Chapter Text
Leaves rustled above. I became aware of children laughing, running about, playing some sort of game. I looked down at my hands, but saw past them to the grass below me.
“❄︎☟︎♋︎👎︎♏︎🕆︎💧︎?” Her voice glitched, but I heard my name anyway. I turned to her. She was beautiful as I’d ever seen her. I tried to focus on her face, take in her features again, but for whatever reason, I couldn’t.
“❄︎☟︎♋︎👎︎♏︎🕆︎💧︎, love, come sit down.” She smiled. I blew out a slow breath. The air was clean here. Fresh. The grass was slightly damp, enough to be pleasant but not dangerous. Warm light shone down around me, and the gears in my chest whirred unhindered. I sat down next to her, putting my arm around her shoulders. She was my love. My life.
What would I do without her?
“Papa, papa!” a little girl exclaimed, running up to me. “Look what I found!” She held up a small white flower.
I nodded, circling my face with my hand. Beautiful.
She shoved it towards me with both hands.
I took the daisy between my thumb and forefinger, touching my other hand to my chin and gesturing towards her. Thank you.
She giggled and ran away.
I turned to the woman I loved, and placed the flower behind her ear, the stem holding itself in place by her hair. She pressed her forehead to mine, and I closed my eyes, savoring the moment.
“Why did you leave us?”
The question hit me like a jab straight to the core. I opened my eyes, pulling out of her embrace. My hands came away sticky, wet grains staining my fingers a dull orange.
“ Why did you leave us? ” she repeated. I looked back up at her, the gears in my chest tightening so they could turn faster. A ping in the back of my head told me adrenaline production had started. What stared back at me was not my love. Lifeless eyes, a body scorched and decayed. Even as I watched, rust spread over her body, starting at her joints but spreading rapidly outwards.
But she wasn’t dead. She reached out to me, every slight movement creaking and scraping.
“ Why- did you leave… me?” Her voicebox was filled with static, glitching every couple syllables. “ Help, please-” She reached out to me. My head screamed at me, two orders at once.
Take her hand.
Don’t touch her.
I wanted to hold her again. To pretend this wasn’t happening. To fix it.
“Help- us.” It wasn’t just her. The children crawled towards me, each of them in a similarly decayed state. The flower I’d put into my love’s hair just moments ago was now brown and wilted. I took a step back, the now dead and burnt grass crackling under my feet. Fire surrounded us, burning all life from everything around us.
Except me.
Why not me?
I tried to reach out and take them in my arms, or hold them, or take my love’s hand one last time, but all that happened was another step back. I stumbled, but instead of hitting the ground behind me, I kept falling. The ground closed up again as I fell, and all that was around me was darkness.
Then I opened my eyes.
***Roaming Log #92345***
***Location: “The Wall”***
I have begun forgetting.
I believe my energy core is degrading more rapidly than first estimated. Information deemed non-vital by my intellectual processor is being deleted by my internal systems. But for the first time since I left Home, I see a light. The Ghost beckons to me, and I must follow. As I jump onto another protruding rust-covered girder from the cleft I spent the night in, I see it in the distance. I could liken it to an owl, but its shape shifts every time I look at it, most of the time it appears an abstract shape, almost lacking a third dimension.
Last night’s rest spot was located somewhere south of the last waypoint I marked on my Internal Navigation System. Sleeping in a cliffside isn’t as uncomfortable as it may sound, even Everywhere’s mouseholes are easily big enough for a person to stand in. It’s still rock, of course, but I’ve slept in worse positions.
I blow out a slow breath, and allow myself to drop down onto the closest ledge to scope out my surroundings.
The Wall is an odd place. I find it in a state of disrepair, but from the size of it I could be led to believe it has been this way since the beginning of recorded history. What I can only assume are rusty nails are big enough for me to walk across. I haven’t found another being that is both living and intelligent in the last 789 days, thus I can only assume The Wall is a classifiable ecological deadzone.
The laws of science tell me nothing is truly infinite, but for all my experience here, the laws of science may well be proved false. Whatever the case, The Ghost is my guide. It is my only hope to escaping this godforsaken place.
I dreamed about her last night. About all of them.
Best not to dwell on that.
I see something in the distance. An odd object. I will approach with due caution. I climb onto a metal support, and it shifts under me. My balance drivers hitch, kicking adrenaline into production again. I sigh. My scanners tell me this beam has a roughly 85% chance of holding my weight, but reflexive precautions have been kicked into overdrive since…
Since what?
I wish my Intellectual Processor would ask me before deleting my memories. But no. That’s too much to ask, isn’t it?
I look below me. I wonder what it would be like to fall. I cannot see the bottom of the structure from this vantage point. The size of my surroundings, especially what is below me, sometimes offsets my balance drivers. I was not designed for environments of this scale, and unfortunately it shows profoundly in some respects of my daily life.
I jump across a narrow chasm, catching myself on a ledge. I walk across it towards the odd object. As I approach, it comes into focus more clearly. A person. Or, perhaps more accurately, the remains of one. The Ghost encourages me to continue forward. I do so with caution. I kneel down next to the unfortunate, paying my respects, but The Ghost draws my attention to an item on the corpse’s person. A pair of climbing picks. Old, worn, scratched up from who knows how many years of use. My scanners indicate that the picks’ previous owner died of natural causes over a hundred years ago. Precision carbon dating can’t be more accurate than that. I hesitate, wondering if it would be insensitive. Then I put my situation into perspective and realize insensitivity to the dead is the least of my worries at the moment. I pry the picks from the cadaver’s hands, wincing at the cracking sound the joints make as they’re moved. The sound seems unnaturally loud in the silence of Everywhere. I feel the picks’ weight in my hands, bouncing them a little. They’re not perfect, but I can make do.
I take a deep breath, and jump off the ledge. I shove the pointed end of the climbing pick into the side of the concrete cliff to slow my fall. I slide down a bit more as the ancient, brittle stone cracks. Well, I’m not dead yet. That’s something. I force the other pick into the side of the cliff. Seems sturdy, at least. I look over at the next ledge, where the Ghost waits for me. It’s a bit of a climb, but I think I can make it. I yank one of the picks out of the cliffside and begin climbing sideways towards it. My joints recalibrate, squeaking in protest at this new kind of movement. I certainly wasn’t built for this of all things. Hydraulic pressure mounting in my shoulders and elbows, making climbing like this possible, but not easy. My arms shake, trying to keep me from falling into the quite possibly endless abyss. The mechanisms in my chest begin working faster, trying to keep the level of strength consistent. I can feel my centers of power heating up. This kind of exercise is in no way sustainable, but I only realize this too late.
With a final burst of energy, I push myself off the wall. My fingers just barely catch on the edge of the next platform. For just a moment, I dangle precariously between life and endless darkness. I stare down at the abyss, adrenaline circulating through my chemical piping. I look up, readjusting my position. I will not die. Not here, not today. I steel myself and pull myself up. Hands over the edge first, then forearms. Shoulders, upper body, legs. I crawl away from the edge of the cliff, breathing heavily as my core’s RPM settles back down to a neat 100 and my internal temperature returns to 85 degrees F. I look up, and my heart sinks. With a haunting coo, the Ghost flies off again. In silence, I beg it not to leave. Not again. The loneliness threatens to crush me as I rise to my feet, taking a stumbling step forward, trying to follow it. My joint pressure evens out again so I can walk properly, but I find my emotional processor is running at capacity. Tears spill down my face as the EP’s self-cooling mechanism kicks in. I cannot continue. Not now. I look to my right and find the Ghost has led me to a small building. A corrugated iron-tin-steel alloy, my scanners indicate. As much as I don’t want to let the Ghost out of my sight, I can’t think of any other option. My EP is taking up too much power right now to let my Intellectual operate properly. I stumble into the shelter, collapsing onto a cot that creaks under my weight. A thick layer of dust covers everything, yet the monitor in the corner remains powered. I will scan it later for relevant information.
I suppose the most prudent choice is to write down everything I currently remember.
I do not know my name, but I have called myself The Lorn. I do not think I have ever been able to speak - System diagnostics have found no signs of a voicebox port, only a basic ‘Alarms & Communications’ unit. I use gestures and signs to communicate with the few people I come across. I have two processors - Intellectual and Emotional. Hydraulic joints. A core rapidly running out of energy. I have been trapped in the lower reaches of the megastructure - known as Everywhere - for 253 years in search of a way out. I was led here by the aforementioned Ghost. The elders of my home colony gave me their blessing to do this, but I do not know why.
I loved someone back then. I loved her very much. We had at least one child, but beyond that I do not know how many we called ours.
They are gone.