Once, on the field of Sums just outside Cyre, Agraneia witnessed a full army preparing to invade. Consul Deioch at the back, driving a full third of Cyre’s soldiers toward the gate. Thousands of helmets, gleaming in the sun.
An army to conquer a planet.
Now, a fleet of drones that dwarfed that army hurtled through the air, aimed at her. They rattled and screeched and crashed into each other, joints scraping shield plates, wires and tethers getting caught in their neighbors’ manipulators as they battled each other in the race down to the pyramid. To the nadir, Agraneia thought. To the human. The sky above was a background of beams, overlaid with thousands of glowing eyes and metal bodies.
And high above, the mountain construct watched.
To be honest, the sounds did her good. Her heart pounded in her ears, drowning out the voices. And her eyes narrowed on the machines, so that she could not tell if the faces were there at all.
This. This was peace. This was purpose.
One drone left the sea of metal, and dared to dip below the rim of the pyramid. A flash of light, like silent lightning, lit up the pyramid’s slopes. And the drone’s tentacles stopped their twisting, turning dance. Its thrusters shut off, and all at once it transformed from a living thing, hellbent on her destruction, into a lifeless chunk of metal.
More flashing. More drones, going lifeless and still. But they were still in free fall. Even as the mountain construct shifted, bidding its drone fleet to return, the ones that were already caught by the pyramid’s deathly light made a deathly hail. They smacked into the slopes of the pyramid, inadvertently exploding into shrapnel that sliced down towards the nadir of the pyramid.
A wedge of a drone’s underbelly tumbled down the slope, gathering speed until it was moving as fast as a cannonball. Streams of liquid metal surged from Agraneia’s body, and speared out in a slant, deflecting the wedge before Agraneia could even bring her arms up to cover herself. “Oh,” she grunted to the metal. “Thanks.”
The mountain construct shifted its position, until its weight loomed over the center of the pyramid, high above the rim. It waited, while thousands of drones moved into position around it until they filled the sky above, a mesh of rust and metal and shining lights.
To Poire, Agraneia said, “Can you help me get up there?”
Poire nodded. And one of the plates that formed the slope of the pyramid extended itself out with a heavy thwack that echoed across the pyramid, offering itself as a kind of step for Agraneia. Then another, and another, until hundreds of hard thwacks echoed all the way up to the rim of the pyramid.
“Agra?” Eolh started to say.
“Avian,” Agraneia said, “Protect the godling.”
She did not wait for his response. The cyran soldier leaped up the first step, trailing tendrils of silver armor behind her.
Even gravity could not hold her. This close to the center of the planet, gravity’s grip was weak, so that each step vaulted her ten feet higher up the pyramid’s slope.
The sky changed. Gaps formed in the mass of drones above, like a school of fish opening for some sea predator. Then, she saw why. Three large machines floated like sharks among the minnows. They were taller than they were long, and something extended outward from their head, a slowly growing shield made of thin, interlocking plates, creating three distinct shadows on the pyramids slopes. Like umbrellas, Agraneia thought. Those look new.
Each one was tipped with a bright, pointed tip. Smooth and rounded like the head of a rock pick.
They did not move.
The mass of drones jostled and rustled against each other, miles of clattering machines squeezed together, floating on their own gravity. The mountain construct was up there somewhere. And the longer the machines waited, the more time she had to reach it.
So, she kept climbing. Heedless of the thousands of eyes above.
But the eyes were not on her. They were at the nadir. The drones did not consider her presence, as if she was nothing but a gnat to them.
Then, as if by some invisible signal, the three umbrella drones began to glow. Agraneia could see, but did not understand that their thrusters were priming. Not until the three huge drones dropped.
Agraneia barely had time to look as they shot past her. A wind knocked her flat against the slope. And an ear-shattering crunch that sent shockwaves rolling through the pyramid, knocking her off her step. She caught the ledge, and held herself. And chanced a look down.
The three drones were embedded in huge sheets of metal. Somehow, Poire had pulled sheets—as large as a cyran temple—down the pyramid, so that they formed a layer over the Mirror and the nadir. The tips of the drones pierced through. One of those tips was now embedded in the Mirror, and cracked the glass, and plumes of mist rose from the Mirror.
But the godling was still alive. She saw his shining armor, and Eolh’s black feathers, and that small shape was the lassertane, almost blending in with the metal. They hid under the protection of Poire’s metal shields.
Then, the sky changed. And the drones began their siege.
They threw themselves down the inverted pyramid, moving in great waves. Flashes of light raged across the metal slopes, strobing the drones and killing them, but at the speed they fell it didn’t make much difference.
They smashed against the slopes, exploding into pieces and filling the air with machine shrapnel. They smashed against the sheets of metal Poire had conjured, and they smashed through the gaps. Poire threw his hands in a circle, as if directing the sheets of metal, but they would only stretch their segmented bodies so far.
The mountain construct hovered above the rim, opening up its outer layers and pouring drones from its mechanical guts down into the temple. Drones rained down on the pyramid, a barrage of artillery walking up and down the high slopes. Each hit made the metal shake and ring out. And all the while, the light from the Mirror flickered wildly as shadows raced through its unnatural depths, brought to the edge of this world by the crack in the glass.
Agraneia held out her hands, and uttered a word: “Blades.” Twin metal serpents rolled down her forearms and formed into two broad blades, each as long as her arm.
She leaped.
Running, dodging, jumping, cleaving through falling debris. And when she failed, the armor saved her. How many times did she whisper “thank you” to the liquid metal wrapped around her wrists?
This was how Agraneia climbed.
***
Eolh made sure Poire and Yarsi were safe first. The lassertane was kneeling in front of the cracked Mirror, whispering and waving her hands over it. Poire was standing behind her, frowning at the crack.
“You two all right?” Eolh asked.
Poire turned his frown on him. “You need to go after her.”
“I have to keep you safe-”
The bulk of a drone’s body bounced on the slope nearest them, sending a screaming chunk of metal sailing towards them—and the Mirror. Poire flicked a nod, and tons of metal twisted in a wall around them, deflecting the dead drone.
“You need to go after her,” Poire said again.
Through the break in the metal, Eolh could see the shining heights of the pyramid. There was Agraneia, leaping and dodging across dead drones. But not all of the drones that fell into the pyramid’s maw were dead. One survived, somehow. It lashed out at Agraneia, its long reticulated tentacles biting at her arms. A flash of chrome, as the liquid armor reacted. It shot off Agra’s arm, and jumped into the drone, and slipped back out. The drone fell, lifeless. And Agraneia kept running, her blades held out.
Eolh had seen her fight before, but never like this. She danced as she climbed, and the drones failed to dance with her. Cloven machines rattled and skittered and scraped down the slopes. But Agraneia was alone. And the drones kept coming.
Down here, at the bottom of the pyramid, Eolh was next to useless. He couldn’t tear his eyes away from Agraneia. Every blow the drones struck against her, he felt should be directed at him.
A hand, soft and warm, touched the feathers on his arm. “She needs your help,” Poire said.
“What about you? And Yarsi?”
“I’ll keep her safe.”
Eolh ran his fingers through his crown feathers. If anything happens to him…
What about Agraneia?
The whole universe…
What about Agraneia?
Poire tugged on his arm, forcing him to meet his gaze.
“You can’t help me here,” Poire said.
Eolh’s heart sank, because he knew it was true. Eolh was out of his depth, and the fledge? The fledge was beyond his reach. Then, there was no reason not to go.
“Fine,” Eolh said, lifting his wings. “And don’t even think about dying. I’m warning you.”
He thrust his black wings to the ground, and thrust himself up into the air.
A drone screamed past him, and he pulled his wings in and dove just in time to avoid getting clipped by its limp tentacles, stretched out behind it like some rotten medusa. After that, it was easier to dodge the rest. But then, they weren’t aiming for him.
Agraneia was atop the rim of the pyramid when Eolh caught up with her. Eolh could read her thoughts in her posture. She was squating down, thinking about lunging at one of the drones and trying to—what?—wrestle it into submission? Ride it the rest of the way?
Hells, Eolh thought. She might even be able to do it.
But the mountain construct was watching them. It hovered a hundred feet above, a huge, gray body riddled with rust and gashed open by its own machines. Mechanical parts dangled from tethers, hanging out of the mountain construct’s ripped underside like innards of some great beast. Electric arcs crackled out from its insides, spidering across the floating web of drones.
Eolh tried to shout at her, but his own crowing voice was drowned out in the rattle and screech of the drones, throwing themselves down into the pyramid. He didn’t see the drone that had snuck up from behind. But Agraneia did. She speared it with her blade, right the its main eye sensor. Then, she kicked it off her blade, and let it tumble down the sloping sides of the pyramid.
She pointed her blade up at the mountain construct. Eolh nodded.
Agra slapped her shoulder, and Eolh jumped, grabbing her shoulders with both feet, curling his talons into the fabric of her clothing. He heaved his wings down, and though the cyran was heavy (gods-damned heavy), Eolh held nothing back. His arms burned, his shoulders strained, his chest went tight with every gust of his wings. They climbed.
He brought them to a hole in the mountain constructs’ hull, one that gaped so large a dirigible could easily float through. There were still drones crawling out of its innards, though some had been crushed and were barely moving, while the others only had eyes for the nadir.
Still, Eolh took extra care to stay out of their paths.
Though it did not move, the gap seemed to open wider as they flew closer. Becoming impossibly immense, a shape that dwarfed the world as they sailed into its depths. He could see now that the hull was not one solid mass of metal, but hundreds of layers with a network of fibers running between. Small, crab-like creatures (or were those constructs too?), no larger than Eolh’s metal hand, crawled in and out of the layers of the hull, creating sparks with their claws.
And there was a set of gaseous outtake pipes, large enough to swallow the hanging palace. They were free standing now that the hull had been ripped away, and they belched invisible fumes that made the air waver. Eolh steered away from these, too, as he brought them into the gap of the mountain construct’s hull.
Eolh and Agraneia flew into the enormous gap. When they passed the outer layer, the rattling of the drones went suddenly quiet as a new sound echoed in the bowels of this great machine. A shuddering, revving sound that Eolh could feel more than hear.
Agraneia shouted, “Throw me!” She was pointing at some loose piece of framework. It looked sturdy enough, and his arms burned with effort.
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So, Eolh threw her. She sailed, her arms outstretched, her blades angled to pierce down into anything. Her face, a steely mask of concentration. Where had all her fear gone? There was nothing below them, but the bottom of the pyramid, too many wingspans below.
Agraneia caught against the side of the framework, her blades sinking into the metal. But he couldn’t watch her climb. From across the gap, a drone was glaring at her. Its body was slightly crumpled, and a piece of its armor was shredded into a long fang.
It lifted from its perch, and began to drift toward Agraneia, a predator circling its prey. She couldn’t climb and fight at the same time. Eolh had to stop it.
He flew in front of the machine, swiping his talons at its eye sensors. The talons scraped off, without hurting it. Two tentacles whipped from behind the drone, fast enough to break Eolh’s neck, but he was already underneath the construct, trying to wrestle a plate of its armor. It wouldn’t come loose.
Another tentacle, this one grazed him and sent him spiraling down. Eolh caught himself, and looked up. The drone had retrained its sights on Agraneia.
Eolh loosed a screeching warcry, and threw himself at the drone, knocking it off its course. Tentacles lashed at him, hammering against the drone’s own body as he ducked and slid out of the way. Now, it’s angry, he smiled to himself, right before a tentacle smashed between his legs, narrowly missing him. Eolh croaked, and sprang away from the drone’s body, flying away from Agraneia.
And the drone chased him.
He headed straight for the wall. Specifically, the part of the wall where the hull had shorn loose, leaving enormous jagged “teeth” of metal rising up the interior. He flew faster, staring straight ahead. Waiting until he could see the pointed tip of the nearest tooth. And swooped up.
The drone impaled itself with a wrenching crunch.
“Hah!” Eolh shouted. Then, something clapped the wind from his lungs and threw him out into empty air. Gasping for breath, he struggled to right himself as he fell, coughed, heaved for air, and kept falling.
He looked up to see what had hit him. A hundred black specks, glowing, stared back at him.
Eolh did not wait for the drones to make a decision.
He started to fly up, back into the mountain construct, when a deep, rumbling groan rang out like the blast of some ancient horn. Something huge clunked high above, and a chunk of machinery, glowing and sputtering with a blue light, dislodged and began to tumble through the gap of the mountain. More chunks followed, machine systems as large as buildings dropped from the bowels of the construct. More gaps formed in the armor as its interior structures collapsed, and the stress was too great for the metal to bear.
The mountain construct began to sink.
She did it.
Something so huge should not fall so quietly, and yet, watching the walls sink silently around him made Eolh felt as though he had gone deaf. Then, the rumble grew.
The world began to fall. If Eolh didn’t leave, he would fall with it. And then, when it crashed into the pyramid, he would be crushed with it.
What about Agraneia?
Eolh looked up. A hundred drones stared back at him.
There was no question.
He made his body a spear, and flung his wings down, shooting himself up into the falling body of the mountain construct. He flew with every muscle in his body, until he burned all over. He threw himself at the drones, feinted low, went high, and felt a machine appendage graze his tail feathers as he slipped past.
He did not look back.
There was the exhaust pipe, and there were the gouges in the walls where her blades climbed. Eolh found the trail of dead machines she left in her wake.
Found her, at the end of that trail, lying on the precipice of some metal scaffolding that, apparently, once held up a complex machine organ made of cables and wiring. The organ was missing, leaving only shredded cables behind.
Agraneia was panting heavily. Grease and burn marks ran down her side. And blood. Her right arm was hooked over her left shoulder, and already Eolh could tell something was wrong.
She didn’t even try to sit up. Just turned her head, and said, “It’s quiet.”
Eolh rushed to her side, crowing softly over her. Her arm was gone, and whatever had taken it had also torn out a chunk of her side. He could see white ribs among too much dark flesh, and her leg was hanging by silver threads of liquid armor. Blood flowed over the chrome, even as the chrome tried to weave into her muscles.
Eolh was afraid to touch her. More afraid to let her die without being held. “It’s okay,” he said, nervous and trying not to shiver as he scooped her into his arms. Moments ago, he struggled to lift her with all his strength. Now, she was far too light. “Ags, it’s going to be OK.”
Her eyes stared ahead at nothing. But there was a kind of peace on her face. “The faces. They’re quiet.”
***
Above, the shattering slam of metal on metal rained death upon them. They’re trying to kill me, Poire thought idly. But it was a small thought. He knew he should care, but right now all he could think about was making sure Yarsi was safe.
The lassertane’s eyes were squeezed shut. Her snout moved, showing her white fangs as she whispered ancient words to the Mirror. “Gift us with your word. Lead us unto the undefiled path. Oh, Sen, who made the world to move, and-”
A deep groan carved all sound out of the air, so that Poire could only hear the low, moaning rumble of metal. A heavy, empty sound.
He dared to impulse the shields to crack open, so he could see the mountain construct beginning to fall.
“Yarsi-” he said.
She was whispering her prayers faster now, too loud for her to hear him. Poire was about to call her name again when he realized he didn’t know what he would say.
Should we run?
They couldn’t. There was nowhere to go. The plates that Poire had summoned off the pyramid were slatted together, forming a crude shelter over the Mirror. He could only hope that when the mountain fell, it would not crush them.
If the Mirror breaks…
He couldn’t allow that, either.
But if it does?
He knew he shouldn’t, but he almost felt like laughing. If the mountain crushed the Mirror, or him, or whatever, it wouldn’t matter. He wouldn’t be able to do anything about it. The thought was freeing, in a way, and Poire allowed himself a slight smile as he shook his head. Madness. Every step of the way has led to this insanity.
But all he could do was wait.
It’s enough, he told himself. It has to be.
An avian screech puled Poire’s attention up. Eolh’s black, winged silhouette dropped out of the mountain construct’s hull. The corvani carried something limp and red in his talons.
He flew fast, but the mountain construct was gaining speed as it fell. The machine filled the sky above with its bulk, twisting and rolling like some city-sized iceberg made of metal, calving and shedding pieces of itself as it sank toward Poire. When it dipped below the rim, Poire slammed his eyes shut. The pyramid flashed with a light so blinding, Poire could still see its shadow with his eyes closed.
And when he opened them, he saw the great machine tearing itself open. Sloughing off its outer shell, discarding plates of armor and hull and inner workings like a flower sheds its rotten petals. What remained was a long, almost mechanical slug-like, whose tail twisted up as it fell. The tail was covered in thousands of long spines, whose tips began to glow with a sizzling light. Poire reacted automatically, throwing his hands up, impulsing the makeshift metal shields form into a wall between him and the mountain construct. The air hissed with the gathering of energy, followed by the ear-piercing scream of a direct beam. Poire felt the very air burn as the construct’s beam burrowed into his metal shields.
The beam stopped. Molten metal dripped down the sides of the shield, steaming as it cooled.
Another hiss seemed to suck all the oxygen out of the air. Singing it, until the smell of burning compounds brought tears to Poire’s eyes. Another deafening blast.
This time, the shields would not hold. This time, he could only hope that his liquid armor might save him-
Poire could not see it. It happened too fast. At the very moment the construct’s beam burned through his makeshift shield wall, a column of light shot out of the Mirror. It caught the beam of pure energy, freezing all the molecules—not only in place, but also in time.
Slowly, he opened his eyes. Expecting to see death.
The column pierced the construct’s slug-like body. Spearing it through the middle, so that it could not move.
The rattling of drones ceased. The hiss of energy, died out. The groaning of the pyramid being gouged by machines went quiet.
All he could hear was Yarsi’s whispered prayers. And he smelled a scent—neither sweet, nor burning—that reminded him…
Of home.
He turned around to see Yarsi wreathed in the mist that leaked from the Mirror. She was talking to someone, or at someone. “Thank you, oh, thank you, most merciful god.”
Sen? Poire thought. She’s alive? And somehow, she had answered the young lassertane’s prayers.
“How did you know?” Poire asked. “How did you know she would listen?”
Yarsi touched the back of her neck. “I not know,” she said quietly. “I hope.”
A metallic scraping noise filled the air. Poire looked up, to see the mountain construct wriggling on its spear of light. It was turning in ways the machine wasn’t meant to turn, tearing itself in half. The pinpricks of light on its weapon antennae strobed on and off, slicing through its own skeleton in an attempt to free itself. Pieces of its superstructure sheared against their own weight, dumping a new barrage of machine parts down on the nadir.
Eolh was in their path. Flying toward Poire, but not fast enough.
Poire shouted, “Get out of the way!” but his voice was lost in the rising cacophony of the mountain wrenching itself free.
A dozen more spears of Light shot up from the Mirror. Poire grabbed Yarsi by the arm, and pulled her away so the Light wouldn’t touch her—and kill her.
Above, Eolh dove and weaved around the newborn spears. His wings folding in to dodge the constructs exposed joists and girders bursting out of its body. What was left of the living mountain began to fall.
It rolled in the sky, and Poire caught a brief glimpse of its innards. Folded weaponry, hidden in layers of porous metal. Tubes that looked like magnetic cannons pushed through as the layers of outer shells peeled away. As it fell, the mountain construct began to unload.
A thunderous everything.
A kinetic shell whistled overhead, and slapped into the side of the pyramid. Poire heard the sound a second after impact, a crack so loud he felt it in the bones of his jaw.
The only solace was that it could not direct its fire. The lower half of the pyramid filled with kinetic rounds that boomed and shook the ground. Poire pulled his arms over himself, and impulsed the metal of the pyramid to protect both of them. To form a geometric cocoon around the Mirror.
But the pyramid threw an error. Something about structural integrity being at risk.
Override, he thought.
And a prompt he did not expect flew into his mind?
Dedicated resources do not exist. Throne may collapse.
>Are you sure you wish to proceed?
Poire hesitated.
Another shell, this time it bounced off the remains of his makeshift shield. Poire’s armor leaped out to grab the shrapnel. A piece of his armor was torn off.
He was about to impulse one more command, when Yarsi yanked his arm. Her eyes were wide and in the whites of her eyes he could see… himself.
“You look,” she said. “You bright like sun!”
She lifted his arm for him, so that he could see his own skin, his bones, the striations of his muscles. Glowing. The outlines of veins glittered as they coursed through his body. Filled with a bright, gray light.
The mountain construct crashed to the bottom of the pyramid with a boom. It rattled and screeched down the last slope of the pyramid, rolling and thundering and screaming as it slowed to a stop against the tattered remains of Poire’s makeshift shield. Then, there was only the empty whine as the mountain construct made an effort to heave its body.
But its body would not move. Rings that connected the segments of its body began to rotate. The mountain turned its bulk, snapping its own internal supports as it did, bursting more girders out of its hull in an effort to face Poire. A head-like protuberance, far too small for its body, extended out. It was covered with thousands of sensors for every kind of light and motion and vibration. More devices jutted out from its face, like the shaggy growths of some forest monster, growing asymmetrically around its head. All focused on Poire.
Cannons bristled on its shell, and the remnants of weapon antennae began to crackle with renewed energy.
Yet…
There was no fear. Only…
The mist crawled over the ground. It slid up his ankles, winding its way around his legs. His silver-covered torso, and his arms. He breathed it in.
“Divine One?” Yarsi whispered.
There was no fear, and without it, Poire discovered that he was strong. It was right to do this. It must be, because he could feel it in the core of his body, and beyond—in some other existence—where it poured out of some yawning emptiness, as endless as the space beyond the stars.
“Divine One,” Yarsi begged. “Please, come back.”
But how could he? If he ran, how could he protect her—or any of them?
Poire sent an impulse to his armor. It rolled over him, peeling away from his back to reinforce his front, so he could face the mountain head on.
He took another step.
The ruined, steaming remains of the mountain construct—little more than a giant hunk of tangled metal and wires, stuck through with enormous spikes and turrets snapped in half—glared at him. As he approached, hatches along its body opened with the hiss of cold gas that mingling with the storm of Light that raged below them. Barrels of weapons that Poire had only ever seen in virtual sims peered down at him, the glint of Light on those cold, thoughtless barrels.
They began to spin. The antennae surged.
“Fledge!” High above, Eolh shouted, “Run!”
So, he did.
Poire sent an impulse into the pyramid, and one of its segments threw itself up, launching Poire into the air. At the same time, the mountain fired its beam, a white-hot lance of pure energy that singed the air—but missed. The cannons fired next, but Poire flew through the air, and landed underneath their range. He rolled, and tumbled, and impulsing the armor to help him rise to his feet. It hardened at his joints, and pushed.
And then, Poire was standing underneath the mountain’s sensor array. Its weapons struggled impotently against their structures, unable to fix on him.
Poire reached up.
The mountain’s head tried to pull back, but it had nowhere to go. Its own body was too heavy. It tried to push itself away, shuddered, and sagged back down.
Poire brushed his fingers across the mountain’s face.
Instead of the cold, smoothness of metal, he felt a different sensation. Like a man who has wandered for days without water, and touches his lips to a cold mountain stream. Only, instead of days, this sensation was backed by millions of years of desperate yearning.
A violent torrent of energy ripped out of Poire. Vicious patterns of something like lightning, but too ordered and symmetrical, leaped from his outstretched hand and chained him to the mountain. He tried to pull back, heaved with his whole body, but the force gripped him even as it raced up the mountain’s hull. Fractal lightning erupted from his hand, carving streaks through the air, each bolt a perfect image of the other. He felt it in his fingertips, and his palm, a chilling rush colder than ice.
Black, glittering veins began to open up on the mountain construct’s hull. Metal and carbon and plastic and alloy and the particles in the air itself changed, crystallized, crumbled like ash in the wind. Poire’s arm was shaking uncontrollably, and he gripped it with free hand, until every muscle in his body fought back. The veins grew deeper, wider, and crawled over the mountain’s body, consuming its hull, its shields, its innards. And when it came to the base of the machine, it did not stop. The veins grew out into the metal of the pyramid upon which the construct rested. The veins formed more slowly there, but still, they grew.
A stinging, awful scent filled the air, and as Poire inhaled it, he felt the emptiness inside him expand.
Dust filled the air. That black, glittering ash, drifting and swirling, seeking new places to alight. No, Poire thought. Poire impulsed the thought, like he would any other: no!
The dust was drawn to him, too. It swirled and swarmed in a vortex around his being, spinning faster and wider. There was Yarsi, her eyes wide as she backed away—to slowly.
“NO!” Poire screamed through gritted teeth, using all of his strength to bring it back within him. Impulsing. Fighting.
Focus, a voice from the past said. Focus on one thing, and one thing only. Focus, and breathe.
He wanted to do anything but breathe. All that dust was waiting for him, yearning to gather on him, to grow that frozen death that lived inside him.
But his caretaker was right. She had always been right. And he would not fail to listen to her again.
Poire focused on a single word: No.
And he breathed in, one long, powerful, endless breath. You will not change this, he thought. This is my universe. The dust rushed to him, and he choked on it, but he refused to let go of the thought. Refused to stop breathing, even as his lungs filled with this unutterable death.
The fractal lightning crackled from his hand snapped inward, like a thousand-headed beast slamming into his chest. It slammed him back, knocking him to the ground. All at once, the dust fell, inert.
When Poire opened his eyes, Yarsi was standing over him. Her claws curled to her chest in worry. Overhead, the mountain construct loomed. Its body was half devoured, like some diseased mouth had bitten a chunk out of its body.
The head was mostly gone, eaten away by that black, glittering disease. There was something behind it, some apparatus suspended by hundreds of wires. A core. An enormous one, almost as large as Poire.
Part of the core had been chewed away by the lightning. A white, sparkling mist poured out, and though the interior still glowed, the light was dim.
Tubes that had been hooked into the core now hung uselessly, dripping some dark liquid. And inside, buried beneath a micromesh, protected in layers of thin, translucent coating, sat something wet and pink.
A brain. One that looked far too human.