Survival Machines

by Ste Sharp

  ‘Who will lead us now?’ he whispered.

  ‘Hell if I know,’ Crossley replied.

  ‘Who’s left to lead anyway?’ Crossley grumbled. ‘The whole thing’s fucked up.’

  They kept their voices low.

  ‘There’s no army left,’ Crossley continued. ‘What were we going to do anyway?’

  John tried to think of an answer.

  ‘I would rather die breaking free,’ Yarcha said, ‘than remain a slave.’

  Crossley closed his eyes, apparently out of energy.

  ‘We would have carried on fighting,’ John eventually said.

  ‘And they would have blown all our heads off,’ Crossley replied. ‘We’re just lucky they need some of us to dig out their goddam rocks.’

  John pictured Yam-mit’s bubble ability and wondered if that could be used to defend against the pin technology, then remembered the Korax had been killed by the lava Scarpinelloss, in the wall. Did they still have hope? he thought, remembering Yam-mit’s faith in his allies.

  ‘They have pins too,’ John said, gesturing at the guards.

  ‘Yep,’ Crossley said, sitting up. ‘Which means they must work on a different frequency or–’

  ‘Look,’ Yarcha said and nodded at silhouettes stumbling into the chamber from the main entrance.

  ‘We’ve already got new recruits,’ Crossley said. ‘So whatever we’re digging for must be pretty high up on the Ascent’s list of priorities.’

  ‘Like the tower,’ John said, flexing his robotic hand, which still tingled with the memory of the explosion.

  ‘Nothing trumps that,’ Crossley said. ‘From what you told me, every faction’s trying to get in there, but nobody’s tunnelling in.’

  John watched the newcomers as they entered the light of the long chamber. ‘No humans or–’ he stopped when one figure caught his eye.

  It was tall, with long, thin arms and limped on four grasshopper-like legs. Only when she came into the full light of a nearby lamp did John recognise her and feel his spirits lift.

  Falen.

  *

  Olan faced the metal doors once more, touched the hammer hanging around his neck and cleared his thoughts. He’d already scratched a line into his belt and tried not to think about the previous nine fights. They were a series of blurs punctuated by vivid islands of pain and anger. He had killed for no purpose other than to survive and now, looking at the weapon he’d been given, he wondered if this would be his last battle. He still had his chest plate, he thought and gave it a reassuring tap as he would a nervous comrade.

  ‘One more time then,’ he said to himself as the roar of the crowd outside raised a notch and the door slid open.

  Olan swung the lump of bludgeoning metal up onto his shoulder and strode into the light, sounds and smells of the arena. He squinted and moved with irregular steps to avoid the flame balls he’d been showered with at the beginning of the last bout. The fact they’d let his opponent out in advance had suggested the Ascent still wanted to punish him for his escape attempt.

  Olan scoured the arena for information: metal fences had been constructed in a formation he hadn’t seen before and the opposite doors remained closed. To his right he saw Osayimwese, with Steve Smith a little further round and Bowman beyond him. Their weapons were equally basic.

  ‘Looks like we’re being teamed up!’ Smith shouted.

  ‘Maybe,’ Olan said with a shrug.

  They never knew what lay ahead in each fight – part of the entertainment apparently – but this was new. No weapons on the floor.

  Smith jogged over and, reflected in his mask, Olan saw his own face for the first time in days.

  ‘Who d’ya think we’re fighting?’ Smith asked.

  Olan shrugged as a low rumble from the other end of the arena signalled the opening of the doors. Out came two rows of humanoid silhouettes, arms raised to shield their eyes.

  ‘Are they human?’ Smith asked.

  ‘Yes,’ Olan said with a grimace. ‘They want us to exterminate each other… to weaken us until there are none of us left.’ He turned to the crowd. ‘Have you no other use for us?’ he bellowed.

  Some of the crowd shouted back alternatives but Olan ignored their insults. He squinted at the new soldiers, looking for any he recognised – most were human, some were Sorean. There was no point in trying to team up with them. The guards wouldn’t allow it, so they’d have to focus on the most dangerous first.

  ‘Gal-qadan!’ Olan said, spotting the Mongol horseman.

  Bowman and Osayimwese joined them and started picking out other soldiers they recognised.

  ‘They left our old camp before we did,’ Bowman said. ‘I thought they’d been destroyed before we were captured.’

  ‘Where is Peronicus-Rax?’ Osayimwese asked. ‘And the two brothers… Pod and Das?’

  ‘No idea,’ Olan said, still focussed on the arena set-up.

  Something about the layout irked him and he couldn’t tell why.

  ‘Good,’ Bowman said. ‘I’d rather take these guys on any day.’

  ‘I vote we focus on the right wing first then–’ Smith was cut off by a new rumbling sound.

  A strip of land in the centre of the maze of palisades between the two sets of fighters shook and collapsed on one flank. A dark line five paces wide cracked open and the ground descended. Seconds later, in a cloud of white dust, a herd of wild-eyed tocka rushed up the ramp, out of the darkness and into the centre of the arena.

  ‘What the hell?’ Smith mumbled and stepped back.

  ‘Are we supposed to fight them too?’ Bowman asked.

  Olan shrugged.

  Who knew what the vindictive Ascent overlords expected of them? Olan had thought of them like his gods – wielding great power and choosing who should live or die – but now he knew they were just weak mortals. The Ascent were trapped here, like everyone else, and fought for what power was available. They’d become big fish in a little pond, nothing more.

  ‘I think the only thing we’re required to do,’ Osayimwese said, ‘is die.’

  ‘Not today,’ Bowman replied.

  The tocka calmed their pace and circled the centre of the arena, crossing the dusty ground where the ramp had locked back to form a seamless floor.

  ‘They’re carrying something,’ Osayimwese said.

  ‘Weapons,’ Bowman said and took a step forward, then looked at Olan like he was their leader. ‘Come on! We have to get there first or we’ll be totally outgunned!’

  Olan took a moment to scan the crowd for any of the Ascent elite. No Stur-Morches or Rassums present as far as he could see. No Lutamek either, but they had rarely been seen these past few days.

  ‘Let’s get the weapons,’ Olan said, ‘but watch out for mines and other traps.’

  No sooner had the small party advanced than a hole appeared in the arena floor.

  ‘That was close!’ Bowman said, sidestepping the dark pit that had nearly swallowed him.

  ‘This is different to before,’ Osayimwese said. ‘Why don’t they just let us fight?’

  A distant crackle made Olan turn and raise his bare shield arm, but nothing appeared.

  A new voice cracked into life, creaking like a falling tree. ‘Now we witness a great moment from the human army’s past,’ the voice boomed across the arena through unseen speakers, and the crowd jeered. ‘We witness the taming of the tocka.’

  Olan winced. He had no idea how these horses had been tamed – he had only heard rumours spread by Crossley and the odd mention from Dakaniha that Kastor, the Spartan, had been the soldier to tame them, but he was dead, so what could they do?

  As they neared, Olan caught the metallic glint of various weapons strapped to the backs of the tocka, whose eyes remained wide with panic. Wet marks on their back showed why. Olan recognised the barbed cuts of the whip weapon the Bensha guards liked to use. They’d literally been whipped up into a frenzy.

  The crowd’s roar picked up as Olan peered over the neares
t palisade to watch a Sorean from Gal-qadan’s side leap on the back of a tocka. Hanging on for dear life, rather than subduing the animal, the Sorean desperately fiddled with a buckle, trying to release the weapon.

  ‘Another one’s up!’ Bowman shouted.

  ‘We’ve got to get in there,’ Smith said.

  ‘Be my guest,’ Olan replied.

  The last thing he wanted to do was run into a wild pack of carnivorous horses and jump on a back! Olan hadn’t been part of Gal-qadan’s army but had spent time with the tocka and knew their normal behaviour, and something about them now reminded Olan of what he had seen when they’d saved the soldiers from the Frarex. Whether it was his chest plate working for him, he didn’t know, but he recognised the distant look in the tocka’s eyes.

  ‘They can’t see us,’ he said, turning to the nearest soldiers, shouting to them. ‘The tocka can’t see us! They’re under a Frarex spell.’

  Nobody replied.

  Olan didn’t have time to explain and shook his head. ‘We have to use everything we have to get the tocka to calm down and stop… every power available to us.’

  Osayimwese looked away. Olan was well aware the Oyo warrior had no adaptation, as Li had called their powers, but what about the others? Bowman had his sight, but Steve Smith?

  ‘Smith,’ Olan called over, ‘if you’ve had any changes since we found you in the ship, now’s the time to tell us.’

  The shiny screen of Smith’s helmet gave Olan no idea of emotion – only a warped version of his own concerned face.

  Smith shook his head and said, ‘The Lutamek told me those changes only happened to those who travelled through the dome cap… something to do with the Synchronisers?’

  ‘Right,’ Olan replied and took a lungful of air. ‘Then we’d better get on with it.’

  Olan pictured the monstrous Brakari he had fought with his axe, the huge, dead puppets he had leaped off to cut the puppet strings from Belsang. This would be no worse, he told himself.

  ‘With me!’ he shouted, as he had done to his men on countless raids, and jogged to the last metal palisade next to the central oval where the tocka thundered by.

  Gal-qadan’s men were holed up on the other side, but Olan only had eyes for the tocka.

  ‘They slow on the turn,’ Olan said and ran out into the open.

  The crowd cheered as he opened his arms and ran with the tocka, ready to jump and grab one around the neck. But these beasts were not docile pack animals and no sooner had Olan made his intentions clear than two tocka separated from the wild herd and barged him to the ground, to the obvious pleasure of the crowd.

  Olan rolled to a stop and scrambled back as two new shapes bore down on him. These tocka looked wild – their teeth bared and front hoof claws unsheathed. Olan raised the lump of metal to defend himself as they reared up, then heard a shout.

  ‘No!’

  And the tocka skidded to a halt.

  The tocka remained precariously balanced above Olan and the crowd had gone silent. Had someone stopped time? he thought, watching as the tocka’s eyes rolled up and closed. Their muscles relaxed and Olan rolled away before the pair collapsed on him.

  The crowd burst back into life with a wild roar and Olan turned to Osayimwese, who leaned over with a hand on each tocka. As he pulled back, a crackle of blue energy rippled across his palms.

  ‘How?’ Olan asked and Osayimwese replied with a shake of the head.

  ‘Can you do that on the others?’ Bowman asked and Osayimwese shrugged.

  Olan got to his feet as Smith and Bowman unstrapped the weapons from the sleeping tocka.

  Osayimwese stood dumbstruck, staring at his hands.

  ‘This looks good,’ Bowman said, holding a black crossbow with a string of green light.

  He pulled the string back, turned and fired towards Gal-qadan’s soldiers.

  Nothing happened.

  Olan could see that some Sorean and Gal-qadan himself also had weapons and were struggling. Was there someone else they were supposed to fight? Olan wondered.

  ‘What’s that guard doing?’ Osayimwese asked, coming out of his trance.

  On the other side of the arena, at the midpoint, a guard had pulled a cloth of camouflage down to reveal an entrance Olan hadn’t seen before. The Ascent had sent various enemies through every combination of gateways, so there was no way to predict who was coming out, yet this suggested something new.

  ‘And now,’ the voice on the speaker boomed back into life, ‘we witness the humans’ first contact with a new species.’

  The crowd gave a half-hearted cheer as the tocka slowed their circle of panic and the two parties of soldiers scrambled to the nearest lines of metal fences, still fiddling with their weapons. The door opened and two large metal balls rolled out.

  ‘Oh shit,’ Smith said.

  The crowd were silent for a long second, as though processing what they could see, then exploded into a wild frenzy of sound. The crowd fired their weapons, lasers tore colourful lines in the air, metallic gunfire erupted and the beating of shields echoed around the arena.

  Olan felt the muscles in his back tighten.

  ‘For their first training mission,’ the voice boomed, ‘these young Lutamek will take the place of their forefathers.’

  The two Lutamek eggs unravelled like spooled snakes.

  Olan looked to his comrades. ‘We’d better get these weapons working right now!’

  *

  ‘We find ourselves in a new prison, John Greene,’ Falen said.

  ‘Yes,’ John replied, sitting beside the tall, insectoid Drauw, the pair of them leaning against the cave wall. ‘Only this time I get the feeling it’ll be our last.’

  ‘Maybe,’ Falen replied. ‘And maybe this whole world is a prison?’

  John looked at her. The light was better here than in the pit, so he could take in the bizarre spiral markings which covered her head while they talked about the lock and how Ten-ten had adapted John’s hand.

  ‘We are both failures,’ Falen said with a sigh. ‘Rejected.’

  There was so much John wanted to ask her – about her time in the dome, about this world and about life beyond – but he had something to tell her first.

  ‘I met one of your allies,’ he said and drew a disc and three dots in the sand of the cave floor. ‘His name was Yam-mit. A Korax.’

  John remained fixed on Falen but, as ever, couldn’t read any emotions.

  ‘Is the Korax here?’ she asked, calmly.

  ‘He was killed in the uprising,’ John replied, picturing the rock wall Yam-mit had been entombed in alongside Rar-kin and Samas.

  ‘That is a shame,’ Falen said.

  ‘Did you ever meet one?’ John asked, feeling his spirits lift. ‘Yam-mit said he came from an age when your species communicated but were unable to send images.’

  ‘Yes, I come from a later time,’ Falen replied, ‘when our trading alliance had matured.’

  John thought for a bit before asking, ‘What about the third species? Who were they?’

  ‘They–’

  ‘Silence!’ A Bensha guard shouted. ‘Or we will reopen the games.’ He growled and gave a gravelly chuckle.

  John waited in silence, letting the guards wander away, before whispering to Falen again.

  ‘If we don’t escape soon we will die,’ he whispered. ‘But the pins,’ he pointed to Crossley, who was curled up asleep, ‘give the guards power over us.’

  Falen’s head cocked to one side, reminding John of a dog he used to see on his delivery rounds. She turned her dark head to John, scanning him from head to toe.

  ‘This new leg of yours,’ she said.

  ‘Yeah,’ John said, pulling his trouser down to cover the metal glint.

  ‘Lutamek technology?’

  ‘Yes, it talks to my nerves through my stump apparently,’ John said and wiggled his foot.

  ‘And the Lutamek oil is still present in your arm?’ she asked.

  ‘Yeah, I can s
ee it in the joints,’ John replied. ‘Why?’

  ‘Sometimes,’ Falen replied, ‘the greatest enemy is ourselves… and that might be the one lesson our Lutamek friends haven’t learned yet.’

  Chapter 17

  Isao drank pink liquid from a metal tube and tried not to think what it was made from.

  ‘It contains everything your body requires,’ a Lutamek had said when it had handed it to him.

  It tasted like meat and berries, Isao thought, trying to work out why he’d never seen that particular Lutamek before.

  Isao sat cross-legged on the floor and studied his prison. From what he had been able to see when his group of captives had been transported in, he was in the centre of the Lutamek encampment, which sat inside the Ascent city. He was caged alongside four or five other unfortunate souls, in a building constructed from several starships, like the ones they had found outside their dome, and which was a hive of activity.

  Some of the hibernation pods were still active by the look of it, but most had been ripped out and replaced with metal boxes of varying sizes covered with glowing panels and blinking lights. Lutamek and tall, thin, insectoid aliens Isao hadn’t seen before rushed around, carrying rocks and vials of liquid.

  ‘No, that depth has already been tested,’ a Lutamek said to an insectoid. ‘Label it and file it.’

  What were they studying? Isao let his eyes slip into the shadow world, hoping it wouldn’t set off any alarms, and saw energy gleaming from the rocks. It was like nothing he had seen before: they sparkled with hypnotic waves, which ebbed and flowed erratically.

  ‘Is that why they brought you here?’ a whisper made Isao turn to his neighbour.

  ‘What?’ Isao replied, pulling his eyes out of the shadow world.

  ‘Your ability?’

  ‘How did you know?’ Isao asked and shook his head.

  Before setting his eyes back to normal Isao saw a green diamond in the alien’s chest. The creature looked like any of the bizarre bipeds this world was littered with – two eyes in a round head and a thickset body dressed in lightweight body armour – only this one had an array of tiny antennae scattered across its otherwise bald scalp.