The Gardener of Man: Artilect War Book Two

by A. W. Cross

  He looked older than the last time I’d seen him, and why wouldn’t he? His long hair had been shorn, and coarse silver hairs mixed with the black at his temples, even though he was only in his late twenties. Faint lines etched his forehead and around his mouth, but his eyes were the same, wide and searching. Just not for me.

  “Cindra. I— When Luke told me—I didn’t believe it. I’d thought he’d finally gone mad, talking about how you and his daughter had returned. He’d never mentioned having a daughter before.” His arms hung at his sides. I’d expected him to smile, to embrace me, if not as a lover then at least as a friend. As family.

  “Can we talk?”

  “What? Yes, of course.” He pulled his load over to the side of the path and leaned against a large chunk of rubble. He wouldn’t look at me.

  “How have you been? I heard you got married, that you have two little girls.”

  He nodded, his eyes and fingers on the fraying hem of his coat.

  “And Grandmother…I heard she passed.”

  He nodded again, his gaze now fixed on the ground by my feet.

  “Do you want me to go? I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have—”

  “No. Please don’t,” he said, propelling himself off the debris and grabbing my hand. “Don’t go.”

  “Will you at least look at me, then?”

  And at last, he did. “I’m sorry, it’s just so—”

  “I know. It’s strange for me too.”

  “What happened, Cindra? Where have you been? If you were alive, why didn’t you come back?”

  “It’s a long story. I’ll tell you once you tell me what happened. I’m sorry, Asche, I need to know. How did she die? In the war? Or…after?” I hoped it was during the war, saving people from a burning building or something. The thought of her getting devoured by the silver rain, or attacked by another of our people, or starving to death was too much to bear.

  His smile was both fond and sad. “She died in bed, actually. In her sleep. After the war started, I mean properly started, your grandmother and I went into the bomb shelter. Do you remember? That huge one the government built on our land and had to give us the rights to?”

  “Yes. It was big enough to keep everyone safe.”

  “It would’ve been, if everyone had come with us. But they didn’t. Many people refused. They said what was happening was the natural course of things, and if we were meant to survive, we would. I think the truth was that they didn’t want to survive. Some days, I can’t blame them. Perhaps I’d have felt differently if I’d know what was going to happen afterward. But I still held out hope that you were alive, and I wanted to take care of your grandmother for you. Well, let her take care of me, I guess.” The corner of his mouth twisted wryly when I laughed.

  “That sounds about right.”

  “We were in the shelter for a month when our supplies began to get low and your grandmother worried that you were looking for us. There was never a doubt in her mind that you’d survived. And as always, she was right. Every day, as soon as the sky lightened enough to see, she would sit on her porch, waiting for you. She helped the other survivors, what few there were by then, as much as she could, but one eye was always on the road, watching. Then one day, she didn’t wake up.”

  My heart fluttered against my ribcage, like a bird trying to break free.

  “So I took over her post. Every day for a year. And then…I realized you were probably dead. I thought you would’ve come back to us if you’d survived.”

  “I wanted to, Asche, believe me. But it wasn’t that simple.”

  “I never thought it would be simple. I just thought…I thought I knew the person you were and—”

  “I was asleep, Asche.”

  He frowned and pulled back, letting go of my hand. “What do you mean asleep?”

  “We—the Pantheon Modern cyborgs, myself and the others in my program—were put to sleep when the war started. There was a code in our programming. We were asleep for five years. I woke up only weeks ago.”

  He stared at me, disbelief clear on his face. I didn’t blame him.

  “Look at me, Asche. Do I look any different to you? After a war and five years of survival?”

  He leaned closer and searched my face for the truth. “You haven’t aged…but you are different. I mean, I guess you would be, wouldn’t you?”

  “If I’d been awake, Asche, I would’ve come home. I would’ve found a way. I’m the same person I was.” His breath warmed my lips, and I tilted my face up to him. “I’m still the same person, Asche,” I repeated. “I still—”

  “I’m married,” he blurted and stepped away from me.

  “I know. I just… Time hasn’t passed for me the way it has for you. I’m sorry.”

  We stood in awkward silence. He fiddled with his hem again.

  “Do…do you have any special powers? How are you different?”

  “I can…diagnose illness. And injuries.”

  He smiled at this. “That sounds right up your street.” He hesitated, and his smile fell. “We could’ve used you during…everything.” The awkwardness returned.

  I cast about for something to say, something that would keep him with me just a little longer. “So, who did you marry?”

  “Do you remember Gaia? We have two little girls.”

  “Gaia? You mean from our class at school? Asche, she was only about four feet tall.”

  “Yeah, well, she makes up for it with pure will.” He shook his head in admiration. “You should’ve seen her after the war. She teamed up with your grandmother, treating the sick, hunting, gathering food…anything to help keep people alive. She did what—”

  “What I should’ve done.”

  “Cindra—”

  “No, I’m sorry. It’s…it’s a lot—” My grandmother, the strongest person I’d ever known, dying in her sleep. It was the best death I could’ve hoped for her, but it seemed so mundane, so unlike the person she’d been in life. I’d have accepted it better if she’d died throwing herself in front of a falling bomb, shielding a group of children with her wiry body. Then, at least, my last image of her could’ve been as I remembered her in life: her feet rooted to the ground, her hands planted defiantly on her hips, her face impassive in the blossom of fire that engulfed her. Not alone, unaware in the dark, her mouth slack, her thin body clad in a tattered old nightgown, no awareness of her passing, no chance to fight back.

  And Asche, the man I would’ve married, looked at me as he might a distant memory, and a not altogether pleasant one.

  It was too much.

  “I have to go. I’m sorry, Asche, I shouldn’t have come. I’m happy for you, truly. It’s just…I can’t—”

  Before I turned away, I caught the look on his face. Relief.

  The bird in my chest burst free.

  I remembered then how the story of the woman who’d come back from the dead had ended. People had been afraid of her, her lover most of all. One night, while she was sleeping in her lover’s arms, he’d cut out her heart and thrown it into the river to be devoured by the fish, making sure she was truly dead to him, once and for all.

  You may be wondering about some of the things you now know. For example, can a human truly love a robot? Or is it merely lust or the infatuation we feel for an object we highly prize? What if you were a cyborg, straddling the line between human and machine? How would you feel about it then?

  —Cindra, Letter to Omega

  There was a knoll about half a mile away from the compound, a gentle hill that in another lifetime would’ve been a perfect spot to watch the sun rise. The dried grass and dead wood crowning it was scorched, a blackened mass of ash and scuff marks.

  I’m surprised the fire didn’t spread, given how dry the air is.

  When Cindra had asked me to be a passenger inside her, to give her strength as she talked to Asche, I’d walked out of the compound. I’d seen the rise in the distance and recognized the view once I’d reached the top. The last time I’d see
n it, I’d been in Adrian, gasping for breath as he and Ros burned themselves alive. Two wrought iron crosses studded the ground where they’d died, and just beyond rested a large fallen log, which I’d used as a bench.

  As I pulled back from Cindra, my throat aching with her grief, I crumbled some of the blackened grass between my fingers.

  I thought I would have something to say to you. I’m sorry about what happened, about everything. I wish I could’ve known you, that things had gone the way they were supposed to.

  Whatever that was. I wasn’t so sure anymore.

  “I know you’re there. You may as well stop cowering behind that deadfall, and show yourself.”

  He sidestepped to where I could see him. “I wasn’t cowering, I was spying.”

  “You’ve been spying on me for a long time.”

  “Even longer than you know.”

  He came closer, and I finally got my first view of the man who’d been shadowing my every step. Beyond being tall and broad, he was like a reverse image of Tor, the dark, grave beauty replaced by a golden ebullience. I couldn’t tell what color his eyes and hair were; they seemed to shift even as I watched.

  The lack of sunlight is messing with my sight.

  I closed my eyes for a few seconds, and when I opened them, my vision had settled.

  His face was stronger, more rugged than Tor’s, and his full mouth looked much more prone to smiling. His eyes, indistinguishable just moments before, were a rich, familiar green, the left iris fragmented by an odd amber color that matched my hair. His own was a deep shadowed gold that tumbled over his forehead.

  He propped one hand on his hip. “Would you like me to do a spin?” he asked. “Or a slow turn? That way you can see everything.” He grinned.

  “I’ve seen enough. You’re Fane, aren’t you?”

  His grin grew wider, and he bowed, a fluid, graceful gesture.

  “Why have been following me?

  “My people have been watching your people, and I’ve been watching you. We think we may have the same interests.”

  “Really? Like what?”

  “Staying alive.”

  “What are you? I know you’re not human. You’re a cyborg, aren’t you? You must be if I can see your thoughts.” As strange as they are.

  “In a manner of speaking, though not the same as you. I’ve had certain enhancements.”

  “Are there more of you? Another group of cyborgs, like us?”

  He shook his head. “I am the only one.”

  “Your people are Cosmists.”

  “Ah. Yes, well, before the war they called themselves Cosmists. I’m not too sure what they would call themselves now.”

  “I’m surprised Cosmists would tolerate a cyborg in their midst.”

  Before the war, the Cosmists had viewed people with cybernetic implants with contempt. Full cyborgs like myself were abominations to them; they hated the idea of us even more than the Terrans did. I’d witnessed this first-hand when I’d seen Fane’s memories.

  “So, you’re here to kill us, then? Finish what your war didn’t? That’s why you’ve been following me? Why not just pick us off before now? We’ve been vulnerable enough. Or were you trying to find the compound?” I shifted, preparing to run.

  “Pax. I may be in trouble. Are you there? Pax!”

  Dilated pupils, cuticles bitten to the quick. Torn skin at the corners of a mouth. A landslide, thousands of tons of rock falling from a great height, the looming shadow, the crushing weight—

  “Stop!” I pressed my hands against my temples, willing the vision to cease.

  He stepped back, his hands raised in submission. “I’m sorry. I-I don’t usually have to control it. Nobody else can see.”

  “Ailith? Ailith, are you okay?” Pax’s voice was sharp at the edges, his own version of panic.

  Fane shook his head and took another step back. “I’m sorry.”

  “It’s okay, Pax, I’m fine. I’m sorry. I’ll tell you what happened when I get back.”

  “Oh. Okay. We’re having hare for dinner. Again.”

  “Right. Thanks, Pax.”

  “How can I see that? What you’re thinking? Oliver— Actually, never mind.” I’d let my guard down, again.

  “We’re not trying to kill you, honestly. And it wasn’t our war. I mean, it was, but not just ours. It was yours, too.”

  “Why are you spying on us then?”

  “We were waiting for the right time to introduce ourselves. We’ve been wanting to meet you for a while now, but it took a very long time to find you. Years, in fact. But when we saw you in Goldnesse, we knew it was time.”

  “You were in Goldnesse?”

  “Not me. But some of us have lived there for years, ever since the war.”

  “What could you possibly want with us?”

  “We think we may have the same interests now. Aligned, like the stars.”

  “How could we possibly have interests in common? Your people never wanted my kind to exist. How do they tolerate you, anyway? They hate cyborgs.”

  He seemed to be thinking then, finally, to come to a decision. “Honestly? I don’t know.”

  “What do you mean?”

  He twisted his hands in a strangely child-like gesture. “They haven’t told me. They don’t always trust me. They tell me half-truths.”

  “Join the club.”

  He looked confused. “There’s a club?”

  I sighed. “No, I—” What are you doing? Stop talking. “I know how you feel.”

  He looked even more confused. “Of course you do. You can see—”

  Oh my god. “I mean, I’m only getting half-truths from my people, too.”

  His face brightened. “Do they not trust you either?”

  “It’s more that I don’t trust them.”

  “Do you trust me?”

  “I don’t even know you.”

  “You will. They want to meet.”

  “Well, that’s fine. Tell them to take it up with Mil and Lexa.” The cold air was beginning to bite through my sweater, it’s needle teeth making my skin prickle and the fabric itch.

  “They want to be sure there’s no danger first.”

  “Danger? From us?”

  “I believe our two groups share a past. Lien gave me this, for you to give to Mil.” He reached out, something shiny clutched in his fist.

  “Lien. She’s your leader.” I remembered her.

  “Yes. Here, take it.”

  It was a tiny metal man, jointed and faceless, on a delicate filigree chain.

  “He’ll know what this is? What it’s supposed to mean?”

  “Lien thinks so. And even if he doesn’t, that’s still an answer.”

  “How is he supposed to contact you?”

  He shrugged. “Through the radio. She said he would know what encryption to use.”

  “What if I refuse?”

  He blinked. “Why would you do that?”

  “Because I don’t know you.”

  “You know us better than you think. It was good to finally meet you, Ailith.” He gestured to the hills surrounding us. “It will be green again one day, I’m sure. Sometimes things need to be burned to the ground before something can grow again. This whole area will be green, like an emerald sea. I’ll see you soon.”

  Emerald sea. His words echoed as the world started to spin.

  I found my kite at last, propped up against the withering trunk of the tree. He was still a man, but not a man, his featureless face bowed to the ground. His skin was no longer smooth and shiny, and the silver ribbons that had streamed behind us like shooting stars as we’d run were gone, crumbled into dust.

  I took hold of him, to see if, after all this time, he could still fly. What remained of my hand touched a chest that moved, a chest that was warm. As the ghost of my fingers spread over his beating heart, he lifted his head and opened his eyes.

  The scraps of images. His ability to connect to me. How could I have been so stupid? After all
, we’d only been a rumor once.

  The blackness rushed up to swallow me whole.

  Living in the town was weird. No one ever talked about the war. Not what they were doing when it happened, who they’d lost, or how they’d survived. And they certainly never talked about what they’d believed before. Mom said people had learned from their mistakes and were trying to trust each other. I think they were afraid, and that they trusted no one. So, we all lived strangely, like ghosts in a waiting room.

  —Love, Grace

  How long had I been here? Why was it always dark?

  Was I asleep? Where was Eire?

  Where was I? Think, Ella. What do you remember? Start at the beginning .

  The war. The war started. We were safe. We became cyborgs, like we were supposed to.

  Then…we needed to go to sleep. But not me. I was awake.

  We didn’t go outside. The air turned stale.

  I tried to keep busy…I wanted to learn.

  I found something. The silver rain. I found out what it was. I—

  We’d been living in Goldnesse for three years when the rumors started. Stories of cyborgs that had survived, of artilects who’d been created after all. People laughed at these rumors, said they were tales to frighten children, but after that, everyone who came to town was treated with more suspicion, looked at more closely. But I wondered, if their humanness was threatening enough to cause a war in the first place, how would we even be able to tell?

  —Love, Grace

  My hair was tucked too tightly under my head, making my scalp burn. I tried to sit up, but I was in the air, my legs swinging uselessly.

  Ella. If she was dead, how could I hear her? Where was she? She wasn’t at the compound. What had she found out about the silver rain? That it was man-made? It wouldn’t have surprised me. I’d ask Oliver later if he knew anything. If it was bad, he’d have told me by now.