Exquisite Possession: A Dark Scifi Romance (The Machinery of Desire Book 4)

by Cari Silverwood

  “Why?”

  “Why –”

  “Why would that be my plan all along? I arranged for a share, for the grounders to be left free. I don’t lie. Lying is bad.”

  “It is?” The man laughed, making the tattoos on his face dance. Definitely they were maggots, JI decided. “Look, Osta –”

  “What is your name?” He had him talking. This seemed promising. He waved to the others. “Lower your weapons. If anyone gets shot accidentally, I will throw you off a building, or into the sea – something fatal anyway.”

  They obeyed slowly, and he waited until all had done so.

  He wasn’t in practice with lethal threats. It would do. He swung his attention to the scav again. “Name?”

  His free hand sneaked into his coat pocket and he let the smoothness of the black crystal comfort him. Fern was nearer than he’d have liked, and she was agitated.

  “I am Scobo. I’ve been in many battles with the mekkers. I slew a –”

  “Tut-tut.” JI waved the man down, pushing his palm downward. “No. Name was all I needed, Scobo. I will honor the agreement with the grounders.”

  The voices of dissenters were raised again, growing louder and louder.

  He shouted too. “We will! They are free to do what free people can do as long as they harm no one!”

  “They harm us by taking what should be ours!” Scobo yelled. “Is this not so?”

  Emboldened by Scobo’s statement, other scavs yelled agreement. The noise of the crowd built again, and the grounders moved into an outward facing circle. Guns were being raised.

  Well, he could shoot Scobo. JI eyed him, tempted. It might stop this. Might make them worse, get half the people killed. It took him only seconds to run down the logic, while he also became aware of the heat welling from the crystal under his fingers.

  He brought it out, stared, and a sureness arrived that now was the time to do what he had the first day he met the three scavs outside Fern’s tower.

  He could feel that day in his veins.

  Remembered it perfectly. When oddness happened.

  “Stop!” The power in his voice rippled outward and people stilled, shocked. That’s it, he told himself. Keep going. He had them.

  “We will be peaceful. We will be kind to each other. We will be fair, because by doing this we will all benefit. Collect the last of the crystals…” He looked around at this spellbound mob. “Then pack up everything. Tomorrow we leave and journey to the new city resurrected by the mekker, Ryke. New Hope will take you all! It is time for us to make new foundations.

  “You and you and you!” He pointed around him, turning. “Are the new heroes of Aerthe. Make me proud of you!”

  A little over the top with the heroes.

  Teeth gritted, he unclenched his fist, which felt heavy, as if he’d lifted a boulder.

  The air was as fragile as newly formed ice. The crystal burned on his palm.

  Then they moved, they broke away, looking bewildered.

  Grounders thumped each other on the back. Scavs nodded to each other then nodded at the grounders. Children ran out and across the sand and into the middle to hug their parents.

  Openmouthed, JI watched. “What did I do?”

  “Good.” A man spoke. Zerlin. “You did something good. I think they will be fine now. And for some days to come. Once in New Hope there will be less opportunity for this to happen again.” Zerlin nodded to JI, tapped the side of his forehead, and walked away.

  “Well. Thank you,” JI said quietly.

  This Zerlin was more than he appeared to be.

  The waik stone…he stared…was now a cold white crystal.

  “Wow.” Fumbling a little, Fern placed a hand on his back, then linked her arm through his. “You had such authority. I’m proud of you, man.”

  The slur in Fern’s voice had him checking her status. She seemed tired? It was his best descriptive word for this slurred-of-speech state.

  His mouth twisted wryly. Such praise, though he wasn’t convinced some gesture or insult would not have them fighting again. He patted her hand.

  “I am a man?”

  “Ohhh, yes. You’d not noticed?”

  That made this a flawless day.

  * * * * *

  It was past sunrise, when organics would find detecting a mech difficult.

  Aunt M creepy-crawled on his lightest pincers, striving to be silent, and topped the rise that should let him observe the location the scav at Owler had indicated was a suspicious hive of mekker activity.

  Nothing was visible. No movement anyway.

  After waiting many minutes, he rolled over the top, choosing a place where a cutting would conceal him from below. He negotiated the steep, forested face, heading for what was a suspiciously treeless spot.

  Still no sign of sentries or watchers of any sort, and he’d reached that spot. There was a concealed doorway here with signs of recent activity – bared dirt and snapped branches, squashed grass – due to the trampling of boots. Aunt M hesitated. If he went in there he might be trapped. If he did not, what else?

  Wait above?

  This was possible.

  He listened with sensors placed on the door’s surface and heard distant voices, echoing as if far below.

  Mekkers were here. Unless these were scavs after all?

  He opened the door, checking first for anything that might register his presence. Slowly, he rolled and walked down the passageway and turned a corner, found himself facing a two-man crew manning a large gun.

  At the muted clank of his limbs rising and the glowing, red-eyed visage he adopted, because it tended to scare the fuck out of humanoids, they moved from the gun and raised their hands.

  “You’re Aunt M,” one said, matter-of-factly, despite his shaking body. “I have a message for you from Judge Ormrad. He will come up here and meet you wherever you choose, unarmed, outside if you wish. Say where and it will happen.”

  A trick? They knew the name Gio had given him.

  He retreated, studying the walls for hidden traps, listening for clicks, whirrs, footsteps, anything.

  When they only waited, he calculated the chances. They hadn’t attacked him above. The chance of any prepared defenses in the forested hills was unlikely – below two percent probability.

  “I will meet the judge. These co-ordinates and time.”

  He spat them out and whirled, shot out the door and climbed the slope faster than any vehicle except a ramm could exceed. Then he settled down to wait for the coming of the judge.

  Mekkers were down there, and many of them from the recording he’d made in the tunnel.

  More analysis of the sounds suggested they were up to a quarter of a klick under the surface.

  Morning brought a small army of mechlings swarming out the door. They parked themselves and began to absorb the bluish waik power of the Aerthe. Then the judge emerged. No men followed him, though he carried a weapon.

  Not carrying a weapon in this jungle would be stupid. He could not hurt Aunt M with that long gun without being killed.

  Aunt M decided that no matter how friendly the judge appeared to be, he would simply bypass all protests and take the mekker to Ryke’s city. There should be no mistake here made by him, even if the judge had made one.

  The judge climbed the last of the path and paused to catch his breath. His long black coat was scuffed and showed dirt at the hem, as if he’d fallen a few times on the journey. When he laid down the long gun and also placed a pistol on the ground beside him, Aunt M relaxed his wary stance.

  He still kept a pincer poised to skewer him in one fast jump. It was sensible. The judge was known to be tricky and false.

  “Greetings, Aunt M.”

  “Greetings, judge.” He rolled in a small arc, making it hard for any sniper to gain a bead on him. “We will be going on a trip now. Please do not attempt to re-attain your weapons. I can subdue you if I need to.”

  He raised his hands. “I would not dream of doing tha
t. All I wish to do is to show you this.” Then he opened his palm and held his hand out so Aunt M could see the surface. “As you can see from the sigil mark on my hand, I am the King’s Own Lawgiver, and as such, with the authority given me by the king, I command that you follow me.”

  Inside, an electronic relay he’d not known existed clicked open and Aunt M was deluged with a series of instructions. One by one, they shut down the ability to do anything except obey. He moved forward, in spite of the screams of denial rocketing about the other portions of him, the free parts. His limbs lowered.

  The judge picked up the weapons, shouldered the long gun, holstered the pistol. “I’m so glad we can be friends. Come. I have a use for you. I need you to tell me all about your companion Osta and also anything you know of this JI-mech that may still be active. You can begin while we walk.”

  That was an order.

  Aunt M strived to stop the onrush of obedience, the gathering of relevant information, but he could do nothing except observe his traitorous self. Though of course he was not truly betraying, he was doing what he’d been hard-programmed to do, long ago.

  It still pained him, terribly – as if sections of his circuitry were on fire.

  “First of all, Osta and JI are one person. The JI mech merged with the scav by killing the brain and invading the skull cavity.”

  “Really?” The judge’s voice had risen at the end of that word. “Fascinating! Please give more details…”

  Chapter 22

  Transporting the jaggs turned out to be the most difficult part of the trip to New Hope. The scavs had fifteen vehicles altogether, parked and guarded on the outskirts of Owler, but few were big enough to take more than six. And the jaggs… They couldn’t gallop fast enough to keep up with mechanized transport.

  JI watched Arthur and Martha tied into the back of a large scav truck. Weather beaten, rusted, and a mix of blue and white, the enclosed back of the truck fitted them fine. Both jaggs snorted and began trying to kick out the sides of the truck. Yelling, a scraggly man called Detter, the owner of the vehicle headed for the creatures.

  With a sigh, JI held him off by extending his arm and barring him from jumping up there. They might kill him. “I’ll handle this.”

  The jaggs didn’t think the truck suited them. The angry roll of eyes and flare of nostril, the bang as antlers were swept into the roof and hoofs beat the floor, said they were not happy. He settled them with a pat and murmured words, then jumped down.

  They kicked up a whole new fuss, putting dents in the truck ceiling.

  The scavs knew where New Hope was, even if they hadn’t dared go there. Two days max travelling time.

  “I’ll sit with them.”

  Detter grunted, shrugged. “Good. If you get trampled –”

  “I won’t.”

  Sitting on the edge, with the truck doors open, he waved Fern over. She stood surrounded by a gaggle of mechlings. One would think they liked her. He grinned at the sight as she headed for him and they trailed along behind.

  “You want to travel in the front of this, with Detter?” He gestured. “It might smell if they crap in the back, but I have no choice. I have to be here with them. If not, they will destroy the truck or hurt themselves.”

  “So, you babysit your jaggs.” Fern smiled, nudged her chin at her own ankle-dwelling creatures. “So long as these get to ride on the roof.”

  It was arranged quickly. He’d ride out the two days with the jaggs.

  That night he let them loose to graze and instead they wandered, annoyed the people they found, and poked them for treats.

  “Miscreants.” He shook his head and eyed Fern from beneath his brow.

  The mess of people here unsettled him. He’d caused this – made them take this journey to join up with an entirely different race of people who were their sworn enemies.

  But Fern, she was somehow his rock, his one stable foundation.

  And he’d barely known her for long. Fear settled into his stomach again, a fear of the unknown. Being organic had more minuses than he’d ever foreseen. If you grew too attached to something, someone, it gave you a weird sense of responsibility for them, a weird need to be with them and not lose them.

  “I feel so very lost tonight,” JI whispered.

  Fern didn’t quite understand what he’d said but squeezed over closer until they were beside each other. She took up his hand in her two and placed it in her lap. A measure of contentment breezed in. Was it a hindrance to like someone this much?

  “We should reach New Hope tomorrow, late. I will have to go ahead to ensure we don’t get shot at by Ryke’s people.”

  A convoy of scavs and grounders would be a surprise.

  “You want to stay there, with them?”

  “I don’t know. I want to see what Ryke has achieved. What if the landships could be halted and all mekkers could be assimilated? Like this.”

  He nodded at the dotted campfires and the people talking, as if scavs and grounders could be true friends, not merely forced allies due to the mekker threat.

  Embers floated upward, drifting. There were arguments and heated conversations, but no one tried to enslave or injure anyone else. There was laughter also.

  Physically there was little difference between scav and grounder except upbringing, costume, and a tendency for scavs to be fair-haired and lighter skinned.

  A shot rang out, and many people turned to look but it was soon confirmed as only a night hunter. A nearby scav told a grounder mother this, and she took it as the truth, with no questions asked, just kept nursing her child.

  “This seems a miracle,” Fern said, quietly.

  It was.

  How long would it last?

  He brought out the white crystal fragment and rolled between his fingers, looking at the facets.

  This was not natural, and he did not mean the stone.

  * * * * *

  ABANDONED MEKKER COMPLEX

  The judge shoved his hands into his pants pockets. The Aunt M mech had brought him here to this large empty room. Four of his soldiers waited a few paces back. After the interrogation of Aunt M, where the mech had spilled everything he needed to know, Tygorn had suggested a thorough survey of the complex be done, by this mech.

  Aunt M was currently the highest-level, functioning mech the judge possessed.

  “Have you found something? If not, perhaps we will have to attempt extracting your brain to use in the KI-mech after all?”

  Since both Tygorn and Aunt M had ruled that out as a good match, he was only saying it out of habit. Not that he thought he could scare a mech. Still, the mindfucks were an essential part of control and he needed the practice.

  “Let me demonstrate.” The mech crawled forward, extended a limb, and inserted the tip into an unseen cavity. Nothing appeared to happen. “I am waking up a very old system. It is connecting…”

  Connecting what?

  This was possibly the last opportunity.

  “What lies beyond?”

  “What you need. My friend, JI, has a brain that is as unlikely to suit the KI-mech as is mine. He would merely die, if it were removed from his skull. In there is, according to my deductions, the brain originally intended for your giant mech. Behold.”

  A line of intense blue light showed, ran up to the ceiling then took a right-angle turn…as if it delineated a doorway.

  The judge hissed in a breath. So exciting.

  This was his future.

  If the deduction was correct, then all they needed to do was to figure out how to fit this brain into his KI-mech. Aunt M had the right skills. So much knowledge packed into one mech. He was the perfect acquisition.

  “Don’t think this means my other plan has changed. You will still carry that out.”

  The line of light switched again and headed floorward. Definitely, this was a door.

  “Acknowledge my order.”

  There was a delicious pause, as if he had truly brought this mech to its knees, to an ag
onizing decision point. As if this betrayal troubled it.

  “Yes, Judge Ormrad, I shall do this. I will bring JI and Fern here.”

  “Good.” The judge smiled. “Open that door.”

  Chapter 23

  New Hope appeared on the horizon, a battered city by the sea, like Owler. Even from a distance JI could see changes. They’d halted their convoy on the edge of an escarpment. The same one he’d stood on with Gio and Ryke…and Aunt M, not so long ago. Yet it was also a lifetime ago, for he’d found Fern in the interim.

  The girl who’d tried to kill him, twice, that first day.

  The way down to New Hope had become a slightly worn road, instead of the random path they’d taken.

  No shiny towers or multitude of lights. There were no signs of construction. Instead rectangles of vibrant color showed where crops grew just outside the edge of the city, green things sprouting. The yellow heads swayed and reflected bands of sunlight shafting down from a sky crowded by storm clouds. A few slow vehicles were trundling about, though whether used for transport or crop maintenance he couldn’t tell.

  And there were people, dotted about the terrain outside the city, walking near the green fields, or riding beasts. Those might be jaggs, like his recalcitrant pair.

  A small caravan of foot travelers approached the city off to his right, and he wondered if those might be mekkers coming to be blessed. If so, they should hurry or risk the wrath of Aerthe. This would explain the storm.

  His party descended and drove toward the city only to be stopped outside by armed mekkers. Their weapons were not the mind-teachable long guns the scavs used. They were plainer metal colors – golden and silver and black, but as deadly. The city must have received supplies.

  He dismounted from the truck, and one of the sentries recognized him from his last visit. The man sent for Ryke or Badh, the brother.

  He must remember to call himself Osta here, as he did with everyone except for Fern and Aunt M. Even thinking about M made his stomach rebel. How neglectful and selfish he’d been, to let him go alone.

  JI swung wide the doors and led his jaggs out, before he walked forward and waited.