Eva wished Tiny Tin, Ferrou, and the toys a succinct farewell. In turn, she touched each robot. She placed a hand on Spring Peeper first. He sat atop Tiny Tin. As soon as Eva withdrew her hand, Peeper sunk low, almost flat atop Tin’s box. Then, Eva bent to touch Wheelian. He sat on a barren patch of ground and gave her a hopeful look. As Eva touched his sphere, he touched her arm. Eva stood again and approached Ferrou. Ferrou stretched to match her height. His silver body felt wet and cool. She withdrew her hand and felt dry and warm again. Finally, Eva put her hand on Tiny Tin and looked into his digital eyes.

“As soon as you convert the turret gun, return to the bunker. In two weeks, wake the androids. Sooner, if you detect a ship leaving the continent.”

Tiny Tin stretched his stalks. His digital eyes grew wide. “Are you not coming back?”

Eva shook her head. “Maybe. We’ll see. We’d have to fly to you. The route looks bad. I think the team that found the ship is already infected. Keep that to yourself for now. But, don’t let them back in the bunker.”

“What instructions should we give the androids?”

“None. They aren’t going to take instructions from me or you. Follow their lead, but let them know that the monster has years more to live. They need to do something.” Eva took a few steps back. “I’ll try to return for you.”

“But you can’t promise.” Tiny Tin nodded his stalks.

“I can. I just can’t promise right away. We’re going to bring help.” Eva looked at her synthetic friends. She assigned each an emotion whether they felt it or not.

Tiny Tin was brave. Ferrou resigned but determined. Wheelian crestfallen, and Spring Peeper confused.

Eva turned away. They needed to move fast, just in case she proved right about the infection. A good bot would flee its companions if it felt infected. Eva trusted the infected team to be good bots. Or, did she?

“Come on,” Eva said to Meladee and Camellia. “We can reach the ship in three days, but we need to go.”

Meladee and Camellia followed, and Eva set the pace at a fast walk. Once an hour, she glanced at her communication device and adjusted their course to reach the chosen ship. Eva tried not to think about her surroundings and comforted herself with the memory that this part of Lurren had been ugly for most of her life. Nothing here had changed.

Halfway through the first night, Camellia asked, “Your teams found a good ship quickly. How come they couldn’t help get the fighter?”

Eva kept walking, but she glanced at Camellia. “It’s not as easy as it looks. I think…I think we’re going to lose a few.”

“Oh.” Camellia said no more.

Eva realized just how bleak a picture she painted. She had to admit. The land didn’t look as bad as it had been before their hibernation. And, the reason the other bots didn’t help was because she didn’t let them.

Eva said, “Then again, things are a bit easier. The ships are more exposed. The flesh isn’t so thick. It’s more necrotic and dry. I could have let them help, but I didn’t know then what I know now.”

“It’s dying,” Camellia said.

“I doubt that.” Eva frowned. “Not even the automatons are dying at the expected rate.”

Camellia kept her eyes on the ground to find her path forward. She swerved around a thick patch of flesh and came close to Eva. “Automatons made from synthetics may be able to last a very long time. How long do – did – organic Lurriens live?”

“About ninety years,” Eva answered. “They shouldn’t be alive now, even as automatons.” She remembered that some of the oldest Lurriens reached one-hundred and ten, but most seemed to finish their lives between eighty-five and ninety.

“Wow, that’s short.” Meladee wore a look of worry. “I can expect to get sixty years on them, and Camellia gets even more. What happens if Ah’nee’thit makes automatons out of our people?”

“They’ll live a long time,” Camellia said.

Eva looked between her friends. They walked on either side of her. For the first time, Eva realized that their lands might be in more danger than Lurren. Her choice to wake and seek help might have been just in time for the Tagtrumians and Groazans and the rest of Iruedim that she still knew little about.

Eva spoke aloud the things that she thought next. “The other synthetics lack a sense of purpose. They need organics. It’s a failing of their programming. If they’d had any sense, they would have sought your lands sooner. We could have stopped Ah’nee’thit and Lurren’s monster that much sooner.” Eva shook her head. “I wish I hadn’t listened to them.”

“We’ll have to settle for good enough,” Camellia offered. The next words, Camellia spoke low. She probably intended to keep them to herself. “Come on, Adalhard. I need you to come through. I need you to put all your energy into this. We’ll exit that wormhole. We’ll find help.”

Eva heard Camellia’s quiet prayer and lent her hope to it.

“So, we’re definitely leaving through the wormhole, right?” Meladee asked. “We aren’t going back to battle Ah’nee’thit? We aren’t coming back here?”

“Nothing on Iruedim seems to stop these things. We need to leave,” Eva said. “I checked the wormhole’s status. The exit will shift within a week. It’s been leaping wildly every few minutes to a new location.”

“I think…” Camellia began. “That helping you is the best thing I’ve done in a long while.”

“Yeah,” Meladee agreed.

Eva stopped. With upraised hand, she shushed them. In the distance, something screamed, a sharp angry sound. Eva couldn’t place it. Camellia searched the night, a touch of panic on her face.

“What?” Meladee couldn’t hear the sound yet.

“I think the automatons are coming,” Camellia warned.

“That may be them, but I don’t recognize that noise.” Eva admitted. She set off at a run. “We should find somewhere to defend ourselves. We might need to use the freeze weapons.”

For a temporary fortress, they chose a raised foundation. Large hunks of rubble lined the structure, and necrotic tissue zigzagged the concrete.

Meladee found the structure’s center, an area free of tissue but littered by rubble. She crouched behind a large column. “It’s going to get very cold.” Meladee opened the egg.

The magic circle glowed. Cold air oozed from the egg’s interior. Meladee recognized the feeling from her days aboard the Rime Breaker in Iruedim’s north pole. She cast a quick spell of warmth over herself and Camellia. They had endured cold temperatures each night, but they wouldn’t fight well in polar weather. Meladee left Eva to fend for herself. The cold didn’t bother Eva, just like the heat of Suen hadn’t.

Eva took her place at the front of the platform. She drew the freeze gun and supported it with both hands. Camellia drew her sword and stayed two paces behind Eva. Camellia could defend herself in limited scenarios, especially given her magic sword. Meladee thought the weapon was too cool. She wished she had it.

“Don’t use your flourishes,” Eva warned. “If we send bits of automatons into the air, we could get infected. Just protect Meladee. No magic. Blade only.”

Camellia nodded. Meladee swore silently.

Up the hill, automatons hobbled in fast motion. They twitched from side to side, like sloppy puppetry. Eva fired the freeze gun, and two of the automatons froze. The others came on.

Meladee conjured a wall of icy flames. The bluish fire rose in the automatons’ path. Several jerked to a stop and fell to their knees, but most continued through, with frostbitten flesh.

Eva fired her freeze gun again and again, creating a field of grotesque statues. Meladee worked slower. She chose her spells with care. From simple, single rings, she conjured icicles. They shot up from the ground. To Meladee’s disgust, the impaled automatons wriggled and sometimes broke free. Through the torn flesh, what used to be human or synthetic, peeked out.

Before the automatons reached the foundation, Eva froze a dozen more, and Meladee executed one more spell. A three-ringed circle of sapphire. It coalesced into an icy basan.

The automatons climbed the foundation, Eva let her freeze gun fall to her side. A strap held it on her shoulder. She drew her crystal staff, spun it, and cracked through a pair of the creature’s servants. The gun hung from her shoulder, and she pulled the trigger. The automatons froze at her feet.

Another set of automatons set their branched limbs on the platform. Camellia chopped them off, and the basan blew chilled fire on the broken limbs and flailing bodies.

With her staff, Eva continued to whip the automatons. She ran along the platform’s edge to catch as many as possible. When she had them down, she blasted them with her freeze ray. Broken bodies piled high into a makeshift ladder. Automatons tried to climb their companions, but Eva smashed the frozen ones, disrupting their ascent.

“Come on, have some fucking respect,” Meladee taunted the monsters. “This is a mass grave. Don’t climb your fallen comrades.” Meladee watched and searched for an opening to use a spell.

Camellia and the basan worked in a rhythm. The automatons climbed the platform, and Camellia lopped off limbs and would-be heads. The basan froze them with its breath, and Camellia kicked them to the ground, usually in time to knock more automatons down.

“Good little chicken.” Camellia patted the creature’s neck, her fingers grazing green and red feathers.

“He’s pretty big for a basan actually, but he came with that icy fire. I just gave it a little kick.” Meladee smiled.

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More automatons arrived.

Meladee conjured a three-ringed circle and planted a tree of ice at the automatons’ center. The tree stretched its limbs and impaled the monsters. Beside the multi-limbed automatons, the tree looked alien. It seemed unnatural, kin to the creature’s servants, which come to think of it, resembled trees. Meladee would never look at trees the same way again.

“This is more than I’ve ever seen,” Eva shouted.

Meladee realized just how much noise the automatons made. They chattered like bugs.

“Should I use a wind spell?” Camellia pointed ahead. “I can push some back.”

Eva shook her head. “Too much ice. They’re stuck. They’d never blow away now. Besides, even at that distance, there’s a small chance to be infected by stray particles.”

“If we get overrun, we’ll definitely be infected. And, there are other, less spectacular spells attached to my sword,” Camellia said.

Meladee thought the argument would continue, but her friends just dropped it. Meladee bet the horde of automatons had something to do with that.

She worked in the back and cast every ice spell she knew. At least, she cast all the spells she could transform into ice. A wall of ice rose behind her and guarded their backs. Should they need to escape, their efforts would be limited, but the wall blocked some crafty automatons. The unlucky monsters now had to maneuver around the sheer, slippery barrier. Meladee cast her next spell far into the horde. A giant ball of ice burst, and some of the automatons shrieked. She followed the spell with a shower of icicles that pinned some of the automatons to the crowd, impaled and wriggling. Meladee paused her attack and tried to ring her bell. The bell’s clang rang loud and far, but only a few soil soldiers answered its call. Most fell, trapped in necrotic flesh or smothered by living tissue.

Rain began to fall. Under the ice egg’s influence, it turned to snow. As the cold temperature and snowfall grasped the automatons, the attack slowed. Eva bashed and froze a final set. All the automatons either lay on the ground or moved in slow motion. Meladee and her friends had won.

“That had to hurt our time,” Meladee said. “We were fighting for what...two hours.”

Eva checked a handheld clock. “Twenty minutes.”

“Oh, that short?” Meladee shrugged.

Eva ignored her and turned on Camellia. “What did that thing say to you when it got through the spell?”

Camellia’s tired eyes shot open. “It was curious. It wanted to know who and what I was. I think it remembers an encounter it had with Groazans.”

“You didn’t believe it would attack us?”

Camellia shook her head. “No…I…”

Meladee stood beside Camellia. “Hey, I wouldn’t expect even the friendliest monster to warn us.” Meladee pointed at Camellia. “Just leave her alone. For all we know, this attack had more to do with your infected team.”

Eva drew back and bowed her head. “You’re right. But, we still can’t let this kind of attention follow us to the ship. If I got attacked like that when I got the fighter, I would never have made it. I need time.”

Meladee raised her hand. “You’ll get your time.”

Morning dawned, and Eva’s team refused to rest. The automatons paced them. Far-off, the monsters twitched and kept on a parallel course. So, Eva and her friends kept moving.

That morning, the other teams called Eva. She sat down for a moment to answer.

Team one had abandoned their first turret. Automatons overran their work. They found another turret and successfully converted the behemoth gun. As they called, they had located and worked on a third. Team two noticed a patrol and hid. They could not finish their work until the creature turned its eyes elsewhere. Team three and four worked together on the ship. To Eva’s relief, only three bots had been infected and already destroyed. Eva instructed the remaining bots to watch for automatons and to keep their work quiet.

Team Zero called as well.

Tiny Tin’s voice carried the other side of the conversation. “We can convert another turret. There’s a half finished one near our location.”

“I know. Team one abandoned it. Automatons attacked. Leave it,” Eva ordered.

“There’s no one here now, and Ferrou scouted in all directions. I’m almost done.” Tiny Tin sounded a bit smug. “We found a third too. We could get that one up and working.”

Eva wanted to both praise and scold Tiny Tin for his initiative. Instead, she instructed, “Finish team one’s turret, but leave the other to the better equipped teams.”

“It’ll be a small detour.”

“What about the toys?”

“They’re fine. Spring Peeper is hooked on me, and Ferrou carries Wheelian everywhere,” Tiny Tin asserted. “Besides, you gave us the easy area. I could accuse you of playing favorites.”

“Go home,” Eva stressed.

With a beep, Tiny Tin turned off his communication.

Eva growled.

“Well, at least he’s motivated,” Camellia said.

Eva glared, but her eyes widened and slipped past her friend. On the horizon, Eva saw a special automaton. With quivering limbs, the thing approached. It possessed more than one of the special tentacles bestowed upon Cahir. In fact, it possessed nothing but those special tentacles. Eva beheld a converter.

It looked more tree than monster. The tentacles stood stiff from the body. In place of leaves, the converter had dangling bits of flesh. In place of roots, the converter had gripping tentacles. It propelled itself forward.

Eva got to her feet. “That’s a converter. Its limbs can inject you with the infection. All of its limbs. This one doesn’t have inert tentacles. Take your pills now.”

Meladee and Camellia scrambled to down the capsules.

“How do we fight it?” Camellia asked.

“Like the others and like Cahir, but don’t touch this one.” Eva got her staff and the freeze gun ready.

As the monster approached, automatons joined its march.

“Where am I going to hide?” Meladee complained. “Where can a girl be a mage around here?”

Eva had no suggestions. They stood in open land.

To Meladee’s credit, she didn’t panic but opened the egg and set it nearby. She rattled off spells and prepared their battleground. First, a warming spell graced Meladee and Camellia. Second, followed a maze of stalagmites. Third, Meladee conjured both her dragon and basan, in enhanced icy forms. The basan remembered Camellia, and as Camellia drew her sword, the basan bobbed to her side. While the basan stayed close, the dragon advanced a few steps. Finally, Meladee rang her bell, and a small army of soil men emerged. Most smothered under the veins of flesh, but dozens dotted the landscape before and behind the companions.

“I haven’t rested. I don’t think I can do much more than this,” Meladee apologized.

“It’s enough. You should be safe.” Eva fired the ice gun and hit the converter.

The branched monster slowed but did not stop. Eva dropped the gun, left the safety of the spelled area and walked towards the converter.

“Where are you going?” Camellia asked.

“I’m going close to keep it away from you.” Eva hefted her crystal staff and drew her narrow-barreled gun. She walked, glancing back to assure herself of Meladee and Camellia’s defenses.

“Go with her,” Meladee instructed the dragon.

The beast lumbered after Eva, and she didn’t object to its presence. Halfway to the converter, Eva looked back again. Meladee and Camellia watched, looking suspicious and worried.

Just before Eva and the dragon reached the automatons, Eva fired her gun. The narrow barrel emitted small bursts of energy. It damaged less, but it kept fewer particles out of the air. Automatons staggered but only stopped after several shots. They reached Eva and overtook her.

With her staff, she batted a few away. Then, the ice dragon set to work. It opened its mouth and spewed snow and frost. At that distance, Eva got covered in a fine mist, but the automatons got the brunt. The nearest automatons slowed, then stopped. Snow collected on their bodies, and they looked like snowmen, lamenting the end of the world. Eva smashed them. Ice and flesh flew.

The converter approached, and Eva got ready. Its branches stabbed down, and Eva dodged. Stiffer than Cahir’s tentacles, the branches pulled free from the soil. They stabbed for Eva again, and she rolled away. The dragon spit ice onto the attacking branches, and they frosted over, indistinguishable from a tree in winter. Eva brought her staff down, and the branches snapped free. The converter howled, and stabbed the ice dragon. Now, the dragon screamed.

“Damn” Meladee cried. “Usually, injuries just disappear once they’re unsummoned, but it would be just my luck for this whole infection thing to never go away. Do you think the dragon can be permanently infected?”

Camellia shook her head and shrugged. She turned back to the battle.

A few automatons entered Meladee’s stalagmite maze. Soil soldiers popped out of hiding and tackled the automatons. Still, some automatons snuck through.

“Use the damn wind sword.” Meladee worried more about a monstrous hug than a possible infection. After all, she’d just downed one of the capsules. “I think they’re going to reach us.” Meladee stepped back, closer to the ice egg and got ready to grab it.

Camellia performed a simple flourish. A strong gust of wind forced the automatons to stop and lean forward. One unlucky automaton fell over and lay on its back, tentacles wriggling. As it righted itself, Camellia performed the same simple flourish, and the basan spit cold fire into the wind. This time, the sword’s magic carried the basan’s attack, and the automatons frosted over.

Meladee laughed. “That was great!”

Camellia glanced back at Meladee and smiled. Meladee pointed ahead. She grinned. She wanted Camellia to see the automaton on its back, tentacles wriggling. Its rear frozen to the ground. When Camellia turned back, she laughed. Then, Camellia looked at the basan and performed the flourish a final time. The basan added its chill breath, and the battlefield became a snow-covered wonderland. The wriggling automaton stopped.

Eva kicked the converter’s chest. It staggered but kept its hold on the dragon. The dragon defended itself and blew ice. The converter’s branches froze, and Eva chopped the offensive limbs free. The converter fell. The dragon clamped jaws on the icy branches, plucked them from its chest, and tossed them far.

The converter staggered to its feet. Only three sets of branches remained, and it used one to right itself. The other two swiped for Eva. She rolled under them. She came to her feet in front of the converter and waited. The converter sent one of its limbs her way. The tree-like tentacle curved from the thing’s back to its front. It sought to pin Eva and hold her against its body.

Eva dodged. Unable to halt its attack, the converter stabbed itself in the chest. The dragon breathed ice and froze the thing in place, all except for the two remaining limbs. Again, the dragon screamed as the remaining branches stabbed its neck. Eva took a small knife from her pocket and with a rigorous sawing motion, she beheaded the converter. Both dragon and monster moved no more.

As the soil men and basan picked off the remaining automatons, Camellia watched Eva head back. Eva sprayed herself liberally with the bleach solution, going as far as to inject herself with a syringe of the stuff. Camellia expected Eva to comment on her use of the wind sword, but maybe, Eva hadn’t seen.

Eva put away her bleach and gave her companions some breathing room. “One of us has to distract them and lead them from the ship.” Eva stared at Camellia.

She means me. I’m not an engineer. I’m not a pilot. “I should do it,” Camellia volunteered. “I can’t fly the ship or repair it.”

“Whoa, that sounds like a terrible idea. Right?” Meladee laughed.

“She’s right. She’s the best distraction we have.”

A moment of silence followed, and Camellia looked at the ground.

“They’ll rip her to pieces!”

“No, they won’t.” Eva raised her communication device and looked at it. “Three turrets are functional as ice rays now, and we have a robot at each one. If I give Camellia a tracker, they can keep the worst of the enemy away from her. The automatons will attack the turrets, but the robots should be able to leave before they get taken. Each synthetic stationed at a turret has at least limited flying abilities.” Eva approached Meladee and held out her hand. “Give her the scrolls you made. She can use those.”

“No.” Meladee frowned. “I’m not doing that.”

Camellia hated to go alone, but she wanted that ship so bad. She wanted Eva to have time to fix it. “Meladee, can I take your basan with me?” Camellia put a hand on its neck.

“Yeah, it won’t dispel until destroyed.”

“You can fly the ship to me when it’s ready.” Camellia felt sick.

Eva handed Camellia the tracker. “We won’t leave you. I might have plans to let the other synthetics fend for themselves but not you.”

Meladee crossed her arms and refused to meet their eyes. “Fine.” She took out the scrolls and handed them to Camellia. “I wish the ice dragon had made it. Then, I could send both with you. I can’t conjure it again till I rest. It better not turn into an automaton.”

“I hope it’s okay,” Camellia agreed in a small voice.

“There’s a coastal region to the south,” Eva began. “The creature has never put out many tendrils there. But, I warn you that may be because the flesh is underground.”

Camellia nodded, not loving the idea of underground flesh.

Eva continued, “I think I remember my creator going there. I’m not sure why. Maybe, I remember wrong.” Eva stared into space.

Camellia wondered how a synthetic could have an imperfect memory.

“If you go there, the automatons and converters may stop their pursuit.” Eva looked Camellia in the eyes. “Maybe. You can reach the beach in two days. That’ll be our rendezvous.” Eva activated a map on the tracking device and showed Camellia.

Camellia nodded. “But, it’s south. Why don’t they like it there?”

“I don’t know,” Eva repeated. “Be careful.”

So close to the sea… Camellia stared at her map and its southward route.

Finally, Eva said, “We should reach the ship before you. The robot teams have already made good progress, and they’ve hidden their presence. I think we can get the ship running fast. Then, we’ll come get you.”

Again, Camellia nodded.

Meladee said only, “See you later.” She gave Camellia a hug.

“Make a good distraction.” Eva put a hand on Camellia’s shoulder and turned away.