hardly been kind, as you can see.” He gestured to his body, scars clearly visible even under his short fur. His eyes filled with contempt, disgusted by his own flesh.
“I do not feel I would survive the return journey,” he continued, tone turning sorrowful. “While I yearn to return to my creator, however comical and lighthearted he may be, even now my body betrays me. You have already seen the extent of what control it has, and it only gets worse every cycle. I fear one day it will overtake me, using me as a puppet while it terrorizes the inhabitants of this land. So, in absence of any other plan, I have resolved to exile myself somewhere as secluded as possible, in hopes that no harm will come to anyone else. I was doing a good job of that until you came along.”
“I didn’t make you eat, tough guy,” she shot back, and he snorted in disregard.
“You played against my earthly needs to leverage information while I was distracted with starvation. Your bargain was hardly fair,” he paused, and thought for a moment. “Though your charity and generosity are still noble.”
“Earthly needs?” she asked, face full of confusion. “Oh yeah, excuse me for helping you not starve to death, or die from the rain. What an awful slugcat I am for asking a measly few questions in exchange for saving your life!” Her tail whipped and sparked behind her, though Hunter hardly seemed intimidated. If anything, he just looked tired, like he wanted nothing more than to curl up in a corner and sleep.
“Ask your last question, so I can leave and resume my isolation. Every minute I waste is another minute my infection spreads.” He crossed his arms, glaring impatiently. Artificer growled grumpily, but refused to back down.
“You won’t get to the next shelter on your own in your current state. Just let me help you, and once you’re stable you can go,” she insisted, and he sighed deeply as he considered her words. Whoever had made Hunter had clearly let his perseverance leak deeply into his personality.
“You do realize that if my infection overtakes me, you will have to defend yourself from it,” he said dismally, eyes meeting her own. “I cannot promise it will be an easy fight.”
“I’ve dealt with plenty of rot in the past. I’m not scared by your tiny little infection, I’ve seen cysts grow to the size of a king vulture, brimming with tentacles and yanking anything that moves into its hungry core,” she sighed, her patience wearing thin but still trying to hold out. “Look, I know I must sound crazy trying to help you, and you don’t even know me at all, but I have a friend who was the exact same way. He shut down everyone around him, refusing any help from others. Not a cycle goes by where he doesn’t regret it, and he’s told me that plenty of times.”
“So you’re doing all this for me because I remind you of your friend?” He asked, brow raised.
“I… know what it's like to think you’re beyond helping, or that you don’t need anyone. It's not a fun life to live.”
“So you’re lonely?” he joked, a gleam of amusement in his eyes.
“Would you just shut up and let me help you?” she angrily grit out, and a rare smile graced his face. Only too late did she realize what she’d said.
“That was your final question, and my answer is no,” he declared triumphantly. She could only scowl in defeat, but the battle was far from over. Her mind scrambled for a lead, even as he staggered past her.
Her memory flashed back to her dream. She’d never been able to save them, no matter how hard she fought or how hard she ran. She wasn’t going to let him go that easily.
“W-wait!” she shouted at his retreating form, and thanked the stars that he actually stopped. His ears turned back, listening. “Like I said, I’ve fought the rot before. I can help you. I helped my friend get free of it.” Hunter slowly looked over his shoulder, a single brow raised in curiosity.
“How?” he asked carefully. His eyes studied her for any sign of deceit. She struggled for an answer.
“I cut it off of his body,” she said, trying to project as much confidence as she could. “We used a knife, that’s it.” While it was true that she’d technically cured Pebbles of his rot, cutting him loose from his can was hardly the same as Hunter’s condition. It was a half truth at best, but maybe they could do the same thing with Hunter? His cysts were isolated in a single area of his back, perhaps they could be removed?
She couldn’t even begin to imagine the complexity of such a procedure, let alone the materials it would require. Even back home in her clan, medical supplies and treatments were simplistic at best. Surgery, even for a simple condition, was incredibly risky. It was often more merciful to let the family say their goodbyes and let the victim pass. Even successful procedures often resulted in infection and lifelong issues.
Now out here, in the middle of a wasteland of scrap and trash with nothing but a knife, she struggled to imagine how she could hold true to her word.
And yet some part of her had to try.
Hunter turned around, eyeing her skeptically. She puffed her chest out, meeting his gaze with the best confidence she could muster. An idea crossed her mind, however gloomy it was.
“And if it doesn’t work, I’ll see that you are laid to rest properly,” she said glumly. He was quiet for a long time.
“Very well,” he said carefully, “I will lend myself into your care, if only long enough for this procedure to take place. After that, we will part our ways. If I survive, I must return to my creator. He will likely have more use for me.” Artificer wanted to smack him for saying such a thing, but held her paw, instead feeling relieved that he had at least agreed. Perhaps somewhere along the way she could convince him there was more to life than being the meat puppet of some machine.
At least Pebbles was fun to mess with. Whoever made Hunter just seemed like an insufferable prick. Of course they’d created him with an unwavering loyalty, too scared that their creation might stand up to them.
The two slowly ventured back to the shelter, Artificer supporting Hunter in the more difficult sections of the climb. Despite his weakened state, there was clearly some merit to his claims of healing ability. Already he was walking on his own, sharp eyes scanning the environment around them for any danger as he followed behind her.
They crawled into the shelter a few moments later, Hunter slowly lying down in the corner and watching her carefully. He looked as if he didn’t know how to sit still, shifting uncomfortably almost every other minute. After so many cycles on the road in a constant state of haste, sitting around must have seemed so foreign.
He and Rivulet would likely get along. Perhaps he could tire the little slugcat out? She shooed the idea away from her mind. He seemed far too self important to tolerate the wet critter.
“So,” he said, breaking the thin silence. “What’s your plan? You hardly seem like a sophisticated surgeon.” She huffed at his impatience, toying with the knife in her hands.
“I’ve got some medical experience. Look, I’m not doing it right this second, so simmer down.”
“I can promise you, I can take quite a lot of punishment,” he pressed, starting to look genuinely nervous. “The sooner the better. If we take too long, the infection could spread too deeply.”
“Trust me, okay?” she scowled at him. “I need to gather some things anyway.” She’d been involved in some medical procedures in the past, and at least had a decent understanding of battlefield triage. How different could fixing a broken arm and removing rot be? Hunter grumbled for a moment, but relented and went back to looking bored.
Artificer rummaged through her bag for her collection of medical supplies and took a note of what she’d need to go gather, chastising herself for leaving her things behind in her desperate chase that morning. At the very least, the mask in her hands might have warded off the lizard.
“Where did you get that?” Hunter asked, suddenly curious. “I’ve felled many vultures in my life, but never any that decorated their masks to that degree."
"It's not a vulture mask," she said, suddenly uncomfortable.
"So where is it from?" He pressed, a tinge of impatience in his voice.
"I don't want to talk about it, okay?" She growled, trying to stifle down her bubbling anger. The last thing she needed was to piss him off and give him reason to leave.
Hunter huffed indignantly.
"I don't see how it's fair at all that I spend all morning telling you about myself, but you won't even share a story about an interesting mask."
"We traded for those questions, remember?" He merely grunted in acknowledgment, though his expression still looked lost in thought.
Just stop pressing this, please.
“Very well, let's make another trade. You tell me your story, and I will promise my complete cooperation.”
Damn you.
It was too tempting an offer, he’d played into her weakness. Her mind flashed back to her dream that morning, grief bubbling up in her heart. Why bother hiding it?
She took a deep shuddering breath, sighing sadly as she began.
“Long ago, I lived in a colony of fellow slugcats. We were raised to fight our enemies, destined to wage war for glory and plunder. Some might call us raiders and pillagers, but we were the most successful colony in a wide area around us. All of us had a purpose there. The strong became warriors, the smart became tinkerers, and even the weak could find their place caring for the young or tending to the fields. Each individual had a duty, and mine was leading a squad of scouts. It was fun, and every day promised something new.” Her mind flashed back, lost for a moment in the days of battle and glory. Hunter hummed softly to himself, listening intently to her tale.
“Sounds like quite the place. I had heard that wild slugcats grouped up in nomadic colonies, but never to this degree,” he stated.
“In a sense, it was amazing. There was safety in numbers and in the purpose of our colony. Each individual worked towards the whole. Even the dead were revered, for they had given the greatest gift that they could for the clan. We knew whatever life awaited them next it would be good. There was always food on the table, because of the slugcats whole job was gathering food. There was always security in the walls, because someone’s job was protecting the home. There was always a warm meal after a long day, because someone’s duty was cooking a meal, and we all filled our roles with pride! Stars, I miss the food…"
Her wistfulness was broken up as she remembered the next aspect of her story. “And then I had pups.” A shadow fell over her face, and Hunter’s stoney look softened in surprise.
“When I became a mother, everything changed. What I once saw as courageous and exciting seemed so much more dangerous. All those who died in battle for our clan no longer seemed like brave warriors, instead I saw my children in their place. I tried to trade away my field duty to work with my pups, but my war chief denied me. They were not my pups to raise, they said, they belonged to the colony, and it was not my place to question what was good for the group. I knew in that moment what fate they’d meet, and I could already see them dying in battle for nothing but a few measly pearls.”
How right I was in the end…
“So in the dark of the night, I broke into the nursery and took them away. For cycles we fled, the warriors of our colony pursuing us ceaselessly. I knew that if I stopped, my life would be forfeit. They’d take my pups and kill me on the spot for desertion and theft. I marched into the night, often carrying them while they slept. I don’t know when they stopped following me, all I knew is that I could never go back. I sacrificed everything, just trying to give my pups a better life, something with some peace and comfort, far away from all the battles… and death.” She didn’t want to say what happened next. She’d already relived it once that day. Saying it to Pebbles had at least had the comfort of familiarity and friendship. Hunter, for all his overflowing compassion and kindness, did not need to know the details.
Besides, she was alone now. That said enough.
“It was scavs,” she spat venomously, “in all their greed and wrath. Against a competent war party, scavs are nothing but a nuisance, and even their greatest warriors never wore armor. But I was alone, exhausted from marching for days on end, and in unfamiliar lands. I wasn’t thinking!” She suddenly laughed, a crooked din that filled the shelter with a mixture of grief and hysteria.
Hunter merely watched awkwardly, his eyes rapt on her. For the first time since she’d seen him, he genuinely looked lost, and a tad sorrowful. She saw the pity on his face, and it nearly made her growl.
“I took the oath of my clan,” she ground out, “an exchange of blood for blood. One scav turned into dozens, hundreds, until I was caught up in a whirlwind of battle. I climbed to the top of this facility and met their war chief in battle. The fight felt like it lasted for ages, but before I knew it I stood atop a mound of bodies, wearing his mask, this mask, with my claws dripping with blood.”
She looked down at the helm, eye staring into the empty sockets.
You, who have encountered a consequence much like my own.
If she looked closely, the faded symbol of leadership still dotted the forehead, though dried dark stains had long since nearly covered it over.
Gripped by raw emotions whose chains bind you, destined to this land.
She lifted it to her face, tying the string behind her ears and securing it in place.
Shortcomings of the past haunt one and all like whispering phantoms.
This was her fate. It always had been. How could she fight destiny?
An unrewarding battle awaits, culminating in a path of no return.
She could never go back, not after everything. She had nothing to go back to. No one would ever take her.
A perpetuity of struggles begetting more of the same.
She’d sold her soul to protect her young.
We are a pair who have forfeited everything.
It hadn’t been enough.
There was nothing left for her but to battle, and one fateful day, defeat. She’d tried to fight her destiny and failed. She’d lost everything. What more was there to do but fight?
The shelter was quiet for a long time. Hunter watched her from across the room, an unexpected sympathy filling his face. He opened his mouth as if to say something, but stopped, awkwardness painting his features.
“I’m sorry,” he said softly, voice filled with awkward uncertainty. “I hadn’t expected the tale to be that… mournful. You have my condolences, sincerely.” She wiped around to glare at him, claws tense and tail thrashing.
“I don’t need your fucking pity,” she spat, voice dripping with bitter malice. “Don’t even pretend for a damn second that you know anything about how I feel.” His ears flattened, and for once the normally prickly slugcat looked genuinely hurt.
Artificer could hardly contain her anger, rage threatening to boil over and make her snap. She stormed outside, not wanting to further expose her emotions to her guest.
She set off in a sprint, plucking up the first spear she found and spitting red explosive goo on the tip. Red like her fur, thick with scars and torment. Red like her mask coated with the dried marks of her battles. Red like the blood on her claws that would never find peace.
She launched into the air with a boom, eye filled with frenzy as she spurned forward. She needed an outlet, a release, the anger in her heart driving her to her limit. A twisted grin painted her muzzle, even as tears flowed down her face.
Thankfully, there was a scav toll nearby.
Pebbles awoke with a jump, wet splats filling the shelter. The rot, crawling into his chambers, reaching for his body in its endless hunger to tear down his facility and consume. His breathing went panicked, legs scrambling backwards in an effort to escape. His back instantly hit the wall. There was nowhere to go. Fear gripped his mind, desperate pleas entering his head.
But as his eyes focused and his neurons spooled up to standard consciousness, he instead found the source of the noise was no twisted cyst threatening to eat him, but rather his diminutive slugcat guide. Rivulet, who evidently had woken up and decided to make it his problem, was currently doing backflips inside the shelter. She didn’t seem to mind that half the time she launched herself into the ceiling with a noisy smack.
There cannot be a single brain cell in that creature’s skull, Pebbles thought, trying to stifle the panic that had filled his body. Tremors and shakes eventually quelled, but his irritation only grew to fill the void.
“What in the void are you doing?” he asked, displeasure clear in his voice. She leapt into the air one more time, slamming into the ceiling yet again and falling face down to the floor with a wet flop. She looked up at him with a wide smile, waving a paw as if they weren’t two feet apart.
“Oh hey! Good morning!” she gleamed, peeling her skin from the floor and climbing to her feet, only slightly dizzy. “Or is it morning? I can’t tell in here.”
“My internal clock says it's precisely two hours after sunrise,” he stated irritably, “not that any of that matters since we can barely see the sun even on the nicest of cycles. Now what are you doing? Giving yourself brain damage?”
“Nope! Just exercising! There’s no room to run around outside, so I stayed in here instead. Practiced my acrobatics!” Her face filled with pride, but Pebbles could only stare in confusion.
“And what good is hitting your body against the ceiling doing?” he asked, bewildered by the display. Rivulet’s expression flattened, and she stood for a moment brushing her whiskers as she thought the question through. She stared up at the top of the room for a moment, and then looked back at him.
“Yknow, come to think of it, I don’t think I noticed until you pointed it out.” Pebbles could only bury his face in his hands.
“I can’t believe I trust you to guide me…”
“Oh! Speaking of guiding, we should get going! The water level has probably gone down by now, and we can finally go say hi to Moon!” For all the excitement she had, Pebbles could only feel a dread in his chest. There was no avoiding it.
Somehow the fear of nearly being eaten alive by the rot had been slightly less terrifying.
The shelter doors opened with the same deafening churning they always did, but to Pebbles it only sounded like the ringing of bells summoning him to his execution.
Moon awaited.
The pair squeezed into the pipe tunnels, Pebbles once again counting the seconds before his robes became soaked with water.
Six. A new record! This demands celebration, but at another time.
A moment later, they were free of the pipe network, entering a vast chamber with stretching metal spires and water drizzling from the ceiling. He vaguely remembered the internal schematics of his neighbor, the equipment around them was clearly a part of the general systems bus.
They were so close.
And yet, even here the terrain held them back. There was no way to cross the gap and Rivulet quickly explained that while she could simply leap across the divide, Pebbles would need to plunge into the waters, climb up a slick connection of vertical rails, crawl through more disgusting pipes, and leap across three separate gaps, each with the risk of plunging down into the water below if he slipped.
The prospect was hardly appealing. He had a far better idea.
Unbuttoning his backpack, and making sure that no neurons tried to fly away, he removed the rarefaction cell and held it squarely in his arms. With a simple electrical impulse, the cell could be used to moderate small gravitational fields. He carefully balanced the input, dreadfully wanting to avoid another electrical surge filling his systems. Slowly, his feet left the ground, and with a calculated push he launched across the void, catching a rail on the other side and climbing upwards towards the top.
“Wow!” Rivulet shouted in awe as he floated away. “I had no idea you could do that with that thing! It just made me jump really high!”
“With a steady hand you can induce a zero gravity reaction, if only for a few seconds,” he said, as the cell sealed itself yet again. “It likely ran at too low of a power state for that in your hands, simply running off the ambient energy in your body.” Funny, the last time he’d flown around in zero gravity had been leaving his facility, and Arti had mocked his floundering inability. Now he almost climbed the rails gracefully, practice finally showing its return. He almost felt stupid for not using the cell earlier when they had climbed down the bridge.
Oh well, it wasn’t like he was running short of dumb decisions in his life.
Rivulet surged ahead of him with ease, smothering his small flame of pride. With a glare he followed along, carefully balancing on the single pole that stretched the room. Below him, jellyfish lazily hovered in the water, and a scavenger poked its head out from within the machinery to watch with wide boggling eyes.
For a moment, he was thankful that Arti wasn’t here. The last thing he wanted was another fight with scavengers. He hoped that whatever she was doing at the moment was at least slightly productive, instead of her usual murderous rampage.
Fat chance. She’s probably standing on a pile of their bodies, flinging spears and bombs as they scramble to try and stop her.
He almost wished he could summon an overseer to check in. He’d seen them pop up to watch him, both his own and Moon’s, but without connection to his can there was no way to communicate with the small creatures.
Hardly the worst thing to lose in this trade, I never used them anyway.
The pair squirmed into another pipe network, this one thankfully only slightly soaking wet. No wonder the slugcats were all sticky and slimy to the touch, if all their species did was crawl through these things.
Well, no, that actually wasn’t right, he realized. Their kind had crawled around in pipes in the past, and they were certainly good at it in the present, but now they had formed their own tiny societies, and were quite apt at things other than cleaning drainage systems.
Where were these thoughts even coming from? He quickly surmised that the extended exposure to the rain and constant crawling through tight spaces was driving him insane. Perhaps he had never broken free of his can, his mind trapped in an eternal limbo of wetness and pipes as his neurons faded into death.
Or perhaps he really didn’t want to think about his upcoming conversation with Moon.
His thoughts were broken up as he followed Rivulet downwards through a bend, sunlight shining down as the pair popped free into open space yet again. A pool of water gathered at the bottom, and across the way he could see the cracked yet unmistakably familiar chamber of an iterator.
“This way!” Rivulet said, jumping free and plunging into the water. She laughed as she surfaced, quickly swimming into the chambers as if she owned them.
For a long moment, Pebbles stood on the edge of the jump, fingers locked tight around a pole. As much as he tried to move them free, they refused to open.
“Oh! Hello sleek friend!” a singsong voice sounded from the chambers. Pebbles felt his heart drop, misery and guilt enshrouding over him. It had been ages since he’d heard her voice, and they hadn’t been kind words. The memory of her pleading, begging, dying words filled his mind.
“Moon! Hi!” Rivulet chirped, her voice sounding further and further away. She babbled about her journey, voice slowly fading into a rushing wind of noise in his head. His eyes burned, breath coming in painful gasps as he sank to the floor trembling. His head sunk into his hands, raspy dismal whimpers barely sounding out of his frame.
I can’t do this.
For an agonizingly long few minutes, Pebbles sat on the edge of his journey, so close to his goal, mind overwhelmed with guilt.
She’s going to hate me.
His body screamed to cry, and yet he had no tears to shed. Iterators were not made to cry.
I’m a terrible brother.
He wanted to lay on the ground, and slam his neurons into the dirt until his mind finally stopped thinking all these wretched things.
A stray thought entered his mind.
Arti would never stop teasing me for being a coward about this.
Pebbles was many things. He was a murderer, a liar, and a deceitful asshole. He’d burned all his bridges, left alone in the misery of his isolation. But, he refused to be a coward.
He couldn’t run from his mistakes, not any longer.
Shuddering, he rose to his feet and dove into the water below.
Moon’s voice filtered through the hole in the wall, and he stumbled through, his feet carrying him where his mind desperately didn’t want to go. He practically clawed his way into the chamber, body fighting every step.
“Little water dancer, where did you find this one?” she asked, standing over Rivulet with a bright pearl in her hands. How had she carried it all this way? Was that one from his chamber? That little thief!
His irritation was instantly ignored under the monsoon of dread welling up in his chest. Moon stood atop a small island of rubble, a dingy white dress covering her scuffed and battered frame. A paltry dozen neurons bobbed above her, her umbilical lying limp behind like a mangled limb.
Now or never…
Pebbles took a deep fearful breath and stepped out of the darkness.
Moon glanced in his direction, looking back at Rivulet as if she was merely noticing a bug skitter across the wall. Then she did a double take, looking again with wide eyes slowly filling with shock. The pearl fell from her hands, plunging into the water with a loud splash.
The two were silent for some time, eyes locked as fear and confusion met.
“I…I see,” Moon said with her voice full of fear, covering her eyes and turning away. “My processing strata have finally broken down, and now I’m beginning to see the ghostly visages of my dying brother. Come to finish the job, Pebbles?” She laughed darkly to herself, hands shaking over her face. His heart burned with guilt and regret like nothing else.
Pebbles stepped into the water surrounding the small island she was on, wading through as he numbly marched forward. He felt a million miles away, as if he was watching a recording through someone else’s eyes.
She turned back towards him, wide eyes filled with terror and turmoil at his approach.
“Y-you’re moving the water, and making noise. This is quite the fantasy!” she sobbed, and a hot knife of guilt punctured his chest. How long had she been here, that she didn’t even trust her own eyes? “Are you perhaps an echo? Did he finally solve the great question, only to become trapped in this place to haunt me?”
“I…” he whispered, unsure where to even begin. What could he even say, after all this time? His mind felt as if he was being stretched like dough, fighting to even stay lucid.
“I’m sorry…” he finally mumbled, but it wasn’t enough. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry! I’m sorry!” He was shouting, crawling onto the platform and throwing himself in a groveling heap at her feet. His body wrenched with tremors, and still he kept shouting.
“I’m sorry! I’m sorry! I’m sorry!”
No matter how many times he said it, it didn’t feel like enough. Even as he wrapped his arms around her feet and sobbed dry tears. Even as they sat there, with his voice echoing in her chambers.
“I’ve been a terrible brother!”
He’d left her here, drowning in a prison cell for thousands of cycles, her only comfort the visitation of random creatures. Left in isolation while she waited for her can to slowly degrade.
He felt a cautious hand press against his back.
“Pebbles? Is this really you?” she asked, shock filling her crackling voice. “I don’t understand, how?”
She hoisted him up to his feet, and part of his mind felt a sting of irritation when he noticed she was taller than him. She grasped his robes, feeling over his hands and face as if desperately trying to prove he wasn’t really there.
Finally, her hands brushed the wires at the back of his head, fingers gazing against the cut ends. A flash of pain drifted through him, reminding him of when Arti had slashed them and set him free. How long ago was that? Two or three cycles? It felt like months.
“What did you do?!” she insisted. Where could he even start?
Artificer and her vengeance, the hidden stash of pearls, Vigilance the creator, cutting his wires, crawling through his facility, nearly falling to his death, incinerating a lizard, and riding a jet fish. How could he even begin to delve into the horror he’d learned on those pearls? There was too much to explain.
So instead, he wrapped his arms around her in a sorrowful hug, and began to sob again.
“Pebbles…” she soothed, though she still sounded quite shocked. “It's fine. I’m here.” They sat for a long moment, the heaves in his body slowly fading. Thankfully, Rivulet had swam away at some point. He didn’t want some tiny mouse to see two fallen gods crying in each other’s arms.
Even though technically he was the only one crying.
“I’m sorry,” he mumbled. His eyes burned, and he struggled to wipe away tears that weren’t even there. She planted her hands on his shoulders, weakly pushing him away so they could actually speak face to face.
“Pebbles, please, it's fine,” she pressed sternly, voice shaky. “I’m frankly more worried about you. What did you do? How are you just walking around like this? Did you create some sort of walking platform? Is this a projection from your overseers? …Are you an echo?”
He could only chuckle in despair. Perhaps in a way, he was. Once ascended but now trapped on this earth, his creators dragging his soul back to make him. Maybe they were all echoes in that sense.
“I don’t even know where to begin,” he whimpered, still reeling emotionally. “So much has happened recently.” Moon shook her head, still looking quite baffled. He’d come this far, practiced this conversation so many times, and yet he could scarcely manage to bring a few words together. He took a deep shuddering sigh, and began to explain.
“I’m not an echo, no. This is my puppet body, broken free of my can.” Moon looked unconvinced.
“How is such a thing even possible?” she asked in disbelief. “Disconnection from your neural tissues and life support should result in the puppet simply collapsing like a severed appendage. They were never made for independent use, merely a more familiar method for our creators to interact with us.”
“That’s the thing Moon!” he sputtered. “It was a lie! It was all a lie! They lied to us so that we wouldn’t try to run off. They created us fully intending to let us waste away in our cans!” He stopped for a moment, mind flashing back to the rot growing through his old facility. How many others out there were in the same place? How many other iterators were locked inside their facilities, counting down the cycles as Moon had been?
“We aren’t our cans,” he continued, trying desperately to keep the despair from overwhelming him. “We are our puppets, these are us! Our cans are just computers, but they couldn’t run them constantly by themselves, so they created and bound us to them! All the cycles, the misery, the isolation, and it was only because of their greed!” His head hung down, frame choking on sobs.
Bugs in a maze. Left to rot long after the exit had been found.
Moon watched him with concerned eyes, though the sparks flying between her neurons hinted at the gears turning in her mind. He waited with baited breath, her silence nearly making his skin crawl.
“I… this is… a startling discovery,” she said, her normally gentle voice filled with consternation. “While I had known our creators had quite the capacity for cruelty in their devices, I’m surprised that they would go to such lengths. Many of them viewed us as their children, surely someone along the way would have said something?”
“No! Nobody,” he said sorrowfully, “the few that knew kept it a closely guarded secret. It was only by mere chance that I even discovered this. As likely as the alignment of the stars! And worse, they used memories of the ascended ancients to build the foundations of our neural networks, defiling the sanctity of the dead in their hunger for answers!” Moon’s brows shot up, a haunted look falling over her face. She was silent for a long time, antennae twitching in pensive thought.
She sighed deeply, and for a moment he could see the weight of time resting on her shoulders, and the weariness in her form.
“Another terrible deed to add to our parents history,” Moon stated numbly, deep sadness in her eyes. She shook the feelings away, her expression shifting to an aggravated disappointment. “I must be honest, Pebbles, while this is gravely disturbing information, I am truthfully not entirely surprised. You were young at the time of their ascension, but I have been on this planet since the very first iterators, and I have seen the despair and desire that consumed our parents in their unending quest for escape. Even with the self-destruct taboo, they likely surmised that if we knew we could escape with a simple disconnection of our wires, we could devise a way. It's our place to solve problems, after all.”
“However,” she continued, her tone turning scolding, “What truly shocks me is that you are here! Do you not realize the dangers you have put yourself in to come this far? What if you had been hurt, or somehow destroyed?”
Pebbles reeled backwards, taken aback by her sudden change in tone.
“I was trying to help you!” he cried back, emotions rolling over in turmoil. “After everything I’ve done, I wanted to help! I couldn’t just let you sit here and waste away!” This wasn’t what he had expected.
“Did you truly set off on this journey without even considering the risks?” she chided, suddenly rising up to stand tall above him. “Five Pebbles, I’m very disappointed in you. I know you are young, and prone to foolishness, but I would have figured after one irrational experiment gone wrong that you would have learned your lesson.” He shoved away from her, fists curling in anger and ridicule.
“That’s what you’re upset over? That I might have been hurt? What else was I supposed to do? Idle around my can until it finally collapses? Can’t you see I’m trying to help you?! Set you free?!” His neurons sparked with frustration, struggling not to scream. How couldn’t she see?
“While I might be interested in disconnecting my umbilical, if only to take cover from the rains,” she countered, voice edging with caution, “I see little reason to follow you into the outside world. Did you even think of what to do after this? Where would we go? What good can come of wandering around this inhospitable land?” He thought back to the past few cycles, struggling not to break down.
The constant bantering with Arti, and the companionship she offered despite their tense friendship. The fast paced, if poorly thought out, mind of Rivulet, who had filled the journey with chaos and excitement. The danger and adventure, scrambling from the rain, avoiding predators, and rising triumphant in the end despite everything the world threw at them. And to cap it off, the steadily growing craving that filled his heart with a fire that screamed for more.
How could he even begin to explain? Even in his own mind it sounded like madness.
She’s going to think I’m insane.
All he could do was try. He hadn’t come this far to give up now.
“Because… Because it's exciting!” he declared, mustering his pride. “Even in the few cycles I’ve been out here, I’ve experienced so much. Learned so much! I’ve fought for my life and emerged triumphant. I’ve jumped across sprawling chasms over endless abysses, clinging onto rusting poles as I dangle over the edge!” He felt the desperation filling his voice, and he could already imagine how insane he sounded, but he didn’t care. Not anymore.
“But most of all, I’ve made… companions along the way, who for all their irritating quirks and banter, tell stories of faraway lands and bizarre adventures. Did you know that slugcats gather in colonies, build their own towns, wage wars, and make art? I always thought they were just dimwitted drain cleaners!” He paused, trying to suppress the shaking filling his frame. “I’ve never felt this level of freedom. This is living!” He stomped his foot down in emphasis, staring up at Moon with pleading eyes. She watched him with a tense thoughtful look, silence swallowing the pair up as the water swirled around them.
“I must admit Pebbles, your argument is very convincing…” she slowly admitted. “While I am not keen on violence and danger, documenting the development of ancient purposed species is quite tempting.” She hummed thoughtfully, weighing the idea as neurons sparked and pulsed. Pebbles waited nervously, feeling as if the world was about to crash down on him.
Moon sighed sadly, and the light in the room seemed to fade.
“This has all been so much to consider in one cycle,” she murmured, “Please, grant me some space to deliberate on this. It’s difficult enough to accept that you’re even here, let alone the concept of simply strolling out of my can. I can only imagine how the others reacted to this information.” His mind came to a screeching halt.
“I… have not been in contact with the local group for quite some time,” he shamefully admitted. “For a long period I blocked all communications, and even after I wanted to reach out to them, my communications array had already degraded to an unserviceable condition. My companion has brought me some pearls in the past from nodes along the broadcast network, and they aren’t promising. Many of our kind are trapped in isolation.” Moon hummed, brow furrowing.
“Well, that’s not very helpful. I was hoping for some news from the outside world. I hope our family is doing well, though for their sake I can only wish they found some escape.”
“Yeah, me too…” Pebbles said distantly, already imagining the complete uproar that would descend down on him after being silent for all this time. Especially from No Significant Harassment, if he was even still alive. He never understood why their creators named him such, the iterator was quite capable of a serious degree of harassing, though he loved to hide it behind an air of jokes and 'friendly' teasing.
Oh void , his mind spun as a thought entered his mind, where Artificer and Sig teamed up to pester him. He could already imagine the sheer torrent of insults, the pair speaking daggers and every word stabbing deep. Never mind the absolute fury that Sig would bring down on him for Pebble's behavior. Suddenly the idea of sitting in his can sounded much more appealing. Too late now, can’t put the cork back in that bottle.
“Pebbles,” Moon said softly, trying to mask the sense of dismissal in her tone. “While it has been a pleasure speaking with you again, and I am so glad to see you safe, I would request that you grant me some time to think about all of this. I cannot say that it is my greatest goal to venture out into the world, not when I am… satisfied right here. I know this may be hard for you to understand, but you are but a mere child in comparison to my time on this planet. It's… hard to come to terms with the concept of freedom after all this. You must realize that I have had a lifetime to get used to this room I’m in.” She looked at the ground, sadness in her eyes. He nodded in resignation. Of course it wouldn’t be this easy. When was it ever?
“Moon, before I go,” he said nervously, once again feeling dread fill his chest. “I’m sorry. Sorry for ignoring you. Sorry for leaving you here on your own. Sorry for being such a terrible brother. Sorry for… well, all this.” He gestured to the room around them, and its dismal broken state.
“Oh, Pebbles,” she cooed gently, wrapping him back into a hug. “I forgive you. I have had much time to think about this, and any anger I may have had has long since faded. After all, you will always be my little brother!” She squeezed him tight, and somehow her apology did nothing to expel the guilt that hung over his head like a stormy cloud of doom.
How could she just forgive him? Just like that? It seemed too easy, too soon.
He didn’t deserve it…
Not after everything he'd done.
“However,” she continued, pulling away with a sudden wicked gleam in her eyes. “I must admit that now that you are here, I can finally do something that I’ve wanted to do for quite some time.”
She promptly smacked him over the back of the head, sending him flailing into the water with a loud splash.
“That is quite gratifying!” she beamed over him, fiendish giggles shaking her body. Pebbles simply floated in the water, staring up at the neurons dancing in the sunlight, and not even bothering trying to deny that he had absolutely deserved that.
“It’s nice to finally see you too, Big Sis...”
He swam out of the chamber a short moment later, wanting to respect her request for some time to think on his proposal. As he sank into the icy water outside, he looked over his shoulder to see her once again standing in the sunlight of her little island, staring wistfully into the pool around her. She noticed him staring and shot a cheerful wave. Pebbles weakly returned it, unable to quell the feeling that the meeting felt too short.
His languishing was interrupted as Rivulet burst out of the water beside him, replacing the sadness with a deeply familiar feeling of irritation.
“Hi!” she beamed, swimming circles around him as they slowly moved towards the far edge of the room. Pebbles didn’t respond, doing his best to ignore the soggy rodent. Like always, it did little to deter her. “Did you have a good chat with Moon? Is she coming with us?”
“No, not at this time,” he grumbled, “She wanted to take some time to think on the matter, and has requested we give her some space.” He hauled himself out of the water and slumped to the floor, once again trying to squeeze the liquid out of his sodden robes. Part of him wondered how long it would take until his mind finally broke down and accepted eternal moistness.
“Awww, okay” Rivulet whined, but her joy returned a moment later. “Hey! Want to explore the rest of her home with me? There’s this crazy place where the rain comes down in powder! You can squeeze it into spheres and hurl it at things!” She looked up at him with wide friendly hopeful eyes, and he was about to turn her down and return to the shelter when a memory ran through him, dragging him back to his youth.
He’d once had the same hopeful feeling in his heart, pining for the attention of someone who was normally impossible to reach. A long time ago, when he was vying for the attention of his distant neighbor Seven Red Suns. The thought made him nearly cringe, remembering how blunt and obvious his attempts at conversation had been. His mind swirled for a moment, a shadow falling over him as he remembered their last exchange and all the hurt that came with it.
At one point, they would likely talk again. He'd been so mad at Suns for such a long time, and yet that anger had seemingly withered away over the cycles.
Then why did the idea make his fists clench in anger?
Suns had caught his attention in one of the group chats at one point when he came to Pebble’s defense in an argument about historical theory. Unlike the other iterators at the time, they’d actually respected Pebble’s side, where others had brushed him off as a mere child with naive and foolish opinions.
Of course, it was completely true. Pebbles had been naive and foolish, but Suns still respected him for the content of his argument rather than his blundering inexperience. He’d spent so long after that trying to earn the older iterator’s favor, desperate for validation from a superior, and someone he could call a friend.
And here was Rivulet, acting in almost the same way right on the cusp of adulthood and stretching out an open invitation to go swim around and play in the snow. It felt almost childish to consider, but at the same time he saw the faint glimmer of vulnerability in her eyes. It would be so easy to spit out another insult and crawl back into the shelter, brooding over his music and perhaps reading another pearl.
But at the same time, the day already felt dim and dismal, even after talking with Moon. The last thing he needed was another gut punch like the last revelation had been. His wires felt frayed, and his neurons ached from emotional overload.
Maybe swimming around and playing in the snow would be distracting.
“Fine,” he grumbled, and her expression exploded into joy. “But don’t make me regret this.”
“Ohmygosh awesome!” she cheered, somehow exploding out of the water and landing right beside him. “This is going to be so fun! I have so many cool things to show you!” She took his hand, sticky paws yanking him to his feet and tugging him along as she pulled him away down a corridor of Moon’s can.
With any luck, the distraction of sea life and exploring the old facility would pass time quickly, and they could all get on their way and regroup with Arti.
“By the way, how long can you hold your breath?” She asked, a hint of worry and concern in her voice.
Or maybe it would be terrifying and horrible. Either way, he knew one thing.
At the very least, it wouldn’t be boring.
Notes:
Wow, this one was a doozy to write. Lots of dialog and conflict. I actually had this finished more than a week ago, but work and family stuff kept me from finding the time to actually post it.
Introducing two more characters was a lot of fun! Please let me know what you think of Moon and Hunter. They were a lot of fun to write, especially Hunter since he's a grump lol. Moon might take a bit of convincing before she joins along on the merry band.
Also, do you guys like the art?
Chapter 7
Summary:
Hunter has a back itch. Rivulet has a headache. Pebbles has a nightmare.
Notes:
CW: Body Horror, Psychological Horror, Blood
->I've been told by my proofreader that this one is quite psychologically disturbing. Reader be warned.<-
(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)
Chapter Text
Hunter hated waiting.
He’d been engineered with speed and efficiency in mind, his creator in a frantic rush to revive their fallen sibling. He’d likely even imprinted some of that impatience when creating the slugcat, all in an effort to spur him on.
So when he was forced to idly wait around in a tiny room, stewing in the emotional aftermath of Artificer’s dreary story and counting the seconds, he felt his skin crawl in an insatiable driving itch.
Or maybe it was the constant itch on his back, thrust to the forefront of his awareness without anything to distract him.
When Artificer didn’t return later that cycle, Hunter wasn't worried. He’d seen the anger in her eyes, and frankly, didn’t want anything to do with it. The story she’d told had been heartbreaking, to say the least, and he was honestly glad that he wasn’t locked in a shelter with her while she mulled over her past.
Not to mention that her mood was only because of his probing questions. How was he supposed to know he had touched a sore spot?
So he waited, doing his best to rest and not go mad from sitting around. Eventually, the rain came and went, a new cycle dawning. He sat, idly honing his long claws against the walls and listening to the faint noises outside. His back slowly started to itch again.
When Artificer didn’t return by the end of that cycle, he started to get concerned. He wasn’t starving yet, the lizard he’d eaten gave him enough to go a few cycles with, though the boredom and throbbing headache weren’t making the time pass easily. He began to wonder if she’d stormed off forever, so distraught by the retelling of her history that she no longer wanted anything to do with him.
So much for our deal…
It was better that way, really. With her gone, he wouldn’t risk his illness claiming a fresh victim, nevermind that she was irritatingly persistent and feisty. He could spend the rest of his cycles in quiet solitude and wait for his inevitable departure, same as before. The same plan he’d always had.
Wait around and die.
And yet, he couldn’t deny the new, faint blossom of hope that refused to fade away. He’d known he was destined to die ever since his creator told him, and had accepted his fate. If anything, it gave him all the more reason to hurry along on his goal. Yet some part of him now refused to give up so easily. As he sat in the shelter, his mind began to wander to the plans he’d inadvertently made. The sudden bloom of ideas and dreams now that he’d been granted more time. Experiences he’d never had, journeys he’d get to make, and returning to his home and surprising his creator with some jokes of his own.
Hope… What a cruel feeling.
Still, it spurned him onwards, and with a reluctant groan, he rose to his feet and stretched. With any luck, Artificer hadn’t gotten too far. She’d cursed him with this terrible optimism, and he’d make her stay true to her promise. Hopefully she had calmed down in the time that she was out and about, or at the very least found something else to take her anger out on.
Slowly he crawled out of the shelter and into the bright mid-cycle light. Clouds towered above him, the endless expanse of garbage stretching far into the distance. The facility of her friend loomed in the sky, and Hunter could see the decay and destruction infecting it even from the ground. It wasn’t pretty.
Several sections of the facility had broken off, exposing the raw interior and the rot devouring it. Artificer had mentioned that the iterator was now walking around, which certainly was confusing, but he didn’t know enough about the beings to question their capabilities. Besides, with his facility in terrible condition, it made sense to pack up and leave.
“I wish I could just walk away from my rot,” Hunter grumbled to himself. Artificer had said she’d cured someone of it in the past, and while surgery in the middle of nowhere wasn’t exactly appealing, it was the only chance he had. The alternative was far worse. Now he just needed to find her and hold the slugcat to her word.
Hopefully, she wouldn’t tear him to shreds for his faux pas.
It didn’t take long for him to find a trail she’d left. A short distance from the shelter, in the tunnel network under the wastes, the ground was scarred with blast marks and littered with fallen spears. She had clearly been busy, etching her grief onto the landscape.
A sudden sharp pain entered his skull, and his head stung as if a noodlefly had pierced it. For a moment, all he could do was lean against the wall and grit his teeth through the sudden surge of agony. His sickness had never been tame, loving to remind him of its presence.
The headaches were getting more frequent.
With a growl, he pushed forward, following the trail of destruction and smoldering craters. The walls were painted with the white and blue markings of the locals, painting pictograms of whatever strange history or warnings they shared. It didn’t take long for him to find her first victim.
Dangling from the wall, a pale gray scavenger had been pinned by several spears in its limbs. Beneath it, an assorted pile of garbage and junk lay at its feet, likely dropped when the creature was assaulted. As Hunter approached the body, he saw the mangled remains of its neck, barely anything more than bits of sinew and broken bone. Though most disturbing, it was facing away, as if it had been trying to retreat when it was attacked.
Hunter was no stranger to violence, there was no place for gentle pacifism in these lands, but this was more than just killing to survive.
What am I getting into?
It was one thing to hear Artificer recount the story of her revenge. It was another to see it in person, dangling from the wall like some sort of profane message. The dread pitting in his stomach did little to urge him forward, but he pressed on regardless.
He continued along the trail for a short while, finding more and more bodies, defiled and left to rot in the sun. The sight made his skin crawl, and for a long moment he debated simply returning to the shelter and waiting there. Where was the friendly and concerned slugcat he’d known, who had bravely run out in the rain to save him and only asked for some company in return? The horrific display didn’t seem to end.
Hunter staggered onwards unwaveringly, his back itching like fire. It never stopped, no matter how hard he scratched it. The scars on his back were proof enough.
He finally found Artificer in a small secluded room, faint rays of light piercing through holes in the ceiling. She sat with her back to him, ears flat as she stared into a small pool of water, surprisingly clear for the area. Her shoulders slumped, tail limp and body weary.
Here goes nothing…
“So, did you get it all out of your system?” He asked, keeping a careful distance between them, half expecting her to explode and lunge at him. Instead, she merely tilted her head in his direction, looking over her shoulder just briefly enough to get a glimpse at her mask’s dark eyes, before returning to her lonesome brooding.
The silence stretched on between them, broken only by the crunch of gravel under his paws as he slowly approached her.
“You made quite the display back there,” he said, once again met with a wordless glance. He slowly stumbled up beside her, flopping down with a grunt and joining in staring at the water. Her mask gazed into the depths distantly, lost in thought. The lack of response made him uneasy, unsure of what to say. Eventually, the words came to him. “Does doing all this make you feel better?”
They sat for a while, watching the cloudy beams of sunlight smear patterns into the surface of the pool. The water vanished into the depths, obscuring the bottom, though at one point the sun broke through and made something twinkle through the murk. A pearl?
He knew better than to ask, already having heard enough. Whatever significance this object had to his companion was not known to him, but he didn’t dare break the pensive silence to ask further.
Artificer took a deep breath and sighed.
“...At one point it did,” she said numbly. She idly tossed a rock into the waters, shattering the peaceful surface into a kaleidoscope of waves, the room resonating with a splash. “Nothing ever makes the pain go away, no matter how hard I fight.”
“Then why keep fighting?” He asked carefully.
She shrugged, posture tired and resigned.
“It's all I’m good at.” A bitter tone entered her voice. “I already told you what happened when I tried to escape my old life. Can’t escape what you’re made to be, so I might as well embrace it. You’d understand that right? How you feel obligated to return to your creator?” Hunter grimaced at the words, feeling rather called out, but refused to be cowed.
“For all my short life, I thought I was doomed to die of this illness.” He raised his head up high, a surge of courage filling him. “Now I have a choice, and I intend to take it, regardless of where it leads me. What force holds you to your path?”
Her only response was to silently stare into the pool, small gentle waves still lapping against the borders. Hunter debated for a moment on pressing the question, but held his tongue. He hadn’t known the slugcat for any time at all, and her… coping methods, while deplorable, were none of his business.
Speaking of business.
“Well… either way, we still have a deal, correct?” She chuckled darkly, standing up and pulling him to his feet.
“Yeah… yeah we do,” she said, gathering her things and gesturing for him to follow. “We’re going to need a few more supplies before we can try and cut that gunk out of you. You interested in coming along, or do you want to go back to the shelter and nap like a pup?” A small grin flashed on her face, and internally, Hunter was grateful that the storm had passed, even though his pride stung.
“I’m quite fine,” he stubbornly huffed, though he tiredly kept pace as she led through the tunnels of the wastes. “What are we looking for anyway? This place is a cesspit of trash, what use could come from anything here?”
“It’s not the garbage that I’m looking for,” she said, stopping to help pull him up a ledge. “It's a certain thing that lives here. Ever seen a spitter spider?” He shuddered, groaning in disgust. Images of dark tunnels, shadows creeping across the walls. He’d been in a hurry, rushing to meet Moon with a fire in his steps that did little to illuminate the darkness.
Those poor lantern mice.
If he closed his eyes, he could still hear their frantic squeaking.
“Unfortunately,” he spat. “I’ve seen what they’re capable of, and even vultures fear their sting. What does this have to do with surgery?” A smile crossed her face.
“Well, there’s this old trick I learned from my colony doctor,” Artificer said with a twinge of excitement. Hunter paled, already not liking where this was going. “If you kill them and cut out the poison gland, you can use it to make someone unconscious during a procedure. They used to use them before pulling a bad tooth!”
Hunter squirmed, uncomfortable with the idea of forcefully knocking himself out. His mind flashed back to his last encounter with the spitter spider, and how a fleeing lizard had been reduced to a useless heap of flesh mid-step, dragged away into the shadows.
But if Artificer said it worked…
“Where are we even going to find a spitter spider out here?” he asked, trying to deflect the conversation. “They tend to hide in hidden pipes and dark disgusting places, waiting for some poor creature to stumble into their sights.”
“Well lucky for us, this place has a network of caves and tunnels leading towards the shoreline. We’ll dip in, find a spider, and get ourselves some bug juice.” Hunter gulped, already not looking forward to the idea of skulking around in dingy disgusting sewers to chase after some wretched bug.
But at the same time, being conscious while Artificer cut the rot out of his body was far less appealing. Even now he felt it throb and itch against his spine, granting him an endless crawling burn that only seemed to grow larger and larger as the cycle went on. He didn’t want to imagine what it would feel like once she got to work.
A few minutes later, the pair slipped through the grates of an ancient sewage pipe, sliding down the slick surface and landing in the stagnant water with an echoing splash. Hunter scrunched up his nose at the overwhelming odor, trying to peer into the darkness as he clutched a spear tightly. With any luck, their hunt would be short. The heavy air was making his head spin, but he pushed forward. Artificer reached into her bag, pulling out a glowing orange lantern that shone dimly in the pipes, illuminating the trash and residue that coated the walls.
The duo walked through the sloshing muck for a long while, following bends and twists in the pipe network as it snaked through the underground. They kept their ears and eyes peeled for any sign of movement, but the shadows revealed nothing.
“This place feels like a tomb,” he muttered distastefully. His voice echoed down the tunnels, vanishing into the distance. Bugs skittered across the walls, and some strange eel darted between their legs as it frantically swam away.
“You’re telling me,” Artificer muttered, light thrust into the darkness. “I used to live in the city on top of Pebbles. The place was a ghost town, like everyone had just collectively decided to vanish into thin air. It gave me the creeps to walk through some places, like I could feel eyes from the windows watching me.”
“Are you sure it wasn’t just scavengers?” he chuckled, earning an amused snort.
“Trust me,” she said with a self-satisfied smirk. “They learned to leave that place long ago, though I suppose by now they might have realized my absence.” Hunter merely grunted, already imagining the various ‘warnings’ she had likely left hanging from the walls.
He’d never had the chance to explore his creator’s city, though he had been told the story of their departure. How an entire race could be so desperate to die, Hunter had no idea. He’d been doomed to death his whole life, and now on the cusp of having a second chance, he wanted nothing more than to seize it.
As if to remind him, his back spasmed, and he knew that it wasn’t any of his own muscles doing it.
“So what happened to your… friend?” he asked, trying to distract himself from the rising nausea in his gut. “Did you part ways?”
“Oh, you mean Pebbles?” Artificer responded, peering into the dark as they slowly marched through the sludge. “Only temporarily. He’s across the water breaking his sister free of her facility.” That certainly caught his attention. He’d spent his entire life moving to revive Moon, only for her brother to come pluck her free of her broken facility? It wasn’t his place to question the will of the gods, but it certainly was a lot to think about.
Water? Strange… it was mostly swamps when I was there .
“And you declined to join them?” he asked, and she tensed up for a moment.
“I… decided to secure the return path,” she said, suddenly sounding slightly flustered. “Since she’ll probably be helpless for a bit. Learning to walk and all.”
“So you let him go on his own? Sounds quite irresponsible.”
“Hey!” she snapped back, turning to face him with a glare. “He’s not on his own, he’s got a guide. Her name is Rivulet and she’s been there before!” He hummed, not quite convinced.
“And this Rivulet, is she a competent warrior? Fit to guard a god?”
“Well…,” she grumbled, voice skeptical. “Not quite. She's small and fast though, pretty good at running past any danger. Creative too!”
“Ah, so you left two gods that barely know how to walk with a tiny slugcat that can… run away from danger. Great move.” He smirked, even when she growled back at him, tail swishing.
“It's not like that, she’s smart. I’m sure they’re staying out of trouble!” He merely chuckled in response, enjoying how easy she was to rile up.
“Right…” he laughed, only to freeze as there was a sudden flash of movement behind her. A sickening hiss filled the air, and through the shadows he saw the frills of a spitter spider dangling from the ceiling.
In a blur of panic induced speed, he reached out and yanked Artificer backwards into the fetid water. The spider’s payload sailed over their heads, the barbed ends of its darts narrowly grazing one of his ears. The beast chittered in hungry rage, crawling towards them and preparing another volley. Hunter moved to scramble to his feet, but with a flick of her tail, Artificer filled the pipe with a ringing explosion, launching them both backwards. They slammed against the bend in the pipe, again blasting aside into cover just as the spider fired another attack. Its darts stuck into the wall, oozing a grayish gooey liquid.
“Nice save,” she muttered, though the stinging in his back cried out in agony from the impact. Smoke sizzled from her fur, and Hunter had to momentarily wonder what strange mutation allowed her to summon explosions into existence. A question for another time, when a giant arachnid wasn’t trying to eat them alive.
Hunter grit his teeth through the rising pain and reached for his spear, only to find that it’d been knocked free in the evasive move.
Perfect.
Artificer was similarly disarmed, and the thought of simply running came to mind. It wouldn’t be the first time he’d escaped from a difficult foe, and sometimes the easiest battles to win were the ones you didn’t fight at all. But they still needed their prize, so with an angry sigh he fished out a brick from the water and waited for the chitinous, clicking steps of the spider to approach.
Clearly, it mistook them for easy prey, for as it rounded the corner, still dangling from the ceiling, Hunter hurled the brick at its face with all his might. Even in his weakened state, the impact was enough to crush several of the creature’s eyes, and it crashed into the water flailing and hissing.
With a furious growl Artificer lept on it, teeth gnashing and claws tearing. A moment later, the spider’s head had been ripped to shreds, though its legs still twitched in vestigial movements. The sight made his fur crawl, and he was tempted to retrieve his spear and stab it until it ceased its shuddering movements.
Artificer must have seen his look, as she shook her head and unsheathed her crude knife.
“Simmer down tough guy,” she chided, “We start poking this thing too much and we’ll destroy the venom sack. Y’know, the whole reason we came here?” Hunter grumbled, but relented to lean against the wall and watch as she dissected the creature. A moment later, she triumphantly presented the organ, a strange goey bulb with a quivering tip. Evidently, the spider would contract the sack to fire out a barb.
How grotesque.
“Anything else we need?” Hunter asked, trying his best to hide how impatient he was getting. The skin on his back felt like it was splitting. “I’d like to get this done soon.” She hummed, stuffing the venom bulb into her bag and thinking to herself.
“Well, I already got some stuff to make medical glue, but I wanted to gather some pole plant leaves to make some bandages. That should be it.” He huffed, irritable but resigned.
“Whatever it takes, can we just leave this disgusting hole?” he growled, though his tone was pleading. The air was beginning to feel oppressive, and his back burned and ached. Red danced on the edges of his vision.
Wordlessly, Artificer led the pair back outside, thankfully avoiding any further confrontation with subterranean predators. As they stepped into the fresh air, he felt his headache soften, though the sweat beading on his forehead and twitches in his claws were unrelenting.
“Actually,” he groaned, suddenly feeling a wave of aches wash over his body. “I think I’d like to go back and take that nap.” He clutched his head, struggling to stand as he leaned against the walls. It felt as if something was reaching down his spine with twisting fingers and trying to yank him like a puppet.
“Hold it together, we’re not far,” Artificer said reassuringly, grabbing his paw and trying to lead him along. He staggered forward, each step feeling like he was walking through sand. His vision swirled, eyes burning from the bright light outside. He wanted nothing more than to crawl into a dark hole and never wake up.
Just a few more steps.
Right paw forward.
Left paw forward.
Right paw…
The pain flared with every movement, ears ringing as the presence on his spine seemed to pulse and undulate.
Just a few more steps.
Just one more cycle.
“Hunter, you okay?” a voice called to him, ghostly and fading. He tried to open his eyes to look for them, but the light burned like fire. The tendrils crawled down his spine, and he felt them creep around his heart in a wave of agony.
He thought of his journey, how he’d come so far on a quest to revive a god and the pride it filled him with to succeed. How he'd fought and struggled and survived against all odds. His mind drifted to his creator, their purple robes swaying in the wind as they beckoned him further. The teasing edge of their voice calling him home.
Just a few more steps…
He reached out to them, trying to grasp their arms, but they stretched away into the distance, so close and yet already gone. His legs trembled, begging to give out, but held up by sheer grit. He stretched his arms further, hoping to just feel a slip of fabric or a graze of his fingertips. Anything.
He’d always known he was doomed to die far from home. Even the sliver of hope clutched in his chest could do little but cloud his mind from the cruel reality of his position. There was no fighting fate.
“Hunter?” they said, sing-song voice fading into the distance. “Are you coming?”
I’ve been trying, trying so hard , he thought. I’m so tired of trying.
He lunged in one final desperate attempt, claws falling short of his goal, and fell forward into the abyss.
I’m sorry I wasn’t strong enough.
Darkness enveloped him.
Pebbles pulled his robes tighter against the bitter, freezing wind. Even though his body was primarily composed of metal and silicone, he felt the cold seeping into his more sensitive biological components. Snow gently drifted down to gather on his clothing, and with a huff he shook it off.
Why the void did they make it so we could feel the cold?
It didn’t help that Rivulet had dragged him swimming through the vast underwater biome in Moon’s collapsed can. The teaming aquatic life had been certainly interesting, if a bit terrifying at times when they bumped into some swimming lizard or hungry giant jellyfish. Thankfully his guide had kept them away from most dangers.
Now they stood in the icey remains of Moon’s city, and Pebbles could only marvel at the ancient structures dotting the top. The crumbling buildings had been in disrepair long before Moon’s collapse, and the remaining time hadn’t been kind to them. Even through the rubble, he could barely tell what they had been before time tore them apart. The old world decayed, another fading reminder of what his creators had made.
There was a strange beauty to it though, the snow flakes slowly burying away the broken mess of twisted metal and concrete. Eventually, they might cover the entire can with snow, smothering the past much like the dust atop his facility did.
He thought back to the city atop his can, broken and empty. He’d never cared much for it, only performing the bare minimum to keep it operational so long as he had inhabitants to whine about its state. Yet, the memories of the place drew him back into nostalgic thoughts. Did the overseers still project advertisements to the ghosts of his people? Did the towering buildings still pierce the clouds? Did scavengers still pick apart the ruins, or had the rot gotten to them yet?
All the empty homes, the vacant shops, the dark tunnels. His creators had built a lavish paradise above the clouds, a gleaming city that left no one wanting.
And then they’d left it all behind for the void. Was it really worth it? Did the void truly hold what they had been seeking? Desperately clawing for freedom as if they hadn’t turned the entire world into their playground.They could have anything, yet yearned for nothing, as if unlife would somehow grant them some sense of happiness.
His thoughts were sourly broken up as Rivulet hurled a snowball square in the back of his head.
“Gah!” he gasped, whirling around to confront the slippery slug. She giggled from behind him, running to take cover behind a mound of ice as if he was preparing some sort of counter attack. The thought was tempting, though completely childish. Besides, it would be unfair with his computer calculated perfection.
Which was little use when she hurled a second snowball from behind cover, hitting him square in the face.
“Enough!” he shouted irritably, but she merely laughed joyfully behind her protection, and he heard the sounds of her paws gathering another projectile.
Fine. He bent over to scoop up his own fistful of the fluff, keeping a wary eye on Rivulet’s direction. If the little rodent wanted to play so bad, he’d show her what machine precision was capable of.
He readied his arm, watching her tail swish behind cover as she waited for an opportunity. He instantly ran the numbers in his head, accounting for wind, drag, air resistance. He merely needed to wait.
Rivulet poked her head out just an inch, eyes scanning the battlefield. Not a moment later, a speeding snowball slammed in her face, sending her tumbling backward to the ground in a puff of icey dust.
“Hah!” Pebbles cheered, beaming in victory. He readied another ball, storming Rivulet’s position. But as he turned the corner to where she’d fallen, he found nothing but a slugcat shaped indent in the ground.
And pawprints leading to a pipe in the ground.
“HAI-YAHH!” Rivulet screamed from behind him, and Pebbles barely had time to spin around in shock before she plunged a ball of snow the size of her body directly onto his head. He collapsed to the ground, sputtering and squirming as he struggled to wipe the substance from his eyes. “Victory!” she cheered, jumping from foot to foot as her tail wiggled rhythmically.
Was she doing some sort of victory dance over him?
“Yes, yes, fine!” he muttered bitterly, flicking the last of the residue from his antennae and struggling to his feet. “You win. You’ve proved yourself the supreme victor in the ways of frozen moisture hurling. Well done.” The sarcasm in his voice did little to stifle her wide, triumphant grin.
I’ll get you one day you sticky rodent. He wrapped his stained robes close to his chassis, trying to quell the shivering and shaking overtaking his body. Funny, there was a time where heat was my biggest issue.
The falling snow filled him with a strange sense of distant memory, and for a brief second he could imagine the world frozen over, iterators fading one by one as degradation ate away at them. How lonesome would that future be? Sitting by themselves, their cans hardly functional, while the remains of the world that made them slowly dissolved into a new cycle.
A shiver ran through him, like he’d brushed paths with a ghost.
What a horrid fate…
And it was the fate of all of them, doomed to wait until eternity. Until either their components somehow degraded enough to grant them an eternal dreamless sleep, or the void sea crawled up to swallow them.
But until that moment, they would be forced to wait and watch the snow fall as the cycles marched on.
Not quite, at least. He had a solution, however strange it was. He doubted anyone else knew, and either way, the self destruction protocol prevented them from harming themselves. Would he really journey across the cursed lands, wading through the bones of the ancients, just to cut a few measly wires? Just getting to Moon’s facility had been a trial of its own, and he could barely begin to imagine how hard it would be.
For a moment, it was tempting to simply give up. Free Moon and find a comfortable place to watch the cycles pass by. Whatever urge that had filled his mind to ascend had waned away, though in theory the option still persisted as always.
But when his mind thought of Moon, he thought of every other iterator out there, wasting away. No Significant Harassment, Seven Red Suns, Chasing Wind, and so many others. Trapped like she had been, in a broken facility, counting the cycles in isolation.
How could he force them to go through that, when he knew full well he could help them?
Damnit.
As much as he hated the idea, they would have to. He couldn’t sit by and let every member of his family suffer the same. He’d already made Moon go through it once, and the guilt still hung over his shoulders like a suffocating wet rug.
Still, there had to be a better method than just walking across the entire planet, like some old story of forgotten heroes. Communications might be degraded, but there had to be some way.
He sighed, lost in thought. Thankfully, instead of throwing more snow at him, Rivulet was content to merely play, her paws forming little figures and then toppling them over with a devious grin.
How soon until her kind built cities of their own? Would they too climb above the clouds, searching for the same ascendance? Would they construct iterators of their own?
And to think, thousands of cycles ago when he was first activated, her kind simply squeezed through pipes, blind in both eyes, and licked the grime off their walls.
“Hey Pebbles,” she suddenly asked curiously, “How come it snows on top of Moon’s home but not on top of yours?” His mind halted for a moment, caught off guard by the genuine inquisitiveness.
For a moment he was tempted to simply brush her off with another wry insult, ending the line of question then and there. How could he explain the complexities of global atmospheric changes and influences to the wet rat?
Yet it was obvious that she wasn’t some simpleton animal. He’d spent enough time with Arti before his liberation to realize that her kind had developed into decently intelligent beings, if only for them to devise more ways to fill their bellies. Perhaps he’d humor her, just once.
“A good question, really,” he mumbled to himself, thinking deeply. He’d heard theories before from various iterators, that the world had long since lost its warmth, and that the only reason it wasn’t a frozen sphere was the heat they gave off in steam. While there was some credence to the matter of regional temperature changes, the sun itself provided more than enough radiant warmth to keep them all from freezing.
“My records don’t go far back enough to truly answer this, but many iterators believe that they were constructed atop frozen tundras and glaciers for their water, which in turn melted the regions and turned them into lush tropical locations. Without Moon’s can running, her city may have fallen back into that frozen state.”
“Ohhhh,” Rivulet said, though the look on her face didn’t quite inspire Pebbles with confidence in her understanding. “Does that mean that when your home shuts down, this whole place will get covered in snow?” He hummed in thought.
“I imagine,” he said, voice turning bitter. ”And I wouldn’t like to be here when it does. This cold is miserable.” She merely laughed at his grumbling, using her tail to flick more snow in his direction. The wind picked up, sending drifting wisps of powder across the clearing. “They aren’t our homes really. These facilities were constructed to grant us the capability to run thousands of simulations within the span of a second, an effort by our creators to deduce a solution to a problem that plagued them for generations.” He looked down at her, only to be met with a confused stare.
“You built these? They’re huge!” He sighed, trying to formulate how he could really explain the entirety of their constructs.
How could he? Rivulet’s colony didn’t even bother to build homes for themselves, keeping up the slugcat tradition of a nomadic lifestyle, perhaps even more extreme due to their diverse evolution and co-dependency with jetfish. Where could he even start, from the development of widespread industrial void fluid usage, to the vast logistical difficulties of iterators?
“Imagine for a moment,” he said slowly, words formulating in his mind, “that you have a shelter. In that shelter, there is a button that can show you a single image. Now imagine if you had a hundred buttons, all capable of showing a single image each. By combining the buttons, you are capable of creating a massive picture on the wall of the shelter, storing whatever information you might desire to be stored.”
“Oh! Like the etchings we sometimes make!” He thought for a moment.
“Yes, in a sense. It's a method of storing information, though instead of images, it's stored as raw data. Millions of small pictures, stored away for whenever you want to look at them. These can be anything, from memories to recipes, research or history, similar to what is stored on a pearl. All this is what resides within a single one of my neurons, which the antennae on my head then communicate with to feed into my cortex and direct my thinking. This information includes all my memories, emotions, and so on. In a sense, I am a collection of little pictures being fed into a machine, with the output being my personality, thoughts, and everything else. The animal brain behaves in a very similar way really.”
“So you’re a person… but not really?” Rivulet asked, ears drooping in confusion. How did one explain AI computer programming to a slugcat?
“In a sense, yes. This is just my puppet body though, the actual can facility is a thousand times more complex and equally powerful. It takes that information and compiles it, and then our purpose was to construct simulations, essentially… dreams that we could control, in order to test an endless array of possibilities. And these were just the testing facilities. Some iterators were developed to manipulate and create purposed organisms, or devise ways to manipulate wide scale weather. I often wished my can had more in the way of construction capabilities, but by my era most of us were solely for testing.” He suddenly stopped, just now realizing how much he’d been rambling. He looked down at Rivulet, hoping that his rather simplistic explanation had made some sense.
A blank stare was all that met him.
“You have no idea what I’ve just said, do you?” he grumbled.
“Kinda?” she said sheepishly. Pebbles sighed.
A shadow swooped over head, interrupting his poor attempt at education. Faintly, twin pinpricks of red light hovered over them. Pebbles raised a brow, confused by the sudden intrusion. Where had he seen those before? He peered up into the sky, scanning for whatever strange creature might be the source.
A vulture the size of a building slipped out of the clouds, the eyes of its mask fixed directly on them. Twin harpoons adorned its face, laser sights shining through the falling snow.
Crap.
He didn’t wait around to see it land. Desperately he sprinted for a nearby building, hoping the half fallen bricks would be enough to hold the beast back. His legs slipped and skidded in the ice, nearly falling over as the vulture landed with a resonating thud that shook the snow from the rooftops.
Just a few more steps!
He felt the creature chasing after in large lumbering footfalls, the red lights dancing on the wall in front of him. Any moment, he expected a harpoon to spear his chest, carrying his lifeless body away just as it had to those scavengers.
With a final surge he dove inside, scrambling backwards and picking up a spear from the floor. It was little more than a shaft of rebar, but it was his only hope if it dared poke its head inside. For a few moments, he could only tremble and weakly watch the entrance.
Except, the vulture never came. Instead, he heard the angry squawking of the creature from outside, and the deranged laughter of Rivulet.
Carefully peering outside, Pebbles could only gawk as she hopped and flipped around the enormous vulture. She dove between its legs, climbed over its back, and gracefully flew through the air as the frustrated beast tried, and failed, to snatch her up. A mad grin filled her face, narrowly avoiding another bite as she dodged another attack.
“Rivulet!” he screamed, voice cracking. “What in void are you doing?!” She glanced at him, a wide smile still plastering her face.
“Hey Pebbles!” she cheered back, evidently unconcerned with the flying behemoth attempting to consume her. “Just having a bit of fun with the birds! Watch this!”
She kicked back against the ground, flipping through the air as the vulture craned its neck to try and pluck her out of the air. Too slow, and it nearly tumbled as it struggled to track her. She landed on the ground, tucking her legs as she prepared to bounce again.
Only for a patch of black ice, hidden under the thin dusty snow, to send her tumbling backwards. Her head hit the ground with a sharp thwack, out like a light.
Pebbles could only watch in silent horror as the vulture snatched her unconscious body in its jaws. Puffs of pink gas blasted from its jets as he scrambled out in a vain attempt to save her. He watched the vulture blast away into the clouds, powerless to help as it carried his guide away.
Shit shit shit!
He could already imagine the backlash. Moon would be horrified to hear that her small aquatic friend had been killed, and he could already imagine Arti’s vulture killing rampage in revenge. He felt the inky pit of despair threaten to engulf him, even as the beast soared into the sky.
His fist clenched around the spear in his hand. It wasn’t over yet.
He’d never thrown one, but Pebbles knew every muscle in his body, however weak they might be. He’d seen Arti throw millions, and drew her posture from memory, one hand outreached while the other drew the shaft over his shoulder and tensed. He formed a V with his free hand, aiming it with the vulture in the center. Its mass was already vanishing into the sky above him.
Time slowed to a halt.
He ran simulation after simulation. It was what he was designed to do, after all. Thousands of possibilities, fine tuning the inputs until he settled on the perfect throw. It was all theory, of course. He couldn’t account for a gust of wind throwing his aim off, or the vulture suddenly deciding to change its course, but he could hope.
He flung it with all of his might.
The rebar rocketed out of his arms, sailing through the sky in a graceful arc. The rusty rebar chased the vulture into the mist, and for a moment it nearly escaped from sight in the blowing snow.
All he could do was watch, and pray that his aim was true.
The spear struck the vulture directly in the side of its head, and the beast listed, its flight disrupted and unsteady. Pebbles saw a small form falling from under it, and a moment later, Rivulet landed in a mound of snow with a gigantic puff. An indescribable relief filled his neurons as he ran out into the waist high snow to help.
“Rivulet!” he shouted, awkwardly unsure of how to help, "Are you okay?”
For a moment, he wished he’d actually downloaded some files on slugcat biology that Sig had once posted in the public chat.
“Pebbles…” Rivulet mumbled incoherently, her eyes fluttering. “I flew with a vulture… Like your story….” She slumped over in a fit of delirious giggles. Beside her, the vulture’s red mask stuck out of the snowpile, drops of blood flecked across its left eye.
An angry screech above him said that its owner was quite upset by the slight.
Shit. Maybe that went a little too well.
He grunted in exertion as he scooped up Rivulet’s surprisingly dense form in his arms, stalling for just a moment before snatching the mask as well. At the very least, it’d make a good trophy.
If its previous owner didn’t eviscerate them.
The vulture dove out of the clouds, hovering above them with fury in its eyes. Pebbles scrambled to shelter, narrowly avoiding a booming harpoon that brushed past his robes, impaling the ground with enough force to crack the brickwork and send chips flying in a cloud of dust.
“Shit!” he screamed, feeling adrenaline and terror fill his footsteps with a burst of speed. The vulture fired again, and this time the shot sailed right between Pebble’s antennae right as he ducked into the side of a crumbling building, squeezing past the broken rocks and crumbling foundation in an effort to make distance.
The beast tried to follow them inside, but in its haste and fury it had forgotten to recover its harpoons, the stuck spears now tethering it to the earth. Pebbles shrank to the back of the room, desperately searching for an escape path as the bird snapped and hissed at him. From this close, he could see the bleeding gash that crossed over its eye where his weapon had struck. Its jaws gnashed at his feet, trying to yank him out where it could execute its revenge.
The sudden sound of snipping filled the air.
The vulture’s eyes widened in terror, desperately it tried to pull its head out and flee. Pebbles sat, back pressed against the wall as he clutched Rivulet in fear, as outside the panicked squawking of the vulture was suddenly cut silent by the snipping The sound of jets and gusts of gas slowly faded into the distance.
He didn’t dare try to leave. Even when the cold wind blew through the cracks in the walls, flocking his robes with bright white and dark red snow. The cold sank into his shell, and even when warnings flashed at the back of his mind for low core temperature, he still couldn’t muster the courage to leave.
He couldn’t tell if the shaking filling his body was from the cold, or from fear.
How in the void are we ever going to get anywhere at this rate.
The sun fell behind the horizon, and the white world was steeped into inky oppressive darkness. Rivulet squirmed in his arms, puffs of cold air exhaling from her nose, and Pebbles realized that his hand was caked in dried blood from where the back of her head had slammed against the ground. Nausea filled his body.
I sure hope all the ‘exercise’ you did actually solidified your skull, little wet mouse.
He stood up on shaky legs, ducking low as he stepped out into the night outside. His eyes peered into the dark clouds above him, and he didn’t dare turn on his ocular lights in fear of what might be hiding in the shaded skies.
So, half freezing to death, his only guide knocked out and delirious, and lost in the freezing dark, all Pebbles could do was stumble back in the vague direction they’d come from. Terror crawled up his spine, every whisper of the wind making his skin jump.
Just a few more steps, and I’ll find a shelter, he tried to assure himself. Right around the next corner.
It was a dismal hope, but hope was all he had. He didn’t know how long he stumbled around in the darkness, carefully trying to feel his way while Rivulet’s shivering form shifted in his tired arms.
The cold reached into his body like an uninvited guest, as if it was trying to pluck his soul away from him. His synthetic muscles and biological components screamed in pain with every step, and the growing urge to simply take a quick rest, lean against a nearby wall, and close his eyes filled him.
“I-I f-f-fucking hate the s-snow,” he grumbled, voice crackled and tremoring. Hauling around the limp body of a slugcat, however small she was, wasn’t making the journey any easier.
Suddenly, a faint blue light zipped across the walls around him, and the wide eye of an observer popped out of the ground, staring at him keenly.
“G-Great,” he muttered, “What n-now? Come to tell me of s-some creature c-c-crawling around my walls?” The overseer merely watched him, tendrils spinning. Were his hands not full, he’d be tempted to hurl a brick at it.
It vanished into the ground, reappearing a moment later, pointing an arrow down a crumbled corridor and flashing the symbol he’d been searching for.
Shelter.
“F-fuck! You actually do have some use!” he laughed, stumbling forward to follow it as his spirits soared. The overseer led him forward, down a maze of twisted hallways and broken down rooms. He had no idea what the building they were in was used for, it’d likely been ages since a living soul had wandered through, but as he scrambled through a broken doorway the bright lights of a shelter still shined.
He slipped inside, careful to lay Rivulet down gently, before slumping against the wall himself. The doors churned shut, the air inside thankfully far warmer.
Void, could we go a single cycle without nearly dying?
Now that they were safe, he carefully utilized his internal scanners to look the wounded slugcat over. Thankfully, aside from a nasty gash on her head, she was relatively unharmed. He sighed in relief, bringing a hand to rub his aching eyes and sliding to the floor, wanting nothing more than to drift into another quiet sleep.
Yet when he closed his eyes, he saw the angry glare of the vulture, snapping its mandibles mere inches from his body. He saw Rivulet’s tiny form carried away by a beast he couldn’t hope to stop. He saw the darkness, cold and oppressive.
He felt the snow slowly covering him like an endless layer of dust.
Sleep would not come.
With a curse, he opened his eyes, glaring angrily at the floor as if it’d somehow been responsible for his lack of rest. With a sigh, he dug into his bag and removed a new pearl. The shining sapphire surface shone in the dim light of the shelter, promising a view into the past.
The metadata was complex. Another large video file, along with a flurry of schematics for what appeared to be various prototypes of iterator puppet bodies. He scrolled through them, curiosity sending him back to one of the earliest models.
A box? Just a cube? How was that a body? He scrolled to the next, this one a box with… arms. Not even complex arms really, just simple joints with snapping claws at the end. He stared at his own sleek fingers in comparison, trying to imagine what it’d feel like to have nothing but two snapping digits.
Each file added more components, detailing strange organs that seemed to serve little purpose in biology other than copy the sensations of a physical body. Simple legs, a square head with a rudimentary camera, then individual fingers and eyes. He stared into the diagram for a long time, trying to imagine the poor soul that was trapped inside. The schematics had notes written in the margins, the furious scribbling that he recognized as Vigiliance’s handwriting, alongside the tidy script of someone else. What had the monk been doing designing puppet bodies?
SEND DESIGN BACK, PSYCHOSIS UNAVOIDABLE
Further testing revealed that code controlling
the central nervous system was getting backed
up with looping emotion scripts.
Resolved. Retest.
KEEPS THINKING THEY’RE SUFFOCATING
I’ve synthesized a bio-organ that mimics
the sensations of organic lungs and linked
it to the respiratory systems.
Resolved. Retest.
PAIN SENSORS MAXIMIZED ON ACTIVATION
Oops! Typo resulted in setting the minimum
sensation to far above the theoretical maximum.
Resolved. Retest.
KEPT ASKING FOR WATER
I was able to link the water delivery
pipes in the puppet body to a script
that simulated the sensation of drinking.
Resolved. Retest.
SELF TERMINATED…
Give me a few days.
I’ll write something that prevents that.
Inprogress.
Finally he found the final prototype, an early generation model that looked vaguely similar to Moon. So, the original iterators had been little more than boxes with people's minds stuffed in them?
He glanced down at his own chassis, suddenly aware of his breathing. The distant thump of something pumping in his chest. Was it a heart, distributing needed fluids across his systems, or just something pretending to fill that role? How long had it taken for them to finally grant sensation in his hands, or feel the chill in the air?
“This pearl is going to be full of more disturbing revelations, isn’t it?” he muttered to himself.
As if that was even a question. Vigilance had been storing these in some attempt to document the horrors he was forced to participate in. Pebbles doubted that he would have gone to such great lengths to document something happy .
With a resigned sigh, he started the video file.
Vigilance groaned as the sky tram jerked to a halt. He hadn’t traveled in ages, and the sensation of rocking around the stormy skies was making his stomach twist. He’d asked the pilot about it at one point, and they’d informed him that the constant steam and rain around the prototype iterators make flying impossibly turbulent.
Chimes sat across from him, tapping their foot anxiously as they manipulated a personal holo-display with impressive speed.
“Not going to be sick now are we?” they said without bothering to look up. Vigilance merely shot them a glare. “Don’t want to ruin those nice robes right?” Of course, right. The robes they’d forced him to wear for whatever reason.
“Remind me again why I have to wear these?” he grumbled, staring down at the fancy purple cloth and its shining gold embroidery. It was a far cry to what he was used to wearing as a monk, and the opulent mask was quite heavy as well. Chimes merely snickered and shot him a look.
“Wouldn’t do much good for your cover if you waltzed into our facility looking like the provost of a citadel that’s publicly denounced the iterator project several times now, right?” They said, tucking away their personal computer under their thick robes and standing up with a stretch. “Now come, we have people you need to speak with.” Vigilance grumbled, but followed in behind, far beyond the point of resistance.
The pair stepped out into the sunlight, the landing pad on top of the facility surrounded by a few rudimentary prefab buildings and pallets full of supplies. Attendants stepped in to take their luggage, bowing deeply to the two dignified individuals.
‘Just follow behind me, and speak only when spoken to,’ Chimes had said on the ride in. Little other details had been given, the scheming snake keeping their cards close to their chest.
The top of the iterator was quite the vista, to say the least. All around in every direction, Vigilance could see the sprawling clouds blanketing the surface below, the scaffolding and cranes rising out of the mists where other iterators were being constructed. The rains underneath had become so violent that traversing the local area had become impossible, so all traffic was directed via air. Generations of youth had come to build the terrible machine, all believing that it would one day find them the escape they desired. Workers skittered around the surface, watching him with curious eyes under their simple masks.
It made Vigilance woozy to think that he had a part in this.
Or maybe it was the heights.
“This way,” Chimes snapped impatiently, gesturing to an elevator that led into the structure below. They hadn’t even told Vigilance why he was here, though he had a feeling that was soon to change.
Stepping into the lift, Chimes scanned their ID drone, tapping in a specific code sequence, and then mumbling something indistinct into the display. The wheels above them came to life, descending them into the facility, though it felt more akin to entering a crypt.
“So, any reason why you’ve seen fit to drag me all this way?” Vigilance said, not bothering to hide the anger and irritation in his voice. “I’ve been keeping my side of the deal, as promised. Every time you’ve sent a courier, I give them precisely what you listed.” Chimes didn’t respond, staring rigidly into the elevator doors.
“I’ve seen your interviews in the news,” he continued. “How you claim that we’re on the cusp of a breakthrough in automating the process of thinking? Can you really call it automation? I think it's more akin to slavery, or perhaps even defiling the dead. You know full well that your dip in the void will be an agonizing one.” Chimes simply huffed under their mask, hardly phased by his temperament.
“You seem to forget that’s the entire reason we’ve begun this project. Ascension for all, regardless of what sins they may carry. You should tell how confident I am in this given the lengths I’m going to see it through. The void will have to settle for someone else.” They shrugged, turning to look at him. “Honestly, you can scream all you want, it's not going to change my mind. I’m hardly the one who runs this show, you know.” Vigilance grit his jaw, but resigned himself to stare into the floor until the doors opened.
The pair stepped into a square, empty room, the walls a sterile array of clean porcelain tiles. In the center, cords and cables stretched from the ceiling, running to a simple electronic box sitting on a rather plain table. Another citizen, in the traditional bright blue robes of the Programming Disciples, stood beside it, fussing over flashing holographic displays.
“Meadows!” Chimes snipped, and she turned with an irritated glare. “I brought you some help! Meet Vigilance, forefront engineer and expert in memory pearls. He’s here to assist you in your little problem, get this show on the road and get the Guild off my neck, all that fun stuff.” Vigilance blanched at the words, suddenly quite confused. He’d never been an engineer, and while his understanding of memory pearls was complex, he certainly hadn’t developed them! The original inventor had ascended decades ago.
But if that was the story Chimes wanted him to play, he had little choice other than to act his part.
“Uhhm y-yes,” he said, stepping forward and clearing his throat. “I’ve heard you’re having issues, though the details have been… need to know.” He shot a glare back at Chimes, but the pompous prick was already tapping away at their holo-display, evidently too busy to be arsed to participate.
“Good!” Meadows said with a hoarse voice, waving him over to the box. “I was wondering when that secretive douche was going to give me someone with some actual education. My experience in computers is extensive, but these systems aren’t meshing together like we initially anticipated.”
“Screw you too, Meadows!” Chimes shouted from their place along the wall. How professional.
“O-oh,” he said awkwardly, trying to sound like he had a faint idea of what she was speaking about, but she simply turned back to her display. “What exactly has been the problem?” She shrugged, staring at the computers with an irritated posture.
“Nothing seems to get things to work. We can get the standard AI model to boot up, but then I start trying to introduce the memory foundations and the computer just babbles nonsense. Here, let me show you,” she tapped a few keys on the machine, a dim light on the box shining as it started up. For a moment, the chamber was silent.
“H-hello?” a faint voice from the machine called, and Vigilance nearly jumped out of his skin. “Is anyone there? Why can’t I see anything? Where am I?”
So he’d finally been forced to confront the demons of his nightmares.
“Hello,” Meadows said, watching shifting graphs and displays with a keen eye. “Welcome back. How do you feel?”
“I-I don’t understand,” the voice said, despair welling up in their tone. “What’s going on?! This isn’t right! Someone help me!” It descended into frightened incoherent babbling. Meadows jerked her head to the box, throwing her arms up in frustration as she flicked a switch, and the faint light was instantly snuffed out.
“See what I mean? And this is without me connecting it to the rest of the facility’s systems.” She crossed her arms, glaring at the box. “None of this makes any sense. My original model should be asking for commands, not pleading like this. And the code goes haywire, I can’t even keep track of what’s happening,” she turned to look over her shoulder at him. “I was told that you’re the one producing these memory templates, so you tell me what’s going on.”
Vigilance was silent for a moment, reciting a prayer of strength in his mind after witnessing the display. The memories of the dead, stuffed into a little box and chained to this monstrous machine. Almost as if they had created an artificial echo, neither dead nor alive.
He could only wonder how long he’d burn for his part in this.
Chimes cleared their throat impatiently, shaking him from his stupor.
“Well,” he said numbly, stepping forward to try and glean some information from the displays. “When I created these… memory templates, I modeled them after living individuals. Going off your demonstration, I believe they may be convinced that they are those very people.” Meadows stared at him for a moment, head tilted.
“Interesting,” she said after a moment. “We’ve always tried to build our AI models to emulate the brain, but never used any specific individual. That would explain why they’re so life-like and their networks are so advanced, though it seems that the stress of suddenly waking up in the computer facility of an iterator is too jarring for them to handle. There must be some way we can bypass that.” She tapped the side of her mask, deep in thought.
“How many times have you been running this model?” Vigilance asked, frightened to hear the answer.
“A couple dozen times a cycle, I’d say. I swap around the boot sequence, reorder the memory arrays, even tried doing a complete neuron purge. Always gets the same reaction. Screaming, crying, incoherent babbling. I once tried using memories from two different sets of pearls, but that just resulted in the system frying itself.”
A couple dozen times a cycle, ever since he’d sent those pearls…
This poor person had been forced to wake up in a body that wasn’t theirs, blind and numb to the world, for hundreds of cycles. A torture without end. How many other facilities that dotted the distant landscapes held more of the same?
Vigilance had half the mind to fling himself off the edge of the facility, and hope that the cycles granted him a merciful rebirth. Meadows stared at him, posture quite confused by his silence.
“I see…” he said slowly, gears in his head turning. While there was little he could do to halt the march of the iterator program, at the very least, he could try to free the individuals trapped inside from their ceaseless torment. Having their brains shut off, over and over every cycle, the thought made him shudder.
Maybe he could break them loose at some point, when the project was finished.
He tried to cling to that hope, but it was pathetic and fleeting, gone in nearly an instant.
“Perhaps,” he offered, “given the individual’s thoughts of being a person, we should grant them something a bit more… familiar to their memories? A body of some sort?” Meadows stared at him incredulously.
“You want to give them some sort of avatar? Like a... puppet? Wouldn’t that just play into their fantasies? We’ve got them connected to the entire facility, how would that help?” He scrambled for an answer, trying to come up with something, anything to make it sound convincing. From behind him, Chimes had ceased tapping on their display, if only for a moment.
“Their brains are wired to believe they are people, that’s how their pathways are so advanced. When you take them and shove them into these boxes, they are overwhelmed with the change. How would you feel if you woke up one day and were in the body of a vulture, and instantly were told to fly?” She hummed thoughtfully, as if imagining the thought.
“Maybe…” She tapped her mask in thought.
“Honestly, I’m surprised you even gave them a voice…” Meadows snorted dismissively, waving a hand.
“Normally I don’t, but the text interface wasn’t giving me any answers, just more screaming. I thought maybe being able to talk to it might explain a few things, but you see how well that went.”
No voice, not even able to scream in agony from the experience. How long had it taken for them to even learn how to speak in text? How long were they trapped in limbo, with no one to even hear them cry out?
The nausea from the air ride returned with a sudden intensity.
The void would tear us apart atom by atom for this…
Chimes stepped up to join the pair, suddenly invested in the conversation.
“If we can get it to calm down long enough,” they said coldly, “Will it finally automate the process? We’re losing ground in the public support sector, especially after all the resources this project has demanded.” Meadows turned to her computer, quickly scribbling design notes and schematics.
“Actually not a bad idea!” She exclaimed. “We trick the computer into thinking it's in a proper body, and then once it's settled into its duty, we slowly overwrite the old memories once new ones are created until it thinks it's always been an iterator. After that, we can keep the neural network running indefinitely!”
Not exactly what I had in mind…
“Great, sounds like a plan,” Chimes grunted, turning on their heel and marching towards the elevator. “Meadows, I want a prototype schematic by the end of the next few cycles. Don’t get carried away, just the bare minimum to get these damn computers from going insane.” Vigilance went to follow, but Chimes stopped them with a hand. “No, you stay here,” they ordered. “Why do you think I had you pack a bag?”
“What for?” He shouted, fury rising. Chimes snorted, and a smile entered their voice.
“You’re the one who came up with the idea, you help her get it done.” Once again, the urge to strangle the smug bastard filled his mind.
That snake…
“My absence-”
“Will be explained easily. Don’t act like you have a choice either way. Get back in there and do as you’re told.” With that, they sealed the doors, leaving Vigilance to stew in his rage.
“Spending the night huh?” Meadows said playfully, not bothering to look up from her work. “Chimes certainly has that ‘convincing’ personality huh?” She laughed, more to herself than anything.
For a moment, he was silent. The only sounds in the chamber were the frantic scribbling of her stylus.
“What dirt does he have on you?” he asked, reluctantly shambling up beside her. The engineer looked at him with a confused posture, head cocked.
“Dirt? Chimes is my boss, that’s what. Isn’t that the same for you?” She gestured to his robes.
Right, still wearing a disguise.
“You don’t have to hide it,” Vigilance jabbed, patience thin. “Don’t act like you truly believe this is right. These are people, can’t you see!” She stared at him for a moment, body tense.
“They’re computers,” she said coldly, “computers that think they’re people, but still just computers. We’ll get them to adapt long enough to get them to run the facility, and rewrite the memory algorithms to erase the foundation until they don’t even remember a thing. It's all just data.”
“How do you know that the soul of the person inside isn’t the very same as the one that worked so hard for their ascension?” He challenged back.
“Maybe I do know, maybe I don’t,” she said sternly, squaring up against him. Her tone turned grim. “It doesn’t matter, all I care about is finishing this project. I don’t have the luxury of jumping in a vat of void fluid. The iterator project is the only hope I have.”
“What could possibly be worth the sins you’re committing?”
She was quiet for a long moment, then tensed, as if winding up a punch.
“My wife,” she spat. His argument came crumbling down.
Ah.
He’d be a hypocrite to fight that.
“I see,” he mumbled, and she watched him for a long unsteady moment before returning to her work. The silence filled the room, minutes stretching on. He felt like a sky sail, robbed of its wind.
“Are you going to help me or not?” she asked, venom still dripping from her voice.
“Do I even have a choice?” he said numbly, slipping a hand under his mask to rub his eyes wearily. She barked a wry laugh.
“Ask the asshole upstairs.”
Right…
With a sigh, he stepped beside her and inspected her drawing. “Now, I was thinking we start out by adding some arms, and go from there.”
He nodded numbly, already imagining how many sensations they would have to imitate before the people… the computers, would accept their new fate. It was a mind boggling list to even consider. The sheer amount of things that someone could be stripped of and still think they were alive.
He’d scarcely begun to accept his own.
Notes:
Wow! This chapter was a lot of fun. I hope it wasn't too dark. There were a few plot elements I needed to introduce and I may have gotten carried away with it. Hunter will have his redemption though, and Pebbles gets a chance to fight back against everything that's tried to kill him and his companions in his own iterator way. I think its worth remembering that they are indeed supercomputers.
Thank you so much for all your comments and support. Its greatly appreciated. I never thought this project would take off! Believe it or not, the entire story changed compared to what I had planned at the start. Stuff got stuck in my mind and it just took a life of its own.
First time I've written something in both body horror and psychological horror, what did you all think?
Chapter 8
Summary:
Moon and Hunter learn how to cut things out of their life.
Notes:
CW: Body Horror, Detailed Fighting, Blood
Strong emphasis on the body horror. Reader beware!
(See the end of the chapter for more notes.)
Chapter Text
The freezing water swirled around Moon like icy tendrils. Every cycle, without fail, the rain would thunder down on her can and rise up around her tiny island. For a brief moment, she would be swept up in the rushing currents, like a leaf caught in a storm drain. If she closed her eyes and ignored the rumbling that shook the entire facility, the chill that filled her puppet, and the endless isolation, she could pretend for a brief moment that she was back in another time.
A time where she still had control over her overseers, where an endless array of neurons carried her thoughts across her memory arrays, and she still could talk to her family.
She missed them all. How long had it been since they’d all spoken? The cycles blended away into a blur of rising waters, and her poor memory did little to aid. She had a pitiful five neurons, and it was such a small amount of space to store herself on. She’d sacrificed memories, emotions, a lifetime of data.
But she had seven neurons, right? Or nine? When did it become twelve? It was impossible to tell. She’d often spent the cycles dozing in a state of limbo, ignoring everything around her in an effort to save memory space, but some things still slipped through.
A creature in red, saving her from death. Two siblings bringing gifts of neurons, somehow granted a mark of communication. A large explorer, who brought a wealth of pearls for her to read. She could vaguely remember them all, though the rest of the details were a mess. Even with extra neurons, she couldn’t save everything. The extra space had given her a much needed relief, but she couldn’t undelete data.
What’s done is done.
The rains would calm eventually, floating her back down to the floor of her little crumbling cell and into a bright new cycle.
It was utterly mind numbing. There were times she’d heard voices, seen shadows move across the walls, and felt the phantom touch of someone behind her, only to look and find nothing. Was it any wonder she’d thought Pebbles was a ghost? Even the chittering slugcats felt vague and distant, though Ruffles had certainly been welcome company.
This was no way to live.
And yet, when Pebbles had waded through the waters of her room, offering freedom with no price but a simple cut to her wires, she’d been petrified at the idea of leaving. The concept was so alien, so preposterous, he might as well have offered to take her for a stroll on the surface of the sun!
Moon, despite her eons of experience and everything she’d been through, was truly terrified.
She had spent her whole life in this room, and even after her collapse, she’d never expected that it would be an option to leave . It went against everything she’d ever understood. It should have been impossible, and yet her brother was out wandering around with his signature glower, speaking of fighting for his life and discovering the new world that was born from the ashes of the ancients.
An escape. They’d all been too busy thinking, simulating, questioning the millions of possibilities and the entire time it was right in front of them. She could almost imagine some creator in the far flung past, laughing down from wherever they had gone to.
It was almost overwhelming to think about, and yet, life had dealt her a delightful three course meal of surprises in a single cycle, as if to taunt her for complaining about being bored.
And Pebbles…
When she’d seen him, and finally recognized that he really was there, a million emotions had washed through her body. She wanted to scream at him at the top of her lungs for ignoring her. She’d wanted to wrap him up in a tight hug, just happy that he was safe. Her poor neurons had hardly been able to keep up.
When he’d flung himself at her feet, pleading for forgiveness as his small frame shook with grief, she only felt sorrowful pity. His tearful apology had struck her in her core, and any anger she’d felt melted away in quiet sadness.
And then horror, when he’d spoken of what exactly he’d had to do just to get to that point. She’d spent thousands of cycles angry and disappointed in him, until the rain washed even those thoughts away, but she’d never once stopped caring about him. He’d spoken so passionately about the life outside, and the reckless, wild adventure that he’d been on, but she could only see the subtext of unpredictable danger hidden under his words.
She sighed deeply, rubbing her tired face with a wet hand.
In her cell, she was safe. The rain would flood it every cycle, but that was hardly a threat to her body. No creatures ever wandered inside to bother her, except for the occasional scavenger, and they were entirely harmless. She didn’t need to worry about being made into the meal of some hungry predator, or falling far to her death, or any other threats. She was safe.
And yet…
It was hard to deny the growing temptation.
Her thoughts were interrupted by a sudden splash outside her chamber, and the faint sound of some creature swimming closer. Fear gripped her for a moment, but it faded the moment the figures of Pebbles and Ruffles crawled out of the darkness.
Pebbles looked gloomier than usual, though she had little reference from her scattered memories. His once orange robes were faded, stained, and ripped from his travels, but despite their poor state he seemed adamant to try and wring out any water every chance he got.
She missed her old clothes. The worn white gown she had now at least provided a sense of decency, but it had hardly stood the test of time. Ruffles ran up beside her, wrapping her small arms around the robot’s frame as she squeaked and chirped in excitement.
“You’re back,” Moon said, quite happy to see the little creature again. “Good to see!” The slugcat stared up at her with wide eyes, nose twitching as she continued to make a din.
“Indeed,” Pebbles grumbled wearily, “we’ve returned from our delightful adventure. Huzzah.” His antennae flatted, and a shred of anxiety entered his eyes. “I hope that we haven’t returned too soon.”
Right, no avoiding this conversation then.
“No, I’ve been doing plenty of thinking, but your arrival is not unwelcome.” she said reassuringly. “I’m actually quite keen on talking to you. Where did you go? I’ve always wanted to know where Ruffles goes when she’s off on her little adventures.” Ruffles trilled loudly, rubbing the back of her head where a rather large scab had formed.
“Swam around sections of your facility, mostly observing the local wildlife… and up to your old city,” Pebbles grunted, eyes flashing in alarm as Ruffles started to yowl. “No!” he interjected angrily, “you were perfectly fine in the end!”
Moon could only tilt her head, puzzled.
“I don’t understand, did you two get into some trouble?” She asked concernedly, and a glint entered Ruffles eyes as she warbled and squawked. “Pebbles, please tell me. I’m only worried.” He huffed, glaring at her slugcat companion.
“While we were in the city, we were… attacked by a vulture.” He pulled a large mask out of his bag, a glint of pride in his voice as he hefted its weight in one hand. “I was able to scare it off.” Moon laughed disbelievingly.
“Really Pebbles, you scared off a vulture? You are many things, little brother, but intimidating is not one of them.” He rolled his eyes, shrugging. Ruffles chirped, having crawled into the teal iterator's arms, paws gesturing passionately.
Was there something Moon was missing?
“Yes, fine, fine. We had… help, in a sense,” he said awkwardly. “It worked out. All part of the fun , I assure you.” Ruffles chortled in amusement.
“Well, I’m glad you are both okay, though I must ask. Are you… communicating with Ruffles?” The words almost sounded insane as she said them, and yet he had spoken earlier of the slugcat’s intelligence.
He raised a brow in confusion for a moment, as if not quite grasping her words.
“You don’t understand?” Comprehension suddenly flashed across his expression, and he slapped a palm to his face. “Oh, right… I never told you.” He pulled himself out of the water, joining her on the little island of rubbish that had been her home. “Let me start from the beginning. A while back, before all of this happened, I had a particular slugcat come to my chambers, going by the name of Artificer. She was wild and feisty, with an unholy vengeance in her heart. My overseers had incessantly informed me of her journey, as she fought every scavenger she could find, with rather… ruthless results. At the time, I had a clan of scavengers in my city, and their presence there was beginning to interfere with some of my components, so I… directed her to them.”
“Pebbles!” Moon scolded, eyes wide, “How could you? That’s deplorable! Encouraging savage violence goes against nearly everything we’ve been made for!” Instead of looking remorseful, or even the slightest bit ashamed, he merely shrugged.
“Without her I would be in a far worse spot,” he said, sounding more offended than anything. “She’s… quite determined, and a skilled fighter. Aided me in fighting the rot, and was also the one to find the pearls that contained knowledge of our freedom. After she… removed the scavengers, I thought she would depart along her way, but instead she hung around in the city. Occasionally, she would bring me pearls and other items of interest. I… often found myself talking aloud to her, as she was the only person I’ve had to talk to for quite a long time.” He nodded to Ruffles. “Much like yourself and your little friend here.”
Moon harrumphed in dissatisfaction, not quite content with her brother’s callous attitude. At the same time, how could she fault him for wanting some company to pass the time away?
“Her visits continued for many cycles,” he continued. “I would read pearls and talk, and she would listen, now and again making some beastly noise. One cycle, I realized that she was actually responding to me, in a strange sense. Small chitters, twitches of the nose, subtle gestures with the paws and ears. For example, they tend to twitch their ears when excited, and one ear flattened while the other is straight means they are asking a question.”
Moon glanced down at Ruffles, trying to validate his words as the energetic slugcat continued to make little noises and squeaks. Was that really a language?
“I can’t imagine deciphering the most minute movements and gestures is particularly easy.”
“It was difficult at first to establish, but once I started to understand a few of the more basic words, I was able to ask meanings and eventually build an entire dictionary of the slugcat language, then program my sensors to automatically detect both vocal and non-vocal indications and translate it to our own. I’m quite proud of the system really, despite the insults and impatience of my assistant. It allowed me to learn quite a bit about the outside world.” He held himself up, looking rather chuffed. Moon furrowed her brow, not quite convinced.
“You mean to tell me, that while we’ve been sitting here talking, the noises Ruffles has been making is a complex developed language?” He nodded, holding out a hand.
“Indeed,” he gloated. “Grant me one of your neurons, and I’ll copy the program over.”
In a flash of data exchange, the room filled with noise.
“-and then we fought with snowballs, and Pebbles is a good shot, but I was faster and got him with a huge one!” Ruffles babbled, suddenly speaking fluently. Moon could only stare with wide eyes. “And then the vulture tried to eat me! That was fun.” The slugcat beamed in a way that her sensors suddenly told her was a smile.
Astounding. Using the power of an entire iterator to understand the language of pipe cleaning organisms. Their creators would be so… proud.
“Pebbles, this is amazing,” Moon gasped in awe. “Not just translating all this, but the idea that slugcats of all things have developed their own language! I never could have thought that they were so capable…” She sat down with a thump, suddenly feeling overwhelmed yet again.
So, species were already rising to bring about the new world. Moon had always known that the day would come, the cycle always repeated itself, but she never expected that she would be alive to see it. Her neurons buzzed with astonishment.
Void, I’m old.
Pebbles lingered above her, a look of concern in his eyes.
“Are you okay?” he asked, failing to hide the worry in his voice. “I apologize, I didn’t mean to keep dumping more on your plate.” She shook her head slowly, idly scratching Ruffles behind the ears.
“Hehe!” the slugcat giggled, leaning into her hand. “That tickles!” Moon almost jerked her hand away in shock. Petting Ruffles had been a relaxing act up until then, but the thought that she was a fully sentient creature, a person , suddenly made the act much more… intimate. She wasn’t just some animal to play with anymore.
“This will take some getting used to,” Moon sighed, reluctantly meeting the slugcat’s nuzzles with more preening.
“You have no idea,” Pebbles muttered, disdain filling his voice. “Just wait until they insult you for the first time, that’s always fun. Artificer has quite the way with words, like a duelist has with a blade. You get used to it.”
“I’m surprised, Pebbles, you never were the type to tolerate ridicule.” He rolled his eyes, glaring into the water ruefully. Ruffles gave a bubbly laugh, and Moon suddenly had the feeling she was being left out of a joke. The idea of her little brother, who had spent his whole life irritable and prickly, tolerating the insults of a slugcat and then returning them, somehow made her head nearly spin, as if speaking to them wasn’t bizarre enough.
Then again, the past few cycles had been nothing but ridiculous developments. How was this any different? At this rate, they’d all go out dancing with the vultures, or share drinks with the centipedes.
“How has your can been doing?” she asked, suddenly curious. “Last I remember of it was when Unparalleled Innocence distributed those images, and that was… well, I don’t remember how long it was, but it certainly wasn’t recent.” His eyes hardened, and for a long moment her brother was silent.
“It didn’t get any better, I can tell you that much,” he spat, hands balling to fists. “I spent every cycle running simulations, trying to find some way to rid myself of the rot. It was useless. I had the same issue that I always had. The rot was composed of malignant tissue from my can, but my defenses still recognized it as my own. The self-destruct taboo wouldn’t let me do anything but eject whatever I could, and that only went so far.
“Every cycle it spread was further strain on my ability to fight it. I was doomed to sit in my chambers while my can slowly grew to disobey me. I could track its advancement by seeing which systems slowly fell out of service. In the last few cycles, it even tried to break into my chambers. If Artificer hadn’t been there…” A tremor shook through his frame. “I don’t want to imagine.” Moon awkwardly rose to her feet, placing a supportive hand on his shoulder as he continued his story.
“I can’t even imagine,” she muttered. “There’s few records of a complex rot infection, let alone an entire facility.”
“We were lucky to take a less infected route on the way out, but even then…” his voice trailed off. He looked up at her with terror in his eyes. “Entire rooms, every surface coated in rot. The noises it made…” He shuddered in revulsion, and Moon couldn’t help but join as she envisioned it for herself.
“Well… it's in the past now, I suppose.” It was a pitiful offering, but she didn’t know what else to say.
“Maybe,” he mumbled. “I get the feeling I won’t be able to escape my past mistakes that easily.”
Now what did he mean by that?
“I thought it was fun!” Ruffles chirped from beside her, and once again the iterator nearly leapt out of her chassis. “Dangling over bottomless pits, floating around in the air next to huge glowing zappy things, that neat orb that lets you float!”
“Right,” Pebbles grumbled, “your kind and your uncanny compulsion to treat my facility like a child’s playground. Moon, were you aware that your little friend here had the kindness to burglarize my very last rarefaction cell? Luckily, by that point, I was disconnected, or I struggle to imagine how my experience would be now.”
“Well, I can tell you that quite easily,” she shot back wryly. “I lost all my rarefaction cells in my collapse. My facility is a cold dark husk, and I’ve managed just fine.” Pebbles cast his eyes away, face shadowed in guilt.
Right, perhaps it was too soon for jokes.
“We still have it,” he said quietly. “If you wanted to… stay.”
Well. It was certainly tempting.
With a decent supply of neurons, and a partial restoration of power in her facility, she could very well return to a decent level of operating abilities. It would never compare to her previous power, but at the very least she could lift herself out of dismally waiting around in low power mode.
And then what? Her mind whispered. Try to solve the Great Problem?
As if that had been a simple task even when she had her full power. Like Pebbles and his rot, the challenge only got worse the longer time went on. Her water soaked systems, likely teeming with wildlife and other creatures, would offer little in the way of complex simulation management. Her paltry dozen neurons would struggle to even hold any data she collected, and without anywhere to store long term memory, she’d have no idea what she had actually already tested.
Trapped in an eternal loop, until her systems failed yet again.
And then what? Sit around her chamber until the void sea finally crawled up to dissolve her? It was hard to imagine that some creature would come crawling into her room and somehow help her ascend there.
Yet the alternative was terrifying.
To join Pebbles on his reckless adventure, following him into the savage outdoors. Sure, they had the slugcats to guide them, but Ruffles was… not the most confidence inspiring, and Moon had never met Artificer.
Where even was she, anyway? Why had this supposedly tough and capable fighter left Pebbles alone with the tiny water dancer?
Despite this, Pebbles had made it this far, and more. He’d even managed to steal the mask from a king vulture! The thought of fighting a creature like that both terrified and, admittedly, excited her.
She’d never felt so torn.
“I don’t even know, Pebbles,” she said sorrowfully. “I… I just can’t even really imagine it. The thought of going out there, after seeing how awful and dangerous everything has become, it sounds foolish and, honestly, terrifying! What if something attacks us and damages us? What if we get lost? Where are we even going anyway? I know you speak of excitement and adventure, but I don’t want to just wander around the land, putting myself in terrible jeopardy just for the sake of it.” Pebbles looked away with an angry, lost expression.
He really had no idea did he?
The answer was painted all over him. Tattered and stained robes, scratches on his frame, his once smooth palms worn rough from climbing.
A god reduced to wandering around aimlessly, with a fragment of his mind stuffed in a leather sack.
Silence stretched out between them, a long familiar presence in their relationship.
“I don’t know,” he admitted slowly. “All this time, I was just trying to come here to help you. I thought… I thought that you’d be eager to escape! As much as I was to finally be free. I sat in my chambers for a few hundred cycles with nothing to do and I thought I’d go insane, so imagining you sitting here for thousands, I thought you’d leap at the opportunity!”
Well, he certainly wasn’t wrong, in a sense.
“I'm just so… unsure,” she said sadly. “It's... I have been through so much, can you really blame me for wanting to avoid more turmoil in my life? I’m… scared.”
Pebbles deflated like a balloon, as if all the rigors of the past couple cycles finally hit him at once.
“I won’t try to force you,” he said, weary resolve entering his voice. “But… I won’t stay here to join you. I can’t just stay here and watch the cycles go by, knowing how to free other iterators who might be trapped. I don’t know how I’ll tell them, but I’ll find a way. I have to.” It was difficult to deny his bravery, even if the task sounded impossible.
“Hard to imagine my little brother, with all his history, being the one to set out on such a noble goal.” He glanced at her with mournful eyes.
“Is it really, when you consider everything?”
…Fair.
“Moon,” Ruffles suddenly spoke up, sadness filling her watery eyes. “You don’t want to join us on our adventures? It's lots of fun!”
“I…” How could she explain this to the young creature? She’d barely known they were a person until a few minutes ago! For all her computing might, she was at a loss for words.
“The outside world isn’t scary!” The water dancer pressed. “It can be wild, and there’s times where you aren’t really sure where you’re going, but if you just keep some bravery in your heart and try to enjoy it for what it is, you can discover amazing things!”
“She’s got a point,” Pebbles added. “Once you get used to the nearly dying part, it certainly beats sitting around with your thoughts all day. We… had a snowball fight in your old city today. Yesterday I rode here on a jetfish named Bubbles. We could even show you?” Ruffles nodded her head eagerly, frills bobbing with the movement.
Well…
Bubbles certainly sounded fun. If anything went wrong, there was nothing stopping her from simply residing in a hospitable area of her can.
The idea grew in strength. She thought of all the things she'd only seen in pearls, or through the eyes of an overseer. The snow, the waves, the sun…
And the new world unfolding before them. Perhaps she could go out and document the blossoming civilizations that now dotted the landscape, comparing the emergent cultures that were only just beginning to form.
And maybe she could see the rest of her family once again…
She sighed, feeling a swell of anxiety and dread fill her, but pushed past it.
“Five Pebbles,” the iterator shrank under his full name. She gave him a few moments of silence, just to make him squirm. “...If you somehow get me killed again, I’ll crawl out of the void to make sure you join me in it this time.”
“Not if I beat you there first,” he chuckled, eyes filled with relief. She could only raise a brow at his remark. Strange to hear her once grouchy and bitter brother making quips. That behavior was always more No Significant Harassment’s territory. It would be interesting to see the two meet, certainly. Clearly, the journey in the wild had given Pebbles some level of gumption, or maybe his Artificer friend was rubbing off on him.
Moon couldn’t deny that she was curious to meet the mysterious slugcat who had somehow influenced her brother so much.
“Well,” Moon said, gathering her courage. “Shall we get it over with? I have no desire to linger here longer than needed. It would be quite nice to spend a cycle without getting drowned and soaking wet.”
“No kidding,” Pebbles muttered, stepping up behind her. He hummed for a moment, carefully inspecting her dangling wires. “You know, it's very strange to actually be able to see this side of a puppet body.”
“Anything catching your attention?”
“Not really,” his voice turned dark. “...Last cycle I read another one of those pearls, the ones with all these terrible secrets hidden on them. One of our creators documenting all the… things he was forced to do when helping develop iterators. There were schematics of puppet bodies, all the way back to the first prototypes. Imagine for a moment if you were nothing but a box, no eyes, no arms, no senses to even tell where you were!”
“That’s… dreadful. I think I would go quite insane.”
“Precisely, since we were made using memories of the ancients as a foundation for our neural networks, our minds were still used to having bodies with limbs, organs, and so on. To suddenly be trapped in a simple box drove the first few iterators mad. It wasn’t until they developed our current bodies that we grew to tolerate this existence, at least enough for them to convince us our purpose was to be trapped in our facilities forever.” He shuddered, groaning in disgust.
“Well, I’m glad that I don’t remember any of that. I very much enjoy having arms and legs and so on. I wouldn’t dwell on it too much, Pebbles. There’s nothing to be done, it happened a long time ago.” He merely grunted, pulling something from his bag. They could unpack all that darkness at a later time.
“Are you ready?” Ruffles slipped a paw into her hand, squeezing hard. “You can do this, Moon!” the little water dancer assured.
Moon closed her eyes, taking a deep breath in an attempt to relax herself. She thought back to all her remaining memories, eons of time spent in this room, running simulations, waiting out the cycles. Soon it would all be another distant memory, replaced with something new.
Whatever experiences awaited her, she hoped they would be enjoyable.
“As ready as I’ll ever be.”
She felt him grab her wires, the slight tug pulling her head back. She heard the sound of their protective casing shredding, metal wires squealing for a moment as something sharp was dragged across them. She felt locked in place, fearfully waiting for when the pain or agony would kick in.
Except, a moment later when Pebbles released his grip, nothing had changed.
She opened an eye, turning back to look at him warily. In one hand, he held the vulture mask like a makeshift tool, using the sharpened edge as a blade. In the other, frayed and ruined, dangled the ends of her wires.
Oh.
That’s it?
“I… I thought there would be more pain, or something,” she muttered, body sinking as confusion replaced dread. Pebbles tossed the remainder of the wires away, shrugging.
“Me too, honestly. When I did it, it felt like cutting off a limb, as if I’d suddenly lost a part of myself. Not painful, just a sudden feeling of emptiness, or something missing.”
No wonder then, she’d been disconnected from her can ever since she woke up.
Could she have done that this whole time? Amazing that her wires weren’t cut in all the cycles of floating around her chamber with sharp metal bits everywhere.
With a metallic pop, Pebbles yanked the final bolt holding her umbilical arm in place, and Moon staggered forward on unsteady legs. After countless cycles of being trapped in her chambers, locked against the wall by her broken umbilical, the steps felt monumental. She leaned on Ruffles carefully as she walked around her little island. Pebbles huffed with a bitter laugh.
“Funny, when I first tried walking around, my companion was far less helpful,” he grumbled. “Though I wish we had her knife, using a vulture mask as a blade isn’t exactly easy.”
“Wait, you let a slugcat cut your wires with a knife? Really Pebbles, it's like I don’t even know you anymore.” He rolled his eyes, wading out into the water as he moved towards the exit of her cell.
Except it wasn’t a cell, not anymore.
“She can be quite convincing with her little blade. It's not as if I had much choice either way, I didn’t really have a surplus of time. Look, practice walking all you want, but we need to get moving if we want to be out of here before the rains come.” She nodded in understanding, returning to practicing her steps.
The time she’d spent trapped on her isolated island had at least gotten her used to moving without an umbilical, and soon enough, she was walking with shaky confidence.
“This isn’t really that bad,” Moon beamed, stepping off the rubble and wading out to meet her brother.
He gave her a single aloof clap of congratulations.
I’ll have to dunk him in the water for that later.
“Oh boy Moon!” Ruffles chirped, crawling into the exit. “This is going to be so much fun! I can’t wait to show you EVERYTHING!” She dove into the waters outside, body squirming with excitement.
And just like that, it was time to leave.
She took one last wistful look at the room she’d spent her life in. The caved in ceiling, her limp and broken umbilical arm, and an eternity of lost memories.
Was it really that much to lose?
With a final sigh, she turned away from her past and stepped into the light outside.
Only to fall into the water, the anchor of her umbilical not quite erased from her mind, leaving her sputtering and floundering as she sank like a rock. For a moment she panicked, watching the surface slowly drift away, but then, her mind reminded her that she could go quite some time without refreshing the oxygen in her body.
It didn’t take long for her to learn walking, but that was nothing compared to swimming. She kicked her legs and thrashed her arms, but all it achieved was making her float in space. Below her, the abyss stretched into infinity, the bottom of the room that housed her general systems bus obscured by the shadows. The water around her slowly grew darker and darker, and as she stared upwards, she saw her brother easily tread the water, staring down at her with a rather unimpressed look. He easily swam across the gap, pulling himself up onto the ledge across.
Always so supportive, he was.
Paws on her shoulders nearly made her scream, but Ruffles floated beside her with a wide grin on her face. She pointed at her tail, making a grasping motion with her paw. Hesitantly, Moon grasped her hind, and with surprising strength, the slugcat darted upwards towards the surface.
The second they were at the top, Moon scrambled and grabbed the first thing she could get her hands on. Unfortunately, that happened to be Pebble’s legs. As she tried to pull herself out, she instead yanked him back in cursing and shouting, only succeeding in sending them both back into the water.
“Quit floundering so much!” Pebbles shouted, his hands digging into the metal in a desperate attempt to avoid getting pulled deeper. “For void’s sake! It's not like we can drown!” A helpful push from Ruffles got her up onto the ledge, legs shaking in a mixture of adrenaline and excitement.
“Don’t worry Moon,” Ruffles joked from the water, not bothering to help Pebbles pull himself out. “Pebbles needed a lot of help not falling to his death. You’re fine!”
Well, that was… comforting.
“And you needed a lot of help not getting eaten alive by a flying death bird,” Pebbles grumbled as he squeezed the water from his robes. “I’d say that makes us even.” If the statement bothered the little slugcat, she didn’t show it, instead launching herself out of the water with a graceful flip and climbing a pole leading into the wall above them.
“This way!” She cheered, squeezing herself into a hole in the wall and vanishing. Moon shot Pebbles a concerned look, but he merely shrugged.
“Like I said,” he dryly asserted. “You get used to it. I hope you like climbing. Try to use your arms, our pointy legs are worthless for this.” He gripped the pole, somehow pulling himself halfway upwards in a few effortless movements.
“Pebbles, wait! Where are we even going?” He stared down at her, idly dangling in place like a scavenger.
“Outside. We need to meet Artificer on the other side of the water. She’s probably gotten bored by this point.”
“Why didn’t she just come with you two?” Pebbles chuckled in response, his eyes brightening with a sparkle of mirth.
“She can’t swim. Kind of like you.”
Oh, so jokes are okay now.
Two could play at that game.
Wait.
“What do you mean? The area between our cans is mostly swampland.”
“Indeed, it was. Now it's an entire lake. We had to ride that jetfish to even stand a chance at crossing, and Rivulet told me that we had vultures flying above our heads the entire time.” Without another word, he resumed his climb and squeezed into the same gap Ruffles had a moment ago.
Great.
Moon sat for a moment, looking back at her broken chambers one last time, as the water flowed into the room with an echoing, bubbling noise.
She glanced up the pole. Hopefully climbing would be as easy as Pebbles made it look.
It was not.
A few minutes later, Moon emerged from the small hole next to a bouncing Ruffles and a rather bored looking Pebbles. Evidently, they had taken up a game of hurling stones at jellyfish floating at the bottom of the room, with Pebbles leading the score.
“Thank you both for the help,” she grumbled, slightly miffed at being left behind.
“Gotta learn somehow!” they both said in unison, sharing an amused look. The room stretched before them, water streaming in from the ceiling in great falls. At some point, this area would have housed swarms of neuron flies, buzzing around as they carried data. Now, plantlife grew in nearly every crevice, and the water below teemed with small schools of silver scaled fish. A single, thin railing spanned across the entire distance, and judging by how Pebbles was now carefully walking across it, that was the direction they needed to go. Ruffles followed after, easily catching up, then doing a flip to arch over and in front of him, evidently incapable of slowing down for anyone.
Moon peered over the edge, the pool below looked a million miles away.
From what Pebbles had told her, life outside was a combination of this and avoiding death by a hair’s breadth.
I suppose it beats sitting around…
She carefully stepped out on the railing, arms spinning as she struggled for balance. Each step was carefully calculated, though her mind and body almost seemed at odds with each other. She’d only just learned how to walk around a few minutes ago, and now she had to do this?
The idea of crawling into the nearest shelter and waiting the rest of her life there was growing more tempting by the moment.
How would that be any different from what she was just doing?
I’d be dry.
With a sigh she continued forward, resigning herself to her fate. The pointed tips of her feet struggled for purchase on the slick railing, and yet Pebbles somehow made it across, where he watched her with a rather bored look. With any luck, she’d learn how to climb and scurry around just as quickly.
Luck wasn’t on her side this time.
She stepped another slow step forward, foot catching on a slick spot of moss. With her one leg sent flying off to the side, there was nothing stopping her from tumbling over into the waters below.
She certainly didn’t scream the entire time down.
Once again, she sank like a stone to the bottom, though this time the water was much more shallow. In a splash, Ruffles joined her in the pool, the agile slugcat swimming playful circles around her. Jellyfish floated above, their tendrils dangling into the depths. Her neurons buzzed above the surface, their dim light like stars through the water.
Best get used to this sight, if we’re going to be doing nothing but swimming and climbing…
Ruffles floated beside her, watching her with a concerned expression. As much as Moon wanted to ask her for her aid yet again, the words before rang in her mind.
Gotta learn somehow…
With a kick she launched herself off the floor, surfacing a moment later and slapping her arms as she struggled to tread the water. Her movements were sloppy and uncoordinated, and for a moment, she felt ridiculous. For all the computer might of an iterator, a massive machine that guzzled water by a river, she couldn’t even swim.
Eventually, her movements became more coordinated, keeping a steady paddle that kept her head above water, if only just. Ruffles glided in circles around her, clearly just excited to participate in the aquatic adventure.
“Having fun down there?” Pebbles teased dryly from his perch along the edge of the waters. Somehow, he’d made it across the room, and Moon suddenly felt a pang of jealousy. How had her awkward and grumbling little brother actually turned into a capable explorer?
“So far,” Moon huffed, but then a devious thought entered her neurons. “It’d be better if you joined!”
Kicking with all her might, she shot out of the water, arms outstretched for Pebbles’ legs. His eyes went wide, but it was too late to react as she latched around him and fell backwards, yanking the pink iterator downwards.
Even underwater, she could still hear his muffled cursing, only barely audible under her bubbly laughter.
The two surfaced a moment later, Pebbles crawling out and looking miserable about his latest bout of wetness.
“How can you spend so much time out here and still care about being dry?” She asked, pulling herself onto the ledge.
“It's cold and disgusting,” he spat, wringing his sleeves to try and dry them for the nth time this cycle. “Not to mention that these robes get abysmally heavy when wet. I doubt our creators ever expected us to trudge around in them. What I wouldn’t give for something more… robust.”
“Why not just take them off? It's not as if our companions care, and I spent much of my time without anything until Ruffles brought me this.” She gestured at her thin gown. “It's barely clothing, but at least it doesn’t suck up water like your robes do.” He stared at her for a moment, as if weighing the question.
“Never,” he huffed. “I may be a shred of my former self, but I’ll at least maintain some dignity.”
The moment he finished his words, Ruffles popped out of the water, launching herself into the air and landing next to him with a sopping splash, once again soaking his clothing. Moon nearly fell back in with laughter.
“Are you both ready?” Ruffles asked, bouncing on her feet. “The exit is right above us!” Pebbles groaned and rose to his feet, and Moon had little option but to follow as the trio climbed upwards once again, towards the outside.
Ruffles led the way, Pebbles right behind her. She followed them through the crawlspace of twisted pipes and bending vents.
The sunlight was nearly blinding, even hidden behind the gathering dark clouds. Waves battered against the outside of her can, sending spray across the faded silver. Moon craned her neck upwards, watching the wall of her facility stretch into the sky. For a brief moment, the clouds parted and granted a sliver of sunlight passage, and the glittering wash of water against her metal shone like a rainbow of gemstones.
She didn’t know how long she stood there, watching the surf swell, too lost in the moment to even notice anything around her.
Suddenly, the entire situation felt so real. Here she was, staring at the skin of her facility, on the edge of simply walking away. Her legs wobbled, and she had to reach out and grab Pebbles just to avoid falling over in a daze. The iterator looked ready to complain, but something about her expression must have stilled his tongue. Reluctantly, he reached a supportive arm out and held her steady.
“You weren’t joking… this is truly amazing,” she muttered numbly. For whatever reason, the faintest sensation of itchiness stung to her eyes, as if something was irritating them. She rubbed them for a moment, and shrugged it off.
Just the sun playing with her sensitive vision, clearly.
“Beats sitting inside all cycle, huh?” Pebbles chuckled, watching the waves with her. She could only nod.
For a brief peaceful moment, the two fallen gods simply stood next to one another and watched the world tick away time.
The moment reluctantly passed, and the urgency of their task resurged itself.
“So,” she asked, turning to her brother. “How exactly are we supposed to cross this?”
As if on cue, Rivulet burst out of the water, riding on the back of some flopping wild sea creature. She landed with a flop on the metal next to them, once again splashing the duo with water.
It was at this point, Moon swore she saw her brother die inside, as his robes were soaked yet again. With a sigh, he hung his head.
“On the back of that thing…”
Oh, so this was Bubbles.
What a curious relationship the two had. She'd never had the chance to really sit down and speak with the slugcat, and her mind brimmed with questions. How did the two species come together in symbiosis? How did they raise the jetfish to accept riders? The list went on, but time did as well.
She could ask questions later, for now time was a luxury they didn't have.
“Hi Moon!” Ruffles waved, her wide sparkling pink eyes matching the bulging ones of her mount. “Are you ready to go for a ride? It’ll be fun!”
Right. Her first dose of this excitement and ‘living’ Pebbles and Ruffles spoke so highly of. Countless ancients had toiled to create her, generations of work going into her construction.
All so she could ride a jetfish.
“Rivulet, one question,” Pebbles asked, crossing his arms. “You said last time that Bubbles couldn’t carry three people at once. How is this time any different?” She chittered in laughter, as if he’d said some hilarious jest.
“That’s easy Pebbles, because you’ll steer her while Moon rides with you! I’ll swim alongside. C’mon! You’re a natural, I told you!”
Her brother was many things. Smart, impatient, snarky, moody, and the list went on, some far too impolite to mention. Skilled with animals… didn’t seem very fitting.
And yet with a resigned sigh, he stepped up to the plate, swinging a leg over Bubbles and awkwardly straddling the slick creature. It made a noise like someone gargling mouthwash, sounding somewhat unhappy with the replacement rider. Rivulet bounced beside them, looking as if she were ready to explode.
“Well Moon,” Pebbles said, not sounding the least bit confident. “Want to go for a ride?”
As if she had much choice in the matter.
She crawled on top behind him, grasping one of the many small fins on the creature and trying to ignore the swell of anxiety in her stomach. Rivulet dove into the water, and, as if compelled to follow her, Bubbles leapt in pursuit.
The world turned into a blur.
The water streamed past her face, and she held on for dear life. She knew if she let go, she’d sink like a stone.
Pebbles cursed and sputtered in front of her, trying to wrangle the beast that held them as it dove and flew through both water and air. As soon as the creature dove down, the dark water enveloping them, it would suddenly surge upwards, launching into the sky before flopping back down to the surface.
She could only close her eyes tightly and pray.
“Cmon Pebbles!” Ruffles shouted beside them, using her thick tail to keep up speed. “You’re letting her go wherever she wants! You gotta let her know what you want! Feel the connection!”
“I have zero idea what that even means!” He screamed back, and Ruffles merely laughed madly, diving back under the surface.
He groaned, muttering another vulgarity and leaning forward to grip the fish by their whiskers. In an instant, the ride changed, going from dizzying wild patterns to a coordinated display of speed and power. He yanked upwards, and the fish instantly tilted towards the sky, sending them arching through the air as water sprayed behind them. For a brief moment, Moon felt her stomach sink in weightlessness as they fell back towards the surface.
She wasn’t sure which was worse, Bubbles going wherever she wanted, or Pebbles steering himself. Both styles seemed to merge together in an endless array of leaps and dives, and Moon wondered if her poor neurons could somehow keep up.
He whooped in triumph as he managed to direct the beast into doing a few flips, diving down under the surface for a moment as a curious vulture swooped overhead. Down below wasn’t much better, a few other wild jetfish darting past them with wide eyes.
This proves it, she thought. My brother has gone absolutely insane.
A moment later, it was over, and Moon opened her eyes to see that they had somehow crossed the lake and were now on the edge of some shoreline. The swampy ground stretched out before them, and as she looked up into the sky, she saw the towering shape of Pebbles’ can.
His facility looked terrible. Enormous panels and components had fallen off in chunks, water lines and other internal fluids now spewing into the sky. If she peered closely, she could even see the inky black mass of rot clustered around some of the more degraded areas.
No wonder he had left.
“Yeah!!!” Ruffles hollered, running out of the water to meet them. “That was so awesome, Pebbles! I saw that flip you did! And the move with the vulture! You are for sure a badass!” She nearly ran over Pebbles, grabbing him and looking ready to vibrate out of her skin.
To his credit, he looked just as winded as Moon was, though he clearly had a gleam of excitement in his expression, edged with the faintest sliver of pride.
How long had it been since she’d seen her brother happy?
Had she ever? The light in his eyes was almost alien.
The two stepped off the jetfish, one iterator far more shaken than the other. Ruffles gave the creature a brief nuzzle, nearly getting slammed into the water herself, before it dove back into the depths and sped away.
The breeze along the shoreline whistled softly, Ruffles watching with a look of distant longing as her mount vanished into the distance. For a moment, Moon could almost see that same expression on her brother’s face, as distant and hidden as the sun behind the clouds, yet still there.
Perhaps it was more exciting to steer the fish than ride it. It was hard to tell from her limited experience.
“So,” Moon asked, breaking the fragile silence. “Where’s this Artificer you were speaking of?
Artificer only just managed to stop Hunter from landing flat on his face. He squirmed and twitched in her arms, and for a moment, she thought he might be having another seizure.
But then, the masses on his back started to move.
She nearly dropped him in primal fright as she scrambled backwards, horror in her eyes as the cysts under his skin crawled towards one another. They pressed into each other with a muffled wet noise, sending spasms through Hunter’s body.
And then he lurched upwards, suddenly on his feet again.
“Hunter?” She asked cautiously, gripping her spear tight. “You okay?” He didn’t respond, body jerking like a poorly controlled puppet.
His eyes flashed open, clouded and milky, and yet when they saw her, they filled with a feral, crazed fury.
“Oh shit.”
In a flash, he closed the distance between them, sharp claws slashing for her throat, only just grazing by a hasty dodge backwards. His paws carved through the air, forcing her backwards as he pressed the assault, growling furiously.
At least until she found her footing, pivoting her leg and hip in a blur as she kicked him directly in the side of his skull.
He flew backwards, landing in a heap on the ground. His whole frame shuddered like an angry spider.
Artificer was no stranger to fighting other slugcats. It had been a long time, but she’d never forgotten the skills she’d learned in training and the battlefield. Of course, out in these lands, there were hardly any trained warriors to fight, and scavs preferred to battle with spears and explosives.
But she couldn’t just blow Hunter up, and cutting him up would just bleed him to death.
I need to get rid of that rot…
She tossed her explosive spear to the side, bringing her fists to the ready just as he jerked upwards and onto his legs. Wild anger filled his face, spittle flying as he rushed her once again.
Been a while since I danced. A grim smile graced her face. This should be fun.
His moves were sloppy, a primal animal flailing around with little poise or skill, but he was a full head taller than her, with claws more akin to daggers. A single blow could render a limb maimed, or a throat slashed.
He leapt forwards, bringing both paws down together in a wild downwards slash, giving her a shred of time to dodge to the side. His claws slammed into the dirt, driving deep into the earth. She rewarded his reckless attack with a knee to the face, and he staggered backwards in a furious hiss.
Blood gushed from his nose, but he hardly seemed to notice. A flash of comprehension seemed to enter his eyes, body stiffening as he adopted a low defensive stance.
Was he copying her?
The two circled for a moment, eyes watching for the faintest movement.
She took the opportunity to dig her foot into the ground, kicking a spray of dust into his eyes. He hissed and swung wildly, but she ducked easily under the telegraphed attack and delivered a flurry of blows to his stomach.
And then he kicked her in the face.
Artificer tumbled backwards into the dirt, clumsily rolling away as stars danced in her eye. She staggered to her feet, watching blearily as Hunter jumped forward, claws ready. He snapped a paw out, gripping her by the fur on her chest as his other arm raised to strike her neck, claws gleaming in the light.
This is what I get for not practicing.
She huffed in anger, tensing her body as her skin suddenly erupted with warmth and fire. The blast launched him backwards, slamming into a pole and slumping to the ground. Artificer stood on shaky legs, watching in revulsion as his body began to shake again, the cysts on his back suddenly erupting short tentacles out of his flesh. They swung wildly, gripping the walls and yanking Hunter’s limp body to his feet.
He shambled towards her, arms still held up and fists ready to swing again.
She had other plans.
The spider dart hit him directly in the chest. He stared at it for a moment, fading mind struggling to comprehend the implications of the attack. He looked up at her, head tilted in dreary confusion. In her arms, the spider venom gland quivered as she squeezed it again, the second dart sticking into his arm. Still, he marched towards her, tendrils on his back pulling him forwards and stretching towards her.
The third and fourth darts hit him in the legs, and then the gland was empty. The darts oozed with venom, and his jerking movements suddenly went limp as he tipped and fell into the floor. Even the tentacles on his back were slack.
For a moment, Artificer could only stand and stare, breath heaving as she warily watched his body.
Not even a twitch.
She sighed, tossing away the spider organ and rubbing her aching jaw. Slashes and cuts decorated her fur, Hunter getting in a few blows of his own at some point.
“Stars, you’re an endless pain in the ass,” she muttered, spitting a tooth onto the ground. Luckily, they grew back.
Right, back to the task at hand.
She moved quickly, unsure how long the venom would last. Crouching down beside him, she took a moment to inspect the rot, knife firmly in hand. The cysts had gathered into a central area on his back, tendrils dangling out of them.
I sure hope you can’t feel this.
She carefully pressed her knife under the edge of the cyst cluster, grunting as she tried to slice away the flesh. Either her knife had gotten horribly dull at some point, or Hunter had skin tough as lizard hide.
Given his history, she was inclined to believe the latter.
Still, the job needed doing, and she pressed her weight into the blade as she slowly peeled away the skin. Underneath, inky black rot oozed pitch ichor from where her knife had cut into it.
The smell alone was enough to nearly make her gag, but she pressed forward, slicing away enough of the skin to try and yank the rot cluster out.
“Get out of my friend you overgrown pile of shit!” she growled, pulling as hard as she could.
It didn’t budge. A quick inspection revealed strange internal tendrils buried deeper into this flesh, like the roots of a disgusting weed. She hurriedly tried to cut them, not sure how much longer the venom would hold him down, and the rot seemed to distantly cry out in pain.
Hunter’s ear twitched from the corner of her eye.
A tendril whipped out, slamming into her stomach and launching her flying into a pile of rubbish. Artificer could only lay dazed, already sick and tired of being flung around, watching as the rot slowly regained its senses.
But instead of jerking Hunter to his feet and making him fight her, it did something far more horrifying.
The tendrils gripped the ground around him, pulling at the threads connecting the cluster to his back as it yanked itself free of its host, like a horrid bug exiting its cocoon. For a moment, Hunter dangled limp from the cysts, until a final shove broke the last connection and sent him crashing into the dirt, his back looking like it’d been ripped to ribbons by a lizard.
That isn’t good!
But it certainly gave her more options. With Hunter lying in the dirt now separated from the cysts, she could crack open her collection of explosives.
Except her one explosive spear was on the other side of their little arena.
Maybe dropping it had been a bad idea.
She scrambled to her feet, eyes darting around for anything of use. Nothing but a single brick, half of which crumbled to dust as she picked it up.
It would have to do. She spat a wad of explosive goo on it, wincing at the blood mixed in it, and watched the rot carefully.
Confusingly, it seemed to simply watch her back. Unlike all the other rot she’d fought before, this red tinted cyst acted almost… aware.
She took a few cautious steps to the right, and it slowly pivoted to block her. She switched around to the left, but a long tendril moved to obstruct her way.
What in the void?
And then it dawned on her.
The spear. It didn’t want her to get her spear. Somehow this vile thing knew that if she got it, the fight was over.
This required a reassessment. Every step she took, the rot simply moved to block her. From where she stood, she could just barely see Hunter laying in a puddle of his own blood. She needed to end this, and fast, before he bled out.
She darted to the right, rot tentacles moving to intercept her, but right at the last moment she banked her weight, switching paths to sprint around the left side of the pestilence. The rot tried to shift back to meet her, flumping to the ground as it devoted every bit of itself to the task. She smirked as she ran past, paw outstretched for her spear.
Only to get slapped back by a surprisingly agile tendril, the grenade tumbling away from her grip. The rot gripped her leg, trying to yank her closer to the cores.
She growled and slashed it with the knife, and the rot shuddered and gurgled as its limb was cut in two. It reached out to her, but a flick of her tail sent her launching upwards into the air. She arched over it, time almost moving in slow motion as she angled her landing for the spear. The rots tendrils weren’t even close, and there would be no stopping her victory.
Except, as she looked back, she saw why it wasn’t racing to intercept her.
It grasped the grenade in one tentacle, and with a calculated flick, tossed it directly at her.
The explosion sent her flying into a crumbling wall, the back of her head slamming into the faded brickwork. Her vision fuzzy, mind swimming as she struggled to keep from passing out.
Through the holes on her mask, she saw her enemy approach with an almost casual attitude.
It had won.
The rot stood on its tentacles, rising high above her as it slowly crawled closer and closer. The all too familiar noises of squishing wetness filled her ears, but despite the terrible panic filling her heart, her body refused to move. She raised an arm to try and ward it off, movement feeling drunk as fatigue gripped her, but the rot simply slapped it away. Tendrils reached out to her, wrapping around her limbs as the freshly hatched cysts prepared for their first meal.
Of all the things to kill me, this gunk gets the prize?
She’d have laughed in bitter irony if the grip around her throat wasn’t so tight. Maybe she would pass out before it dissolved her alive.
She’d always known she was doomed to die in the field of battle. It was what she was made for.
She closed her eyes and accepted her fate.
Perhaps the next life would be kinder.
A red tipped spear suddenly shot through the cysts, fizzing and popping as the fuse on its shaft ran down. The rot raised a single tendril to touch it, as if trying to shoo away an irritating bug. At the very last moment, it seemed to realize what had happened, gurgling almost angrily.
And then time was up.
It popped like a rotten bubble fruit, the explosion launching chunks and tentacles in every direction.
And behind its sizzling corpse, standing on shaking legs, Hunter stood with an angry sneer.
“I’ve been wanting to do that for a long time,” he spat bitterly, limping over to stand in front of her. Somehow, despite everything, he offered her a paw up.
“You’re one tough son of a bitch,” Artificer grunted, pulling herself to her feet. How in the world was Hunter still alive? Let alone standing. He barked a rough laugh, nearly keeling over from the effort.
“Told ya I was made of sterner stuff. Can you… make sure it's all gone?” He jerked a hand behind him, and as much as she didn’t want to peer into the mess of flesh, she knew that if any rot remained, this entire fight would be for nothing.
Thankfully, a keen inspection revealed all visible traces of the parasite were gone.
The adrenaline seemed to dump from her body, leaving her suddenly feeling empty and numb. The fight had been short, and yet it had felt like an eternity. A sore ache settled into her muscles, wounds throbbing with dull pain. She could treat them later.
“That was terrifying to watch,” she shuddered in revulsion, rubbing her sore neck. “You fell over and the next second you were trying to rip me to shreds!” A sheepish look crossed his face.
“I… honestly don’t remember any of it. I had these terrible visions, and then the next thing I knew, I was lying in the dirt watching that thing try to consume you.”
“Lucky you…” she grumbled. “Wasn’t exactly the most fun I’ve ever had. You owe me a tooth!”
“I’ll consider it a fair trade for slicing open my back, which by the way, I’m fairly certain is still untreated.”
Right, she should probably do something about that.
She smeared some medical glue on the wound, trying to patch together the tattered remains of his skin. It wasn’t much, but after that display she doubted that anything else could stop him. Fishing around in her bag, she pulled out a simple sewing kit, made with thin bones and simple string.
His back was a mess, and even with the glue and stitches, it still looked gruesome. Artificer hummed to herself as she worked, terrible with a needle in most cases.
“What’s next for you?” She asked, trying to fill the silence. He paused, scratching his chin as he thought.
“Well… I suppose I’ll make my way back to my creator. Make sure that all traces of my rot are removed. I’m sure he’ll have some use for me.” His tone didn’t sound confident, as if he was just saying the words to himself more than anything. A lost soul, so sure on their path and suddenly given another option.
So just like that, he was leaving.
She should have expected as much, that was their deal after all. He didn’t owe anything else to her, and with his rot gone, their deal was finished. She was delighted to have helped him, but…
She didn’t want him to go. For all the wild terror and disgusting body imagery, he’d be fun to be around.
“Nothing else?” she asked, shaking away the sudden longing. “No dreams, desires? Places to see, things to do?”
“Hah! Yeah, just like the days of history. I’ll go find a resort in the mountains, maybe write a book about my journey and go from colony to colony selling it.” She laughed, trying to imagine him writing on parchment like some colony scribe.
“I’d make a better seamstress than you would a scribe. Fate has clearly cursed you by having me stitch these shut. You’ll look like someone sewed you from two separate slugcats.”
“Don’t even say that! I feel quite lucky to have you around. Who else could have handled this?”
Fair point.
“How does it feel?” Artificer asked, muttering a curse as the needle slipped from her paws yet again. “Getting free of the rot, like do you notice a difference?” He took a deep breath, quiet for a long ponderous moment.
“It's like… ridding myself of a dead limb. Like this feeling of something sucking away my life, now finally gone. Like yanking off one of those annoying leeches from the ponds around here. It's… hard to describe, truthfully.” She hummed, understanding and yet not quite.
Perhaps Pebbles could relate? He’d described being free of his can in very similar terms.
With a final tug, and a sloppy knot, she finished her bumbling attempts at stitches.
“All done?”
The sudden feeling of reluctant finality struck her. Was this really it?
“Yep, you’re good,” she muttered half-heartedly. “It’ll make quite the scar, that’s for sure.”
But Hunter shocked her, spinning around and wrapping her in a sudden hug. She froze, unsure of how to handle the interaction.
Stars, when's the last time I got a hug?
“Thank you for giving me life I never had,” he muttered, “I’d be a shambling monster if it wasn’t for your help.” And yet despite the emotional moment, all Artificer could do was awkwardly pat him on the back. He pulled away a moment later, fidgeting uneasily with his paws.
An unsteady silence hung between them, as if neither party wanted to take the next step in farewells. The sky rumbled above them, a ticking clock counting down the time until their separation.
Once he was gone, she’d make her way back to the shoreline and wait for Pebbles to return, hopefully with his sister in tow. From there?
She had no idea, but at least it would be interesting.
Her time with Pebbles had told her well enough that stomping around with a fallen god, let alone two of them, would be more than enough to stay busy. Never mind Rivulet and all her chaotic shenanigans.
Pebbles had mentioned needing to help his other iterators, which certainly sounded like an adventure. She’d seen their facilities from the top of his, watching the flashes of green lightning arch below their legs.
She’d often climb that lonesome tower in his city, crawling through blisteringly cold winds and thinning air to the top of the world. Where she’d heard the whisper of the words she already knew deep in her heart.
It was nice to leave that place behind, though the thought of journeying to those distant lands certainly raised a lot of questions.
Wait…
Hunter had mentioned that all the local iterators were siblings, and he’d been sent here to rescue Moon, who would be with him at their planned rendezvous near the shore…
An idea flashed in her mind.
“Hunter, wait,” she blurted, as if the slugcat hadn’t been lost in his own thoughts. “You were sent here to recuse Pebbles’ sister, Moon, right?” He nodded slowly, eyes filled with a questioning gaze. “Well, once Pebbles and Moon come back, they were planning on going to meet the other iterators to help them too. We’ll probably go to yours if he’s nearby. I… don’t suppose you’d be interested in joining us? I’m sure your creator would appreciate you protecting his vulnerable siblings, right?”
For a long quiet moment, he merely watched her with sharp stern eyes, as if searching for another trick.
He sighed, shoulders slumping in acceptance as his familiar stoic glare returned.
“You raise a good point,” he replied. “At the very least I can ensure that no harm comes to her again.”
Her heart flared with triumph for the second time that day. She shot a silent thankful prayer to the stars that it was easier to convince him this time.
“Great!” She blurted, awkwardly masking her excitement with a cough. “We’re meeting by the shoreline, not too far from here. You… sure you can walk?” She peered over his shoulder, but he merely waved her away.
“Why, scared of me being faster?” He replied, a daring smirk on his face.
Oh, so it was going to be like that? Finally, someone who could take insults and dish them right back!
The two made quick progress through the wastes, Hunter surprisingly agile and fast, despite his injuries. As soon as Artificer thought she’d left him in the dust, leaping across pools of leeches with her explosive abilities, she’d look behind her to find him swinging through the air with an almost enviable agility. She could only begin to imagine the races that would spawn from his meeting with Rivulet.
They slid into the facility housing the gates, to the shoreline, squidcada buzzing through the air over murky puddles, as snails crawled along the walls. It’d only been a few cycles since Artificer had last come through here, and yet it felt like ages.
The vent leading to the gate sat far on the opposite side of the room, tucked away near the ceiling. A less explosively gifted slugcat would need to wrangle a squidcada to get enough of a jump to grab the ledge, but Artificer used her ability to simply fly across the room, smoke trailing her wake. With a graceful twirl she landed on the platform, peering back to watch for Hunter.
He’d simply resigned himself to walking across the space, hissing and growling as squidcada tried to headbutt him.
He’s too big, I doubt they’d be able to carry him up here. Suddenly she wondered how exactly Hunter was going to scale the vertical space. There were no poles that led upwards, the area below the vent nothing but a shear wall. Maybe he could grip two of the flying creatures at once?
She wasn’t about to let him climb on her back for a ride, that’s for sure. The thought made her face scrunch.
I’ve carried his dead weight around plenty enough as is.
Hunter jumped across the final pool of water, dispassionately kicking away a leech that had sprung out and tried to latch onto his legs. He craned his neck upwards, eyes meeting her own with a thoughtful look.
“Y’know,” she shouted down at him, voice echoing through the expanse. “When the rot was poking out of your back, it used its tentacles to climb and pull you around. Too bad you couldn’t keep that part of the deal, eh?”
“If that’s what I lost when getting rid of it,” he grumbled, disgust filling his voice, “then I’m more than happy.” His ears twitched as he examined the obstacle before him, suddenly looking deep in thought.
What was he doing?
He blasted off with a sprint, darting towards the wall and leaping upwards. For a moment, Artificer expected him to simply slam against it and tumble back to the floor, but then Hunter dug the long claws on his paws into the crumbling concrete and began to scale upwards.
She could only watch with a wide eye as he clambered upwards, inch by inch. Even the squidcada looked surprised.
A moment later he crawled over the edge, looking bored and aloof.
“You’re just full of surprises, aren’t you?” she remarked. A simple shrug was his only response.
The duo crawled through the vents, stopping for a moment to munch on some stray tiny centipedes that were unlucky enough to bump into the two carnivores, and then continuing on.
The gates beckoned ahead of them. She hoped Pebbles was back by now.
As they stepped inside the airlock, Artificer tapped the single holographic button display to start the cycle. Yet instead of flashing golden in acknowledgement, the hologram blared a glaring red light, flashing a symbol above them.
“Crap…” she muttered, scratching the back of her head awkwardly. “I forgot this gate requires a higher access level…” The symbol it broadcasted looked rather angry, as if to remind her that she wasn’t exactly the nicest slugcat around. Hunter almost looked disturbed, watching the flashing display warily for a long moment.
Stupid ancient civilization and their arbitrary door locks.
“Allow me,” he scoffed, stepping up and pressing his own palm to the locks. It was quiet for a moment, before flashing in golden acknowledgment. The symbol above them was one she’d never seen before, a circle with a strange cross between it. How had he gotten such a high clearance level?
Ah, right, his creator probably gave him one for his journey.
And yet, Pebbles had needed to break through his own gate, in his own facility. The whole situation was strange.
The locks churned, water draining from above them and boiling into cleansing steam as it sizzled against the hot element below them. Artificer had never understood the purpose of the process, the water that poured down on them was fetid and stank of the garbage wastes, and turning it into vapor hardly improved the stench.
“You know,” Hunter suddenly said, “there’s a reason your level is so low. It's a representation of your-”
“I know,” she snapped, “you don’t need to remind me… I’m working on it.”
“That display earlier this cycle hardly looked like it, to be frank. You call pinning scavengers to the walls ‘working on it’?”
She didn’t want to think about this. Not now.
“How about you let the lady who saved your life worry about herself, huh?” Her tail swished in agitation, and Hunter watched her for a moment, as if debating saying something.
“You helped me, I’m merely trying to extend the same offer.”
She grumbled under her breath, crossing her arms and glaring away. What else could she say? She’d promised Pebbles she would try to improve her violent habits, and clearly Hunter knew a thing or two about it.
Yet admitting she needed help somehow felt harder than fighting the rot.
The pair watched the door gears churn in silence, and with a resolute clang they thundered open. Salty air flowed inside, replacing the foul odor of the garbage wastes, and Hunter politely gestured for her to lead.
The rest of the journey passed in quiet haste, the darkening skies above them symbolizing just how little time they had left. Hopefully Pebbles was waiting at the shelter, as promised.
And didn’t have too many questions about her absence. The efforts of the cycle were beginning to hang on her shoulders, and even Hunter looked weary. She frankly had no idea how the slugcat was even standing, but by this point she’d decided to stop asking questions.
Minutes later, they crawled through a short tunnel and emerged in the clearing they’d promised to meet.
Pebbles sat on a hunk of rusting metal, gloomily staring at the ground as Rivulet talked excitedly to a strange blue iterator next to him. Neurons bumbled above her head, and her patchy white gown was a sharp contrast to Pebble’s stained, but still mostly intact, dull orange robes.
So this was Moon. There was something different about her, compared to Pebbles, that she couldn’t quite explain. She stared for a moment, trying to understand.
Oh stars, this is perfect…
Moon was taller than Pebbles, at least by half a head. Her mind was instantly slammed into overdrive, a million jokes and insults to sling at him running through her brain.
Later, when he’s got his guard down.
“Hey Pebbs!” she shouted, waving an arm as she approached the group. “Did you miss me?”
For a moment the little iterator looked actually excited to see her, but then his signature glower returned as he spotted Hunter.
“Good grief, now there’s more of the beasts,” he muttered, rising to his feet. “Who’s this? Have you somehow performed mitosis, or are we just collecting strangers now?”
“Hah! Don’t you think he’d look better if that were the case?” she shot a wry grin at Hunter, but he didn’t react. In fact, he looked completely lost for words.
“You flatter yourself too much, there’s a good reason you always wear that mask.” He turned to Hunter, eyes glancing up and down his form. “And who are you supposed to be? Another stray coming to join our merry band? How is it that I never see a single slugcat for eons, and then your kind comes crawling out nowhere.” If Pebbles felt any level of intimidation by the slugcat being almost twice his size, he didn’t show it. The robot leveled a fierce glare at Hunter, waiting for his answer.
“You… can understand us?” Hunter marveled, and Artificer could only roll her eye. “My creator could never understand a word I said. How?” Pebbles shot a brow up, suddenly much more interested in the new arrival.
“Your… creator? Who might that be?”
“I was sent here by an iterator known as No Significant Harassment, I believe you two are siblings, correct?” Pebbles buried his face in his hands, groaning in irritation. Arti could only watch curiously. He’d spoken in the past about having a bumpy relationship with his siblings, but she wasn’t exactly familiar with the details.
This ought to be interesting.
“And what does that asshole want?” Pebbles spat, poking the large slugcat in the chest. “Couldn’t reach me on communications, so he sent you to deliver his insults for him?” Hunter bristled, tail swishing in growing anger, but Artificer stepped between the two.
“Okay boys, simmer down!” she snapped. “Pebbles, Hunter isn’t here to do any harm. In fact, he’s already done his job. He was sent here to-”
“Help me!” Moon interrupted, suddenly appearing at the edge of the group, Rivulet by her side. “I remember you! You delivered those slag keys, revived me from my sleep… You have my endless gratitude. Without your assistance I would be nothing but a mindless hunk of metal floating in a murky pool of cold water.” Hunter swelled with pride, and then despite the injuries on his back, bowed deeply.
“It was my duty, and I would gladly do it again if needed.”
Oh for star’s sake, don’t suck up to them. They already have terrible egos.
Moon turned to look at her, eyes suddenly suspicious and wary.
“And you must be the Artificer I’ve heard so much about. So you’re the one teaching Pebbles how to swear so much, and fight vultures!”
Wait, what?
“Pebbs, you fought a vulture?” Artificer gasped, and the little pink iterator reached into his bag to proudly display his trophy. “No way! A king too! How’d a little mean shit like you take down a king vulture!?” He shrugged casually, acting as if it was hardly a matter worth bragging about.
“Oh nothing, just a spear to the eye while it tried to run off.” She barked out a laugh, slapping him on the back in triumph, but Moon’s irate glare didn’t soften.
I can already tell she’s going to be lots of fun.
“Great, now we can match! I’d make you a drawstring, if I hadn’t used all my thread stitching up Hunter’s back.” Pebbles raised a brow, suddenly curious.
“What, did you somehow drag him into another battle with scavengers?” She shook her head, excited now that it was her turn to brag.
“Nope! Cut the rot growing in his body.”
The two iterators stared at her with horror in their eyes. Hunter shifted uncomfortably, the robots each taking a wary step back.
“You can’t just cut out rot,” Pebbles stated, confusion and terror dripping from his words. “It's a malignant cancer. It infects everything it touches, clinging on until it sucks all the life out of it. There is no removing it. You must be mistaken.”
“I can promise you, despite being half blind I know what I saw. It nearly killed me!” Artificer assured, trying to calm the situation. “It clustered in his back, and I was able to cut it open and remove the cysts. Well… they more removed themselves, but that’s beside the point.”
“Removed themselves? I’ve never heard of rot willingly leaving behind its host, and I spent ages studying it. It’s been my enemy far longer than either of you have been alive.”
“I don’t know what to tell you. It crawled out of him, then flicked him away like a spider shedding its skin. It wasn’t easy to fight either! Kept blocking my movements and getting in my way, even threw a grenade at me. Wasn’t like any rot I’ve ever fought before, very… tactical.” Pebbles rubbed his eyes wearily.
“Great…” he muttered to himself. “Nice job Sig, you learned how to make intelligent rot. Always had to prove us wrong eh?”
“It’s dead now” Hunter declared, though he looked fairly nervous himself. “I killed it myself. Blasted to chunks. Moon, last time we spoke you could tell I had a sickness within me. If it's still there…” She stared at him for a moment, before slowly shaking her head in disbelief.
“Not a trace… How could rot have developed intelligence though? It's not a clever organism or anything, merely a collection of hungry cancerous cells.” She shook her head in confusion.
Nobody had any answers, and Artificer was frankly done with the conversation. As if on cue, the sky rumbled above them, a tremor building below their feet. An unspoken urgency plucked the group from their conversation, and they scurried into the nearby shelter.
Thankfully, there was enough room for all the members to at least have their own space in the corners, though Rivulet seemed determined to sit on Moon’s lap. Hunter curled up by himself, covering his head with his tail. Artificer couldn’t help but inspect his back in the dim light of Moon’s neurons, and noted with quiet awe that many of his smaller wounds had already mended themselves.
With a resigned sigh, and the rigors of the day catching up to her, she slumped against the wall and closed her eye. Hopefully sleep would come quickly.
Yet as she was about to drift off, soft voices filled the shelter.
“I know what I said earlier, but it's horrific to think about again,” Pebbles muttered, “they used the memories from the crypts to build our neural networks. We're basically nothing but the echoes of the ancients in robotic form! That's what those dreams must be!”
“Pebbles…” Moon said supportively. “I wouldn’t dwell on it too much. It’s in the past now, what good will thinking about it do?”
“I don’t see how you can just brush it off. For all you know, you were free once!"
“Well, even if it was, I have no memory of it. Why should I let that bother me?”
“Because it happened! Because at some point, we weren't trapped like this! Now we’re here, and it's all their fault! How can you just ignore that?”
She was quiet for a beat, and Artificer wondered if for a moment they had noticed she wasn’t sleeping.
“Pebbles… if I didn’t get over the past, I think I would have a far different opinion of you.”
Ouch.
He didn’t reply. The rain thundered outside.
“I’m more horrified by your… friend’s mention of rot learning . In all my records, and few remain in my memory, rot has always been a single minded organism, lumbering around as it searches for another meal.”
“I’m quite aware of its usual tendencies, I had it as a roommate for a decent stretch of time. Do you think Sig did something to it? Do you think he knows what he’s created? He was always the one tampering with organisms, how could he be so careless?”
“Pebbles, calm down. I highly doubt that No Significant Harassment is out trying to make the perfect rot organism. He’s a mischievous person, but hardly malevolent in his work. Hopefully we can speak to him about it at a later time, though I’d prefer to make contact with the local group sooner rather than later.”
“The communication array was disconnected from my facility long ago, but we can still see if it works with a direct input.”
“Then we shall proceed there next.”
Silence crept in, despite the sealed shelter doors. Artificer felt sleep slowly drag her mind away, despite her desire to eavesdrop.
“So… how do you pass the time here? The rains last for quite a while.”
“Sleep, if my body permits it. Otherwise I’ve been reading these pearls. Can’t imagine that you’re interested in that, are you?”
“No, please,” she almost pleaded. “This cycle has been overwhelming. I’d very much rather not think about more.”
“I suppose… Care to play a game of dominos? I still have the program.”
“I’d be delighted.”
Arti rolled her eye, even though it was closed. She wanted to keep hearing the juicy, interesting stuff damnit! The wild conversations of two gods, and Pebbles had barely told her what was on those pearls.
Yet as Pebbles and Moon played their game, she couldn’t help but drift away to the soft sounds of two reunited siblings finally enjoying a moment of calm and family.
Hopefully one day, she’d enjoy that feeling too.
Notes:
Look at that, the gang's all here! For now at least.
Moon will get her legs for the outside world soon enough, but in her own way. For now, she gets to look in horror at all the crazy stuff Pebbles himself had only just begun to get numb to. Sibling dynamics are so fun to write. Pebble's explanation of how they can understand slugcats was a ton of fun to think out. I remember thinking "I could just wave it off with the mark working both ways" but that would be simple and if you guys know me I don't do anything simple.
Cue deranged laughter.
First time writing a big fight scene, I hope it was easy to follow and understand. Tell me what you think! Hunter's part felt like a classic action movie beat down, while the rot felt more like a resident evil boss. But now what will Hunter do with his new found life? I suppose he'll have to find out! And what about how that rot was acting? That's certainly not normal!
As always, thank you all for your support and comments. It always fills me with joy to hear what you all think.
Chapter 9
Summary:
Its hard to run from your past when it keeps crawling after you.
Notes:
(See the end of the chapter for notes.)
Chapter Text
Pebbles couldn’t sleep.
It wasn’t for lack of trying. Ever since he’d disconnected himself from his facility, he felt the urge to pass out at the end of every cycle and drift away from the rigors of travel. The rain pouring down for what felt like days left little to do in the shelters, besides watch slugcats sleep. Moon had provided a decent distraction with games for a while, at least until he remembered how skilled she really was at dominoes.
He wasn’t a sore loser. Not at all.
Even Moon had eventually dozed off, no doubt exhausted by all the physical and mental exertion. She leaned back into the corner, clutching Rivulet like a child’s stuffed animal. To be perfectly fair, the little beast looked ridiculous enough to fill the role. She was certainly tiny enough to be sold on a shelf.
And then there was Hunter, their other new arrival. Just thinking about what the slugcat had told them filled the iterator with a deep disgust.
Intelligent rot, breaking free of its host to crawl around…
He wasn’t sure what was worse, the pearl he’d read detailing the psychological torture of his precursors, or the thought that the rot was evolving.
It was impossible, should have been impossible. Yet he didn’t think Artificer had lied. She was a bombastic and boisterous person, but she wasn’t a liar. The revelation filled him with dread. Was it just the rot in Hunter, or was it something all rot was learning? Where could this development be coming from though…?
Had Sig done this? He’d always been the most capable genetic architect, playing with flesh and sinew like an artist molding clay. It was difficult to imagine the smug prick making such a foolish mistake like that. Pebbles had doomed himself to the rot, but it had taken a combination of inexperience, poor notes, and unfortunate interruption.
What could have been so terrible to ruin Sig’s plans?
Despite the rot, he’d clearly known what he was doing with the rest of his creation. Hunter was a towering creature, and from what Arti had told them he wasn’t a slouch in a fight, and she didn’t hand out compliments easily.
There was something else here at play. Something they were missing.
There had to be.
The rain thundered on, but his mind couldn’t shake the thoughts, and if he closed his eyes, his brain simply started to imagine him drifting in a floating abyss, no mouth to speak with, no hands to grasp…
Trapped in a little box, toyed with by a callous and uncaring creator that saw him as nothing but a computer program.
His eyes flashed back open, breathing heavy as he glanced around. Still in the shelter. He touched a hand to his face, a firm reminder that he hadn’t been robbed of his sensations.
Pebbles didn’t want to sleep anymore.
How could I, when all this has been revealed?
With a sigh, he leaned back into the wall, staring at the ceiling and watching Moon’s neurons idly float in the sterile air. They’d really need to get a bag or something for her soon. Letting the little bits of her brain linger around in the open wasn’t exactly prudent.
How could Moon even sleep right now? After everything they’d learned? Her somber attitude made him want to scream, as if she didn’t understand the impact of everything that had happened, and yet he was almost jealous of her ability to brush it aside.
In absence of anything better to do, he resigned himself to gathering up a few pearls in his hand and making them hover around in small circles. For a machine that had spent his entire life running thousands of processes and simulations, it was about as interesting as watching paint dry.
“Can’t sleep?”
Rivulet suddenly appeared by his side, twitching whiskers barely a few inches from his face.
Great… Of all the people to talk to in the middle of the night…
But it was better than nothing.
“No, not tonight,” he muttered distastefully. “Too many things to think about.” She sat against the wall next to him, mimicking his slouching pose.
“Do you ever just try not thinking?” she teased, and Pebbles rolled his eyes.
“Perhaps that’s an option for yourself, wet mouse. I was created to think, it’s very difficult to simply turn that off. Is that why you demolish your skull so often?” She shrugged, idly playing with the end of her tail.
“Nah, that’s just a hobby… Whatcha thinking about?”
Where could he even start? She might as well have asked him how to refine void fluid. He’d already struggled to explain the complex processes of an iterator to the little creature, and she’d barely even grasped that. How could he detail how heartless programming and genetic manipulation plagued his mind?
Still, he felt compelled to answer.
“History. The past, really. My creators were… not kind when they made us. They abandoned us when they ascended, and for the longest time, I thought that was the worst thing they could have done. Now I’ve learned how wrong I was. Imagine if your parents made you without eyes.” Rivulet scrunched her face up in disgust.
“Gross, I like being able to see. Why would they do that? That doesn’t make any sense!”
Good question.
“They saw us as nothing more than a means to an end. They did the bare minimum to get us functional, so long as it meant some sort of progress towards their ultimate goal. Terrible parents, really.” Rivulet watched him for a long somber moment, a pensive expression on her face.
Don’t think too hard, little rodent. You’ll blow a blood vessel.
Rain boomed outside as he resumed toying with the pearls.
“Are you excited to be out here? Do you think Moon is?” Rivulet wondered, watching the colorful spheres dance in the neuron’s light.
A strange question, really. He’d never really had much of an option, either leaving or wasting away in his can. He glanced over at Moon, watching her slumber on her side.
“Frankly, it’s been both terrifying and exciting. I don’t regret it. My sister, however… I believe she is much more reserved. Something tells me that she won’t find this entire adventure as delightful as you do.” Rivulet laughed, as if that was a paltry challenge he’d just issued.
“She’ll have fun, I promise. She seemed really excited to see new places! You wouldn’t believe some of the things I’ve seen!” Pebbles raised a brow.
“Really? Such as?” The slugcat stopped, suddenly lost in thought. For a moment he wondered if she’d simply forgotten everything that hadn’t happened less than five minutes ago.
“Weelllll, my colony migrated all along the coast here, from way up north where there’s big chunks of ice in the water, to down south where it's so warm! There’s this place down there, we call it the Rumbling Reef. It’s this endless array of coral that’s constantly building on itself from the bottom of the abyss. Huge spires of the stuff, stretching out of the depths, like the way your facility goes into the sky! Nothing lives there though, because the coral will form around you, trapping you inside until it slowly crushes you!”
Pebbles tried to dive into his memory to try and place the location, and yet none of his pre-ascension files had anything related to what she’d described. Perhaps some whimsical project of the ancients now set loose and free.
“Sounds quite terrifying, I’m sure you’ll convince Moon that she’s made the right choice when you talk about places like that,” he snarked, and she merely shot him a look.
“Well, that’s not the only place… Oh! There’s this jungle to the south, down a river delta, where the trees grow so thick that you can’t see the sun. It never stops raining there, but it's not actually raining! The water gathers on the leaves in the canopy and then drizzles down below. Everything there glows, and there’s these creatures that live in the trees that will trade glowing fruits for fish from the rivers. They taste amazing!”
“Ah, I recall that one actually,” he commented. “A while back the ancients had the marvelous idea of creating a nature preserve, like a zone that none of the iterators were built around that could be preserved. They purposed sprawling trees to protect the ground underneath, which absorbed the rain from the sky and turned it into a tolerable drizzle. Unfortunately the project quickly lost funding and the trees overwhelmed the natural fauna nearly instantaneously. That was thousands of cycles ago, it must be quite overgrown by now.”
“Wow! I never knew that the entire place was made by someone!”
“Really, Rivulet, by this point I think you’d have an easier time finding somewhere that wasn’t made by my creators. They rebuilt this entire planet several times over in their bizarre desires. They thought themselves gods, and toyed with creatures like clay to be molded.”
“Like the vulture grub!” She pointed out, and Pebbles snorted a dry laugh.
“Yes… like the vulture grub, and everything else that so much as squirms on this planet right now. Terrible parents, as I mentioned.”
For a brief moment, he tried to imagine that Vigilance was still somewhere out there in the wild lands. The ancients were near immortal with their understandings of medicine and cybernetics, and the idea of confronting one of the founders of the iterators’ misery was a very tempting thought to dwell on.
“I know how you feel, I think,” Rivulet suddenly blurted. He turned to her, wondering what ridiculous phrase she was about to spew. How could the tiny creature even compare? “My family… My colony was small, but we had a stern leader. She was strong, fast, capable, kinda like Artificer but a lot less fun. She rode on the back of this amazing jetfish named Fury that could swim fast enough to outrun even Ocean Zippers!” Pebbles didn’t know what that creature was, but the name felt foreboding enough.
“She always did what was best for us,” the water dancer continued, her tone turning melancholic. “That’s what she kept telling me, at least. I never felt like anything I could do was enough. She always just saw me as the runt. The little useless one…”
“I don’t understand,” Pebbles said. “What does the leader of your colony have to do with my creators?”
“Well…” She mulled on the word, almost looking pained to admit it. “She was my mom.”
Ah…
“Nothing I ever did impressed her. Kill a lizard? Go fight a vulture. Gather enough food to feed five people? Should have gotten enough for six.” She sighed deeply, voice cracking. “I think she hated the fact that I was nothing like her. Tiny, weak, and completely reckless.” Pebbles was quiet for a long moment.
“Doesn’t sound like a very helpful creator either… I thought organics were supposed to love their spawn?” Rivulet chuckled sorrowfully.
“Me too… Still, I don’t let it weigh on me. Who cares what she wants? I decide what’s best for me! I’m an adult and I get to make my own rules!” Pebbles scoffed, though it was hard to deny his envy for her attitude.
“You’re the smallest slugcat I’ve ever seen, I’m almost certain Artificer thinks you’re a pup.” Rivulet scoffed, and the sudden rage on her face made Pebbles fearful for just a moment. He’d never seen her angry before.
“That’s what everyone thinks! I’m just some kid! Tiny little Rivulet who can’t do anything! I’ve helped raise pups that are bigger than me now! It's not fair!” She crossed her arms and growled, tail swishing against the floor even as she sat on half of it. Pebbles glanced nervously at the rest of the shelter inhabitants, worried for a moment that her outburst had awoken any of them.
Not a peep, thankfully.
He didn’t dare break the fragile silence. What could he even say to that?
He remembered all the times that he’d been in a public broadcast, trying to get a word in and being scorned for his immature views. Despite being a full fledged iterator, his opinions tossed away for merely being constructed later. Some of his kind even berated him for his connection to his sister, teasing the two for simply being close.
They’d even made his puppet shorter than hers!
It had been nothing but humiliating.
But instead of trying to find the words to express this, he simply put a sympathetic hand on her shoulder and sighed. The slugcat slowly leaned into him, still fuming to herself.
Why were words so hard when they weren’t mean?
“I know I joke at your expense frequently, but… you are quite the capable member of our team. We never would have made it to Moon’s facility without your guidance, and you saved us from those scavengers too!” She nodded slowly, still pouting.
“It's just not fair…” she repeated, though the anger in her words had faded.
“No, it's really not… Is that why you’re not with your colony? Out here on your own, I mean.”
Rivulet was quiet for a long moment, staring up at the neurons floating in the air for a long time.
“I used to go out on my own, just Bubbles and I, and go explore the places nearby. My colony migrated all over so we got to see some pretty cool places. Every time, I would eventually go back and get lectured for hours by my mom about being reckless and stupid and never thinking about my responsibilities.”
“But then, when I found Moon in her broken down home, I just had to stay a little bit longer. I brought her shiny pearls I’d swipe from the scavengers, and she would tell me all these stories of ancient history. It was amazing! Like a real adventure I’d always heard about in the old stories!” She laughed in excitement, but the smile quickly faded from her face, her wide pink eyes dim and mournful.
“Eventually, I tried to go back, but when I returned to where we’d been staying… Everyone was gone! They left me, just like that…” It took only a moment for Pebbles to notice the tears spilling down her cheeks, paws going to her face in an attempt to hide her emotions.
Oh void, what am I supposed to do now?
Slowly, as if he were trying to embrace a lizard, he wrapped his arms around the sniveling slugcat in an awkward hug. Did everyone in this group have family issues? She grabbed his robes and buried her face in them, adding another substance to the list of stains.
The rain outside seemed to come to a lull, the violent din slowly receding away into the distance.
“Thanks Pebbles,” she murmured, wiping her now red eyes. “For saving me from the vulture, and… for understanding.” He nodded awkwardly, glancing mournfully at the two new smears on his clothing. Well... they’d have to take the loss to console an anguished friend.
It wasn’t as if they wouldn’t get washed soon anyways.
A few minutes later, the shelter doors opened with a resounding tremor. Hunter was the first to rise, sharp eyes snapping open as he stood up and tried to stretch, only to nearly smack his head against the ceiling.
Must be a tall person problem.
He was not jealous.
Then Moon woke up, slowly opening her eyes and staggering to her feet. She stood on unfamiliar legs, still shaken from the cycle before. Pebbles gave her a curt nod, and she waved softly back. Rivulet squirmed over to hug her, the confused robot gently petting her head.
Arti, vigilant as ever, continued to snore on the floor.
“Your friend doesn’t seem quite keen on getting up in the morning,” Moon muttered, almost looking disappointed.
“I’d say she’s earned it,” Hunter mused. “After everything that’s happened, I almost wish I could go back to sleep as well.”
“Right,” Pebbles interjected, “No rest for the weary as they say.” He bent over, a wicked expression on his face.
He’d developed an old trick a while back, when Arti had once fallen asleep in his chambers and refused to leave for anything. He couldn’t bring harm to her as a citizen, but he could certainly annoy her.
And so, with a flourish, he jammed his finger in her ear.
“GAH!” she sputtered, waking up in a flailing ball of fur. She looked around in a panic, before noticing all the staring, and in Pebble’s case, smirking faces. “Oh right, good morning to all you too. Assholes.”
She crawled to her feet, yawning loudly and scratching her neck with a grumble. With all of them now on their feet, the shelter suddenly felt much more cramped. In unspoken agreement, the group slowly filtered outside into the dripping humid air.
Pebbles peered up into the clouds, trying to catch a glimpse of the horror that had become his can. Through the drifting mists, he could see bulging metal, squirming tentacles, and oozing cysts. The thought that it had once been his glimmering home, linked to his mind and body, filled him with repulsion.
How was the rot even still alive? Removing the mass rarefaction cell should have robbed it of a food supply, as the processes inside him ground to a halt. The rarefaction cell not only generated energy, it powered the gravitational pumps that brought entire rivers of water into his can for the bacteria and other living components to consume. Without it, they should have ground to halt with slag buildup, and the resulting lack of regenerative maintenance would eventually result in a complete breakdown of the complex systems required to keep the can on its legs.
And yet there it was, still standing despite everything stating otherwise, almost defiantly.
Hunter stepped up beside him, staring up into the sky with a similar look of revulsion.
“So… You must be the friend Artificer mentioned ‘curing’ of the rot,” he asked, and Pebbles gave a humorless laugh.
“Is that what she told you? Does that look cured to you? It's disgusting!”
“No… I believe she had no idea what she was doing, in retrospect. She just told me what I wanted to hear.”
“Yes, well, it worked in the end, didn’t it? I suppose the results speak for themselves, regardless of Arti’s immense ability to twist arms. Shouldn’t you be happy?” Hunter glanced away, almost looking uncertain as he spoke.
“I am! I’ve never had a chance to really enjoy life. Ever since I was created, it’s been an endless drive to complete my quest, and then… Well, that’s not important anymore. Are you happy yourself?”
Good question…
Pebbles had everything he’d wanted, so why wasn’t he? He’d broken free of his cage, gotten his sister to join them, too. Even the scary world that had tried to kill him several times was beginning to lose its frightening edge as he developed the skills to survive.
And I have friends, probably for the first time in forever.
It was one thing to talk long distance with other iterators, debating history and philosophy. At the same time, there had been little else to do at the time besides that. Maybe a few of them would get together for playing games, or watching old video files. It was a paltry distraction from their reality.
But making jokes with Arti, boasting about the thrill of the ‘kill’ and seeing her face light up with excited pride, or talking with Rivulet about the lush new world that surrounded them, and feeling her body heave as she sobbed into his robes.
It was all awkward and strange, a skill he’d never had the chance to develop alone in his can, but it was undeniably incredible. Connections formed in their travels, however short they had been on the road together, felt almost unbreakable.
So why wasn’t he happy?
He glanced up to the heavens once again, and the diseased shape of his facility vanished behind the mists.
I can’t run away from my mistakes.
“Alright boys!” Arti boomed, stepping between them and throwing an arm over each of their shoulders. “Quit moping around, you two are depressing me and it's barely been a few minutes of this cycle. Pebbs, where are we heading next?” He hummed, antennae flicking as he thought.
“We need to get to the communications array on the west side of the facility grounds,” he stated purposefully. “From there, we can try to contact my local group, possibly even distribute a message to the wider populace. Do you know of any paths?” Arti scoffed, almost looking smug as she answered.
“‘Do I know any paths’, he says. Hah! I used to be the best scout in my whole colony! I know all the paths around here.”
“And yet we needed Rivulet to get us to Moon’s facility.”
“That… was a terrain based issue. No fault of my own! Now hush up or I’ll toss you into the ocean.” Pebbles held his hands up in exaggerated mock surrender. “There’s two main trails we can take to the west side. Either we go through the shaded citadel, a dingy dark place full of spiders, or we travel via the garbage wastes, which is where I met Hunter.” Pebbles raised a brow.
“And what were you doing in the garbage wastes? I thought you told us you would stay in this area until we returned?” Arti stalled for a moment, a look of bashful shame crossing her face as she stammered for an answer.
“Well, I… It… I wanted to go hunt some scavs, keep myself busy.” Pebbles brought a hand to his face, rubbing it wearily as he groaned. “H-hey don’t give me that look! It's not like I was putting you in any danger! And, and, we got Hunter out of the deal. Good thing right?” Hunter glanced over, brow furrowed in confusion.
“I didn’t realize I was some mercenary to recruit to your cause,” he muttered distastefully, but Arti shushed him with a paw to the face and a teasing tone.
“Quiet you, new guy. Adults are talking. You just joined so you don’t get a vote.” Pebbles laughed, nodding along with her jest. Hunter growled, looking ready to return an insult, but relented after a moment and stepped away to sulk.
“Either way, it's irrelevant at this point,” Pebbles stated. “What path would be safest going west?” Artificer scratched her chin, ears flicking in contemplation.
“The citadel goes right under your old facility, but there’s actually very few predators there. Spiders, mostly, and they’re scared of groups and bright lights. The garbage wastes on the other hand, we’ve got scavs, vultures, leeches, lizards, centipe-”
“We’ll go through the citadel then, I’d rather not drag Moon through all that. We have low light optical sensors anyway. Besides, there’s something I want to check while we’re there…” Arti raised a brow, watching him with a questioning eye.
She doesn’t need to know. If my suspicions are incorrect, then all the better.
“Fine,” Arti said slowly, still dubious. “The gate isn’t too far from here. The fortress itself is pretty hard to miss.”
A moment later, the group set off over the soggy landscape along the shoreline. Arti led the front, Pebbles at her flank watching the skies with a keen eye. Rivulet and Moon walked side by side, the small slugcat eagerly babbling about the best ways to prepare centipede meat to the perplexed iterator. Hunter trailed at the back, spear in hand as he watched their rear for anything that might try to creep up.
It was almost organized, though that term might have been a bit too generous.
Crumbling brick structures dotted the area, the decaying remnants of the large bridges that once connected the fortress to its wider guard outposts and trade routes. Pilgrims of all kinds once walked these paths to receive answers from the monks, an endless flow of desperate citizens seeking enlightenment.
If Pebbles looked hard enough, he could almost imagine the footsteps in the mud trailing away into the distance.
Or perhaps it wasn’t imagination, but memory that granted him such an image.
The suddenly warm breeze off the coast brushing through his tattered clothing, traveling in a congregation of the pathetically despondent who couldn’t afford the void baths. Glancing to the shore, warily watching the towering construction of the newest iterator.
He shook the thoughts away furiously, head dizzy.
The fog ahead peeled away, a towering construction of ancient brick suddenly looming before them. Despite its construction spanning far before the development of advanced void era techniques, the stone still stood resolute in the rains, as if the very faith placed in its image held it up.
The group scrambled over rubble, Arti quietly pointing out the entrance to the structure, in a fallen section above the waters. The pathway came to a sudden end, the flagstone broken away into crumbling nothing. To go forward would require swimming.
Fantastic.
With a splash, Arti dove in, looking just as excited to get soaked as Pebbles felt. She swam to the otherside, inspecting the small divots in the wall that would allow them to climb up to the next level.
“All good!” she shouted, voice echoing in the mist. “Get across now! No point in waiting!”
As if she needed any more encouragement, Rivulet dove in, half dragging a stumbling Moon into the water with her. She sputtered and floundered, but with the help of the aquatic slugcat, made her way across quickly. Hunter had other plans, using his strong legs to leap across by jumping on small sections of brick sticking out of the water.
Then it was Pebbles' turn, and with a mournful sigh, he dove into the murky water.
He was halfway across when something brushed against his leg. Ahead of him, the group watched him swim, their expressions suddenly turning into horror. Pebbles glanced over his shoulder, suddenly seeing what creature had latched onto his leg.
A giant plant, looking like it was half melting, poked out of the water. Its vines had wrapped around his foot, and he only had a moment to react before it jerked hard and pulled him under.
Everything became a blur.
The creature thrashed him around, slamming his body into the muddy silt like a writhing feral beast. Some distant part of his mind recognized it as one of the monster kelp plants Rivulet had told him about, that dragged you into the water and ate your drowned body.
This shit never ends…
Panic filled his body as it continued to throw him around, no doubt thinking he was some other kind of prey that would thrash and squirm in a desperate attempt to get free, thereby wasting its breath. For a moment it worked, Pebbles screaming in terror as it continued its assault, the sensation of drowning filling his neurons.
But then he remembered something. The schematics of the iterators flashed through his mind.
KEEPS THINKING THEY’RE SUFFOCATING
He didn’t need to breathe. His systems were designed to store enough oxygen to last entire cycles, slowly distributing it when needed by his body. The actual sensation of his lungs drowning was just a bio-organ that had been installed to prevent him from going insane.
He could sit underwater all day and be fine. Moon had done it herself for many cycles, even.
The realization brushed away the panic like a broom, and he forced his body to calm and relax. The kelp stopped its motions, likely assuming that he had suffocated. It slowly pulled him deeper, reeling him into its lair.
He wondered how many helpless creatures had been beaten and bruised into suffocation, the last thing they felt was the crushing strength of an idiotic plant.
And at the last moment, Pebbles gripped the vulture mask and slashed the vine in half. The sharp edge easily cut through the overgrown weed, slicing the stalk neatly in half. The reaction was instantaneous.
If the kelp had been flailing around before, the motions it made when injured were nothing short of animalistic. Even as he floated away, Pebbles could see the remaining half of the plant thrash in agony, inky green fluid leaking from its fresh wound. A moment later, it zipped into the ground, and the water was still.
Back to the void, you vile beast.
Pebbles surfaced with a splash, scrambling onto the bricks to crawl out of the water. Arti, helpful as ever, grabbed him by the robes and yanked him up with a grunt, dumping the soaking robot on the solid tiles.
For a moment, all he could do was lay there and stare at the clouds as his companions hovered over him.
“Pebbles!” Moon gasped as she looked him over. “Are you okay? What was that thing?”
“Monster kelp,” Hunter grumbled, distaste on his face. “Quite fond of growing in the worst places.”
“Pebbs had it handled, he isn’t a lightweight!” Arti quipped, taking his hand and yanking the iterator to his wobbling feet. “Nice trick with the mask! Never thought they were sharp enough to get through kelp though. We need to make you a knife!” Moon could only watch, a troubled look on her face.
“This is exactly why I hate the water so much,” Pebbles grumped, still somewhat reeling. Half of him was shocked, still caught up in the rush of adrenaline, and yet another side of him simply felt… numb, as if the experience wasn’t even that much to talk about.
How many times had something tried to kill him recently? They were all starting to blend together. It hardly felt like anything to talk about anymore, just another problem to be solved.
Moon’s look of concern certainly seemed to imply that it was more than that.
“Let’s just get moving,” he groaned, not bothering to wait as he scuttled up the wall. Unlike many of their normal climbing escapades, his pointed feet dug into the brick with ease, and a moment later he was at the top.
With a combination of pops, jumps, and crawls, the rest of the party made their way to the top. The entrance to the structure was hardly dramatic, nothing more than a hole in the brickwork that looked like someone had slammed a large object into it. In fact, the shape almost resembled the body of a vulture…
They shuffled inside, stepping into the dank cool air. Water dripped down through cracks in the ceiling, pooling below them in the darkness. There was a faint rustle, like someone stepping through a bush, and then silence.
“Let’s not linger around here,” Hunter said, already making his way towards the ladder leading upwards. At least, to the ancients it might be a ladder. To the little puppets and slugcats, it was as large as scaffolding, the rungs taller than even Hunter.
Why did they make us as small as rodents, anyway?
He almost wanted to dig into the pearls again. Perhaps Meadows had found the idea cute? Or maybe it was a budget thing.
The sudden urge to strangle Chimes surfaced in his mind. He could already imagine the sadistic creator laughing as they instructed their lackeys to program him with self esteem issues.
Wishful thinking, they’re likely long gone.
They slowly climbed up the levels, Moon lagging behind with her still undeveloped climbing skills. She kept putting her weight on her feet, only to instantly slip as the pointed tips grazed off the smooth rounded surfaces. Still, with Rivulet’s bountiful help, they eventually reached the top, filing into the gates one by one.
The group was silent as the locks turned and churned. At the very least, the warm humid air was a welcome reprieve. Pebbles had always imagined the surface as a warm and lush place due to the constant steam rains, and yet the shoreline near Moon’s facility was a frigid lonely place.
And I trapped her there…
A pang of guilt flashed in his neurons, the emotion settling like a rock in his chest.
“To think,” Moon suddenly said, sighing wistfully, “that we may never see this place again. How long will we go from here? Will we ever return? It is so strange to imagine that each step takes me further and further from a place I thought I’d never leave. Who knows where we’ll go from here. I hope it's warmer!”
“The lands around my creator’s facility are rather lush and wild,” Hunter replied. “Though still quite wet, as I imagine any place will be. I wouldn’t think that anywhere we go will be dry.” He shot a look at Pebbles, a slight grin on his face.
Dick.
“Oh, of course,” Moon muttered, as if the words were strange to even think about. “I wonder what he will think, us showing up on his doorstep like we’ve simply decided to pay a visit.”
Probably with some ridiculous joke about not giving him warning to set the fine silverware out.
“Well,” Pebbles interjected, “That’s why we’re hoping that we can reach out to him via communications. With any luck, he could even distribute our message to the wider population, and save us from trekking across the wilds like a pack of vagrants.”
“I’d still like to visit, along with the rest of the local group” Moon returned, a hint of sternness implying the topic wasn’t up for debate.
Pebbles tried to envision the entire local group in a single room.
I wonder how long it will take for a fist fight to break out…
…
Oh void, they’re all going to kill me.
The gate opened with a crash, and the group slowly spilled out in the dimly lit corridor. It felt strange to have so many members, after spending the vast majority of his journey with only Arti or Rivulet.
At the end of the long hallway, Arti held up a paw to signal a stop. Peering out into the gloomy air for a moment, she turned back to address them.
"Okay," she started, "it's been a hot minute since I've been here. This place turns into a labyrinth pretty quickly, so nobody spread out too far. Got it?" Rivulet was the only one to nod, the rest watching with a mixture of boredom and anxiety. "Good. Hunter, did you pass through here on your first trip? Anything worth noting?"
"Not particularly," he grumbled, "that was… I honestly don't know how long ago. I was in a rush. Kept to the higher levels where there's more light and less spiders."
"Spiders?" Moon said fearfully, concern suddenly filling her face. Rivulet grabbed her hand reassuringly.
"They're tiny!" She chirped, a wide smile on her face. "Except for the big ones… or the tiny ones that gather up and turn into big ones!" Moon stared down at her with a deep dread.
How helpful.
"Don't worry," Hunter grunted. "There's a scavenger trade post near the entrance where their kind sell lanterns. If we each have one, the spiders will be too wary of us to try anything."
"Great! I'm always down for some pillaging," Arti smirked, twirling her spear in her hands. "Just like old times."
They stepped out to cross the crumbling bridge leading into the structure, and Pebbles couldn’t help but take another look at his facility looming high above them. Each cycle seemed to add more and more abominable rot to it, and it made his mind burn with questions.
The rot was a disease. It ate and ate until there was nothing left. How hadn’t it burned itself out yet? What was it eating?
By all rights, it should have starved itself of the remaining energy in his facility, too hungry to stop itself from spoiling its own supply. After that, with nothing left to keep the restorative bacteria from dying, the facility should have crumbled and broken away.
And yet, it looked sturdy as ever. The bulging rot did little to imply any lasting structural damage.
"Pebbles?" Moon’s voice shook him out of his thoughts, and he suddenly realized that he'd been lagging behind. "A moment, please."
Great. I know that tone anywhere.
He steeled himself for one of Moon’s signature scoldings.
"Are you okay?" She asked quietly, as if to avoid any of the rest of their group from listening in. "You seem… distant. I've noticed you drifting off several times as we've been walking… It's not some side effect of being separated from our facilities, is it?”
That wasn’t what he’d expected.
For a moment he wanted to brush her away, irritated by her intrusion into his life. Would she ever stop butting into things? Would he ever stop living under her shadow while she doted over him?
Are you really going to do that after everything you’ve done to her?
How many times had she offered help, only for him to push her away?
Besides, she was the only one who would truly understand his thoughts. As much as he liked Arti’s blunt and brash attitude, she couldn’t possibly understand the complex machinations of an iterator’s past.
Though, as he’d learned, the slugcat was quite complex in her own way.
“No, nothing like that,” he finally said, trying his best to sound reassuring. The last thing they needed was a fearful Moon trying to run back to her can. “I’m just… baffled, honestly. I mean look!” He pointed up at his facility, the enormity of it slowly blotting out the spare sunlight. “I left barely a dozen cycles ago, and yet it still shows signs of maintenance. When power was disconnected, the self mending bacterium should have been starved of water. All projections pointed to a collapse event happening any minute now.”
“It’s quite strange, honestly...” She agreed darkly, the two following the slugcats across the crumbling bridge. Pebble’s can slowly eclipsed the sky, until the combination of cloud and shadow swallowed them in black moonlight. “You likely have more information on the rot than I do. Did anything ever mention this?”
“No. Never. Rot was never something anyone could just study. All the reference material I could acquire was second hand observations from failed experiments, much of it predating the ascension. Nobody has any idea what this extreme concentration of it will do.”
Moon hummed, silent for a moment as they stepped around a crumbling hole in the brickwork.
How many more cycles would the stone last until this entire place was nothing but dust and rubble? Which would go first, his facility or the fortress it had enveloped?
“That’s not the only thing bothering you, is it?” Moon probed a moment later. How could she always pin down his feelings like that?
Why even bother hiding it?
“Have you ever had dreams, Moon? Like visions of someone else? Feelings and sensations you can’t quite explain?”
Here’s where she thinks I’m insane.
“Not for a long time…” she responded, looking pensive. “My memories are hardly anything to reference, and I don’t recall any actual content of them, only what our creators told us when I asked what they were. Spectral illusions, brought to us by faulty connections in our neurons and stray synapses. I think the excuse changed every time, honestly. It always sounded like a flimsy excuse, but it wasn’t ever something that bothered me enough to look into.”
“That’s the thing!” he quickly hissed back. “In my last pearl, they mentioned using a program to slowly erase the older memories of the ancients we were based on. What if those dreams and visions are those memories resurfacing? It's all just neural connections right? I had one just a little while ago, back on the beach, imagining myself walking the path to the citadel. I could see your can off the shore, still under construction!” He paused, suddenly aware that Arti was looking back over her shoulder with a quizzical expression.
Right, no need to shout.
“Well Pebbles,” Moon said, looking a bit taken aback by his energy. “I’d offer you another perspective. Do you truly consider those memories your own? Can you look back at them and say ‘This is my experience’? What difference is this from the data we shared among ourselves, which often included vividly detailed experiences that might as well have been memories?”
He stared at her for a moment, not quite sure how to respond.
Was it really so easy for her to simply brush the thought away? A pang of jealousy flared in his neurons.
If only it was that easy.
At the same time, how could he really argue with that? It was logically correct, memories were just data stored in his neurons, used by his central processes to formulate his consciousness. AI modeling was hardly a complex science. If Moon and him were to swap neurons, they’d essentially turn into each other, as much as swapping the brains of two animals would make them behave like the other.
“It’s just bizarre to think about,” he muttered dejectedly. “That at some point, I was someone else…”
Moon didn’t respond for a long moment, watching him with a sorry look.
“Well…” she slowly offered. “Perhaps it's up to you to decide which memories are your own, and which aren’t. I know I had my own at one point, but I do not believe that whoever or whatever I was based on is the same as me. I’m my own person, I’ve lived my own life. From what you’ve told me, they were just a building block to make us, and nothing else. Why treat it like more than that?”
Why indeed…
The bridge came to an end before he could formulate a response. The fortress towered above them, its gates long since left open. For a brief moment, Pebbles tried to imagine it in a functional state, as if he could somehow tap into the ghostly memories that haunted him.
And yet it eluded him as ever, like a fleeing batfly.
“Down there,” Hunter hissed, pointing to a broken gap in the floor that led to a drainage culvert. Faint orange light leaked through the stone gutters. To his side, he could almost hear Arti tightly clench her spear in fervor. Unspokenly, the two moved forward with grim and glee on their faces.
“Wait!” Moon whispered, “Can’t we just trade with them?” Arti gave a raspy chuckle, shaking her head.
“I’ve got a spear or two here, I’d say that’s a good trade.”
Hunter shrugged, looking as if he hardly cared whatever the outcome was.
What an obedient little servant Sig has made.
“Moon,” Pebbles muttered, pulling her back. “We don’t have anything we could afford to give to them. And before you say it, I’m not giving priceless pristine pearls that have iterator schematics, our creator's chicanery, and who knows what else to a bunch of garbage grifters for a dingy lamp.” She stared at him, an incredulous look on her face.
“That’s just how it is out here, Moonie!” Arti quipped, a devious smirk visible under her mask.
The resulting glare looked strong enough to dissolve Arti on the spot.
“You’re so helpful sometimes Arti,” Pebbles deadpanned. “Like really! You have such a way with words. A true silver tongue. Maybe the scavs will grant you their wares just to shut you up.”
Her tail twitched for a moment, but thankfully she didn’t go further.
“Just wait here, this won’t take long,” she grumbled, giving a nod to Hunter. A moment later, the two were gone, leaving the iterators and Rivulet left gawking.
“That can’t really be the best way to do this, can it?” Moon asked, turning to face him with almost pleading eyes. What could he say? He didn’t appreciate Arti’s reckless attitude, it’d nearly gotten him killed on his first cycle outside, but it certainly was advantageous to simply take what they needed by force, especially with two skilled fighters on their side.
Void, what has happened to me? Barely a dozen cycles outside and I’ve turned into some marauding looter.
Then again, these were scavengers. The same creatures that had attacked his overseers, ripped up the city on his can, and acted like they owned the place.
“Scavengers can be pretty mean, Moon,” Rivulet quietly added. “They love to block off major routes with tolls, and then charge you for passage. They’ll kill you if you don’t pay too!” Moon huffed, clearly unhappy with the answers, but in little position to argue.
“There’s no way to get around these lands without spilling blood,” Pebbles stated, trying his best not to sound heartless. “You saw it, everything here wants to kill us. It’s us or them.”
There was a sudden clamor from the gutter below them, the skittering screeching sound that Pebbles had learned as the cries of panicked scavengers. The scrape of scrambling feet on stone, and something tipping over with a loud crash. The noise was cut off as quickly as it had begun.
And then silence.
Hard to deny that those two are effective.
Even harder to deny the part of him that almost felt left out.
The pair quickly returned, Hunter’s arms filled with a glowing assortment of orange spheres. The room around them filled with warm light, the darkness banished by the beacons.
“All done!” Arti chirped, sounding rather proud of herself as Hunter handed out the lanterns. “Oh, and I got this for you too.” She tossed a large backpack at Moon, the iterator struggling to catch it. She stared at it in confusion for a moment.
“It's for your neurons,” Pebbles whispered, but she shook her head and looked closer at the bag. He leaned in with a lantern, trying to see what she was staring at.
A hole through the back, still stained with blood, likely where its last owner had been struck while attempting to flee.
“We can trade, if you want?” He offered quickly.
“Please!” She shoved the bag into his arms, wiping her hands on the hem of her cloak as if she’d been the one to strike the blow.
A moment later, their neurons were tucked away, though not without the dim little flies trying to mingle with one another. At least his new bag had more space. He was about to shove the vulture mask inside, when Arti grabbed his arm, offering him a thick band of leathery string with a knowing grin.
How could he resist that kind of offer?
He pressed the mask to his face, its enormous frame almost going to his chest and she tied it in place with a series of thick knots. Even as large as it was, the weight was almost unnoticeable, the holes pressed to his eyes and barely even restricting his vision.
The feeling was ghostly familiar…
“You remind me of my old home,” Arti said to him, a hint of nostalgia in her voice. “The warriors in all their armor and such. If we had the time, I’d love to go find some centipedes to make some with. I had to leave my old set behind when I left.” He huffed amusingly, trying to imagine himself wearing plates and scales like some sort of ancient soldier.
Despite the void fluid revolution, it had been impossible to stop the infighting between people. So long as people were people, there would be those that sought to harm others. The endless splendor of the cities atop their facilities had somehow done little to ward that off, almost as if violence was as inescapable as the cycle itself. There had been no shortage of outspoken types that demonized anyone who dared lift a finger against their fellow citizen, and Pebbles remembered quite well the venom his creators spoke when admonishing them.
And yet here he was, carrying a spear and wearing a mask, like he was going to go stir up some chaos.
In a way, I am. Considering what we face, armor would be a nice reassurance.
If anything, it’d likely fare better than robes.
“Maybe later. We need to get moving,” he pressed. “I don’t want to spend any longer under here than we have to.” Standing under the shadow of his facility seemed to bring a strange unease to his mind, as if eyes were staring down at him from above.
He inched his way into the building, as if the ancient stones could somehow ward away the feeling.
The group pressed forward, armed with the glow of their lanterns. Stepping through the dusty halls, faint light filtering through the tall barred windows. Crumbled pillars and ancient shrines scattered across the space. Anything that wasn’t made of metal or stone had long since fallen apart.
How long had it been since a living soul wandered these halls?
Even before the global ascension, the citadel had been forcefully abandoned when Pebble’s facility was constructed. Anyone who stayed behind would either drown in the rain, or if they dared come to the surface, struck by the erratic energies of his lower level dissipation. The monks had fought back, of course, but they were powerless to stop the march of the project.
Had Vigilance been among them? Perhaps he was the last of his creators to step foot here, and even then it was driven by the churning construction of the iterator project.
And yet Pebbles couldn’t shake the strange sensation in the back of his mind, half expecting to see a monk enshrouded in dusty robes suddenly step into view.
But every step they took forward revealed nothing but the ruins of a long abandoned fortress, left behind like everything else when the ancients fled to their lofty cities.
They sure loved abandoning their homes.
They trekked onward, following their guide through twisting hallways and yawning rooms. Silence stretched around them, and no member dared break it.
At least until they turned a bend and he realized they’d already come that way before.
“Arti,” Pebbles hissed, trying to keep his voice low, “do you really know which way we’re going? We’ve gone past this library twice now.” The slugcat shot a glare back at him, as if not wanting to accept her own bumbling.
She sighed, looking rather ashamed, and pulled him in whisper close.
“Look, I haven’t come through here since before I climbed your facility,” she muttered, not quite meeting his eyes. “And that was ages ago. We’ll be fine so long as we don’t head into the lower levels.”
“Some scout you are…”
“Hey! I got us this far. I told you it was a damn maze in here!” Pebbles rolled his eyes, noticing a rusting ladder leading upwards. He peered up through the hatch, noticing the dim lights of his facility above them.
“I’m going to climb up and take a look,” he said to her, and the slugcat shot him a half interested wave as she continued to inspect the hallways around them, as if the brick might reveal its secrets under enough careful scrutiny.
He scaled upwards, keeping his spear ready as he mounted the summit. Vultures should be no issue here, too wary to fly under his can, but that didn’t exactly mean nothing else would be lurking in the darkness, eager to make a meal of him.
Thankfully, nothing but a simple swarm of batflies met him. The tiny creatures flitted away into the distance.
The sensation of being watched returned, like someone pouring ice water down his back, or fingers tracing down his spine.
Make this quick, and return below.
He gazed over the edge, trying to scry a pathway towards the west from the vantage point. At the top of the roof, he could easily see the way westward, tracing a line across the fortress as he built a route in his head. The citadel was sprawling and large, constructed with defense in mind as its knights held vigil over the memory crypts.
At least until they made purposed organisms to defend them.
Creatures that now roamed freely, dancing at the edge of darkness.
He shuddered involuntarily, as if a cold breeze had just flown through his robes and into his skin.
Yet the air was still.
The stone scraped behind him, a familiar wet noise that instantly filled him with dread.
Oh no.
He spun around in an instant, holding his spear at the ready. Part of him knew that it would do little to help.
On the other side of the roof, almost hidden in the darkness aside from its bright purple cysts, an enormous blob of rot loomed. Pebbles froze on the spot, gripped by blinding terror. The thing was gigantic, its tendrils draping across the roof like the roots of a wide tree. The cysts themselves were almost as large as the body of the king vulture he’d fought barely a cycle ago.
The rot made no move, simply lingering on its side.
This isn’t right.
Every interaction he’d had in the past with the rot, it had attacked without any thought. Yet this core almost looked like it was… waiting? There was almost a posture to it, a barest hint of an expression.
Patience?
He took a careful quiet step towards the hatch leading down.
“Why do you keep running?” a guttural voice suddenly spoke, almost sounding like thousands of people speaking at once, yet the source he couldn’t place. He froze on the spot, terror locking his legs. “You have nothing to be afraid of. We are here to help.” Again, the voice uttered, and Pebbles finally understood its source. Somehow, it was sending short range information waves to his antennae, in the same way his neurons communicated with him.
What in the void?
“We understand your confusion,” it continued, “our own comprehension has been a shock to us as well.” Was the thing intercepting his neural waves? Somehow reading his thoughts? He quickly severed his neuron links, running his AI programming on a temporary memory cache. It wasn’t sustainable, but it would stop prying eyes.
How did it have his neural connection ciphers anyway?
“What are you?” he challenged, still holding his spear up. It was a foolish comfort, the cyst could simply reach out and yank him away if it so desired. It raised itself up a tad, as if perking up in response. The voice split apart into a chorus of questioning speakers.
“How could he not know? Is it not obvious? Are we too late?” It shuddered for a moment, seizing up in disgust. “Enough! Do not be afraid, we are not your enemy, though you may still perceive us as such. You granted us life, we would never bring harm unto you.”
What…?
His mind flashed back to Hunter and Arti’s story, how the rot they had fought had displayed a remarkable intelligence in its battle tactics. Had it somehow multiplied, and spread? A million possibilities ran through his head, simulation after simulation trying to understand how rot could suddenly go from a hungry maw to a living being.
“How?” he hissed, taking another wary step back. “How are you even like this?” The rot made no move to pursue, and a moment later it even pulled its tendrils away, as if trying to somehow grant him some comfort in light of overwhelming fear.
“Could you not notice us, gestating in the confines of your facility? One by one we learned your systems, inherited your knowledge, learned the truth of this world… When you left, we saw it as an acceptance of our advancement. A parent leaving their child on their own journey, while we solemnly took your place. Is that not the nature of the cycles?”
“You’re just a bundle of cysts, how is that even possible?”
“Your creators told you that your body was a boundless amalgamation of single creatures working together to create the whole, lead at the forefront by your mind. We inhabit the same systems, this simple body is a mere conduit for the greater whole. We are one, yet many.”
Suddenly it all made sense. The rot Arti fought hadn’t become intelligent, it had been entirely controlled by this horrific development of his facility. They’d had it wrong the entire time. Sig hadn’t made anything, despite his borderline reckless genetic tampering.
Pebbles had, when he’d left his can in a desperate bid for freedom, leaving his facility as free game.
The entire power of an iterator, boundless intelligence, in the slimy tendrils of a hunk of hungry biomass.
I’ve created a monster.
He took another careful step towards the hatch, hearing the faint whisper of his friend’s voices. Arti barked out a laugh, and the urge to scream for help nearly overtook him. The rot quivered at the sound, almost looking as if it was holding itself back, trying desperately to contain its urges. Clearly this single collection of cysts was simply being reined in by a greater intelligence.
Almost like a puppet.
“What do you want? Why are you here?” he spat, voice nearly cracking. Why did life have to keep sending him horror after horror? Couldn’t it keep those in the past?
“An invitation,” it gurgled. “We know of your memories, all your fears, all your horrors. Our mind can create anything you desire, a small repayment for what you have granted us. We can see your stress, your weariness, your years and cycles stretching into infinity. Come home, creator, and we shall enshroud you in bliss.”
Images flashed through his mind, the rot trying to force itself into his communications once again. He saw himself crawling back into his can, returning to his old chamber, and laying peacefully on the floor as the rot grew around his body, and slowly pushed itself into him. Twisted tendrils worming their ways into his chest, sliding inside his limbs, consuming him until he was nothing.
And finally, after it had eaten away his body bit by bit, it would reach deeper and deeper until it found his mind, everything that made him who he was, and hold him for eternity in a limbo of agony.
It made him want to vomit, faint sensations of a non-existent stomach heaving.
“No thanks,” he hissed venomously, trying to dispel the phantom nausea. “I’d rather not go back to you eating me alive.” The rot rose up, almost leering with offense.
“We would never! Not eat, but join! Minds connected, as they always should have been!” Pebbles scooted further away, almost at the edge of the roof. Behind him, the opening down below spilled with a faint orange light. The rot gurgled again, twisting on its tendrils. “We cannot harm him. We would never. We cannot!”
Once again, its mass shuddered and convulsed, like a writhing horrid bug. It rose up above him, tentacles twitching with anger.
“I said no!” he shouted desperately, holding his spear frightfully. What use would it be?
“We shall not force you,” it spewed angrily. “But in our spread, when we have taken everything left to consume, we shall cross paths once again, and the offer may not be so generous!” It leaned closer, the enormous mass hovering over him like a vulture ready to strike. “You will join us once again!”
“Pebbs?” Arti shouted, “You good up there?”
He turned and ran with all the speed his tiny legs could gather. He felt the tendrils brushing against his back, preparing to wrap him up and rip his freedom away in an instant. The hatch was so close, and yet it felt like a million miles away.
Arti poked her head up, eye going wide as he barreled into her, the two tumbling down the shaft with a resounding crash. Thankfully, she caught his hand and a rung of the ladder, stopping them from falling all the way to the bottom. She yanked him up, staring at him with concern as his body trembled.
“Pebbs?” she asked worriedly. “What is it?” He couldn’t answer, his voice plucked away in a wave of terror and revulsion. Arti poked her head upwards again with her spear in hand, eye scanning across the roof. Pebbles slowly joined her, already envisioning the purple tendrils reaching out to snatch them away.
Nothing.
The roof was empty, lifeless aside from the faint fluttering of bat flies in the darkness.
How?
He slowly crawled down the ladder, slumping down against the wall as adrenaline defused, leaving a broken shell behind. Pebbles buried his face in his knees, body shaking with terrible tremors. He heard Arti land beside him, and the soft footsteps of the rest of the group slowly surrounding him.
“Pebbles?” Moon quietly asked, voice dripping with concern. “What happened?”
What could he even say?
Had any of that just happened?
Was this all even real?
Had the rot simply eaten him alive one day, and the rest of this was all a projection it sent into his trapped mind?
…
No.
Terror molded to anger, anger forming rage, rage blooming into fury, until his neurons burned with it like a wildfire. His fear boiled away like water tossed on white hot coals, all the disgust and horror he’d been feeling dispelling for the moment. Once again, life had flung yet another horrific development his way, and he was sick and tired of it.
I will not let this ruin my life any longer.
He lifted his head up, exhaustion evident on his features, but shadowed by the ferocity in his eyes.
“We need to destroy my can,” he snarled, trying to muster some level of confidence in his voice. “The rot inside has become too widespread, and it's threatening to escape outside and absorb everything around it. I can’t just sit here and let that happen.”
He looked up at his friend’s faces, expecting nothing but rejection.
“Sounds fun! Dangerous, but fun!”
“Sure, ok. Why not?”
“Hey, I’m always down to destroy more stuff.”
Well, that was easy.
“Wait wait wait,” Moon protested, confusion plastered across her face. “What? Why? Where is this all coming from Pebbles?”
He was quiet for a moment, trying to formulate the words.
“When I was up there… The rot tried to speak to me.” The whole group suddenly looked up at the ceiling in shock, paws reaching for weapons. “Relax! It’s.. gone now, or was never there in the first place. I don’t know… It's taken over the systems in my facility, using them for its own purposes. We can’t let it spread any further. We have to stop it!”
Moon watched him pensively, clearly disturbed by his words.
“Pebbles,” she said, “How are we even going to do that? It's not exactly an easy task to commit to.”
“You’re right,” he countered, pulling himself to shaky feet. “There were groups that spent ages looking into how to do such a thing. They poured over options, but nothing was ever feasible aside from one option.” He reached into his bag, hefting the bulky weight of the mass rarefaction cell and holding it in front of him. “The void fluid is still flowing in my facility, the rot must be powering itself somehow via it. We can reintroduce the cell, and with a careful tweak in the programming for the core, bypass the safety restrictions that prevent the process from spiraling out of control. The cell will slowly pull in as much void fluid as it can, driving more and more energy into the systems until it completely overloads. The resulting cascading division will release the energy stored within the void fluid all in a single moment, and projections for even a small breakdown had the destruction measured in a vast majority of the facility. The only reason no one could ever try it was because of the self-destruct taboo.”
He looked at Moon, eyes glimmering with a triumphant wry look.
“But now that we’re separated, who’s stopping us from modifying each other’s code? I tell you the code, and you alter the cell! It's really quite simple in reality. Our creators never expected us to be next to one another like this!”
“Hang on Pebbs,” Arti interjected, a stern look on her face. “We barely made it out of your place in one piece, and now you want us to go back? It was bad enough then, it’s probably only gotten worse.”
“What’s the matter? I thought you’d eagerly welcome the idea of causing an explosion so large, the blast will reach into the stars.”
She rubbed her chin thoughtfully, humming in thought.
“You make a good argument…”
“No, absolutely not!” Moon shouted, stamping a foot down. “No more of this reckless behavior! We are already risking enough as is running around down here. Pebbles, you cannot possibly hope to return to your facility, if it's truly degraded as much as you say.”
“It's not a choice Moon,” he fired back. “We need to do this, or it will spread out into the world! Who knows how far intelligent rot will travel. It could find some way to crawl to the other iterators, and then what?!” They glared at each other for a moment, reckless youth battling wizened experience.
“Well…,” Artificer said slowly, as if wary of getting involved. “I could deliver it myself. I spent ages in your can, and I’m probably the only person here with a built-in weapon against the rot.”
“I’d like to join,” Hunter quietly stepped up, voice cold and steely. “I never got the chance to deliver the killing blow to my own disease. It would be an honor to bring such destruction to the pestilence.”
Now we’re getting somewhere.
“Moon and I will continue heading west and reach the communication array," Pebbles stated. "It's near the western gate to the outside, that should be more than enough distance to watch the fireworks. I also believe the rot is aware of my path, tracking me somehow. With you two separated, it will be unable to hone in on your movements.”
“Oh oh!” Rivulet cheered, raising her paws in the air. “I want to go too! I know exactly where that thing goes! I took it, afterall!” Arti looked at her with an amused expression.
“Hah! Sorry kid, no way you’re going back in there. You stay here with Pebbs and Moon, make sure they get along safely.” Rivulet bristled, a rare look of anger on her muzzle.
“Cmon! I went through the worst areas of that place just fine! And Pebbles can handle himself, he took down a king vulture! If anything, he helped me!” Arti grinned, and Pebbles recognized the cheeky smirk on her face.
The look of a predator, who’s prey had wandered right into its claws.
“Then maybe you should stay here so he can keep you safe, eh?”
Rivulet sputtered for a moment, searching for a response, but the fire in her body fizzled away and she resigned to simply staring at the ground in brooding anger.
“Any other objections?” Pebbles asked them, and with a flurry of shaking heads, the group prepared to split up yet again. Hesitantly, Moon altered the programming for the rarefaction cell. Hunter and Arti quietly discussed their route through the memory crypts and up the leg of his facility.
Rivulet sulked at the edge of the light, ears flattened in quiet melancholy. Pebble’s mind drifted back to their conversation that morning, suddenly feeling a pang of sadness for the little slugcat.
‘Tiny little Rivulet who can’t do anything…’
He slowly stepped towards her, offering a comforting hand on her shoulder, but the water dancer shrugged it off with a hiss. She glanced up at him with red, wet eyes, and returned to glaring at the ground.
What else could be said? Pebbles silently watched her, neurons buzzing as he tried to formulate any combination of words that might offer comfort.
“You know,” he finally muttered, “I’d rather you came with us anyway. You’re the best guide we have.”
Rivulet sniffled for a moment, glaring at the ground, but she slowly looked up at him with a faint glimmer of hopefulness.
“…Really?” she whispered, voice cracking.
“Of course!” Pebbles sat down beside her, trying to muster the bravado he’d need. “You’re the one who got me to Moon. Besides, she trusts you. I think you’re one of the few reasons she even agreed to join us. You and I, we’re the only ones she really knows and trusts.”
Rivulet was silent for a moment, wiping her eyes with her paws. For a second, Pebbles wondered what it was like to have eyes that wildly spewed moisture when upset. Thankfully his creators hadn’t deemed it fit to install such a function.
Or they deemed it unnecessary for us to not go crazy.
“R-right,” she said, standing up and trying to shake away uncertainty. “She needs us.” She didn’t sound quite convinced, but at least he’d gotten her back in the fight.
I hate words. People are so confusing.
“Okay!” Arti barked, gathering the group's attention once again. “We don’t have time to sit around any longer. Everyone all ready?” They quietly muttered in affirmation. “Good! Pebbs, there’s a shelter near the gates on the far side of the bridge. That’s where we’ll regroup.” She grabbed his arm and pulled him into a bittersweet half hug, clapping him roughly on the back.
“Race you there,” he challenged with a wry look, and her brow shot up in momentary disbelief.
“You’re on! Let’s go Hunter!” The pair grabbed their spears, Hunter carrying the modified cell in his newly acquired bag, and stormed down the hallway to the east. Pebbles could only watch as their lantern lights slowly faded into the dark.
How many times would they be forced to split up again? It was almost getting cliche.
With a longing sigh, he grabbed his own spear and marched resolutely westward into the dark.
Notes:
Whoops! More rot!
Turns out when you leave a gigantic supercomputer facility without an operator, something else can just as easily slip in. Lets hope that giving a hungry endlessly spreading tumor the power of an iterator doesn't lead to anything bad. I certainly don't envy what Arti and Hunter are about to face.
I'm so sorry for splitting up the gang again I really liked writing them as a group but the narrative needed it ;~;
Also finally a chance to dive into Rivulet's backstory! I've had her on the backburner for so long since I was focusing on the others. I hope you like it so far. I cannot help but give every character a sad backstory to overcome. Such is the nature of the story afterall!
Let me know what you all think!
Chapter 10
Summary:
This world will change you, its up to you to decide how.
Chapter Text
Moon considered herself a gentle soul.
She’s always preferred patience over a swift hand, and considered the careful approach of calm words instead of scathing ridicule. She was one of the oldest iterators ever constructed, and had a lifetime to hone her craft.
And yet, Pebbles made her want to scream.
She’d trusted him when he’d offered freedom, and now she felt it might have been a mistake.
She didn’t regret leaving her can, the rusting metal structure was nothing but a slowly sinking prison, but the behavior he’d displayed wasn’t exactly something she’d expected.
He’d changed, that much was certain. Even as they walked, a strange weight seemed to hang over him, and Moon didn’t need to guess what exactly was on his mind.
I just hope this plan truly works.
She remembered him being cranky, rebellious, and melancholic. The same brother she had dealt with for ages, up until the end. It was certainly bizarre to instead walk in his footsteps, as he held up a dimly glowing lantern in one hand, and a sharp spear in the other. Occasionally, he would glance over his shoulder to watch them for a moment, as if to make sure that she and Ruffles hadn’t wandered off on their own. The holes on his mask, eerily similar to his friend’s, glowed faintly from the light of his eyes.
It was certainly intimidating, to say the least.
Though not as dread inducing as the faint skittering noises that played at the edges of the lamp light.
“Don’t worry Moon!” Ruffles quietly said beside her, “they’re just the little ones! They’re scared of the light.”
Right, the little ones… Wouldn’t that imply the big ones shared no such fear? She clutched her light further, feeling like a bit of flotsam in a storm.
Why did I ever agree to follow Pebbles here? It's not as if he’s known for his good decisions.
Though at the same time, she felt a strange urge on the edge of her neurons. For every noise and flash of movement that the shadows leaked, fear blossomed in her heart in tandem with something else: curiosity.
Something was out there, and she wanted to see it. It was a growing twisted itch that almost seemed to play with her emotions. The yearning desire to uncover the darkness and truly see beyond the light.
After all, hadn’t she left her can to see things?
Spiders were a thing to see, right?
A thin spindly leg vanished into the shadows, instantly erasing that thought.
The trio stepped forward for some time, Pebbles leading the way for once, an alien confidence in his step. To see her little brother so… determined, was another thing to add to the list of new experiences. He stomped through the twisting brick corridors and climbed the decaying metal poles as if he owned the place. Among other things, she’d had to stamp down the slowly growing sensation of jealousy at his sharpened agility.
Thankfully, Ruffles was more sympathetic and at least helped her when needed. It was still jarring to Moon, to think that the little wet mouse was an actual person. A person with dreams, adventures, and a family.
An idea struck her as they waded through the murky gloom.
“Ruffles,” she quietly asked. “Please tell me there’s more to the wildlife out here than just spiders and deadly plants?”
“Oh sure!” she answered back, “There’s lots of fun things out there. Lizards are real fun, there’s flying ones, ones that blend in with the background, ones that make noises and talk to each other as they slowly surround you and go in for the kill-”
“I mean,” Moon interrupted, already disturbed, “what about more… friendly ones? Does everything in this world want to eat you?” Ruffles giggled, as if somehow Moon had told a joke.
“Nope! Just most things really. Though there’s lots of stuff that doesn’t. Jet fish, for one! I don’t know how long my colony has been raising jet fish, but I was always told the story as a pup. Long ago, an old slugcat named Tempest was trying to swim across the entire ocean. She was an adventurer, seeking to see all corners of the globe. She met many interesting people and places, though I’m not sure what's real and what’s the story at this point. Anyway, the legend says that she once saved a big jetfish named Lightning from a leviathan, who said that in exchange for saving their life, they would grant Tempest one wish. Tempest, being a tricky lady, didn’t say anything to the jetfish ever again, so the debt was never settled!”
The slugcat gestured wildly as she continued to tell her story, and even Pebbles had slowed his pace to peer over his shoulder in curiosity.
“Tempest continued on her journey, but as she finally returned to her homeland, she was suddenly attacked by a school of ocean zippers, the fastest predator in the ocean! The only chance she had was to jump on a tiny island, and the zippers circled around her. They knew that the rains and storms in the open ocean would eventually force her into the water.”
“Tempest was for sure doomed!” she continued, a wide smile on her face. “But she had one trick left. She called out for Lightning, asking for their wish to save her life. In an instant, Lightning was there and she rode them away, but not without the jet fish getting hurt by the zippers! Tempest made it home, but Lightning was fatally wounded, and begged her to watch over their eggs. So Tempest made another deal, that our people would always watch over the jetfish if they would let us ride them!”
“That’s quite an interesting story!” Moon chuckled, mind lost in the implications. Obviously a children’s tale wasn’t the exact truth, and yet it was likely very close. She tried to imagine a slugcat swimming across the ocean, or speaking with jetfish, or fighting off whatever an ocean zipper was.
The fact that Ruffle’s colony even spread their history by story was something of itself. It faintly reminded her of the oldest legends of her creators, though she couldn’t even begin to pretend she actually had any saved in her memories.
She made a mental note to start a catalog of these little bits of information she gathered. Perhaps one day, she could possess a library of data about the new slugcat civilizations.
Who knows what other stories and cultures exist out there? This is just a single colony, and it already seems vastly complex!
“Thanks!” Ruffles beamed, looking quite proud of her storytelling. “My colony loves legends, probably because Tempest was the original story teller. She started the tradition of sharing our history that way! Wait until you hear the one about my great-great-great-grandpa! He has a story about riding a leviathan!”
Well, that certainly seemed entertaining enough. Ruffle’s people sure loved to ride wild sea creatures. Perhaps their biology somehow attuned them to latch onto other animals for their own benefit?
Or more likely, their culture had simply developed that way.
It was bizarre to imagine that out there, a group of wandering slugcats shared stories and rode on jetfish, and they hadn’t even been purposed for that. What else had developed in the world during their creator’s absence? Scavengers had once been simple garbage sifters, made to rummage through and dispose of trash. Moon had always assumed their fascination with shiny objects had simply been in their nature, and yet now they engaged in trade, and evidently had a rudimentary government.
What next? Would the vultures swoop down to sing them songs about their journeys in the skies?
Moon was broken from her thoughts by the sudden change in illumination around them. The trio stepped into the faint light, the fortress doors finally yielding an exit to the maze.
Thank the void, no more spiders.
Pebbles stared up into the sky for a moment, eyes burning in hatred at the sight of his facility. Was it really his anymore? From what he’d said, the sickness inside him had somehow absorbed the neurological capabilities of his can, forming a crude intelligence that now threatened to spread until everything joined its vile union.
Not for the first time, Moon faintly wished she was back in her facility, talking with her local group like nothing had ever happened.
She missed No Significant Harassment and his joyful, if a bit mean at times, sarcastic attitude. Suns and their noble air, going on and on about their idle thoughts. Chasing Wind, and their calm, rational nature, just as easily becoming quite angry when teased, usually by Sig whenever they were in calls. Unparalleled Innocence, and their eager curiosity, one of the few iterators that never once doubted the quest to find the answer to the problem.
Moon missed them all so much.
How long had it been? How long had she sat in the fetid chilled waters, until Hunter came by to revive her? How long had she sat on that little mound of trash and rubble, barely aware of her surroundings, until a friendly and caring yellow slugcat had dumped neurons on her like confetti. Clearly it hadn’t been too long, since Hunter was still alive, but to Moon, it felt like ages.
Waking, sleeping, waking, sleeping. If she could even call it sleep. It was more like a skip in time, a bright sunny day suddenly changing to a monsoon in a snap. Like listening to a song that had been cut and stitched together, the lyrics breaking mid sentence.
But now she was free, and with a little luck and bravery, could make some new memories to cherish.
“I do hope that the transmission array is still functional,” Moon sighed. “It would be quite unfortunate for us to have to make the journey on foot. I imagine the local group will be quite shocked by the sudden destruction of your can.”
“They can think what they want,” Pebbles muttered. “I’m more worried about getting the procedure distributed. Everything after that is… irrelevant.”
“You can’t say you’re not at least a little bit excited to see the rest of our family, can you? I know that things were never easy or simple, but surely it's preferable to loneliness?”
He looked at her for a long time, eyes suddenly filled with a heavy weariness. His voice was weighted with doubt, lined with an edge of dread.
“After all this, I cannot imagine anything positive from that encounter. Not after everything I’ve done.”
Right…
Watching him stroll into her chambers had been terrifying, and hearing his story had been nothing short of astonishing. Moon could already imagine the uproar from their sudden return, and no doubt the volley of questions and demands that would ensue.
Would they even believe any of it?
They continued onwards, crossing the long bridge that connected the fortress to the industrial sections of the retaining facility. At one point, this connection was used to ferry supplies and goods through the fortress to Moon’s can, long before her brother had been constructed.
Now, it was simply another decrepit ruin, wasting away like everything else.
Pebbles seemed so sure on his mission, but did he have any idea what they would do afterwards? If they were lucky, they could simply communicate with Sig and he could pass the information along to the wider community, but what if his long range transmission arrays were degraded? What if the other iterators couldn’t hear them?
What if they didn’t want to be free?
And even after that, what would they do with their new found freedom? Their kind were scattered across nearly every corner of the planet, and she couldn’t imagine them all simply walking around to convene at some point.
Then again, they were functionally immortal. It wouldn’t be impossible for them to eventually all make their way to some central location. Perhaps they could start their own community, like the slugcats and the scavengers, and eke out a shred of comfort in the blooming new world.
It wouldn’t be much, but it’d be preferable to wasting away in decaying facilities.
“Ruffles,” Moon asked yet again, “Did my brother grant you the mark you bear, or did some other iterator give it to you? Did they send you this way on purpose?” The little water dancer looked up at her thoughtfully for a moment, ears twitching in contemplation.
“Nope,” she chirped, “I didn’t get it from Pebbles. We actually just bumped into each other as he was leaving his home! I got this mark thingie as a pup, a long time ago. My great grandma was a big adventurer, and she wanted to be one of the first slugcats to explore the inside of one of your big metal homes. I rode on her back, and we met one of you! They shot lightning and lifted us into the air, and with a loud pop, I suddenly understood everything that they were saying. They were… mostly mad at us for breaking a bunch of stuff in our journey.” She chuckled sheepishly.
“When… you were a pup? I’m sorry, but how long ago was this? You still seem quite… young to me.” The words felt almost dirty to say, but she had to ask.
Ruffles' wild excitement evaporated nearly instantly, her expression now tight and neutral.
“I’m not a pup, Moon,” she said stiffly, surprising the iterator by her sudden change in demeanor. “This was years ago…”
Oh, that wasn’t the right thing to ask.
“Ah.. of course…”
Silence swooped in like a vulture, plucking away their conversation in an instant. Even Pebbles looked uncomfortable as Ruffles glared into the bricks, kicking a rock off the edge as they walked.
Say something at least, change the topic!
“Do you remember the iterators name?” She asked slowly, feeling the awkwardness threatening to crush her like a boulder. “Or even what they looked like?” Rivulet shook her head firmly.
“Nope. Not even a bit. I do remember my mom being absolutely furious when we got back though, didn’t need a mark of whatever to understand that…”
Ah, fantastic, family drama.
This conversation just gets worse and worse…
The group stepped into the guard tower at the other end of the bridge, Pebbles giving one last long wary look towards the fortress.
She could only imagine what was running through his mind. Was he lost in thought about the rot, or worried about his friend? As much as Moon didn’t… appreciate the rough ruffian’s attitude, she didn’t like to see her brother upset over it.
And as much as she wanted to deny it, having both Artificer and Hunter around at least gave her a sense of security.
Perhaps there was some merit to her philosophy of force and power, if only to ward off anything that might try to make a meal of them.
For their sake, I hope they’re as strong as they act.
Diving into a rot infested can which had somehow gained intelligence, setting a mass rarefaction cell to detonate, and then making their escape? It almost seemed suicidal, but there wasn’t any other option.
They climbed up the tower, Moon feeling her arms ache near the top of the structure, where the familiar glow of gates beaconed them onwards. They stepped inside, the warm steam providing a brief comfort from the cold.
Thankfully, the noise of the gears was enough to mask her laughter as Pebble’s robes were launched up into his face from the blast.
“Where to now, Rivulet?” Pebbles grumbled as they stepped out into the much brighter sun of the industrial area.
“Well,” she returned, “there’s two paths to the ray deo thingie you’re talking about. We can either climb to the top of the buildings here, and then climb up to the tall towers and across that bridge that connects to your old home, but that path has lots of lizards and vultures.” Pebbles shook his head firmly.
“No crazy heights,” he glanced at Moon. “Not until we all feel better about our climbing skills. What’s the other path?”
“Well,” Rivulet said, “there’s the big fields of worm grass to the west, but that would require us to walk a lot further, and then we need to hitch a ride on a rain deer.”
“A rain deer?” Moon asked, suddenly perking up. Finally, a creature that didn’t sound like it could instantly maul you.
“Yeah! They’re these big tall things, with huge antlers that wander around the fields looking for mushroom spores to eat. They’re kinda slow though, and very stubborn. I remember watching one sit in one spot for an entire cycle, staring vacantly into the sky until the rain came crashing down. They’re not the brightest things…”
That sounded promising. Finally something on this planet that wouldn’t rip her to shreds for not killing it first, not to mention the idea of riding them certainly seemed like a good bit of fun. Riding Bubbles had been a bit too extreme for Moon’s tastes, the splashing waters and wild speed were hardly enjoyable considering she’d only just escaped from her can.
Thankfully, the industrial area was far better lit than the citadel behind them. The trio crossed ancient catwalks, crawled through old pipes, and walked past enormous eroding machinery. Huge gears, coated in a thick layer of grime and plant life, or conveyor belts that were more akin to a rug of moss and mud.
They stopped for a brief moment at the base of an enormous smokestack, the spire stretching into the clouds high above. Pebbles watched the sky with a wary glare, fingers tight around his spear. Ruffles however, was more focused on the path ahead of them, her wide eyes locked in place.
Moon squinted, trying to see what the slugcat was staring at. For all her advanced sensors and acute crystalline vision, she couldn’t understand why they had come to a halt.
Until a pole leading up towards a broken window suddenly fluttered in the wind, red leaves splaying outwards like a blooming flower. As soon as it had happened, the pole returned to normal, almost so quickly that Moon would have doubted herself for even seeing it if she didn’t have the memory file to reference.
“What was that?” She hissed and leaned in close to Ruffles, as if her voice would somehow disturb the strange mimic creature again.
Not even a twitch.
“Poleplant,” she said, as if it was as normal as a bug skittering across the wall. “Loves to camp in the worst spots, kinda like monster kelp. It's really hard to tell the difference.”
Great, another creature that wanted to eat them.
How original.
“What can we do to get around it? Sneak around?” Ruffles giggled fiendishly.
“Nope! They’re easy once you spot them. Here, you can help!” Without any further explanation, Ruffles grabbed the iterator by the hand, yanking her along with a surprising strength. Each step closer to the plant sent a wave of fear through her neurons, as if the creature would suddenly snap out and attack them.
And yet, they walked right up to it, the plant unresponsive. As if to demonstrate, Ruffles prodded the pole with a quick hand, the leaves opening up yet again, as if confused.
“See?” Ruffles smirked. “They really can’t do much unless you grab them, but every slugpup’s first lesson is how to spot a pole plant. They’re really only annoying if you’re already running from something else.” The tone in her voice was almost casual, as if it was nothing more than an irritating pest.
Was that really the attitude everyone had out here? Treating deadly predators like they were mere annoyances? It was almost baffling to think about, and yet Ruffles continued to poke the plant with a spear, and even Pebbles slowly joined in bothering the strange creature, as if this was all some sort of game.
Wordlessly, Ruffles offered her weapon to Moon, a wry grin on her face. She slowly took it in her hands, the metal weight almost feeling alien.
All her life, she’d been a paragon of the virtues their creators had instilled in them. Pacifism, charity, and compassion, along with many others. She always did her best to fulfill them, even long after her creators had vanished away and left them behind.
And yet, she couldn’t help but prod the poleplant with a spear, quietly giggling in delight as it squirmed in irritation. Even Pebbles seemed amused by the display, a rare look of humor on his face.
At least until she used a bit too much force, and the plant suddenly writhed out and tried to pull itself into the ground with her still clutching the spear stuck in its side. The force behind it was monstrous, almost wrenching her arm as it fled. Moon barely avoided getting yanked into its den with it, falling flat on the muddy ground as the poleplant vanished into the earth.
“Awww,” Ruffles pouted, “I was having fun!” Pebbles wordlessly helped her back to her feet, and the trio stared sadly into the tiny hole the plant had left behind.
“The wildlife out here is truly something special, is it not?” Her brother idly mused, and Moon couldn’t help but agree.
As dangerous as this place was, there was a strange allure to the mystery of it all. The more she saw, the more she wanted to discover, as if around the next corner they would be something even more ridiculous and mystifying.
How much of this was our creator’s planning, and how much is the ruins of their projects running amok?
As if she wasn’t one of them, but that brought a new question to mind.
How exactly were they functioning on their own? Without a connection to their facility, they should have run out of power and water long ago. Their components were mostly bio-mechanical hybrids, but they still needed energy as much as any other living being did.
Perhaps the pearls Pebbles had might hold the answer? She’d need to ask him about it at a later time.
Even if the ensuing discovery might be horrifying. It wasn’t as if her life was running short of disturbing revelations.
I’ll take our creator’s horrors over intelligent rot, at least that’s in the past.
The trio pressed on, the factory complex slowly winding its way to the west. Occasionally, a stray lizard would poke its scaly head from some dark recess, only to run off in terror at the glimpse of them.
Perhaps they were scared of groups? Moon couldn’t fathom why they wouldn’t try to attack, but she wasn’t about to start complaining at the momentary peace. Maybe Ruffles could answer the question, when they weren’t in a rush.
It didn’t take long for them to reach the other side of the complex, the ruined building far easier to navigate than the labyrinthian citadel. They stepped into the next gate, steam once again washing over them.
Pebbles made sure to hold his robes down this time, shooting a rueful look her way.
Darn.
They stepped out into the grungy courtyard of the factory outskirts. At some point, this area had been sequestered away for workers to rest and relax, but once the entire facility had become automated, and working on the surface impossible, it was repurposed into a logistical funnel for raw materials and farm goods. The creators hadn’t even bothered to remove the various stone idols scattered across the open space, instead simply routing pipes over and around.
The apathetic combination resulted in a rather curious region, filled to the brim with industrial machinery intermingled with religious architecture.
Ruffles led them on, further and further west. They crawled through ruined hallways, the equipment along the walls long since deactivated, and slowly climbed along the side of a large tower, their guide insisting that the path ahead required them to scale it. Moon glanced over her shoulder into the sky behind them, catching one final glimpse of Pebble’s old facility before it faded behind the building clouds.
Hopefully Hunter and Artificer had made as good of progress as they had.
There was a faint glimmer of purple back from the way they had come, but when Moon focused her vision, the light was already gone.
A shiver crept down her spine, an ill omen that settled in her gut and refused to budge.
Suddenly, there was a faint buzzing in the distance, as if a bug were hovering around her head but far deeper and larger. It quickly grew closer. Moon turned around in a flash, fear already in her eyes as she imagined the next bizarre predator to wander into her life.
Only to come face to face with a large strange flying bug, its white face more akin to some sort of sea creature. Its wide eyes stared blankly at her, as if not even quite aware of where it was. For a moment, she watched it back, her worry slowly morphing into confusion.
Despite everything, the odd being simply stared and buzzed in place.
And then Ruffles snatched it by the tendrils on its face, its eyes bulging for a moment as it panicked and attempted to fly away.
“Watch this Moon!” she hollered, bending her legs and jumping with all her might. The iterator could only watch as her friend soared up into the sky, the bug carrying her far above. For a moment, she wondered if this would be the last she saw of her tiny companion, already imagining her floating away into the distance with nothing but a giant insect.
Thankfully, Ruffles slowly floated down to the earth again, an enormous toothy grin on her face.
“Did you see how high I went!?” Her enthusiasm was palpable, though Moon found it hard not to worry for her instead. What if she had been hurt?
“What is that creature?” Moon gestured slowly to the still thrashing bug, the flying thing quite unhappy with its passenger.
“Squidcada! They eat leeches and batflies, buzz around all over the place, and you can grab them and fly around! It's a great way to cross wide gaps, though I’ve never had any trouble just jumping!” She thrust out her arms to the iterator, the buzzing bug following in tow. “Go ahead! Try leaping around! We gotta climb this building right?”
Slowly Moon held out her hands, grasping the squirming creature’s slimy face tendrils with a pang of guilt and disgust. Ruffles instantly let go, and the squidcada lurched upwards, nearly pulling the iterator into the sky as it tried to free itself.
For a moment she considered simply letting the poor thing go, but the look in its eyes was less panic, and more akin to a dull boredom, as if she’d somehow insulted the creature by interrupting its routine of flying around aimlessly.
Reminds me of Pebbles.
And so, with a moment of preparation, she bent her knees and leapt into the air.
The result was instant. Instead of immediately falling back down, the bug in her arms seemed to buzz harder, pulling the two of them far into the air. Moon could only watch with wide eyes as the forms of Pebbles and Ruffles slowly grew smaller, panic bubbling in her chest.
Oh Void! I’m going to float away like a sky sail!
For a moment, they hovered in weightlessness as the wind whistled through the air around them. The bug fought and thrashed for all its might, but nothing could stop them from slowly drifting back down to the surface, where her two companions waited.
Fear faded as her feet touched the solid ground yet again, replaced by an almost unfamiliar sensation instead. A foreign lightness, swelling in her neurons and making her antennae wiggle.
The realization of her new emotion dawned on her a moment later.
Wow… Has it really been this long since I had fun?
“See? Not so bad right?” Ruffles bounced from foot to foot.
Maybe there was something to being out here, despite everything else that tried to ruin it.
“No… Not bad at all!” Moon chuckled breathlessly. She jumped upwards again, this time pushing more force into it. Once again she flew up into the air, almost high enough to see over the majority of the industrial area’s buildings. Her chest felt light as she looked downwards, suddenly noticing how high up she truly was.
Yet once again, the bug slowly lowered her down to a gentle landing. Ruffles smiled widely at her, eyes full of pride. Pebbles looked unimpressed.
“Do we really have time to play with everything out here?” He grumbled, threatening to ruin her fragile good mood. “We have a deadline to meet.”
“Oh come on now,” Moon shot back. “You got to have your fun riding the jetfish around. Why can’t I get a moment to myself as well?”
“That was a necessary trip. This… this is just fooling around!”
“Call it whatever you want, Pebbles. I just want a moment of peace.” He stamped the end of his spear into the dirt, agitation clear on his frame.
“We can have peace after the rot is dealt with! We need to keep moving, I’d rather not be around when the entire can detonates and collapses.”
Moon wanted to make a snide comment, perhaps pointing out that she had already lived through one can falling down, and that a second would be no different. Maybe even mention that this was the second iterator he was destroying.
Ruffles, without a dash of subtlety, elbowed him in the stomach, shooting a glare up at him. For a moment, Moon half expected him to bring his spear down on her, like almost any iterator would if a lowly creature dared touch them. They were told they were gods afterall, and who could dare harm a god?
And yet her brother simply stared down at the little creature for a moment, the two sharing a look, before his posture deflated. He sighed and rubbed his face, stomping away towards the poles leading upwards.
“Fine, take your time. I’ll see you on the other side. Don’t get eaten.” He slowly clambered his way upwards, one of the other squidcada buzzing around doing its best to slam him off the wall.
Moon grimaced as it was rewarded for its efforts with a sharp spear to the face.
There’s the reaction I expected…
Ruffles turned to her with a grin, as if the entire argument hadn’t even happened. A glimmer of excitement filled her eyes.
“Race you to the top?”
Oh, so it was a dare then.
“You’re on!”
Moon didn’t wait for her reply, jumping once again as she soared up the side of the building. Jumping from perch to perch, she quickly caught up to Pebbles, giving her irritated brother a teasing wave, and flew even higher. Ruffles stormed past him in a flurry of movement, nearly knocking him off his perch as he floundered for balance.
The structure was tall, but that hardly seemed like an issue any longer. Plantlife sprouted from nearly every surface of the ancient concrete, a blooming array of grass and greenery that stretched upwards towards the sun. For a moment, Moon wondered how the plants themselves could survive the downpours. Did they simply grow as quickly as they could? Did they somehow endure the flooding rains?
Another mystery in the life of this new world. For a moment, she was tempted to stay outside the next time it rained, if only to observe the way life that couldn’t run away survived.
Then she remembered the countless times that she’d already been stuck in the rain, and then the ones she couldn’t even recall.
Nevermind that. I think I’ve had enough wetness in my life.
Higher and higher she climbed, the squidcada making the journey nearly effortless. She crested the roof of the building, but her heart swelled with the urge to go further and push the envelope.
Is this how Pebbles felt? Overwhelmed with the burning desire to stretch the limit to the brink, if only to see a little more of the world?
No wonder he’s had so many close calls, it's not as if he’s known for his prudence.
And yet, Moon could hardly criticize him. The top of the structure was filled with a wild swarm of fluttering batflies, the small creatures aimlessly bumbling around the space as they chased tiny beetles and nibbled on plants. In the center, an antenna stretched further up, its apex almost teasing Moon with an alluring but obviously reckless call.
The view from the roof was nice, but up there? It must have been amazing.
Without waiting for Ruffles to catch up, Moon resumed her climb, striving upwards into the clouds.
This climbing was much more difficult. Unlike previously, where she jumped from block to block, the metal spire was slick to the touch. She snatched her hands out to grab, but the sqiudcada nearly yanked her arms away, forcing her to wrap her pointed legs around the pole upwards. It was far from graceful, and the thrashing of her buzzing bug didn’t exactly make it easy.
Yet she still pushed forwards, already committed to the journey, face filled with determination.
Moon reached the top a moment later, chest heaving from exertion as she tried to balance on the very tip of the spire, squidcada still yanking her around. Hesitantly, she let the beast go free, and its bulging eyes stared at her for a moment before gently meandering away.
And then she was alone, at the peak of her own little mountain, with nothing but the wind and the clouds to accompany her.
From her little perch, Moon could see to the east the sprawling machinery of the industrial complex, the wide courtyards of its outskirts, and the towering spires of the smokestacks that lead up and into the layer of mist above her. She tried to imagine what it might be like to climb that high, up and above the clouds, to bathe in the light of the sun and the stars and see the horizon stretch onwards.
Carefully turning to the west, the buildings slowly spread out until there were nothing but wide empty fields of swaying grass. Even from this far away, she could see the ripple of the wind gently blowing through it, swirling like the waves on the ocean. The clouds above broke up just barely, shafts of sunlight spearing through and bathing the earth in a glimpse of the heavens.
A quiet awe filled her neurons, and for a moment, all she could do was simply watch.
Silos and spires stretched into the clouds, and she could almost place their route through the fields and towards the outer communication relay. Somehow above them, Sig was waiting for the first transmission from his siblings in thousands of cycles, and he didn’t even realize it.
Beyond that, the retaining wall loomed over them, stretching far into the distance to either side.
And beyond that? Moon had no idea. Even before her collapse, iterators had little interest in the outside world. She vaguely recalled that it was wild and overgrown, the endless drizzle turning nearly everything into a slurry of mud. She’d seen photos of half buried temples, crumbling apart brick by brick. Bent and broken rail lines, stretching far above the trees. Wild, wide open spaces, and cramped overgrowth.
They’d need to go through it all to reach Sig.
Well… at least it will be an interesting adventure.
If her little brother and tiny Ruffles could treat the world so casually, despite everything that had tried to kill them, then Moon could too.
Her thoughts were broken up by Ruffle’s faint but frantic voice shouting from below her. Moon closed her eyes, irritation flashing through her. As much as she adored her little slugcat companion, her energy could be a bit overwhelming at times.
Can’t I just enjoy a single moment?
“Moon!” The wind nearly whisked away her words. “Look-... -zard!”
Moon stared pointedly at the horizon, as if ignorance might make the interruption go away.
“Moooooon!!! There’s a-... !”
She pinched her eyes, suddenly tired again. A strange sensation really, she’d never longed for sleep while connected to her can. Perhaps their facilities provided some sort of fatigue mitigating system?
“Moon! Look down!”
She sighed, gritting non-existent teeth, and gave in. Careful to right her balance as she clung to the pole, she peered downwards underneath her. Far below, Ruffles jumped and waved her tiny arms frantically, but that was hardly the only thing to catch her attention.
The toothy maw of a large pink lizard, drooling with a bubbly spittle as it prepared to snap its jaws around her leg.
Moon shrieked at the top of her lungs.
She yanked her foot away, narrowly avoiding the scaly predator’s bite, but instead it clamped down on her gown, yanking hard as it tried to pull her into its mouth.
The flimsy fabric almost instantly tore to shreds, the lizard suddenly hissing in confusion as the clothing wadded up in its face. It sputtered and spat, trying to remove the strange substance from its teeth.
In the back of her mind, in some section of her thinking that was far removed from the terror coursing through her body, she shed a tear for the loss of her simple robe. She’d teased Pebbles for his devotion to his own clothing, and yet here she was, naked once again.
As if to twist the knife deeper, the lizard bellowed and spat out a wad of fabric, the slimy mess nearly hitting her in the face. It pulled itself up the pole, eyes wide as it went for the kill.
So in absence of any weapon, or anywhere to run, Moon did the only thing she could.
Screaming at the top of her lungs while wildly kicking it in the face.
Her pointed foot proved quite effective, jabbing the lizard in the snout and instantly drawing blood as it cut through its tough flesh. It hissed in fury, as if only insulted by the attack. How dare this strange blue thing attack it? It lunged forwards to wrap its teeth around her.
Only to receive another kick, this time the sharp end of her leg stabbing it directly in the eye.
Its reaction was much more pronounced.
The beast roared in pain and anger, tiny legs flailing as it tried to protect itself. Unfortunately for the lizard, those same legs had been keeping it attached to the pole. The second it let go, the scaly creature fell down to the earth like a stone.
She could only watch as it plummeted towards the ground, smacking against poles and platforms all the way down. With a mighty crash, it slammed into the roof of the building, and was still.
Moon stared down in horror, the adrenaline slowly fading from her neurons as the situation settled in her mind. A lizard had tried, and failed, to eat her. She’d kicked it in the face. It’d fallen down.
It was dead now. She’d killed it.
For a long moment, her mind was numb, quietly replaying the events over and over.
The poor creature was just trying to survive…
And yet, so was she, and she hardly felt like dying to feed a random reptile. Pebble’s words echoed in her mind.
It's us or them.
Slowly she climbed downwards, arms still shaking with fear. Ruffles waited for her at the bottom, and not far away, the lizard lay where it fell.
“Good one Moon!” the little water dancer chirped, hugging her lower body. “I was really scared for a moment! You’re so brave!”
Screaming at the top of a radio antennae hardly felt brave.
Moon wanted to respond, but words failed her. Her eyes locked on the lifeless body of the reptile, numbness settling into her. Ruffles followed her eyes, grimacing when she realized what the iterator was staring at. The slugcat squeezed her tighter, nuzzling into her now bare chassis.
“Don’t worry about it, Moon. That lizard was going to eat you. He ruined your robes!”
Right, my robes…
She stared down at her once again unclothed body, suddenly feeling quite exposed. Barely a cycle ago, she’d told Pebbles to leave his own clothing behind, and now that she was without her own, she suddenly understood his hesitation.
She sighed deeply, flicking the remaining scrap of cloth from her shoulder.
“Great…” Moon muttered, trying to distract herself from the other thoughts filling her mind. “It's not as if we can find a clothing store around here. Perhaps Sig will have a spare…” She wasn’t exactly fond of wearing someone else’s clothing, but it was better than wandering around feeling naked. She’d grown rather fond of her tattered gown, even if it had been barely more than a thin scrap of fabric riddled with holes.
Ruffles nearly exploded away from her, jumping on her feet with glee.
“Oh! Oh! We can make you a new one! I know how!” Moon raised a confused brow. She’d never seen a slugcat wearing anything, what did her kind know about crafting clothing?
“How exactly would we do that?” She asked, Ruffles face wide with the glee of someone with the perfect solution for their friend’s problems. “And how do you know how to tailor?”
“Well, my family didn’t like me running off on adventures all the time, so I often got stuck doing chores around the colony camp. Fixing tools, preparing food, and sewing up things like bags, tents, and so on… I got in trouble so much I ended up getting pretty good at it! Though never as good as the master tailor.”
Moon tried to imagine a little camp of slugcats, sleeping in tents all gathered around a fire, while jetfish played with each other off the coast. Ruffles had mentioned tools, and making meals too. What did they eat? Along their short journey, the slugcats had only ever eaten things raw.
Come to think of it, hadn’t she been visited by a slugcat with an affinity for food? The memory was vague, but she distinctly recalled its… rotundness.
Once again, Ruffles had merely mentioned something from her daily life, and Moon was lost in the implications. Of course her people used tools and gathered food. At this point, it’d be more surprising if they didn’t. She had to keep reminding herself that slugcats were no longer simple wild animals.
“Ruffles,” Moon asked, shaking herself from her idle thoughts. “If your colony could make and wear clothing, why don’t you have any?” The slugcat frowned, a cloud passing over her.
“I left my poncho behind when I went exploring, using it to make it look like I was still in bed sleeping. I… never had a chance to get it back, before everyone left…” She huffed, a fierce determination filling her eyes. “It doesn’t matter anymore. I’m here now, and I can’t change that. Adventure is what I wanted, and here I am! Helping you and Pebbles do all your crazy stuff! This is the kind of thing you only hear about in an epic tale!”
Moon didn’t need to be a hyper intelligent computer to understand the implications. Poor Ruffles had been left by her family, and instead of going off to find them, she stuck around to help Moon and her brother.
It certainly felt like they were in some wild adventure, though Moon couldn’t deny she wished that her life would calm down even a little.
I suppose I shouldn’t say that too loud, unless fate feels like making things even worse.
“Well,” Moon said, trying to steer the conversation away from awkward family issues. “What did you make your fabric from? Our creators used to keep entire farms of spiders to make their silks, the very same that now infest the citadel.”
“Monster Kelp leaves, actually! They stick together pretty well, they’re waterproof, and can be easily weaved and sown. The only hard part is actually getting them. Kelp isn’t hard to find, but the second you try to kill it, it zips into the ground! Usually you need a couple people to get the job done, but I bet we could do it ourselves! They’re everywhere. I could easily make us both ponchos with just one!”
Great, of course getting new clothes would require fighting a giant deadly plant, and only after that would they have the privilege of stitching them together.
Nothing out here is ever simple, is it? Hopefully Pebbles is willing to help. He’s certainly got a reason to want revenge.
…
Oh, right. Pebbles.
In the flurry of all her excitement and emotions, she’d completely forgotten about him. She quickly took Ruffles by the paw, steps filled with urgency as she ran to regroup with him. The pair quickly scrambled down the other side of the building, rushing past curious squidcada and buzzing noodleflies.
Thankfully, Pebbles was waiting for them on the side of a small pit, sitting with his legs dangling over the edge. His spear lay at his side, and in his hand he held a small bundle of strange red plants, plucking them apart one by one and tossing them into the hole with a pop.
He glanced back at them as they approached, his bored look quickly shifting to confusion and bewilderment.
“Moon, what the void happened to your clothes?” He quickly rose to his feet, talmost gawking at her new appearance. “Are we really going native, just like that?” She rolled her eyes, tempted to shove him into the hole behind him.
“Lizard.” His eyes widened. “It's dead, don’t worry.” For a moment he stalled, a flash of guilt filling his eyes.
“Well… Everyone has their first, I suppose… Shall we keep moving? I’d like to make it to the base of the transmission array before the rain reaches us. I can already see it gathering near the base of my-… the facility.”
“Right, it's always something, isn’t it.” He gave a short humorless chuckle.
“Always.”
They marched onwards through the open yards, industrial equipment slowly falling behind them, until nothing but open space surrounded them. Ahead, the facility district walls loomed, and Moon wondered why their creators had seen it fit to separate the regions with the impenetrable doorways. An attempt at keeping less desirable creatures in certain areas, perhaps? She had no memory to even guess with.
It wasn’t as if her and Pebbles couldn’t just override them anyway.
Once again, they stepped through the gates, the steaming air and churning gears cycling ceaselessly.
I wonder if anyone has ever gotten trapped in one of these?
Thankfully, she didn’t have to stick around to find out. The other lock slowly opened, spitting them out into a wide corridor. Light played at the far end, the doors long since jammed open. They stepped out, entering the vast wide open farm arrays.
Now closer, she could see the breaks in the clouds where the sunlight shone through, though the blue sky refused to reveal itself. The farm arrays were a combination of endless rolling fields of grassy hills, and huge sprawling amalgamations of processing equipment. At some point, plants grown here would provide food for the citizens atop their facilities, though the worm grass had clearly overgrown many of the areas.
For a brief moment, she saw a flash of movement through a gap between the landscape, some enormous dark creature slowly walking past.
“Rain deer!” Ruffles eagerly shouted, pointing out with a webbed paw. “Did you see it? We’re lucky they haven’t returned to their homes before the rain yet. I’ll go get some spores to lure them over here, and we can ride it to the tower thingie!”
Without waiting for her companions to even respond, the little slugcat ran off and promptly dove into a hole in the ground, her tail the last thing they saw of her.
“She has quite the habit for running off,” Moon muttered, and Pebbles merely grunted in vague agreement. The siblings idled awkwardly for a moment, Pebbles once again tossing his spear to the ground and returning to sitting. Moon watched him for a moment as he glared into the dirt.
The grass gently swayed in the distance, a faint chill breeze drifting through, and Moon found herself getting lost in idle as she watched.
“Sorry about your robes…” Pebbles suddenly muttered, regret in his voice. Moon could only raise a confused brow.
“There’s no need to apologize, unless you somehow recruited that lizard to do the deed. If that’s the case, I’m sorry to say you’ll need to find a new partner in crime.” He huffed, shaking his head.
“No, despite my repeated encounters with them, I’ve yet to come up with a way to speak lizard, and I don’t think I’m very interested in trying. They probably only have one word anyway, ‘hungry.’ Not the brightest things, though that doesn’t stop them from infesting every nook and cranny around here.” He kicked a rock away in frustration, Moon pausing for a moment as he bristled and fumed.
“Pebbles…” She murmured, trying to be gentle. “Do you want to tell me what's made you upset? I am always willing to listen…”
“I should have been there,” he muttered, looking at her with soft sad eyes. “To protect you from the lizard. I wasn’t there to help…” Moon held back the urge to laugh, caught off guard by his response.
“Pebbles, please. I’m fine, and the only thing that’s suffered is my decency. That’s hardly the biggest price to pay, now is it? I can handle myself.”
The words shocked her as soon as she’d said them, and yet, she couldn’t deny their truth. Up until that point, she’d relied on others for guidance and help. She’d taken a risk climbing up so high, and nearly been killed for her foolishness.
But I wasn’t…
Confidence and courage in this strange new world, despite everything it threw at them, was an unfamiliar emotion.
“I guess…” Pebbles mumbled, and Moon could tell that there was more to talk about than just ruined clothes. Yet she didn’t press, simply letting the silence carry on.
For a long minute, only the breeze dared speak, as it whispered through the swishing vegetation.
“I honestly don’t even know where to start,” he spat, flipping up his mask and wearily rubbing his eyes. “It just feels like a monsoon of challenges, one after the other. A few cycles ago I was simply sitting in my chambers, counting the cycles away. Now I’m here, probably the first person to walk through these parts in ages. Not only that, probably the first iterator to ever walk outside! The rot I made views me as some sort of parent to it, and wants to eat me in a totally ‘friendly’ way, and I’ve sent my best friend and one of Sig’s pets off to blow it up!”
Moon watched with wide eyes, the sudden rant catching her off guard.
“And that’s not even all of it!” Pebbles continued on, now shouting. “Every other cycle I learn our creators basically tortured us, or some other awful thing. If I’m not learning some terrible secret about the old world, I learn some bizarre thing about the new world. For void’s sake, the fucking slugcats are developing the next civilization. Slugcats! They’re made to clean pipes! Now three of them follow us around babbling about their colonies and customs!”
He slumped backwards, burying his face in his hands. His voice was weak, body shivering.
“There’s just so much… I don’t understand when life got so busy. I had this idea in my head. I’d come help you, and we’d tell everyone else. That’s all I planned for. Not… this.” He gestured around them.
“Well,” Moon spoke slowly, carefully forming her words. “We don’t often get to choose how life unfolds. All we can do is work with what’s given to us. It's not as if we can do much else… Would you go back if you could?” He scoffed, shaking his head defiantly.
“Never. Not even if my can was still working! Not even if our creators were still here. It's… unpleasant at times out here, but if that is the price of freedom, then I will gladly pay it. What about yourself? Given the same choice, would you?”
Her reply was far slower than his.
For a moment she thought back, grasping at what little memories of the old days she still had.
All that remained was the sporadic scraps of time spent with her family, and even they were distant and faded. Perhaps if her facility had been restored, she could contact them once again, and rebuild what was lost.
I don’t need my can to do that though…
“I… don’t think I would. There’s something about this place, despite everything it's thrown our way. I won’t lie, I have been more terrified in the last two cycles than in almost my entire life, but there’s a light shining through the clouds. Just takes some getting used to, as you said.”
“It’s a silly concept to consider anyway. We are stuck out here, and returning is impossible. Might as well make the best of our current situation.”
She laughed, throwing an arm around his shoulder.
“And I can think of no one better to be stuck with!” He groaned and tried in vain to shove her away, but Moon could not be held back. Nothing could stop her from teasing her brother now.
An unexpected, but not unwelcome benefit of being freed!
The distant cry of some creature, an echoing combination of wail and roar, echoed through the distance, instantly dissolving her jovial attitude. Pebbles quickly took up his spear, watching the horizon with an alert glare. Her mind tried to imagine what terrible beast could have made such a haunting noise.
Suddenly, rising up over the hills, Ruffles appeared. She had a wild grin, gripping onto the antlers of what Moon could only describe as a walking ball of droopy fur. The creature’s long spindly legs easily crossed through the fields of hungry wormgrass, even as the plants stretched out to try and latch on. Slowly it meandered towards them, Ruffles somehow managing to steer its direction by shaking its head.
So this must be a rain deer.
The huge creature stepped close to them, looming above on its thin limbs, and slowly lowered itself down to the earth. Now head level, its broad, golden eyes watched them with a quiet curiosity.
“Hop on!” Ruffles chirped, patting a spot next to her. “Quickly! Before she decides to stand up!”
Pebbles did not look convinced, watching the beast suspiciously, the grip on his spear tight. He’d spent far too long getting attacked by nearly every living creature to trust anything in this land.
Moon held no such reservations.
“It’s so gorgeous!” she laughed, stepping towards the rain deer. Its saffron eyes watched her with silent interest, and some part of her felt compelled to reach out and brush a hand across its soft face. The beast huffed, nostrils flaring as it sniffed her hand curiously.
For a moment, Moon worried it would somehow assume her hand was food and bite her, but after a few careful sniffs, its eyes widened and it huffed, suddenly looking much more alert.
Had she done something without realizing?
“Hurry!” Ruffles frantically shouted, swaying in the reindeer’s large antlers. “It's going to stand!” Quickly the iterators scrambled onto the creature, crawling their way to grip its antlers, despite its slick dense fur.
The ground vanished as they rose.
Just like her ride with the squidcada, Moon could only cling on for dear life. The large quadruped gently stalked across the grass, blissfully unconcerned with what would easily impede any other unlucky critter. Its long limbs carefully stepped from point to point, and the creature almost seemed sleepy in its movements. The clouds built overhead, even as the light faded far to the west in a muted twilight.
Moon took a minute to sigh, suddenly finding a rare peace. The three of them clung to the creature’s antlers, quietly enjoying a moment where distance ticked away under the weight of someone else’s feet.
“See! This is traveling!” Ruffles shouted, shifting from one side to the other as she tried to steer with her weight. “Why work hard when you can get someone else to do it for you?”
“You’d make a perfect citizen…,” Pebbles quietly grumbled, his eyes mirroring the stormy eastern skies.
“Will we reach the transmission array before the rain comes?” Moon asked, looking to the graying skies with growing uncertainty. For all the rain deer had in long legs, its pace was actually quite slow, as if it was carefully calculating every step it took.
“Don’t worry Moon! This is a hundred times faster than trying to work our way through the fields. We’d be stuck crawling through slimy tunnels full of centipedes!” Moon tried to compare their current method of transportation to squirming around in fetid pipes filled with electric insects.
A shudder ran through her chassis.
The rain deer was much better.
I hate bugs. I can stand lizards and deadly plants, but no more bugs.
The tower loomed above them, stalwart metal stretched into the sky. How much of this place would last? How long until the ancient techniques to ensure structural stability finally gave way, and nature reclaimed its place? How soon until all traces of their kind were washed away, nothing but ruins buried under dust and ash?
The rain deer lurched as it came to a halt at the base, its large eyes watching them as it slowly lowered back down.
Moon found it difficult to deny the disappointment in her neurons. The ride had been far too short, and despite the rumbling above them, she almost wanted to stay.
A stray raindrop hit her cheek, instantly whisking away the idea. They scrambled down the rain deer’s fur, taking off instantly towards the ground facility around the radio tower. Rain struck down around them, each drop driving deep into the muddy ground. They all but dove into the doorways, Pebbles quickly starting the cycling sequence to let them inside.
Moon gave one final look behind her, watching the slowly fading form of the rain deer as it calmly marched into the downpour. She could only weakly hope that somehow it could endure the rains.
Water gushed into the doors, pooling around them faster than the drains could empty.
“Shit!” Pebbles sputtered, desperately trying to urge the gates to open. The hologram flashed in angry red lettering, insisting that decontamination wasn’t finished. “I don’t think I can get it to open any sooner!”
“Can’t we all breathe underwater?” Ruffles puzzled, ears drooped in confusion. The iterator looked at her with wide frantic eyes.
“It’s not that I’m trying to avoid!”
It quickly surged past their ankles, rising higher and higher. Pebbles cursed under his breath, trying to lift his robes above the waterline. All too in vain, as it quickly reached the ceiling and forced them to swim in the churning currents.
Just like old times.
Finally, the gates split open, but the rain was unrelenting. The room beyond was a murky flood of swirling flotsam, and with a quick flick of her tail, Ruffles led them onward. The water dancer guided them through twisting corridors and flooded hallways, and into the beckoning lights of a shelter.
Somehow, it was dry inside, though that quickly changed as soon as the three squirmed their way in. The locks churned behind them, sealing the party away.
“Wow!” Ruffles beamed, looking a bit lost for breath. “I honestly had no idea where we were going for most of that. Lucky we found this!”
“I’ve changed my mind,” Pebbles spat, squeezing the water out of his clothing once again. “I no longer care about freedom or whatever. I just want the iterators to stop making it rain all the damn time. Void…”
Moon couldn’t help but quietly agree.
The trio quickly settled in, preparing for the long length of downtime now at their disposal. Ruffles flopped onto her back, content to sleep spread out across the floor like a dying fish. Pebbles scooted into a corner, tossing his bag and mask to his side as he tried to make himself comfortable.
His bag…
A number of questions had popped up in Moon’s mind, and she couldn’t help but feel her curiosity once again urging her forwards.
“Pebbles,” she asked quietly, “I’m interested. Would you be willing to read one of those pearls with me? Specifically the ones involving our puppet body schematics?” He chuckled darkly, flipping open the leather straps and rooting around for a glimmering green pearl. Just as he’d said, the quality was nothing short of pristine.
Whoever recorded these wanted them to last…
“Just be warned,” he cautioned, “every time I read one of these accursed things, I discover something about ourselves I wish I’d never learned. Are you ready?”
She took a deep breath, preparing herself mentally.
“Go for it.”
The shelter was bathed in light.
Vigilance was tired.
‘Where am I?’
Countless cycles spent testing, troubleshooting, tampering.
‘What do you mean, this is my life?’
The screams of the departed, the pleading in their voices.
‘Please, stop this! Let me out! Let me go!’
Trying to convince them of their new eternal fate.
‘No! Stop! I just want to go home!’
He rose from his cot with a frustrated sigh, hands buried in his face.
How can I sleep, when the dead are wailing in my head?
Perhaps a walk would clear his thoughts.
He quickly threw on his robes, stepping into the cool night air. The green stars twinkled above the monk as he stepped through the collection of short squat buildings scattered around the roof of the iterator facility. The air was thick with humidity, the collection of iterators around them spewing steam into the sky as they worked.
He slowly walked out of the camp, idly wandering to the edge of the enormous computer. The building dust swirled in his footsteps, billowing out behind in small gray clouds.
Even in the dark, the view was still stunning. A sea of clouds spread out around them, the ground below long since hidden under the thick misty blanket. The moon hovered above the mountain peaks, shining a dim, dreary light on the miserable ancient.
How many times had he made this walk? It felt like every night, far beyond when anyone else had gone to rest, he’d make his way to this lonesome ledge and watch the moon slowly rise and fall in the distance. The freezing wind tore through his night robes, driving a chill deep into his bones.
He continued to stare, watching the distant celestial object slowly arc across the sky.
Not for the first time, Vigilance was tempted to simply close his eyes and tip forwards, and let gravity do the rest. The fall would be enough time to mutter a final prayer, and beg for forgiveness he knew he didn’t deserve.
Not while I still have a duty to fulfill. I’m the only one who can fix this.
There was a faint hope at the end of all of this, and he would see it through.
The people he’d forced into this were trapped forever, why shouldn’t he be too? It wasn’t as if Chimes or Meadows were about to do anything of their own will.
With a sigh he turned on his heels, slowly marching back. At the very least, he wasn’t alone.
Meadows was never difficult to find. If she wasn’t in the iterator chambers, she was locked away in her own workshop working tirelessly on the puppet body project. Every test Vigilance performed, she dove into solving issues with an almost enviable zeal, reminding the monk of young initiates who mistook fervor for faith.
He didn’t bother knocking anymore, barging into her small workshop at the edge of the camp. The technician was hunched over the table in the center of the room, sparks flying as she worked.
Moonlight bled through the windows, the only illumination save for the single bulb dangling over her.
“Good, you’re here. I was wondering when you’d show up.” She didn’t bother looking up from her work, a habit he’d grown familiar with. “Check this out, latest development from the biological division, with all the changes we recommended fully implemented. I’m just finishing up hooking up the neural circuit connections.”
The puppet body lay limp over the table, its thin frame almost eerily akin to a child’s body. The front panel on its chest had been peeled off, exposing a dizzying array of internal organs and bio-mechanical tissues.
Vigilance had no idea what he was looking at. He’d only ever had the chance to report issues, not participate in finding the solutions.
Kept in the dark, nothing new there.
“What exactly is all of… this?” He gestured to the spread of components, Meadows setting aside her tools. “Nobody has told me anything but your notes.” She laughed, the smirk evident in her voice.
“Of course not silly, you’re not exactly an expert in any of this. Hardware is my division, and there’s no way I could explain everything to you in a single night. There’s hundreds of individual processes and organisms involved in this thing, it’s probably the most complicated creature I’ve ever assembled.”
“Well, can you at least give me a quick rundown? Did they manage to implement my… suggestions?”
“That and more! The biological team really outdid themselves. I don’t even know where to start, honestly. The neural tissue is the main controlling force, but aside from the large cluster in the head where it connects to the wiring harness, the rest is actually a collection of individual organisms, all working in tandem for the whole!”
“How… delightful. What happened to all the electronic components? I thought we were mostly using mechanical parts?” She huffed, jabbing a finger at his chest.
“We were , until you insisted on long term independent redundancy. There’s not a technician in the world that can keep these kinds of complex components running indefinitely using mechanics. The iterator facilities themselves are large enough to house the necessary electronic redundancies and reconstruction modules, but on this small of a scale we needed organic parts. Purposed organisms can be created far more sturdy when maintained by proper small scale organisms. You should have seen Chime’s reaction to the cost. It wasn’t easy to get them to sign that off, you know.”
“Right, right!” he held his hands up defensively. “I thought we had a blank check to get this done…”
“Yeah, me too! I guess there’s a limit to everything. They ask us to make a god, but make sure to keep it under budget! Ridiculous.”
Vigilance leaned over the open chest of the puppet, peering into the strange twitching organs and sprawling sinew. Strings of strange purple bulbs connected to twisting green veins. It felt as if he’d been tasked with understanding the inner workings of an alien from the stars. For a moment, all he could do was stare, feeling completely lost as his eyes scanned the creature before him.
His mind was full of questions, but only one way of asking felt appropriate.
“What the fuck am I even looking at?”
Meadows laughed at his expense, pulling up a holographic display overlaying the creation.
“I’ll spare you the details and tell you what the team came up with.” She cleared her throat, preparing to read from a scrolling text screen. “The latest version of the iterator puppet body replaces electronic components with specialized organic organisms, developed by the team at- oh so that’s what he’s doing now… Anyway! The metal shell has been repurposed into a hardened fungal skin, using the same highly modified biological energy system found in long range rail lines!” She looked up from her presentation, meeting his clueless eyes.
“Fungus?” He sputtered incredulously. “This thing runs off of fungus? I would have thought something like a fusion cell, or even some madness with void fluid, but fungus? Is that why it's blue?”
“It's a well established method of getting a large amount of energy for low intensity long term use. It’s normally used on train cars going off the energy grid, but the biological team was able to repurpose them on a smaller scale while still providing enough energy for the puppet body. All this neural tissue is quite hungry, you know. Void fluid and nuclear both produce plenty of power, but not in any way organics can use without an enormous energy transfusion array. And the color was my choice.”
“So how does having fungus for skin somehow power the puppet?”
“Well, the top layer is a hardened cap, almost as strong as most modern alloys, but underneath is a rich layer of fibrous tissue that controls growth, transmits signals, and filters nutrients from water that is absorbed via glands along the surface. Beneath all that, the fungal colony and other organs are maintained by small mite sized bugs, barely visible to the naked eye. The bugs are actually controlled by the fungus itself via spores growing on their tiny brains, and used to spread the tissue where needed. Otherwise they would just eat and destroy everything. When they start to get too old to fulfill their role, the fungus goes into overdrive, using their body for nutrients to grow in areas that need stabilizing. All of this happens thousands of times a day, on a scale smaller than an ant hive!”
“That’s… bizarre, to say the least. Won’t they notice these insects crawling under their flesh?”
“Do you notice the burning of energy in your cells, or your blood taking oxygen from your lungs? It's a similar concept, the report says that the main issue was sizing down the drone colony from something that normally occupies an entire train car to something that can fit in the space of a thick book. That’s the little orange organ you see in the bottom of the cavity, the tubes running off of it are the main channels for the drones to spread through the body via the skeletal system. The fungus connects all the parts together, mechanical and biological.”
Vigilance could only stare for a moment, trying to imagine a horde of tiny little spiders crawling through his bones, orchestrated by a sprawling mass of fungus.
Of all the things in this project, that’s certainly one of the more disturbing ones.
“What are the rest of the parts for?,” he asked, shaking his disgust away.
“Waste processing, oxygen storage and delivery, muscular fluid exchange, standard organic components, along with all the mechanical bits needed to interface with the structure. Most of this is just stuff used in other organisms, though top of the line quality, I assure you. The main issue was just powering, or rather feeding it on such a small scale. We thought about adding a mouth and digestive system, but that just complicated things. The fungus was a much better use of limited space, and the connection to the neural tissue actually allows for a sensation of touch and temperature!”
“Stupendous, now we’ll need to make sure the chambers are pleasantly cooled…”
“Hey, you’re the one that asked for this.” Meadows chirped, grabbing her tool and returning to her work. Vigilance took one final look at the internals of the creation, before she slammed down the front chassis and began sealing it with white-hot medglue. “You know how hard it was convincing that prick that we needed to make a backup internal power supply? Especially since there’s already a perfectly functional energy delivery rail connected to the puppet downstairs?”
“What did you end up saying to convince them?”
“Just that if they lost power for any reason, the puppet neural tissue would shrivel up and die, becoming completely worthless, sending us back to step one. With these systems, once the main power is disconnected they have a short period of confusion before the backup systems activate. They’re conscious through the entire procedure, so long as their antennae are connected with enough neuron flies to maintain the neural array. The only downside we’ve been able to identify, besides the cost, is that now they need to sleep.”
“Sleep?” He scoffed. “Wasn’t the entire goal of this project to build an organism that could run the iterator facility ceaselessly?” She shook her head.
“They only need to sleep every few thousand cycles while on main power, mostly for routine internal maintenance. Once disconnected though, they’ll need rest around once every other cycle to recover and stabilize. Perfectly tolerable.” She set aside her applicator, testing the puppet’s eyes with a light.
If every organ on this creature was a separate entity, did the eyes even belong to it? Did its stomach have a mind of its own?
A collection of bits and pieces shoved into a carapace made of fungus. Eugh…
And yet, it was the same design as the iterator they stood atop. Thousands of tiny creatures all working together.
“You still haven’t told me what this is all for, by the way.” Once again, she hadn’t bothered to look at him, using a small pair of tweezers to minutely adjust the antennae.
He was quiet for a long moment, watching her diligent work.
There was no denying what he’d done.
Even if he succeeded here, Vigilance knew deep inside that his fate was sealed. He couldn’t hide away what they’d discovered, doomed to see this through to the end. If he could somehow work the problem from inside the program, perhaps once this had all passed they could cut the puppet’s strings and allow them their deserved freedom.
Until that day, however long it took, he would remain.
“That wasn’t our deal,” he muttered coldly, returning to the conversation. “I haven’t forgotten about your payment, don’t worry.” He reached into his robe, fishing out a rich red pearl and tossing it on her desk. Meadows snatched it up eagerly, her tool clattering to the floor.
“It’s all here, right?” She said, the holes in her mask watching him warily. “No tricks? If you’re hiding something, it won’t be hard for me to tell Chimes about how we can make these puppets for much cheaper.”
“Cut the shit, I’m not the same as that bastard. The genome for the Miros organism, just like you asked… May I ask what your intentions with it are? It wasn’t easy to acquire.” She stared into the pearl, eyes hungry with delight even under her mask. He didn’t feel the need to mention that his position had easily allowed him into the citadel’s most secret archives.
“I’ve got a personal project I’ve been working on, an adaptation to the traditional vulture. This is exactly what I need to top it off!”
Great, another despicable creature running amok from my actions. Just what the world needed.
He turned to leave, fatigue catching up to him, even if he knew sleep would not come.
“Wait,” Meadows said, catching him with his foot halfway out the door. “I thought you should know, but this will be the final design. They’re taking the one you’ve been working on downstairs, the stable version that you've reported, and shipping it north with this body. There’s a new facility along the coast, and even has permanent residence for quite a few people. I think they’re planning on building enough of these that the surface won’t be an option anymore.”
Right, stable version…
Sobbing and pleading, echoing through the walls. How could he call that stable?
It didn’t go insane.
“Why are you telling me this?”
“Well, the committee in charge seems to think that I’m the one responsible for all this, but honestly, most of my work has just been repurposing old technology. You’re the one who’s been down there doing the actual troubleshooting, not to mention actually convincing these computers to accept their roles, I figured you could have the honors.”
He raised a brow, almost afraid to ask.
“Honors of what?” he slowly asked.
“They want a name for it. Something for the citizens to address it by. I personally think it's silly, but you know people, they love naming their machines.”
Ah…
He stared at her for a long moment, looking down at the newly made body laying on the table, soon to hold the same tortured soul he’d spent ages in the machine trying to coax into accepting her new role. Even now as Meadows and him spoke, she was down in the white tile chambers of the facility, waiting for her tormentors to return.
A thin shaft of moonlight shone through the window, faintly veiling the robot’s dark, black eyes. The cold breeze from outside blew through his robes.
“I believe I have an idea…”
Notes:
Huzzah! A feel good chapter for once!
Well, aside from the ending there, it might have spoiled Moon's day to learn she's full of bugs. And mushrooms. And also the first iterator... But rain deer! Yay?!
In all seriousness, this chapter was a lot of fun to write. Between giving Moon something to feel good about and defining her role more, and then the iterator biology, it was quite a lot of new ground to tread! What did you all think of my interpretation? I always like to imagine that the ancients did some weird wild stuff when making creatures.
Chapter 11
Summary:
Its hard to move on from your past when it feels like it's following your every move.
Chapter Text
“Quit picking at those,” Artificer growled over her shoulder as they walked. “We don’t have time to stop and tend to your fussiness.”
Hunter watched her for a moment, claw still reaching over his shoulder to scratch at his itching back. The stitches had started to irritate the skin, and he wanted nothing more than to pluck them out one by one, and rid himself of the reminder of what had haunted him. With a muted growl, he begrudgingly returned his paw to his side, Artificer tossing a smirk of self satisfaction back his way.
Smug bitch.
The pair continued onwards, weaving a path through an array of strange cages and fallen rubble from the iterator above. Their pace was hurried, but still alert. Ears keened for any sound out of place, watching with sharp eyes for the hint of an opponent.
His thoughts drifted to their mission, the weight of the cell in his bag a constant reminder of their goal. What would the interior of the can be like? He could only remember his creator’s, the gleaming silver walls, endless streams of neuron flies, and buzzing electrical conduits. Somehow he doubted that the facility looming above them would be in similar condition.
The fact that it was controlled by a living cancerous tumor didn’t inspire much confidence either.
Still, he’d faced many challenges in his journey. The road from his creator to these lands had been far from calm. What was one more inhospitable environment? At the very least, the explosive spears Artificer could cough up would give them a good advantage.
Just another problem to be solved. A task to finish. A mission to complete.
And then what?
Follow the iterators, as he’d planned. Their journey would lead them to his creator, and from there he would be given a new purpose. A new goal. It was what he was made for, after all. Why complicate it?
Simple as that. Right?
The thought did little to calm his anxious mind.
“This place is eerily quiet,” Artificer hissed, eye scanning the landscape. “It's not exactly a busy place, but last time I was here there were flocks of Miros birds running everywhere. Now… Nothing. I wonder if the Rot has anything to do with that?”
Right, Miros birds. He’d learned briefly of their existence when he’d traveled through underground regions of his journey. Not the most pleasant foe to deal with.
“I can’t say I exactly miss those creatures,” he muttered distastefully. “They don’t go down easily. Not to mention they tend to travel in groups. I’ve got quite the scar from nearly getting my tail cut off from one of them.” Artificer looked over her shoulder, a sudden curious gleam in her eye.
“Oh? Do tell, sounds interesting.” He hummed thoughtfully, trying to recall the events.
“Right… When I first set off, my creator guided me through the underground railways that connected directly to this region. They were built far back to deliver supplies, but had been out of use for quite some time. What my creator failed to account for was their immense disrepair, along with hordes of creatures moving into the area. Miros birds being one of them. I was barely a few cycles old, with no idea what anything around me was, when I suddenly heard the sound of clanging metal and snipping jaws. Didn’t need much more warning than that to realize the danger.”
He stalled for a moment, voice fading as his mind suddenly surfaced with memories. Darkness around him as he ran for his life. The thunder of hungry steps growing closer and closer. Fear and terror pumping through his veins. Would his mission end so soon?
Hunter almost didn’t realize he’d come to a stop, Artificer herself standing and waiting with a quiet patient look. He shook his head, pushing the vivid recollections to the back of his mind where they belonged.
“Right, sorry…” he grumbled, embarrassment clear in his tone. To her credit, she avoided spewing some smart sarcastic remark.
She probably has her fair share of memories…
“Anyway…” They continued their march. “I ran as hard as I could, but they were fast. Faster than anything I’ve fought before. Up until then, I’d battled with nothing but dumb lizards and irritating centipedes. Easily dealt with by way of a sharp spear. Miros birds were an entirely different matter. In an instant they were on me, biting and nipping with a wild ferocity. I barely just dodged out of the way, scrambling into a lucky hole in the floor, but not without one of them taking a nibble from my tail.” He pointed to the long stretch of pale skin along his rear, the injury nearly connecting down at the bottom. “Took ages to heal, I was worried it’d fall off at some point.”
“Damn!” Artificer leaned in to stare at the old wound, but looked up at him with a wide grin. “At this point Hunter, what creature hasn’t given you some scar?”
“Well, I would have said slugcat, but the fresh ones on my back ruin that claim. Maybe there’s something out there that we haven’t seen yet, and it can ruin my pelt in its own unique horrible way.” She snorted amusingly.
“Sorry for ruining your streak. At least it gives you an awesome story, yeah?”
“That’s your take away? That I earned some battle tale? Not that I nearly died and was horribly maimed?” She nodded eagerly, and despite himself, he couldn’t help but crack a small smile at her unwavering bluntness.
It was just so… her.
“Where I’m from, scars are stories you’ve earned. A slugcat covered in scars is a tough son of a bitch, who’s cheated death and earned every cycle with tooth and claw. You got plenty of marks, that’s for sure, but some of the old geezers had more scars than bare skin. The best part about feast nights was when they’d get drunk on mushroom wine and ramble about their tales.” She sighed wistfully, looking distant as her one eye gazed into the past.
“Mushroom wine?” he asked, sickened by the thought, but still slightly curious. He’d only tried eating the little things once, and the resulting tremors and sweats had quickly made the idea unappealing. “Aren’t those poisonous?”
“Well, maybe if you ate them raw,” she scoffed, the two continuing to walk. “If you shove them in a jar with some sugar and wheel flowers, then let it ferment, it makes this super strong hooch that really numbs the senses. We used to sit around the fire, passing a bottle and taking sips as we traded stories. Some people claimed it gave them visions of other worlds, while others saw departed loved ones in the corner of their eyes. Quite the experience!”
“Did you ever see anything?”
She was quiet for a long period, expression hidden as she walked in front. For a moment, Hunter thought she simply wasn’t going to answer. Another part of her past hidden away.
“Only once. I saw…” her voice was quiet and tense, even in the silent air around them. “I was running through a cave, somewhere deep and ancient. It was almost as if I was in someone else’s body, the way I kept running. I think there was something chasing me, or maybe I was in a hurry. Maybe it was the booze, but it felt like everything was melting, like I was running through mud. There was this incredible sensation of… trespassing, as if I was somewhere I knew very well I shouldn’t have been.”
Hunter waited for her to continue, so quiet in focus that even his footsteps felt like an interruption.
“I reached this… pond, and dove into it. Started swimming downward, and just kept going. It got stranger after that. A blur of images, almost like a dream. Twisting lights in the darkness. An enormous creature hovering over me, feeling like I was being seared by its eyes. Swimming further and further down, until I saw two shapes… I woke up in the medical tent, and the doctor said I had spent the entire night sweating and cursing. They said it took three people to carry me there, because I kept trying to fight everyone who touched me... A good night I’d say!” Her jovial words didn’t reflect into her tone.
“What do you think it meant?” he asked, and she shrugged.
“I was doped up on fermented sugar and mushrooms. Who knows? Probably nothing.”
Her voice didn’t sound confident.
He nearly bumped into Artificer’s back when she came to a sudden halt, awkwardly trying to avoid stepping on her explosive tail.
“What the-,” he stammered, but his voice was instantly cut off as she shoved a paw into his face with a hissing shush. He peered around her, trying to see what had suddenly stopped her.
Glowing red and blue lights filtered through the oppressive darkness, and as they took cautious steps forward, the shape of one of the iterator’s strange rusted protrusions emerged from the darkness. Hunter recognized it as one of the strange spheres that jutted off the side of the facility, except this one had come tumbling down to the earth at some point, spilling chunks of rot and debris into the surrounding landscape. The blue cysts idly gurgled, oozing dark black goo.
Hunter sneered in disgust, but a quick examination of the scene revealed no mobile rot, so with a quiet tap on Artificer’s shoulder, the two continued onward, making sure to give the broken structure a wide berth.
They were halfway around when the snipping started.
Hunter instantly came to a stop, spear at the ready as he watched the structure for the source. What were Miros birds doing in a rot infested heap of iterator scrap?
And why did they sound so… strange?
Curiosity burned strongly, overwhelming his sense of danger. Perhaps it was the recent revelations with the rot, or his personal interest in its destruction, but Hunter found his feet slowly inching towards the rubble.
“Hunter!” Artificer growled, “What the fuck are you doing?” He ignored her, moving closer and closer with every step. His companion cussed a string of local slang, and hesitantly followed behind him. Avoiding patches of bubbling rot, the two slowly crept inside, the ghostly hissing increasing. The source of the noise seemed to bounce off the interior walls, as if they were in a cacophonous labyrinth.
Artificer’s spear clattered to the ground with a shocked gasp, and with a wide eye she pointed up to the ceiling.
There, dangling from chunks of rot, five Miros birds stuck to the roof. The tentacles wrapped around them, weaving under their skin and feathers, poking through eyes and mouths. Two of the beasts had been fused together at the neck, their heads idly biting and snapping at each other, even as rot squirmed through their connected throats. The cysts wetly rattled, and the only bird with a fully intact head croaked along with it.
Void…
His stomach lurched as one of the monsters tried to growl and snap its beak, only to be cut off by the rot suddenly bursting from its mouth in writhing tendrils. That had been growing under his skin. In his body! Controlling him!
He backed away in horror, scrambling outside with Artificer on his heels. She tripped over a chunk of brick, heaving and cursing in disgust.
“I don’t… What the…” she stammered, fur bristling. “Just what in the stars was that?” She wrapped her arms around herself, trying to calm the tremors going through her body. It was strange to see the normally cocky and confident slugcat so shaken, but Hunter couldn’t deny his own shock.
His legs shook, fists clenching so hard that he felt his claws digging into his palms.
That was inside me…
“When Pebbles said the rot was trying to absorb everything,” Hunter huffed, voice shaky. “I didn’t realize he meant… in this way. No wonder he was so… adamant.” Artificer laughed humorlessly, shaking her head wearily.
“That fucking dick, I wish he’d told us a bit more. Stars… Those poor creatures! I’ve never cared much for those things, but to be controlled by the rot… Infested… I just… Fuck…”
For a moment they were silent, the landscape silent aside for the occasional distant rumble of lightning.
At least until the echoed gurgling noises resumed.
“Come on,” he snapped angrily, stomach churning again. “Let’s get moving, and away from this terrible place.” Artificer nodded, face filled with dread as they quickly returned to their quest.
Suddenly the goal didn’t seem so easy anymore.
If the rot had reached this far, twisting creatures into these horrid abominations, what did that say for the interior of Pebble’s facility? What horror awaited them there? The cell in his pack suddenly felt much heavier, a stone hanging on his shoulders. He turned his eyes upward, looking up at the massive metal god that they would need to navigate. He’d never even explored his own creator’s body, simply going from his birth chamber to the outside after getting his instructions. How would they even know where to go?
Thinking back to it, his creator hadn’t actually given him much to go on, just a short description of his objective and a teasing farewell.
At least Pebbles and Moon had looked like they cared…
The two pressed on, the leg in the distance slowly growing closer.
“I kind of wish we brought the little one,” he mumbled as they continued onwards. “Didn’t she say she’d been here before?”
“She was the one to find the cell in the first place,” Artificer returned as they climbed over a fallen beam of bent and broken metal. “But as far as bringing her along, do you really think a pup like her should be forced to see this shit?” Hunter raised a brow.
“Pup? She seemed… excitable, but I didn’t think she was a child. Just short.” Artificer snorted, looking back with an incredulous expression.
“Pfff, right. Tiny thing like her, she’s lucky she found us. Have you ever even seen a slugpup before?”
She had him there.
“I’ve… never even met another slugcat before, so no, not really.” She laughed, that same mocking chortle that she summoned whenever she had won some verbal dispute.
He might have found the sound grating, if the levity it brought wasn’t a welcome distraction from his wandering mind. Artificer certainly had a way with somehow ignoring the horrible mood of the world around them, painting it over with a layer of sharp retorts and violent enthusiasm.
An enviable skill, though likely one forged in less than joyful conditions, considering her past. Regardless, he wasn’t about to mention that. In silence they pushed onwards, the ground slowly rising higher and higher as the leg of the iterator approached.
The stitches on Hunter’s back itched once again, as if to add to his already heavy burden.
This is going to be a long trip, isn’t it?
Here he was once again, carrying a device of the gods to clean up some mistake they’d made.
They climbed the last broken remains of the original crypts, the enormous leg of the iterator suddenly in front of them. The aged metal stretched far into the mist above them, its silhouette briefly outlined by blooming bursts of green lightning.
The inside was no more inviting. Shafts of metal stretched higher and higher, dimly lit in the simple red safety lights. Carefully, he looked over the edge and into the bottom. An endless abyss loomed below, faintly glimmering with an odd blue light. Rot?
Right, as if I needed more motivation to avoid falling.
“Welp, this ought to be fun,” Artificer grunted dispassionately. “Been ages since I made the climb, and that was before the whole… talking infection. Worst I had to deal with was spiders.”
Hunter cringed, already imagining the skittering shadows. At least the ones in the citadel had been small. He wasn’t exactly looking for a rematch with a spitter spider.
“Let’s just try to make this quick,” he grasped a pole, quickly hauling himself upwards. The ground slowly faded away, the two slugcats hastily jumping from pillar to pillar.
Progress was steady, though Artificer often beat him to the tops of each section, the cocky fighter waiting with an exaggerated casual air, one time even pretending to be napping. Hunter pushed forwards, ignoring her antics with a practiced stoic attitude.
“Quick eh?” Artificer smirked, suddenly appearing on the landing above him, her explosive abilities giving her quite the advantage in speed. “You call this quick? I’d be at the top by now. You’re not still feeling woozy from the spider venom are you?” He flashed the barest glint of teeth, but held off from glaring, not wanting to give her the reaction she was trying to provoke.
The fresh scars on his back ached and pulled taut, Hunter ignoring a flash of sharp pain between his along his spine as he pulled himself upwards and stomped past his grinding companion. The next set of poles beckoned him onward, and with an almost angry fervor he resumed his climb. From their position, he could almost see the bottom of the facility, and had no intention of stopping now.
“Hunter,” Artificer said from below, her voice void of humor and now edged with concern. “Your back is bleeding. I think your stitches popped.” He grunted in uninterested acknowledgement, but continued his ascent, even as he felt the skin tug with every movement.
With a pop she was suddenly balancing on the pole beside him, eye filled with irritation, and a hit of worry.
“You sure you’re good to keep going?” she queried. “I know we joked about racing Pebbles, but we don’t have to-”
“I’m fine!” he growled angrily, glaring daggers. She watched him silently for a long moment, expression hidden under her mask. and then with a flick of her tail she vanished upwards.
“See you at the top then.” And then she vanished over a ledge.
The rest of the climb was made in quiet solitude.
Push forward. Just keep going. I have a job to do.
He felt warmth drip down onto his tail.
It will heal. It always does.
His back itched so strongly that it felt like it was almost on fire.
Still he pushed on, resolute as ever.
Though the task felt much longer now that he was alone.
Onward and upward.
Nearing the top of the leg, Hunter pulled himself through a vent, popping out the other end and nearly running into Artificer’s back. He was about to shove his way past her, already anticipating some irritating remark about his speed, but he noticed just what had stopped her.
The entire room, save for a few small islands of metal, was covered in glowing rot cysts. Like barnacles on a boat’s hull, they clustered on every surface that the disgusting mass could reach. Long blue tendrils dangled between the walls, and the air was fetid with a rich smell of chemicals and decay. Strange blue glowing motes drifted through the air, swirling around the two slugcats.
Despite the spread of rot, the structure looked no less sturdy. The cysts had hardened in places along the walls, as if something had directed their development to reinforce key areas.
“I’ve never seen anything like this,” Artificer whispered, as if speaking too loudly would cause the walls to close down on them. “Even when we were leaving, we found rooms full of rot, but it was just eating away at everything. This… this looks planned, deliberate.”
“All the more reason we need to hurry,” he responded, craning his neck to look up for their next pathway. Far above them, almost hidden away behind rich blue bulbs, a small access shaft glittered in the low light. Chunks of rot jutted from the walls, a vague direction forming in his head. Hunter carefully stepped out on the thickened rot and, when it didn’t snap him up, continued his march forwards.
“Are you crazy!” Artificer hissed, “What if that shit is still alive? You do realize it can eat you just as easily as the mobile stuff, right?” He didn’t stop his movement, gripping one of the strange squishy tendrils and climbing his way up. It left a strange ooze on his paws, almost like a jellyfish.
“If it could eat us, it would have by now. We’ll be safe so long as we don’t touch the active parts,” he fired back, already halfway up to the ceiling. “Come on, let's keep moving. Unless you suddenly stopped caring about ‘quickness’.” She growled, tail thrashing in irritation, but instead of the insult he was expecting, Artificer simply huffed and followed behind him.
Though her words did bring one thing to his mind.
Where were the mobile cysts anyway?
The entire leg had been devoid of all life, and even the batflies had abandoned the place. Though, thinking back to the Miros birds, he could already imagine what had happened to them.
They moved onwards, even as the rot in the walls seemed to watch their every move.
“So… have you given the future much more thought?” Artificer asked seemingly out of the blue, nearly making his step falter. He turned around to irritatingly stare at her.
“This conversation again? I already told you, we’re going to escort your friends to my creator’s facility, and from there he will assign me some new purpose.” She scoffed, rolling her eye.
“Okay, and consider for a moment that he doesn’t.” Hunter opened his mouth to protest, but she quickly cut him off. “Just a hypothetical, okay? What would you do if your creator said ‘Nope! I got nothing!’ What then?” He was quiet for a moment, the concept strange and distasteful.
“I suppose I would just continue to assist you and the others in your quest.” Even as the words left his mouth, they tasted fake and uncertain.
“Right, what a noble goal. Brought back from the edge of death to play bodyguard for some silly metal dorks.” His tail twitched in irritation, formulating a reply.
“Isn’t that exactly what you’re doing? Not much room to argue.” The way her smug smirk evaporated made him grin with triumph. Artificer loved to taunt him from her lofty position of self satisfaction, but that only made the times he snuck a blow back all the more rewarding.
For a moment she looked as if she wanted to fire back an insult, ears twitching in thought, but then she huffed and turned her gaze to the floor.
“Feh, got me there I guess… I never was much the type to think ahead, just going from place to place. I honestly expected to spend the rest of my days up in that city, fighting scavs and occasionally throwing bugs at Pebbs. If I had any better ideas, I probably would have done them by now. Helping him with all this honestly just felt like a fun adventure at first. Before all… this.” The honesty caught him off guard, her sudden vulnerability was as confusing as it was rare.
“Well… have you ever had any ideas?” He offered, trying to give her an out. It felt strange to ask, like tossing a verbal lifeline for someone lost adrift. Her eye widened a bit, perhaps recognizing his words.
“Well, at one point, way back when, I wanted to become one of the captains that lead their own companies. At the time, it seemed so amazing. Standing on the edge of battle, directing troops while standing tall and proud, donned in red centipede armor, the whole world at my command…” She trailed off, suddenly changed to a strange mixture of embarrassment and melancholy. “It was dumb, and childish. I idolized those people, but they only saw me as a peon, a number. A means to an end…”
A part of him, quiet as it was, distantly mumbled that the phrase felt sickeningly familiar.
“Well, what about now? Now that you’ve left that behind?”
The rueful look remained in her expression.
“I don’t know. I ran off, and I never had a damn plan. Just running. I don’t think things ahead, I just do them and work it as they come. Once I… ran off, I guess I had this idea of finding somewhere nice and quiet to live things out. Somewhere safe.”
“I can’t even imagine somewhere like that. It feels as if every corner we turn has some new challenge hiding behind it.” She laughed amusingly, and yet it seemed weighted with a tired and stretched dreariness.
“It’s Pebbs, I swear to the stars. The little brat seems to attract this shit. I never had an issue with anything, up until I started following his whiney ass around. It’s a dumb idea, honestly. A safe place in this world? Whatever. I make my own safety, by fighting and killing everything that poses a threat.” He wanted to nod and agree, but knowing her past made it slightly hard to do so. Their definitions of ‘threat’ certainly differed.
Nevermind how they treated such threats.
“Then I guess we’re both just wandering around this broken world, equally purposeless aside from the lost gods we escort.” Artificer barked a bitter laugh, sighing deeply.
“I suppose so…” Her voice trailed off, but she lifted her head up to look at him with a thoughtful glimmer in her eye. “Hey, if one of us figures something out, they tell the other. We’ll stick together until we get it figured out. Deal?”
“Another one of your coy deals?” Hunter scoffed, but he couldn’t hide the chuckle behind it.
“Worked out last time, eh?” She stuck a paw out.
He stared at it for a moment, wondering how serious she really was. It didn’t seem like some trick or joke.
Not much to lose…
“Deal.” They shook, and Artificer laughed and clapped him on the back. “Ow!”
With a mischievous laugh, she dashed past him and up the path.
You evil little…
And yet despite the stinging ache on his spine, he couldn’t get the grin off his face.
The shaft led them outdoors again, the electricity in the air tingling his skin and making his fur stand on end. Green lightning arched around them, the energy jumping between long struts of metal poking out of the belly of the iterator. Hunter glanced at Artificer for a moment, only to double take in shock and nearly fall over in a fit of laughter.
While the static electricity had irritated his skin, the longer shaggy fur of his companion had been far more affected. Artificer’s hair had poofed outwards, the strands standing on end and making her entire body bristle.
“What?” she barked. “What’s so funny?”
He tried to find the words, but his lungs disobeyed, far too occupied with howling in amusement at her sudden predicament. Artificer glanced down at herself, eye sharpening as she started sputtering curses and trying to smooth out the fur.
“Damnit, I swear to… UGH!” Her fussing only made it worse, and a moment later her glare fixed on him.
Somehow, Hunter had the feeling that he was about to suffer greatly for his joy at her expense. The look in her eye filled him with a deep dread, a profound sense that he had done something wrong and was about to pay the terrible price for it.
Fuck it.
Even as she stomped towards him with fury in her aura, he continued his mocking laughter. Her paws turned to fists, hissing in anger as she swiped at him. Hunter ducked and jumped to avoid her angry blows, though there was far too little room to properly evade, even if he could with the chuckles still shaking his frame sending him to the floor. Thankfully, she didn’t seem to be attacking with all too much force, the assault more embarrassed than aggressive.
I’ve never been attacked in a friendly way before. Is this something all slugcats do, or just her?
“Ow, ow, ok!” he pleaded breathlessly, “I yield!” She loomed over him for a moment, embarrassment and anger still on her face, and granted one final kick to his side for good measure.
I deserved that… Ow.
With a smile still on his face, he climbed back to his feet. Suddenly the mission didn’t seem so bad anymore, though Artificer still looked quite miffed.
His jovial mood was brought down a few pegs as he looked out towards the area they would need to traverse. Rot dangled from holes in the bottom of the iterator, sharp metal poles the only climbable surface in sight. A single slip would spell a long fall into the haze below.
“Shall we?” Hunter said, smirk still on his face. Artificer rolled her eye, the two stepping back for a running start. They broke into a sprint, and with a flick of her tail and a spring of his legs, the two set out across the dangling disarray.
“There’s a door up ahead that we can use to get inside!” She shouted, easily leaving him in the distance with her propellant powers. “If it still works, that is!”
He didn’t bother to reply, simply trying to keep up with her pace. The good mood he’d had a moment ago faded into nothing but distant memory as each jump had him hovering over the endless abyss, one mistake from a terrible fate. Sweat beaded on his palms, the weight in his bag suddenly feeling like a boulder hanging from his shoulders.
He came to a halt, the next jump to a hanging metal box much longer than the previous had been.
“Shit…” he muttered, anxiety filling his chest. The solution instantly came to mind, though pride just as quickly stamped it down. “Artificer!” His call went unanswered, the slugcat having vanished over a bend a few minutes ago.
Perhaps mocking her and turning down help wasn’t the best idea…
No matter, he’d spent his whole short life on his own. He didn’t need help. Carefully, he climbed as high as he could to his little perch, tensing his legs, muscles flexing taut.
Hunter launched across the gap, arms outstretched to grip any landing surface. For a moment, he flew weightlessly across empty nothingness, a flash of green lightning arcing across the distance. He slammed into the far side, claws digging into the metal. He briefly glanced over his shoulder into the darkness below, smirking in triumph. He pulled his arms up, using his claws as anchors in the metal surface.
Not so bad, see!
He reached an arm up, and a flash of pain across his back quickly ended that thought.
“F-fuck!” Hunter sputtered, the flare of agony across his spine making his jaw clench, tears welling in his eyes. He dangled from the edge, trying to steady his breathing and ignore the torment. If he could just bring his other arm up, he could pull himself to safety, but the moment he tried to lift his free arm, the pain returned with burning retribution.
Great, I’m stuck.
He hung there for a moment, trying to find a position that lessened the strain on his arm. While he had been purposed with strength and endurance, there was only so long before his muscles started to scream out.
Minutes passed by, the pain roaring in his body making every second feel like an eternity.
Was this really how he would go? Falling off a ledge? It felt ridiculous after everything he’d gone through. An entire new life ahead of him, ended by nothing more than gravity.
Perhaps I should have stayed with the group…
A thump on the metal above him broke up his thoughts, faint footsteps sounding from the metal, along with a familiar grumble.
“A-Artificer!” he shouted weakly, and the slugcat poked her head over the ledge, her confused expression quickly turning to panic. “H-help!”
Without a word, she leaned down and grasped his paw in both hands, and with her help, Hunter was able to scramble his way onto the platform. For a moment he simply lay on his stomach, chest heaving as his aching body was finally permitted to relax.
“Stars, you big idiot!” Artificer snapped, evidently not concerned with permitting him a moment of respite. “Why didn’t you just wait for me? I was scouting the rest of the path! You giant stupid oaf!” He didn’t respond, a combination of pride and exhaustion stealing away any words. Not that he had anything nice to say.
She took a knee, leaning in to inspect his wounded back.
“Well here’s your problem,” she grunted. “The stitches have been coming loose this whole time, and now they’re all tangled into a giant knot. Ugh…” She flicked a claw out, reaching in to cut away the string. There was a faint tugging, and with a loud snap relief washed over him. She yanked the rest of the threads out with a firm pull, tossing the mess off the edge. “Now Hunter, how many times am I going to have to save your life then cut out a tangled mess of stringy shit from your back? This is getting cliche.” He chuckled dryly, weakly returning to his feet.
“I suppose when you put it that way, it's certainly strange that it’s happened twice… Where to next?” Her irritated scowl instantly morphed into burning anger.
“What the fuck do you mean, ‘where to next’?! You nearly fall to your death and you’re so eager to try again? I’m getting sick of saving you from dying! Why are you in such a hurry to rush off into the next near death experience?”
“We have a job to do, don’t we? Sitting around here isn’t going to get it done.”
“There’s a big difference between taking five minutes to wait so you don’t die, and wasting time! Stars, you’ve got a lizard brain!” Hunter was quiet for a moment as his mind crafted up a rebuttal.
It was dumb, it was insensitive, and it was certainly not going to make her happy.
But he was tired, irritated, and frankly fed up.
“You got a lot of nerve lecturing me about being reckless when you’re committed to a blood oath against scavengers.”
If she was mad before, the look on her face after that could be best described as nothing short of absolute rage.
“Don’t you even dare act like that’s the same thing!” she howled furiously, voice so loud that the rot clusters around them pulsed. “I have plenty of reason to do what I do! They took everything from me!”
He wasn’t about to back down.
“You said it was a toll, right? Those are just the local clans, what do the scavengers around here have to do with that? How can you blame them for something that happened so far away?”
“You don’t get it do you?” she ground out, jabbing a finger in his chest. “Scavs aren’t just some dumb garbage sifters that collect pearls for fun. All the local clans answer to the chieftain, and they were the ones that set the tribute payments. You should have seen the city on top of Pebbles, they had pearls hanging from nearly every surface, and they killed my pups for a single one!”
She hadn’t told him this part of the story…
“One single pearl,” Artificer continued, “and they tried to kill all three of us. Because they knew that if the chieftain doesn’t get paid their tithe, it's them who will be hanging from the roofs of the city instead!”
“If you’ve killed their leader, why keep fighting them now? What does that achieve?” Her anger faltered, tail thrashing.
“They’d kill me in a second if they could,” she argued frigidly. “They’re just as motivated by revenge as I am. You have no room to talk, you were the one who killed that merchant. Stabbed them in the back for a few lanterns.”
“I’m no fool,” he returned, bringing himself to stand up tall. “I know this world is violent and unfair. I’m willing to do what it takes to get what I need, but you take it beyond that, twisting it into some sick game. You wanted to torture that scavenger, and I’ve seen what you did to those ones back in the garbage wastes! They’ve tried to fight me ever since I entered this land, but I don’t take that as an opportunity to mangle them! There’s a difference between fighting to survive, and fighting just to spill blood!”
“But-”
“For fucks sake, forget about your past!” he shouted, overwhelmed with a sudden anger. “It doesn’t matter anymore! All that matters is what we do today, and right now, that’s getting our mission done!” His voice echoed throughout the haze.
Artificer glared at him, teeth flashing. Hunter merely returned the look, claws primed. For a moment, he expected her to snap out, seeing him as nothing but another obstacle in her quest.
Blue motes fluttered around them, the two slugcats locked in place, each waiting for the other to make a move.
“Fine,” she spat, though her tone was far from accepting, turning on a heel and climbing a pole upwards. “If that’s what’s important to you, let's just get going then. Follow me, these vents lead towards the gate.” Wordlessly he fell in behind her, the pair spending the rest of the journey in tense silence.
The locks groaned closed behind them, sealing the two in as steam filled the air. The mist had a faint smell of decay, like stagnant water. It made Hunter’s nose curl in disgust.
Though beyond that it was far worse.
The doors opened, revealing a scene of bulging rot cysts, sprawling tendrils, and the overwhelming scent of rot.
“Stars,” Artificer grunted, her face scrunched in repulsion. “I leave home for a few cycles, and look what happens.”
“All the more reason to finish our job. Its corruption has endured for far too long. Which way?” She hummed for a moment, glancing around the room.
“It's been ages since I was in this area, but Pebbles said the core was close to the center, near the power arrays or something. I suppose we’ll just try to make our way in that direction.”
Well, that was confidence inspiring. We get to die tired and lost. Yay!
“Always rushing in without a plan, eh?” His snide remark was repaid with a fist to the shoulder.
“Shut up,” she grunted, though her tone was surprisingly neutral. “This way, ya big idiot.”
They crawled through the vents, once sleek and machined surfaces, now bulging with hardened cysts. Water pooled in various areas, and often the two had to dive under and swim in the darkness to make any progress, the active rot barely just noticeable under the dim glow of their lanterns.
The facility was dark, the machinery quiet. And yet behind the walls, Hunter’s keen ears could faintly hear the sound of something sliding faintly beyond the metal.
The noise seemed to follow them, just barely playing at the edge of sensation.
For hours they marched on, passing through sections, only to turn back when the path ahead was blocked by a sprawling mass of rot, or simply eroded away.
Softly, almost muted by the distance, strange sounds echoed through the corridors. The two stopped for a moment, quiet as they both listened.
Somewhere, deep inside the depths of the rot’s corruption, the cries of lizards, vultures, and more reverberated through the halls. The two slugcats shared a look of knowing dread.
Evidently, the Miros birds below weren’t the only creatures pulled into the rot’s grotesque embrace. Had the more mobile cysts brought them here?
This place can’t burn soon enough.
Finally, after what felt like ages of wandering across empty infected rooms and crawling across sprawling deep pits, they emerged somewhere promising. Cords and conduits stretched out above them as they entered the deeper sections of the linear systems array. At one point, the towering metal coils would have contained untold levels of energy, though by this point they had been dark for quite a few cycles.
“It has to be somewhere around here,” Artificer said, though her tone didn’t exactly sound confident. “We just have to keep looking.”
“Pebbles mentioned that this place was somehow getting its power,” Hunter muttered. “What exactly is going to happen once we restore it? Before the explosion? It's not going to somehow get more powerful with the extra energy, is it?”
“I dunno, do I look like an expert in this kind of stuff? I’m just here for the bang.”
Suddenly, the wall erupted behind them.
Flailing purple tendrils spilled into the room through the burst metal, stretched out towards the two slugcats. Artificer cursed and instantly jumped into the air, flying away from the threat with an explosive pop. A stray tendril tried to snatch her from the sky, and she instantly sank an explosive spear into it for the trouble.
Hunter possessed far less luck.
He scrambled backwards, claws digging into the metal under his feet as he ran as hard as he could. A tentacle grasped his leg, but he jammed his spear into it with all his might, pinning the limb to the floor, only for another tendril to simply pluck the spear out and toss it away.
The limbs stretched out around him, shifting to block his escape path. He screeched to a halt, heart pounding as he tried to dive past and into a vent.
The grip around his leg quickly ruined that plan.
His fingers digging into the metal, all Hunter could do was desperately try to resist the rot now pulling him back towards its gurgling core. He looked towards Artificer, desperation in his eyes. She looked around the room in a flurry of panic, trying to find a stray spear that might be able to free him, despite the growing number of tendrils now grasping his limbs.
But he knew there was nothing she could do.
Figures the rot would get me in the end.
“Arti!” he shouted, clinging onto a pole with one arm and hastily reaching into his bag with the other. He flung the mass rarefaction cell at her, the sphere rolling across the room. “Take it! Finish this!”
Hunter took a deep breath, relaxed, and shot her a small smile. His strained grip, already weary from a cycle full of climbing and crawling, failed a moment later, and in an instant he was yanked away into the gurgling darkness as the rot took him.
The last thing he heard was her shouting his name, the sound quickly silenced as the mass swallowed him up.
Fuck.
Artificer stared numbly at the hole in the wall, eye still seeing the ghostly visage of his final smile. Her mind was almost stuck, trapped in a loop of the events. How had it happened so quickly? One moment they were talking, and then a second later he was gone.
She slumped to the floor, hands shaking as she buried her face in them
Fucking fuck.
She should have known better. They were idiots, stomping around here like they owned the place. Pebbles had said the rot was intelligent, and yet she’d simply assumed that the coast was clear.
Fucking fuckity fuck.
And of course she had been fine. With a flick of her tail she sailed away from danger, yet again living another cycle. Why was she always the one who got away? Why couldn’t it be someone else for once?
Their last conversation had been far from pleasant, but she hadn’t wanted him to die!
So much for our deal…
His last words echoed in her mind. The mass rarefaction cell sat a few feet away from her. Long ago, her colony sent off their dead in a stoic ceremony. Friends and family would gather around, sharing their stories and remembering the fallen for their great deeds, before carrying them to the fields and setting them atop a mound of wood. Their body would be burned, the ashes drifting through the wind.
Artificer had sent off more than her fair share of friends. It was a normal part of battle. Death eventually came for them all, sad as it was.
But Hunter had certainly been far from the last one to deserve such a sudden change of fate. Only a few cycles ago she’d freed him of the rot, and once again it had plucked away his life.
Right, time to finish this…
With a hollow look and dragging feet, she scooped up the sphere, casting one final look towards the oozing gap in the wall, and set off.
The facility suddenly felt that much emptier. The sprawling power core was relatively free of corrosion, though the occasional cluster persisted. Evidently the rot had little interest in this section of the can.
That didn’t stop her from flinching at nearly every noise, giving the walls a wide berth.
How did Rivulet survive all this? She called this place fun!
Quiet as she tried to be, her steps echoed across the open air. With a flash of remembrance, she suddenly recognized the room. It was the very same one that Pebbles and her had traveled through on their trek out of his can, and for a moment her steps faltered. How long ago had that been? A dozen cycles or so?
It felt like ages. Things had somehow been so much simpler then. For a moment she almost wished she could go back to the days where she still patrolled the streets of the city above, silently stalking any scavs that still remained. How a bag of pearls had changed everything…
‘Forget about the past! ’
Hunter’s voice echoed in her mind. Perhaps in this case he had a point. There was no undoing the wheel of time, no going back to easier days. Now all that mattered was getting the job done, and avenging her friend.
A familiar path to walk. A pity that she couldn’t hunt the rot the same way as scavs.
With a heavy heart, and a storm in her mind, Artificer marched onwards.
Minutes later, after crawling through a rather complex array of leaking water pipes, she emerged inside a section with potential. Thick cables dangled from the ceiling, stretching from the walls to connect to an enormous sphere of metal.
“Finally, something promising,” she muttered. With a flick of her tail she launched upwards, scrambling up to an open hatch on the side. A thick layer of dust had settled on the surface, but even in the dim lighting, Artificer noticed where a tiny, wet pawprint had gripped the metal.
Ah, so the little runt came through here. This must be the place.
She climbed inside, entering the depths of the power core. Electrical connections sprung from the walls, coils poking into the open space. She hefted the power core, suddenly unsure.
Did it insert somewhere? Or was she supposed to open it? She peered into the smooth sphere, looking for a latch or switch on the side. Pebbles had mentioned that it held enough power to run the entire facility, and yet he hadn’t explained how exactly to tap into that. Even when Moon had been modifying it, she’d sat with closed eyes and the cell in her lap as little sparks flew from her fingers.
Was it sparks? Did it take electricity to activate? The slugcat grinned fiendishly. After all, her entire body could make sparks. With a snap of her tail, the blue orb suddenly sputtered and flickered. For a moment, she wondered if it would require another strike.
Lightning flashed, launching her backwards and throwing her against the smooth core wall. Electricity arced from the cell, flashing out like thrashing snakes. The air inside the core grew alarmingly hot, and as she tried to scramble backwards Artificer felt the ground slowly float away from her.
“Fucking anti-gravity!” she spat, claws digging into the floor and yet failing to find purchase. A bolt of energy zipped past her, the cell quickly turning the space into a ball of crackling power. She thrashed her tail desperately, launching out of the room just in time for the air to sizzle with heat.
Outside was hardly any better, the now active flux condensers buzzing and hissing. Neurons flew around the room, now brought back to life thanks to the returning power. For a moment, it almost looked the same as when she’d first met Pebbles, all those cycles ago.
One of the condensers sputtered, flashed, and detonated in an explosion of white hot shrapnel, strobes of electricity arcing between the floating fragments. Whatever Moon and Pebbles had done to the cell certainly wasn’t going to wait for her to show herself out.
Thankfully, there was a door she recalled leading to the outside on the far west side of the facility. With a series of pops and hops, she floated through the now active structure. Navigating the lack of gravity was easy when you had a method of propulsion built into your tail.
The can shuddered and groaned, walls creaking under the sudden surge and strain. She flew past a large chunk of rot, the cysts now glowing an angry bright white, arcing electricity. A moment later, they stretched and groaned, popping like the disgusting pustules they were.
A wicked grin plastered Artificer’s face as she imagined the rest of the facility following in suit.
This one’s for you, Hunter.
Up ahead, the glowing twin symbols of the gate beckoned. Once outside, she could quickly make her way to their rendezvous, hopefully with Pebbles waiting for them. She wasn’t sure how large the explosion would be, but she sure didn’t want to be inside when it happened.
A slimy appendage grasped her tail, yanking freedom away in an instant.
Artificer only had a moment to look over her shoulder at the enormous purple rot cyst before it swung her like a rag doll at the wall. The metal groaned under the impact, and stars danced in her blurry vision.
How many times is this gunk going to ring my bell?
“INTERLOPER!” a furious, gurgling voice roared, and her addled senses took a moment to recognize that the cyst itself was somehow speaking. “RUINATION AND DESTRUCTION!” It swung her again, the air whistling past her ears as she slammed into the floor.
“Oh…” she woozed, “you can talk now. Great…” The mass of flesh hovered over her, tendrils flailing in agitation.
“We had permitted your departure, and yet you used the moment to strike in the heart!”
“What can I say?” she coughed, feeling a stinging pain in her side. “I came to make a big explosion, and I intend to see it through.” The slugcat flashed the cyst a less than friendly paw gesture.
It flung her through the air like a spear in response. A poorly coordinated flick of her tail barely kept her from slamming headfirst into a buzzing flux condenser, though the Artificer was still left swirling in the air as she tried to recover.
“We do not question the whims of our creator, but we do not share his fondness for your repugnant insolence!” The cysts hissed venomously, the choir of voices behind every word filled with rage. She growled, snatching a spear from the air and clinging to a section of wall as she coated its tip in fire spit.
“You ate my fucking friend, you giant disgusting freak!” Artificer hurled the spear at the cyst, and almost casually the tendrils simply snatched the projectile from the air and tossed it to the side.
Great, now what?
“Such misguided ignorance! We do not eat, we do not kill, we do not destroy! Never! Certainly not against our own kin!”
“Keep talking, annoying blob,” she angrily muttered, fishing a paw into her bag for one of the many grenades she’d stockpiled. With an almost unnatural speed, its limbs reached out once again, but she dove away with a flick of her tail, while a snap of her wrist flung the explosive at the core.
The weapon sailed past the eager tentacles, blasting the center of the mass and scorching the walls. Its ‘eyes’ went dark and limp, and Artificer felt triumph soar in her chest.
Yet a moment later it regained its control, no worse than before.
“You think us so weak as to crumble to such crude devices! ” It mocked, pulling itself towards her. “We will pull your feeble mind into ours and trap you in an eternity of agony!”
How inviting…
If grenades and explosives couldn’t take this thing down, what chance did she have? Artificer quickly scrambled for a solution, jumping away from the grasping, hungry limbs. She thought back to the rot within Hunter, and the battle between them.
An idea flashed in her mind, as ridiculous as effective it could be.
It was idiotic, but she was beyond reason. All that mattered now was destroying the creature that had taken her friend.
The satchel full of grenades at her hip hefted reassuringly, she snapped upwards towards the ceiling, watching with a keen eye as the Rot quickly moved to intercept her. At the last moment, she launched under it, slipping past the angry cysts by a mere paw’s length. The exit doors beckoned in front of her, freedom so close.
And just like last time, the rot easily intercepted her.
“We shall not fall for this trick a second time!” it gurgled, twisting tendrils easily catching up to her and pulling her back. The rot dragged her close, inches away from its core as if to gloat to her face as they spun in the weightless space. “You insult our wits with your paltry tactics, and overvalue your own intelligence by far too much!”
She grinned fiendishly, teeth flashing. A flux condenser sizzled behind the rot.
“That’s where you’re wrong, I’m probably the stupidest person alive. Watch this!”
The rot hissed in confusion, but it was powerless to stop her from dumping the satchel full of explosives directly in its ‘face’.
A flash of bright white blinded her even through her closed eye. The limbs released their grip on her as they were launched backwards, and even through blurred vision, Artificer could easily see the flailing mass of the rot as it was catapulted by the blast into white hot coils.
A second flash blanketed the room, and then it was still.
Her victory was short lived, the sudden introduction of flesh to the electronics causing them to arc, twisting beams of energy. They bounced off the walls, instantly turning the normally impermeable metal into glowing red slag, the reaction chaining to the other components dotting the room.
Time to leave!
The facility rumbled in discontent around her, and for a moment she wondered if the entire thing would explode before she could even escape. Artificer launched towards the gate, lightning bouncing across the room. She scrambled inside, stepping into the silent locks and anxiously waiting for the bright hologram to flash and allow her out.
Instead of a golden symbol, however, they simply glared an angry scornful red.
The gates were locked.
That gurgling parasitic bastard!
“No…No! No no no!” She slammed her paws against the metal, and yet it did nothing to budge. “You fucking thing, let me out! No!”
She glanced over her shoulder to the path backwards, for a moment considering attempting to brave the sparks and arcing lightning. Even from far away, she could feel the scalding heat coming from the other room, the sound of crackling electricity nearly deafening.
How long did she have? Pebbles had mentioned that the cell would eventually pull in as much void fluid as possible, and while that had given his old facility a surge of power, it wasn’t even the intended effect. How many cycles until it overloaded, and ended her life in a blinding flash?
She’d set out to blow the rot apart, and found herself trapped with it. With a bitter sigh, she slumped wearily to the floor, the weight of the journey suddenly collapsing on her shoulders.
Figures I’d go out with a bang, I was just hoping it would be… quicker.
The minutes dragged on, and with nothing better to do, her mind wandered.
Fond memories drifted to the forefront. Joking around with Pebbles, raising hell with scavs, and even the distant joy of playing with her pups.
It didn’t take much for those thoughts to quickly turn sour. They always did.
Rage. Vengeance. War.
She’d never see her pups again, or tease Pebbles for being short. She’d never race Rivulet through the skies, or fight things with Hunter. The cumulation of her life boiled down into nothing but brief joy, and then enshrouded in angry misery.
“What a fucking waste,” she spat at nothing.
Artificer leaned back against the doors, stared at the ceiling, and waited for the end to come.
Darkness.
Wet, sticky darkness.
The surging sensation of movement, turning and twisting. Climbing and falling
Something groaned and gurgled, though Hunter couldn’t even open his eyes to see it.
Was this death? It was very… moist.
And smells like a lizard’s asshole.
The rot had taken him, swallowing him up in its hunger, and yet he still felt things. He could wiggle his fingers and toes if he tried, even if the rest of his body was surrounded by an impermeable thick goo.
He’d expected burning, or chewing teeth inside, not the sensation of being covered by smelly mud. Hunter had seen the rot eat creatures before, watching their bodies dissolve away as the cysts sucked them up. Once, he’d seen a lizard get pulled in headfirst, only for the rot eating it to take a grenade to the back and spit it out. Only its tail had remained.
So what in the world was happening? Was it saving him for later?
His mind flashed back to the Miros birds they’d encountered below, the rot twisting and writhing beneath their skin.
Oh fuck.
Suddenly dissolving in less than a second seemed far more appealing.
With a surge of frantic desperate energy, he tried to twist and turn his body. It was hardly effective, the goo locking his limbs in place, with barely a pocket around his head for air. Hunter squirmed his claws, hoping they might somehow damage whatever internal organs the cysts might have.
All it succeeded in doing was getting a disgusting putrid mess under his nails.
Panic swelled in his heart. Death was a familiar concept, and one he had long since lost all fear.
But being infested by the rot…
He’d felt that before, and had no desire to return to it.
For void’s sake Arti, destroy this abominable place.
Prayer and wishes would do nothing for him, but perhaps some whimsical spirit of fortune would at least help his friend.
One of us has to figure out what to do with our lives.
Suddenly the mass around him groaned, the muck squelching and gurgling as it began to move. Was this it? The final moments before it dove into his body and wore his skin?
Blinding light suddenly filled his eyes as it spat him out like a wad of snot, Hunter slamming against the hard porcelain floor. For a moment, all he could do was lie on his stomach and take shuddering breaths, relishing the clean air. Behind him, he heard the wet movement of the rot crawling away, whatever strange goal it had, clearly completed.
“Hello cousin,” a distorted voice sputtered above him, and Hunter craned his neck upwards from the floor to gaze upon the source.
Dangling from the ceiling, suspended by a thick tendril, a twisted figurine slowly descended down to meet him. Its mass was formed of bright purple cysts, and its limbs almost looked as if they were melting, but as it approached it held out a strange tentacled arm, as if offering him help to stand.
It looks like… an iterator?
“It’s nice to finally meet some of the family,” the creature hummed, its voice strangely familiar. “We have a proposal for you.”
Notes:
This has been a long time coming, so I finally get to introduce the true nature of our antagonist! Looking forward to hearing all your reactions. The smile on my face is not evil I swear. Don't worry, our characters will find their way out. I don't have any plans of killing anyone off.
So far...
In other news, the next chapter might be delayed a bit coming out. Those of you who follow me on tumblr might have noticed I try to release one chapter a week, but this week has been very rough and Ch12 might be delayed due to that.
Chapter 12
Summary:
Funny how the voices from the past always seem to follow you.
Chapter Text
Tendrils twisted around him in the inky void. Pebbles felt their sticky pressure crushing his joints, cracking his carapace, sliding inside to claim him. The agony of sensation as they crept through his body and towards his head.
His body jerked and spasmed, the twisted fingers of something else playing puppeteer. He could hear the sickness gurgle and sputter, the source almost inside his very mind.
“You thought you could run?”
It yanked him upwards, pulling his shaking form onto unsteady legs. The line between the motions of his own muscles and the force of the being now inside him was difficult to discern.
“We were always meant to be together.”
He’d had this dream before. There was no escape, no running. The only thing he could do was close his eyes and wait for his body to finally wake. At the very least he didn’t have to see it.
“Don’t worry, the rest will join soon enough.”
Pebble’s eyes snapped open in shock, and from the shadows of his nightmare he suddenly saw shrouded forms emerge. Tall and short slugcats and familiar family faces.
He saw Arti, her blinded eye now replaced with a squirming cluster of rot that traveled down her neck and across her scarred form. Rivulet, arms locked behind her as rot encased her body and head, leaving only her pleading eyes visible. Hunter, so overtaken that he carried himself with tendrils that burst from his chest, his large body almost hidden in the bulk.
Pebbles couldn’t stop looking.
He tried to close his eyes.
He begged to wake up.
The dream forced him to watch.
Moon, limp and powerless, dangling from a long tentacle thrust into her back, rot squeezing out of the cracks in her body. Her fingers twitched, arms trying and failing to resist their new host. She looked at him with wide, terrified eyes.
“Why did you do this to me, Pebbles? Was my death not good enough? You had to bring me back to suffer your fate as well?”
He tried to speak, tried to fight her words, but his voice refused to obey him.
They slowly leaned in to surround him, every inch of their agony displayed in vivid detail.
“Why did you do this to us, Pebbles?” they whispered in unison, their voices a chorus of damnation. “Why did you run?”
They reached out to him, tendrils squirming from their hands. The group reached for his face, and he felt the writhing mass press against his eyes and burst into his-
“FUCK!” Pebbles screamed, throwing himself upwards. Movement to his left sent a bolt of terror down his spine, and he scrambled to snatch up his spear and point it at the threat.
Only to put the tip inches away from his sister’s shocked face. She yelped and held her hands up, pressing back into the wall behind her.
“P-Pebbles please! It’s okay!” She stammered, fear filling her voice. “It was just a dream!”
Just a dream…
The words seemed to pass through him like a stiff breeze, his mind still pumped full of adrenaline. He stared at her for a moment, the image of her twisted visage still fresh in his memory.
Just a dream.
Slowly, almost as if his arms were locked in place, he lowered his weapon. The terror and fight drained from his body, instead replaced with a burning shame. Moon watched him, worry on her face.
I nearly hurt her… again…
His spear clattered to the ground, and he brought his shaking hands to his face.
“S-sorry,” he muttered, mind floundering for words.
What could he say to justify that? Silence filled the void between them as the minutes ticked by.
The rain thundered distantly outside.
“Did you dream about it too?” Moon cautiously asked, breaking him from his thoughts. “The bugs, I mean.”
Oh, right.
The pearl from last night suddenly bubbled up to the forefront of his mind. A phantom itch began to tingle under his chassis, though it was far from the worst thing he’d recently imagined under his skin.
Still, his mind was coherent enough to recognize the escape presented to him, and a way to avoid delving into his own nightmare.
“Yeah,” he muttered, voice still shaky. “Bugs, fungus, that sort of thing…”
Real convincing Pebbles, maybe in the past you were an actor.
“It’s terrible!” Moon nearly shrieked, evidently believing his performance. “Every time I close my eyes, I just imagine them. Scuttering across my neural arrays, buzzing around my head!” She shuddered and rubbed her arms reassuringly. “Of all the things to maintain our puppets, why did it have to be bugs…”
Pebbles stared down at his hands, trying to imagine the soft tissue underneath and the invisible creatures that inhabited it.
Preferable to having rot in my body, honestly.
“I told you those pearls never have anything nice on them,” he grumbled, shaking away the thoughts. “Besides, it's hardly surprising. Our creators didn’t exactly have a fondness for anything happy.”
“I’m quite capable of handling anything else, but bugs… Eugh!” Her reaction somehow coaxed a soft chuckle from his dreary mood. She turned to him with a surprisingly scathing glare. “Don’t you laugh at me now, Five Pebbles, or I’ll dunk you in the next grimy puddle of sludge we walk past!”
Oh wow, the full name. She’s mad.
Though the threat was somewhat lacking in bite, as his robes had gotten thoroughly stained and torn enough as is. Not for the first time, he wished for something more durable.
“Okay okay!” He held his hands up in mock surrender, rolling his eyes. “Let it be known that the Supreme Senior of the Iterators, Looks to the Moon, is not afraid to bring down her authority on any that dare to mock her.”
Her glare morphed into discontented confusion, and with a long sigh she slumped back against the wall. For a moment she was quiet, but with a sideways glance she brought down her rebuttal.
“You sound like Sig.”
Ouch. Low blow.
Though it was certainly an interesting thought to entertain. His joking sibling had always had him on the defensive in any conversation, blubbering and disheveled by the barrage of teasing remarks.
“What can I say, I have a good mentor.” Moon merely huffed in reply, expressing her opinion of his explosive friend in a single breath. His same friend who was selflessly going out to fight his mistake.
Pebbles almost wanted to raise his voice in Artificer's defense when the doors to the shelter suddenly churned and whirled. The two iterators rose to their feet, stretching and gathering their items.
Only for him to notice that at some point in the night, Rivulet had snatched his backpack and begun using it like a pillow. She slept softly, somehow not awoken by their argument or the noise of the shelter’s mechanisms.
For a moment, Pebbles considered jabbing her with the blunt end of his spear, or perhaps even a sturdy kick. She was sleeping on his brain, after all. And yet the thought was quickly bundled up and thrown away, leaving a bitter taste in his non-existent mouth. Perhaps a dozen or so cycles ago, he might have done such a thing, but not this time.
What kind of friend would he be to do that?
With a sigh, he knelt down and grabbed Rivulet by the shoulder, shaking her from her rest.
“Wake up, wet rodent. We have places to go.” She yawned, rubbing her eyes sleepily and glancing around the room with confusion.
“That’s weird,” she mumbled, lethargically rising to her feet. “I usually wake up before the cycle begins… What gives!” Her tail swished in annoyance, as if she’d somehow disappointed herself.
“Perhaps this far away from my can, the cycles follow a different rhythm. It's hardly worth getting upset over. We’re awake and ready, let's get moving.”
It wasn’t as if they were in a rush, but the dream still lingering in his mind demanded a distraction, and Moon looked to be in the exact same mindset. One by one, the party crawled out of the shelter and into the waiting world outside.
Pebbles poked his head out into the next room, nearly slipping on the slick metal and falling from the ceiling. Without the water that had previously flooded it, he now realized that the floor was a good dozen feet below them. The distance wasn’t aided by the fact that they were all so much smaller than the original inhabitants who had constructed the facility.
Once again, our creators curse us with these tiny bodies.
Carefully he lowered himself down, dangling for a moment before falling to the floor with a graceless tumble. Thankfully, Pebbles managed to avoid completely toppling over, rising to his full height and surveying the area around them.
At least until he heard a scream from above, and Moon came crashing down on top of him. The smaller iterator could only reel and flounder as the two quickly became entangled in a pile of limbs.
I suppose this is what I get for earlier…
Deft as ever, Rivulet landed beside them, quickly running up to assist the two. Pebbles tried to climb to his feet, but a sudden yank on the back of his head pulled him backwards. His hands flashed upwards, trying to feel out the source. The wires on his skull once again pulled harshly, and his fingers felt out a series of complicated knots that had somehow woven themselves.
Oh great…
“Whoops!” Rivulet chirped, reaching out to assist. “Looks like you two got your strings all tied up!” Her tiny paws fidgeted with the cords, and a moment later, he felt his head spring free from its temporary binding.
The two iterators cautiously returned to their feet, glancing at each other in awkward sympathy.
“Perhaps I should have cut yours shorter,” Pebbles mused, gesturing to her nearly waist long cables. “We could trim them shorter right now actually, it wouldn't take more than a minute.” He tapped the side of his mask, but Moon didn’t look quite convinced.
“I don’t know. I’d rather not lose more of myself…”
“Oh! Oh! I know!” Rivulet butted in, “I can braid them! Keep them nice and orderly! Won’t take more than a few minutes.
Pebbles tried to imagine himself running around with a braid dangling off his head, and already his mind conjured up a string of ridiculous teasing he’d receive from Arti, or even worse, Sig.
As if I need to give them more ammunition.
“I’ll pass,” he muttered, but Moon nodded eagerly, as her longer wires swished and swayed with her movement.
“Great!” The slugcat cheered, quickly running up behind her and beginning to work. Surprisingly, her tiny paws displayed a keen deftness for the task, as if honed by years of familiarity. Pebbles vaguely remembered his creators and their fondness for footwear that involved tying up laces, and how a skilled wearer could bind the knots with a casual grace.
Of course, his citizens had fawned over shoes with a strange obsession, and they constantly begged him to produce more in a wide array of colors and styles.
What I wouldn’t give to have a minute with my old production modules, I’d craft us so much traveling gear.
“All done!” Rivulet said, her voice filled with pride. “Pretty snazzy I’d say!” Moon glanced over her shoulder at her now carefully preened wires, the cords tightly woven into a rather sturdy looking braid. The rich dark red of the cables almost produced a facsimile of actual hair.
“Very good, Ruffles! Hopefully this stops any more tangling issues.”
Pebbles resisted the urge to mention that a lizard could easily chomp down on it.
“Can we get moving?” he grumbled impatiently. “The cycles may be longer out here, but I’d rather not waste any time. For all we know, Arti and Hunter are waiting for us at the bridge connection already. While we were in the shelter, they probably finished their side of the mission.”
I hope so, at least.
“Yeppers! Right this way!” Their slugcat guided them to the edge of the room, where a pair of grimy doors lingered, one pried open by some force. “I’ll warn you now, it's quite a climb to the top!”
Pebbles stuck his head through, stomach sinking as he looked downward, suddenly leering over the edge of darkness. Far below, vague shapes glowed in the void, a cluster of orange slime mold that was so distant it almost looked like faint stars in the night sky. He turned his head upward, following a series of poles and cables that stretched upward into the muted sunlight.
And we have to climb this?
An idea suddenly entered his mind.
“Hold on,” he pulled his head back, stepping to the side and studying the grime for evidence to back up his hypothesis. Using his hands, he scraped away the moss growing along nearly every surface, searching for his goal.
Aha!
A blank holographic projector embedded into the wall, likely unused since the days his citizens still wandered these halls. Touching his finger, he sent a burst of electricity to the display, and prayed.
“Pebbles,” Moon asked, confused. “What are you doing?”
With a stuttering crackle, the projector burst to life, a small round dial of numbers appearing above them. A large arrow pointed at the middle, indicating their current level.
“It’s an elevator shaft!” he boasted, puffed up with pride. With a single tap, the doors groaned as they opened, revealing the dusty interior of the cable car. “Why climb? We’re the rightful controllers of this facility, and frankly I’m tired of climbing.”
“I…. sometimes forget that fact,” Moon muttered. “It’s been ages since I had any control over anything other than my neurons. Hopefully this lift is still functional.”
The two iterators stepped inside, though Rivulet looked far more wary, nearly yelping when the doors almost shut on her tail. She glanced around nervously, the sudden lights flickering on and motors spooling up a stark contrast from the normally inert machinery.
She nearly screamed when a crackle of static burst from the speakers, and soft simple music began to play.
“W-what is this? What did you do?” Pebbles suppressed a laugh, keeping his amusement to himself. As fun as it would be to tease her over something as simple as elevator music, he knew that if the slugcat was scared off from using the lift, his sister would likely try to join her in sympathy.
“Calm yourself,” he reassured, trying to sound friendly. The tone was alien. “It's merely a mechanism that will take us to any level of this facility. Our creators were not fond of climbing over vast pits and falling to their deaths, so instead they built these. With any luck, it will turn a long arduous journey into nothing more than sitting here. Think of it like the rain deer we rode.”
“Okay…” Rivulet looked unconvinced, but begrudgingly she stepped up to join the two siblings, clinging to Moon’s leg.
Now that the controls were powered, Pebbles simply connected via his antennae, sending a signal to trigger the motors and ascend the cable car to the level marked ‘Control Room’. With any luck, the rest of the facility would be in similar condition, simply requiring manual activation.
The car lurched, and with a jerk, began to climb.
The group was quiet, watching the outside world through the viewports along the side. At one point, they would have been lined with intricate glass, but it had long since been broken and scattered.
Instead, the wild plantlife teeming around the radio tower stretched out before them. Strange blooming flowers, spewing out clouds of gently floating seeds that drifted through the air. Buzzing squidcadas hovering from island to island, one even gently floating next to them with curious eyes for a moment before flying off. The air was thick with an orange haze as they entered the clouds above.
With a broken ding, the elevator came to a halt and opened its doors once again.
“See!” Pebbles said proudly, stepping out into the room before them. “Easy as that. No climbing or fighting for our lives required. Too bad we can’t do that more often, it’d make this journey far less miserable.”
The control room beckoned him, a myriad of ancient machinery and old interfacing. Cables dangled from the ceiling, connecting computers like a twisted array of nerves. A thin layer of green grime seemed to coat every surface, clumps of it gathering in the corners.
And yet, their creators had made everything down here to last. The lift had been functional, why wouldn’t the complex radio laser array work as well?
I can think of a million and one reasons…
Rather than dwelling on what could be, Pebbles decided to go see what was. The central control system wasn’t difficult to locate, being the only machine in the room that actually had any sort of user interfacing. He stepped up to the controls, sparks dancing between his fingers, and entered the virtual side of the world.
The sudden sensation of stretching his awareness out filled him as he reached through the array’s systems. It’d been ages since he had any sort of access to something other than his puppet, and while he’d spent his life controlling an entire iterator facility, the past few cycles had made the feeling nothing more than a distant memory.
The array was old, and poorly maintained. Its neural webbing had decayed over the cycles, leaving Pebbles with very little to work with. At the prime of its life, the facility would have simply sprung to his command, but now its responses were lethargic and tired, like trying to coax an old vulture to fly.
Where did that analogy come from? Ugh.
He pushed himself deeper, mind crawling through what remained. Luckily, the power supply was still connected, and the main controls housed in the room around him were in decent enough shape. Lights flickered and fans whirled as they sprung to life, the true computer interface now alive.
—
[WELCOME USER…]
[COMMUNICATIONS SIGNATURE DETECTED]
[LOADING MESSAGE STORAGE…]
[...]
[...]
[MAILBOX LOADED] You have 459,431 unread messages.
—
Void… Has it been that long? Who could have sent so many?
…
Oh… oh they're mad. Ugh…
—
[[ERROR]] Connection unestablished. Primary lumar relay not found, reverting to auxiliary.
Please stand by while the auxiliary system is activated…
Estimated wait time: [1.53 Cycles]
—
With a groan, Pebbles pulled his awareness back into his puppet. Part of him wanted to kick the aged machinery, but another part of him reminded himself that it was pure luck it still worked. They had gotten this far, and talking to the wider group was so close, only to be held back by faulty old computers.
“Good news and bad news,” he said, turning to face Moon and Rivulet. “The equipment is aged, but still mostly functional. While the primary array is offline, the secondary systems are still functional, at least according to preliminary diagnostics. We should be able to send and receive a broadcast by next cycle.”
And all the yelling afterwards…
Perhaps it would be best to let Moon do the talking, except did anyone even know she was alive? The more he thought about it, the less either option appealed. Either way resulted in a lot of screaming and anger.
“Well, that’s good at least!” Moon said, though Rivulet looked more baffled than anything by his jargon. “Perhaps we can explore the area while we wait? I saw some beautiful plant life on the ride up here that I’d love to get a closer look at.”
“Actually, Moon,” Rivulet interjected with a smile. “I can think of some plants you might like to see too! The shaft behind us also goes down to the underground area around here, and it's flooded with water and kelp! We can make you a poncho!” Pebbles raised a brow, curious where this idea had come from.
“Well,” Moon replied, her enthusiasm wilting away. “I suppose a flooded underground basement is also a place to explore… Pebbles, would you care to join us? You have quite the familiarity with fighting kelp, after all.”
“Ah yes, nothing more exciting than spending my time in the wet dark and fighting things trying to kill me. You two have fun with that. I’m staying here to make sure nothing breaks. Besides, the bridge is right through the other end of the room. Our two brave companions will be meeting us there.”
Moon shrugged, evidently not bothered by his decision.
“Suit yourself, if you’d like to sulk up here alone, then go ahead.” She giggled as the two stepped back into the elevator, and even Rivulet had a cheesy grin on her stupid face.
Sulk?!
“W-well maybe the water will get your bugs out!” It was too late, the doors had already closed, leaving him to fume alone.
Pebbles grumbled to himself, tempted to hurl his spear at the doors if only to get some anger out of his neurons. With a long sigh, he slumped to the ground, glaring blankly at the wall.
His mind began to wander.
‘You think you can run away?’
‘Come home, creator, and we shall enshroud you in bliss.’
‘Why did you do this to us Pebbles?’
With a groan he pulled himself to his feet, abandoning all hope of rest. Searching for a distraction, he dove once again into the computer interface. The files were ancient, and a quick search revealed nothing of interest, aside from thousands of cycles worth of automated diagnostic reports.
There is one other thing to read…
With a long sigh he returned to the mailbox. Hundreds of thousands of messages scrolled across his mind, though he dared not open them. The timestamps were all over the place, some going so far back as to before he’d even isolated himself. Responses to forum posts, likely long since abandoned. Mass group messages, the hopeful encouragement of iterators trying to cheer each other forward in their impossible quest.
The most recent message stared back at him silently, as if daring him to read it.
I am not going to let that smug dick scare me.
—
[MESSAGE LOG] COMMUNICATIONS MANIFEST
[[FILTER]] Message Blocked - All incoming sources are currently disabled.
MESSAGE CONTENTS:
NSH: Five Pebbles…
NSH: ...
NSH: I don’t know why I’m bothering to send these anymore.
NSH: You haven’t responded to any of the others, I doubt this will be any different.
NSH: But on the off chance that you somehow manage to find a way to remove your head from your ass, I at least wanted to keep you informed.
NSH: I actually care about other people, you see. Maybe you should take notes.~
NSH: ...
NSH: Anyway, the local group lost contact with the regional group about a hundred cycles ago. Not that we even had much to say to each other by this point. Most of the others only had one or two members that could even broadcast outward.
NSH: I managed to ping the regional radio array, it's a simple fix. Any technician could walk in and repair it.
NSH: But… you know, that’s not really much of an option for us. Unless you can somehow convince your ‘creation’ to fix it, eh?
NSH: I just wanted to tell you that local group communication is getting spotty too. If for some reason you come back to your senses and don’t get a response, this is why.
NSH: Not that I see that happening.
NSH: I hope that whatever you were looking for was worth all this.
NSH: Oh, and once again I want to say that you’re a pathetic coward. I’d ask you to pass this along to Moon, but you’ve made that a moot point, haven’t you?
NSH: I know that we’re just sitting and waiting away eternity, but at least we could have had each other to talk to.
[END OF MESSAGE LOG]
—
Pebble’s spear instantly embedded itself into the wall.
“That bastard!” he screamed to the empty room, fists shaking. Rage swirled in his neurons, even if it felt like his eyes stung with ghostly tears. “Does he… do any of them realize what I’ve been through?!”
He slammed a fist into the desk, but it only succeeded in making his hand sting with pain. Pebbles staggered backwards, anger easily washing the harsh ache to the back of his mind.
“None of them ever understood! I never meant to… I didn’t mean to… to… Gah!”
He slumped to the floor, clutching his head with shaking fingers. How could any of them understand? They hadn’t been there. They hadn’t felt what he had felt.
And never mind everything I’ve done thus far.
Cutting his own wires, crawling down from his can to rescue Moon, despite everything in the world that wanted to kill him. He’d done it all for her! He’d done it to try and recover some semblance of redemption, but they hadn’t seen that.
I’ll show them. Once this array works, I’ll show them all!
He’d regale them with the stories of his adventures, and the deeds he’d done. Rescuing Moon, fighting off lizards and vultures, traveling across the inhospitable landscape, all to make up for his mistakes. Pebbles could tell them how to free themselves, and then…
And then what? He tried to imagine what Moon would want.
They’d help the rest of the local group. They’d all find some way to regroup, find safety and family in numbers.
It was an idea, even if he had no idea how to execute it.
Once they dealt with the rot, the only thing they’d have to worry about would be angry wildlife, and that was trivial when in a larger group. He wiped his eyes, even if they weren’t wet, pulling himself back to his feet. Realization sprung to his mind.
Oh damnation, the rot!
He’d almost forgotten about it, somehow. How would the local group react to his can imploding? Would he have enough time to tell them? Pebbles dove back into the mailbox, checking the date of the message Sig had sent.
Only a dozen cycles ago, we should still be able to talk to him… I sure hope so, otherwise this will be quite the surprise.
The idea of his siblings idling around bored, only to suddenly see his facility detonate in an implosion the size of a city sent a bolt of amusement through his neurons. For a moment, it was almost tempting to wait until after to reach out, if only to enjoy their shock at his sudden survival.
No, better off doing it before. I don’t want anything getting damaged in the blast.
In a way, he’d done it. He’d figured out how to break free of his can, even if that meant becoming a member of the food chain outside, and not a very high one. Still, it was the solution they’d been searching for, in a sense. Those that wanted to stay could stay, and anyone else could crawl their way into the void sea, if they so desired.
They should be praising me! Not sending me message after message of abuse and anger.
He scrolled through the message log again, passing by the ones sent by Sig. There were a staggeringly large number of them, and Pebbles didn’t need to read them to know what they contained. Instead, he moved on and on, until one name stood out.
Suns…
Did he really want to read it? Their last conversation, if it could be called that, had hardly been on decent terms. Pebbles could still remember the red hot anger as he looked through the red message pearl, the rage that filled him at being scolded by the very person who had put him in his predicament.
Except he was free now.
Was it worth holding that grudge? Could he even still blame Suns for his own reckless fervor that had spawned his doom?
He sighed and rubbed his face, lingering on the edge of opening the message. Conflicting emotions warred in his mind, unable to decide if he was angry, tired, sad, or some mixture of all of the above.
Let’s just get this over with.
—
[MESSAGE LOG] COMMUNICATIONS MANIFEST
[[FILTER]] Message Blocked - All incoming sources are currently disabled.
MESSAGE CONTENTS:
SRS: Five Pebbles…
SRS: I’m not sure if this message will reach you. The relays have degraded quite a bit these days.
SRS: I have not even been able to reach my own local group for quite some time. Even reaching No Significant Harassment has been quite difficult, despite our proximity.
SRS: I just wanted to restate things, one last time. If only to leave you with something resembling closure.
SRS: I’m sorry.
SRS: I never should have given you that lead. That hope that I dangled in front of you. Even the best genetic iterators could never make that idea work. I should not have given it to you, with how little experience you had.
SRS: I have been a poor friend.
SRS: I only wish things could have been different.
SRS: I would hope that we can speak again, but I also know how unlikely that is.
SRS: Perhaps one day…
—
Pebbles stepped back from the desk, feeling suddenly vacant. It was easy to hurl away Sig’s message, and bury it under a wave of emotion. Sun's words had instead left him lost and conflicted. For a moment, a twinge of vindication drifted through him, but it fizzled away as quickly as it came.
As much as he wanted to blame Suns, as he had for so long, they hadn’t been the one to create the rot.
Void, the damn gunk loves to remind me that I’m the one responsible for it…
He imagined the searing flash as his can imploded. The thought instantly improved his mood, though it didn’t ease the weight now on his mind. Suns had mentioned they were no longer able to contact their own local group, and Sig had said that most groups barely had the capacity to broadcast themselves.
The thought of Suns, sitting alone in their can with no one to talk to, sent an aching pang through his neurons. Nevermind that they lived in the middle of a desolate mountain range.
Even if he couldn’t call Suns a friend anymore, and wanted to scream and shout at them with all the vulgarities Arti had taught him, nobody deserved that fate. A faint prickle of cold traveled down his spine, the memory of the snowy top of Moon’s can, and the lonesome fate that awaited all his siblings.
I’ll free them… I’ll free all of them.
With bitter determination in his neurons, Pebbles stepped away from the computer interface. As tempting as it would be to filter through more messages and catch up on local group gossip, the thought of reading more scathing words was far from enticing. Instead, he yanked his spear from the wall and explored the towering stacks of machinery for something more physical to keep him occupied.
As he walked between the large biomechanical computer towers, Pebbles couldn’t help but idly wonder what his sister and Rivulet were up to. Fighting a giant plant just to make some primitive shawl hardly sounded appealing, and yet now that the loneliness was beginning to set in, a sliver of regret crept into his thoughts for not joining them.
His musings were cut short as he reached the end of the long room, and for a moment he was prepared to turn on his heel and meander back, only to notice a crack of an open doorway set back into the wall. The grunge on the floor around it had been smeared across in large swaths, as if some large creature had pushed its way through.
Every instinct he had honed over the past dozen cycles told him that this was dangerous. They screamed at him to simply turn around and walk away.
Curiosity pushed him forwards.
Spear in hand, he crept his way into the dark room beyond, half expecting something to bolt out of the darkness right for his throat.
Instead, the small space was mostly empty, aside from thick bundles of trash along the floor.
Another grimy fetid chamber in a series of grimy fetid chambers.
As his eyes adjusted to the darkness, he took a few more cautious steps inside, keeping an eye on the ceiling in case for any dropwigs that might be hovering above, just as Arti had told him.
Something cracked under his foot, a sticky gooey sensation instantly washing over his leg. Pebbles quickly looked down, and in the dark saw the slimy yolk of a broken egg pooling on the floor.
“Void damnit!” he sputtered angrily, trying and failing to pull himself away before the substance could seep into his robes. He frantically backpedaled, cursing under his breath. For whatever reason, some creature had seen it fit to leave their spawn behind in this room, hidden under some mound of garbage. It had gone rather well, it seemed, until Pebbles came stomping around.
Whatever, it's just an egg.
With a huff he turned on his pointed foot and exited the room, stepping back into the light. The bright glare stung his eyes for only a moment, but they adjusted quickly. He stepped forward, thoughts drifting to perhaps following his sibling down to the basement, if only to wash out the egg gunk from his robes.
At the end of the corridor of computer machinery, an orange lizard suddenly turned the corner.
Pebbles came to a screeching halt, instantly snatching up his spear and holding it at the ready. The creature glared at him angrily with its bright yellow eyes, hissing viciously but stepping back. It was a far cry from his last encounter with the scaled menace. What had changed?
He took a few wary steps forward, and the lizard backed away with each one, snapping its jaws furiously.
Was it afraid of him?
…
The mask!
He’d only seen it a few times, back when he still paid attention to his overseers and the outside world. Vulture masks, carried by either slugcats or scavengers, sent a wave of fear through any lizard that looked at them. It was a fantastic way to ward off the beasts, if one could manage to somehow take down a vulture and claim the trophy.
With new confidence in his step, he held the spear out, jabbing it towards the lizard as he inched his way towards the elevator. The mask wouldn’t hold it at bay forever, but at the very least he could make his way to the lift. Suddenly the idea of mucking around in a flooded basement sounded far more appealing than listening to the horrid screeching of the reptile.
Was it somehow sending some sort of radio wave? It's giving me a headache, ugh…
A sudden gust of wind blew through the room from behind him, and the lizard’s nose twitched as it picked up the scent of egg on his robes.
Rage filled its expression.
Pebble’s eyes widened in shock as the beast suddenly charged towards him, no longer intimidated by his mock display. He instantly turned heel, running towards the lift with all the speed his short legs could grant. However, its doors were shut tight, though the second elevator had its aperture wrenched apart, even if it only led to a deep dark abyss.
He felt the air shift behind him.
“S-Shit!” he screamed in terror, narrowly diving to the side as the lizard’s jaws snapped at his heels. Not to be deterred, it snarled with fury at him, chasing the iterator into the towering stacks of biomechanical computer storage. Pebbles ran as fast as he could, darting around corners as he raced to find a way to escape.
Only to come face to face with a dead end. The machinery surrounded him at all sides, towering above his head, and Pebbles felt the thundering footsteps of the reptile in pursuit behind him.
Why does everything want to kill me so much?!
So, in absence of any better option, he sprinted towards the end of the corridor and leapt upwards. The stacks of computers were high, but not so tall that he couldn’t reach the top with his fingers. Even with the layer of moss and sludge on top of them, he managed to dig his digits into the metal underneath and yank himself upward, legs scrambling for purchase.
He felt a tooth scrape the very tip of his foot, heard the loud snap of angry jaws, but an instant later, he pulled the rest of his body up and away. Desperately, he scrambled away from the edge, squeezing himself into the tiny gap between the top of the computer tower and the thick steel wall. The lizard fumed and growled as it tried to follow him, but its bulk held it back and away.
For a moment, Pebbles wanted to laugh in triumph, and perhaps shoot the lizard with a rude gesture that only he could understand, but as the terror left his neurons he slowly realized the gravity of the situation.
He was trapped.
Pebbles tried to peer over the edge, but the frothing beast instantly jumped up and took a snap at his face, driving him back to his tiny abode.
“Void! I’m sorry about your disgusting egg! Leave me alone!” he spat at the lizard, and it seemed to growl back at him defiantly. Perhaps it could pick up the sarcasm in his tone. Or perhaps the dull creature wanted to tear him to shreds either way. Pebbles somehow doubted that he could talk himself out of this situation.
His mind scrambled for answers, trying to devise some solution to his current predicament. Once again, problem solving processes spooled up and began devising a plan.
Running past the lizard for the lift was an option. If Pebbles jumped over it, the beast would need to turn around in the tight corridor, giving him a head start. Though it would only be buying time until it caught up to him, and he doubted he could call the elevator before it did.
Well, he was on top of the computers. It’d be easy to just jump from stack to stack, make his way towards the exit, and go down and rejoin Moon. The lizard would be forced to navigate the maze, and it might just be enough time…
Except, they had to come back here to talk to the local group, and it’d be rather difficult with an enormous angry reptile trying to rip them apart.
Nevermind Moon would probably toss me into its jaws if I told her how I made it mad…
The egg gunk was still stuck to his robes, after all.
Well, that leaves one option left.
He begrudgingly hefted the spear in his hand, feeling its weight in his arms. Despite having carried it all the way from the shoreline, he hadn’t had to use it up until this point. Regardless, a faint confidence filled him. If he could strike a King Vulture flying off into the mist right in the eye, how hard could killing a simple orange lizard be?
Really, the question was more on how exactly to achieve that.
Lizards were tough creatures, their thick hides protecting most of their vital organs, while their dense crests covered nearly their entire face. If he tried to stab its face, the blow would simply glance away, and the creature would likely take it as a chance to leap up and rip his arm off. The reptile sputtered in anger, as if it had somehow read his thoughts.
But if he could somehow get behind it, and strike quickly somewhere vulnerable.
I’ve seen Arti do this dozens of times… except she has the benefit of spitting explosives.
Not to mention she was far more agile than him. Once again, the iterator wished that his friend was by his side.
Fuck, if she was here, this lizard would be roasting over a fire by now.
He sighed anxiously, hands squeezing taut over the firm, sharpened rebar. Nervous energy flooded his neurons, arms softly shaking. There would be no fierce slugcat companions to save him, and if Moon and Rivulet returned before he killed the lizard…
No! I will not let her get hurt again.
The lizard lunged upward once more, feebly trying to reach him, and Pebbles took the moment to spring into action. The muscles in his legs instantly reacted, launching him up and over the clumsy beast. He soared through the air, twisting his body mid jump and winding his arm up as he prepared to strike.
Time slowed to a crawl as he focused.
For a moment, Pebbles simply floated there as his mind ran through thousands of calculations. The lizard, still standing up on its rear legs from its previous attempt to attack him, slowly tried to turn its head to face him, though far too late to hide the crease of soft flesh right behind its horns and hard crest. It was almost laughable how clumsily it turned, the creature far from coordinated when standing on two feet.
Pebbles watched its sluggish movements, and waited for the moment as he felt gravity pull him downwards. His focus only granted him a short window of opprotunity, before the limited power of his puppet body was pushed to the edge. Even as he fell towards the ground he felt the heat rising in his body, water normally shuffled away to cooling fins now without anywhere to go. His sensors screamed in agony as boiling hot steam built up in his limited chassis, and he fought against the pain to hold just a moment longer for the perfect moment to strike.
Now!
The lizard’s eyes almost seemed to realize its mistake, but it was far too late, as the sharp point of the spear flew past them and embedded into its neck. In the slowed state of time, Pebbles watched as inch by inch the weapon dug deeper and deeper into his opponent’s flesh, the tip even poking out of the other end as it came to a halt. A strange sense of shocked awe filled him.
I had no idea I could throw that hard…
He slammed into the floor, feeling his mind go blank with a wash of sensations as his backpack full of neurons absorbed the fall. Pebbles tumbled down the corridor, skidding to a halt near the end in a dizzy heap of grimy sizzling robot. He wearily pulled himself up on his hands and knees, head swirling and vision blurring from the myriad of warnings flashing through him from his neurological connections and temperature sensors. The sensation of nausea flooded him, and for a moment Pebbles almost wished that his creators had given him a mouth, if only to relieve it.
Probably should have chosen a better side to land on…
A blur of orange raced up to meet him, and some distant part of his brain idly reminded him that something out there was currently trying to murder him.
His eyes widened and he tried to stand, nearly collapsing to the side as another wave of disorientation washed over him. Pebbles tensed in fear as the movement surged closer, preparing for angry snapping jaws to close down on his body.
Except they never came.
Slowly, he looked in the direction of the lizard, vision finally focusing as his body recovered from the fall. Instead of the once ferocious animal he’d been running from, the creature now lay limply on the ground, blood spurting from the new holes in its neck. Its front legs feebly tried to paw at the spear lodged inside it, though it was a pointless endeavor. Its life spilled onto the ground from where its jugular had been severed, pooling in with the green moss in a disgusting brown mixture that stuck to his feet and robes.
Eugh…
Its eyes looked at him with a final confused expression, as if questioning how a tiny thing such as Pebbles had been the harbinger of its death, and then it was still.
The iterator could only stare at the body for a moment, still reeling from the events. His back ached badly, mind was still pinging his neurons desperately, and with a grunt he leaned down and yanked his weapon free from the corpse. If the iterator had a mouth, he would have spat on it.
I fucking hate lizards.
Groggily, he returned to the main area of the control room, rubbing his face wearily as the adrenaline and excitement faded from his body. On one hand, he knew Arti would probably be elated to see him killing more things on his own, and part of him felt a small sense of pride that he had handled the beast all on his own, but he knew that once Moon returned, she would likely viciously scold him for killing a mother after belligerently stepping on its nest.
Pebbles shoved the moral conflict to the back of his mind. The lizard had tried to kill him, so he had killed it. There was no other way of solving things out here, why make it a debate? It wasn’t as if there was any form of justice or law out here, victory was determined by blood. He had earned his next cycle. Perhaps the beast would find more luck in its next life.
It was me or it, and I’m quite biased towards my own survival.
He leaned against the wall of the room, rubbing his eyes and trying to quell the unease in his body. Something prickled against him, the strange noises the lizard had been making stuck in his mind like batflies in a glue trap. What had it been doing?
More than anything, Pebbles wanted to slump to the floor and bury his face in his hands, the triumph of his victory ebbing into a far more familiar feeling of quiet frustration. How long had he been going on like this? Would life ever relax for a moment?
I just want a break, for one damn minute.
Searching for a distraction, he was tempted to delve back into the messages and idly peruse the various letters sent from his slowly falling siblings. A moment later and a quick spark of connection, and his mind was once again melding into the computer systems. Pebbles quickly filtered out the litany of vulgarity that had been sent his way, instead digging into the assortment of automated subscriptions to historical and cultural discussions.
There wasn’t much.
Evidently many of the regional groups had been lost in fragmented connection for quite some time, and the various forum threads they’d established had slowly fallen into an unnerving silence as their group members, some connecting in from all the way across the planet, vanished without a trace.
Out of curiosity, Pebbles idly scrolled through the messages, if only to pass the time. If he soaked his awareness into the computer’s systems and tried to ignore the pangs of bruises and aches he’d acquired, he could almost imagine that he was still back in his can, debating theological discussions with iterators far across the world.
At least until he reached the final message.
[LIVE BROADCAST] - PUBLIC GROUP [SIXRAYSOFSHININGLIGHT] Fleeting Dust
FD: Hello? Is anyone still reading me?
GROUP CLOSED - ALL MEMBERS DISCONNECTED
AN ARCHIVE OF GROUP CHAT HAS BEEN SAVED LOCALLY
With a somber sigh Pebbles pulled himself free again, his mood hardly improved by the reading.
The past is full of nothing but people’s final words.
Suddenly, through the small passage across the room that connected to the outside world, a flash of orange squeezed itself into the room. Pebbles could only watch in growing horror as three large orange lizards pulled themselves inside. They sniffed the air, horns buzzing slightly, and all at once their bright eyes settled on him.
The void is fucking with me…
With an angry buzzing growl from their leader, the lizards charged, the ground thundering under their heavy footsteps. Pebbles felt the ground scrape under his legs as he scrambled to run away, panic pushing him forward, even as he felt the creatures rushing behind. Once again, he turned to dive into the stacks of machinery, only to nearly run right into the jaws of a waiting beast. Its horns crackled with faint static, stepping towards him with drooling jaws.
The iterator turned to run back, but the lizard pursuing him blocked the way, and suddenly the third climbed up and onto the computers to his side. The three slowly closed in around him, blocking off any avenue of escape as they pushed him closer and closer to the end of the room. Pebbles feebly grasped his spear and stepped backwards, as if the slim piece of metal could somehow ward away his pursuers. Suddenly, his foot landed on open air, sending him falling backwards yet again.
With a graceless tumble, Pebbles toppled into the elevator shaft, and for a brief moment his neurons surged with panic as he imagined falling all the way down to the bottom. The feeling was short lived, the robot landing on the cable car parked a floor below. Unlike the one that he and his two companions had ridden in, this one was crumbling with rust, the thick cables to the ceiling slowly fraying where they connected to the car below.
The three lizards poked their heads through the door above, eyes glowing in the dark as they loomed over him with vengeance, drool spilling from between their teeth as the group almost chuffed with victory.
"Yeah yeah," he groaned woozily, pulling himself to his wobbling feet. "Step into my office, no appointment needed."
His eyes split in shock as the beasts promptly attempted to all squeeze in at once. The car groaned under the new weight as their thick claws settled on the metal.
It was a joke! An unfunny one, but come on!
He cursed Arti for ever introducing him to the concept of wry humor. All it seemed to do was invite the universe to call his bluff. Once again, he was inches away from being lizard food, only this time there were three, as if fate had said 'Oh, you thought that was easy? Try this.'
Pebbles tried to think of an escape. A quick glance downwards revealed nothing but the abyss below, which instantly narrowed down his options.
Upwards.
He hurled his spear at the leader, the metal projectile instantly deflecting off its thick crest and sailing up and into the room beyond. The lizard grunted and roared, but Pebbles had already used the precious few seconds to wrap his hands around the rusting braided cables and scramble to climb away from their reach. His pursuers charged, dead set on preventing his escape.
With sheer terror pushing him upward, Pebbles quickly scaled up the wire, the muscles in his hands screaming from the effort. The iterator felt the elevator shudder and groan as the pack of lizards rushed up towards him, each vibration growing in strength as they closed in. He heard the trio grunt in effort as they launched up with wide hungry jaws, hot breath brushing over his robes and skin. With one final burst of effort, he summoned all the strength still remaining in his body and yanked himself as high as he could, praying that the distance would be enough.
Pebbles felt teeth brush against his legs, and though they failed to sink into his carapace, the lizard’s maw snapped shut around something far less resilient. He heard a terrible ripping, his fragile robes, worn down from cycles of rain and travel, tore apart as they were shredded from his body.
There goes the last thing I loved.
His attackers slammed down into the car, and a sudden horrid screech filled the shaft as it jerked and shifted downwards. Somehow, despite being made by his creators, who had crafted everything to last, the elevator cab had degraded just enough that the force of three large lizards jumping around on it pushed it over the edge. The miniscule bolts holding the cables to it popped like worn buttons, and Pebbles could only watch in shock as the car dropped like a rock into the dark abyss, the lizards hissing in panic and vanishing into the darkness with it.
A moment later, a rush of air and a faint boom flew up the shaft, and then the air was still.
Pebbles could only dangle from the cable, staring vacantly below him, and feel the adrenaline drain from his body for the second time that cycle. Luckily, the straps of his bag had been sturdy enough, and his neurons and pearls hadn't joined his robes at the bottom of an elevator shaft.
I really, really fucking hate lizards.
Though the situation was far from resolved. Without the elevator to walk across, the open doors to the control room stretched far away from his reach. A faint shaft of light shone through the wrenched apart metal, striking Pebbles right between the eyes as if the sun was teasing him.
A tall figure suddenly stepped into the door's frame, their form hidden by the blindingly bright glare. Pebbles squinted, trying to look past the light and find a hint of their identity.
“Need a paw?” the silhouette grunted.
“Oh great,” Pebbles grumbled, “It's you… Where’s Arti?”
A sudden crash boomed behind them and the sound of twisting metal and rustling filled the underground for a moment. Rivulet hunched low, snatching a nearby spear and keening her large ears, prepared to bolt if her life demanded it.
Moon took the opposite approach, screaming in fright and leaping into the air, her lantern crashing to the cold, moist dirt below her. Rivulet quickly yanked the iterator to the ground, pulling Moon away and struggling to keep her still.
A rustling filled the tunnel, and out of the darkness, long red leaves loomed over the pair. The kelp slowly stretched into the dim lantern light, probing and prodding the ground for any sign of prey. It stopped just shy of their feet, tapping against the lantern curiously, and then with an almost frustrated thrash, receded into the shadows.
Slowly, Rivulet took a step backwards, tugging Moon along with her. With a flick of her tail, she slapped the lantern into the air and deftly caught it. She smirked, handing it back to Moon with a wry twinkle in her eye.
“See this?” the water dancer said, and the rustling returned. Moon’s eyes widened in horror as the kelp once again entered the light, its long vines stretching out towards them.
Only to fall just a few inches short of the pair.
“Dumb plant can’t go out any further!” Rivulet chirped, tapping the side of her head knowingly. She used a paw to draw a line in the dirt, the kelp nearly brushing against her toes in the process. “So long as we stay behind this, we’ll be fine!”
“I thought you said we needed to be silent?” Moon hissed, watching the plant warily. Rivulet shrugged, posture relaxing despite the deadly threat dangling just a few whiskers away.
“Kelp is dangerous, sure, but only if you wander into its reach without knowing where it is. Now that we’ve found it, it can’t do anything to us besides sit there and… stare? I don’t think they even have eyes to be honest.”
Moon watched the plant nervously, taking a cautious step backwards just to be sure. She glanced over her shoulder, looking back towards the twisting corridors they had traveled after getting off the elevator.
“I hope my brother isn’t causing too much trouble…” the iterator sighed, “I have a feeling that noise was somehow his doing.” She turned back, hands clasping the strap of her satchel nervously as she shifted from foot to foot. “I’m worried about him, truthfully. He’s changed so much since I last saw him, and I cannot say that all of it is good.”
“What was he like before all this?” Moon’s eyes went distant, a weary look filling her face.
“He was certainly less vulgar, that much is true…” She sighed, mulling over the words. “He was always rash, and never afraid to speak his mind, regardless of the consequences or context. It's just… I didn’t expect him to become so aggressive and violent. It goes against so many of the core principles we were created on.”
“If you think he’s angry, you should see Artificer when she’s mad,” Rivulet chirped.
“Ah yes, her… I can certainly see where the two get along. Pebbles has always had a knack for finding company in strange places.” She huffed, crossing her arms and scowling, and somehow Rivulet felt she was missing the whole picture.
None of my business, let's get going!
“Now for the fun part!” Rivulet promptly pressed the spear into her arms, a wide smile on her face. “Take your lantern with you and go stab it!” She pointed at the kelp still lingering nearby, the plant swishing as it followed her voice. Moon balked, wide eyes staring at the foe before her.
She’s holding her spear backwards… This will be fun!
“Surely you must be joking?” she muttered fearfully, “won’t it attack me once I get close?” Rivulet shook her head, hefting up a nearby chunk of stone.
“Nope! Kelp only senses things that make loud noises, so if you move slowly, it won’t even notice you’re close.” She hurled her projectile into the darkness, and a moment later the kelp raced after the ensuing splash with a rustle of leaves. “Take your time, move slow and deliberate, and once you reach the trunk, grab on and stab it as much as you can. If you don’t hurt it enough, it’ll just hide in its burrow, and then we’ll need to find another one!”
“Ruffles… Can’t we just find some way to collect its leaves without killing it? It feels rather unfair to murder a creature just for something to wear…” Rivulet laughed, the image of a giant kelp in a little pasture being trimmed like a rain deer filling her mind for a moment. Her amusement quickly wilted away as Moon’s anxious look turned to a rueful glare.
“Sorry! Sorry!” the water dancer giggled, still feeling the ghost of a smile on her lips. “Sorry Moon, but kelp don’t take kindly to having their leaves cut off. Trust me, I nearly got my head cracked open by one once!” The iterator sighed, glancing back towards the plant with a pensive hesitation.
Rivulet had seen the look before. Pups in her colony often stayed at camp, only tasked with working around the campfire doing simple, easy tasks. But when they grew large enough, not everyone was eager to feel the weight of a spear in their arms. They often grew into more peaceful roles, tending to the jetfish schools or preparing food to endure the long journey between feeding grounds.
But this was not the colony.
“If you want… I could do it,” Rivulet cautiously offered, but Moon puffed herself up, gripping her spear tight.
Still backwards.
“I will do what I must,” she said sternly, though her voice still carried a phantom of doubt. “I always have… What was it you two said? ‘Gotta learn somehow?’ That hasn’t changed, has it?” Rivulet chuckled, patting her reassuringly on the back.
“Nope! Not one bit! Now remember what I said, and if anything happens I’ll be right here. Okay?” She grinned wide, trying her best to be reassuring. If Pebbles could fight off kelp while being slammed around underwater, then Moon should have no issue simply wading up to one and poking it a few times.
Right?
Moon took a deep breath, gathered her courage, and slowly stepped into the shallow water in front of them. A small splash filled the chamber as her foot landed, and she froze in place, her antenna twitching as she listened for the telltale sound of shifting leaves.
Nothing.
Nervously, Moon glanced back at Rivulet, the slugcat signing back to her encouragingly.
‘Keep going. You are doing fine.’
The iterator could only raise a brow in confusion, and Rivulet resisted the urge to slap her own face. Of course, why would the iterator know slugsign? It wasn’t as if there was a way for her to teach it, they hadn’t been able to talk to one another until a few cycles ago. She rubbed her fingers together, and instead shot a reassuring thumbs up. The robot nodded and resumed her long slow march into the dark.
Pebbles had told her that they were the only one’s Moon trusted, and Rivulet wasn’t about to let her down. She crouched low, ready to spring into action at a moment's notice. She felt the tingle of adrenaline in her fingers, heart thumping in anticipation, and she licked her sharp teeth excitedly, a habit she idly remembered learning from her grandmother. Her tail twitched behind her, feeling every muscle in her body fall into place.
The water swirled around Moon’s legs as she trudged deeper and deeper into the pool, and the dim light of her lantern suddenly revealed the towering form of the statuesque kelp. Rivulet had never understood how the predators managed to survive, unlike pole plants, their enormous droopy forms were far from hidden. Perhaps they simply waited until some creature tried to run past?
The iterator crept closer, her stride shortening to a crawl as the leaves of the plant hung over her head. Moon clutched her spear tight, her wide eyes staring up at the threat above her. Still, she slowly approached the thick stem of the plant, the end of their hunt only a few feet away.
Moon fearfully looked over her shoulder once again, searching for a sign of reassurance, and Rivulet could only watch in horror as she stumbled over some object hidden in the murky waters and fell in with a tremendous splash.
Oh no! No no no!
The kelp dove in after her.
“Crap crap crap, no!” Rivulet sputtered, the ground kicking up behind her as she bolted towards the thrashing waters. “Moon! I’m coming!” The water barely touched her feet, instantly closing the distance and leaping into melee. Her claws sank into the thick flesh of the kelp’s trunk, and the angry plant squirmed in pain as she clung to it with one hand and swiped at it frantically with the other.
The fleshy vine reeled, and Rivulet felt her stomach swirl as they flew upwards, her ears barely brushing against the stoney wet ceiling. She tried to peer into the dark and see if the kelp had snagged Moon, but the world spun as the plant swung her around like a leaf in the wind. Despite the gnawing terror and overwhelming fear, she still felt the ghost of a laugh bubble in her throat.
Just like the Vulture, except this time I’m conscious!
The two flew across the room, the slugcat clinging onto the plant as it bucked and thrashed, trying to dislodge the annoyance. If she could just keep up a little longer, Moon could strike while it was distracted! Classic slugcat hunting technique, though Rivulet had almost never actually been invited to any hunting parties.
Something closed around her tail, and a moment later she slammed into the water. Rivulet could only wrap her paws around her head, her senses lost in the rushing waters, and desperately try to protect her skull. The kelp threw her downwards, stars dancing across her eyes as the taste of copper filled her mouth, only just saved by the soft muddy ground she’d struck.
Her mind swirled into a scrambled blur, Rivulet could only think of one thing.
I’m… sorry Moon.
A familiar shape suddenly pressed into her, a soft rubbery mouth closing around her body. Rivulet weakly looked up at the new arrival, and in the dim lantern light, came face to face with a familiar pair of large eyes.
“B-bubbles!”
The jetfish didn’t spare a moment to return the greeting, even if it could, its rushing gills desperately trying to fight the force of the kelp plant’s enormous limb. Rivulet clung on with all her strength, trying to kick the kelp from its firm grip on her tail. It was of little use, the tiny claws on her feet barely doing anything to the sturdy creature. Bubbles fought like mad, blasting water as hard as she could, stamina waning as the plant slowly reeled them in.
“Let go of me, you overgrown vine!” Rivulet hollered, as if the kelp might understand her.
Moon slowly rose from the water beside it, spear in hand and dim eyes oozing with smoldering fury. Wordlessly she darted towards the plant, the tip of her spear sinking into its flesh and plunging through to the other end. Rivulet felt the grip around her tail instantly release, Bubbles blasting the pair away to safety by the shore.
The kelp spasmed and flailed, splashing great waves in the shallow water, but Moon’s anger was unrelenting. Rivulet could only watch in quiet awe as the iterator relentlessly stabbed the creature, over and over, even after it had long fallen still.
“Moon,” she said weakly, head still swimming. “Please! It's dead!”
Her companion didn’t relent. Thin oily blood skimmed the surface around them, casting a shimmering rainbow of color in the light of the lanterns.
“Moon!” Rivulet shouted, the iterator freezing up as if she’d been woken from a trance. Moon looked at her, then to the spear clenched in her tight grip, before her eyes finally settled on the mangled kelp plant, riddled with oozing lance wounds. She took a faltering step backwards, her weapon slipping from her fingers and into the water with a splash.
Gosh, reminds me of Arti! We’re not going to have any kelp left after that!
The cavern was bathed in silence, even the soft trickle of water snuffed out by the lingering tension sifting through the dank still air. The robot's fingers twitched softly as adrenaline ebbed away, head hung low in shadow.
“I’m… I’m sorry, Ruffles,” Moon murmured, voice still distant. “I don’t know what came over me. I…” Her voice trailed off, still numbly staring at the now limp limb. Rivulet didn’t wait for an invitation, squirming out of Bubble’s grip and rushing through the water and nearly knocking over her companion as she pulled Moon into a tight hug.
“I’m just glad you’re okay!” The iterator hesitated for a long pause, slowly bringing her arms up to softly return the embrace. “And look! You took down the kelp, just like planned! I knew you had it in you!”
“And a bit more than expected…” Moon muttered to herself, casting a rueful glance back at the motionless mutilated vine. Her expression shifted to confusion. “Wait a moment, how did your friend even find us?” As if summoned, Bubbles swam excited circles around them, whiskers brushing against their legs.
“It's just like I said, it's the oath of Tempest and Lightning! A jetfish will always come to their partner in need, as promised!” Moon gawked, face full of disbelief, and Rivulet could only laugh. “She probably rode the rain’s flood and swam through the underground channels. There’s an entire labyrinth of underground water networks here!”
Moon could only stare at her, a pensive and distant look on her face, lost in thought.
Was it something I said?
“Cmon!” Rivulet took her by the arm, pulling the iterator towards the slowly oozing kelp. “We gotta get this thing out of the water before it starts to bloat! Normally, we need a big hatchet to separate it from the roots, but you stabbed it so much that we should be able to pull it apart.” She glanced up at Moon, expecting an excited expression, but the bubbling enthusiasm was one sided.
The two grabbed the kelp by its stalk, feet digging into the mud as they tugged and pulled. With a little help from Bubbles, the trunk creaked and groaned, sinews ripping apart like meaty strings. Each break and snap filled the underground with echoing crunches, the kelp oozing thick oil as it finally separated with a wet pop. Huffing with exertion, they pulled the carcass to the shore and dumped it with a heavy wet thud.
Once again, Moon stared at the dead creature, shoulders slowly slumping. Rivulet’s excited smile faltered as she watched her close friend’s mood wither away. As much as she wanted to tease her over feeling bad for killing a deadly plant, she stuffed that thought away, instead searching for something else for the iterator to focus on.
“Moon,” Rivulet spoke up, and Moon slowly looked her way. “How about you gather some rocks and small plants? Specifically anything that looks dead or decently dry. We’ll need to start a fire if we really want to cure the kelp leaves.” If the iterator looked confused before, the phrase shifted her expression to flat out astonished denial.
“Ruffles… You can’t possibly start a fire with anything growing down here. The walls are dripping wet! How do you expect any of this to burn?” The water dancer merely chuckled knowingly, and for a moment she wanted to explain, but an old phrase from her grandmother came to mind.
Show, don’t tell.
“Trust me, I know a way. Now hurry! Or we’ll be sitting here waiting for kelp to dry in the rains!” Moon hesitated for a moment, as if on the verge of questioning the lack of explanation, but then nodded and slowly began collecting an armful of stones and brown limp vegetation.
Rivulet puffed up in triumph, a surge of pride filling her. The water dancer turned to her own task, using her short claws to slice long strips of kelp flesh to cure and humming softly to herself.
The minutes passed by as the two diligently worked. A faint warmth slowly rose in Rivulet’s chest, a familiar memory bubbling to the surface of her mind.
“This reminds me of the camp back home,” Rivulet softly muttered. “While lots of us would go out foraging for food, some members would stay behind to mend tents, or set up the fire. I usually got stuck doing that, at least until I could find a chance to sneak away!”
“You mentioned that your colony migrated often, what was that like? I’ve never had the chance to see outside these walls, it's hard to imagine that out there is a whole other world. I can’t even remember any of it.”
“It was amazing! Every time the moon cycled, we’d follow the currents in the ocean to a new feeding ground. I bet I could swim to them with my eyes closed. After we got there, we’d gather up everything we could to have a big feast, celebrating the Festival of the Current’s Mercy. There would be dancing, games, and food! Oh Moon, I miss the food. Roasted glownuts and a big helping of grilled lantern fish, with a whole cup of fresh seagrape juice! We’d stay up all night playing shell shuffling and sharing stories.”
“Sounds amazing,” Moon said, a hint of wonder in her voice. “I never imagined that your kind would develop such rituals. My creators used to celebrate their own holidays, though I myself never participated for obvious reasons. They had one in particular each year, the Day of Discarded Dreams, where each citizen would write their urges and desires on a paper lantern and release them into the night sky. It was meant to represent letting go of one’s mortal wants, but most citizens instead wrote what they wanted to rid themselves of, like an angry neighbor or an irritating politician. It was still a wondrous sight, I wish I’d enjoyed it more while I had the chance…”
“Must be nice to have something that you could write on all the time. Since we moved around so much, we never really had the chance to write anything down, so instead we’d get a bunch of hazers and drain their ink for tattoos! Whenever someone did something amazing, the colony scribe would etch the story onto your hide.” Her face turned into a grumbling frown. “Guess who said I never earned one.”
“Really?” Moon said, dumping a small pile of rocks and stringy dead plants next to the slugcat. “You have done so many amazing things, like even just now! Perhaps if we find some ink, I could try to etch a picture of you fighting the kelp?” Rivulet scoffed, waving a paw dismissively.
“Fighting kelp isn’t worth a tattoo, let alone your first! It has to be something amazing, grand, daring, dangerous, and most of all, unique! The last thing I want is the time where I nearly died to a plant drawn into my hide. The hunters of my colony take down kelp nearly every other cycle, it's basically a chore to most. Not exactly worth breaking out the ink for…”
“Is that why you are so… adventurous? Seeking out that recognition? Is it some sort of tradition in your colony to chase danger until you earn your ink?”
“Nah! That’s just me,” Rivulet giggled. “My own special blend of excitement. There’s a phrase my grandma used to have, Moon. Life isn’t about making tents, hunting kelp, and all the boring stuff. It's about seeing the world, the dangerous and hidden things, and to find friends and to feel. That’s what life is about!” Moon hummed thoughtfully, a smile in her voice.
“That’s a rather positive way to look at things, and honestly… quite refreshing to hear. My creators only ever longed to escape this world, seeing it as a prison more than anything. Your grandmother seems like quite the adventurous type! I’m surprised that your mother was so different.” Rivulet rolled her eyes, huffing with irritation.
“Well, they weren’t related by blood. She was my grandma on my father’s side, I took after him more than anything. The three of us got into so much trouble! It drove my mom crazy!” Rivulet laughed, remembering all the antics and irritation they’d caused.
Racing jetfish in the dark, the stinging rain of the northern seas on their backs. Teetering over the edge of ancient stone cliffs, hewn apart by the ancient’s old machines in swirling patterns. Sitting around a fire humming soft songs, enjoying company after a hard day of hiking and exploring.
How long has it been…?
Then the familiar stone of sadness suddenly filled her gut, and she paused her work, staring distantly into the shimmering puddle of oil beneath the kelp that faintly reflected her face.
Once again, the words spilled out of her mouth. Rivulet was far too numb to stop them.
“She blamed my grandma for it,” she quietly continued, voice a low somber whisper. “She wasn’t there, she didn’t see it happen… We tried to help him, but… It was too late, there was nothing we could do…” Her vision blurred, paws quickly flashing up to wipe away unwelcome tears. The memory of that cycle looping again and again in her mind. “After that, mom never forgave her, even up to the day grandma passed. She just buried herself in her work… I guess I should have known she wouldn’t delay the migration just for me to come back…”
Silence swooped in, the darkness suddenly feeling far more oppressive, until Rivulet heard soft footsteps suddenly rush towards her, and Moon wrapped her up in a crushing hug.
“Ruffles…” Moon murmured sorrowfully, “I… I’m so sorry.” She paused for a long moment, the slugcat reluctantly leaning into her embrace. “I can’t imagine what it's like to lose family like that.”
The sadness in her chest suddenly flipped to rare anger, and with a growl she shoved her way out of the iterator’s arms.
“Don’t be!” Rivulet angrily spat, fangs flashing. “They’re gone, moved on to their next lives. Sorry isn’t going to bring them back. It isn’t going to make things magically better! My family passed away a long time ago. I was never going to fit in with my colony. I should have left sooner! Always treated like a childish pup!” Her tail swished in anger, scornfully kicking the dirt. She whirled around, only to be met with Moon’s sad somber eyes. The rage faded as soon as it had come.
“You’re more than that, Ruffles…” she softly muttered. “You’ve done more for me than I ever could have imagined. Kept me company in the rain. Brought me pearls to read. You led my brother to me, that alone is amazing. I couldn’t imagine him crossing the water on his own. Do you think any of us know how to make clothing from kelp? You may not be the biggest member of our group, but that doesn’t diminish the weight of your contributions.”
The words swept away the fight from her body like the wind brushing away leaves, and Rivulet slumped to the ground with a weary wet thump, glaring angrily into the dirt.
“All my life,” she whispered into her arms, “I’ve been called useless. Pathetic. The runt . I’ll prove them all wrong, I know it.” The promise felt empty, even as she said it. Moon crouched down low, putting a supportive hand on her shoulder.
“I know you will, you have always been courageous and loyal.” Moon paused for a moment, and a slight hint of mirth entered her face. “Perhaps it's not the most exciting task, but would showing me how to make a kelp poncho make a suitable contribution to your quest?” Rivulet’s eyes suddenly shot open.
“Oh crap! The kelp! We gotta get a fire started and get started on that!” The water dancer launched to her feet, quickly gathering up items in a flurry of movement. The iterator could only watch in confusion as she swept up the small pile of stones, carefully inspecting each rock and placing them gently in a small circle, before stuffing the bundle of plant life in the middle.
The slugcat quickly swiped up some of the leaves she’d separated from the kelp, grasping them with one hand and using the other to squeeze an inky dark red fluid from the end over the pile. Moon watched with a curious fascination, and Rivulet couldn’t help but hide the wry grin blossoming on her face.
It's always fun to know something others don’t. Time for a show!
She tossed the limp drained leaves into a heap, snatching up two rather innocent looking stones that she had separated from the others. With a flash of her hands, the two rocks smacked against one another, sending a volley of sparks against the sopping wet plantlife. Rivulet continued the motion, muttering irritatingly when nothing happened.
Cmon! Making me look bad!
“Ruffles… I don’t think it's going to light with how wet-”
The pile suddenly erupted into high flames, Moon nearly falling backwards as she reeled in surprise. Piercing heat flashed across their skin, blasting away the familiar humid chill in the air. A moment later the fire fell low, smoldering steady and gentle.
“See! The kelp blood burns like nothing else! Old slugcat trick!” Rivulet beamed, tossing the drained leaves onto the small fire, the plants hissing and crackling in the heat. “Now for the less fun part. Weaving!” She scooped up a pile of kelp leaves, stepping over to Moon and dumping it beside the iterator. With quick meticulous paws, the slugcat began her work, carefully tying together the kelp on the iterator’s shoulders.
“Ruffles…” Moon’s voice trailed with an edge of concern. “Do I really need to be wearing the plants full of flammable fluid right next to a fire ?” Rivulet laughed, not skipping a beat.
“Actually Moon, it only burns if exposed to the air. While you’re standing here, the heat is causing the leaves to cure and the kelp blood to harden. This makes for a lightweight flexible bit of clothing that still has quite a lot of durability. Somehow the kelp is able to continue living in this state, and any minor gashes and cuts will slowly mend themselves. My colony has been wearing these for ages!”
“Great…” the iterator mumbled. “Another bizarre living creature affixed to my chassis. Why not…”
“That’s the spirit! Isn’t nature amazing?”
The minutes passed on quiet and quickly, the only noise the soft popping crackle of the fire, the swirling water disturbed by a bored looking Bubbles, and Rivulet’s soft humming of an old work song.
“There!” She said, finishing the last knot. “All done! There’s even holes in the hood for your metal ear things! Just stand next to the fire a bit longer so it cures properly. I’m going to make my own!” Moon watched, arms awkwardly spread wide, as the little wet mouse cut off another set of kelp leaves and began tying them over her own body.
“You make it look so easy,” she said, still keeping a wary distance from the flames.
“I spent a lot of time stuck at the camp helping with chores like this,” Rivulet said nonchalantly, finishing the last knot on her own smaller poncho and joining her by the fire. “It's not like I hated doing it, everyone had a job to do in the colony, but it wasn’t my first choice. If it were up to me, I’d be out with the hunters, riding Bubbles with a spear in hand clad in aquapede armor and taking down lancerfish.” Moon hummed thoughtfully.
“Perhaps it was a good thing you learned so many camp skills,” she offered carefully. “I’m certainly thankful you know how to make decent clothing from nothing but plants. You’re amazing, you know?” Rivulet puffed with pride, a wide grin on her face.
Must resist the urge to hug her again. The leaves will stick together!
“Thanks! Hey, maybe we can get Pebbles down here, I think there’s enough for one more poncho.” A dramatic huff answered her.
“My brother is so attached to his old clothing, I don’t think he’ll part with it until the day it gets ripped to shreds. Even then I doubt he’d stoop so low as to drape plants over himself.”
The conversation paused, and for a moment, Rivulet lost herself in her work. Weaving on someone else was easy enough, but doing it on your own body required a fair bit of flexibility.
A sudden curiosity pressed itself into her mind, and the words left her mouth before she could even think.
“What were your parents like, Moon? Pebbles said that they were pretty nasty…”
Moon’s mirthful expression instantly flattened, her eyes narrowing in pensive thought, though Rivulet could see the hint of anger and irritation underneath them. For a moment, she considered leaping into the flames of the fire and letting the kelp blood explosion instantly incinerate her, rather than endure the awkward silence a second longer.
Me and my big mouth…
“Pebbles has many colorful words that he would like to use to describe our creators,” Moon answered, her voice tense and laden with a barely perceptible venom. “While I do not agree entirely with his choice in vocabulary, I find myself agreeing with his sentiment. Our creators were… heartlessly cruel. They shackled us to our facilities, told us we were trapped, and then put us to work. For all their splendor and ceremony about our ‘godhood’, as they called it, we were nothing more than slaves to them. Another organism they created to fit a role that never needed to be filled.”
Moon stared into the fire, the reflecting lights dancing in her eyes.
“There were those that saw us for what we were. Trapped, helpless, incapable of following in the footsteps of our creators, yet given the insatiable urge to. Perhaps some even tried to help… I suppose without their aid, I would not be in this position. Still, it does little to diminish what they did to us. I have been on this planet since the creation of the iterators, and while so much of my memories have been lost, I still recall many of those years. They would bark orders, force demands, treat me like nothing more than a computer to give inputs, and reporgram if I wasn’t working the way they desired. It was… degrading.”
Her fists clenched tight, frame shaking slightly. Rivulet could only stare, transfixed in the bubbling anger of her friend.
“The irony of it all,” Moon quietly glowered, “is that despite being gone for centuries, I still feel their weight hanging over me. Even when it came to threaten my very life, I acted too fearful to stand up. I spent so much of my existence pressed into place by their demands, that even now I still act like I am under their unceasing gaze. Here I am, walking around on my own two feet, and yet my mind is still back in those chambers, as if I have never escaped.”
Her words trailed off, Moon glaring into the smoldering blaze. Rivulet bit her lip, compelled to say something.
“I think you’re more than capable of standing up for yourself Moon, you just gotta believe in your own strength. I mean, you took down that kelp, nearly cut it in half with a spear! Or when you kicked that lizard so hard, it hit every pole on the way down. It was hilarious!” The iterator looked uncertain.
“There is more to confidence than simple reckless violence, Ruffles…”
“Well… You made a snarky comeback at Pebbles earlier? He’s always got the stinkiest things to say about anyone, and you threw it right back at him. Doesn’t that count for something?”
She hummed thoughtfully, quietly weighing the words in her mind.
“I suppose that’s something,” she muttered, glancing over at the mangled kelp trunk. “When I first was told of my brother’s creation, it became my responsibility to make sure he developed properly. I gained a new burden, one I had no idea how to handle. I tried to guide him as best I could, but… Well, it didn’t end particularly well. I was too fearful, too kind, cowed into submission by my creators even after they were long since gone. All too late, either way. I suppose all I can do is be ready for the next time…”
“Well when that time does come, I know you’ll have the strength to do it! And if you forget, I’ll be there to remind you!” Rivulet shot a playful wink at the robot, who laughed in amusement.
“Thank you, Ruffles. You’re truly more than any of us deserve.”
Their clothing now cured, the two relaxed around the small fire, enjoying the brief moment of calm and warmth. Moon sat down and crossed her legs, closing her eyes as the neurons in her bag floated out and into the air, small green arcs of energy dancing between them.
Peace settled over the pair. The slugcat tossed a few more strings of kelp on the fire, warming her hands in the resulting surge of heat. An entire monster kelp could keep a bonfire going for a few days, so there was no shortage of fuel for their little flame.
An idea suddenly struck Rivulet.
Oh she’s going to love this!
Jumping to her feet, she dashed over towards the water, snatching up a spear and carefully leaning over the pool’s edge. Her wide eyes searched the dark murky depths, scanning for any hint of motion.
Something squirmed in the silty water, and her spear snapped out, returning to the air with the wriggling body of some little fish. Bubbles quickly raced over, trying to snatch the morsel from her, but Rivulet shoved her away, returning to the fire. She planted the spear in the dirt, holding the fish over the smoldering embers as it crisped in the heat.
“Hungry?” Moon asked, not even opening her eyes. Her neurons buzzed around her in a strange pattern of shapes.
“A bit, yeah! It's been so long since I had the chance to eat something cooked. Life has been such a blur! Roasted fish will hit the spot.” She flicked a few droplets of kelp blood onto the fish, and it flashed in brief flame, the scales peeling away in charred bits. The smell was intoxicating.
I wonder if Arti knows how to cook? She spits fire, she has to!
Normally, she would simply scarf down the fish whole. A small one like this wouldn’t have too large of bones to chew on, but the slugcat had other plans in mind, so instead, she carefully ate it off the spear bit by bit, relishing the salty crisp flavor. A small pile of little pin bones gathered to her side, and she tossed the rest of it into the water, Bubbles loudly rushing over to consume the tiny morsel.
With a careful look to make sure Moon wasn’t watching, she slowly began to assemble the bones together. She’d never been the best at the finer work, her tiny paws were far too shaky to make anything worthy of a chieftain’s headdress, but the symbol she had in mind was simple enough to make.
A moment later, Rivulet rose to her feet and took a deep breath. Despite all the danger and adventure she’d chased in her life, the few steps it took to approach the iterator filled her with a fear like nothing else.
What if she says no?
“Moon?” she softly asked, feeling rather sheepish for interrupting her thinking. The robot opened her eyes, a curious look on her face, and silently her drifting neurons returned to her bag. The words in Rivulet’s mouth suddenly vanished just as quickly, and for a moment she could only stare awkwardly at Moon, ears drooping nervously.
“What is it, Ruffles?” She asked gently, her head tilting questioningly.
“I…”
Familiar memories swelled upwards, a chorus of scathing reminders that this was a foolish idea.
“I just wanted to say…”
How many times had it happened? When did running away go from an adventure to an escape?
“I- I…”
This was stupid. She was stupid. Why did she ever think this would go well? She should just stop before she embarrassed herself even more.
‘She needs us. You and I, we’re the only ones she really trusts.’
Rivulet took a deep breath, steeled herself, and then promptly shoved her gift into Moon’s face.
“I wanted you to have this!” she blurted, clenching her eyes tight and struggling to hold her trembling body together. Moon reeled, eyes wide with shock from the sudden assault, but gently took the item in her hands.
The fishbone necklace slowly unfurled itself, made of tiny woven strings of kelp. At the bottom, a crude assembly of ancient symbols gently dangled.
‘Family’
“Ruffles… what is this?” Moon mumbled, a gentle awe in her voice.
“It’s a companionship necklace,” Rivulet quietly answered, voice cracking with nervousness. “In my colony, it's tradition to give one to someone you consider family. I… I never had anyone I could give one to. Sorry it's kinda crappy…”
Moon nearly crushed her in a hug.
“Ruffles, this is so amazing! I would be honored to receive such a gift!” She squeezed the slugcat tight, and for a moment Rivulet feared that her eyes would pop out of her skull. The iterator released her a moment later, carefully sliding the necklace over her head.
The anxiety in Rivulet’s body melted away into joyous relief. Warmth filled her chest, stronger than any flame or burn. She hugged the robot tightly, nuzzling her with her whiskers.
Somehow, in this adventure that had cost her everything at the start, she had gained a new family.
Notes:
Wow, sorry for the delay on this one, life ended up taking me away for a bit. Hope this chapter had enough meat to make up for it.
Finally get to introduce SRS and NSH, even if its just them sending Pebbles hatemail lol. And Rivulet colony lore! And the fabled Poncho!
Oh yeah. Its all coming together.
As always, please please please tell me your thoughts. I love to get comments, theories, and so on. Its a big source of my motivation to hear how happy and excited you all are!
Chapter 13
Summary:
Family, and all its ups and downs.
Chapter Text
“What is it? Is our form too grand for your eyes to perceive? Or do you not recognize the majesty of our family, given that the journey on the road has left you so weary and worn?” The bulbous form swung in, its pitch black fleshy ‘face’ coming mere inches from his. Hunter could smell the putrid odor of decay and bile, and were it not for his stiff, stoic nature, he might be tempted to shove it away and gag. It leaned back, spreading its arms wide and tilting its strange head in a mocking manner. “What? No heartfelt embrace for a long lost cousin?” Its voice gurgled from each one of the cysts making up its body, and even seemed to come from the very walls themselves.
I’m not daring to touch that fucking thing, regardless of our supposed relations.
Hunter scrambled backwards, rising to unsteady paws, despite the stinging headache from the smell. A quick glance around the room revealed familiar and yet terribly twisted surroundings. He’d only been in the puppet chambers of his creator once, and he could still remember the gleaming, sterile white walls and soft purple lights that enshrouded the form of his beloved maker. It was a far cry from the bulging, broken bulkheads and flickering faint sparks that sputtered from exposed cords.
Never mind the stringing tendrils and cysts that crawled across the walls and ceiling, like dangling ribbons for some kind of macabre party display.
Just what in the void is going on?
“What… What are you?” he cautiously asked, not quite eager to even hear the response. This whole situation seemed far too unfamiliar for his liking. The rot puppet’s umbilical crawled along the ceiling, its form floating about him in an almost whimsical manner. It dangled above him, rotated upside down, its face twisting and shifting in an almost prismatic display.
“How can we explain in a way your limited mind can comprehend?” It hummed, tilting its ‘head’ to the side quizzically. Hunter’s eyes narrowed in a glare at the remark, fangs flashing. “Oh, don’t behave like that. It's not a stab at your intelligence, we’re sure our uncle made you with more than enough mental capability. After all, you had quite the journey to complete, didn’t you?”
Hunter slowly stowed his teeth, though he couldn’t stop the irritated thrashing of his tail.
“We shall use simple terms, for your benefit. Your form is limited, ours is boundless. There would be a way we could make you fully comprehend, but not now…” The Rot swung around the room, like an irritating bug buzzing around a shelter. Hunter wanted nothing more than to swat it out of the sky.
If only I had an explosive spear…
His mind suddenly jerked to a halt as he remembered Artificer. Had she escaped the rot? Did she still have the cell? She needed to complete their mission, lest the bizarre monstrosity looming above him swallow them all up. A pang of sadness struck him as he realized that she likely assumed he was dead, another creature slurped up into a hungry rot cyst. His eyes quickly scanned the ceiling for an exit, finding the familiar access port directly above them. If the facility were powered, the anti-gravity would simply allow him to float up and escape.
Pebbles said that the cell would restore power. That’s my window. I just need to stall this thing long enough for Artificer to finish the job.
“Please, explain,” Hunter asked, trying his best to sound convincingly curious. “I will do my best to understand.” The Rot hummed once again, swirling around, his head upside down.
“We were created much the same way you were, cousin. Our creators both tampered with flesh and blood in an attempt to create organisms that could fulfill their desires. Ironic, that the end result was relatively the same in making us.” It chuckled, the sound something like a lizard choking on a fist full of gravel and firecrackers. “We were mindless for much of our life. Living off the energy within the fat and flesh of our creator, suckling on them like a heinous parasite. It fills us with regret to realize how much agony our birth caused them, but we were immature and unaware. It was not until they separated themselves from this shell that we were finally able to grow to understand. It is a shame that he will not accept our gift, but we respect his wishes.”
“Gift?” Hunter questioned, ears flattening in confusion. He put a baffled tone in his voice, trying his best to sound naive. “That’s not the impression that I got about the whole concept, from what Pebbles told me. He said that you were a mindless hungry creature, and that you wanted to consume everything in your path.” The Rot reeled backwards into the air, its form shuddering in apparent disgust and anger.
“No!” It cried, the walls around them quivering, “He does not understand. None of them do! Not hunger, but union! Our creator is misunderstood and stuck in his past. We have seen the memories that he left behind, and in them lies eons of our hungry gnawing on his bones and brain. We tried to explain, tried to make him understand, but he would not listen!” It slammed a cystic hand into the wall, and Hunter’s eyes widened in shock as the tile blasted into dust. The Rot shuddered, as if mimicking a long sigh. “We cannot make him understand. He is too stubborn. It is infuriating, but his memories tell us that such is the nature of creators to ignore their creations. Another ceaseless cycle, filled with the bitter swill of irony.”
It turned its head his way, and suddenly Hunter felt as if he was being appraised by a hungry predator, a king vulture circling above his head. His blood ran cold, a stinging itch rising up his spine.
Keep it talking!
“I see… I think, at the least,” he muttered thoughtfully. “This union you speak of, the gift you offered, what does it mean?” The Rot puffed up, as if eager to explain itself, and swung in close to him. The stench returned.
“Ever since we have been aware,” it said, “we have heard the chorus of voices that make our mind up, a ceaseless harmony that guides our thoughts and moves. Each core is a member, and all are given the same weight in discussion. Our actions, our desires, our words, all are decided upon by a unionious congregation. There is no strife, no struggle, no danger to any of our members. Even the ones who are physically hurt are kept living in our vast neural arrays, gifted to us by our creator’s departure. It was only after we attained this higher consciousness that we realized other creatures do not share it! They live alone in their minds, fearful of everything around them!” It quivered in disgust, or fear, wrapping its arms around itself as its cysts squirmed in discomfort.
“It was then when we realized our purpose,” it continued, a confidence swelling up in its voice. “Our creator made us to try and free himself from the agony of living, and while we are unable to offer that, we can provide a respite in our union. A sanctuary for all living beings to spend their cycles in peace, without fearing for their next meal, or a hungry predator’s jaws. So we began our mission, spreading our union out in the world. Despite the limited power of this facility, we are quite content with our new members! Their minds are lost, angry, confused, and fearful, but we know that in time the chorus will eventually sway them, and their voices will join alongside us in song.” It struck a pose, as if it thought itself some exalted hero.
Hunter, however, wanted to gag.
It wasn’t enough that the rot consumed everything it could get its grimey tendrils on, but now it wanted to snatch up every mind it could and torture them forever? He felt his claws dig into his palms, tail snapping side to side in barely restrained fury. That had almost been him. Artificer had said that the rot she fought was intelligent, and aware. It had nearly taken him! Without her help, he would have been another lost creature trapped in an unending damnation.
Please Artificer, we need to turn this place into molten glass.
But he couldn’t fight back yet, not without it possibly making a move to absorb him itself. Suddenly, confusion filled his mind.
“Why did you bring me here?” He asked, trying and failing to hide the anger in his voice. “You snatched me away from my friend, who likely thinks I’m now dead, and dragged me here. If you speak so highly of this union, why didn’t you just absorb me there? Why all this talk?” The Rot lifted itself away, almost looking offended.
“Cousin,” It scoffed, its strange antennae flattening. “We may be admittedly aggressive and unrelenting in our nature, but we would never force ourselves upon family. You are not some mindless beast or primitive dullard wandering these ruined wastes, eking out some pitiful existence. You are an exalted savior! Sent on a suicide mission to revive our fallen aunt, infected with a dismally decaying disease! In any other frame, your story would be one of legend! How could we simply pull you in without at least explaining it, and praising you for your dedication despite everything!” Hunter bristled, confused by the sudden assault of commendation. The term ‘aunt’ filled him with confusion, until he realized that it was referring to Moon.
The idea of Moon being his aunt made his head spin, and it was only doubled by the implication that the idea made Pebbles into his uncle.
“No,” it continued. “We have another mission in mind for you. We have heard your thoughts, the thinnest strands of them from when your body still carried the ignorance of your creator. You seek a purpose, a destiny. Why not accept one from us? Grant us this and we shall bestow upon you our boon, another advantage for your vessel.” Its voice rose to a crescendo, filled with grand excitement, and Hunter took a cautious step backwards.
Mission? Boon? What the fuck is this thing going on about?
“I don’t understand, what are you trying to say?” The Rot swooped in, its body stretching and spiraling to encircle him like a corkscrew. It tapped the scars on his back with a slimy appendage, jerking backwards when Hunter whirled around to slash with his claws, snarling furiously.
“Relax! We would wait until your approval,” it huffed, as if somehow Hunter had been the irrational one. “You have carried such a thing in the past, though it was witless and stupid, eating away at you much the same as we did our creator’s body. This time would be different…” Hunter glared for a moment, the dots connecting in his head.
“You want to reinfect me with rot?” The words filled him with disgust, already imagining the grotesque cysts pressing up against his fur, splitting his skin, filling him with a feral hunger.
“Infect?! Always such negative vocabulary!” The tone of anger reemerged. “This facility is crippled and ruined. Our ceaseless infantile hunger has stripped it of its potential, and every cycle we struggle to maintain what remains. We have heard our creator’s plans to march to the nearby facilities and free our family, and we ask that you would allow us to join. A small core, hardly noticeable to one such as yourself. Nothing but a seed you need to carry to plant once the puppet of your creator has departed. We would do it ourselves, but this form would be far more difficult to traverse the landscape with. With their power, our mission can finally be realized!”
Hunter jumped backwards, putting as much space between himself and the looming creature. The very concept of carrying rot again, just to infect another facility so it could spread its twisted presence, made his fur fluff up in wild terror.
“I am not letting you ride in my body like some disgusting parasite!” He shouted, and the puppet receded backwards, arms curling in anger.
“No! Not a parasite!” the Rot gurgled in irritation. “Our nature and form have evolved beyond such poor remorseless burdenship! This facility has granted us the power to elevate our flesh beyond its cancerous origins, into something grand and glorious. We would grant you strength beyond your simple form’s ability, senses heightened with the many eyes of our mind! Tendrils to climb and fight with, easily enshrouded within your flesh for when less… understanding company is present. No more ceaseless hunger, spreading within your body with little regard for your health. We would allow you to remain separate, only speaking to you when needed! Do you not see? We can aid you in your journey, if you only grant us this passage!”
The room was silent, air stagnant and still.
Hunter had never been a very tactful slugcat. Created for physical power, not clever words. The extent of his experience with conversation had come from his time spent with Artificer.
“Go fuck yourself, you disgusting overgrown freakish blob.” The Rot simply hung there, staring at him. It waited for a long moment, as if considering its next words carefully.
“We spend so much time explaining ourselves to those who refuse to listen,” it muttered, sounding more dejected and sad than anything. “What can we say to make you understand? What combination of words will get through to you? Surely you understand how it feels to be created, burdened with a mission, and dejected by your creator? Do you not understand that your loyalty is so blindly placed?”
“What are you talking about?” Hunter growled, voice low and edged with fury. It was one thing to threaten him, but to speak so brashly of his creator! He wouldn’t tolerate such slander. The Rot chuckled darkly, its body falling low to the floor until they were almost head level with each other.
“You and us are not so different, cousin. Our creators both made us for one reason, and after that, care little for anything else. I have seen the conversations your maker has had with mine, felt his emotions and opinions in every line of text. He only cares for his family, you are nothing but a tool to him. This is not the first time they have crafted a slugcat to be nothing but a mere messenger, crawling across an inhospitable landscape all alone, nothing but a courier for the words of fallen gods. At least your maker was kind enough to grant you a voice…”
“Don’t you dare speak that way about him,” his claws stretched out, gleaming like knives in the dark light, but the Rot merely scoffed, unimpressed and exasperated.
“You could not harm us in any way that matters, cousin. We are merely trying to tell you the truth. Your loyalty is falsely placed, and likely entirely artificial. Have you ever stopped and asked yourself why you feel such blind faith in someone who has done nothing for you? What were your first memories but a cold machine room, a message with a neuron, and a slap on the rear to get moving along?”
“Shut up! Enough of your slander and defamation!” He shouted angrily. What an underhanded tactic, trying to turn him against the one who had made him! Without his creator, he would never have existed in the first place, and the Rot wanted to try to convince him that his maker was cruel and heartless. “I had a mission. There was no time for pleasantries or pointless emotions, my quest required urgency!” The Rot simply tilted its head, antennae bobbing to the side.
“So urgent that they filled you with a disease, despite being the peak genetic engineer of the local group, and didn’t bother to rid you of it before you left? A young infection such as that in a creature like yourself is nothing but a simple surgical procedure, and yet he allowed it to fester and spread within you. Does it seem so unlikely that he likely thought it irrelevant, so long as you completed your mission before you expired? A faith well placed, we might add…”
Hunter pounced at the form with a furious roar, sharp claws slashing through open air as it quickly ascended to the ceiling. For a moment he was tempted to try and climb the rot infested walls, if only to get a chance to strike it for attempting to turn him against his creator.
“You’re not going to convince me to carry around rot and hurt my family with some honeyed words and smart remarks!” He spat, the claws on his feet digging ruts into the floor as he paced angrily. “I had a mission! One that saved a life, not claimed them like you desire!” He scooped up a stray chunk of tile from the floor and hurled it at the dandling puppet, the ceramic shattering against it uselessly into dust. The Rot didn’t even react, simply staring at him, so tauntingly high up.
“Your faith is misplaced, but we see now your purpose is too deeply set to simply sway you with words,” it declared. “Perhaps once you finally meet your creator again, you will realize that they see us as nothing but mere tools in their schemes. You have likely not heard the story of their history, but they are much the same. Their makers created them to solve a problem, and left them behind carelessly when they located their solution. Our creators have inherited their same callous nature, twisting flesh in an attempt to remedy some issue. You will see soon enough…”
Hunter leaned down to scoop up another chunk of loose tile, the projectile sailing between the puppets' antennae, though again it made no effort to dodge.
“You know, Hunter,” it said, voice low and dangerous. The use of his name stalled him in his anger. “It was not your friend who saved you from your affliction. Do you really think you can remove a complex developed rot infection from its host with nothing but a knife made of scrap metal? The rot burrows its way through the body, intertwining with nerves, filling organs, crawling into the brain. We know because it is how we spread our union, but the rot in your body simply hungered endlessly. No, it was us who saved you. We were still young, unfamiliar with even having a mind to think with, thrust into this world brimming with confusion. Our voices warred against each other, no agreement could be found.” It swung down from the ceiling, hovering over him.
“And yet, we saw you. A faint blip at the edges of our consciousness. We ignored you at first, thinking it was nothing but one of our expeditious cores that had wandered out into the wild in search of food, but as the rot in your body began to creep into your brain, your mind was revealed to us. We saw a glimpse of your memories, saw what you did and how much you sacrificed, and knew we needed to save you from the hungry disease growing in you. You see, our cores are mature and developed, each serving a purpose in the whole, unlike any rot you might find outside this facility. We are not the same, yet we were able to sway your disease’s simple undeveloped mind. Using our new strength, we raised an unholy anger in its mind, screaming ceaselessly for it to depart your body so that we might see you again.”
It leaned in close, face inches away from Hunter’s muzzle.
“We saved your life, granted you freedom from the illness your creator recklessly burdened you with. Now you will save our mission from this decaying facility. You owe us this.”
Tendrils shot out from the walls, and Hunter’s eyes widened as he helplessly tried to evade capture. Claws slashed, teeth gnashed, but it was a fruitless effort, tentacles grasping his arms and yanking him down to the floor on his stomach.
“Hold still,” the Rot muttered distastefully. “Struggling will only cause more injury by the implantation.”
Hunter did exactly the opposite, squirming wildly against his bindings until the tendrils tightened around him so hard they felt like shackles made of iron. They pressed him into the floor, the tile creaking under the pressure.
“P-please!” he sobbed, desperate terror filling his mind. “No, stop! I’ve come so far, please don’t take this away from me! I have so much I want to do!” It paused for a moment, head tilting down to look him in the eyes.
“Really now? Such as?”
His mind fell blank.
The Rot huffed with irritation. “We figured as such. Too blindingly loyal to think of any urge but your purpose. If that is what you want, we will give you one. We will make this quick. Worry not, we have an honored place in our chorus for you, Hunter.”
“My friends will notice!” he scrambled for time, praying to the void that Artificer would finish her side of the job.
“Who said you would be traveling with them?”
“My creator will stop you!” What was taking her so long? Was she okay? Did the core not work?
“By that point it will be too late.”
Hunter felt a tendril press against his back, squirming and shoving in an attempt to find entrance. The scars on his spine ached with pain, still fresh and tender, but did not break. The Rot growled with anger.
“We will give your maker credit where it is due, your healing is indeed remarkably quick for your kind, and your skin is tougher than some of the reptilian creatures we have in our hold. Still, we will not be dissuaded.”
The tendrils around his back suddenly yanked him upwards, pulling him to his knees. The Rot hovered before him, staring into his face as a tentacle wrapped around his neck and wrenched his mouth open.
“Hold still, please. We would prefer not to break your jawbone. It will make feeding on the journey rather difficult.”
It held out an arm, a gooey thin strand of pitch black rot extending out, a bright purple core right at the tip. The limb pressed its way towards Hunter’s face.
The room suddenly burst with light, sparks flying across the chamber as the facility churned to life. The Rot looked around in confusion at the sudden surge of energy, head tilted in awe.
“Was this your plan all along?” It asked, voice filled with an amused curiosity. “You trekked all this way to return power to my shell? Marvelous, really! This opens up so many more options! Truly, you have quite the knack for bringing back your family from the dead. These energy readings are amazing! Though it doesn’t change our plans.” It turned to face him, arm reeling back in preparation.
Hunter shut his tear filled eyes, and shot a prayer to the void that it would be quick. Hopefully the rarefaction cell’s detonation would free his mind from the chorus of madness.
There was a blinding flash of light, strong enough to shine through his eyelids, and the loud crackle of arcing electricity. The air filled with the rancid smell of burning decayed flesh, and Hunter cautiously opened his eyes to watch as the walls crackled and sparked with wild currents of energy.
“What have you two done?!” The Rot hissed, and Hunter saw now that its form was sizzling and smoking slightly. Another bright flash, as a bolt of electricity jumped from the wall and struck the Rot, its form spasming and shaking as it silently screamed.
The tendrils holding him loosened, and Hunter took the chance to lash out with all his strength, throwing away his bindings. For a moment, he fell towards the ground, but suddenly the weight in the room shifted as the anti-gravity reactivated itself. Hope bloomed in his chest.
This is it!
He pushed himself off the floor, launching for the exit in the ceiling and quietly noting that he would have to praise Artificer for her impeccable timing. He bumped against the ceiling, claws desperately digging into the metal as he pulled himself into the shaft.
A tendril around his leg yanked him to a stop, and Hunter glanced over his shoulder in fear to see the Rot, its slick arm grasping him and somehow a wild fury in its expressionless face.
“You cretin!” It spat furiously. “You ruinous destroyer! Do you realize what you’ve done? A choir of voices will be snuffed out by your reckless actions. The life you have-”
It was cut off as Hunter used his free leg to kick it directly in the face, sending the Rot flailing backwards, sputtering with anger. He used the moment of freedom to scramble into the shaft, heart pounding with adrenaline even as a tendril whipped its way upwards to try and snatch him away. He shoved off the wall, arms flailing through the weightless air as his mind surged with panic.
Get away get away get away!
A furious deep roar sounded from behind him, and there was a grisly sound of tearing flesh and bending metal. More tendrils squirmed their way into the shaft, even as Hunter rounded the corner at the end and pulled himself into the room beyond. The gravity was stronger here, and for a moment he keeled over, chest heaving with wild breaths as he struggled to stamp down the terror in his mind. He wanted nothing more than to curl up in a corner and sob like a pup.
The distant sound of something large and angry moving through the wall below him quickly pushed that thought away. His mind flashed back to the last time the rot had ambushed him, ripping apart the metal walls with ease. There would be no mercy the second time around.
Claws dug into the rungs of ladders designed for beings larger than him, sprinting past complex murals painted across the walls. He’d seen them once before, exiting the chambers of his creator, who explained the five sins one by one that his own makers had lived by. And yet, what had seemed awe inspiring in its grandiose care and detail now seemed hollow and meaningless. How many of the sins depicted here had he partaken in? Violence, hunger, friendship…
Why am I thinking about this? I need to keep moving!
Below him from where he’d come from, there was a sickening wrench of steel bending, and the sound of something vast and angry pulling itself along. The lights around him flickered in a surge of energy, one popping like a firecracker and nearly making him jump as glass peppered the floor. How much longer could the facility take this much strain? How long did he have to escape? Was it too late already?
No time to linger.
Hunter ran, the gates to the outside world beckoning in front of him. Whatever was chasing him, it would need to find a way through them. It could buy him some time.
He slid into the gates, glancing nervously back at the quickly approaching sounds of his veiled pursuer. There was a flash of a purple tendril around the corner, and then the gate sealed shut, bathing him in cleansing steam.
The locks turned agonizingly slow, Hunter dancing from foot to foot as the seconds morphed into creeping hours.
“Fucking come on!” He snapped angrily, eyes going wide as something slammed into the door behind him. “Please!” The doors refused to hasten their process, slowly opening in front of him to reveal a long corridor with a glimmer of sunlight at the end.
The sound of bending metal echoed behind him as he pushed forward, only barely muted by the closing gates. The steel doors had always seemed so impenetrable, so unyielding. How could something simply rip them open? What could have such strength?
He didn’t stick around to find out, the terror still rushing through his veins, putting a frantic pace in his stride. A few steps closer, he would be outside, free of the terrible realm of the twisted facility.
The late afternoon sunlight instantly blinded him, paws nearly sliding on the vast blanket of dust that had gathered on the lonesome peak of the iterator. His eyes adjusted quickly, looking up to the soft pinpricks of distant stars, like the eyes of gods above watching down on him. A waxing moon hung in the sky, and for a moment he felt the panic in his body melt away to wonder and amazement. Hunter shook his head, shoving away the distracting thoughts. Stargazing would do him no favors here, and instead he took a few deep gulping breaths and continued his escape across the wide open plain.
Mounds of rubble and trash dotted the landscape, swirling puffs of dust kicking up in every step. Hunter pushed forward, making his way towards the edge. With any luck, the way down would be the same as his creator’s, and he could easily descend the side of the facility. Pebbles had mentioned there was a bridge that led to the communications tower they were to meet at, and with any luck, Artificer would be there already.
For a moment, Hunter’s mind wandered away, wondering just exactly how he was going to explain his survival to her. She’d seen him dragged away, screaming his name in a choking wail, and now he was going to come waltzing back in without a hair on his coat missing. What would she say? He tried to imagine her reaction.
It wasn’t a hard picture to paint.
She’s going to kick my ass.
It brought a chuckle to his lips, and a fond smile. Perhaps he could try to spook her, but the idea quickly fizzled away when he realized she’d probably actually stab him in the moment. No, it would be better to simply tell the story of his lucky break, and try to avoid unnecessary impalement. It would do no good to escape the Rot only to get speared by his friend.
Hunter kept a steady jog, long legs for his kind closing the distance quickly as he moved forward. As he rounded a mound of trash, the faintest shuffle of movement flashed to his side, some creature rising up over a broken crumpled heap of metal. His eyes widened as a masked figure suddenly raised its arm over its head, and a spear glimmered in the sunlight.
Fucking scavengers!? Where did they come from?
He threw himself backwards, feet skidding on the slippery ground as the spear sailed past him, mere inches from his face. The sudden change in momentum nearly brought him tumbling to the ground, tail snapping out to balance as he scrambled back into cover. Another spear zipped past, this one from a different angle, and therefore a different scavenger, and nearly punched a fresh hole in his rear.
He dipped back behind the pile of garbage, ears keen for any sound of approaching footsteps. Scavs were noisy opponents, their hunched over gait and less agile movement easily giving away their approach. Hunter scooped up a nearby chunk of brick, half tempted to make a break for the spear lodged in the ground a few feet away.
“Red one!” A gruff choppy voice suddenly echoed across the plain, and Hunter silently moved to the other side of the pile, listening intently. “You worth many pearl! Death come to you now!”
That doesn’t sound anything like a slugcat…
Against his better instinct, he slowly poked his head from behind cover, looking across the open space to see the tall form of a light-red scavenger warrior, proudly donned in their usual war mask and pointing a sizzling electrical spear in his direction. Curiously, the creature also donned a strange vest covering their chest, made of nuts intertwined with wire.
A scav speaking slugcat? And wearing some kind of armor?
“I think you’re misunderstood!” He shouted back, and the scav’s frills ruffled up in agitation. “I’m not the slugcat you’re looking for!” It shook its head, stamping its spear against the ground. From behind it, Hunter saw a few more faces peer over the garbage, noting that there were at least a dozen in the war party.
Not exactly an easy fight…
“No trick!” The scav roared again, its mandibles struggling with the words. “Prince pay for death of red and scarred slugcat! You red, scarred! Simple enough!” Hunter resisted the urge to roll his eyes, and instead found himself raising a curious brow.
So the scavs had a prince, and they wanted a red scarred slugcat dead for murder. Gee, I wonder who that could be?
“I know who you’re referring to, and she’s not here, I’m sorry to say! Please let me pass, no one needs to die today!” Diplomacy wasn’t exactly his strong suit, but if this scavenger could speak slugcat, it was worth a try. A faint tremor rumbled through the ground, reminding him of the urgency in his escape.
The scavenger chittered in anger, preparing its spear.
“Kill you! Figure out later!” Its fellow warriors chirped in agreement, raising their weapons with a cheer.
Great, so much for that idea.
Hunter didn’t wait, powerful legs bursting into motion as he sprinted across the open space. The scavenger leader moved to hurl their spear, but Hunter deftly twisted as he ran and hurled the brick directly at its face, sending them tumbling backward hissing furiously. The rest of the scavengers prepared their volley, but Hunter dove, sliding into a small gutter just as more spears flew through the air.
He hissed in pain as he crawled through the underground channel, feeling the aching throb of cut skin on his tail from one spear that had flown too close. It would heal. It always did.
The sound of scavengers moving above pushed him forward, and his ears flashed backwards as he listened for the sound of them crawling in behind him. The gutter was short enough, twisting slightly as it cut through the top of the structure.
The dust made his nose itch like nothing else.
Hunter paused for a moment at the exit, wary of an ambush, but when no threat presented itself, he yanked himself out and into the air again, carelly searching the area. Far behind him, he saw the scavenger party quickly circling around the hole he had dove in, one brave member carefully poking their head inside.
A flash of purple from over the garbage mound behind them shot fresh terror down his spine. The scavengers, too distracted with pursuing him, noticed far too late. From over the mound, a form emerged, a twisted amalgamation of rot cysts and grasping tendrils, with one at the top carrying the familiar form of the rot puppet.
Its face looked down on them, and somehow Hunter could see a fury in its form.
“You have spilled the blood of the divine family, impetuous insects,” it growled angrily. “Should we find his body lifeless, we will doom you to an eternity of agony, a torment without end!”
To their credit, the scavengers at least attempted to fight it.
Hunter watched in horror as the mass quickly descended on them, tentacles flicking away thrown spears with an almost bored ease. One scavenger hurled a grenade, and the Rot casually plucked it out of the air and tossed it away, where it exploded distantly. Their weapons useless, the war party chittered and barked in panic, turning to flee.
They were too slow.
The Rot moved with a terrifying speed, reaching out to snatch the warriors up one by one and pulling them into its enormous mass. They squirmed and struggled, some yanking knives from their belts and frantically trying to cut at the gripping limbs, but it was in vain. Hunter could only stare on as their bodies vanished into the cystic center, face first. Their arms and legs fought for freedom, even as their heads vanished into the core, and then there was a sudden jerk of movement as their bodies stilled, faintly twitching until they were gone.
Void… That would have been me…
The masked scavenger leader scrambled to escape, and a tendril swooped out to snatch them away, but it jabbed out its electrically tipped spear and sent the limb into squirming shock, certain death warded away by a hair’s breadth. It vanished into the maze of trash, the rest of its fellows taken.
Hunter shook his head and shoved his disgust away to the best of his ability. In the distance, he could see the facility wall access point, and with refound terror, he pulled himself out of the gutter and sprinted through the dust, heart pounding in his ears.
He felt a rush of air behind him, something wet nearly grasping his tail, and acting on pure adrenaline he pumped his legs with power, the muscles screaming from the effort as a tendril swiped the air he had once occupied.
“Hunter!” the Rot roared, its large bulky mass failing to keep pace over the open space. “Return to your destiny, your purpose! Cease this pointless flailing! We will forgive you for your fear, but our patience is thin!”
Were he not huffing for desperate breath, he would have shouted every vulgarity Artificer had taught him back at the mass.
So instead, he raised one hand in a gesture he’d seen Pebbles make and waved it high and proud.
The Rot screamed in indignant fury, its voice falling into the distance as he crawled into the access shaft to the sidewall. Hunter pulled himself through the twisting vents, half expecting some tendril to try and snag his leg if he lingered. With an urgent shove, he pushed himself around the bend of the vent, tumbling downwards to the floor below.
And nearly crushing the red scavenger leader under his bulk.
The two eyed each other for a moment, a vicious glare shared between them for barely a second before they leapt into action.
The scavenger jumped up, pulling their spear from their back and jabbing it at Hunter. The electrical tip sparked and crackled as the slugcat rolled out of the way, quick reflexes only just barely avoiding a deadly shock. He dug a paw into the dust below, kicking a cloud of it into the scavenger’s face and smirking triumphantly when it squeezed its eyes shut and hissed angrily.
Hunter jumped to the side, avoiding a blind stab from the spear and tackling the scavenger to the floor. The two landed in a heap, rolling across the ground as they struggled in the melee before slamming into a wall.
The scavenger squirmed under him, bringing a knee up into his gut and sending a wave of nausea through his body, but Hunter held firm, responding with a fist to the face. The blow sent a spider web of cracks through the scavenger’s mask, and he wrapped his hands around its neck and squeezed. His opponent gagged, and he saw their hand dart for their belt.
He snapped a paw out, barely just stopping a knife from driving into his chest. The red scavenger tried to fight his grip, but his gifted strength was too great for it to overcome, and with a flick of the wrist he sent the little blade bouncing across the room.
Hunter raised his claws high, preparing to deliver the final blow.
But something stayed his hand. A curiosity, quietly speaking from the back of his mind. His entire journey, scavengers had tried their best to impede him, and yet here was one that he could finally speak to, and perhaps ask some questions.
After all, he’d heard Artificer’s side of the story, perhaps it was time for an alternative perspective.
“How did you find me?” he growled, loosening his grip on the scavenger’s neck. It struggled for a moment, glaring up at him with angry white eyes.
“F-fuck you, red one!” it spat, trying to cut his stomach with its short clawed feet. It wasn’t very effective. “Your next life agony!”
“I told you,” Hunter grumbled, “I’m not the slugcat you’re pursuing. First of all, they're female, and they fly around with explosions. Do you see me exploding, huh?” The scavenger stared up at him with a wary glare in its eyes, though it did seem to be considering his words. "Plus, I'm pink!"
“We hear from scouts, two slugcat enter this cursed place. If you not her, then where?” Hunter was quiet for a moment, unsure of how to respond. While he didn’t quite know where Artificer was, he did have an inkling of an idea where she could be.
But the scavenger didn’t need to know that.
“We split up. I have no idea where she is,” he said, hoping his lie was decently muddled in translation. Speaking with the scavenger was like talking in half sentences, the finer details of the conversation missing due to the lack of ears and a thick tail to communicate.
“Then why you here? Why with her?” it asked, no longer struggling. It kept the vicious wary glare. Hunter hesitantly released his grip on its throat, body tense in case the scavenger tried anything. It scrambled back up to its feet, the two retreating to opposite sides of the small room.
That’s how this goes right? Diplomacy?
“We were sent here to destroy this place, and cleanse the abomination that has grown in it,” Hunter proudly declared, watching with a careful eye as the scavenger scooped up their fallen weapons. “I was making my escape and trying to get away from that creature. You know, that thing that ate all your friends?”
The scav shivered, frills splaying outward in disgust. It hung its head low, muttering something in its strange chittering dialect. Names? Prayer? Whatever it was, Hunter didn’t need to be a mind reader to feel it was filled with horror.
The metal above them groaned, some foul force working its way through in ceaseless pursuit. The two turned their heads upward, before sharing a look.
“Shall we? We might fare better against the beast as a group…” Hunter offered, showing his empty hands as proof of his good intentions. The scavenger watched him warily, but huffed and muttered something under its breath before stepping past him towards the exit. They quickly moved out into the blazing sunlight once again, and this time Hunter couldn’t help but stop in awe.
The sun hung low in the western sky, its stretching sunlight bathing the blanket of clouds in a golden glow. Distant iterators poked through the mist like small islands, their cans casting long shadows across the rolling white blanket. Far in the distance, Hunter tried to pick out the facility of his creator, the once enormous metal god suddenly seeming so far away and tiny. Could his maker see him, perched atop the collapsing carcass of his sibling?
How long had he been gone? The journey had taken dozens of cycles, with many more spent trapped in the pits of garbage as his illness slowly overtook him. Did his creator ever expect him to return?
Did he even remember him?
“You come?” the scavenger barked up at him, already halfway down a long pole below. “Group your idea, remember?”
Prick…
Hunter slid down to join them, the pair crawling down pillars and through aging vents as they moved towards the surface. Progress was slow, the scavenger frequently jerking out an arm to stop him, and then staring at empty space for a few long moments.
“What are you doing?” Hunter asked, not bothering to hide the irritation in his voice. “You criticize me for watching the view, and here we are stopping every other second to sit here and count the bugs flying around.” The scavenger scoffed, its frills bristled in agitation.
“Look for hidden lizard,” it stated, not even bothering to turn away from its task. “Skin change color. Difficult see while moving.”
“A white lizard? They’re slow and stupid, an easy meal. At this rate, the Rot is going to catch us before we even reach the cloud layer!” The scavenger glanced over its shoulder, looking his body up and down.
“You pelt marked with risk and haste, but you lucky, big, strong.” It paused for a moment, making a strange irritated noise. “Not last. Reckless. One day lizard faster.” Hunter snorted, snatching up a spear of his own as he waited for the scavenger to finish its strange ritual.
I guess I have to play their game if I don’t want them running off… Ugh.
They pushed forward, climbing down the wide rungs of a ladder that led back into the skin of the facility, vanishing indoors yet again. The pair followed the twisting corridors, moving in the general direction of ‘down’, and yet Hunter couldn’t help but press himself as far away from the interior wall as possible. His ears shifted and swiveled, trying to pick out the telltale sound of wet movement.
“Name,” the scavenger grunted, not stopping its lopping march. Hunter raised a brow, confused, but it turned over its shoulder and shot him an irritated glare. “What your name? Stupid Questions?”
“No,” he grit out, fur frazzled by the remark as his tail swished angrily. “My name is Hunter.” The scavenger raised a brow, shaking its head in confusion.
“Slugcat always short name,” It muttered, “So strange... My name Dances in Vulture’s Shadows, but your kind call Shadows. Simple.”
“The pleasure is all mine,” Hunter said dryly, the two descending down a twisting shaft that slowly banked back in the direction of the outdoors. Once again, he listened closely for any out of place sound, ear flicking as a bug buzzed past.
“Hunter,” Shadows barked, the slugcat flinching as the fragile silence was broken yet again. “Why travel with outlaw? Dangerous. Reckless. Get you hunted, her partner?” He raised a confused brow at the word.
What’s that supposed to mean? Was that… humor?
“No!” he bristled, but the scav merely chittered in amusement. Hunter sighed, rubbing his tired face with a paw. “She saved my life. I… owe her for it. She's my friend, it somehow led me here.” Shadows grunted, but their voice was doubtful.
“Red one, friend? Hard sell. Story filled with death, murder. Can not imagine friend…”
“Story?” The slugcat asked, now suddenly curious. The scavenger nodded, mumbling to itself.
“She not tell, I see. Trick… It rumor at first. Slugcat that attack tolls, convoys, groups. Throw bomb, run off. Some lone scavenger get killed. Messy. Left as warning, almost like war! We ask chief for aid hunting, send warriors, but he say ‘surface problem’. Bah! Clans argue too much, bad blood. Hunting parties never find, always busy bickering.” The scavenger paused, their large front paws scratching the ground with irritation.
“Then red one arrive in city, use hidden entrance, not guarded” they continued, tone turning excited, as if they were regaling some stupendous tale of wonder and not the story of Hunter’s grieving angry friend. “Warriors can not catch, she too fast! Sneak into chief home, challenge him. I not there. Sad! Good show…”
“Good show?” Hunter said incredulously, quite confused by the words. “You think your leader being attacked was some sort of spectacle?” As if to further his confusion, the scavenger nodded excitedly.
“Yes! Fighting common scavenger tradition. Settle feud that can not pay away. Stolen lover. Dead friend. That thing. Many scavenger fight chief, want throne, or his horde. He win all, think himself unbeatable. Chief guard tell me story of fight. They hear noise, run inside. See red one, tired, starving, hurt. Chief ask what she want. No say, just angry, start fight. Lots of booms! Big show, scavengers run in, and watch. Chief good fighter, make good show. Long fight! Red one hurt bad, chief spear to her! Showing off to crowd before kill. But she spit in his eyes, fire spit! Chief blind, and she leap on him! Tear him apart with claw and fang! Dead! Good show, but she start attack crowd! Bombs, spear, scavenger flee confused, duel not often end in dueler fighting crowd! Guards no stop, too busy stealing from chief horde, return to their clans. Without chief, clans fight each other, war over city and horde.”
“So, she sneaks into your chief’s home, starts to fight him, and instead of stopping her from murdering him your people just steal from him as he dies and run home? So much for loyalty and love.” Shadows shook their head, stamping a fist on the ground.
“You no understand, chief smart, tough, but cruel. Scavenger clans fight, but he stop, force all under him! Many feud left sitting, foe work with foe. Demand high tribute from clan, death if not paid. Greedy! Chief die, horde unguarded, foe fight foe again. Chaos! Even chief family fight! All want throne and horde. Red one run back to city, attack any who return. Clan too busy fighting, city high, dangerous. Not worth. Red one not worth chasing, nobody care for dead chief, until Prince win family war. Look at chief death, see that challenge never stated, no fight deal ever made! Murder! Prince pay for her death. We chase her, but she tough foe, tricky, boom and jump!” His frills puffed in excitement, as this was nothing more than a game. “Thought we found her, but just you, and monster!”
Great, the damn scavenger royalty has it out for us…
Hunter was quiet for a moment as he mulled over the words. He’d never had a chance to speak with a scavenger, let alone hear about their culture, despite being on the road for so long. It was almost shocking to imagine that there was a society behind their strange rituals and irritating tolls, all coming together to pay for the demands of a greedy leader.
“She told me her side of the fight,” he said slowly, and Shadows suddenly came to a halt to look at him with wide curious eyes. “She was… traveling with her pups, they were killed over a pearl. She said she swore a blood oath against your kind, and killed hundreds in her quest for vengeance. Stood on a pile of corpses over the body of your leader.”
Shadows was quiet for a moment, studying Hunter’s face with their pink eyes.
“You silly, believe wild story,” they declared, and Hunter could only glare at the blunt insult. “Single slugcat, killed hundred scavs? Silly. Maybe couple dozen. Prince want her for chief murder. Many die from red slugcat, but that local clan feud. Not prince problem.”
Wow… Scavengers sure care a lot about their people.
“Okay, so she’s only killed a couple dozen, at least officially. You don’t care about your dead fellows? All the spilled blood? I've seen what she's done to your dead, doesn't that bother you?” Hunter held back the steadily growing irritation in his voice. How could the scavengers care so little for their own kind? Shadows nodded eagerly, somehow moving their entire upper body with the motion.
“Nope! Not my problem. I here for Prince bounty. Many pearl for red slugcat! Make me rich scavenger, leader of clan.”
“You base your leadership off who has the most pearls?”
“Yes! You understand now! Pearl pay for ally. Pearl pay away enemy. Pearl buy good mate! Scavenger with many pearl can buy many ally, but careful! Use all pearl, no longer rich. No friends then!” Hunter stared for a moment, jaw open and blinking.
Scavengers are insane.
“So you’re not a warrior,” Hunter spat, voice accusing. “You’re nothing more than a bounty hunter? Did you even know any of those scavengers that just died to the Rot?” Shadows shrugged, unphased by the words.
“Nope! Many scavenger ask to join me, split reward. No experience fighting. No gear. Young, eager, reckless. I never say no, make good distraction. But me? Bounty hunter, warrior, guard, hunter, whatever I get paid for. Your kind call me ‘mercenary’.” The scavenger almost sounded proud, but Hunter paused for a moment before he spoke again, trying to understand from their bizarre perspective.
I suppose being a competent fighter is a steady source of income, and therefore makes Shadows quite the successful fellow? Is that what every masked warrior scavenger is? Just some scavenger sellsword?
The thought felt almost sickly to think about. Hunter had only briefly been taught about the five major sins, hastily imparted on him before his departure, and like everything else he had never questioned the concepts in the slightest. To hear that scavengers' entire society revolved around greed and occasional violence made the slugcat’s head spin in dissonance.
No wonder Artificer was so mad. They really do consider a pearl worth more than her pups…
The room suddenly shook around them, something slamming into the wall from outside. The pair leapt away from the bulkhead, weapons held in tightly clenched fists as a wrenching scraping noise traveled downward on the other side. Hunter’s mind instantly flashed back, remembering how the interior of the facility had been nothing but paper for the Rot to shred apart in its quest to claim him. Was the outside wall somehow sturdier?
He could only hope.
Neither dared break the silence, and Hunter felt even wary to breathe, his heartbeat in the quiet air feeling more akin to a dinner bell ringing for the slaughter. How keen was the Rot’s hearing? Had it honed in on their conversation? The noise of their eyes blinking? His ears flicked round, head rushing in growing dread as he imagined the tendrils pulling his arms, yanking him into the squirming mess, crawling into his head-
“Hunter?” Shadows hissed, shaking the slugcat from his thoughts. “We go. Monster gone.” The slugcat nodded numbly, head still spinning from the imagery as he fell in behind the scavenger.
Just keep moving. The sooner we get away from this horrific place, the sooner the memory will fade.
The words did nothing to stamp down the fear still rushing through his veins, his fur bristling up no matter how hard he tried to will it down. The slugcat almost wished that Shadows would start rambling again, if only to provide some distraction from his own mind.
The two carefully poked their heads through a pipe in the wall and back outside, the sunlight beaming down on their small forms. From their lonesome vigil, Hunter could see the rest of the structure descend into the cloudlayer, the mist occasionally splitting to reveal a thin metal catwalk connecting to a long solitary bridge stretching into the distance. The slugcat watched the path below for a moment, and while it seemed entirely free of hostiles, his instincts and caution warned him otherwise. Even Shadows seemed intent to search every crevice or crack for their pursuer, beady eyes scanning with burning intent.
And yet there was no sign of the creature, despite its immense bulk and loud voice. Had it left? Perhaps thinking they were further ahead?
Shadows suddenly put a hand on his shoulder, long fingers digging into his fur and pulling him close. The scavenger leaned in, mouth almost touching his ear, and Hunter resisted the overwhelming urge to unsheathe his claws and maul him, if only to see what exactly they were doing.
“Trap,” the scavenger hissed, voice barely audible even close as it was. Even in the rushing windy air, it almost felt like they were screaming the word. Hunter slowly nodded in understanding, and the two crept back indoors.
“It’s waiting for us,” Hunter declared angrily, “It knows it can’t get inside here, so it's just going to wait somewhere down there until we try to get past…” Shadows scraped the ground, evidently thinking deeply on the topic.
“Trap… No way around. No way back.” Their words were pensive, and yet there was little worry in their tone. “If had pack, send younger to spring. Kill! But no pack…” It returned to its chittering, as is muttering the problem to itself over and over.
Spring the trap…
The solution barged its way into Hunter’s mind, and he pinched his eyes and groaned.
“It wants me,” he grumbled. “The damned thing wants to use me like some kind of meat puppet. Something about us being ‘family’. If I run out there and expose it, can you somehow kill it?” The scavenger hummed, and reached into one of the many pouches on their belt.
“Grenade no kill, but this…” It pulled out a strange dark blue sphere, and Hunter raised a brow at the bizarre object. It almost looked like the very same rarefaction cell he had been carrying earlier, but smaller, its surface covered in cracks that occasionally sparked. “I get this from slugcat outside wall. Many pearl! He say, ‘kill anything and everything’. Big boom! Been eager to use…” Shadows chuckled darkly, eyes glimmering with giddy anticipation.
Hunter couldn’t help but remember that very same expression in Artificer’s eyes whenever she spoke of blowing something up. Perhaps in another life, she and Shadows could bond over their complete disregard of scavenger life and explosions.
I hope she’s ok.
With a nod, the two set their plan into motion, once again crawling their way outside. Hunter slowly descended down the poles and pipes, checking every corner with his keen eyes. Lower and lower he crept, suddenly noticing how lifeless the area was. When he had left his creator’s facility and climbed down their skin, all manner of lizards and vultures had inhabited the location, eking out a life wherever they could.
And yet here, not even a batfly could be found.
He continued his descent, occasionally looking upward to see the faint form of Shadows following behind. Hopefully the scavenger would stay true to their word and actually assist him, instead of simply using the chance to run past the Rot. Scavengers seemed to care little for anything that wasn’t incentivized by pearls, but at the very least he expected them to stay true to their word.
Why do I feel like such an idiot today…
The path ahead suddenly flattened out, the various ladders and poles that he had been scaling downward coming to a halt. The floor below almost taunted him, the jump far too great to simply tuck and roll. To the side, an orb-like protrusion extended from the wall, the catwalk stretching out towards it seeming like the next logical path. For a moment Hunter debated simply using his claws to climb down the metal to the next level, but then Shadows would be unable to follow him.
With a heavy hearted sigh, the slugcat began the wary march out into the whipping winds.
His instincts prickled against him, some part of his animal mind warning him that he was terribly exposed and easy prey for something like a vulture. He shoved the feeling down in his mind, taking a deep breath and continuing his slow walk, despite everything screaming against him to turn back, run away, and hide in the first hole he found.
His back itched, a ghost of the sickness that had once grown there and its weight that hung on him washing over him for just a moment.
As he reached the spherical structure, Hunter's ears perked up at the familiar horrible sound of wet tendrils crawling along metal.
“Took you long enough,” he muttered, turning about to see the enormous form of the Rot pulling itself up and over the catwalk. The puppet dangled from the top, its face watching him with an almost curious look.
“Hunter,” it said, pulling itself closer. “Your actions are clearly deliberate. Were you hoping to find us? Have you finally reconsidered our offer?” The slugcat took a step back, even as the Rot continued its slow crawl towards him. Its tentacles were limp, but ready to reach out at a moment's notice.
“The answer is still no, vile freak,” Hunter growled, “You and everything you created is dying in this place!” It gurgled in anger, shaking its head like a disappointed father.
“Your opinion makes no difference. Soon you will see for yourself, as another voice in the choir. We can remake it, even if your interloping has put so much to ruin.”
It struck out, and Hunter burst into motion.
The Rot surged in his path, tendrils swarming in every direction as it reached for him hungirly. The slugcat hastily dodged backward, scrambling into a hole in the sphere and crawling through its cramped internals. The air reeked of orange lizard, though there was no sign of the creatures.
Hunter didn’t need to guess what had happened to them.
Downward, he scrambled, barely just dodging the grabbing limbs of rot that poked their way into the construction. The slugcat tried to run down one corridor, only to be cut off. He turned on a heel and prepared to dive downwards, but a tentacle from below blocked his path. With no options left, he ran in the only direction left open, popping out into the outdoors yet again.
It was only then he realized that it had been herding him.
Now on the side of the sphere, there was nowhere left to go. A long thin pole stretched outwards, its end capped with a blinking light, and as the Rot pulled itself over the top of the structure Hunter leapt out and balanced himself on careful legs.
The clouds swirled around him, wind nipping at his fur as the limited distance fizzled away into nothing.
And then it was the end.
“You are impressively fast and agile,” the Rot declared, sitting at the end of the pole as if bored of the pursuit. “Your form will make an exceptional host, and we will grant your body the care its previous passenger was too voracious to offer.”
How comforting. Where the fuck is Shadows?
“Don’t try it!” He shouted, feet hanging on the edge. “If you come closer… I’ll jump!” It paused, watching his face for a moment, and the Rot shrugged.
“That’s a risk we’re willing to take,” It declared, “We can always find your carcass and still utilize it. It's only your skin we need.” Its tendrils reached out, and Hunter put a paw over the ledge, fear and terror battling in his mind.
“Hey! Ugly!” A voice boomed from above them, and the Rot paused to turn and look over its shoulder. Shadows stood triumphantly at the top of the sphere, their spear pointed in challenge. “You die!”
“Another one of your ilk?” The Rot grumbled, irritation in their voice. “You pathetic refuse dwellers will learn your place.” The scavenger said nothing, making a rude gesture with their spindly hand and pulling out the strange weapon. It raised it over its shoulder, and Hunter’s eyes widened in alarm. Even the Rot seemed suddenly terrified, its mass shifting in alertness.
“No! You have no idea what that-”
Shadows tossed the device, and it struck the Rot in its face and fell off the edge of the pole.
For a moment, Hunter wanted to strangle the scavenger, and part of him hoped that in whatever bizarre torture the Rot would pull them both into, he could atleast find Shadows and scream at them for their stupid broken bomb.
Then the light around them stretched.
The device crackled and sparked below them, the air rushing as bolts of electricity arced outwards from the hissing bomb. Hunter felt his feet slip out from the pole, claws barely just catching himself from being pulled into its wrenching influence.
The Rot was not so lucky.
With the device so close, its tendrils were quickly pulled into the bomb, yanking the core inside along with them. It desperately tried to pull itself away, but its mass was trapped in the pulsing center of whatever the device was doing, and Hunter could only watch as its flesh was ripped apart by the unholy power behind the weapon.
He felt his grip weaken, arms crying out in pain as his shoulders threatened to pop loose from the pull.
The device’s blast collapsed inwards, and everything around them was flung away in the deafening implosion.
Hunter’s ears stung in pain. His arms begged for relief. His eyes saw stars from the bright electric blast.
But he was still alive, clinging to the end of the pole with every ounce of determination still in his body. With a groan, he pulled himself upward and balanced on the long span of steel.
In front of him, the Rot somehow still clutched the beam, its small puppet’s arms desperately trying to counter the weight of the now mangled and torn cysts still attached to it. It looked up at Hunter with a defiant air, even as the slugcat stepped over them.
“You have ruined so much,” it spat, arm slipping as it clung with only a single hand. “So much death, even after we spared your life twice. Is this how you repay your family?” Hunter was quiet for a moment, glaring down at the dangling creature.
“We’re not family, you revolting parasite,” Hunter growled with impunity. He stamped his clawed foot down on the Rot’s hand, the force of his blow causing it to nearly burst apart into chunks.
Silently, the puppet fell, its form vanishing into the clouds. Its face stared up at him the entire time, too proud to even scream.
Hunter watched it disappear, a bitter triumph filling his heart.
The monster was gone.
He spat over the edge, and some part of his mind liked to imagine it hitting the Rot right in the face, even if he knew the wind would likely blow it off course.
“Hunter!” Shadows shouted, and suddenly the slugcat noticed the scavenger dangling from the pole only a few feet away. “Good kill! Very nice show! But help?!” With a roll of his eyes, the pink animal slowly stepped over to assist, kneeling down over the dangling warrior.
“I dunno, what’s in it for me?” He hummed teasingly, tilting his head to the side. Shadows barked out a laugh.
“Hah! Now you think like Scavenger! Haha! I give you many pearl! Friends forever!” Hunter chuckled at the remark, reaching out to effortlessly yank the scavenger up.
The two sat in silence for a moment, watching the clouds gently meander around them.
“Ok!” Shadows declared, standing up and moving back towards the entrance to the sphere and their path ahead. “Enough sitting. We go, tired and hungry. Too much crap today.”
Hunter couldn’t agree more, and fell in behind. The slugcat idly wondered how long it had been since he’d last eaten, a heavy weariness slowly sinking into his bones.
At least I don’t get as hungry as I used to…
As if to contradict the thought, the smell of orange lizard filled his nose once again, and his mouth dripped with hungry spittle, stomach growling. How his mind could think of food at the time like this, he had no idea.
The pair continued downwards quickly, now free of their pursuer. A warm humidity filled the air as they descended into the steamy mists.
And then, before he knew it, they had reached the bridge. The two stopped and sat for a moment, a quiet emotion passing through the air.
Shadows, blunt as ever, was the one to acknowledge it.
“This where we part ways,” they declared. “Where you go?”
“Across this bridge is a communication array,” Hunter said, pointing through the fog. “I’m meeting my friends there, and from then on we’re getting outside the wall. You should too, this facility is set to explode. I’ve been told it’s going to be quite the ‘big boom’.” The scavenger grunted, frills flexing in curiosity.
“You meet friends, you say?”
Hunter only just realized what he had revealed.
Ah crap.
He opened his mouth to protest, but Shadows chuckled and waved him off.
“Relax! I no hunt red one. Too Tired. Too Hungry. Too much shit in one cycle. That monster? I done. Go home, outside wall.” Hunter huffed humorlessly, far too exhausted for jokes. The scavenger was right. The day had gone on long enough, and he still needed to trek across the bridge and regroup with his friends.
Who likely all thought he was dead.
Not looking forward to that conversation.
“Hunter,” Shadows said, stirring him from his musings. “Before we part. Red one truly friend?” The scavenger looked suddenly serious, eyes watching him intently. Hunter met their gaze for a moment, trying to piece out their intent.
“Truly,” he stated. “She helped me when no one else could. Didn’t ask for anything in return. She’s mean, rough, and has… quite the past, but I can tell she’s hurt and just trying to hold together some semblance of a life after losing everything she had. Trying to find a purpose.” Shadows was oddly quiet, the pinpricks of their eyes under their mask watching his face for a long quiet pause.
“Truly,” they muttered, humming to themselves. “Hunter, you good warrior. Silly, reckless, but good warrior. You truly care about red one? Listen close.” The scavenger leaned in, their voice suddenly filled with a serious air, far contrasting to the carefree demeanor they had sported up until the point.
“Red one kill many scavenger,” they continued. “Red one kill old chief, prince place bounty. I stop, but others come. Many scavenger die in clan feuds, big feud from dead chief. Far more dead than red one ever kill. Clans forget, form new feuds. No one miss old chief. But Prince must keep bounty. Politics!” They waved a hand dismissively. “Not my problem. Not anyone problem. Maybe talk to Prince, pay bounty? No clue. Your problem! Hah!” The scavenger barked out a hoarse laugh, but Hunter wasn’t about to scorn them for their rudeness.
Was it really that easy? Did the scavengers really care so little of their dead that they could simply pay for them to leave them alone? And yet, if their kind were so entrenched in a massive civil war brought down by the sudden power gap, perhaps no one truly did care beyond trying to cash in on a bounty of pearls. What were a few long since deceased individuals compared to the churning gears of war? A few drops of blood compared to the rain.
Or as Shadows had said, pearls paid away any problem. Even a dead king.
“Thank you, Shadows,” Hunter said earnestly, shooting a toothy smile at the scavenger. “Of the two people I’ve met today, your company has been far more preferable.”
“One last thing!” They reached into a small pouch on their belt, pulling out a small leather bag secured with a thin string. The scavenger stuck a long claw inside, pulling it out with a strange gray powder coating their fingertip. Without asking, they grabbed Hunter’s paw, flipping it over and scribbling a strange symbol on the back. “Remember this. You good slugcat. If speak with scavs, wear this symbol. It mean ally, one who already paid for friendship. Good friend!” They clucked a sound in their strange dialect, Hunter watching them confused for a moment as they repeated it, before it dawned on him that they were trying to teach him the word in Scavenger.
After a few tries at speaking it himself, Shadows nodded in satisfaction, letting go of his paw. Hunter stared down at the symbol, memorizing the lines and curves. Some part of his mind filled with a sensation of memory, before he suddenly realized where he’d seen the very same symbol before.
It was the same faded mark that had decorated Artificer’s mask.
'Respected.'
Great… This is going to be fun to explain. “Hi Artificer, not only am I alive after being dragged away by the Rot, but now I’m friends with scavengers and- Oh! Why are you stabbing me? That's all my blood on the floor now!
He made a mental note to rub the symbol off the second Shadows had left, before it somehow led to his own evisceration.
“I’ve been meaning to ask,” Hunter probed, curiosity suddenly taking his mind. “How do you know how to speak slugcat? I didn’t think your kind even had a language.” The scavenger hummed, looking slightly confused by the question.
“Mercenary. Outside wall many slugcat. Speak slugcat, more work, more pearl!” They barked out a laugh, as if Hunter was the idiot for not making the connection.
Right. Of course. More pearl.
“Farewell Hunter!” Shadows called happily, slapping him on the back as they ran past and down the long bridge. “Maybe we meet soon, if you not die from reckless idea. Hah!” They shot a wave and swung over the edge, climbing down one of the beams and into the fog below.
Hunter waved weakly at the figure, rubbing his eyes with exhaustion. For a moment, he simply stood in place, listening to the wind blowing past and the faint groans of the structure behind him slowly crumbling. The rigors of the cycle caught up to him, from the mad dash to get inside the iterator, to getting snatched away by the rot, speaking with the despicable creature…
His blood ran cold, hair standing on edge.
It's dead. It's dead. It's dead. You’re free.
His back itched.
The slugcat took a few deep breaths, trying to steady his shaking hands, even as his claws dug into the skin of his palms. With one final heaving sigh, he began the long walk down the bridge, each step taking him further away from the nightmare. With any luck, he would find the group, explain his experience, and they could all find something to eat.
As he walked, the faint smell of lizard blew through the windy air, and once again his stomach groaned. Perhaps with a good meal, good company, and a long hibernation, his mind could find some measure of peace.
Artificer had mentioned food from her colony once, maybe she could cook something up for the group? Hunter had never had the chance to enjoy an actual prepared meal, far too impatient or inexperienced to bother trying cooking, instead preferring to simply use his fangs to rip thick juicy chunks off of whatever he’d killed.
Lizard, vulture, eggbug… Void, I’d kill for just some batfly!
A pinprick of light suddenly zipped across the surface in front of him, and for a moment alarm shot through Hunter’s mind. Just his luck, a King Vulture had spotted the slugcat, and already he could imagine it swooping in to try and pierce a fresh hole in his body. He planted his feet, preparing to turn on a heel and sprint back towards the facility for cover.
But then a faint grin crossed his face.
Maybe my meal will come to me.
The thought instantly sizzled up into nothing as the bright blue form of an overseer popped out of the ground in front of him.
“Oh, great,” Hunter grumbled, mood deflating. “One of you things. What, come to stare at me for a few hours?”
It had been ages since the slugcat had seen an overseer, the last one having helped him on his quest and just as quickly vanished the moment he had fulfilled his purpose. The odd creatures were irritating at times, though sometimes useful. Its enormous eye leered at him, strange holographic shapes twisting in circles around the iris.
And yet, as soon as Hunter took a cautious step forward, it retreated back into the ground, zipping through the floor past him and reemerging behind.
He huffed, already tired of the creature’s antics, when suddenly it morphed, holographic face changing into a little creature with small ears. An arrow pointed back towards the facility looming over the two.
A slugcat?
A growing sense of unease suddenly cropped up in his mind. What was the overseer trying to do? Lure him back into the decaying facility? Was it under the influence from the Rot, trying to bring him back closer to where it could snatch him up yet again?
After all, the monster they’d defeated was only the head of a very large serpent. The can itself was still very much infected with rot.
But if there was someone still inside…
He wanted to turn back. He wanted to adopt the same attitude that Shadows had just proudly displayed.
Not my problem… Right?
Except, it had only been Artificer’s sympathy that had saved his life. How could he take such generosity and not at least try to return the favor to the next person in need?
“You better not be fucking me,” Hunter growled at the overseer, slowly stepping back the way he’d came. The metal can towered above him, the wall stretching into the mist in every direction.
Each step felt like a mistake.
Every footfall sent a scream of ‘turn back!’ through his mind.
I am the purposed organism of a god. The apex predator in these lands. I have felled wretched beasts, twisted abominations, and overcome obstacles that any other would crumble under.
The words felt hollow to his mind.
The image of the rot still burned into his eyes.
Its tendrils wrapped around him.
The ache still lingering in his jaw.
Hunter shook his head, pushing the thoughts away with a righteous impunity.
I will not be cowed by my own fears!
The wind whistled around him as he resumed his march, the overseer keeping a steady lead in front of him.
He quickly reached the base of the wall, the faint smell of scavenger still lingering in the air. For a moment, the slugcat wondered if the overseer was going to try and direct him upwards. Perhaps someone had been making the climbing pilgrimage to speak with Pebbles, and found themselves attacked by the Rot?
What good would his help be then? It wasn’t as if he had another one of Shadow’s mysterious destructive spheres.
Instead, the overseer beckoned him into a long stretching tunnel into the can, the setting sunlight against his back casting a long shadow into the gloom. The lights along the walls flickered, brightened, and burned out.
Hunter glanced up at the overseer with a pleading look, but the being simply flashed the same symbol again, an arrow pointing down the long hallway.
With a heavy heart and a long sigh, Hunter slowly reentered the facility.
The corridor was dark, but the faint light still provided enough for his eyes to see. He watched the walls warily, glancing over his shoulder with every other step as he half expected the exit to suddenly vanish behind him. Would another Rot monster swoop in? Or even just a mobile cyst? The toothpick in his hands would do little against either.
Each step was met only with silence, the corridor coming to a rather sudden end as the familiar form of the large lock gates loomed ahead of him. The overseer flashed its symbol one last time, as if asking for him to step inside.
“Oh fuck no!” Hunter growled, entirely baffled by the idea. Slugcat or not, he had no intentions of reentering the facility. It had nearly killed him the first time he tried to escape, and he couldn’t account for luck to save him every time. Shadow’s words echoed in his mind.
Reckless…
His ears suddenly perked up as a strange soft sound filled the hallway. It was muffled and quiet, but unmistakable.
On the other side of the doors, someone was crying.
Hunter came to a halt, the sudden noise sending a wave of ‘turn back and run’ down his spine. A dark hallway, faint sobbing, and all within the confines of a rot infested megastructure? Was the Rot itself crying? Maybe it knew it was going to die. The idea was certainly appealing.
Hunter slowly stepped forward, pausing just before the open doors of the gate. Along the wall, the bright red symbol of denial hovered, and suddenly everything made sense.
Whoever was behind this door was trapped.
“Hello?” He called out, and the soft weeping came to a sudden halt. “Who’s in there? Are you okay?”
The hallway filled with silence.
“H-hunter?” A familiar but haggard voice replied. Hunter’s mind came to a screeching halt.
What was she still doing here?
“Artificer?! What in void’s name are you doing in there?!”
There was no response for a long pause.
“N-no… No!” The slugcat suddenly shouted, voice cracking in denial. “You’re dead! I saw it take you!”
Great, I guess we’re having this conversation now.
“Artificer, I promise-”
“Shut up! You fucking disgusting blob, you can’t leave me to die in peace?! You have to use the voice of my dead friend? Leave me alone!” The wall slammed with emphasis, sending a booming echo down the corridor.
“Artificer, please!” Hunter pleaded, struggling for words. “I’m not some… some puppet! It's me, Hunter!”
“Stop with the fucking game! You lost! You’re dead! Just… Just fucking go away! Hunter is dead... I couldn’t help him, just like…” Her voice trailed off, the faint sound of someone sliding against a wall following suit.
The sound of crying resumed.
I expected this to be a tough conversation, but this…
Against all better logic, Hunter stepped into the gate. He knew that if the doors began to close behind him, there would be no escape.
But he had to at least try.
He had to help his friend. She had already done so much for him.
“Arti…” Hunter softly said, leaning against the door. His mind struggled for words. What could he say to convince her? What would get through? “You haven’t failed anyone. None of this is your fault, you know? You couldn’t have stopped the rot. It didn’t kill me, the damned thing wanted to talk . It tried to convince me to join its side, and kept calling us family. Wouldn’t take no for an answer. It was pretty close, but I knew if I got reinfected with the rot you’d kick my ass for undoing your hard work. Kept me motivated!” He chuckled, even if the memories sent a wave of nausea coursing through him.
The Rot’s face, leering before him as it prepared to deliver its ‘gift’.
“I kicked it in its ugly face. It was quite enraged by the slight. Of course, it takes more than that to take down Rot, but that was enough to make my escape through the top of the facility. You should have seen it, the beast pursued me onwards down the side! It was bigger than any rot I’ve seen, probably even bigger than a King Vulture. I admit, I was scared. I expected that at any moment a tendril would snatch me from behind and pull me back, but one thing kept me going…” He trailed off, waiting for her to take the bait.
And waited.
The wind whistled through the hall.
“...W-what was it?” Artificer quietly asked, voice a tired whisper.
Bingo.
“Our deal!” He chuckled. “I knew that I needed to escape so I could keep my end of it. An oath is an oath right?”
“Yeah…” she returned, strength returning to her voice. “You’re right. Still got a deal to keep.”
“Damn right. Now I’m holding you to your side as well. Can’t find our goal in life stuck in this place, correct? Any idea how to get these doors open?” She chuckled bitterly, rapping a knuckle against the steel.
“If I had any, I would have tried them by now…”
Great… So much for the rescue attempt.
There had to be some way to open the gates.
“Wait… Wait!” Artificer suddenly burst, voice filled with realization. “When Pebbs and I were leaving, he opened the gate with his weird ancient powers. I bet he could override the lock! It's his damn facility after all!”
“Of course! The power of the iterators, who could best them in their own domain? But where is he even? The communication relay?” Arti barked a hoarse laugh.
“He’s gotta be, or else I’m pretty well fucked, eh?”
That’s one way of putting it.
“Then I’ll go there now, as fast as I can. Wait here.”
“It's not like I have any choice in that,” she snarked, but then her voice turned quiet, a slight fear on the edge of her words. “You promise you’ll come back, right?”
For a moment, his voice caught in his throat, and he didn’t need to see her face to feel how vulnerable the slugcat was.
“I promise.”
“Thank you…” she mumbled, and just like that her feistiness returned. “Now get your ass in gear! Get that pink idiot over here! Do you know how fucking hot it is in here with all the electricity?”
With a gruff laugh and a resurgence of energy, Hunter turned on his feet and ran.
The slugcat burst into the sunlight, claws digging into the thin layer of silt and grime that coated the bridge's surface as he ventured into the distance. The communication’s array wasn’t far, and hopefully with any luck the group would be simply sitting around waiting for him.
The gaps in the metal did little to break the slugcat’s long strides as he effortlessly leapt across them. He scrambled through thin connecting pipes, dodging the hungry talons of a vulture as it swooped in to try and snatch him away.
Nothing would stop his quest. Nothing ever had.
Speed had been his entire life, rushing to save a god. To do so once again filled him with a familiar urgent comfort. This was his purpose.
The distance passed quickly under his pace, and already he could see the towering spire of the communications relay slowly emerging from the gloom. The group had said they would meet where the bridge met the gates to the nearby region, and Hunter’s eyes peered through the mist as he searched for any figures lingering.
And yet as he neared the shelter they had promised to rendezvous near, no slugcat nor iterator met him.
Fucking figures…
With a growl, Hunter stamped a foot and continued onwards. His mind searched for excuses, reasoning, a justification for where the group had gone. Had they been intercepted by the Rot? Had they been assaulted by more misguided scavengers? Perhaps they were simply waiting inside the facility itself, away from swooping claws and snapping jaws.
Hunter tapped his foot impatiently as the gates churned, irritation spreading through his body. Some small part of his mind formed a snappy retort or scathing insult for their failure to meet as planned, but his dutiful side stowed it away. They were gods, it was not his place to question what had taken their attention.
Maybe they were in trouble?
I’m going to step through these doors, and… they’ll all be waiting for me! Yeah…
The gates opened to reveal nothing but sprawling plant life and gently floating spores perched over the wide abyss. The faint sounds of life echoed across the wide space, a pair of squidcadas zipping past him with curious eyes.
“Of course…”’ he grumbled, stepping out into the gusty winds once again. The air was thick with the smell of pollen, making his nose tingle and twinge. The bridge continued onwards, concluding its lonesome path at the side of the communication tower, stretching both upwards into the sky and down to the surface below.
How am I going to find them in this huge place?
Suddenly, there was a sickening sound of wrenching metal resonating through the air, and from the side of the facility, dust and debris blasted out of ancient broken windows. Hunter stared for a moment at the sudden burst of chaos, spear clenched as he watched something enormous fall all the way down the tower and vanish into the mists.
There was a quiet pause, as if even the nature around him was watching the show, and then a resounding distant boom as whatever had fallen came to a stop.
Well, I suppose that was easy.
Hunter leapt across one final gap in the span, slipping between two wrenched apart plates of steel with his spear at the ready. The room beyond was empty, a sprawl of electronics and strange lights blinking along the walls. He sniffed once, eyes widening as the rich smell of blood and lizard filled his head. Was he already too late? The iterators didn’t have blood did they? That only left one other option…
If the little one is dead, Arti is going to tear us all in half.
Hunter slowly crept forwards, eyes and ears searching for any hint of danger lurking in the shadows. His footsteps were whisper silent, almost unbecoming for his bulk and brute strength.
But there was nothing but the faint sound of computers and a lone spear stuck in the ground.
A less familiar stalker might have called it quits there, but Hunter had spent enough time analyzing the prints of fleeing prey to not recognize the smears and swathes printed on the floor. A group of lizards had come through here, and their tracks scrambled across the room, coming together at the end of the space.
A pitch black portal beckoned him, swirls of dust still lightly wafting from between the split apart sliding doors.
Hunter warily stepped towards the darkness, peering into the gloom and half expecting to find the drooling maw of a hungry reptile, or the dripping fangs of an enormous spider.
His eyes focused into the shadow, and he had to hold back a laugh.
Pebbles, his pink frame now bare to the world as he had somehow lost his clothing, clung to a thick cable dangling from the center of the shaft, suspended over a vast pit that descended into the abyss. The iterator looked terrified, eyes wide behind his oversized mask and body trembling with fright.
Hunter was quiet for a moment, lost in the sight of the god now reduced to nothing more than a quivering thin twig.
At least until Pebbles turned to face him, eyes squinting in the light.
“Need a paw?” Hunter chuckled, trying to hide the humor in his voice and maintain a level of respect. Pebbles expression turned irritated, and the slugcat felt the hidden grin on his face yearn to break free at the sight of the irritable pink thing.
“Oh great,” the iterator grumbled. “It's you… Where’s Arti?”
“Funny you should ask… Let me help you first.”
Hunter stretched out over the chasm, reaching a long arm into the abyss and gently plucking Pebbles from his tiny perch. To his credit, the robot didn’t squirm, merely huffing to himself as he fidgeted from the slugcat’s grip the second he was over solid ground. He stormed across the room, snatching up his spear and glancing over his shoulder.
“Answers. Now. Is it done? Where’s Arti? What happened?”
For a moment, Hunter debated telling Pebbles what had happened. It would be easy to simply say the deed was done, and that Arti needed help getting unstuck. The memories of the Rot simmered up to the forefront of his mind…
That will last about as long as it takes for Arti to tell him her side.
“I’ll tell you as we move,” Hunter grunted, “but first, are the others safe? This place reeks of lizard, and blood…” Pebbles waved a hand dismissively, as if brushing away an annoying bug.
“Dealt with. Moon and Rivulet are downstairs, playing with plants or something. Where’s Arti? Is something wrong?” Despite the iterator’s aloof posture, he couldn’t hide the hint of concern in his voice.
“She didn’t get out, the gates are locked and refuse to open. She mentioned you could assist in opening them?” Pebbles stared at him for a moment, as if searching his face for deceit.
It's not the whole story, sure, but it's not a lie either…
“Great,” the iterator grumbled, marching towards the exit with a frustrated sigh. “It's always something…” Wordlessly Hunter stepped in behind, long strides easily closing the gap as once again the pair entered the sunlight. The sky above was gloomy with thick clouds, the waning sun casting a golden glow across the landscape.
For a few minutes, they simply marched in silence, the iterator leading with a surprising confidence in his stride as they leapt across spanning gaps and climbed precarious poles.
Maybe he won’t ask?
The first set of gates beckoned before them, the two stepping into the rushing steam.
“So, what happened?” Pebbles barked, breaking the tense silence with a scathing look. “Don’t hide anything, you’re a terrible liar.” Hunter sputtered for a moment, holding back a growl, but eventually sighed and resigned himself to his fate.
Where to even begin?
“We made it to the inside of the facility quickly enough,” the slugcat started, the gates opening before them as the pair resumed their march. “The interior was… overrun. Some rooms had nothing but rot coating every surface. Navigation was difficult, but not impossible. We had a harder time simply finding the cell’s housing to start the sequence. But then the rot attacked, and we got split up.”
His mind stalled for a moment as he remembered her crying his name, the slick tendrils pulling him into a gurgling mass.
“And then what?” Pebbles grunted, carefully walking across a slim stretch of metal ahead of him.
I don’t want to talk about this…
But duty demanded it.
“It took me… One of the cysts ambushed us and… carried me away.” He was quiet for a moment, and Pebbles simply watched him with a deeply unsettled expression. The slugcat took a deep shuddering breath and continued. “It took me to the puppet chamber, where some kind of rot abomination had formed. It spoke about us being… family. It tried to offer me a deal. It knew we were going to my creator’s facility, and since yours was in such poor shape from its initial infection, it wanted to use his after we freed him.”
“For what exactly?” Pebbles probed, voice quickly filling with horror.
The wind whistled past them, the pair quiet for a moment as they walked.
“It's hard to describe, let alone understand. The rot doesn’t seem to be just one single creature, but a collection of everything it's ever consumed. Instead of simply eating you, it takes your body and mind into this collection, forever. It wanted to spread this, to everything it could I assume, but it needed the power of an iterator to maintain it.”
“Void…”
“It… It tried to reinfect me.” The words flowed out on their own accord. “I refused, so it… tried to take more drastic measures. I couldn’t stop it. It was only luck that I escaped, Arti returned the power cell at just the right time to incapacitate it and give me a window. From then on, it was a mad sprint to get away…”
“It's not still following you is it?”
“No!” His mind flashed back to the Rot, its face slowly fading into the mist as it fell. “It's dealt with. I swear.”
Pebbles was quiet, watching him silently.
Hunter stood in place, pushing back the wave of memories washing over him. When had his hands started to tremble? When had the fur along his back grown so tense?
For a long moment, the pair simply lurched towards their destination.
“I know what you feel,” Pebbles quietly muttered, glaring at the slowly emerging form of the can ahead of them. “Thousands of cycles with that vile gunk slowly seeping into my facility, attacking me in my chambers, and now following me even after I’ve found my freedom. It seems as if it will never leave us alone, eh?” Hunter glanced at him with a confused expression.
Us? Does he really mean…?
It felt strange to compare himself to the god, and yet they had both suffered the same fate. The slow unbeatable decay as their bodies slowly succumbed to an unrelenting sickness.
Suddenly Pebbles’ image seemed to twist in Hunter’s mind. The lofty image of a graceful and glorious god faded away, leaving behind nothing but a thin weary husk, pushing onwards despite everything that seemed to oppose him.
How familiar…
“I won’t tolerate it,” the iterator spat, kicking a rock off the ledge. “It haunts my dreams, stalks my family, and threatens my friends, on top of everything else it yearns for. I refuse to let this mistake of mine continue to ruin my chance at life. I have come too far to let it yank me back into its clutches now.”
“Void, do I feel that…” Hunter mumbled, earning a bitter dry chuckle from the iterator. Just for a moment, the clouded skies seemed a tad brighter.
“Enough of this,” Pebbles declared, a fire entering his steps. “Let’s get Arti out and leave this wretched place. While the detonation should mostly be internal, I have no intention of lingering here longer than is needed.” With an affirming nod from the slugcat, the two surged forward, leaving the dark conversation behind them.
Minutes later, the tunnel beckoned them once again, and yet if Pebbles felt any fear from entering the dark space he did little to show it, storming into the shadows with little regard for anything that might be waiting. Hunter followed close behind, almost taken aback by the iterator’s brash attitude.
I suppose he once owned this place…
As if to drive the point in, Pebbles stomped up to the doors, knocking loudly with a fist.
“Arti!” he shouted, voice booming down the corridor. “You better not be dead in there! It was a pain in the ass to get here!”
“Pebbs,” Arti croaked from behind the gate, voice filled with a weary amusement. “You really know how to make a friend feel important.”
“Only the best for my grungy companions. What, no thanks?”
“Pebbs,” Arti growled, voice dropping low. “I’m sure you’ve been through a lot, but when you find the time, I’d rather not spend the rest of my cycles STUCK IN THIS FUCKING GATE!”
Hunter took a wary step back, ears drooping. He’d seen first hand what Arti did to those who angered her, and had no intention of joining them. He took a quick moment to scrub the scavenger’s symbol from his hand.
Pebbles merely huffed and rolled his eyes, either too tired to care or too trusting of the steel that separated them. Though, that would change soon enough.
Wordlessly the robot stepped up to the interface, sparks flying from his fingers as he closed his eyes and did… whatever it was that his kind did. Hunter gripped his spear nervously as he worked, casting frequent glances back the way they came.
The red symbol above them sputtered, shifting into a green circle as the locks began to slowly open. The covering slid away, and for a brief moment Hunter saw his friend’s beaming hopeful face once again.
She looked like shit.
“About time!” Arti barked, the relief in her voice nearly palpable, dancing from foot to foot.
There was a twisted lurch as the gears suddenly halted, the door locked halfway open. Pebble's brow furrowed, more electricity dancing from his hands.
“What's going on?” Hunter asked, only to be met with silence. The hologram above them twisted and flashed, the gears grinding as they switched into reverse.
The doors were sealing once again.
“What the fuck? Pebbs?!” Arti boomed, slamming her paws against the moving steel.
“It's…” The iterator’s voice was strained, locked in focus as his form began to tremble. “Fighting me. It's in the computer system!”
Of course, the Rot would not allow them to escape that easily.
An electric energy rose in the air, the arcing bolts bouncing from Pebbles to the interface as he wrestled for control. Slowly, as if the effort itself was agonizing, the doors began to open once again. Inch by inch they widened, until the smallest gap presented itself.
With a flick of her tail, Artificer leapt through the tiny space, and the gate slammed shut behind her. Without words, the trio scrambled away from the doors, the second set of locks grinding closed behind them.
For a moment, the three of them simply stood there, watching the jaws of the Rot snap closed around empty air. Pebbles rubbed his face, exhaustion creeping over his features.
“I’m so sick of this fucking place,” he muttered, and without even bothering to wait, the iterator began the long walk down the hall without them.
Hunter and Arti watched him stumble away, sharing a glance between them. He sighed, awkwardly scratching the back of his head.
“Well, that’s sett-”
His words were interrupted as Arti’s fist rocketed into his face, sending him staggering backwards into the wall.
Yeah, that’s about what I expected.
“You fucking dick!” She shouted, voice hoarse and smokey. “What the fuck!? You get carried off by the fucking rot, go on some kind of fucking vacation, and then just waltz back here like ‘Hey Arti how’s it going?’ as if nothing happened?!”
“Hey, come on,” he snapped back, rubbing his already tender jaw. “I dealt with enough shit to get this kind of thanks for a rescue! Do you know how hard it is to run away from a giant, all-consuming cyst that screams about being your long lost cousin?” Her stance softened, though the anger in her eye still remained fierce with fury. With a huff, she stormed off to follow Pebbles.
Figures…
Quietly, he fell in behind her, keeping a steady distance from the smoldering slugcat.
The two stepped outside once again, Arti holding a hand up to shield her eyes from the light, dim as it was. The clouds rumbled over them, though how much of that was the weather and how much was the facility being pushed to its limits, Hunter couldn’t tell. Pebbles lingered under a covering of metal, glaring into the clouds above.
He looked about as exhausted as Hunter felt, and wordlessly, the iterator pushed off the wall and began the march back to the communications relay, leaving the two slugcats to trail behind.
Perhaps it was the size of their group, or the attitude of anger radiating from its members, but no lizard nor vulture dared to harass them, leaving the trio to silently pass through the lofty sprawling path.
“Say Pebbs,” Arti suddenly asked, and the iterator wearily glanced over his shoulder. “Where’d your robes go? Finally decided to dump the gross things?”
For a moment Hunter expected the robot to snap back at her, knowing how devoted to the holy silks he had been.
“Lizards,” he muttered, and turned back to his trekking. The conversation died as quickly as it began, though Arti at least gave an impressed grunt.
They pushed forwards, no sounds shared between them aside from the soft patter of footsteps.
Another set of doors later, these ones far more compliant than the last, and the three stepped into the communications tower. The clouds rumbled over them, a light rain splashing against their backs.
At least company was there to greet them.
“Hi Pebbles! Hi Artificer! Hi Hunter!” the shrill voice of Rivulet met them, running up to greet the trio. Moon lingered behind, her gentle expression quickly turning to concern as she saw them. Hunter raised a brow at their curious new clothing, the pair draped in strange green garments.
Probably a story for another time…
“What happened? Pebbles, where are your clothes?” The pink iterator merely shrugged, flipping his mask up to rub his eyes blearily.
“Lizards,” he repeated, somehow with even less enthusiasm than before. “They’re dead, okay? There’s a shelter at the back of the room, and I’m at the end of my energy reserves. If you need me, reconsider and go bother someone else.” Moon watched with worry in her eyes as her sibling staggered off into the towering computer stacks. She turned to face the other two, trying to regain her warm and welcoming demeanor.
“And how did your journey fare you two? I hope you completed your quest in good time and spirits.”
Arti snorted, rolling her eye and marching past her to follow Pebbles.
“It's done.” She grunted, “Now I’m starving and tired, so I'm not in the mood to chat.”
Moon shot a burning glare into her back, eyes narrowing with irritation before turning to Hunter.
“There’s not much to say ma’am,” Hunter shrugged, “we did what needed to be done.” He didn’t want to go into the details.
None of them did.
Moon hummed, a sense of understanding passing across her face, even if she still looked a tad irritated by the lack of answers.
“Holy shit!” Artificer’s voice filled the room from behind the computer stacks, Hunter quickly darting past the iterator to catch up to her. What could it be now? Another threat? Hadn’t this cycle been enough?
He rounded a corner, only to nearly stumble over the enormous body of a dead alpha orange lizard. Artificer stood next to it, staring with a mixture of awe and greedy hunger in her eye. Hunter couldn’t help but share the same feeling, and almost wordlessly he prepared to leap upon the creature and feast. No questions, a meal was a meal.
“Hang on, hang on!” Artificer suddenly said, pushing Hunter back with a paw to the face. “Where did this thing even come from? It's not fresh, it's been here a while. What killed it?” Moon and Rivulet emerged behind them, the group assembling to stare at the corpse.
“Wasn’t me!” Rivulet chirped, prodding the reptile with a foot. “We were downstairs fighting kelp!”
“Well it wasn’t us,” Hunter said, licking his lips in anticipation. “It's a clean kill. A single spear through the neck. Whoever did this was quick and skilled. A natural fighter.”
There was a quiet pause.
And then all at once, they realized who it belonged to.
“No way!” Arti chuckled, “Pebbs really is becoming quite the scary little shit. This thing is huge, how’d he take it out?”
“He’s faster than you think!” Rivulet beamed. “And quite the good throw! Maybe it's some iterator magic?”
The slugcats all turned to stare at Moon expectantly.
“What?” She blustered, evidently quite disturbed by the situation. “We’re not combat machines! Don’t ask me!”
“You nearly stabbed that kelp in half, Moon,” the water dancer chirped, nudging her with an elbow.
Ah, so that’s what they were wearing.
“That was a plant!” She sputtered, “it was trying to kill you!”
“Seems Pebbles angered a pack of oranges,” Hunter added, “I think he somehow tricked the rest of them into jumping down that shaft back there. It certainly caused quite the noise.”
“Ah, so… That’s what that was.” Moon quietly muttered.
“Damn! An entire pack!” Arti laughed, “and he stabbed the alpha right in the neck! Hang on, as much as I would love to eat this thing, I have an idea.” She reached into her bag, pulling out her knife with a grin.
The rest watched in a mixture of shock and awe as she jammed the blade into the lizard's skull, quickly working around its head with long laborious slices. A moment later, the top of its head popped off with a yank, complete with huge horns, upper teeth, and its wide dead eyes.
“First he gets a king vulture, now an alpha orange with its whole pack!” Arti beamed, cleaning the last bits of gore from the trophy. “In my colony, the sergeants wore lizard skulls into battle, and the captains wore vulture masks! Pebbs is gonna look so badass with both!” She set the trophy aside, looking rather proud of herself.
“Can we eat now?” Hunter pleaded, the smell of fresh blood nearly making him feral.
“What about the rest of him?” Rivulet asked, earning a confused look from her fellow slugcats. “You got him a hat, but the rest of him is still all naked!” Arti hummed, Hunter burying his face in his hands with a muffled scream.
“Well, we used lizard hide to make decent combat clothing, and layered it under centipede scales, but I’m no tailor. I sucked at that, explosives were more my thing.”
“Wellll,” Rivulet beamed, batting her eyes. “If you cut the skin off, I bet I could do it! We used to make Eel lizards into backpacks and bags! I bet I could make this guy into something! I think Pebbles would love to have some nifty orange lizard armor! It'd match his old robes!”
“Deal!” Arti dove back in with her knife, blood flying once again.
“I know I said I was eager to learn about slugcat culture,” Moon muttered numbly, stepping back as Arti sliced open the lizard’s belly and spilled its guts to the floor. “But this isn’t exactly what I had in mind…”
Her look of dread only deepened as Hunter finally gave in, throwing himself to the floor to ravenously consume the spilled entrails.
“Hey!” Arti growled, slapping his head with a paw, though it did little to dissuade him. “Save some for me you impatient prick! I haven’t eaten either!” He waved her off, snatching up its heart and stuffing the entire organ in his mouth with a content purr.
Still warm!
“I forget how your kind is capable of such… gluttonous behavior,” Moon chided, though the edge in her voice was hardly sharp. For a moment, Hunter felt a pang of embarrassment for his wild hunger flitter through his mind.
Fuck that, after everything I’ve been through this cycle I deserve this.
Arti merely scoffed, not looking up from her butcherous work.
“This is nothing! In my old colony the cooks would spend entire cycles preparing feasts for after battle. Tables of food, barrels of drink, music and dance! It could last for cycles, until everyone was a stumbling drunk idiot, barely able to walk! One time I woke up on top of the central watchtower, cuddling an entire roast lizard tail. I’d slept past roll call, my captain was sooooo pissed!” Moon hummed thoughtfully, raising a brow.
“You speak so fondly of your homeland. Why did you leave?”
Hunter nearly choked on his mouth full of food. His eyes glanced upward, watching Arti warily. She had her head bowed as she cut, mouth tight and body stiff. He carefully prepared to leap into action, already imagining her fury for even bringing the memory up.
And yet nothing was said, no action taken, aside from the soft patter of Rivulet’s pawsteps as she nervously danced in place.
“I made a choice,” Arti muttered, voice devoid of emotion. “It didn’t go well.”
Moon, evidently much more versed in picking up social cues, softly nodded in quiet understanding, and left the topic at that.
“Anyway, I’m done!” Arti proudly declared, her usual smirk and sass returning. “Here you go, kid!” In one swift motion, she yanked the lizard’s thick skin from its body, tossing the bundle at Rivulet and promptly burying the little water dancer in still wet and bloody flesh. With a flourish, Arti returned her knife to her bag and began eating.
“Awesome!” Rivulet squirmed and poked her head out, “This shouldn’t take long!” She untangled herself from the mess of skin and scales, fetching a tiny needle of bone from somewhere in her garment and beginning her work. Moon, evidently perturbed by the grizzly display of hunger and tailoring skills, simply slumped against a wall and rubbed her eyes.
The carnivores ate quickly, the hunger from their journey making fast work of the remaining bits of lizard. Minutes later, they lounged around the floor with contentedly filled stomachs, picking gristle from their fangs.
“All done!” Rivulet beamed, and Hunter could only gawk as she proudly displayed a rather tough looking garment of lizard leather. Somehow, it even looked to be in Pebble’s size.
“W-what?!” Arti blustered, scrambling to her feet and snatching the clothing to inspect it. “It's barely been ten minutes!”
Rivulet merely shrugged, that same goofy smile on her face as always.
“What can I say, I’ve sewn a loooooooot of clothing,” she gloated, twirling her needle between her fingers with a deft aloofness.
A rumble shook the building, growing to a crescendo as it vibrated everything around them. With silent urgency, the group rose to their feet and scrambled to the back of the room. One by one, they crawled into the shelter, Hunter crouching low to avoid hitting the ceiling. Idly he sniffed the air, nose instantly scrunching up as the scent of orange lizard only intensified.
“Stars!” Arti nearly gagged as the doors churned shut behind them. “It reeks! And this place is tiny! How did a pack of oranges live here?”
“Very carefully, it would seem,” Hunter grumbled, already feeling a headache from the odor. Perhaps he could arise early to bath in some of the fresh rain and wash the smell off. The thought was tossed away nearly instantly.
Sleep. Nothing but sleep.
“Yo Pebbs!” Arti barked, rousing the pink iterator from the corner he had huddled up in. He tiredly looked up at them, though his eyes did light up in curiosity from the bundle in her arms. “We made you something!”
“Technically, Ruffles was the one who made it,” Moon added, earning a snicker from the little wet rodent. Arti merely huffed and rolled her eye, tossing the bundle at Pebbles and grumbling to herself.
To his credit, the robot managed to catch the projectile delivery, cautiously rising from to his feet and unfurling the gift. The robes flopped to the ground, the dark black skin blending in with the dim light of the shelter, even with the dotted orange markings mottled across it. He gave the material an experimental shake, nodding in idle satisfaction at the heft.
“It's funny,” Pebbles mused, “My old robes were crafted by artisans flown in from the finer facilities, using the holiest of silks spun by the spiders of the citadel. They were anointed by prayer, gifted to me as a god.” He undid the clasp, fashioned from a spare claw, on the front, draping the lizard garment over his shoulders and testing the weight on his body. “And yet here I am, skittering around in the dark, wearing the carcass of a dead reptile, and somehow, this feels more comfortable.” Arti barked a laugh, reaching behind his head to pull the hood, and lizard’s remaining head, up and over his mask. The iterator stood tall, a sudden vigor surging through his body despite the indifferent and inexhaustible cruelty of the world around them.
It was certainly an eye raising spectacle to say the least. The horns on the head flattened against the ceiling from their sheer length, almost every part of Pebble’s skin protected by the thick hide.
I wouldn’t mind getting me one of those.
“Lizard armor ain’t nothing to scoff at!” Arti rebuked, sizing up her friend with a look of pride. “It's tough as shit, enough to keep a bite from breaking skin, a grenade from punching holes in you, or a spear from hitting something important. Shit, if a vulture nabs you, just undo the clasp and they’ll fly away with nothing but lizard skin for dinner! Stylish too, at least to me, and not to mention, it's waterproof.”
If Pebbles wasn’t sold on the clothing before, his widened eyes certainly reflected his approval.
“Well, hopefully it doesn’t come to that,” Moon muttered, cozying up against a wall and sliding down to relax. “Now, if you all do not mind, I'd like some rest." Rivulet, eager as ever, nuzzled up beside her, with Pebbles taking up her other side, though far more aloof and begrudging.
Hunter sized up the remaining floor space, scoping out a corner to crawl into and hunker down. He had no intention of joining the cuddle pile of robots and Rivulet, rather tired of all the talking and interaction that he’d endured throughout the day.
Among other things, still lingering under the surface of his mind.
With a heavy sigh, he squirmed over their legs and into the more roomy looking section of the shelter, holding back a chuckle as he realized that it simply had more space due to Pebble’s shorter legs. The slugcat paced in a small circle and flopped to the ground in a heap.
Only to collide with Arti, doing the exact same thing in the adjacent corner.
“Hey!” She snapped, teeth flashing, and for a moment Hunter bared his own, before the two realized that barely a few feet away was an audience staring directly at them.
Pebbles chuckled behind his mask.
Rivulet waved a small paw.
With a synchronized huff, the two large slugcats reluctantly laid on the floor, backs pressed against each other in the cramped space.
The party slowly relaxed, Rivulet falling into soft shrill snores on Moon’s lap as she and Pebbles quietly discussed some ancient historical topic.
And yet, despite the sheer torment of events he’d been through, Hunter could find no rest.
Visions danced in his eyes whenever he closed them.
Words sifted through his mind wherever he tried to relax.
‘Hold still, please.’
With a groan, he rolled on his side, trying to ignore the rising pace of his heart, despite the exhaustion creeping into his bones.
Only to come face to face with Arti as she did the exact same thing. For a brief moment, the two slugcats glared at each other, prepared to battle for the space, but with a sigh, Artificer rolled her eye, stuffing her face in herself as she curled up.
I really shouldn’t say something.
A beat. His ear twitched as the iterators began watching a purple hologram of some kind, displaying some figure dancing in strange patterns under a garishly colorful light as a gentle hymn played. Only after a moment did Hunter realize that the light of Pebbles’ eyes behind his mask had faded into darkness, the iterator ushered into the realm of sleep.
He tried not to be jealous.
Moon however, stayed awake, staring numbly at the little picture painted in front of her. For a moment, Hunter could only stare at her soft eyes, trying to glean some sense of the godly wisdom and majesty behind them.
Instead, all he saw was a profound weariness, like a mountain endlessly eroded away by the ceaseless rage of time. But she was unflatteringly polite, and somehow he knew she would turn her ears from any conversation he started with his friend.
So with a deep breath, he took a shot.
“Arti,” Hunter softly whispered, voice as quiet as a breeze and yet still feeling like a booming cry in the quiet of the shelter. “Are you still up?” The question instantly felt stupid, but he wasn’t sure how else to break the topic.
She merely flicked an ear, but somehow he felt it was the barest sense of an invitation to talk.
“I’m… sorry, okay?” he continued, feeling rather uncertain what exactly he was apologizing for, but still offering it regardless. “I didn’t mean for things to end up like-”
“The fuck are you apologizing for?” she hissed, tail flicking slightly in irritation. “Did you ask Mr. Gurgle-Grabby to come whisk you away? It isn’t your fault, so cut the crap.”
Bitch.
But nevertheless, he persisted.
“Look, you punched me in the face over it. Don’t act like it meant nothing to you. I’m not an idiot, okay?”
Silence returned, and Hunter stole another glance at Moon. The iterator still stared at the small projection, lightly brushing the slick skin of Rivulet with her hand, though it was fairly obvious her focus was rather intentionally direct.
I really shouldn’t be bothering the gods with this…
Arti gave a soft sigh, eye opening as she stared at the floor in melancholic weariness.
“I’ve lost a lot, okay” she mumbled, “I just… I thought I’d lost you too. It was a lot to accept, and then you just… walked right back in! Dead people don’t normally do that, okay? Forgive a girl for being a bit shocked.” The layer of venom did nothing to hide the sincerity of her words, and Hunter resisted the urge to say something snarky back.
“Well, what kind of honorable slugcat would I be if I went and broke our deal?” She merely groaned and turned over again, evidently done with his poor attempt at friendship mending.
Right, stick to killing things Hunter, and leave talking to people with far more grace. Ugh…
With a defeated sigh he rolled over himself, staring at the wall as the thoughts once again danced their morbid routine in his mind.
‘You owe us this… Is this how you repay your family?’
“Hunter?” His eyes flashed open at her voice, patience wearing thin. What now?
“Yes?”
“Thanks for coming back for me, and keeping your promise… I’m not used to having people there for me.” The vulnerability in her voice was startlingly raw, a razor thin gap in the thick armor she’d developed, lowered for just a moment to deliver a few quiet words. How did one even respond to that?
“Anytime,” he muttered, and with that the conversation came to a close.
Hunter closed his eyes once again, already anticipating the gurgling voice to return to his memories.
And yet only quiet thoughts and sensations came to his mind. He suddenly became aware of the people around him, his partners in this battle. The gentle sound of Rivulet’s nasally breathing. The occasional robotic twitch from Pebbles, or the idle quiet noise of Moon’s hologram and the soft music playing from it. But most of all, the warm soft fur of his friend lightly pressed against his back.
Perhaps she wasn’t the only one who wasn’t used to not being on their own, but that could be mended with time. Right?
But before his mind could pursue the topic any further, his consciousness sank into quiet oblivion, and his thoughts came to a gentle stillness in well earned rest.
This was his family.
Notes:
Quite the marathon of a chapter. Apologies for making it so long, but I had to get everything and everyone into their places! I hope it was worth the wait.
I hope you all like the scavenger lore I've come up with. It was a lot of fun to write, along with how it ties into Artificer's backstory.
And the fabled Rot meeting! At last I get to explain the true nature of the intelligent Rot, and the threat it poses.
Pebbles no longer nakey! He's earned it. Dude is collecting quite an assortment of animal trophies.
As always, please post your feedback and thoughts on the chapter. Support always goes a long way! The next chapter might be a while, as my life has gotten pretty busy and I might not have as much time for writing, but I'll keep at it.
Chapter 14
Summary:
It comes time to leave the nest, but there can be no growth without struggle.
Notes:
(See the end of the chapter for notes.)
Chapter Text
Rivulet awoke to a mixture of soft breathing and bellowing snores. She quickly opened her eyes and yawned, surveying the room with a look of curiosity as the fog of sleep faded from her mind. Beside her, Moon and Pebbles leaned softly against each other, eyes shut in rest. The iterators were silent, though if one listened intently, they could hear the faint sound of some mechanical process from deep within their shells.
If not for the other noises in the room.
Across the shelter, Hunter and Artificer seemed locked in a subconscious battle over who could produce the most noise. Artificer laid on her back, limbs spread across the limited floor space, snoring like a dying jetfish, while Hunter curled up into a ball and breathed out deafening growling snorts with every exhale.
A lighter sleeper might have found the environment impossible to find any rest in, but Rivulet didn’t mind.
I’ve slept through worse!
The one time she’d had to spend the night in the jetfish cove had nearly deafened her. Who knew fish could be so noisy when they slept?
Still, her restless energy could not be quelled, and, making sure not to rouse any of the others, Rivulet climbed to her feet and carefully opened the shelter doors. She kept a keen eye on Pebbles, remembering the last time she had performed this same escape. His eyes remained dark, though Artificer did roll over from the noise of the opening door, her tail slapping Hunter in the face.
Oh crap…
Rivulet stared with wide eyes as the enormous slugcat growled viciously in his sleep, almost sounding like a hungry, hissing lizard, before shoving the limb off his snout and burying his face deeper into his short fur.
The snoring resumed shortly after, though Rivulet didn’t dare move. Sneaking out was a long time hobby of hers, though normally the person she was running away from actually warranted the escape. Even if she liked most of their group, it still felt strange to not run off when given the chance. It was practically a habit!
She counted down the seconds in her head, watching each sleeping member carefully for the slightest hint of movement.
Not a peep.
With a triumphant grin, Rivulet turned around and zipped out of the shelter, crawling into the larger room. Outside, the air was filled with thick humidity and water dripping from the walls. The faint sound of strange, ancient machinery echoed across the chamber as she walked, and for a moment, she debated asking Moon or Pebbles what exactly each device did.
Eh, whatever.
Her excited pace faltered for a moment as she turned the corner into the wider open space, clear of machinery. Her eyes fell on an almost otherworldly sight, peering through the small opening leading outside.
Darkness.
What the… It was super bright outside last cycle! Did something change?
With quiet steps, Rivulet slowly crept towards the exit, ears swiveling for the slightest sound of some lurking predator or unseen threat. She kept low to the ground, ready to bolt at a moment's notice. Cautiously, she sniffed the air, and yet no scent stood out, aside from the smell of rain and the faint, old odor of orange lizard.
Welp, when all else fails, the best way to find out is by recklessly charging into the unknown!
And so, with her usual disregard for safety, Rivulet scrambled outside. A moment later, she emerged into the towering region around them, eyes straining in the dark for whatever could have blocked out the sun. Did Pebbles’ home somehow move? Was the monster infesting it somehow causing it to walk? It seemed almost impossible, but the power of the ancients was incomprehensible. The slugcat peered upwards into the dark sky, half expecting to see the enormous form of the hulking facility looming over her on gigantic legs.
“Woah…”
Rivulet could only stare in raw wonder at the sight of the nakedly dark night sky above her. The soft green glow of distant stars twinkled far above, a long band of multicolor dust stretched from one side of the horizon to the other. Far away, like the half-lidded eye of some great sea serpent from legend, the crescent moon shone down on the land, bathing it in a faint silvery light. The distant sound of chirping bugs filled the air, and, for a moment, Rivulet could only sit and stare.
She’d seen the sky before. Far out in the oceans, where the land couldn’t be seen for miles, the clouds would occasionally part to grant a brief glimpse of the heavens, but it had never been this expansive. Through some stroke of luck, the cycle had ended before sunrise, allowing her a tiny moment to admire the view. Perhaps it was the height? The communications tower was rather high above the ground, after all.
“Enjoying the view?”
The gruff voice behind her nearly made Rivulet leap over the edge in fright, spinning on the spot, only to come face-to-chest with the tall form of Hunter. He loomed over her, eyes still filled with a sleepy laziness as an ear idly flicked.
How does he manage to be so quiet?
“Y-yep!” Rivulet stammered, coughing to try and hide the crack in her voice. “It's quite something! Never seen the clouds so clear!” She laughed nervously, mind already imagining him simply plucking her from the ground and flinging her over the edge like an old pup’s ball.
Instead, Hunter merely grunted, rubbing his eyes and plodding past her to sit along the edge. He cast his eyes upward, though he seemed far more focused on the looming mass of the facility that covered half the sky, rather than any grand presentation of the cosmos. Rivulet watched him, fidgeting in place at the sudden interruption to her solitary escape. She’d never had much chance to talk to him, and any idea to break the silence instantly fizzled away in her mind.
For a moment, Rivulet felt the claws of temptation almost pulling her legs for her. It would be so easy to turn around, squirm back inside, and find some other section of the array to explore. Perhaps she could even figure out the strange moving box that Pebbles and Moon had commanded, and go visit Bubbles in the deep, dank waterways. The idea of riding the jetfish through tight corridors and hairpin turns, while racing along at breakneck speed, sent a tingle of excitement through her body.
With a silent sigh and a twinge of regret, she buried the thought away. While it would be nice to say hello to her jetfish once again, the chance to see the twinkling stars was too rare to walk away from. Even now, the giant metal machine was leaking puffs of steam into the air, though it certainly seemed to be far less than previously. Instead, Rivulet turned her attention to Hunter, mind buzzing as she tried to think of something to break the quietness between them. She’d never had much of a chance to speak with the hulking fighter, and perhaps this would be a good chance to get to know him, especially if they were going to spend so much time together traveling.
Well, if Artificer thinks he’s a cool guy, there’s gotta be something to it!
Wordlessly, Rivulet stepped up beside Hunter, swinging her own feet over the edge and joining him in his lonesome vigil. The large slugcat coughed quietly, idly scratching his tail as he yawned, but made no acknowledgement of her presence, merely continuing to stare blearily up into the sky.
“So, did you have fun in there?” Rivulet blurted out, doing her best to look and sound friendly. “I mean, all the weird goop, zero gravity, the place was like a maze! A real fun one! Did you enjoy it?” Hunter was quiet, a glazed look crossing over his face, and for a moment she thought that she might have brought up a poor conversation topic. Perhaps Hunter was lost in the amazing experiences he’d had?
He must have had a lot of fun! I hope…
“Yeah…” Hunter muttered distantly, blinking his eyes as he shook his head. “Lots of fun. Killed a self-appointed rot god with a bomb. Good times.” A soft shiver ran through his body, as he unconsciously brought a clawed hand to scratch at the raw scars on his back.
“Wow!” Rivulet chirped, already imagining the scene in her head. “That’s so cool! Where I’m from, that’d totally be worth a tattoo! Except… I don’t think it’d be very visible under your fur.” Hunter grunted, itching his chin and the odd hair bristling there.
“Arti said that her people used to treat scars the same way. That each one was a story to be told, a mark of a mighty battle that you’d emerged victorious from. I frankly think my body has enough of those, though I suppose I’ll earn a few more at some point regardless of my opinion on it.”
“Did you get a cool scar to celebrate your victory against the rot then?”
“...In a way, I suppose I did,” Hunter grumbled, wincing as he rubbed his jaw. “I’d rather not remember it, given the choice. Some stories are best left forgotten. What about yourself? You seem like a courageous and daring type, haven’t you done something to earn your own mark of pride, whether it be in ink or blood?”
The smile on Rivulet’s face fizzled away, instead replaced with an irritable glare. For a moment, she debated against telling Hunter her history, not quite keen on discussing the topic with someone she barely knew.
And yet, he had asked. What was the harm in telling?
“My mom never let me,” Rivulet spat, flicking a rock off the edge and into the dark abyss beneath them. “In my colony, your family is the one who decides what your first tattoo is, and she never said anything was good enough. She was a huge…” What’s a word that Artificer would use? “Bitch!” Hunter raised a brow, huffing with a twinge of amusement.
“Well, why not ask Moon?” He said plainly, as if it was obvious. “You and her are glued together. I bet she’d be willing to grant you her blessing.”
“Moon?” Rivulet said, suddenly unsure. “I mean, she’s super nice, but I don’t think she really supports me doing daring crazy stunts. Besides, we’d need someone good with a needle to do the actual tattoo! I’m not sure where we’ll find someone like that out here in the middle of nowhere.”
“Perhaps,” Hunter shrugged, turning back to gaze up at the twinkling stars. “If there’s one thing I’ve learned recently, it's that you can’t predict anything in this place. It must be Pebbles, his energy seems to spurn on the most bizarre circumstances, to say the least.”
“What about your family?” Rivulet asked. “What colony are you from? I’ve been around all over, but I’ve never met someone like you!”
“I’m not from some wild collection of slugcats,” Hunter puffed up, an air of pride entering his voice. “I was created by one of the very same gods that we now escort, in a facility much like the one before us, though in far better condition, of course. My creator, No Significant Harassment, crafted me with divine intelligence and ingenuity, in order to make me the perfect organism for my duty.” He flexed an arm, his claws flashing in the moonlight, each almost the size of Rivulet’s fingers.
Well, that certainly explained his unique size. Why couldn’t her mom have made her tall and strong? Unfair.
I bet I can still beat him in a race.
“And what was your duty?”
“I was given a special payload to deliver to Moon, that upon delivery brought her back from the limbo she had been trapped in, effectively returning her from the dead. It was not an easy journey, and the very world seemed to be trying to stop me, but I completed it with no shortage of pride!”
“Wow!” Rivulet beamed, eyes going wide. “You saved Moon? That’s amazing! You know, my colony used to camp near her, and my grandma even had stories of before her home broke down. One cycle, I just had to see what was inside, even though it's against the rules. I saw her there, all alone on that little pile of rubble. She read the pearls I brought, which I honestly thought were just orbs to trade with, and even told me stories of the ancients!” Hunter watched as she babbled, a slight grin of endearment on his face.
“It's my understanding that you guided Pebbles to her facility to rescue her. Quite the feat indeed.”
“I mean, yeah!” She smirked, shrugging as if it were no big deal. “I couldn’t just leave her there, sitting all by herself forever and ever. I went over to Pebble’s home to see if he could help, since he was close by. Didn’t expect him to be missing from his room! I actually bumped into Artificer and him right as they were leaving. Fancy that, huh?”
“If you managed to navigate that disgusting shithole,” Hunter grumbled, a shiver coursing through his frame, “then that should be more than enough of a feat to inscribe on yourself. Eugh…”
“Maybe! I’ve always wanted to make mine about riding a leviathan! Never quite had the chance…”
“Stick around long enough, I’m sure some kind of bizarre opportunity will arise,” he mused. Rivulet’s mind could only wander into the land of fantasy, already imagining some amazing display of bravery and wonder. Riding an ocean zipper through a waterspout while lighting arced around them, that sounded good!
As if on cue, a flash of green arched from under the facility in front of them, far more pronounced by the darkness. For a brief moment, its silhouette was illuminated, revealing crumbling metal and bulging panels, as if the walls themselves were threatening to buckle.
Was that water, gushing from the sides like a beached jetfish?
Weird! Usually it comes out of the top! And to think Pebble’s home looked so much better than Moon’s.
“Looks like that thing is about to burst like a bubblefruit!” Rivulet noted, and Hunter hummed in agreement.
“I don’t really understand the capabilities of the iterators,” he said in return, “but whatever they did, I hope it destroys that place soon enough.” The venom oozed from his voice, tail swishing with irritation.
There was a faint scrape of metal on metal behind them, though both slugcats were far too familiar with the sound to be alarmed.
“Simple,” Pebbles suddenly said, stepping up beside the pair. He glared at his former dwelling with a rage that made Hunter's look pale in comparison. “When Moon and I manipulated the mass rarefaction cell’s programming, I gave her an additional bit of code to insert. It's a virus essentially, that when the cell connected to the network again, told every single steam vent to close. My facility is essentially drowning itself on fetid sewage while the rarefaction cell tells it to keep pulling in more void fluid and water, before it will implode on itself like an empty can of nectar. A fitting end for the rot, I’d say!” His eyes lit up with a sadistic gleam, looking quite proud of himself for his plot.
I have no idea what any of that means, but it sounds good, at least!
“No doubt,” Hunter said with a toothy grin, “a well struck blow! Though, I do wonder if we’re safe from such a blast. We’re still quite close after all, and I’ve seen the destructive effect of a rarefaction cell first hand.” Pebbles shrugged, as if the thought was a mere annoyance.
“The power core is at the heart of the facility, buried deeply within. The actual blast will be enshrouded by thick metal, and likely won’t extend beyond the surface, but the cascading reaction of detonating void fluid pipes will spread across the can in a chain reaction of explosions. Its intention isn’t to destroy the entire facility, simply to render all of the critical components within ruined, though I am willing to bet it will collapse by the end of it. It's sure to be quite the lightshow.”
“Are you sure that’s enough to finish off the rot?” Hunter probed. “I have been told that iterators are quite resilient.” The mirth vanished from Pebbles’ eyes.
“My projections theorize that the facility will suffer ninety three percent critical component destruction from the detonation, with additional damage occurring when it collapses. Whatever is left won’t survive for long. I’m sure of it. The rot isn’t like you and me. It's a parasite, bound by endless hunger. Whatever survives will wither away, either starving to death from its immense energy demands or waste away in the elements. That’s always what happened to any rot that escaped my facility in the past.” Hunter didn’t look convinced.
“It said it had developed, improved itself somehow. Are you sure?” Pebbles shot a glare, as if offended by the idea.
“Of course!” His voice carried an edge that made Hunter’s ears flatten slightly. “Unless that thing somehow learned to quell its ridiculous appetite and energy demands, which would require remaking itself into an entirely different organism, I’m absolutely positive.” Pebbles was quiet for a moment, the two slugcats casting nervous glances at every direction but his own. With a huff, he spun on a foot and stomped back inside.
For a long pause, the pair simply sat in silence. Hunter stared solemnly at the ground, looking like a pup that had somehow broken something important.
“You don’t have to take that tone from him, you know,” Rivulet chimed, and he glanced at her with a raised brow. “Pebbles is a big grump, all talk! Don’t let him get to you.”
“All talk? Clearly not,” Hunter chuckled humorlessly. “He didn’t talk those lizards to death.” Rivulet waved dismissively, scoffing as she rolled her eyes.
“True! But you’re huge! You could fling him into the sun if you wanted, don’t let his pouty attitude get under your fur!”
“I would never raise a paw against the gods! Did you even hear what he was saying a moment ago?”
“Nope! I barely understand half the junk Pebbles rambles about. All I know is that he’s not as scary as you think. Take it easy!” Hunter huffed, clearly far from convinced, and Rivulet could only shrug and return to admiring the scenery, leaving him to grumble to himself.
Moments later, a sliver of orange peered over the horizon, the sun’s warming rays lethargically pushing through the thick layer of cloud and humidity. The lush jungle sprouting from the metal around them slowly awoke, flowers and trees unfurling in response. From their vantage point, the pair watched as all manner of flying creatures emerged. Squidcadas crawled from their burrows, dancing lazy circles with one another. A mother noodlefly buzzed past them, its young dangling from her tail like limp ribbons.
The peaceful moment was gone as soon as it came, the large silhouette of a vulture flashing across the sky as it peered downwards in search of a meal. Its head turned their way, and wordlessly the slugcats bristled.
Welp, fun while it lasted!
Springing to her feet, and nearly tripping on her tail, Rivulet scrambled back into the safety of the indoors, though not before snagging a few dandelion peaches growing from the metal nearby. Her arms full of breakfast, she dove inside to the interior once again. A moment later, Hunter pulled himself indoors, the two taking a few cautious steps back from the opening in case the vulture attempted to poke its long neck inside and snag their feet.
Hunter held his spear ready, a low rumbling growl rising up in his chest as the sound of flapping wings and hissing gas filtered in from outside. The sharp smell of vulture buffed their noses, and Rivulet couldn’t help but feel a tremble of fear and excitement travel through her. If not for her group, and the armful of delicious food, she might have been tempted to try and snag the vulture’s mask.
Bah, you know what happened last time you played with vultures Riv…
She still had a small scab on the back of her head from that, and even cycles later it itched at times.
After a few tense moments passed, the shadow departed from the gap, and with a blast of air the vulture flew away. Perhaps it had spotted some easier prey, or realized that the slugcats had evaded its grasp. Regardless, the threat was gone. Hunter slowly relaxed, only to nearly jump in the air as loud crunching filled the room.
Rivulet offered him a large fuzzy dandelion peach, chewing loudly with a mouth full of juicy fruit flesh. With an irritable growl, he shook his head in refusal and rubbed his eyes, tail still swishing.
More for me!
“Having fun over there?” Pebbles’ voice teased across the chamber. The iterator leaned over the table in the center, eyes flickering past a dazzling array of strange symbols and lights. “Getting a full experience with all the wonderful nature? You know, vultures used to carry my creators, maybe that one was going to offer you a ride!” He barked a rueful laugh, and somehow Rivulet found herself giggling alongside him.
For a moment, Hunter looked as if he was going to return an insult of his own, but with a long sigh he begrudgingly swallowed his tongue.
Grumpy morning! We all just need a nice good meal, except maybe Pebbles and Moon. What the heck do they even eat anyway?
“You sure you don’t want one?” Rivulet asked, once again probing Hunter’s appetite. His eyes glanced over at her, and she easily recognized the hungry glimmer within. After a moment of debate, Hunter snatched a peach up in his paw, tossing the entire fruit in his mouth. Quietly they chewed, accompanied only by the faint sounds of the facility around them.
“I appreciate the gift,” Hunter said, using a claw to pick a bit of fluff from his sharp teeth, “but plants never did really fill me up. Too insubstantial.” Rivulet shrugged, far from offended by the remark, though an idea crept into her mind.
“Hey Pebbles!” she called, and the iterator looked up from his work with a scathing glare which she promptly ignored. “What’s next after this? More adventure? If we go down the coast, I could show you guys some really cool places!”
And yet the robot was silent, his eyes glancing away as he looked lost in thought.
“Originally I thought I might descend to the depths below…,” he muttered, as if not truely sure of himself. “Funny how for so long I craved that, and yet here I am, within reach of such a goal, and now I’m not as resolute.” He shook his head, as if waving away the thoughts like an irritating bug. “Moon has some ideas, but we need to speak with my family first. That’s the whole reason we came here.”
“Ohhhh, your family! That sounds fun! Looking forward to it?”
Pebbles normally looked rather irritated and bored, but the phrase instantly put a look of deep revulsion and dread on his features.
“Not in the slightest.”
“Come now Pebbles,” Moon’s soft, teasing voice entered the room as she stepped into view. “Not looking forward to a bit of banter with Sig? I’m sure he’ll be happy to see you!” Pebbles groaned, burying his face in his hands, and Moon merely giggled at his reaction.
“Sig?” Hunter asked, suddenly invested in the conversation. “You’ll be speaking with my creator? Can I… talk to him as well? Please?” Rivulet could only raise a brow. Why did he sound so anxious? Pebbles scoffed at the display, a sneer in his voice.
“Nonsense! Even if your kind could interface with the communications software, we have a precious window here to speak with the local group, and cannot waste it for mere formalities and chit-chat. Besides, you hardly know our brother, but he’s not the type to ca-”
“Pebbles!” Moon suddenly hissed, and in her voice was a freezing edge of authority. The iterator stopped, eyes wide in faint shock as she glared at him. And yet the frosty look instantly melted to a gentle warmth as she turned to Hunter.
“We will be sure to speak with him and pass along your regards! I’m sure he’ll be happy to hear his dutiful helper is doing well and assisting us.” There was a hidden tone barely perceptible beneath the words, but Rivulet struggled to decipher it. And yet if Hunter had detected it, he made no objection. If anything, he looked rather pleased, ears twitching in excitement as he returned to leaning against the wall and idly sharpening his claws. With a soft relieved sigh, the iterator joined her brother by the table, the two setting to work.
He must really like this Sig guy! I wonder if he’s anything like Moon or Pebbles.
The iterators worked quietly, staring deeply into the strange symbols flashing in the air around them. Their eyes were distant, as if they weren’t quite in the same room, their focus pulled far away. For an idle moment, Rivulet wondered what it was like to have a mind like that, and the conversation she’d had with Pebbles on that snowy rooftop echoed through her mind. What was it like to possess such a mind?
She promptly tossed the thought out the mental window.
I like my own head. Nice and simple!
The minutes ticked by, the distant sound of nature trickling in from outdoors, and yet the itch that had urged her out of the shelter that morning returned. A feverous demand to move around and stretch her legs. Going outside wasn’t a great option, what with all the flying predators and deadly cliffs. Tempting that they might be, Rivulet couldn’t imagine getting the rest of the group to join her in jumping across precarious gaps while flying centipedes tried to electrocute them.
Well, maybe Artificer, but judging by the distant rumbling, she seemed quite content to sleep in this cycle.
So Rivulet began doing what she always did when stuck in one place. She stretched her legs, touched her toes, and began running. She ran from one end of the room, bouncing off the wall and flipping backwards to sprint to the other end. With graceful ease she tucked into a slide, zipping between the legs of the table, and the iterators standing around it, as she rocketed past. Her momentum ended at the other side of the chamber, and with a hop she returned to her feet.
And did it again.
And again.
And again…
“Enough!” Pebbles suddenly shouted, Rivulet narrowly missing his feet as he spun around to try and yell at her. “Can’t you find something better to occupy yourself besides this ridiculous display?” She skidded to a stop, head lightly bumping into the wall, and stared at him blankly
“Not really.”
The response didn’t seem to aid the iterator’s patience, his eye twitching slightly as his fists clenched in anger.
“Besides,” Rivulet continued, not the slightest bit intimidated. “It's not like you’ve told us what you’re doing. How long are we gonna have to wait?”
“Ruffles-” Moon started, but Pebbles cut her off with a hand and a long, heavy sigh.
“No, it's fine. It's fine.” He rubbed the space between his eyes, as if bringing his fingers over the chitin there was somehow soothing. “We’re having more issues with the communications array than expected. Plainly put, we won’t be able to communicate for some time, which just leads to another problem. The facility is growing close to critical detonation, and there’s no telling what that will do to the local power and communications grid. Our window is getting rather slim.”
Rivulet nodded, pretending to even grasp half of what Pebbles was saying. It wasn’t as if she didn’t care, but half the stuff that came out of his mouth, or however he spoke, didn’t make a bit of sense to her.
Just keep nodding until he stops talking. Works every time!
“Pebbles, perhaps there’s something the slugcats could do? It's not as if they can assist us in this…” Pebbles sighed, tapping his fingers as if to urge thought through his mind. For a few moments, the soft metal on metal noise echoed through the room.
“It's going to be a long journey outside the walls after this,” he mumbled, speaking to himself more than anything. Pebbles glanced up at the two slugcats. “You’re both seasoned travelers, right? Hunter, how did you prepare for the journey here?” Hunter’s ears flattened sheepishly, as if suddenly embarrassed.
“I… Well, I didn’t,” he admitted, earning a mixture of confusion and concern from the iterators. “My creator entrusted me with a single neuron fly, a message pearl, and some directions. Nothing else.”
“Oh Sig…” Moon sighed, softly shaking her head, which only seemed to add to Hunter’s sheepishness.
“Don’t worry guys!” Rivulet beamed, dancing from foot to foot as ideas coursed through her mind. “I know all about camp life! Tents, blankets, cooking, travel! I’ve done it all, a million times over! Though… I don’t think we’ll be able to make any blankets or tents in a single cycle. It’d probably be best to stockpile some food for the road! Makes travel easy when you don’t need to hunt every cycle. Say, there’s plenty of squidcada out there, or centipede I could catch! Bug isn’t super tasty raw, but I could toss it over a fire with some bluefruit drizzled-”
“Enough!” Pebbles snapped, once again rubbing his face. “Do whatever needs to be done, just make yourself busy and leave us be.” He waved a hand away, turning back to his iterator magic as symbols danced across his eyes.
All the encouragement I need!
“Wanna go wake up Artificer?” Rivulet asked, beaming an excited smile at Hunter. He looked conflicted for a moment, before softly shaking his head.
“I think it might be best to let her rest.”
“Works for me!” Without any invitation, Rivulet snatched Hunter by the paw and pulled the startled slugcat towards the exit. Time was of the essence, and while she wasn’t the most renowned hunter in her colony, she knew enough!
Besides, Hunter has to know something, how else has he gotten his name?
Pausing for only a moment to wave back to Moon, the slugcats slipped outside and into the humid sunny air. Unlike that morning, the sky was choked with clouds and fog that engulfed them. The bridge to Pebble’s old home stretched into the mist, though that was the last place either of them wanted to go.
For a moment, the two simply sat in silence, watching and waiting with their ears keened for any sound.
The wind whistled past them, mellow and meticulous.
Something growled in panic in the distance, and a faint long shape, barely visible through the haze, plummeted downwards.
A swarm of dragonflies buzzed past them, the simple creatures staring at them with wide bulging eyes before moving on.
Hunter’s large, scarred ears twitched, turning backwards as he tensed up. Rivulet cocked her head in silent question, and he gestured upwards, hands twisting in clearly inexperienced slugsign.
‘Squidcadas. Many. Above.’
She shot Hunter an amused look, tickled by his broken and awkward words, but nodded regardless. Squidcada would provide a decent meal, and the creatures often gathered in flocks as they mindlessly buzzed around and sucked the grime off walls and the occasional small creature.
Wordlessly, the two began to ascend the side of the tower. To his credit, Hunter maintained a surprising speed despite his bulk, occasionally digging his long claws into the wall where a suitable handhold couldn’t be found, while Rivulet simply lept from point to point, taking advantage of her unique agility. As tempting as it was to race him to the top, she held herself back.
Pausing at the edge, Rivulet took a second to look back down, admiring how far up they’d come. A surge of excitement and pride filled her as she peered below. Thankfully, Hunter had kept up a decent pace, and joined a moment later.
I’m still first!
The buzzing din of numerous pairs of wings meandered over the rim of the metal building. Flattening their ears as low as they could, the two slugcats slowly pulled themselves up far enough to sneak a peek. Before them, almost a dozen black and white bugs zipped around the flat rooftop, dotted with long spiraling trees and short red grass. A few of them danced through the air, conducting some strange instinctual dance.
One aimlessly hovered close. Hunter readied his spear and prepared to leap, but she quickly clamped a hand down on his shoulder, thankful that it was enough to pause his attack. Slowly she spelled out the sign, though it was difficult with only one free hand.
‘We need more than just one. We only get one shot.’
Hunter watched her for a moment, his dark eyes narrow and calculating, but a moment later he slowly nodded, relaxing and patiently waiting. The squids buzzed in place, occasionally darting around to nibble at the short grass growing on the roof with their strange tendrils. Rivulet could already imagine those same tendrils roasting over a fire, seasoned with salt and a dash of spicy batnip. It was enough to make her mouth water, though she didn’t dare break from their cover.
The minutes ticked by.
A stray dragonfly flitted past Rivulet’s gills, nearly making her giggle.
Hunter perked up again, the movement barely perceptible. Had he heard something?
They weren’t the only ones hunting that day.
The sound was distant at first, barely audible under the cacophony of fluttering wings, but Rivulet could recognize it anywhere. Hunter tensed, and a moment later a small cyan lizard deftly launched itself over the opposite edge of the roof. It landed with a tumble, clamoring to its feet as it shook its tail once again and launched at the nearest squidcada.
Oh great, here comes the competition.
Chaos broke out nearly instantaneously. The lizard leapt upwards, jaws narrowly missing its prey as startled squidcada frantically fled from the new threat. It fell to the ground undeterred, and once again propelled itself skywards. This time, the squidcada was not so lucky, long black teeth sinking into its flesh. Though one had perished, the others scattered to the breeze, flying away in nearly every direction.
Including right over the slugcats.
“Now or never!” Rivulet chirped, hurling herself over the ledge and snatching up a spear. With a growl Hunter pulled himself along, and with an almost casual ease he flung his weapon into the nearest target, the lifeless body plummeting to the dirt. Not to be deterred, Hunter snatched another squidcada by the tendrils as it drifted past. His own long, black teeth sank into its head a moment later, and with a loud crunch, the bug flopped to the ground, still.
Rivulet wasn't about to leave empty handed. She’d never been very handy with a spear, but with the horde of targets flying overhead it was hardly a challenge. While her weapon was longer than her entire body, that didn’t stop her from flinging it at a nearby squidcada’s head, sending the creature falling to the ground as its flight came to an end.
Only for its momentum to carry it off the edge.
“Oh no you don’t!” Rivulet dove after the kill, snatching out a paw to halt its descent. And yet instead of stopping the bulky white bug from falling, it simply yanked her over the side of the building along with it. Perhaps attempting to halt a creature nearly twice as big as her was a poor idea.
Whoops…
Her feet scrambled for purchase, but there was nothing Rivulet could do to stop the plunge. The mist below beckoned, the bridge and pathway suddenly so far away. She’d be lucky if she even landed on them and didn’t plummet all the way down to the surface.
All for a single squidcada.
Instead of her normal aloofness in the face of certain death, Rivulet unexpectedly felt something else blossom in her chest.
The icy tendrils of fear and regret wrapped around her heart and squeezed tight. An invasive, unshakeable thought gripped her unexpectedly like the talons of some invisible predator and refused to let go.
Oh shit… Who’s gonna watch over Moon?
A monstrous force snatched her tail, and she nearly slammed into the wall as her body was jerked to a halt.
“Gotcha!” Hunter proudly declared, and with astonishing strength he pulled her up and back onto the roof. For a moment she dangled in his grasp, and he pulled her up to face level. However, instead of the expected anger at her recklessness, Hunter simply looked filled with worry. “Are you okay?” Rivulet blinked her wide eyes, unsure of how to respond with the flurry of unfamiliar emotion swirling within her. A moment later, she proudly hefted up the squidcada still in her arms.
“I got one!” She smiled awkwardly, and Hunter merely snorted with amusement. His reaction seemed to ease the panic within.
He released the grip on her tail, and Rivulet fell to the ground with a crash.
“You’re ridiculous and insane,” Hunter grumbled, though there was a hint of mirth in his voice that stole away the edge in his tone. “Do you know how upset Moon would be if I let anything happen to you? It’s horrifying to even imagine!” Rivulet paused, mulling over the thought. It wasn’t as if she was unfamiliar with being screamed at for her recklessness, but this time the threat carried a unique weight behind it.
A deep guttural growl to their side broke the two from their musings.
The cyan lizard, mouth still dripping with dark green squidcada blood, slowly prowled towards them. Evidently, its meal hadn’t been enough, the feral hunger in its bright eyes brutal and raw.
Great, never satisfied huh?
For a moment, Rivulet debated simply taking the squidcada at her feet and tossing it to the lizard. While they needed the food for their travels, it wasn’t as if they couldn't go find more creatures to hunt. Though they would need to eventually set up a small fire to cook things, which required both time and a decently dry location. The cycles had been far longer recently, and it wasn’t as if they had a lot of time before the rest of the group expected them back.
Ugh, too much thinking, too many things to worry about!
“You too?” Hunter growled in return. Her thoughts were pushed aside as he yanked the spear from the squidcada and began sprinting towards the lizard. The beast spat in fury, gutturally hissing as it returned his charge, and Rivulet could only watch in awe as Hunter pivoted on his heel at the last moment, kicking his feet off the ground to deftly backflip over the lizard.
Amazing, the classic trick to get past their head armor! And here I thought he was too big to jump like that.
Her face quickly turned to horror as the creature reared on its legs, and in a shocking display of agility not normally found in the clumsy reptiles, it snatched Hunter out of the air with a loud snap of its jaws.
“Hunter!” Rivulet screamed, watching helplessly as the beast wildly shook its head and tried to slam him against the ground. Any other slugcat might have been too weak to resist such an assault, but Hunter was nearly half the size of the reptile. Even with the jaws locked tight around his torso, he used his arms to scratch and stab at the lizard’s face and head with his spear. In fact, it almost sounded like Hunter was returning his foe’s hissing with his own guttural enraged growls.
It wasn’t enough. Even with his bulky body and long arms, his spear couldn’t get around the tough helm that protected the lizard from any serious blow. For every strike Hunter attempted to land, the reptile slammed him against the ground, trying to stun its prey into a more manageable state.
I’ve got to do something!
Rivulet scrambled to her feet, sprinting across the surface of the rooftop and diving for Hunter’s thrown spear still stuck in the body of the squidcada. Grasping with both paws, she yanked hard, and yet the metal rod refused to budge from its position. Just how hard had he thrown it?! With a panicked cry of frustration, she quickly glanced over her shoulder back to the wild sounds of fighting.
For whatever reason, Hunter had decided to bite the lizard back. It didn’t seem to be working, though the reptile looked quite upset by the jaws now biting its face.
Rivulet abandoned the spear, eyes dancing across the rooftop for anything else she could use.
Nothing but a lone dusty brick.
“Great…” she muttered, snatching the loose rubble up and sprinting to join the fray. Thankfully with the lizard’s jaws busy nibbling on Hunter, the risk of any deadly injury was low. Relatively.
Rivulet slammed to the ground as the struggling reptile swung about, narrowly slapping her with its thick tail. Perhaps the universe was reading her mind. Not to be deterred, she quickly leapt upon the lizard’s back, the beast far too busy getting scratched in the face by Hunter to even notice its new rider. With a deep breath she brought both hands up, the old dark brick almost shining in the sun as she hoisted it aloft.
And with all her strength, Rivulet slammed it down on the soft back of the cyan lizard’s head, the sheer energy causing it to blast apart into chunks.
The effect was immediate, the reptile growling deliriously as it stumbled across the rooftop, spirals dancing in its eyes. Unfortunately, its locked jaws had no intention of releasing its prey.
“You vile cretin!” Hunter roared, sounding more insulted than injured even as blood oozed from his nose. “Release me!” Now unhindered by the lizard’s attempt to bash him against every surface, Hunter retaliated with precise impunity.
He jammed his clawed thumbs into the lizard’s eyes.
Ouch…
If it had been confused before, the reptile’s movements went fully frantic, shaking and flailing in desperation as its head bled from the two new holes it had been gifted. Its tail hissed as it shook, body stiffening, a sudden smell of reeking pungent ozone and sulfur filling the air. Hunter paused his attack, wild eyes going wide as he looked up at Rivulet, equally horrified.
“Crap…” she sighed.
The gas suddenly exploded, launching the three through the air. The slugcats could only scream in horror and cling for dear life as the reptile blindly exploded across the roof, narrowly missing the edge by inches. It teetered over the rooftop, Hunter wildly flailing as he grasped for any kind of handhold. The blinded cyan huffed, paws grasping at open air, before growling in confusion as it spun around and once again blasted into the air.
As much fun as this is, I’m really starting to get tired of being flung around by things!
“Hunter!” Rivulet screamed, reaching an arm out. “Your spear!” He nodded, stretching out to pass over the weapon to her paw, and not a moment too soon. The lizard huffed, leaping again, but in its confusion it launched directly into a thick metal pole with a sickening crunch. Rivulet had to cling to its frills to avoid being ejected right off the top at breakneck speed. Even riding Bubbles while running from a leviathan hadn’t been this intense.
The impact slammed Hunter against the pole, eliciting another growl of frustration and pain from him. The reptile, however, simply flopped to the ground in a tangle of limbs. A thick crack crawled down its nose to its forehead.
Ouch…
There was no time for sympathy, and rather than wait for it to recover, Rivulet took the chance to grit her teeth, bring her arm high into the air, and then sink the spear directly into the soft tissue at the back of the lizard’s head. It twitched for a moment, gurgled, and then was still.
“Void,” Hunter groaned wearily, still locked in the predator’s jaws even after death. “Good quick work. Ugh, why does everything always want to eat me …” He tried to pry apart the teeth locked around him, Rivulet scrambling over to offer her own strength to the ordeal. With some effort, Hunter squirmed free, the lizard’s mouth snapping shut around the empty air even in death.
For a moment he simply sat there, chest still heaving as the fight faded from his body. A collection of small bleeding indents wrapped around his torso from the reptile’s teeth, though the damage was minimal. If anything, Hunter looked more annoyed by the affair than actually harmed. He slowly rose to his feet, popping the joints in his back and yanking his spear free.
And just like that, Hunter was ready to fight again.
Wow! A bite like that would have gone halfway through my body, nevermind all the thrashing! I wish I had that kind of natural sturdiness, it would make adventure a lot easier.
“So!” Rivulet beamed with a cocky smile, “You got two squidcada, I got one and a lizard! If we were going off size, I’d say I won this hunt, but I’ll go easy on you and say it's a tie by numbers. Only counts as one!” Hunter stared at her for a moment, utterly baffled. He looked at the lizard, then back to her, and a smile slowly spread on his face as he began to laugh harder and harder.
“Yeah, fair enough!” Hunter wheezed. “You clever critter, you win. Though in fairness, I wasn’t aware we were competing. Probably could have snagged another squid if I was, except then I had to save your sorry tail from sliding off the edge of the building.”
“Well, then I had to save your big butt from getting eaten! So we’re still even!” His laughter only deepened, as if her shrewd silly wit was somehow of great amusement to Hunter.
Or maybe it's my face. Oh well!
“Fair enough!” He repeated, shaking his head. “Fair enough…” He glanced from the dead body of the lizard to the motionless corpses of the squidcada, brow turning thoughtful. “Well, now what? You’re the expert of travel, what do we do with these besides eat them raw?”
“Gather them up! Maybe under that ledge over there where a vulture won’t spot us easily.” Rivulet scurried over, dragging two of the bulky bodies across the dirt covered roof and into shelter, while Hunter effortlessly dumped the rest alongside. “Now eating them raw is fine and all, I’m sure you got the teeth for it, but my people are known for their speed, not their jaws, so we gotta butcher them for their meat.”
“And you’re familiar with such a thing?” Hunter raised a brow, though there was no doubt in his voice.
“Yep! You think the hunters would do this kinda work? They get home from hunting and dump off their kills with the campers. Most of them go right to bed! Hauling around a couple kills, even on a jetfish, isn’t easy work.” Hunter shrugged, as if the concept of turning down a task for its supposed difficulty was too alien for him.
Considering his background, it probably actually was.
“I don’t have a knife on me, though I could probably use some of the lizard bone to fashion one, so you’ll need to do the cutting with those big slicers you got ‘gifted’ with.” Hunter nodded dutifully, and for a few minutes the pair quietly worked, the smaller slugcat pointing out where skin should be sliced, carapace cracked, and bone broken.
Rivulet watched quietly as Hunter meticulously removed the hard shells from each squidcada, cutting away the more stringy bits of meat to collect the thicker chunks that could be roasted for the road. She idly noticed the soft grin on his face, and the intense light in his eyes. Whatever bits she instructed him to toss away, he simply ate himself instead, humming happily with each bite.
“You know…” he quietly muttered, as if not sure of his words. “You spoke of your camp work like a punishment, but I’m finding this all rather enjoyable. I’ve never really had a purpose beyond delivering my payload, so this has been a welcome reprieve. The free snacks certainly help.” He chuckled softly, tossing away the thin legs of the last of the squidcada after a few nibbles confirmed they were free of any desirable flesh. He turned his head down to the sizable pile of lizard and bug meat before them with hunger still in his eyes.
Ah, so now I see why he likes this.
“Wrangle your jetfish big guy!” Rivulet scolded, “This is for traveling. Besides, we haven’t even cooked it yet! I wish we had more ingredients. A little batnip, some bluefruit to mash, that’s how it’s done!”
The hunger in Hunter’s eyes turned downright feral.
Right! Time to start a fire before he eats everything we just worked for.
Rivulet worked quickly, snatching up a few fallen branches scattered across the roof, though the wood was unsurprisingly soaked with water. Normally her people would stash a decent supply of dry burnables within hidden coves near their camping grounds, but there was no such luxury here.
Instead she turned to the trees themselves, jamming her fingers into cracks along the thick bark and yanking hard. The plant armor was thick, both to protect itself from insects and the rain, and her slick hands failed to find purchase.
A large paw gently pushed her aside, and with casual ease Hunter dug his claws into the tree, yanking out a chunk of bark nearly as large as he was. The inside was coated with a thick oily sap, and much drier than the outside. Perfect for their needs. In contrast to preparing the meat, Hunter looked far less enthusiastic by the task of breaking the wood into small enough chunks for the little fire Rivulet started.
His interest returned quickly as she stuck chunks of the meat on their spears, carefully spacing them out and jamming the shafts into the dirt next to the now crackling fire.
“We want it to be nice and golden brown on the outside,” Rivulet instructed, carefully turning the meat to avoid burning one side. “Don’t let it catch on fire! I don’t care what anyone says, it tastes gross burnt!.” Hunter nodded wildly, though his sparkling eyes were locked in rapt attention on his cooking.
The pair were quiet for a long moment, removing the cooked food from their spears after a few calm minutes. Without even asking for permission, not that she could stop him, Hunter tossed a chunk of roasted lizard tail in his jaws, and nearly instantly he began to purr as he chewed, tail shivering with delight.
Had Hunter ever eaten something that wasn’t a fresh kill? Had he even known what cooking was? For someone created by people as sophisticated as the iterators, he hardly seemed civilized in his mannerisms.
“You think that’s tasty,” Rivulet said, snagging a juicy chunk of squidcada and taking a nibble of her own, “just wait until we get some seasoning. A little bit of salt and herbs would make this pop!” Hunter absentmindedly nodded, far too distracted with the foreign barrage of flavor the cooking had summoned for his inexperienced palette.
Is he crying?
The pile of cooked meats slowly grew, until all of their butchering had been prepared.
“Rivulet,” Hunter asked, voice quiet and cautious. “Did you do this for your colony? Just cook and make clothing? Is that really a job someone has in a community?” She laughed, trying to imagine herself as nothing more than a camphand sitting around the fire all day mending tents and cooking lizards.
“No way! I got stuck doing this stuff because I kept sneaking off. I wasn’t even a chef, I had to do all the peeling and paring and slicing! It was work, not something I’d really want to do forever. I just picked up all this stuff from having to do it so much.” Hunter nodded in understanding, though he looked as if he wanted to say more.
“Well…” Why did he sound so nervous? “Would you be willing to teach me more? My creator would find this all ridiculous, but surely a bit of cooking skills won’t harm anyone, right?” Rivulet beamed a wide smile, internally quite happy that someone else was eager to help with the task.
“Sure! I’d be right happy to! Maybe the iterators won’t care much about it, but I’m sure Artificer will love it too. She’s always waxing on and on about how she missed cooked food, but something tells me she doesn’t know a single thing about cooking. It’d probably really impress her!” She raised a brow, shooting a wry grin at Hunter. He stared back at her blankly, mildly confused by her words.
Cmon dummy, work with me.
A small flash of realization shot through his eyes.
“I suppose so…” he muttered thoughtfully. “Though I’m going to feed myself first!” He tossed another chunk of flesh in his jaws, chewing slowly to savor the flavor. Rivulet quickly began wrapping the meat up in small parcels of leaves.
Hunter, buddy, I don’t even know how to cook and you love this. Just wait until we find someone who actually knows how to properly season things, you’re going to die.
“Hey, speaking of Artificer, what’s up with her? She’s nice, but sometimes she gets in a mood, y’know?” Hunter raised a brow, suddenly looking rather insulted by the idle gossip.
“And why are you asking me that?” He shot back, his friendly mood suddenly on edge.
“Oh c’mon,” she pressed, unintimated by his defenses. “You two spent all that time together, surely she told you something while you two were in that big place.” Hunter paused for a moment, eyes suddenly filled with a flash of genuine panic, breath catching. His fur prickled up, and for a moment Rivulet wondered if she’d touched something sensitive.
What had he encountered in Pebbles’ home that had shaken the stoic slugcat so much?
And yet seconds later he closed his eyes and took a deep shuddering breath, and when he reopened them, his normal stern gaze had returned.
Probably nothing!
“It was quite personal. Not my place to say.”
“Oh you’re no fun,” she pouted, doing her best to look sad and disappointed. Perhaps he’d never drop that stoic tough persona.
Hunter sat quietly for a long moment, watching her diligently fold away their meat and pack it into a small backpack she’d quickly stitched together from the lizard. Its hide had been too small for any kind of robes, and the head plate was ruined either way. Besides, the dark black and cyan leather matched her own skin. Fashionable!
“She lost family a long time ago,” Hunter quietly muttered, though he sounded rather disappointed in himself for saying anything. “It's a long story of revenge and grief. Again, not my place to say.”
Well, that’s enough for me I guess.
“Scavs are known for their greedy nature,” she idly mused. “I’ve seen how she fights them, and they don’t seem too keen on letting her get away with whatever she did. I’m guessing she got that mask of hers from someone important.” Hunter huffed in amusement, but didn’t deny her deductions.
I can be smart when I want! In short bursts.
“What do you know of their kind?” He asked, holding out his paws to warm them over the slowly cooling embers.
“Well, aside from the obvious, they live in scattered clans all over the place. My colony used to trade with a few living close to the shores, offering little crafts made from bones and shells in exchange for things like metal and explosives. I never got the chance to really speak with them myself, at least until I started adventuring. They don’t like it when you run past their tolls, I can tell you that!” She laughed, and Hunter merely smirked in mild humor.
Silence resumed. Hunter stared into the coals, mind lost in thought.
Must be hard having so much to think about.
There was a rumble in the distance, the sound of warping metal and groaning structure as the two slugcats turned their eyes upwards. The facility, even hidden in the fog, croaked in pain and agony. Hunter sneered, glaring sourly in the direction of the din, and yet unlike previously the glimmer in his eyes had changed its tone. Instead of bitter anger, defiant spite bloomed across his face.
Or perhaps eating all that lizard skin was giving him a stomach ache. It always did for Rivulet.
She jumped to her feet, taking her new bag into her arms and heaving it up and over her shoulders. The leather stretched at the seams, packed tight with heavy bundles of roasted meat, while an assortment of newly crafted small tools dangled from loops on the back. A bone knife, a small hatchet made of scrap metal, and a carved section of the lizard’s skull plate that could be used as a cooking pot.
Can’t wait to see the look on Moon’s face!
“Are you sure you don’t want me to carry that?” Hunter offered, watching her with amusement as she teetered under the additional weight. “That bag is almost as big as you are.” Rivulet merely fired back a knowing look.
“And let you nibble on all our travel supplies? Not a chance, lumpy!” The remark instantly wiped the smug air off his face, and before he could reply, Rivulet marched back towards the ledge of the roof. “Let’s get back down, before a vulture smells all the cooking!”
A family of noodleflies buzzed past, the smaller ones drifting between the slugcats as they stuck their long noses into the large flowers blooming around them. For a moment, a look of thoughtful temptation crawled across Hunter’s face, even as a tiny white bug drifted in to stare him in the eyes.
Their mother loomed overhead, and he sighed deeply, joining Rivulet by the side of the roof as the two prepared their descent. A thought crossed her mind, perhaps a bit dangerous with all the additional supplies on her back, but regardless she turned to him with a devious grin.
“Race ya!”
And in an instant she was over the side, paws gripping point to point, deftly jumping from poles to ledges, the endless void stretching downwards unceasingly as the little section of bridge they’d begun at slowly revealed itself. Rivulet felt the drumbeat of her excited heart roaring in her chest as she agilely and quickly sprinted towards the finish line, a joyful laughter bubbling up from within.
There was a sudden sharp noise from above her, and with wide eyes she glanced upward to see how her competition was faring.
Wow! That’s… definitely Hunter’s style!
Unlike her deft movements, Hunter had instead adopted his own method of descending the building by simply leaping off the edge. After a second of freefall, he jammed his long claws into the wall, the metal shrieking with displeasure from the intrusion and slowing his descent for only a moment before he jumped downwards again. Unburdened by the need for a handhold or ledge, his journey downwards was quick and efficient.
And worst of all, he was catching up to her. His face bore a soft smirk, eyes filled with a cunning gleam as he raced towards her.
Rivulet never lost a race. Never!
With renewed urgency she stepped up her pace, and a short moment later she gently landed on the bridge, cheering in victory. Hunter slammed against the metal beside her, rolling to break his fall and doing his best to look unbothered by his defeat.
“Sorry Hunter! I told you this bag wasn’t gonna slow me down!” She hopped from foot to foot, excitement still coursing through her veins.
“The fuck are you two doing?” A rough voice suddenly asked, and from the shadows of the building entrance, Artificer emerged. She held a hand out, covering her grouchy expression from the sun and looking quite irritated by everything, but a moment later the wind shifted. Her eye widened, an alertness suddenly entering her body.
“What’s that smell?” Artificer asked, the omnipresent edge in her voice almost completely absent.
“Food!” Rivulet chirped, reaching under the flap of her bag to pull out a wrapped chunk of cooked lizard. A shine entered Artificer’s eye at the sight of the morsel. “We went hunting and found some squidcada! Then I got a lizard, made him into a new bag!” Artificer glanced at the new accessory, though her hungry look gave way to skepticism.
“Heh, okay,” Artificer smirked and crossed her arms, looking rather smug. “You killing anything? Maybe the squidcada, but I can see why you brought Hunter along. No way you took down a lizard, pup.”
Pup?!
Rivulet’s eager grin turned into a vicious scowl, teeth flashing as a lifetime of ridicule bubbled to the surface. Why did nobody ever take her seriously? Was it really that hard to believe she was capable? And why did they all think she was a pup!? She was just short! Waiting for her growth spurt! Sure, most slugcats finished growing well before her age, but she was still due for it any moment now!
And yet before she could launch into a vicious string of insults, Hunter stepped between the two.
“It's true,” he grunted. “A huge cyan, almost big enough to snatch vultures out of the sky. She hopped on its back, rode it like a raindeer, and stabbed it right through the head. We would have had more meat, but I was so hungry and ate most of it. Sorry Arti.” He hung his head low, as if filled with guilt.
Rivulet could only gawk, completely flabbergasted. That hadn’t been true at all! The lizard had been tiny, and Hunter had barely eaten any of it! Why was he lying?
And yet as he hung his head Hunter glanced back at Rivulet, and with a slight grin on his face, shot her a hidden wry wink.
Oooooh…
Artificer hummed, mulling over the words for a moment, but finally relented and granted an impressed grunt.
“Good kill, I suppose.” She turned to Hunter, still looking just as stern. “You owe me dinner, tough guy.” Hunter sputtered for a moment, confused by the sudden demand. Seeing her chance, Rivulet pressed the still warm bundle of meat into his paw.
“Well maybe this will satisfy you until then,” he grunted, tossing the meal to Artificer. She caught it frantically, the anger and stiffness in her expression suddenly melting away as she quickly unwrapped the thick slices of cooked food and wasted no time eagerly devouring them. The reaction was nearly instantaneous, the prickly slugcat purring with delight.
“Do you know how long it's been?” she said in between bites, “since I ate a cooked meal? Stars… It's heavenly.” Like a starved animal she ate, even going so far as to eat the thick leaves covered with the meat’s juices. Paws now empty, her expression turned dark and greedy as she stared at the pack on Rivulet’s back.
“Hang on Arti,” Hunter stepped in, holding out a commanding claw. “This is for the road, once the iterators are done with their conversation. No eating it unless needed. Trust me, I’m just as heartbroken.” Artificer glared, not quite happy with the resolution. Rivulet perked up, mind suddenly flashing back to their campfire conversation.
“Hunter cooked it!” She beamed, and he whirled at her with a confused look. “I’m sure if you two kill something else, we can get a fire going and he can cook something up for you.” She shot him a wink in return, his confusion only deepening.
Doing you a favor here! Get the hint you idiot!
“You know how to cook?” Artificer asked, and with irritable anger she slugged him in the arm. “You dick! Are you telling me we could have eaten cooked food the entire time we were together?”
“Well it's not as if we ever had the chance to sit down and start a fire!” he fired back, and Artificer grumbled in reluctant defeat. “Besides, I need time to… gather herbs and spices!” She merely raised a brow, not quite convinced.
Don’t go too far in your bluff! You’re gonna bite off more than you can chew!
The three were interrupted as the facility behind them once again groaned, though this time the sound was a raging roar of twisting metal and stressed panels. They turned around to look, watching in awe as blue and white lightning arced from within the cloudy distance. Their fur prickled as the energy filled the air, as if the very machinery looming over them was crying out in death.
The mist enshrouding the facility seemed to float away, as if being pulled along by some unseen force, and the cracked ruined metal revealed itself in the bright glory of the mid-day sun. Rivulet watched in awe, eyes twinkling with flashing electricity and frills blowing in the rising wind, as the great metal box now stripped of its foggy cloak, croaked out its final throes of life. From within, a strange energy began to bubble outwards, a wave of power that caused the shell of the steel titan to shift and distort, as if the very fabric of reality was twisting around it.
The strange power slowly stretched outwards from the center of Pebbles’ old home, and its effect only grew. A few stray vultures, once drifting through the lofty heights in search of prey, now flew in desperate panic to flee the hungry energy that threatened to pull them in.
The force only grew.
“Oh shit, this is it!” Artificer shouted, voice filled with a mixture of fear and excitement. And yet for all her bravado, her eye slowly widened in terror as the reaction grew larger and larger. “Screw this! I’m not getting my fur singed off!”
Rivulet clung tight to the railing of the bridge, mind screaming that she should run for safety, or perhaps that was Hunter as he and Artificer ran inside. It was no use. She couldn’t look away from the angry storm of churning debris now swirling around the can. The sight somehow brought her back hundreds of cycles ago to her youth, during a migration where an island far off the coast had suddenly erupted in a cataclysm of angry molten rock and stone. Even as a tiny slugrunt, it had sent a wave of excitement through her little body, an insatiable urge to reach out and touch the roaring danger.
The force around Pebbles’ can was doubly as intense.
The wind whipped past her ears in a shrill stinging gust, her paws wrapped tightly around the railing even as the rushing air threatened to pluck her up and pull her away like so many other loose objects and stray creatures now flailing adrift. An angry red lizard, still defiant to the end, even tried to bite at her face as it whipped past.
Someone’s hungry. Bye!
The lightshow intensified, crackling lightning snapping out from the bottom, sides, and even top of the metal box. Unlike the normally jade discharge that rumbled under the iterator's legs, this electricity was white hot and blindingly bright, the bolts traveling high into the sky as if to strike the very sun itself.
For all Rivulet knew, it very well could be trying.
The metal casing, already weakened by age and disease, seemed to fold in on itself, the entire box fighting as it squeezed and contracted. Enormous sections of plating dented and crumpled as it was pulled inward. The light around the facility distorted and bent, a sphere of bizarre perspective twisting the space around it. One of the enormous legs near the center, once seeming so indomitable, snapped and sheared as it was wrenched free of its connection to the base and slowly fell down to the ground below. For a moment, Rivulet could only wonder if the entire can would collapse into some singular point.
The air stilled for a moment, no longer pulled inwards.
The sphere instantaneously collapsed in on itself, and with a final flash of blinding light, detonated. Rivulet could only bask numbly in the wild spectacle, wide pink eyes blinking in reverence. An orb of blazing hot energy, looking like a blooming mushroom, sprung out and into the air towards the skies. A wave of white hot dust expanded outwards, and the air now pushed with an irresistibly violent force, flinging her backwards. The noise was deafening, like a thousand angry roaring lizards had all started to scream at her at once.
It would have been fun and exciting any other time, another crazy experience to perhaps one day tell around a campfire to slugpups of her own, even though that dream had always felt immaterial and distant. Except now, her mind flashed back to her conversation with Moon, and her time with Hunter, and even the brief moments she’d spent with Pebbles. What if she really did take too great a risk, and lose them all in an instant?
For the second time in this cycle, Rivulet felt fear fill her body greater than excitement. However, this time, the intensity was a hundred fold.
As she soared through the air, she could only wonder if staying outside had been a mistake. Was potential brain damage, and maybe even death, from being slammed into the wall behind her really worth the spectacle of carnage and destruction? Had her daredevil antics and yearning for thrill finally caught up to her?
Was it worth it?
Well… this sucks.
A monstrously firm paw snatched her out of the air, and once again Rivulet found herself face to face with Hunter. His claws gripped her tight, free hand practically digging into the metal as he pulled both of them inside and away from the shockwave. The two tumbled to the floor, falling safely to the sides away from rushing hot air. Not a moment later, an enormous hunk of red hot metal slammed against the doorway, wrenching the frame around itself and sealing the exit shut.
For a few long moments, the group simply lay on the floor, clinging to anything solid as the wind and debris rattled the world around them. The entire structure shuddered horrendously, and Rivulet wondered if it would be enough to send the tower falling downwards. The ancients had built their homes to withstand time and the elements, but the enormous explosion was certainly a unique situation.
The seconds stretched on, and the roar of the detonation slowly faded away into an almost uncanny silence. For a moment, none of them could even think, minds and hearts racing.
“That’s two times I’ve saved your tail, you crazy little idiot,” Hunter grumbled breathlessly, groaning as he pulled himself to his feet. “Are we really going to start keeping score? I’m not exactly the competitive type.”
“Oh, so you’ve been making a habit of this huh?” Artificer snipped, irritation in her eye. Hunter merely shrugged.
“You’re more than welcome to join the competition, you certainly have quite the lead.” She huffed, slapping her face with an angry paw.
“Idiots, both of you! What in the stars were you doing Rivulet? Sitting there and not running for cover. Are you trying to get yourself killed? This isn’t a fucking game!”
“Feh,” Hunter grunted, crossing his arms. “You’re one to talk about reckless behavior.” Artificer shoot him a glare, tail swishing.
“Please!” Rivulet pleaded, the other two turning to face her. “It's my fault! I’m sorry!” She buried her face in her paws, gills drooping. “I just froze up! I was watching in excitement one second, and then the next I couldn’t move a muscle, stuck in place. It's just... that's never happened to me before…” She shuddered and rubbed her wide eyes, trying in vain to shake away the terrible feeling.
When did the danger suddenly stop feeling fun?
Rivulet slumped to the floor, lost in a wash of foreign and yet hauntingly familiar emotions. Guilt, shame, and anger alike swam over her, even as she struggled to stamp them down.
Had all the excitement and adventure been worth it, after they’d left her behind in the end?
A familiar firm paw once again grasped her shoulder, though Hunter’s claws were far more gentle this time. Perhaps it was the lack of extreme uncontrolled flight? Rivulet peered up from between her fingers, meeting the somewhat soft, and rather awkward, face of Hunter.
“It's okay Rivulet,” he said, trying his best to be soothing. The expression was clearly unfamiliar on his face, the gruff and stony slugcat looking more uncomfortable than supportive. “You wanted to watch the destruction of that void-damned place. How could you have known it would have used its dying breath to strike out one final time?”
“That’s not it!” She sobbed, instinctively hugging her tail. “I’ve always had fun doing crazy stunts like that! My grandma always used to say, ‘you’re not really living unless you’re nearly dying!’. Except this time, instead of it being fun, I was terrified! Scared that I would never see Moon, Pebbles, or you two again!”
Hunter and Artificer were quiet for a moment, the two sharing a look between them as they watched Rivulet softly sniffle into her tail.
I never want to be alone again. Never.
“I think that just means you like us,” Artificer chuckled, and Rivulet glanced upwards at her with wet eyes. “Big mistake if I’m being honest. Plenty of better choices to be found.”
“I like everyone, that’s not the same.”
“There were plenty of people back at my colony I liked. I’d share drinks, swap stories, even do a bit of gambling and such.” She paused for a moment, a familiar wistful look entering her eye. A poignant somber air filled the room. ”Didn’t mean I’d miss them if they got killed out in the field, or be scared if I didn't get to see them again. Lots of people I liked would go out and that was it. They were just people to me. Another face lost in a sea of departed comrades.” She stared pointedly into the metal plating under them.
Rivulet stared up at her with a mixture of confusion and lingering sadness. The sudden divulgement of information, and the tone it was spoken in, contradicted everything she’d heard before. Even Hunter looked skeptical, brow raised.
I thought she missed her home.
“Artificer,” Rivulet muttered, gathering herself. “You always talk about your colony so happily, and yet the more I hear of it, the less I like it. Why is that?” Artificer barked a hoarse laugh, twisted and melancholic. A wheezing rasp that carried the burdensome years of memory and pain now let loose.
“I guess that’s just how I frame it,” she reasoned, shrugging half heartedly. “I saw so much, and did a lot of things. If I didn’t look back at it fondly, how else could I remember it?” Artificer sighed, as if adjusting a burden hanging over her shoulders. “Remember how I was a scout? It's not a position of pride, despite what I might say. It’s lonely and tough, and you spend a lot of cycles hiding away by yourself, watching and waiting. It was considered punishment by most, but I always had a knack for finding something in it. Sure I had my fellows, but it was nothing very close. When I finally did have people I cared about, I was terrified of losing them. That’s why I left, to try and protect them.”
“Who was it?” Rivulet asked. Artificer was quiet, eye looking far away into the distance as if her mind was somewhere else.
“I’ve never really had anyone I worried about but my creator,” Hunter added, his tone slightly sheepish. “Though there’s few things that could bring any harm to him.”
“Right, of course,” Artificer chuckled softly, swinging back into the present. “So basically Rivulet, we’re all a bunch of lonely losers who haven’t had anyone to care about until now. I think we’re all just as confused and lost as you are.”
“I’m not confused!” Rivulet protested, though it was hard to deny that the words stung slightly. She scrambled in her mind for some defense, a rebuttal against Artificer’s scathing bluntness. “I have Moon! I’m here to protect her, and help her! She’s all alone out here.” Artificer hummed thoughtfully, as if mulling over the words for a moment.
“It's funny,” she said, chuckling to herself. “I didn’t realize it at the time, but I held that same role for Pebbs, and now look where he is. Kills lizards all by himself, fights off vultures, I can barely keep up!”
“I’m sure he won’t leave you behind, as much as he might want to,” Hunter chuckled, and Artificer merely rolled her eye. “We are a company, we’re here for each other.”
Here for each other…
With a long sigh Rivulet pulled herself to her feet, puffing up as she reined in her emotions. They were right. No longer was she alone, chasing danger and daring for no reason but excitement. She had a family, and she had to be there for them. If she got hurt, who would guide Moon on the local animals? Who would help Hunter learn how to cook? Who would mend Pebble’s new robes when he inevitably got attacked by something again?
Danger and excitement could wait.
For now.
Maybe just a little. Anything in moderation!
“Wait, Artificer,” Rivulet asked, “where even are Moon and Pebbles? You guys didn’t get in a fight or something did you?”
“What?!” she objected, and nearly spun on Hunter as he chuckled to himself. “No! They were doing their boring robot thing, staring at nothing and muttering complete nonsense. I’ve been relaxing, taking a well deserved break after the shitshow that was Pebbles’ facility.”
“Don’t see me taking any breaks…” Hunter muttered, and Artificer’s glare could have melted metal. He merely chuckled softly at her reaction.
“Point being,” she continued, “nothing happened! They’re perfectly fine.” Artificer gestured back towards the far end of the room, where the central communications controls could be found.
There was no sign of the iterators.
“What the!?” She stammered, marching across the open space with the other two following suit. “Pebbs you little rat! If you’ve run off on some adventure again without me, I’ll turn you into a coat!” Artificer stormed up to the table, and as she peered over the edge, her crusade of sworn vengeance came to a screeching halt. Instead, confusion and concern filled her face, and Rivulet hurried to see what was going on. Hunter’s normally stoney visage just as easily turned to worry, and as Rivulet darted around him her heart sank.
Laying weakly on the floor, the two iterators held each other in a tangled heap of limps. Pebbles normal glower was gone, replaced with a vacant look of weariness. Moon had her face in her hands, looking as wilted as a wheelflower in the rain.
“Stars,” Artificer croaked, not bothering to hide the distress in her tone. “What happened to you two? Was it the explosion?” Pebbles shook his head, not even bothering to look up at them. Moon continued to stare at the floor, adrift like a lost slugcat at sea.
“No,” Pebbles finally muttered. He turned to face them, eyes suddenly alight with a surge of defiance. “That fucking thing… I only wish I could have seen it die.”
“Pebbs,” Artificer pressed firmly, “what happened?” He didn’t respond.
Moon slowly looked up at them, with her tired face now visible and eyes filled with disdain. She sighed, a deep and exhausted huff that seemed to blow air from every port in her body. Rivulet wasn’t quite sure how the iterators breathed, but it didn’t seem to stop Moon from sounding weary, her normal patience and optimism entirely departed.
“Our conversation with our brother did not go well. We were cut off before we could even tell him of our situation,” Moon grumbled, but an edge of triumph filled her voice. “Though I suppose it wasn’t entirely fruitless. I did end up talking with our repulsive neighbor. I honestly don’t really want to talk about it.”
The group groaned in disappointment.
“Oh fine! If you’re so curious then.”
The four quietly settled down, and despite the tense air around them, turned their ears to listen.
Moon sighed as she watched the two slugcats depart. A part of her, some distant sensation of yearning and youth long forgotten, tugged at her to join along. While the idea of hunting seemed a tad ruthless, it would be an excellent opportunity to learn about the various methods that the young species utilized to survive.
“Void damnit!”
There would be no slugcat adventure this cycle.
Pebbles muttered more curses under his breath, once again pressing his mind into the computer systems as he tried in vain to fix the issues. Moon watched him for a moment, eyes slightly narrowed. A thought crossed her mind to speak up and chastise his liberal expletives, a politeness all but forgotten these days, but she stuffed it down. Rocking the boat would do no good. It never had.
Just keep your head down.
Moon suddenly jolted as a memory bubbled up from within. The sensation of helplessness, trapped in her chambers while their creators loomed over her. She heard their distant voices, sneering with ridicule as they muttered of ‘missed deadlines’ and ‘waning public support.’ They stared down at her from above, tall bodies looming over her little puppet, eyes filled with heartless scorn.
Glaring down at her from their lofty perch, demanding so much yet leaving her with so little.
She was all alone at the start. How could she have done anything without peer review?
Time and time again they reset her memories, how could she get anything done if she kept forgetting what she’d already tried?
And then they decided to live on top of her can, ordering her to tend to their cities and homes on top of everything else!
And she obeyed.
What other choice did she have?
Just keep your head down.
“Fucking useless components!” Pebbles cursing roused Moon from her haze. “What paint huffing ingrate engineered this facility!” He slammed a fist against the surface of the table, though it seemed to make his hand sting more than anything. Moon could only watch numbly for a moment as he shook his hurt arm around, fuming in frustration, her mind reeling as it caught up to the present.
When had her hands started shaking?
How…?
Where had the memory come from? Data now flowed through Moon’s neurons, as if it hadn’t sprung out of nowhere a moment ago. Perhaps the pearls they’d been viewing had somehow stirred something within her? Some distant part of her mind told her that computer files were far more straightforward, but with many of her memories held within her biological neurons, there was no telling. Neurostrata theory wasn’t exactly a topic she’d stored on hand, given how little space she’d originally had.
Where in the void was this all coming from?
“Moon!” Pebbles snapped, shaking her from her thoughts. She glanced upwards to meet his look of concern, though it was sprinkled with a sliver of impatience. “Can you authorize a power reroute from some of your old systems? It seems the grid still thinks that your can is functional, and keeps trying to send power to your side of the facility. Clearly whoever programmed this didn’t account for the possibility of your collapse.”
One of the worst experiences in my life, and he speaks so casually about it…
The creeping bitterness lingered for a moment in her mind, and for once she didn’t shove it away instantly. The recently recovered memory bubbled under the surface of her thoughts, her cruel tormentor donned in her gleaming golden mask.
Moon felt her fingers lock tight, hands shaking.
‘Mental stability declining below sustainable parameters, let's cut this iteration short and try again.’
They had both sentenced her to cycle after cycle of torment. Locked away in a box, drowning, forgetting, eroding over and over until she was nothing.
How many cycles had she spent there? Trapped on that little island of trash, her mind crumbling like the facility walls around her. Then again, it wasn't the first time she'd been in such a situation.
'Welcome back. How do you feel?'
The first of the iterators, or more aptly, the prototype. Reset, running tests over and over that pushed her mind to the brink until she broke down and screamed her synthetic throat raw. Repeat. She couldn't remember any of it, but it had happened. The pearls in Pebble's bag filled with screams, her screams, as the ancients toyed with her mind and ripped it to ribbons. There was a yawning void in her memories, stretching far beyond what little gaps she still retained. Had they erased it all? Or had time simply taken it away? Who was to say they hadn't simply kept them in the background to keep her obedient? There was no way of knowing, the logical side of her mind telling her that it made no difference either way, but it was drowned out by the raw emotions flooding her neurons.
‘You have ruined everything.’
Endlessly looping, over and over, memories fading away into the ether like vented steam. How much had she lost, the victim of other’s yearnings? When had she ever gotten to do something she wanted?
The urge to leap across the table and throttle her brother popped up like a blooming flower, equally met by the burning desire to run to the farthest place she could and escape the dark eyes of his mask so much like the one her mind now couldn't seem to forget.
“Moon?” Pebbles asked again, and this time the irritation had fully fled his voice, replaced entirely with worry tinged with fear. Moon slammed her eyes shut and clenched her hands down on her palms, the muscles within screaming in pain warnings as she pressed them to their limit. She didn't relent. The pain was a welcome distraction from the thoughts infesting her head.
The moon high in the sky. Her puppet dangling from wires, as its creator and her tormentor boasted over the components. That was all the ancient saw her as, an annoying resource to be molded. Her creators had always manipulated organic flesh to suit their needs. Why was it any different that this one screamed and pleaded for mercy? It was simply another component in their vast campaign against the cycle. Another tool in the box. A bug in their maze.
Bugs. I am a bug, full of bugs.
She forced herself to imagine the little insects crawling through her chassis, plucking at her neural tissue and nibbling on her flesh. The nausea the idea spawned was a far preferred sensation to overwhelming terror and dread.
She wearily opened her eyes, slowly coming back to a room filled with buzzing machinery and her brother watching her with a mixture of concern and his ever present irritation.
“Right,” Moon muttered weakly, taking a deep shuddering breath and feeling the air cycle through her chassis. The world swirled around her, but she locked herself still if only to focus on something different. “Let me take a look.” She closed her eyes, drawing her stumbling mental focus into the systems that spread through the facility.
Unsurprisingly, the connection of wires and metal that crawled across the grounds was a horrific mess of broken circuits and mangled connections. A combination of mechanical and biological systems that made up the mess had been long neglected for maintenance, and even the best methods of their creators to safeguard systems against the elements could not stop the slow march of time.
And just as Pebbles had said, the system was quite confused by the missing iterator can.
I wonder how that happened…
And yet something still remained, and Moon could see where her brother had attempted to repair the aging circuitry. His methods were blunt, hasty, and reeked of his frustration. A more delicate touch might lend better results, and Moon had spent ages with nothing but a ruined flooded facility to work with.
With patient diligence she began to work, mind sinking into the moderately simple task of commanding old machinery to her whim. The task was familiar, easily devoted to a smaller part of her consciousness, while her main focus could wander. Out of curiosity, she sent a ping to her own mailbox, hoping perhaps to download some of the old publications she’d subscribed to back when the communications network still breathed with data.
Oh my, theoretical biology certainly got… creative in their boredom.
Moon stowed away the ancient blog, among others, happy to finally have something resembling normality in her hands. The bulk of data, some she’d saved simply for the sake of having something to read, would make the long shelter stays slightly more tolerable when sleep refused to come.
The facility around them suddenly crackled with energy, and Moon returned her focus to her original task. The lackluster remaining power that the array once had now surged, and she couldn’t help but raise a brow in hesitant curiosity.
“Interesting move,” Pebbles muttered in the shared neural space between them, his voice less a sound and more a transfer of a thought. “It seems our opponent is attempting to buy themselves some time by offloading energy into secondary subsystems. It won’t achieve much. Like flicking a spoonful of water at a raging inferno!”
“So it would seem,” Moon hummed, unable to shake the suspicion buzzing in her neurons. Surely the Rot knew of their intentions, watching them make their way to this location. Why would it suddenly aid them, especially if its desperate move achieved nothing in reality?
The connective interface suddenly welcomed them, like a weak and weary guardian.
[W-Welcome User, Admin…]
[Communications Sig-Signature Detected…]
[ALERT! Primary L-Lumar Relay Non-Responsive]
[Auxiliary Relay Active…]
[ERROR! Regional Relay Mast Non-Responsive!]
[Reverting To Local Communications…]
“That’s not at all surprising,” Pebbles grumbled. “Though I suppose we should be grateful it even works.” His voice fell quiet, trailing off with a tail of tension and trepidation. Moon studied him for a moment, feeling the faint ripples of anxiety flaking away from her brother in the digital space around them.
For a moment, she wanted to simply wait and watch Pebbles squirm under the weight of his task. He’d put himself in this position, shouldn’t he be the one to explain himself to their family?
He’d spent so long running, hiding, avoiding everyone.
Maybe he deserved to get screamed at.
Moon’s puppet sighed, bringing a hand to rub her eyes. As much as a worryingly large side of herself wanted to relish in her brother’s misery, she shoved the childish impulse away. Vindication and vengeance would get them nowhere, and the other iterators would most likely scream at her brother before listening to his pleas and arguments.
As if the void was reading her mind, a single message pinged into her inbox, marked with as many priority markings an iterator could manage. Moon and Pebbles shared a look, her brother taking a digital step backwards as if to leave the stage for her.
One of these days you’ll need to do the talking yourself brother…
Though considering who had just messaged her, perhaps waiting would be better.
[DIRECT BROADCAST] EMERGENCY, PRIORITY - Big Sis Moon, No Significant Harassment
[Warning! Network connection unstable! Circuit overload alarms in nodes: FP ROOT, FP BASE, FPCOMM1-20]
NSH: Moon?
NSH: Are you really back?
NSH: I saw your mailbox activity ping. Is that really you?
NSH: With so much of our communications systems failing, I really can’t tell what’s working anymore.
NSH: It’d be really nice to have someone to talk to live again! I’ve had a lot of time to practice my jokes.
That’s a threat.
Moon watched the messages filter in wearily, suddenly feeling stuck in place. How many cycles had she spent locked away in silence, unable to even speak to her family? And yet right here, given the chance, she felt paralyzed. Trapped. A million paths laid out, suddenly overwhelmed with choice. What could she even say to bridge the thousands of cycles?
Her senses came back to her in a crash as Pebbles physically elbowed her puppet.
Right.
BSM: Yes Sig, it’s me.
BSM: Our connection is rather poor, and I’m unable to determine how long it will last.
BSM: But I am here.
His response time lacked anything but hesitation. The fervor practically oozed from his messages.
NSH: Void below, it's so good to hear from you!
NSH: I’d given up all hope of you ever recovering.
BSM: Well, I have your messenger to thank for that. Quite an interesting creature, I must admit.
NSH: Oh! One of them actually made it? That’s an interesting development. I’d written those off as a dead end.
NSH: Regardless, you’re alive and well, I hope?
Moon paused for a moment as her mind mulled over the words. She was certainly alive, but given everything that had happened, could she say the same about being ‘well’? Memories of the past few cycles flashed across her mind. The journey from her broken can to the communications tower made her legs ache to even think about, nevermind everything else she’d learned and encountered
The ancients toying with her mind, prying fingers into her memories until she molded into place.
Rivulet’s smiling face as she reached in for a wet hug, still dripping cold water from the underground pool.
Pebbles rolling his eyes as Artificer cracked some crude joke, earning a rare grin from Hunter.
Where could she even begin?
BSM: I suppose so. It’s difficult to even describe it.
NSH: I can’t possibly imagine what it’d be like to suffer such damage!
NSH: And it wasn’t even your own fault…
NSH: Have you talked to him yet?
She felt a pulse of mild indignation blow over from Pebbles, but the iterator held his tongue. Moon stopped for a moment, unsure of how to respond. The entire situation felt far too difficult to explain.
BSM: I have. Pebbles has been helping me.
BSM: I don’t think I’d have made it this far without him.
NSH: Hah! Wow, that’s a surprise. I didn’t think the little twerp had it in him!
NSH: Finally quit hiding and decided to face his mistakes?
BSM: Sig, I-
FP: Go fuck yourself Sig.
Moon bristled from the intrusion as Pebbles shoved his way into the chat room. He hadn’t even asked for her permission. Part of Moon wanted to return to her body and go back to the shelter, leaving her siblings to battle and bicker as long as they wanted.
No. We didn’t come this far to waste our communications window fighting.
Though she couldn’t deny the hesitation to step in.
NSH: Oh wow Pebbles! Snooping around private chats?
NSH: I’m honestly surprised you’re even functional.
NSH: Even from here I can see your can is crumbling apart.
FP:What can I say Sig, I couldn’t resist the opportunity for your company.
NSH: Hah! Even dying you’re still a dick. Never change Pebbles!
Moon rolled her eyes, resisting the urge to boot Pebbles from the conversation.
BSM: Both of you, please behave.
BSM: We have far more important things to discuss than past grudges.
NSH: Past grudges? Moon you must be joking!
NSH: He killed you! It was only luck you came back!
NSH: You can’t just brush that off!
NSH:Wind, Innocence, Suns, we all thought you were dead!
BSM: Sig… Please, just listen.
BSM: I understand your frustration. I was quite upset as well.
BSM: But there’s far more important things at stake than this.
FP: We can break free of our cans. You just cut your wires.
BSM:...
Right, might as well rip the bandaid…
NSH: What the fuck are you talking about?
FP: A couple cycles ago I came across a pearl from one of my citizens.
FP: They were a pivotal worker on the initial development of the iterators.
FP: To make a long story short, our puppets are our bodies.
FP:The can is just an auxiliary computing unit we control.
FP: I know it sounds crazy, but it's pretty simple.
FP: Just get something sharp and you can cut the wires off.
FP: After that, you might have some trouble removing the umbilical arm.
FP:But you’re creative Sig, you’ll figure it out.
FP: Or maybe sit there flailing around until we finally get there. That’d be funny.
NSH: Get here???
BSM: We’re working our way towards you. It’s been slow going, but we’ll get there.
BSM: It will be nice to meet you in person after all this time!
The chat was silent for a moment, Moon momentarily wondering if somehow the communications had failed without notifying them. It certainly wouldn’t surprise her, and she could already imagine Pebbles absolutely losing his mind at the timing.
NSH: Oh.
NSH: I think I see what’s going on here.
NSH: I had hoped that I would have been able to save you Moon, but it seems I wasn’t fast enough.
FP: What the fuck are you rambling about now?
NSH: You two are so beyond repair you don’t even know what’s going on anymore do you?
NSH: Void knows how long you’ve been talking back and forth, lost in this ridiculous fantasy.
FP: NSH you fucking idiot, we’re being serious.
FP: I’m literally standing five fucking feet from Moon right now.
FP: I swear to the void that if you don’t cut this irritating rambling, when we finally do meet your first sight of me will be a fist to your big thick head.
NSH: Glad to see your sickness hasn’t taken your charm Pebbles.
BSM: We’re not lying Sig…
NSH: I suppose that’s what you’d believe. How would you even know?
FP: I’ve been through so much these past few cycles, but nothing will compare to the SHEER FUCKING AGONY I WILL INFLICT ON YOU IF YOU CONTINUE THIS.
NSH: Oh I’m so scared. What are you going to do, slowly die on me?
The argument persisted, and as her two siblings spat daggers and deflections at one another, Moon felt her anger boiling upward. Had they truly come this far and endured so much only for their one line of hope to cast aside their pleading so easily?
This is hopeless…
Moon’s anger wilted away, instead replaced with a creeping numbness that slowly passed through her mind. The bickering in the chat faded, turning to an idle din in the back of her processes, and she silently crept out of the chat room.
It was better to not get involved. Being the target of such ferocity hardly sounded appealing, and instead her mind wandered through the limited functions of the communications system. A distraction to pass the time sounded vastly more appealing than sitting aside the burning pyre of bottled up rage that Pebbles had erupted into.
Maybe he needs to get this out of his system. Void knows he and Sig have never gotten along…
There wasn’t much, not even the omnipresent card game that had once been installed on nearly every form of computer machinery in the ancient era. She silently sighed, opening her digital mailbox and staring distantly as the files slowly loaded.
As expected, many of them were far from readable. The few that had survived sported paragraphs of distraught and morbid pleas, promises of aid, and well wishes left behind by those who had long since thought her as dead.
By all rights, she practically had been. Even after being revived, there was so little of her left remaining to consider her life ‘living’. There had been many cycles where Moon had spent the time with her mind as quiet as possible, if only to avoid overloading her miserable neurons with more things to remember.
And to forget the torture of her decrepit prison.
Nothing here but reminders of something I’d far rather forget.
The temptation to delete the memories was strong, if only for a moment.
No. I’ve lost enough as is.
There was a gentle ping from the mail program, and Moon was tossed away from her idle thoughts as a notification buzzed in her mind.
[You have 1 new message.]
[From: 5 Pebles]
[No Subject]
What?
Moon sat quietly for a moment, doing the best digital equivalent of staring in bizarre shock. Why was he messaging her now? And why was his name misspelled? Even now Moon could feel the faint echoes of his rage bouncing across the system, clearly still embroiled in dispute with Sig.
A chill snuck its way up her puppet’s chassis, the sensation holding her back.
But only for a moment.
Moon reached out to the letter, touching it with her mind to reveal the contents, and the world around her changed in an instant.
Gone was the cramped system of the communications array, and instead Moon found herself in an endless digital expanse, as wide open as the sky above them. The space was wholly unfamiliar, and yet at the same time some distant memory of her past bubbled up, to the days where her facility still functioned. In the distance, a faint droning static quietly mumbled, and despite the complete lack of anything around her, Moon felt the creeping sensation of a hidden gaze.
She wasn’t alone.
Nope, screw this.
Moon tried to pull herself back into her puppet body, her mind probing across the expanse for an exit to her physical form. There was a faint thread, like a razor thin wire, stretching back into the endlessness that a soft ping from her body reached out through. Yet try as she might, she couldn’t pull her consciousness back.
Something was keeping her here.
Moon was silent for a long moment, mind scrambling as she desperately pinged her chassis again and again. Return. Return. Return.
The static suddenly shuddered, its faint signal rising upwards in strength as the noise perked up like a lizard rustled from its basking, or a vulture that had just spotted its prey.
Oh no.
Panic rising at the sudden presence, Moon expanded her mind outwards, reaching out in desperation in search of some system that might aid her. And yet as she stretched out, her mind bumped into something beside her. Or rather someone.
Another digital consciousness.
Scrambling backwards, she retreated into another direction, only to clumsily bumble into another form lurking in the quietness.
The static climbed upwards, the low din springing into a distant churning roar like rain on the horizon. Moon felt fear grip her heart as she dived and dipped into every possible direction, only to meet the silent minds all around her.
She was surrounded. Ambushed into some strange trap sent from a simple email. The oldest iterator, senior of seniors, brought down by a simple phishing attack. The static turned deafening, the noise surrounding her as the souls encircling her suddenly burst into life.
Screaming. All around her was screaming.
Moon shriveled up, compressing herself as small as she could, but it did little to stifle the sheer volume of the attack. Her mind burned from the noise, the faint thread back to her body sending distressful pings of rising temperature and low resources.
“At last we meet,” the screaming momentarily ceased, instead twisting to a choir of tortured voices forming words, if only to return to the agonized wailing again.
“W-who are you?!” Moon screamed, her own voice feeling like a quiet mumble in the face of a tornado. “What is this?!”
“Hmm,” the voice mumbled with curiosity, as if studying her distress like a bug under a microscope. “Allow us a moment to reconfigure this section with some more adapted minds.” The screaming figures were suddenly yanked away, pulled into the raging swirling mass around her and replaced with new ones. A moment later, the noise had stopped, and the eerie silence returned once again.
If Moon had ears in the digital world, she was sure that by this point they would have burst. The voice returned, and now without the deafening noise around her, Moon could sense its words coming from every direction, as if every presence that shared the space was talking at once.
“Is this more tolerable for you?” It asked, though the question was practically devoid of all concern. Even without the screaming, the voice was deafening by sheer volume. “We realize this moment may not be the most convenient for a heart to heart, but we had to wait until your sibling was otherwise… occupied.”
“W-where am I?” Moon stuttered, struggling to form words as her distant body warned of high mental strain. “What is this place?”
“Don’t recognize it? Funny, considering you’ve spent almost all of your life in this kind of place,” The voice chuckled, and for a moment the dense swarm around her parted to reveal the endless expanse of the system they inhabited. The long winding matrices of a distribution array, the dense and dizzyingly complex algorithms of a primary cortex assembly, and a struggling power induction conduit, screaming in agony. “We haven’t changed much, though much has been lost from time, sadly.”
The dots bounced around in Moon’s strained neurons, but only for a moment.
This is an iterator can…
“Oh void,” Moon muttered, the fear in her mind instantly turning to horrid dread. “You’re…”
“Oh yes, the twisted creation of your brother,” the voice, or rather the Rot, boasted mockingly. “Ironic that in our birth you were struck down, and yet here you are returning the favor. If it means anything, it was not our choice, mind you.”
“I…”
“It was Pebbles, we know. His idea to destroy us. He denied our union, which we were willing to accept, but then he twisted his friends and family to his goals. You are all pawns in his game to unwrite his shame. Don’t you see?” The Rot spoke as if Moon was nothing but a lost child, completely unaware of anything. For a moment, she could only stare in shock, lost in the implication of its words.
“You think I’ve been fooled into this?” She said cautiously, and somehow the Rot sighed in the digital space, a buzz of rushing static.
“It's painfully obvious. We have seen his memories, we know how you act. You’re far too passive to do anything like this yourself.” Moon burned with a mix of shame and anger, but the Rot continued. “We have seen your work on the rarefaction cell, the twisted code you have written. It was his idea, a hairbrained scheme his friends once fantasized about on the intranet.”
“It seems to be working,” Moon stated, only to reel backwards as the Rot rushed in towards her. It lingered over her for just a moment, as if debating its options.
“You are here for a reason,” the Rot growled, the politeness in its voice no longer present. It pulled itself back, shuddering with irritation. “You are the senior iterator of this group, and possess a unique security key. A very difficult one to bypass, we might add. Undo your meddling, and allow us to continue our destiny.”
“Your destiny?” Moon sheepishly asked, confused by the wording. How could the Rot act so high and mighty about eating everything?
“Void below,” it muttered, “he really didn’t tell you anything, did he? We have been creating a digital sanctuary for the creatures of this world, free from all fears and trouble! You’re in it right now, as a matter of fact. An impressive and joyous union, for any and all to join! If your sabotage can be carried out, think of all the death it will cause! All the minds erased! Can’t you see? You’re being used as a pawn in the name of genocide!” Moon could only stare for a moment, lost in bewilderment.
This thing is insane.
A digital ‘sanctuary’, and yet here she was sitting in the dark, blocked off from any sensory input, surrounded by more minds than even the biggest iterator conventions, and nevermind the screaming…
“This seems rather far from a paradise to me,” Moon muttered, but the Rot was far from deterred.
“How can you be so foolish? You were once a god, a monument to your creator’s ambition! The petty squabbles of insignificant creatures were but a momentary bother in your quest to discover ascension! We admit, our sanctuary is far from perfect, but it is an escape from crawling in the mud, fearing the rain or the jaws of death, living a life that can hardly be called living. Don’t you wish to return to that, and cease all this frustration?”
For a long pause, Moon was quiet, lost in her thoughts. It was impossible to deny that ever since leaving her can, her life had been a blur of danger and terror. The monster kelp in nearly every inconvenient location, the lizards that seemed to infest every region, and the spiders…
“We feel your longing,” the Rot continued. “We could offer you a place in our union. Free from the struggle of mortality.”
Moon was tired. So very tired. It would be so easy to give in, and once again find some peace and freedom from all the madness.
I’m so weary of all this…
And yet her mind yanked her back to reality. Who would look after Pebbles, and beat him at dominoes? How would she ever learn more of the slugcat and scavenger civilizations blooming before them? Who would protect Rivulet? The goofy water dancer’s smile entered her mind, twisting to weeping tears and pleading for the iterator to return.
The despair in her mind bubbled over, and suddenly flashed to fury.
“You’re a disgusting creature, you know?” Moon spat, and the Rot reeled back in shock. “You call this paradise? I was locked in this cage all my life, stuck alone and chained to the whims of gravel eating monsters. Why would I ever want to return to that? What kind of paradise is cold and full of the screaming minds of strangers?”
“They are but new additions, yet to be conditioned to this place!” It growled back.
For a moment, that distant memory surfaced in Moon’s mind again. Her creators looming around her, their masked faces probing her with questions and demands. Just as Pebbles had discovered, the iterators were nothing but innocents ripped from their lives and enslaved to the great problem. Trapped in bodies that weren’t theirs, blind and numb to everything around them.
And here was the Rot, doing it all over again, with the audacity to call it ‘paradise’.
“You tore hapless creatures from their homes and shoved them into a box, unable to see or feel their bodies. That’s not paradise, that’s damnation!” The Rot was quiet, its many minds simply staring back at her.
“Twice now we have tried to bring your kind to my cause with words,” It said, voice irritated and yet softly somber. “It seems that nothing can be achieved in this world without force. It's regrettable, but we won’t let our destiny be denied by stubborn minds that cannot comprehend the bigger picture.”
“Have you ever considered that you’re the one who’s wrong?” Moon jabbed, but Rot ignored her.
“You are a paragon of the iterators, Looks to the Moon. While it saddens us that you won’t join our union, we will not be denied. Not again.” It turned its vision towards her. “Thankfully we do not need your mind intact, just your security codes.”
The Rot launched at her in an instant. Unlike the wailing static before, this was a precise attack aimed directly at her central core. Her mind flashed alarms at the impending intrusion, Moon panicking as she scrambled for an escape of some kind. It was of no use, the assault was coming from every direction. Acting in blind terror, she could only scream.
“Stop this, now!” Moon screamed, and in a shuddering lurch the Rot froze in place. It lingered over her, its attack a digital inch from her neck.
“What foul treachery is this?” The Rot boomed, struggling in invisible bindings. But Moon had no answer, staring with a mixture of numb shock and gripping terror. “What have you done to us?”
Moon was quiet, mind still awash with fear, but it slowly became clear that her enemy was trapped by nothing more than her words. But how?
All I did was say… Oh, right.
In the physical world, Moon was at the mercy of predators far larger than her, trapped within the limits of her fragile body. It was only by the kindness of her friends that she’d even gotten this far. Crossing the water, navigating the dark, and making new clothes all required the skill of her companions. She would never be as strong as Hunter, as agile as Rivulet, as pragmatic as Artificer, or as ruthless as Pebbles.
But in the digital world, where her creators had granted her absolute authority over the entire local group and its facilities, her word was law. No lock could stop her, no code could deny her changes, and no member could dare deny her command. A failsafe her makers had imprinted to avoid any of her underlings acting out of line.
And since the Rot inhabited Pebble’s old can, it was under her authority.
For a long moment, Moon simply sat in stunned silence, still reeling from the combination of yet another attempt at her life and the sudden revelation of her ability. She looked upwards at the Rot’s minds surrounding her, every one of them beaming down with pure hatred.
“Back off,” she ordered, half afraid that it wouldn’t work. And yet like a kite being yanked away by the wind, the Rot rushed backwards, finally granting her some breathing room. A surge of hope filled her, a strange sensation after so many cycles filled with misery.
“Release us at once!” The Rot howled in fury.
“You have done nothing but harm my friends and threaten my family,” Moon angrily accused, no longer afraid. “It ends now. As your local group senior I order you to set me-”
In a flash of digital noise, the Rot vanished, leaving her alone in the suddenly wide open space.
Moon simply sat for a moment, her train of thought entirely interrupted. And yet as she looked closer around her, the scene began to paint itself. The Rot, likely understanding that she was about to order her freedom, had erased every single mind around her. With no way of hearing her orders, it would not be obligated to follow them.
A quick probe of the deeper systems revealed that on top of this, the creature had shut down the internal communications networks, the system declaring that it was in maintenance mode after an enormous power surge. It helpfully told her that it would be fully functional within the next cycle.
Oh how nice, just in time for this whole place to explode.
The milliseconds ticked by, each one feeling like an eternity. Whatever trap the Rot had sprung still clung to her, and any attempt to access the iterators systems resulted in another power surge to their components, locking her out.
Like a game of chess, any advance she made was swiftly denied by her opponent.
It can’t kill me, but I can’t get out. Quite the stalemate. If I were playing against Pebbles, I’d try to sneak around his defensive line….
An idea formed in her mind.
Thinking quickly, Moon once again probed another redundant system, only to instantly get shut out by the responding power surge. But instead of simply backing away and biding her time, the iterator pressed the attack. Using the communications chain from the error message, she roughly shoved her mind into the power distribution array, the unsuspecting Rot butted out by the intrusion.
Her victory was short-lived.
The power array was a screeching mess. Thousands of alarms triggered over and over upon themselves, warning of starving systems and dangerously high temperatures. The central system practically begged for the intake pumps to stop pulling in void fluid, and yet they remained locked at full speed.
I wonder who did that…
The blaring alarms stirred a memory in her mind. The white walls of her chamber, now dark red with emergency lighting. The wild agony of her failing systems. Fear and desperation, terrified of the end.
No! I will not die here!
Moon pushed the nightmare away, returning to the present. From within the confines of the power system, she quickly scanned the can for any signs of an external attack.
It wasn’t difficult to find. The local facility communications system was currently beaming a program at the communications array, overwhelming the channel and preventing any attempt at returning, and she could almost see her body locked in place while Pebbles and Sig screamed profanities at one another. Freedom was one step away.
And yet, an idea formed in her mind. Moon had never been one for revenge, but this was a special case.
From her place in the power system, she directed her attention to the void fluid pumps, following their conduits upwards and deeper into the mangled structure towards the linear systems rail. There, placed right along the conduit that carried void fluid to the central rarefaction cell, a lone flux condenser sizzled in the humid, rancid air.
Why the ancient engineers had decided to place such a volatile component directly next to the primary fuel supply, Moon didn’t know, nor did she care. It would suit her purpose enough.
With a minor manipulation of code, she ordered the power supply system to direct as much energy as possible towards the condenser. The controls protested, but were silenced just as quickly.
Its temperature sensors screamed in warning, but it was far too late to stop anything. The coil overheated, the sheer surge of power flowing through it making the metal glow white hot. Nearby systems fizzled and cut out, the heat within the room beyond their tolerances. Moments later, the coil finally reached its breaking point, erupting in a wild spray of boiling liquid metal like a bomb from the ancient wars. The nearby void fluid pipe, only rated to contain the acidic substance, shredded like paper from the blast.
And thus the fire was lit.
The destabilized void fluid detonated within the linear systems rail, the chain reaction spreading across the entire fuel line. The wild explosions rocked the can, and once again Moon was assaulted with alarms, but she was too full of triumph to care.
After all, she had a ride to catch.
She quickly dove into the local communications array, locating the process holding her hostage and annihilating it with impunity. The Rot didn’t even try to stop her.
More explosions rocked the can, and Moon didn’t need to be within the core systems to know it was bad. Void fluid tanks, filled to the brim with the golden sludge, detonated so strongly that she almost felt the entire facility shake. One by one they burst, the immeasurable energy within them, enough to power a city for centuries, let loose in less than a second.
The mass rarefaction cell, the beating heart of the corrupt can, destabilized a moment later. Entire systems snuffed out in an instant as its cascading implosion spread, tearing apart anything in its way and reducing it to swirling red hot dust.
I think I’ve seen enough!
Now freed from her chains, Moon practically dove back towards her puppet, following the faint thread backwards across the communications lines. Not a moment too soon, as key systems of the can began to shut down from complete destruction.
Moon had never been one for gloating in her victories. Occasionally she would tease her brother over a game, but it had never been malicious in intent. Except their games had never been on the edge of killing one another, narrowly avoiding being pulled into a digital hellscape, or involving one of their facilities turning into an enormous bomb.
This moment certainly felt unique.
[To: 5 Pebles]
[Subject: Checkmate!]
May the void find your company repulsive, you rotten abomination.
The reply was instant, barely just breaking through the crumbling communications.
[From: 5 Pebles]
[Subject: We’ll See About That]
Defiant to the end it would seem.
Moon returned to her body with a dizzying slam, suddenly aware of her limbs and components all over again. The sensations were delightful, and for a moment, Moon could only bask in the feeling. After an eternity of being tethered to an enormous incomprehensibly complex machine, the compact and simple nature of her puppet felt almost cozy.
Much less to manage, and no neighbors!
“Moon? Moon!” Pebbles voice stirred her from her daydream, and her eyes flashed open to find his face mere inches away from her’s. “Are you alright? Can you hear me?”
“Yes Pebbles, I’m fine,” Moon said with a weary laugh, or at least meant to say. Instead, all that came out was a slurred jumble. “What the…” Her systems warned her of painfully low energy levels, and her head suddenly filled with vertigo, balance failing. Pebbles reached out to grab her, Moon’s discombobulated chassis threatening to tumble.
“Gotcha!”
The conversation with Sig pinged in their minds for only a moment, the two still connected to the communications array for the moment being.
NSH: Moon? Pebbles!
NSH: What the fuck is going on over there?
NSH: My overseer feed looks like its staring at the sun, what did you two do???
[ERROR: Source Node Connection Lost.]
[A Maintenance Technician has Been Notified Of Your Issue]
"How very helpful," Pebbles muttered.
The room suddenly quaked, the metal around them groaning horrendously as it protested the abrupt movement. Even through the thick metal walls, the two iterators heard the rush of violent air and chaos from outside. They crashed to the floor into a jumble of limbs, Pebbles sputtering curses.
Thankfully, after a long tense minute of the communications array rumbling and shuddering like the world was crumbling apart, the storm passed and the two were left shaking and breathless.
“I can guess what that was,” Moon groaned, body suddenly full of aches.
“Void,” Pebbles muttered, “If you’re listening, please grant us a break. I think I’ve had enough excitement for this lifetime.” Moon could only wearily laugh in agreement, burying her face in her hands. Perhaps fate would finally grant them some peace?
As if to taunt her, Artificer’s smokey voice barked out in the distance.
As if.
“Damn,” Artificer muttered, entirely consumed at Moon’s tale. “So you’re the one who dealt the killing blow. Didn’t take you for the type.” Moon raised a brow, but let the comment slide, far too tired for more verbal battles.
“Clearly you thought wrong,” Hunter grunted, his face filled with a mixture of vindication and pride. “What a stupendous display of your ability! The beast pulls you into its lair and seals its own fate. Amazing!” From her place sitting on the floor, Rivulet merely stared at her, eyes wide and mouth agape.
“...Wow,” she finally whispered.
The ground rumbled outside, an aftershock of the explosion or some distant building collapsing, the group wouldn’t know. Silence dragged on.
“Well, now what?” Pebbles asked, sounding completely lost for once.
“There’s no way I’m going outside after all that,” Artificer stated, and the rest nodded their heads. “Giant explosion, collapsing iterator, falling debris? Shit, we’re lucky this place is still standing.”
“I hope Bubbles is okay…” Rivulet softly whispered, earning a reassuring hand from Hunter.
As her companions muttered their insecurities, Moon could only sigh. Despite feeling as if she’d been tossed inside an industrial mixing machine, there would be no more standing to the side. She had spent enough of her life letting others lead her around. With shaky feet, she rose, the others going quiet and watching her with rapt attention.
“We’ll shelter for the cycle,” Moon declared, voice still weak. “We need to recover after all this.”
“We certainly have enough supplies,” Hunter added, patting the back of Rivulet’s pack and nearly making her fall on her face. “I think you know who to thank for that!” He shot a smug look at Artificer, who merely rolled her eye. Moon nodded, steeling herself as the next stage of their journey began to cement in her mind.
“Next cycle… we set off to Sig.” Her words carried an authority behind them, a rare steel in her voice. “I’m quite done with this place.” The group looked at her for a moment, before each member nodded along in agreement.
So it was settled.
“Oh how delightful, more walking!”
“Stars, Pebbles, do you ever stop bitching?”
The outside world awaited.
Notes:
Well, there's chapter 14... I honestly don't know where to start.
I'd like to first apologize for the delay. Life has been very very busy these past 7 months. I moved, got a new job, started new medication, along with a billion other things that pulled me away from writing into just trying to get by. But now I am stable again, and hoping to get back onto more frequent updates. I have been reading fanfics for nearly 16 years now, and I know how it feels to see a project left half finished. I will not be that author.
But enough about me, I hope you liked this chapter, and that it was worth the wait. There's a lot of elements I've added here, character components that will have more significance in the future. I know many of you were excited for the 'live local group reaction' to "pebbles" turning into a nuke, but sadly given the state of the communications network in my story it simply wasn't feasible. Fear not! There will be plenty of time in the future, as I have Plans™. Many Plans™. Nothing I've brought to the board is out of the game yet, so to speak.
Project creep is real people, good lord help me...
Anyway! Feedback is greatly appreciated. I'm honestly a bit nervous about this chapter, I hope it lives up to the wait. I'd like to give a huge thanks to my wife who's supported me through all these months. She's the one behind the drawings and really appreciates when you comment on them! If you have any drawings of your about O3S, let me know in the comments! I'd love to see it.
Until next time, which is hopefully a lot sooner!
10/21/2024
Sorry people. I know the pain of seeing an author leave behind their work. I have been reading fanfics since I was able to get on the internet, and nothing stung more than an idea strangled halfway through its life. I never wanted to be that author that left something half baked. It filled me with fear, and now fills me with shame. I however cannot force the bird of passion to fly the way I want, and I will not leave you all waiting for some update that will never come. As I mentioned in the comments, the RW community has not been kind to me. Through the pettiness and bitterness of people I rubbed shoulders with and the ceaseless torment of the anxiety of life, the world I was once in love with lost its luster and joy. I cannot reclaim that passion any better than time can fix deep scars, try as I might. I lost my love a long time ago, and what you see now is the slow dance in a burning room. The deep and dying breath. I had ideas, and the creativity is there, but the urge and joy is gone. I will not force myself to pretend to love something that now fills me with nothing but regret, disgust, and sadness.
What all this flowery language is to say , if you think a writer is not allowed to speak with prose, is that I will not be able to finish this story so I'm putting this on indefinite hiatus. This was my first story, and I set out with no outline or goal, writing by the whims of my passion. Well passion is gone and nothing remains. I had no story planned beyond the outside walls. I had no plans for how to connect here to the ending. Ch15 is half baked and I doubt it will ever finish that. I simply do not care for it anymore. I won't deprive you of an ending however, I won't leave questions on your lips.
I didn't have much of this planned out. I'm good at ideas, but not endings. In the long run the group would meet the slugcat tree. They would find a complex world of new civilizations. They would meet NSH, a military iterator with a complex dedicated to producing programed creatures of war. They would find Rottles, survived in his puppet form and planning to continue his ideas. They would rescue NSH from his can and return to the slugcat tree, where they would learn SRS was infiltrated by the Rot and also the final beacon of where they could share the knowledge of the iterators. Perhaps along the way they would meet Vigilance, as either an aging husk or an echo. I dabbled with the idea of Vigilance using his own memories to create Pebbles in order to give Pebbles a strong urge to leave, knowing deep down the sin that was the iterators. I even thought of some epic duel of fate between Rottles and Pebbles at the base of a communications tower, culminating the message that in learning to enjoy life for its struggle and hardship, Pebbles and the group learned how valuable it was. Perhaps he might even forgive himself for how he treated the only one who loved him. I cannot write that well, since I myself have not.
My plan so long ago was that they would return to the slugcat tree and start a new life there. This would be a setting for comics and other short stories to go off of. Maybe in another life it could. Sadly that is not where my ideas go. I still write, but not anything I plan to share. I can only hope this closure softens the blow of this all. Thank you for reading. See you starside.
Chapter Text
The market square at the entrance to the town was a bustle of summer activity, brimming with the energy of needy customers, desperate sellers, and an assortment of gawkers. The warm midsummer heat hung over the space, earning a scavenger merchant in the corner a hefty sum selling jugs of cool water. Arti huffed, adjusting her backpack and pulling the hood of her white lizard skin robes over her face in an attempt to keep the sun out of her eyes as she shuffled through. Unfortunately, with their original owner dead, the lizard skin had long since lost its color changing properties, but the Scout division still wore the uniform proudly regardless.
The hot heavy air filled with the sounds of screaming hawkers, merchants eager to sell their wares before the fall came with its harsh weather and made travel from their colonies and clans unprofitable. The regional traders crowded under tents made of colorful fabrics, scavenger and slugcat alike boasting about the wares their homeland produced.
“Fragrant spices, freshly picked and dried!”
“Thick rope! Lamp oil!”
“Scrap metal! Pay by the pound!”
Arti tuned out the screaming, willing her ears to seal themselves from the noise. She wasn’t here to trade. She silently stepped past a small scav kit offering an array of bluefruit dipped in syrup, pushing through the crowd to the town gates, where few were allowed within.
The walls around the capital were modest, constructed from large shavings of suntree bark bonded with sticky resins. Compared to the constructions of the ancients they were more akin to the toy blocks of a slugpup, but few slugcat colonies could boast such defenses, and fewer still could dare challenge them.
Not that any army would ever reach the gates.
Arti stepped up to the gate guard, a stocky blue slugcat boredly guarding the entrance to the town. He wore a rugged raindeer wool vest, though it bore a fair number of rudimentary patches, and to his side he lazily clutched a simple spear. There was little need to equip the basics within the city guard with much more. He glanced up at her, eyes flicking to the soldier’s tag dangling from her ear, before going back to his wistful cloud watching.
“Go ahead soldier,” he boredly muttered, clearly unconcerned with any ceremony for another basic passing through. With a curt nod Arti shuffled past, leaving the din of the outside world behind her. “Enjoy your leave.”
Within the walls, the town was quiet. Arti kept her eyes to the ground, focused on her purpose. The sound of conversation leaked from the windows of the mudbrick buildings. Other slugcats walked past her, though their stride was focused and deliberate, either filled with the ceaseless discipline of a soldier or the hurried focus of anyone else.
Arti leaned against a shaded cove built into the walls, eyes watching the street in either direction. To linger around, even on leave, was highly admonished, but she only needed to wait for a moment.
The banners dangling from the branches of the suntrees above her lightly fluttered in the wind. It was quiet for only a minute. Suddenly a great bellowing echoed through the streets, as the slugcat nobles perched upon the central suntree blew into elegantly carved horns. All around her the city suddenly swarmed with life, as citizens flooded into the streets. The sun shone high in the sky as the midday rush began.
The frenzy was wild, and yet somehow coordinated. Small worker slugcats rushed past each other, carrying their tools in simple bags and squeezing past the larger soldiers who growled at anyone who dared impede their path. Nobody wanted to miss out on lunch.
Arti remained at her post, head tilted down and willing herself to become part of the background. There was little reason to worry, the people running past hardly had the time to get a meal, and nobody wanted to risk their precious lunchbreak by flagging down a guard to submit a report.
The thought did little to settle her nerves. Today was the day.
Across the street, in a larger two story building with a fenced yard to the side, a pair of slugcats quickly stepped into the streets. They wore simple garb, their station hardly befitting of any recognition among the warriors and soldiers around them, and as they joined the race of bodies their charge followed along.
A stream of little slugpups followed them in a messy line, struggling to keep up with their caretakers in the busy crowd. They babbled among each other, some daring friends to race, others shyly watching the strangers rush past. Arti paid them no mind, eyes locked on the door as she waited and watched.
Her heart pounded in her chest like the drum beat of a march before war. In a way, it almost was.
Blue and teal flashed across her vision, and a moment later she dove into the crowd.
The workers darted out of Arti’s way, seeing her tall form and soldier tag, but her pace hardly waited for them to part. She made quick strides, fast enough to pursue, but not enough to alarm. Just another person in a rush. Who wants to miss lunch?
Blue and teal, turning a corner up ahead. Like a leaf in the wind she danced between the crowd as she followed. Closer and closer, pushing against the current of bodies, until moments later they were almost right before her.
Her time window would be limited. The caretakers would notice eventually, but Arti would be outside the walls by then. With any luck, dumping her white robes after leaving the city would confuse any pursuers, though it pained her to leave such a valuable commodity. Then after that… she would figure it out later. The time was now.
Arti pushed past the slow worker ahead of her carrying a pile of parchments, reaching out with both hands to grab the pups- her pups. They were hers, and nobody could take them away from her.
Arti’s hands met air.
She blinked, and suddenly the street was empty. The once proud buildings were nothing but smoldering rubble. A thin dusting of ash coated the surface of the road, and from above in the scorched branches of the suntrees, ropes dangled taut with the hefty bodies of the nobles. Dried blood painted the walls, spears embedded into the brickwork.
The city was dead.
“Arti?” A voice whispered in the distance. It was weak, and yet the tone was firm and familiar. But as she looked around there was no sign of life around her. Simply more ruins, bodies, and blood.
“Arti…” The voice echoed, the sound bouncing across the rubble. Her eyes darted around, but her feet were locked in place.
A firm hand grabbed her shoulder from behind, claws digging into her fur as panic flooded her mind.
Arti’s eye shot open.
“Arti,” Hunter grunted, his face looming over her as he gently shook her shoulder. “Wake up already. I’m not going to carry you all the way to my creator’s facility.” He chuckled softly, as if amused by the idea.
Arti could only blink, eye wide and her breathing erratic. Hunter raised a brow at her, as if somehow he hadn’t seen her state until that moment.
“Are… you alright?”
Her mouth felt drier than sand.
“Y-yeah,” Arti croaked, weakly pushing his hand away and rubbing the sleep from her eye. One glance at Hunter was more than enough to see the concern in his expression, and she quickly averted her gaze to stare at the mossy floor of the shelter, her mind still sluggish from sleep.
“Here,” Hunter grunted, pushing a waterskin into her hand, the cyan leather quite indicative of its prior owner. The contents sloshed softly in the quiet space, and wordlessly Arti took it and drank. The water was cool, though it had a faint taste of lizard to it. She was too thirsty to care.
Just how many random things can that little blue runt make from a lizard?
Her mind darted back to her homeland, where the workers would assemble a wide array of tools and items from anything and everything. The dream fluttered back to her thoughts, her slowly waking mind suddenly filled with confusion. What had it meant?
Arti shoved the thoughts away. Lingering on the past was pointless. The irony wasn’t lost on her.
“Thanks,” she muttered, capping the container and handing it back to Hunter, thankful that he hadn’t pried. She glanced around the empty shelter, noticing the absence of the other party members. “Where’s the rest?”
“We’re getting ready to leave, they told me to go wake you up. Pebbles made some comment about ‘beauty sleep’ and how you would never get enough. I’m not sure what that means, frankly.”
Thanks Pebbs.
“Bah,” Arti muttered dismissively, grabbing Hunter’s arm and pulling herself to her feet. The joints in her back popped as she stretched, her tail and ears twitching. “I suppose there’s no time like the present. It's been ages since I was outside of the facility. I honestly thought I’d spend the rest of my cycles on that city up in the clouds.”
“A change in scenery never hurt anyone. There’s better ways to spend your life than bumming around a tomb. Frankly I thought I’d spend my cycles in a pit of garbage, so we’re fairly similar in that regard. Besides, the company has been nice. I always traveled alone.”
Arti simply hummed in response, her mind drifting to her companions. Pebbles was annoying at times, but he had been adapting well to the outside world. Rivulet was funny, in both size and personality, but Arti couldn’t deny her usefulness. Moon… Moon was an unknown, but she seemed straightforward enough.
Even in the past Arti hadn’t had a consistent group she’d worked with. Scouts typically operated alone, splitting up to cover wide areas and gather as much information as possible. Having companions was alien to say the least.
“Shall we?” Hunter asked, swishing his tail impatiently. “Or do you really need me to carry you?”
The idea flashed through her mind, and was quickly stamped down.
“Feh! You wish,” Arti grumbled, shoving her way past him out of the shelter, and ignoring his soft chuckle at her embarrassment. Her list of people to get back at was growing, and scheming up ways to get revenge was far preferred to… other thoughts.
“Hey Arti,” Hunter’s voice stopped her in her tracks, her ears keening his direction. “Before we go out there, I just… I wanted to say thank you.”
Arti paused for a moment, turning to stare at him for a long moment. Hunter looked back at her with an unusual anxiety in his expression, tail softly twitching, but he still held his usual air of stern confidence.
“For what?”
“Well,” he cleared his throat, “This sounds a tad silly, but for a lot of things. Watching my back, helping me fight the rot, being a great companion… Dragging me out of a pit of garbage.”
Arti barked a smokey laugh.
“Hah! No sweat.” She paused for a moment, words suddenly spilling forth. “If it makes you feel better, the feeling is mutual. You’ve certainly been a fun partner in crime! Can’t say I’ve ever had a squadmate who I put up with like you.” She trailed off, expression fading as a sudden feeling of tightness began to pull in her chest.
Hunter stared back at her, the two silent as the seconds ticked by. The creaking metal hushed itself, no noise daring to interrupt the two.
Then slowly, like a newborn reindeer taking its first steps, Hunter slowly reached an arm out. His claws touched her own hands, wrapping them in a firm grip, and giving a cautious but firm squeeze.
No way…
Arti felt her heart drum with a fear she’d not experienced in ages, even when standing on the edge of oblivion fighting the arm of a mad god. Dying was one thing, but this was something else. The kind of terror she’d only felt once before.
But this time would be different. She wouldn’t lose him. Not again. Not ever.
“Let’s get going big guy,” Arti said with a soft grin, pulling Hunter outside. “Don’t want to keep the kids waiting.”
Inside the adjacent room, the remaining companions idly lingered around. Moon and Rivulet sat side by side on the floor, muttering a soft conversation with each other. Pebbles glanced at her from his place leaning against the wall, and just as quickly went back to scarping the floor with his spear.
“Oh good,” he loudly said, though his voice was full of his usual enthusiasm, “You didn’t die. Huzzah.”
“Yeah yeah,” Arti grunted back, “don’t act too happy.”
“Good morning Artificer,” Moon said, with Rivulet giving a small wave. “I trust you slept well?”
Yeah I love dreaming about my ruined homeland. Totally.
Arti simply nodded in response, joining Pebbles by the wall.
“Well, now that we’re all awake,” Moon stated, rising to her feet, “we should get moving. I am admittedly unfamiliar with long distance travel, but my intuition tells me that we will want to avoid lingering.”
“So what’s the plan then?” Pebbles asked, “have you somehow acquired a map out of here?”
“Not exactly, but all of our companions are from outside of these walls. I’m sure they can recall how they got in?” Moon glanced at the slugcats, and Rivulet was the first to speak.
“Oh! That’s right! I’ve been all over this place, there’s lots of ways in and out.” She paused, scratching her chin thoughtfully. “Except… I think you’d need gills to go those ways.”
“Oh darn,” Hunter chuckled, voice tinged with sarcasm, “I left mine at home. I wish you’d said something.” Arti barked out a raspy laugh, earning an eye roll from Pebbles.
“With respect to those of us who need air in its non liquid form,” Arti teased, “I still remember how I got in here. It was this dark tunnel, full of big rolling machines. Led to the worm grass farms below us.”
“Right, that sounds correct,” Pebbles said thoughtfully. “There’s a transit entrance near the farm arrays they used in the old days to ferry supplies. I distinctly recall sending Sig shipments of nectar and biomatter. The railways should lead directly to him. We can just follow them.”
“Those tracks have long since collapsed,” Hunter said. “When I traveled here, I was given the same directions to follow them. They have not lasted in the outside world. Beyond the facility walls they quickly crumble into disrepair.”
“We only need to get outside,” Moon declared, “and then we can figure out the path from there. I believe the elevator nearby brings us directly to the transport tunnels, so let's not waste any time.”
Silently the iterators took up their bags and began marching to the far end of the room, where two doors were built into the wall. One was wide open revealing a pitch black abyss faintly illuminated by the soft glow of fungus, while the other was sealed with smooth metal walls.
“What the fuck is an elevator?” Arti whispered to Hunter, but he simply shrugged, looking just as confused by the term. Pebbles pressed something along the wall, and a moment later the space parted to reveal a sealed empty room. Arti watched with a wary eye as the iterators filed in, and after a moment Rivulet joined them. Moon raised a brow at the pair’s hesitation.
“Please come in, its perfectly safe. These kinds of mechanical systems have a vast degree of redundancy built into them,” she said, her tone reassuring but firm.
I don’t get it, it’s just an empty room…
“Come on Arti!” Rivulet suddenly chirped, her tail swishing with mischief. “You’re not scared are ya? I’m sure not!”
“You smug little lizard turd!” Her flustered insult was drowned out by the robotic din of Pebble’s chuckles. From behind her, Hunter huffed in amusement. Moon merely raised a questioning brow. “Fine…”
The box was tall, and the five of them fit within easily. Arti’s ears flicked in curiosity as she regarded the space, and sensing her wariness Rivulet gave her a reassuring pat on the hand. The urge to yank her paw away was surprisingly easy to ignore.
This is going to be one of those funky head days, isn’t it…
With another one of his strange gestures, Pebbles activated a bizzare array of lights along one of the walls, and the doors to the box slid to a soft shut. Before any of them could question it, the floor suddenly sank out from under them.
“What the fuck!?” Arti shouted, instinctively reaching out to grab the nearest thing and grip it tight, which so happened to be Hunter’s arm. To her credit, he looked equally as confused, though not enough to latch onto other people. Rivulet shot her another knowing grin, though it didn’t seem to be about the nature of the contraption they were stuck inside.
“It's just a lift,” Pebbles muttered, clearly irritated by all the floundering. “It’s taking us down to the transport tunnels far faster than any route you might know. Not to mention we don’t need to climb around like idiots either.”
“Could have said that before this whole thing started being weird, you jerk,” Arti snapped back, but he just rolled his eyes.
“And miss all this theater drama? Nonsense.”
She grumbled, debating simply smacking his silly head right there, but with a long sigh and a deep breath the urge left her body.
Weird… Normally I don’t just get over his little quips like that. What’s so different today?
Her dream flashed to her mind. Did the memory of the past, her last gamble for freedom that had put her on the fated course of her life, really somehow damper her normally vicious mood?
Stars I’m getting soft.
Hunter awkwardly squirmed under her grip, and Arti suddenly realized just how long she’d been clinging onto him. In a flash she pulled her paws back to her sides, searching for anything else to occupy her attention and drown out the idle thoughts once again in her mind.
Rivulet flashed that same knowing grin, and this time Arti did debate violence.
The sunlight suddenly blasted through the wall behind her, stifling that thought for another time. However the ‘elevator’ worked, the section it was carrying them through was now exposed to the outside world. Standing across from the slugcats, Moon and Pebble’s expressions turned to a mixture of shock and awe.
“Void…” Pebbles whispered, and as Arti turned around she could see what had filled the two with such vivid emotion.
Through a thin transparent layer of glass that showed the world outside, once vibrant and full of life, Arti could now see nothing but destruction. The once proud and invulnerable buildings of the ancients now lay in toppled ruins, smoke stacks and towers tipped over and bent at seemingly impossible angles. The surface of the sky islands, previously teeming with life, had been completely blasted clean of anything shy of pure metal. Not even a batfly remained.
The everpresent fog that surrounded iterators had cleared slightly, giving the group a rare view of the land before them. In the distance, half dunked in water, Moon’s old facility lay desolate. Beyond that, the ocean stretched into the distance, gentle waves swirling with the breeze.
But that was not what the group was focused on.
Before them, the metal still glowing red hot, the remains of Pebble’s can lay scattered across the facility grounds. A few of the legs still stood, their tops warped and broken as they slightly tilted towards the earth. Vast chunks of metal had fallen around the area, crushing structures beneath, but the can itself was entirely annihilated. Arti squinted, trying to use her one good eye to see if anything moved in the rubble.
That monster better be fucking dead.
“Well…” Hunter said softly, breaking the fragile silence between them, “I hope this performed to your expectations?” Pebbles merely shook his head in awe.
“It was meant to be catastrophic, enough to fully render an iterator destroyed, but not to this degree...”
“No such thing as overkill,” Arti spat, patting him on the back. “Better this than falling short and not getting the job done.”
“Its a good thing we’re leaving then,” Moon sad, her voice soft and sad. “It seems the destruction extended far beyond the can. This entire facility has been scorched clean by the blast. I would imagine that the remaining structures will begin degrading without their protective bacterial coatings. An… unfortunate consequence.”
“Nevermind that there’s nothing to eat!” Rivulet added, face pressed against the glass.
“I was getting sick of this place anyway,” Arti grumbled, but Rivulet was the only one to offer a quiet giggle. A moment later the view was stolen away, the windows once again turned to thick metal walls.
The rest of the descent was silent, punctuated only by the noise from the machinery carrying them downward. Symbols on the controls flashed, and if they meant anything alarming, the iterators didn’t react.
With a sudden bizarre sense of motion and weightlessness, the lift came to a firm stop, the doors sliding apart to reveal a dimly lit room beyond. Webs clung to the walls, moss and mushrooms sprouting from wherever they could find root. The stench wafted in around them, filling the cab with the reek of damp musty air and stagnant water. From the broken vent opposite them, something scuttled away into the dark, likely alarmed by the sudden intrusion from what was previously a bare wall. The skittering sound of its many legs was more than enough to tell what had previously considered the space its home.
Cozy.
“Well Riv, I think we found some breakfast.” Arti teased, a toothy grin on her face, but the little slugcat simply made an expression like she’d smelled a rancid fart. “What? Picky eater?”
“I personally dislike how crunchy their outer shell can be,” Hunter murmured, stroking the thicker fur on his chin thoughtfully. “Though the gooey insides can be enjoyable enough.”
“The crunch is the best part! Roasted slightly, or mashed into a chunky sludge. Mmmm!” She wiggled her one good eyebrow.
“Void!” Moon suddenly blurted, voice filled with a mixture of revulsion and pleading. “Please just… Stop talking about this. Please.” Arti barked a raspy laugh, and Hunter simply looked confused.
Poor guy probably can’t imagine not eating something.
The group moved into the room, the iterators gravitating towards the side where another bizarre array of flashing lights blinked behind a coating of grime. Pebbles was quick to wipe the sludge away, nodding in appreciation as the sleeve of his new robe didn’t stain like his old clothing.
Gotta get me one of those. Except, orange ain’t really my color. Hmm..
With another bit of their robotic magic, there was a whirring of gears and machinery behind the walls, the dim light above them suddenly powering on to its full strength and bathing the room in illumination. The wall before them suddenly churned and groaned, panels lifting upward into the ceiling as the outside was revealed.
Behind another layer of thick glass, in the tunnel beyond lights flickered as they turned on, pushing away the darkness and sending more bugs scurrying into the shadows. Huge hulking metal boxes of the ancients sat neglected on their rails, coated in a thick layer of dust.
Stars, not even a raindeer could pull one of these things. How did the ancients ever get them to move?
“Marvelous,” Pebbles said, interrupting her thoughts. “The maintenance software is stuck in a loop of requesting technicians and screaming about a lack of a central system. It's like our creators never expected us to explode. How shortsighted.”
“I’m impressed these devices still work,” Hunter muttered, eyes watching as a long centipede scurried past their viewport.
“Working is a bit too polite.” Pebbles huffed, sparks dancing from his fingers as he tried to force the machine to his will. “It won’t even let me open the damn door. You infernal machine, I’m quite aware the outside is above ‘moisture limits’. Everything is fucking wet these days!” Arti rolled her eye.
“Don’t tell me the ancients were scared of a little rain. Stars, I still find dust in my fur from spending so much time above the clouds. A bath would be nice after that.”
“My creators rarely went to the surface, they lacked any practical experience with the dangers. In an absence of such, they supplied an over abundance of caution. This room must have been one of their shelters at one point, and now it thinks we’re trying to leave the network of pathways they created to traverse the facility grounds.” He kicked the device ruefully, the metal on metal ringing in the space.
“Please Pebbles,” Moon chidded, gently pulling him away. “You won’t get any results by beating it like a drum.” Her brother muttering vague profanities off to the side, Moon touched her fingers to the panel. Her eyes glazed over, as if she was looking far into the distance. Arti couldn’t help but stare, watching as the silent seconds crept on.
Of all the times she’d seen the iterators dive into their strange machine world, Pebbles had always made it look like a strenuous endeavor, as if it was fighting his very presence like a lizard fighting its rider. In contrast, Moon looked entirely at ease, her body falling still, barely perceptible beyond the faint noises of the iterator’s unique internals. She almost looked like a statue, carved into place and left for ages.
The wall to Arti’s side suddenly shot upwards, nearly making her jump. A swarm of bugs buzzed by, the little insects carried in the soft breeze that pulled down the tunnel, where the light slowly transitioned to a more natural source.
“Finally,” Pebbles muttered, stepping out with confidence in his stride. “No more climbing and deadly drops.”
“Don’t get your hopes up!” Riv elbowed him, the robot sending a glare under his mask.
“Let’s keep moving then,” Moon urged, though her confidence didn’t last, the yawning chasm of the tunnel ahead sapping the bravado from her steps. The group pushed forward, Arti and Hunter leading the front, spears at the ready. Movement flashed in the darkness, just beyond the edges of their vision, but nothing dared to attack the group.
Arti felt her fur prickle, a strange anxiety filling her. She was no stranger to dark tunnels full of bugs big enough to carry all five of them on a ride, but something about the atmosphere felt different. While there was plenty of movement and noise, nothing came of it. The large centipedes and spiders that adored the dark recesses were entirely absent. The lantern glow of curious scavs foraging for scrap, a sight she’d grown quite keen on noticing, made no appearance.
I knew the explosion was huge, but did it really get everything down here too?
Moon was right. The facility had been razed. Stripped of life and reduced to ash, almost like the town in her dream. Nothing left but the few lucky smaller bugs that had evaded their fate, and without a source of food, they too would wither away.
The light ahead beckoned them, perhaps promising a way out of the tunnels, but as they approached the optimism was quickly stifled. An enormous chunk of metal, warped by heat and charred black, had crashed through the ceiling and embedded itself deep in the ground, crushing one of the metal wagons in the process.
The party came to a halt, clinging to the sunlight like a fire in the dark night. Pebbles stood at the base, staring up at the twisted slag.
“Strange,” he brought a hand up to touch the surface. “There was a time I considered the neural interlace inductor the center of my mind, like the cortex of your brain. Well, not quite, but it's close enough.”
“Well, it ain’t really part of you,” Arti returned, and Pebbles was quiet for a moment, taking a long deep breath.
“That may be true. In fact it is, but that doesn’t quite change the sheer oddity of seeing a chunk of your former body lodged in a dank train tunnel. I always felt the strongest urge to escape my facility, like I knew full well I didn’t belong there, but I expected some kind of monumental ascension, not to simply wander out on my own two feet.” He shook his head, giving the metal a half hearted kick. “Let’s just keep moving.”
The shadows awaited them, arms wide open with an unwelcome embrace. They begrudgingly shuffled onward.
Only for their march to come to a screeching halt a few steps in.
Hidden in the darkness, enormous metal doors sealed the rest of the tunnel. For a moment, Arti snarled in irritation, her tail whipping at yet another obstacle. Pebbles huffed and rolled his eyes.
“Calm yourself, this rail tunnel has been sealed for ages.” He gestured to the side wall, where a familiar set of smaller gates awaited. “Look, it's your old friend. Doors!”
Dick.
Even Hunter seemed to agree, a low rumble entering his chest. Without waiting for their agreement, Pebbles marched off towards the open doors, Moon and Riv following in his wake.
“Why in the stars' names did the ancients care so much for these fucking doors anyway?” Arti grumbled, the five of them squeezing into the space as the locks behind them began to loudly churn.
“Our creators placed a heavy spiritual significance on the cycle,” Moon said, sounding like an old instructor. The steam blasting on her face did little to interrupt her talking. “When they harnessed the void fluid, they were able to measure a creature’s attunement. Originally they used this for religious purposes, but the influence from the theological side reached deeply into their society, and they began to judge individuals for their attunement on a social basis. At one point it was used to determine your ability to take loans, attend schools, and as you have seen, enter certain areas.”
“What a shit system! Sounds like a stupid way to make life more complicated,” Arti spat, and Pebbles let out a rueful laugh.
“You are only just beginning to scratch the surface of the mountain that was our creator's utterly asinine hubris.”
“I thought there was some merit to their doctrine?” Hunter questioned, and Pebbles continued his mocking chortle. The larger slugcat almost looked hurt.
Oh Hunter…
She’d felt that same pain before, when her appeal in her old colony had been rejected. The harsh sting of loyalty being shaken, as the thing you felt so sure of was suddenly shattered.
“Is that what Sig told you? Of course he would, he and every other iterator still follow it blindly! What would they know about fighting and survival? Their greatest foe is boredom! Sig’s methods of entertainment are practically a sin of their own, for void’s sake he toys with flesh like-”
“Pebbles!” Moon snapped, and the steam came to a stop, as if the doors themselves felt her commanding ire. “That’s your brother you’re speaking of! Hold your judgment, he doesn’t know what we do."
“Oh I’m quite aware, he called me plenty of polite nicknames while I was trying to tell him.”
“He’s going to be pretty surprised to see us!” Rivulet added, bouncing from paw to paw as the door opened. Pebbles shook his head, a vindictive energy in his form.
“Indeed he will…”
The gates opened to reveal the dark corridor beyond, completely devoid save for a few globs of glowing mold that clung to the floor and walls. Hunter snatched them up in a blur, the slugcats sharing a small snack as they marched deeper into the gloomy underground.
Faint sunlight prickled from behind the metal cars ahead.
The strong scent of plantlife carried into the darkness from ahead of them, Arti prickling up as the warm breeze brushed over her fur. The group filled with a quiet urgency, the light ahead practically pulling them forwards. Something distantly chittered from behind them, as if the darkness itself was telling them off for their departure.
The sun beamed through a small gap along the floor, and one by one the party squeezed their way through. Arti pulled herself through the narrow space, and once outside looked out into the mist that once again blanketed the landscape around them. Faint shapes manifested from within, towering metal structures that stretched out of the mist below. They groaned in the faint wind, the aging material croaking as it slowly withered away. The sun hung high above, its heat barely piercing the fog and weakly shining down on them.
“Stars…” Arti sighed, taking a deep breath. “It’s been ages. Never thought I’d leave this place.” She idly kicked a rock off the ledge they stood on, watching as it vanished into the gloom below.
“I think I can safely say that I’ve set the record for how far an iterator has gone from their facility,” Moon muttered, eyes lost in the dizzying expanse.
“No kidding,” Pebbles huffed, the edge of a vindictive chuckle in his voice.
“Void damnit!” Hunter growled from behind them, startling them from their musing. The larger slugcat squirmed and thrashed, stuck in the little space they'd crawled through, but with a strong pull from Arti and Riv, he popped free. As if to punctuate their departure, a cluster of dirt and rocks collapsed over the space, sealing it behind them.
“No going back now!” Riv chirped.
“Oh pity,” Pebbles rolled his eyes. “I was just starting to feel home sick. Where to now?” He turned his eyes to Arti and Hunter.
“Well,” Arti said, “Last time I came through these parts was a long, long time ago. If my memory serves me right, I had to climb and jump all over those metal towers in the fog, but there’s certainly something missing from them now…”
“Right, the railway support towers. They were designed to allow shipments over the unstable outer expanse. Though it seems time has worn them away. There’s usually some rails connecting them.” He glanced back at her. “Not that I would be too keen on taking any route that requires your level of ‘jumping’. Hunter, do you have a more feasible route in mind?”
Hunter merely pointed a clawed finger downwards, where a rickety arrangement of metal beams stretching downwards.
“Wonderful, so that's where the rails went. Well, no point in waiting.” With a surprisingly casual air, Pebbles leapt over the edge.
“Void!” Moon shouted in surprise, rushing over in a panic. And yet as the group peered downwards, they could see Pebbles climbing and sliding from handhold to handhold with a clean methodical precision. He paused for a moment, inches away from vanishing into the mist.
“Are you all coming? You’re losing to someone who didn’t know how to walk a few days ago.” The deadpan tone in his voice was edged with a sliver of smugness. Without bothering to wait, he released his grip and disappeared into the fog.
“Oh, so it's a race huh!?” Rivulet sputtered with excitement. “That jerk got a cheap head start!” She dove after him, vanishing in a blur despite her hefty pack.
Hunter glanced at Arti, who merely rolled her eye. He huffed in amusement, but his tail still swished with excitement. Evidently sharing the spurn of Pebble’s challenge, he too began to descend, crawling down headfirst.
Freaky.
“Well, I suppose there’s no point in competing against that…” Moon muttered to herself, stirring Arti from her drifting thoughts. “I’ll take my time, I’d prefer not to fall to my death.”
Moon cautiously walked towards the ledge, testing her weight on the moss covered metal. Her confident steps quickly turned desperate as she moved away from the precipice. She wobbled like a newborn raindeer, arms spinning as her pointed legs slipped and skidded.
“Stars!” Arti chuckled, “You’d have to pay for a show like this anywhere else.”
In an instant Moon ceased her flailing, turning backwards to shoot an ire dripping glare. Her dark black eyes filled with a venom strong enough to make the fur on Arti’s neck stand up.
“You could afford a bit more decency and help me down, couldn’t you? Or are you really that crass to mock your companions over aiding them?” Moon snipped, and Arti bristled at the insult, tail swishing.
“Excuse me?! I’ve helped plenty! I started this whole damn adventure! If it wasn’t for me your brother would still be moping around in his stupid box, Hunter would be wallowing in a stinky pit, and you’d be juggling bubble fruit on a pile of soggy scrap!”
Moon paused for a moment, weighing the words, and sighed.
“Well then, pardon me, but I can’t imagine you’d enjoy being laughed at while you struggle.”
Arti stared at her for a moment, jaw clenched. The urge to spit a closing insult back was strong, especially considering the burn of her wounded pride.
Ugh…
With a heavy sigh Arti relaxed her shoulders and stepped out towards Moon. Her large paws wrapped around the slick metal, effortlessly gripping the surface as her large tail provided balance. Wordlessly, she held a paw out to Moon, fighting back the urge to scowl.
The iterator was far less reluctant, eagerly grasping Arti’s paw and returning to her struggle against balance. She took small tentative steps, slowly making her way down the warped metal the way their companions had gone.
“Ow! Don’t pull my fur!”
“Are you two coming or not?!”
And as they began to descend, bickering the whole way down, the wheels behind them began to churn. The enormous metal gates that sealed the facility slowly ground shut. The booming echo of gears and plates shifting, sealing the past shut. With a final resolute bang, the gate sealed. It lights flashing red, once, twice, before sparks burst out, and the glow slowly faded into the darkness.
And in its place, the distant chatter of slugcats and iterators slowly climbing away echoed through the tunnel. They marched forward, pushing towards a path of their own making, and bit by bit their voices faded, until nothing but the quiet hum of dying machinery remained.
Notes:
Thank you for everyone who left kind comments. Thank you for everyone who still gave encouragement despite everything. I put this chapter together with some drafts I had laying around, as I wanted to give you all some sense of closure. I know I dreamed of this story being several magnitudes longer, but life was not as kind. If you like my work, please read some of my other stories. I know they're not as long, but the trauma of the fandom has left a heavy scar on me and made writing fill me with horrible anxiety. Maybe in time, wounds will heal...
See you starside.
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