Survival Machines

by Ste Sharp

  That answered Delta-Six’s most anticipated question.

  Someone else had survived the Lutamek attack.

  Chapter 12

  John had been awake the whole time, watching and waiting. Even though he had enough energy to escape, he knew it was pointless. He was on an open truck pulled by a small electric engine, similar to the ones that had transported men and ammunition to and from the front line in John’s war, travelling through the centre of a huge town – there were no towers or great buildings like in London so he couldn’t call it a city – which hummed with life and activity. The train of open metal trucks full of mining materials and half-dead captives meandered towards the looming presence of the huge tower.

  John hardly noticed it though, now it was so close, his eyes on the metal shacks and stone buildings, which were far more advanced than the mud domes of Abzicrutia, and the inhabitants – this place was teeming with hundreds of alien soldiers of every species imaginable! John had thought the variety of warriors in the dome had been bizarre, but what he saw here was way beyond that: humanoids of every size brushed shoulders and knees with arthropods and insectoids, like the Brakari and Falen, who scuttled beside seemingly impossibly shaped multi-tentacled blobs, legless worms and bent-over trees. Mechanoid creatures flashed and beeped, some with their organic parts proudly on show behind glass covers, others pure metal as far as John could tell. Nothing flew – everything crawled, walked or ran – and it was hard for John to tell what was normal and who had been enhanced by the Synchronisers. At one point, the giant silhouette of a Lutamek stalked through a marketplace, and John felt his stomach drop. Knowing the level of their technology, John would have no chance of hiding from them.

  It was while his train cut through the market that John had a glimpse of what made the town work. He’d seen the farms where, if he trusted what Falen had told him, newly captured soldiers were put to work or eaten, but what made this place run – other than fear – was trade. Small transactions involved payment with tiny canisters of water and food cubes, while the biggest payments were made with weapons. John smiled when he worked it out – it was so obvious. Other than their life, what was the one thing every one of these thousands of soldiers had? Their weapon. Metal for making new weapons. Ammunition. Explosives.

  This was a martial society in the truest sense.

  John’s gun-arm twitched, and he felt grateful they hadn’t ripped it off, as they’d done with Falen’s weapon. He tried spinning a bullet again but couldn’t quite get it going. The ridges on the outside had deepened as well, which concerned him. Once again, John had no way to defend himself, and he had no idea what was happening to his body.

  The train screeched to a halt, jolting him.

  ‘End of the line!’ shouted a large, gorilla-like soldier with a white bony head. It pulled a captured warrior out of the first truck and threw them to the ground, then pointed to a ramp of soil which descended into a dark tunnel. ‘You’re diggers,’ Bonehead shouted. ‘Grab a pick and get moving, or I’ll take your head off!’ It tapped its belt and then the back of its neck.

  John watched the broken creatures crawl and squirm, carrying what they could, and saw the glint of metal on each of their necks. Funny how he didn’t have one, he thought, and reached round with his good hand.

  ‘Shit!’ he gasped as he felt the cold disc of metal protruding from his neck.

  His shoulders sagged.

  ‘If this doesn’t work,’ a metallic voice made John turn to see a huge, solid block approaching him, ‘you will end up in there, John Greene.’

  ‘Ten-ten?’ John asked and pushed back against the side of the truck.

  ‘The arena,’ said Ten-ten, pointing at a broad building on the other side of an open square. ‘It’s where they send the lucky ones to fight to the death.’ The Lutamek stared at John’s gun-arm. ‘But maybe you have the key to getting us all out of here?’

  *

  Olan tested the weight of the axe in his right hand, swung it round to loosen up his shoulder, then repeated the process with his left hand. The axe was heavier than his original weapon, which the Ascent had taken from him, but it felt well-balanced. He swung and spun the axe, with his eyes fixed on the metal door three strides from his face. The anticipation coursing through his body felt similar to a boat raid, just when the ships glided up to a riverbank. But instead of standing perched on the ship’s side, listening to his men vomiting and making their prayers to Odin and Thor, Olan was stuck in a metal box. All he heard was the pounding thump of blood through his ears and the bizarre yowls and screams of the alien crowd outside.

  They were waiting for him. They wanted to see him fight. They were desperate to see him die.

  Olan scratched a mark on his leather belt: seven times he had entered the arena since his capture. Any humans or Sorean who hadn’t been carted off for other uses had been brought here and thrown into the arena to fight in a melee against whatever wild creatures the Ascent had managed to cluster together. The first had been a free-for-all designed to show off the new captives and root out any weaklings. Confused and leaderless, the allies had fought in clumps and without purpose. Many, including Olan, tried to use the skills they had evolved, but others were simply outgunned by the vicious other-worldly beasts.

  Olan could still smell the giant, toothless worm which had consumed him whole. Swept into its stomach, Olan’s chest plate had given him a clear vision of his surroundings and, holding his breath, he’d had enough strength to cut through the stomach lining and muscular wall. Bursting free with his skin tingling from the stomach acids, Olan had never felt more alive! After twenty more deaths though, every creature in the arena had been trapped by an unseen force and the bout signalled complete.

  Since then, the survivors, including Olan, had endured day after day of deadly combat in the arena. All to raise the morale of the crowd of soldiers – the hundreds of warrior species, like the Lutamek, who had agreed to be part of the Ascent. They were the lucky ones, safe in their protected world. Or so Olan thought, until he fought against a species he recognised from the stands. Each individual’s position here was precarious. That, he realised, was why passions ran so high in the stands. Tomorrow, any spectator could be beside Olan, spilling their blood on the dusty floor.

  Olan sighed. Through the metal door, the crowd’s bellowing peaked with a roar, which signalled another fight ending, giving him less than a minute. He tapped his golden chest plate – despite their efforts and technology they hadn’t managed to get it off him – and pushed his helmet down tight. This was it. He cleared his mind, touched the hammer around his neck and breathed in deeply. The metal door slid back with a swish and Olan stepped out, eyes wide open, ready to face whatever or whoever the Ascent had prepared for him. Yesterday he’d killed a bone-headed Bensha, a long, lizard-like creature with acid spit and three stout creatures he had thought of as trolls.

  He strode forward purposefully, ready for action, but what he saw this time made him pause.

  The scarred floor of the arena held no aliens or trained robots. The other doors were open and there, equally confused, stood four humans.

  *

  John remained still while a graceful, long-limbed soldier solemnly removed his shackles. He tried to remember the soldier’s species – Ilanos maybe? Or maybe this soldier was from a different dome? When it turned its head, John saw the coin-sized silver disc on its neck and sighed.

  Was anyone free in this city?

  ‘This way,’ Ten-ten ordered and John hesitated before jumping out of the carriage.

  The last time they’d spoken, Ten-ten had explained how John’s gun-arm would eventually run out of ammunition – the bones of his arm and the metal of his gun – and stop working. Then Ten-ten, and the rest of his clan, had sold them out to the Ascent.

  A roar from the crowd in the distant arena made John jump and he looked straight at Ten-ten, who didn’t seem to register it.

  ‘Follow me,’ it said and strode away.
>
  John tried to calm his breathing and found his good hand caressing the tin soldier hanging around his neck. Ahead, the ground rose up to the base of the glass tower. He was finally here – in the centre of the disc where the tower seemed to grow out of the very bedrock itself, shooting into the sky like some enormous glass tree. John squinted to see inside the tower, but the dark glass only reflected the buildings and desert around it. John had heard Crossley talk of the tall glass buildings of New York – the skyscrapers – and imagined this was similar, although he struggled to picture a city full of them.

  ‘Security is tight here,’ Ten-ten said and pointed to a metal wall which ran in a ring around the rock platform, leaving an empty circle half a mile wide. ‘Access is only granted with full cooperation of every faction,’ Ten-ten continued. ‘So our time is limited.’

  That would be why nobody stood at the tower base, John thought. He could see the metal fence which ran around the tower had sections leading away into the desert, dividing each faction’s territory. John remembered what Falen had said about the various groups and wished he’d asked more. Would he be safe if he escaped into their territory?

  ‘So it’s a no-man’s-land then?’ John asked.

  ‘A peace has been issued here,’ Ten-ten’s deep tones sounded solemn, ‘although the Platae ignore it.’ He pointed to a dark area on the left-hand side of the tower base.

  The stain shimmered like dark water. John remembered the kite-like shapes in the salt moat around the ruined castle and the drawings of the battle, but couldn’t make sense of the smudge on the tower.

  He looked up at Ten-ten and said, ‘They’re the ones who defeated you.’

  ‘Yes.’

  As they walked nearer to the dome, John started to see definition in the dark shape. It was the entire surviving mass of Platae – foot-long flatworms – spitting their young at the glass wall of the tower, just as they had done to the castle and to the Lutamek. Back in the dome, these polyps had secreted acid and broken through stone and metal with ease, but here they were thwarted by a more advanced technology.

  ‘What’s that?’ John asked as a silver line vibrated down the side of the tower, cleaning the stain away.

  ‘A defence mechanism,’ Ten-ten replied. ‘Our studies show the surface remains untarnished, yet the Platae continue to reproduce and attack.’

  ‘Won’t they run out of soldiers?’ John asked, picturing the line after line of soldiers running through mud, being cut down by waves of machine-gun fire.

  ‘In twenty-six cycles they will have depleted their resources.’

  ‘Cycles?’

  ‘Each time an adult dies it produces a kernel, which needs nutrition and water to germinate a new body. It’s essentially the same adult with the same knowledge but, with their resources reduced, they can only repeat the process a number of times.’

  John nodded. A new group of aliens caught his attention. Eight broad, white-skulled, ape-like creatures carried two throne bearers on which two creatures relaxed: one a mass of fur and limbs; the other a long creature which reminded John of the stick insects he used to collect as a boy.

  ‘This is the one?’ the giant stick insect clicked.

  Once again, John felt grateful for the mushroom he’d eaten when he first arrived here and pictured Crossley’s smiling face. John straightened his back and concentrated. These had to be the Ascent leaders. Whatever he did here could have consequences for everyone in his captured army.

  ‘Affirmative,’ Ten-ten replied.

  ‘You are sure it can open the lock?’ the hairy beast asked.

  ‘Modification is required,’ Ten-ten replied and turned to John. ‘Show me your gun-arm.’

  John held his gun-arm back. He tried to spin a stub-nosed bullet but the heat wouldn’t build.

  ‘There is no point in resisting,’ Ten-ten said.

  ‘You can easily be manipulated,’ the insect clacked, sounding impatient.

  John breathed heavily. He was clearly trapped but felt he had to do something to escape – wasn’t that his duty?

  ‘Do it,’ the furred alien ordered.

  John’s gun-arm swung round and up to Ten-ten as though it had been pulled by a rope.

  ‘No!’ John shouted, but it was futile.

  A metal tube popped out of Ten-ten’s forearm and three drops of oil fell onto the gun-arm barrel. It warmed immediately and, held tight by the Lutamek’s immobilising field, John couldn’t shake it off. A tickling itch, like a thousand tiny spider’s feet, ran down and inside the gun-arm.

  Finally, the holding field dropped, allowing John to scratch the muzzle.

  ‘What’s happening?’ he asked, staring at his arm in horror.

  ‘The next stage,’ Ten-ten replied coldly.

  John yelped as what felt like a hundred tiny bites ran through the inside of his gun-arm. The internal mechanisms were changing. Where fingers and tendons had been merged with firing mechanisms and bullet chambers, these were swiftly reforming and moulding into something new.

  ‘What next stage?’ John asked when the pain subsided to a dull ache.

  ‘Everything changes,’ Ten-ten replied.

  ‘No, it doesn’t,’ John argued back but knew the comment was ridiculous given his circumstances. ‘It shouldn’t do anyway. A gun should just be a bloody gun.’

  ‘We were set on a path,’ the furred Ascent leader said.

  John looked to the immense glass tower.

  ‘And we have our destination.’

  ‘We are just tools in the grand scheme,’ the huge stick insect clacked.

  ‘And our bodies respond to external stimuli,’ Ten-ten said. ‘On arrival, we were each endowed with the genetic plasticity to take us on a new course. Yours is nearly complete, John.’

  ‘What?’ John replied.

  Images came to him: the electric blast from Delta-Six; the Synchronisers preparing the new species; the shock from the display board; the Tathon writhing as their bodies fought their changes.

  ‘Why can’t it just stay like this?’ John asked and felt a looseness in his arm.

  He stared at it as, almost imperceptibly, the stunted machine gun started to change: ridges grew deeper and the barrel shrank, the metal flowing up his arm.

  ‘Mutations have many advantages,’ Ten-ten said.

  ‘Or disadvantages,’ the insect clicked.

  ‘And although no mind is at work here,’ Ten-ten continued, ‘the potential can be seen in every change and, if required, ushered to a chosen destination.’

  ‘You did this?’ John raised his voice. ‘When you scanned my arm before you betrayed us, you… you screwed my arm up?’

  ‘No,’ Ten-ten replied. ‘Our brothers in the Ascent gave us requirements and your adaptation was the closest match, so you were preserved while I prepared–’

  ‘Enough!’ The insect screamed. ‘The doors are opening and our agreement won’t hold long. Get him to the lock.’

  ‘Agreed,’ Ten-ten replied and gestured for John to follow him through the door in the metal fence.

  John paused, caught between watching his hand in horror and the desire to know what was in the tower. Ten-ten’s force field gently nudged him along and he found himself following the giant robot. He tried to spin a new bullet but the chamber was in pieces now – one segment was on what felt like his palm and others were inside his fingers.

  Fingers?

  John turned his wrist to see four darkening lines running up the broadened muzzle like cracks. He tensed what felt like a thumb and the section split away.

  ‘You should find the new changes useful,’ Ten-ten said as they walked through the gates, guarded by two more broad, white-headed gorillas. ‘Now we require silence,’ Ten-ten said and gestured at the crowds of bizarre-looking alien soldiers congregated around numerous other gates in the metal fence.

  Their bizarre body types reminded him how the other domes had been filled with martial species from more distant regions of their shared galaxy. Float
ing blobs, metallic cuboids and large-eyed, fish-like creatures were all focussed on him and Ten-ten as they climbed the incline to the tower. John cast a look back and could see a crowd was forming inside the city as well.

  All eyes were on him.

  John’s cheeks reddened and he stared at his gun-arm again. It had stopped itching and looked more like a hand now. He stretched what felt like tendons and four fingers snapped free, just as his thumb had. It was like having his old hand back, he thought, and gave the shadow of a smile. It felt like a hand but was so much larger. It felt stronger too. And the mechanisms of the Lewis machine gun were still imbedded somewhere in his wrist and forearm.

  How on Earth did they expect him to open a lock with something that looked like a human version of a Lutamek hand?

  The ground levelled off and John saw their reflection, his tiny body next to Ten-ten’s hulk.

  ‘The lock,’ Ten-ten said and pointed at a silver ring set into the glass of the tower wall, a few feet off the ground.

  Ten-ten gestured for John to carry on alone.

  John gave his surroundings one last look then shuffled towards the tower, cradling his metal arm.

  How many people had made it this far? he wondered. Was he the first human? What would happen if he couldn’t open this ‘lock’? A cold shiver ran through him and he scanned the floor but couldn’t see any body parts or piles of dust.

  As he came within two strides of the dark glass, it cleared and John could see inside the tower with absolute clarity.

  ‘Shit,’ John said.

  Inside was another obelisk.

  *

  Olan took a step back. His opponents had paused as well. He hadn’t expected this. Usually he would have some half-crazed animal rushing at him or a wily alien soldier with a head full of battle rage. The first could be tired out given time, while the other was too full of resentment to fight naturally and would eventually make a mistake Olan could seize upon. But this time he knew each of the four men, standing sixty paces from each other. He had fought alongside them and he knew their strengths and weaknesses, just as they knew his. Bowman, Osayimwese, Steve Smith and a Chinese warrior, Rae. Like him, none of them had their original weapons, but that didn’t make them any less dangerous.