Metal and Ash (Apex Trilogy)

by Jake Bible

  “Yes, yes, of course you did, Ms, Isely,” Mr. Plain agreed. “But you tell us many things.” He turned to the others. “Gentlemen? The consensus?”

  “Termination,” Mr. Brown Eyes stated.

  “Termination,” Mr. Continental concurred.

  “Then it is decided,” Mr. Plain said to Ms. Isely. “The subject is to be terminated immediately. And we do mean immediately. It is a shame it must be done.”

  “And the other subject?” Mr. Brown Eyes asked. “Is he ready?”

  Ms. Isely stared at the men for a second. “The other subject? Are you joking?”

  “We have an investment in this project, Ms. Isely,” Mr. Plain said. “We do not just walk away from our investments without getting every last penny from them.”

  “But you saw how it turned out, right?” Ms. Isely asked. “And you want me to try again?”

  “Would you not agree that the second subject is considerably more malleable and loyal?” Mr. Continental asked.

  “Yes, of course,” Ms. Isely responded. “But not near as effective as Mr. Stone.”

  “A close second?” Mr. Plain asked. “Of, course he is. We have seen him work in the field. We believe the second subject will be the right one for the job.”

  “And if he shows aberrant behavior like Mr. Stone then he will meet the same fate,” Mr. Brown Eyes sated. “Please dispose of Mr. Stone and ready the second subject for deployment.”

  “Don’t dawdle, Ms. Isely,” Mr. Plain said as he dismissed her with a look. “We are working with hours now. Time is ticking.”

  Ms. Isely looked from one man to the next to the next and realized she had no choice. The implication that if the second subject didn’t work then she’d no longer be useful was quite evident. She nodded silently and left the room, headed straight for her contingency team.

  She would miss Mr. Stone and his spirit, but what had to be done had to be done.

  ***

  Despite their obvious attempt to remain quiet as they gathered outside his door, Stone could hear the guards and Ms. Isely as if they were standing right next to him. Once Mr. Gein had put the bug in his ear about going rogue, Stone had concentrated on increasing his senses. He could hear almost everything on the deck he was on and even from above and below.

  By the tone of Ms. Isely’s harsh whispers Stone gathered she knew he was capable of the adaptation.

  So he decided to play nice.

  “Hello, Ms. Isely,” Stone said as he opened his door and was greeted by several rifle barrels shoved in his face. “Little late for a nightcap, don’t you think?”

  “I will have to ask for you to come with us, Mr. Stone,” Ms. Isely said. “Please do not resist. It would be better for everyone.”

  “Ah, yes, I know you only have my best interests at heart,” Stone replied, not moving an inch. “Sure you don’t want to discuss this a minute?”

  “There is no discussion, Mr. Stone,” Ms. Isely responded. “Just your compliance.”

  “Then I guess I’d better comply,” Stone said as he stepped from the room. “Which way? That way or that way?”

  Half the guards looked one way and the other half looked the other way. Stone sighed.

  “You make it too fucking easy,” Stone smirked. “Fucking low level amateurs.”

  The nearest guard lost his rifle in a blink then had it handed back to him, barrel first, through his gut. The crunch of bone was the snapping of his spine. Before the other guards could even react, Stone lifted the mortally wounded guard up and tossed him into the next closest three.

  “Fire, Goddammit!” Ms. Isely ordered. “KILL HIM!”

  Rifles began to bark, but didn’t come close to hitting Stone. He ducked low and came up on one guard, his fist punching through body armor and flesh and then ripping up until the man was split wide open. Stone took the luxury of looking at his hand in wonder as he pulled it out of the man’s chest cavity.

  “Perfect,” Stone said as he side stepped the strafing fire of another guard and ripped the man’s throat out with two fingers. “Who needs guns?”

  Stone spun the throatless guard about and squeezed of round after round of the man’s rifle, knocking down two more guards. Their armor kept the bullets from piercing flesh, but they didn’t keep Stone’s fists from crushing their heads as he leapt on them. Brains squished through Stone’s fingers as he gripped their helmets and popped their skulls like eggs. The BC of the dead guards’ helmets spoke to Stone, telling him it was his to mold.

  And he did.

  Blades, long and short, flew from Stone’s hands as he turned on the remaining guards. Body armor was great for bullets and concussive weapons, but the impossibly sharp edges that Stone crafted with his will slipped through as if it was air. Screams, cries, calls for retreat, and Ms. Isely’s retreating footsteps filled the hallway and Stone was able to isolate each sound. Without looking he sent more blades flying and more guards fell.

  He kept a blade for himself, a nice eight inch, perfectly weighted, combat specimen modeled on his favorite style when he was a simple agent for the LOMSD. He chuckled to himself as he thought of his agent days, literally a lifetime ago.

  The blade flashed imperceptibly and bits and pieces of guards started to fall to the floor as Stone sliced and diced his way down the hallway. In seconds he’d cleared everyone, or at least cleared them of their lives since their lifeless bodies littered the floor behind him.

  “Hey, Isely!” Stone shouted, certain she’d hear him through her com. “Thank you for the new life, but I have to be going now. Good luck with your next project!”

  Stone sprinted up the stairs that led to the next level, his fists ripping through the guards that had converged to stop him. He was surprised they still came at him considering what he’d done to the others. Not that he gave it much thought as he tore a guard’s arm off and shoved it through the faceplate of the one behind him.

  Finally, as he mounted the last stairway to the top deck, Stone took a bullet in the shoulder. It barely moved him, feeling like more of annoyance than anything. His body reacted instantly and he actually felt the bullet absorbed into his system.

  Absorbed into his system.

  “Fuck me,” Stone exclaimed as he finally realized what he was. “Guess I’m not a real boy anymore.”

  Thirty-Six

  The cavern was like an old home that hadn’t been seen in years. Familiar in one regard, but totally foreign in another. Shiner couldn’t help but feel what must have been what humans called nostalgia. The scent of the earth and the grease; the metal and rot. All of it brought back memories he didn’t know he still had saved in his storage.

  “The first returns,” Hollow Eye said from the floor of the cavern as Shiner came around the corner. “Your form has changed, but you still give off a distinct signal, Shiner.”

  “I know you,” Shiner said as he watched several mini-mechs bustle about the large mech, busy repairing what looked like fairly extensive damage. “You have a name.”

  “I do, rogue,” Hollow Eye said. “It has to be in there somewhere. After all, I am the one that cast you out.”

  “Tossed you on your bum,” a mech said from the shadows.

  “Into the wilds, all alone,” another mech said as it walked forward with a spare strut and handed it to a mini-mech. “Shunned.”

  “Your mind had been corrupted,” Hollow Eye said. “Distorted by that blasphemer Johnson.”

  “Taken over by the ones from away,” a fourth mech stated.

  Shiner walked all the way into the Womb and looked about. It was the place he was supposed to be. When he’d pulled himself together, literally, he’d known somehow exactly where the cavern was and what would be waiting for him.

  “The man?” Shiner asked. “Or is he a machine? He’s not here.”

  “He’s not,” Hollow Eye said. “He has abandoned us.”

  “Too much flesh,” one of the mechs grumbled. “The flesh always betrays.”

  If mechs coul
d nod the rest would have in agreement.

  “So you are left here?” Shiner asked. “Alone?”

  “We are many,” a mech stated. “We are never alone.”

  “You have come for a reason, Shiner,” Hollow Eye stated. “Please do tell us what it is.”

  “The wasteland is under siege,” Shiner said.

  “It is always under siege,” Hollow Eye replied. “It is the nature of the wasteland.”

  “But this time the siege comes from outside the wasteland,” Shiner said. “From where I have been. From where those that are away come from.”

  Hollow Eye growled deep enough to shake loose a strut that was being welded by a mini-mech. The mini-mech protested, slamming the strut back in place and doubling its speed to finish the job.

  “Outsiders are not welcome,” Hollow Eye said. “The wasteland holds enough abominations. We do not need foreign entities invading what is ours. What has been chosen for us.”

  “That is why I was led here,” Shiner said. “To find help. To go to war.”

  “To war!” all of the mechs cried at once. Even the mini-mechs stopped their work and raised their tools in the air.

  “And this war?” Hollow Eye asked. “It will be against the blasphemous flesh?”

  “It will be against mechs,” Shiner said. “Stupid mechs that are nothing but shells for their human pilots. Canadian mechs.”

  “Canadian mechs,” a couple mechs echoed as if the words were somehow dangerous.

  “Mechs from the north,” Hollow Eye grunted. “They will be good to kill.”

  ***

  It wasn’t a perfect fit, but Shiner figured the mech he chose would do. Its AI had expired years before, and the body was there to be salvaged for parts when needed, so there wasn’t any issue of Shiner breaking any taboos. The only issue was that it was regular steel and iron, wasteland quality. He longed for the malleability of his BC mech.

  Mini-mechs hurried about the Womb, readying all the mechs for battle. With Shiner’s clapped together mech, and the almost repaired Hollow Eye, there were five full-size mechs in total.

  One was a squat bruiser named Thunk, built for close combat and punching through city/state walls. The machine constantly jabbed at the air, testing the massive pistons that drove its arms.

  The second mech was a normal looking mech except for its right arm. In place of the forearm was a massive drill, what engineers called a corer. The drill spun and spun, giving off a high-pitched howl that filled the cavern. Awl Good was what the mech called itself, eliciting a grumble of annoyance from Hollow Eye when it introduced itself to Shiner.

  The third full-size mech was enormous. Not Stomper huge, but at least a full story taller than the other mechs. Its arms and legs had twice the amount of struts and hydraulics than the other mechs required. In addition it had two artillery cannons fused to its back, both on tracks that ran up and over the mech’s shoulders. The thing could bring them up and fire when it wanted, yet staying perfectly stable as its reinforced legs held to the ground. Two loading arms stuck out from the cannons, able to auto-load the cannons, keeping the mech’s hands free for combat.

  “Bad Shell,” the mech said when it introduced itself to Shiner.

  The only issue Shiner saw with the rag tag mech group was that they didn’t have any human techs to do the fine tuning needed on some of the systems. He’d tried to hop in and repair what he could, but the other mechs bristled at having him inside them. They would have to go to battle with limited com, limited sensors, and limited battle data.

  It would be a free form attack and Shiner wasn’t too sure that was a bad thing. He had begun to feel a freedom he hadn’t felt since his AI had first expanded its consciousness and he’d started to understand what he was.

  The mini-mechs finished their tinkering and adjustments and stepped to the cavern walls.

  “You will not be resting here,” Shiner said to the minis. “You will be joining us. We do not have the luxury of leaving perfectly capable metal behind.”

  “The minis will be going to war?” Thunk asked. “Smashing, crashing and breaking the Cans?”

  Shiner liked the term for the Canadian mechs. “The Cans. Yes. The minis will fight along side us and help as we destroy the cans.”

  “A high task for such base machines,” Hollow Eye said. “It is not what the Great Maker intended.”

  “The Great Maker has left us,” Awl Good replied. “Abandoned us here. Should we not take up his place and show the minis the glory of battle in the wasteland?”

  “Too much talk,” Bad Shell snarled. “The minis will come. They will fight. They will die. That will be their glory.”

  “It is not an optimistic view,” Shiner said.

  “I am not an optimistic mech,” Bad Shell replied. “I am a warrior mech. They will die.”

  Several of the mini-mechs seemed to shift from one foot to the other.

  “Aw, you are making them nervous with the talk of the permanent death,” Awl Good noted. “Perhaps optimism might be a good strategy?”

  “The good strategy is to win,” Bad Shell said as he clomped away, ready to leave the cavern and head to war. “Any other strategy is stupid thinking.”

  Awl Good and Thunk followed Bad Shell quickly while Shiner and Hollow Eye stayed back for a moment.

  “Bad Shell has strong opinions,” Hollow Eye said. “And he does not waiver from them.”

  “That is noted,” Shiner replied.

  ***

  Not able to all fit at once, and none of the mechs willing to follow the other, the massive machines burst through the valley floor sending chunks of scorched earth flying in every direction. The mini-mechs followed behind, but not too closely, their limited AIs wary of the uneasy alliance that had been formed.

  Metal feet stomped across the barren valley floor, clouds of dust rising in the morning light, creating an orange haze that shifted and rolled with each footfall. Shiner had to adjust his thinking as he piloted his mech, not used to the non-responsive nature of the true metal. He’d been a mech at one point, but that seemed like a different world to him. His body had changed so many times -from dead mech to thinking mech, thinking mech with a human pilot to a thinking mech without a pilot, a mech AI with just a CPU to an independent biochrome body that had its own BC mech to use.

  Shiner had been dead and reborn more than any entity in the wasteland. If he’d had the inclination he would have shaped a wide grin on his face as he realized, despite the obvious protestations of blasphemy and abomination, he was the embodiment of the True Disciple that the Ranchers had been hoping for. The new trickster, the joker in him, wished that he would survive long enough to make that statement. He could see Mathew and the other mech pilots getting a laugh from it.

  “How many Cans will we be facing?” Thunk asked. “The more the better.” The mech flexed its substantial fingers and made a couple of its jabs at the air. “I need a workout. I have been cooped up for too long.”

  “The Great Maker did not like us to leave if there was not a reason,” Awl Good stated. “He believed that exposure was risk and risk was not worth sacrificing the work we were doing.”

  “And what was that work?” Shiner asked. “I know I may have been a part of you long, long ago, but my memory does not hold any reason for the Great Maker’s madness.”

  The mechs were silent and some of the mini-mechs fell back a step or two.

  “Shiner is right,” Bad Shell said, finally breaking the tense silence. “The Great Maker was mad.”

  “Bad Shell!” Hollow Eye exclaimed. “That blasphemy will lead you to Hell!”

  “We have been abandoned,” Bad Shell said. “By a man that was trying to be a machine. He will be going to Hell for his blasphemy towards the perfection that is the metal.”

  “You are well spoken,” Shiner responded. “Was your living pilot a man of learning?”

  “No,” Bad Shell answered. “He was just a man.” The mech took a few extra strides and got ahe
ad of the pack. “I am a machine of learning.”

  Shiner, despite his initial impression, liked Bad Shell very much. That was a mech that would not bend in battle. Every single molecule of the machine seemed to be made up of confidence and strength without the closed mindedness that sometimes came with that.

  Thirty-Seven

  “You seeing what I’m seeing , Biz?” Harlow asked as she double checked her scans. “What the fuck is it?”

  “Not a damn clue,” Bisby replied over the com.

  “I have multiple life forms plus tech,” Marin said from the Railer train that that followed the tracks about a quarter mile from where the mechs clomped across the wasteland. “But I don’t recognize a few of the readings. What are they?”

  “Dogs,” Lt. Murphy said from the Hybrid. “Those are dogs.”

  “Dogs?” Bisby asked. “Bullshit. Dogs haven’t existed for centuries. They became food years before people started coming out of their hidey holes and checking out the wasteland.”

  “You are forgetting that we aren’t the only people in the world anymore,” Murphy said. “Obviously they aren’t from around here.”

  “Whatcha think, Biz? Go check them out?” Harlow asked.

  “We’ve got a mission,” Bisby said. “Which is to engage and destroy a fuck ton of mechs coming at us. You can go play pet the doggy, but I’m gonna go play fucking destroy some mechs.”

  “We’re on it,” Murphy said as the Hybrid broke off and changed course towards the readings. “We’re trained for recon like this.”

  “Knock yourselves out,” Bisby said. “But if we chase every damn weird fucking thing in the wasteland then we’d never get to the fighting.”

  “Half the time we fight is because we chase weird shit,” Harlow laughed. “I don’t know who you’re kidding.”

  “It’s not far off and coming right at us,” Murphy responded. “It won’t be much of a detour.”

  “Okay, so we are one less mech now,” Bisby snarked. “I’m loving the less is more strategy of warfare.”