THE RED SUN arrives in a ship built from bones of ancient solar chelonians and no port dares refuse it entry. The Death of Endless Worlds burns footprints into the halls. Mere follows, never stepping in ash.
“You’ll have but a few seconds once inside,” Century told it while the eel-ship rode beside the Red Sun’s vessel. “If you’re caught again, nothing will save you.”
Since when has it been caught before?
Soundless, the Red Sun strides into the Courts of Tranquility. The smell of emptiness, the dark between the stars, clings to scarlet and black-scaled armor. Unease writhes through the courtiers, fermenting into panic.
“You dare?” The Gold Sun Lord steps down from the hover-throne and cuts through the skittering courtiers, armor brightening. “And you bring this thing with you?”
Mere spreads its hands in mock supplication from where it stands on the threshold matrix.
“You break every law by coming here,” says the Gold Sun.
“Except one.” The Red Sun extends a fist towards the pool. “I have a right to the dead.”
“No,” says the Gold Sun. “Not anymore.”
Gold Sun and Red Sun raise non-corporeal blades to each other in silent duel.
You should run, murmurs the threshold.
Chaos blossoms.
Mere dives into the pool. It knows every soul pebble, so it scoops a hundred seventeen into its abdomen pouch. The others are already rotted—celestial molecules broken down from the inside, wrapped in distended film, which the slightest disturbance will break and spill out only dust. It cannot save them all.
It knifes through the water and catches the wolflord’s soul last.
Mere senses the keepers’ watching, cold optics drifting in amniotic fluids behind the pool’s walls. Sudden anger sparks in Mere. It slams a hand into the tiled side. Cracks web around the impact. Again, Mere strikes. Its hand sinks through insulated glass and it snatches one of the keepers: an optic node attached to sensory cables.
Alarms ricochet among the keepers, but Mere holds tight. It bounds from the pool.
The eleven-souled sorcerer confronts it, wreathed in iridescent shadow. “Stand down, wraithling,” he says, thin lips curled mirthless.
Mere coils muscle and hydraulics in its legs and leaps, toe-claws bared. It cuts through the sorcerer’s shadow shields and ducks away from his grasp. It kicks the sorcerer in the chest with bone-shattering force. The sorcerer falls back.
Automated defense drones circle overhead. Exhilarated, Mere sprints towards the door matrix, letting the Red Sun’s wroth deflect its pursuers.
Good luck, murmurs the threshold, and Mere smiles.
This time, it runs through the upper halls of the Courts: past luxury holo suites and theaters, gardens and feast halls, over bridges that span crystalline waterfalls and floating glass spheres filled with lovers and voyeurs alike. It crosses into the industrial sectors, locks bypassed by Century’s nanite snakes, which slither through the walls as fast as it runs.
And then, once more, the spaceport. Mere sprints down the wide central platform towards freedom.
Four mammoth crustacean guards—crab-bodied, armored, spotted in hundreds of eyes—unwind from the walls and mesh themselves between Mere and the eel-ship. Mere springs up, spotting niches in armor, planes of body and joint it can use to climb and evade. It has no time to fight.
A fifth crustacean guard appears behind it and hammers a claw into it mid-air.
The blow shatters Mere’s arm and rips open its side. Its body is thrown halfway across the platform, ribs crushed. Mere curls in on itself to protect its belly and rolls. A sixth crustacean guard circles behind and seizes Mere in great pincers. It twists, hissing, a single breath between it and being decapitated through the midriff.
“Stand down.” The voice resounds with such weight and power, Mere mistakes it for one of the Sun Lords. The crustacean guard freezes. “Know my voice: for I am the Unmaker of Worlds.”
The others hesitate. Mere lifts its chin, orienting itself on the voice.
Century stands on the platform, wreathed in a film of ultraviolet light. It projects from her skin, her teeth, her voice.
“The wraith is mine.” Century extends a hand, commanding. “Give it to me, now, unharmed. Disobey my word and I shall rain destruction upon your people until there is naught by the trembling memory of pain in the heavens.”
Gently, the crustacean guard sets Mere down. The others back away, submissive. Century does not move.
Mere limps towards her, past her, and into the ship. She follows, but the crustacean guards do not. Mere collapses inside.
The eel-ship twists and streaks from the port, chased this time by droneships beholden to the Seven Suns: faceless pilots uprooted and loosed once more.
“We will lose them in subspace,” Century says, calm. “If not for long.”
Mere apologizes to the ship for spattering its blood on the floor as it cradles its side. It takes a slow breath, the crunch of bone rearranging in its torso and arm familiar. “You are a Sun Lord,” it says at last.
Century rolls her shoulders. “Once I was the Violet Sun. We took new bodies, it’s true, but they change, they weaken. Anything that lives can die.”
Mere strokes its undamaged hand along its abdomen; its cargo remains undamaged. It wonders what its soul might look like, compressed into a pebble beneath cold water. If it was born from the fractured pieces of the Principality’s enemies, what will its existence reflect in death? It is automatous, but it still more machine than organic, and there are no simple answers in the theologies or heresies it has skimmed.
It unfurls its broken fingers with its other hand and examines the keeper it stole. Inside the optic, thousands of compressed recordings tagged wraith_construct.
“Don’t,” Century says, but makes no move to stop it. “You’ll only hurt yourself, Mere.”
Mere downloads the recordings.
V.
A CRUSTACEAN GUARD drags Mere’s limp body from the surgical pods, where it was once more tested for pain tolerance (high) and fitted with a restraint collar beneath its throat-skin so it will not escape again (fourth time, the keepers say, disapproving).
“Why do you run?” the guard asks as Mere’s eyes open. “There is nowhere to go. Do you like being hurt?”
Mere hisses at the guard, always the one to find it. “Why do you stay?”
“There is no choice,” says the guard, quiet.
“I will make choice,” Mere says.
The wraith is put in stasis.
DOZENS OF NEAR identical recordings:
Mere fulfills its duty as executioner.
It is taken to a containment chamber of sterile walls and faceless technicians. Its memory is selectively culled so it no longer remembers the details of the ones it has killed.
Sometimes, the wraith fights. Dead technicians are easy to replace.
But even technology fails. Mere takes advantage of the blocks in the feeds over the pool and slices open its arm to write on its bones; the flesh glues together before the technicians focus the light instruments into its head.
(The keepers hum interest to each other: Why does the wraith care about the names of the dead? Where is the fault in its programming?)
The keepers cannot find the anomaly.
IT HAS NOT attempted to flee in two cycles, so it is given privileges and allowed to wander the cityskin. It seeks out the Arbiter’s consorts, confined in luxury and pain. Zarrow and Jhijen, the newest consorts who still keep hold of their names, welcome Mere. It basks in attention and conversation. Zarrow teaches it laughter. Jhijen invites desire; Mere can experience pleasure as much as pain. Mere could have picked from any number of genders, but it does not have an interest in the choices, so it remains neutral, comfortable with its pronouns. Jhijen and Zarrow always respect its choice, as it does theirs, when their genders change like the fluid motions of a dance.
(Mere thinks, the keepers note. It thinks of the co
nsorts as friend.)
There is no timestamp to show when Zarrow and Jhijen disappeared.
THE SHE BOUND in the pool looks like Zarrow.
“Who are you?” Mere whispers.
“…and thus the heavens are cleansed anew,” says the Arbiter.
Mere does not kill the she.
The keepers hastily feed a loop of crafted images into the broadcast, so the universe watching will never know the wraith’s hesitation. The Courts of Tranquility see what is expected; polite applause follows.
Obey, the keepers send to its processor.
Mere shakes its head, snips the fibrous chains, and lifts the she from the water. “It will not kill this one. The she has committed no crime.”
The she that looks like Zarrow brushes her fingers along its cheek. “I’ll remember you.”
The Arbiter’s eyes burn with fury. “The she is an insurgent who disobeys the Seven Suns.”
Mere laughs at the Arbiter. “So do I.”
The restraint collar activates and crumples Mere on the edge of the pool. The consorts lift the she’s shallow-breath body and carry her off; her true death will be private. Mere cannot stop it.
Mere hisses in pain as the Arbiter watches. It lifts its arm, shaking, and digs its knife-fingers into its throat. Blood and fluids drip into the pool as Mere cuts out the collar piece by piece.
The Arbiter backs away, a step shy of haste.
Mere’s body slides over the side, into the water. It floats there as its skin regrows and the crustacean guards come to drag it away.
All the Arbiter’s consorts are replaced and the wraith’s privileges are revoked. The keepers implant a block in its neural protocols that will never allow Mere to speak as an “I” again.
IN ITS STASIS chamber, Mere scrapes sharp fingers against the wall, which throbs and erases each mark; still Mere tries to carve the names of the dead, transcribe them from its raw bones before the keepers or the security drones stop it.
VI.
MERE CRUSHES THE remains of the keeper’s optic and stands, shivering. There are many, many more files. It deletes them.
It looks at Century.
Century rubs beneath her quicksilver eyes. “When I gave you to the Blue Sun Lord, a final gift to seal our peace treaty, I couldn’t take you back.” She turns away. “The wolflord was working on a way to unbind you. I refused. I do not wish to see war again.”
Mere wipes the keeper’s fluids from its hands. Bones have mended and the eel-ship has washed away the blood on the floor. “How soon before we are found?”
She shrugs. “We will find Rebirth first. We will finish this.”
AFTER IT ASKS and receives permission from the ship, Mere etches all the names of the dead into the eel’s rib bones. The ship promises to remember them.
Mere murmurs its thanks.
And you? the ship asks. What would you like to be remembered as?
Mere hesitates. Of the possibilities it might choose from, it does not want to be: executioner, killer, weapon. But what else does it deserve?
“A wraith.”
Mere does not know what else it should say.
VII.
LI SIN (REVOLUTIONARY): a neutrois poet whose work is known for biting wit, political critique, and transcendent beauty. No records can be found on Li Sin’s birthplace or their death. The poet stopped writing and disappeared after challenging the Gray Sun Lord in the Year of Unpraised Night 2984; the Gray Sun slumbers in the Arora Nebula, undisturbed and unresponsive since.
THE SHIP DROPS from subspace over planetary designation Z1-479-X: Rebirth.
Mere peers through the ship’s gills at the blue-green-white sphere. It is devoid of cityskin; no metal-glass veins or infrastructure rising to the sky. Mere has never seen a world like this.
“I never thought I would see it again,” Century says. Her voice catches like skin on a metal burr. “Come.”
Mere says goodbye to the ship.
Farewell, friend, says the eel-ship.
They take a shuttle with two life-pods down to the surface.
KITSHAN ZU (WARSHIP PILOT): Zu’s ship, Forever Brightness, Burning Dark, was killed in battle and disconnected its pilot prior to its destruction. Zu was comatose in an Olinara V field hospital until his disappearance following the visitation of the Violet Sun a cycle later. The ex-pilot’s whereabouts and fate are unknown.
THE NIGHT SKY froths with clouds. Mere marvels at the prickly moss webbing the stony ground and the kiss of damp air against its body. This world is unshaped and wild, virile with flora and fauna it does not recognize from the Principality’s records. It has never seen so much uncultivated wilderness, even in holos. Field and forest pass, and still the map leads Century forward.
They landed in a dry canyon and followed the she’s implanted map.
They find a river, unsanctified and alive, bubbling past without notice. Mere stands transfixed. It wants to touch the water’s delicate skin, but does not feel worthy.
This world cannot know its presence long. Mere yearns to stay, to wander the wonders it has only glimpsed on this planet. But it is a taint, a cultured, weaponized stain from the Principality, and it does not belong. It will take the shuttle and let the Arbiter chase it to the universe’s birthing place, so long as no harm comes to this world or any other.
“Here,” Century calls. In a clearing ringed in living walls of flowers, Century stands motionless in raw, rich soil. “Can you feel it?”
Mere shuts its eyes and breathes in. Its skin and circuitry hum with power. “What is it?”
“Life. Potential.” A sigh. “The world welcomes us all. I remember…I remember. I was born here. That is how I know it; why it haunts my bones.”
Mere tilts its head. “What now?”
“Give the ones we carry rest. Perhaps they too will be reborn. Our part is done.”
Mere slits its abdomen pouch and lets the pebbled souls fall loose into the ground. The earth shifts and closes gently over each one.
Energy it cannot name loops through Mere—the world’s fingers caressing its mind.
BE WELL.
Wordless, an impression sweeps through Mere: the dawn kissing the earth, the souls wrapped in soil released from their pebbled shells crafted by the pool. When the sun rises, all will be complete. The dead will find their afterlives or their rebirth.
Century removes her armor piece by piece, and runs her fingers along her scarred scalp. “Will you kill me now, wraith? That is your purpose. It is…what I deserve.”
Mere has never been given choice. It has seen the wolflord to rest. What further purpose must it serve?
It tallies what it would do if freed: seek out the funerary holo of Li Sin and pay homage; sip wine on a far-flung world where identity is unnecessary; learn to dance without downloading precise diagrams of movement; travel the stars; write poems of its own; see wonders; live. And it would remember.
Mere retracts its knife-tips into fingerbones. “You gave it its freedom. It returns the grace. Do as you will.”
Century dips her chin, military acknowledgement. “Gratitude, Mere.”
Mere lifts its head, elated. If it can show mercy, it can do so much more.
Century smiles at Mere. “I will sleep, as I’ve not done in so long. When I wake…we’ll see. Farewell.”
“Farewell,” Mere says to its maker, and lopes towards the ship.
It is free.
IN THE CANYON gullet, the repulsors of dropships thrum. Mere slows, dry earth cracking beneath its feet. The shuttle is visible at the end of the ravine, caked in reentry burns and wind-blown dust.
The air brings the sharp scent of bloodied and oiled mechanics. Mere’s sensors link with other semi-biologicals.
The mercury-veined butchers, stained silver and red, squat in single file rank along the canyon’s lip, sores popped from necrotic skin. Beneath the light-bent holoprojectors, the butchers’ forms are true: fragmented drones from the Gold Sun and the Blue Sun, vessels progr
ammed with tireless efficiency.
The Sun Lords have found Mere.
But these are no hollowed shells. Mere sees the frightened eyes of armor-bound clones (of the Arbiter’s consorts, as they were before they were exulted—Zarrow is there, and so is Jhijen), unmasked behind targeting arrays. It knows each one of them, has shared memory and dreams with them. Once (so long ago) it dared think of them as friend.
Mere stands frozen between the butcher-clones and Century, the wolflord, and all the seeded. In a microsecond, realization:
—no longer must Mere kill—
—the seeded need but an hour more, until the sun rises and wakens new life—
—weaponized bones, detonator heart, poison blood: Mere can unmake all the Sun Lords’ drones, dismantle and slaughter until all that remains is gore-soaked earth; christen the seeded with the promise of eternal war, mark Rebirth for a fate shared by Olinara V—
—Mere wants to live—
The drones have come only for Mere, the Blue Sun’s disobedient trinket. Once the mission is compete, this world will be a forgotten sanctuary once more.
Mere steps forward as the butcher-drones approach. It will fight them, but not to win. The Suns will witness its desperation and be satisfied with its death. It will not be brought back to the Courts of Tranquility. It will remember.
This is its chosen purpose and its choice: to save the ones it can.
The butcher-drones attack. Mere lets them come.
It composes a final a poem, and though the last wolflord will never know, Mere dedicates the words to Kitshan.
Your eyes, grace-touched / forever refuge
We will live together
Tomorrow / when we see the sun.
WROUGHT-IRON FENCES loop around the gardens: six deep, the outer three progressively higher, more elaborate, and with more spikes atop, while the inner three create a mirror effect. Say you make it over all six fences without impaling yourself or falling or getting trapped between iron bars that suddenly constrict or twist or move. Say you avoid the fourth fence, the electric one, or the second one with the poisoned varnish, or the sixth one with a taste for blood.
So You Want to be a Robot and Other Stories Page 3