Chapter 7 A Creature of Metal and Wires
A creature of metal and wires.
“You would think that at the end of the world, all religions would disappear. After all, where are all the deities, angels, and saints when you need them the most? But no. Often, disaster enhances beliefs. The Rise must be the long-awaited judgment, the punishment for all our sins. Most religions survived the end of the world, like rodents during a flood. They gather, all teeth and claws, and they bite.”
PERRI
The carriage sways with every rock and pothole we hit.
Nausea rises, and I breathe slowly through my nose.
We’ve been locked in the dark for hours; the sunbeam shining through the doorframe is the only sign that it’s still daylight outside.
My hands and feet are going numb—the ropes are too tight, and they’re cutting the blood flow.
Vex is at my side. They bundled her up like luggage, her limbs twisted at unnatural angles. I freed her from the darkness of the underground lab just to deliver her to another lightless prison.
“I’m so sorry,” I say again, voice raw from crying for hours.
I should have brought her back to the Market without delay. I should never have left without Stellan. Now I might never see him again.
“Perri, stop,” Vex says. “I’m the one who’s sorry for not being able to protect you. I fear they captured us because of me.” Their disdain of her has been quite obvious. “How is your leg?”
I sigh. “It stopped bleeding.”
Our captors pulled the arrow out of my calf with no care that it ripped skin and flesh.
But the wound isn’t too deep, and I didn’t lose enough blood for it to be dangerous.
My biggest fear is infection. They haven’t cleaned it.
Which means they don’t intend for me to survive long enough for it to matter.
They keep calling us ‘the sacrifices’. I have my suspicions on why, and they’re not comforting.
The air smells damp and earthy. We’re still close to the bay.
Shouts erupt outside, and the carriage stops. Then light blinds me as the door opens. I blink away tears. Marcus, our captors’ leader, gestures, and two of his men grab me. They drag me kicking out of our prison on wheels.
“Perri!” Vex screams. “Let him go, please!” She’s crawling in my clotting blood, her hands and feet twisted behind her back. She looks like a human-sized broken doll. But her blue eyes full of anguish appear painfully human as the door closes and I lose sight of her.
They drop me on the floor without care, and the impact knocks the air out of my lungs.
When I’ve finally come to my senses, I realize that we’re at the beginning of a pier, the kind that was used to anchor small boats. A few of the planks have rotted away after thirty-years left unattended, but the concrete parts still hold.
They carry me to the end of the pier and tie me to a hook before hoisting me up between two metallic rods. My feet leave the ground and in a matter of seconds, I’m dangling in the air. I’m strung up like a fish in those old pictures from before the Rise.
“Why are you doing this?” I cry out.
My question remains unanswered. The men and women bring bloody bags out of the carriage. I know what’s inside; I’ve seen them cut the dead horse’s flesh.
I whimper as they place the bloody meat around me and throw some more into the water.
“Fuuuuuuuck…” I say.
“Do scream. It’ll be over quicker,” says Marcus with a little smile.
“Why are you doing this?” Nothing makes sense.
This time, he answers me. “Sacrifices have to be made to appease the old gods. They’re the planet’s retribution, and we have to make amends.” He bows his head towards the bay.
I knew they were zealots out there; I’ve heard the merchants’ tales. There are entire communities who worship the giant creatures. But I didn’t think they would go that far.
“Then make amends yourself and keep me out of this!” I shout.
He sighs. “We’re already on the right path.
But people like you, worshippers of technology who hold on to the old ways, are the reason we haven’t fully entered the new age yet.
The gods will receive you as a sacrifice.
And your robot—the abomination—will be the ultimate sacrifice. We’re bringing it home.”
“Shit, shit, shit…” I kick my legs in the air, trying to hit him. It’s a desperate attempt to do something—anything!—but I only manage to swivel.
Marcus laughs and walks away.
I rotate my body in time to see the carriages leave. Vex is screaming for them to let me go until they’re so far away I can’t hear her anymore.
Tears are streaming down my face.
Stellan… I should have never left without him. I’m happy he’s not here with me right now, condemned to die, but I hate being alone. For however long I have left.
But death doesn’t come quickly. I stay hanging for hours, my arms and shoulders on fire.
The flies found the horse meat quickly, and they’re swarming at my feet.
If I die of thirst before being found by Scylla, they’ll lay eggs on my body.
I almost wish for the old god to find me before it comes to that.
The sun is slowly gliding towards the horizon, readying to get swallowed by the sea. The heat is still relentless, but at least it’s not blistering my skin anymore. Small mercies.
I close my eyes, defeated and exhausted, when a noise startles me.
Something is coming. My eyes widen, adrenaline flooding my veins.
The water in the bay is calm, but I can hear giant feet dragging on the ground behind me. I wiggle to pivot in a full circle. The land surrounding the bay is lifeless…
The reeds! The reeds are moving, as if pushed aside by something huge.
“Oh, shit… shit… shit…” I whisper.
Is it coming from underground? Scylla should come out of the water! Don’t tell me the meat attracted something else.
The pier shakes. But just as I’m about to let out one last desperate scream, a giant creature appears out of thin air on the shore.
No… not a creature of flesh and bones like the old gods, but one of metal and wires.
Fresh tears well in my eyes as I realize what I’m looking at. It’s a giant machine on six legs, with what looks like a blue and green shell built from different panels.
The Beetle! It’s the fucking Beetle!
I’ve heard the tales, but I never expected to see it with my own eyes one day.
A hatch opens on the underside of the walking machine, and the Devil of the Wastes jumps out. He’s as tall and as wide as the King. Two small horns peek out of his dark hair. He’s a living legend among survivors.
A smaller man follows him. He has blonde hair curling around his ears and a pretty face. He must be Helios. The friend Jude told me so much about, and the Devil’s lover. He takes off running towards me.
“Oh, fuck, are you okay?” he asks me as soon as he reaches me. “It took us a while to locate you. We feared we might be too late.” My only answer is to cry harder. Helios panics at my renewed tears and pulls out an army knife. “Don’t worry, we’ll take you down. Griffin, help me.”
The Devil of the Wastes—Griffin—reaches us.
As he gets closer, I realize his eyes are red, and his pupils are vertical slits.
I try not to stare. He takes the knife from Helios’ hands and cuts the rope.
I land in their gentle embrace. I cry out as my arms are finally free—they hurt worse than the wound on my leg.
“How?” I ask as they put me on the ground.
“Your friend, Vex, has been broadcasting a distress signal,” says Helios.
“And Beet—our AI—caught it.” He gestures at the giant machine waiting on shore.
“She told us they’ve offered you as a sacrifice along the bay.
But she didn’t have the exact coordinates, so it took us a while to find you. Sorry, Perri.”
“Oh, fuck. Don’t be sorry,” I say, encircling my painful arms around him like a terrified child. “Thank you… thank you.”
Helios pats me on the back awkwardly while the Devil of the Wastes watches over us, frowning.
“We need to move,” Griffin eventually says. His voice is deep. “Scylla might not be busy for long.”
“Busy?” I ask as they help me to my feet.
“Beet intercepted a message on the traveling merchant’s channel. She attacked travelers less than an hour ago south of here.”
Not Vex, then. The zealots were heading north, and they wouldn’t use technology even for radio signals. I’ve seen them send a message with an honest-to-gods pigeon that was kept in a cage with others.
“My friend,” I say. “Vex…she—”
“I lost her signal twenty minutes ago,” says a female voice. “Her transmitter is weak.”
Helios smiles when he notices my quizzical look and points at the bracelet around his wrist. “Beet is talking through this.”
Beet, I’m guessing, in the AI inhabiting the Beetle.
“Hello, Beet,” I say with a feeble smile, bowing my head reverently, even though I don’t know if she can see me. “Thank you for saving my life.”
“I like him,” she says. “Can we keep him?”
Helios snorts. “That’s not what you said the first time you met me.”
“Well, that was you, and this is him. Look at him!” Beet says. I guess she can see me. “He’s so tiny and adorable. And since Griffin and you are always busy gazing into each other’s eyes, I wouldn’t mind having someone else to keep me company.”
This time, even the Devil of the Wastes smiles, albeit self-consciously. I can see the tips of pointy teeth peeking under his lip. A few red scales catch my eye just above the collar of his leather jacket.
“You’re wounded,” says Helios when he notices my limp.
“Yeah. They shot me in the leg with a cross-bolt. But it’s not too serious, I think.”
“Let’s check it out.”
They both get a hold of an arm to help me walk.
I try not to whimper at the pain in my shoulders.
We reach the end of the pier, and I sit on a block of old concrete while Griffin disappears inside the Beetle.
Up close, the six-legged machine is even more impressive.
There are a few bullet impacts on her blue and green panels.
“I’m your biggest fan,” I say to the Devil of the Wastes when he comes back seconds later with a med kit. “I never thought I would ever meet you in person.”
Helios and Griffin share a funny look.
“I keep telling you we’re famous,” says Beet through the bracelet.
“You are,” I say. “There are many tales about you. And I’m a friend of Jude. So I know about you, Helios.”
“I’m famous, too!” Helios says, grinning. “And you know Jude!” Then he turns to Griffin. “Can we?”
They exchange a few looks. They’re having a silent conversation, the kind that only happens between people who know each other deeply. Just like Stellan and me.
Griffin concedes. “Very well. Let’s go then.”
Helios smiles, then turns to me. “You’re coming with us in the Beetle. We really need to go before Scylla finds her way to us. She’s not very patient with humans walking on her territory.”
I gape. I’m going to see the inside of the Beetle? No one has seen what’s inside the incredible machine!
Griffin seems a little unsure, but he follows his lover’s lead and helps me to the hatch. He must have survived all this time by keeping to himself, and that only fueled his legend.
“Don’t worry,” I say to him before entering the Beetle. “I won’t ever put you guys and Beet at risk. Ever. And you saved me. I owe you a life debt.”
Griffin seems taken by surprise, but then he smiles—for real this time. He says nothing but helps me in with a gentle hand.
They lead me through a narrow passageway and into a wide circular room with a green couch in the middle. They drop me onto an old leather chair. Everything seems bolted to the floor, just like my home on the Traveling Market.
“So, it’s really a house on legs,” I say in awe.
Helios chuckles. “You can say so.” He opens the med kit and offers me a pill. “For the pain.”
I shake my head. “I don’t need it. The pain is nothing I can’t handle. Save it.”
But he keeps his hand up until I accept it. “We’re not short of these. Just swallow it before I check your leg.”
Griffin offers me a bottle of water he grabbed somewhere when I wasn’t looking. Both of them are just so nice. Right as I was losing faith in humanity once again, tied as an offering to an old god, they rescued me and proved that there are still good people in the wastelands.
Beet’s voice echoes in the room. “He’s crying again. What have you done?”
“Nothing!” says Helios, alarmed.
I burst out laughing and dry my tears. “I’m good. Just happy to be alive.”
Helios inspects my wound and starts cleaning it. “You’ll need a few stitches.”
I nod absently as I feel the Beetle shake. “Are we moving?”
“We’re putting some distance between us and the bay,” Griffin says while monitoring us.
I wonder if he doesn’t entirely trust me with his lover. He’s like Stellan, cautious. I can’t blame him. Not after what I just lived through.
Stellan… I’ll need to get in touch with him. I miss him so much it hurts.
But first, I need to find a way to rescue Vex. I can’t leave her with the zealots. They’ll tear her piece by piece and give her as an offering to some old god.
“I need to hurry and get back to my truck before it disappears,” I announce out loud. “I’m going after them. I’m getting Vex back.”
I wince as Helios pulls the needle and thread through my skin.
“She requested you don’t come after her,” says Beet. “She just wants you to be safe.”
“She was taken because of me. I’m not letting her get sacrificed.”
“Alone?” Helios asks.
Fear slithers into my heart. I’m painfully aware of my inadequacies and my brush with death, but I can’t abandon her.
I sigh. “If I have to.”
“Or you can stay with us,” Helios says. “We’re going after them. Beet seems to have taken a liking to your friend Vex.”
“It’s been a while since I conversed with a brilliant mind,” says the AI.
Helios glares at the ceiling. “Hey! We’re brilliant minds!”
“Of course, honey,” she says, obviously lying.
I should laugh, but new tears spill from my eyes. Tears of relief. I’m going to save Vex with the help of the legendary Beetle and the Devil of the Wastes.