The Broken God Machine (23 page)

They spent the remaining hour before dawn sitting on the marble steps and
looking down at the silent ocean of gardening robots that still sat at the base
of the building, waiting for them. He felt strange – exhausted, but not in need
of sleep – and Tasha seemed to be in a similar state. Pehr suspected that they
both had slept during their augmentation without realizing it.

They shared between them a few bites of salted tral meat and the last of the
water from Pehr’s flasks, which they would refill at the base of the mountain.
There was no water here, other than what fell from the sky, and where it had
pooled it had grown stagnant and greenish; after several years without use,
Havenmont’s plumbing facilities had entered into an automatic shut-down routine
and, like much of the rest of the city, it would require a time consuming
manual restart to enable.

Pehr no longer feared the gardeners. He knew now that they would disperse
when the sun came up, and that when next he returned to the city, they could
begin the process of reprogramming the murderous things and taking control of
the city’s nights.

“They’re going,” Tasha said after a time. The first pink ribbons of dawn had
appeared in the eastern sky, and the little metal insects had begun, one by
one, to march back to wherever it was that they spent their days.

“Back to their holes,” Pehr said.

“Yes.”

“When they’re gone, we’ll take the elevated highway … Route 19, right?”

“Right,” Tasha said, and she made a scoffing, laughing noise. “Route 19. Of
course.”

There was a pause as they watched the crowd of robots rapidly thinning, and
then Pehr said, “How are we ever going to explain this? How will we make them
understand?”

“We can’t, Pehr. They have to come here to understand. Your family, too,
once we find a way back to them.”

Pehr hadn’t even considered this. The jungle still stood between the city
and his land, and though he ached to feel the warm sun, and smell the ocean,
and see his beloved cousin again, he was not optimistic about the odds. Even
should he, a single person, manage to avoid detection by the Lagos, it was
impossible to believe that any group he might mobilize could long remain
unnoticed.

“Perhaps once we have the city running …” he ventured, and Tasha shook her
head.

“No. There isn’t time. We must reunite our people now. We need to get as
many together as you can, and get them all augmented at the same time. If we do
it in small batches, they’ll just exclude the latecomers, like before.”

“So this is our task? Unite all of Uru, stretched from the northernmost
plains of your land to the walls of Nethalanhal by which I grew up?”

Tasha nodded without looking at him, watching as the last of the little
gardeners disappeared from view. The eastern sky had taken on a yellow-cream
color that heralded the sun’s imminent rise above the mountains.

Pehr grunted. “Fantastic, Tasha.”

“If it were easy, someone would already have done it.”

Pehr sighed. His head hurt. His hands hurt. His left calf hurt, and he
couldn’t even remember injuring that particular spot. He was tired of this
strange city full of metal and glass; he wanted only to be somewhere wide and
open, where he could lie down next to a warm fire and gaze up at the stars. He
thought of the sound of the ocean in the distance at night, wave after wave
breaking against the rocks that formed the lagoon’s outer edge.

A sense of homesickness assaulted him then, so powerful that for a moment he
thought he was going to break down and weep.
This
was his destiny? He
and Tasha alone were to unite all the people left in the world and bring them
to this wasted, ancient city? Was it really possible that they would be able to
repair these machines and someday slip the bonds of Earth entirely, to go in
search of those who had left them behind?

“What if they’ve already found their God?” he said out loud, and Tasha
turned, giving him a questioning look. Pehr sat chewing his lip and watching
the sky.

“What do you mean?” she asked when it became apparent that he did not intend
on continuing.

“We’re meant to follow them, but to where? And what will they be like should
we find them? It’s been ten thousand years, Tasha. What if they’ve found God
already and He’s taken them someplace where we can’t follow?”

“If they have found Him, then so will you.”

“I will be dead long before then,” Pehr said, and he knew that it was true.
Somewhere in this place, the technology existed to extend his life for many
hundreds of years. Still, it would not be enough. He would never live to meet
those who had gone before; he could only hope to set those he gathered together
on the right course.

Tasha rose to her feet and yawned. “You will do what must be done.”

“Of course I will,” Pehr growled, and Tasha cast him a sidelong glance as he
got to his feet.

“Before we go, tell me something?” she asked.

“Yes?”

“If she had been anyone but your cousin – anyone at all, anyone with whom
you might have built a life – would you have said yes to being augmented?”

“I would never have come here in the first place,” Pehr said. “I would never
have left her. But, if I had been forced to come …”

“You wouldn’t have done it,” Tasha said. “You would have left this behind,
all of it, and gone back to your woman to hunt boar until you died a hunter’s
death before the age of forty.”

Pehr considered this, and then nodded. “I would have.”

Tasha smiled at him, and she gave her rare laugh.

“I’m sorry to say this, Pehr, but … I am so very glad she is your cousin,”
the girl with the purple eyes said, and with these words she turned and began
to walk down the stairs.

* * *

“Greetings, Mister Prime Minister and Tasha Samhad!” the last fully
functioning RDIS unit said to them as they turned the corner. “I do hope you’ve
brought your umbrellas, as it looks like it may rain.”

Pehr gave an incredulous laugh and said, “I’m sure we’ll get by, Ardis,
thank you.”

“We’re going to need to get that one some new clothes, at some point,” Tasha
said as they continued past it, and Pehr rolled his eyes.

“I think we should start with some new skin,” he said.

In short order they came to the fork that, Pehr knew, would lead them either
back to the plains or to the malfunctioning RDIS unit that had killed Jace. He
turned to face the right-hand path that led to the circle of bone, and he took
a breath. Something sat like a ball of ice in his stomach, and it was only by
force of will that he kept his body from trembling.

“My cousin has … has been exposed to the elements for two years. There
will not be much left.”

Tasha stepped up beside him. “How will you know him from the others?”

“When Jace entered the circle, there was a long delay while it processed his
DNA. He made it much further than anyone else, and he lies alone.” Pehr felt
ill just thinking about that awful time at the circle of bone.

Tasha touched his shoulder. “I will help you to bear it if I can.”

“Gods help me … I mean to do this,” Pehr said, and he forced himself forward
on legs that felt numb and wooden. Five steps. Ten. Twenty, and he was at the
jagged edge of rock around which lay the circle. Tasha was just behind him.
Trying not to think, trying only to act, Pehr forced himself to turn the
corner, bracing himself for the screeching voice of the worn-down RDIS
unit.

The machine was just ahead of him and to his right, leaning against the
wall, its back to him, but Pehr paid it little attention. His eyes were drawn
immediately to the spot where Jace had fallen. There was indeed not much left
of the boy; two years of direct exposure to the elements had reduced his body
to little more than bones. Still, Pehr felt an overwhelming wave of despair
roll over him at the sight, so much so that he made a noise of anguish and had
to steady himself with one hand against the canyon wall.

“Pehr, I’m so sorry,” Tasha said from behind him, her voice little more than
a whisper, and at these words the broken RDIS unit leapt to life. Its head
spun, shoulders following, and its cracked and warbled voice burst forth in its
familiar refrain.

“W-LC-M- FR--ND!” it cried. “PL--S- PR-S-NT Y--R
P-SS.”

As it spoke these words, it turned fully to face them, an act which its body
hadn't performed for nearly ten thousand years. With the twisting of its
abdomen, an enormous jet of sparks and flame blew outward from its side, black
smoke belching forth. The RDIS machine began making a hideous squealing that
grew louder even as its tone lowered, finally dropping to an ear-splitting,
bone-shaking note that was as much felt as heard. The RDIS gave one final
seizure and fell to the ground, its advanced state of decay finally catching up
with it. This thing, this metal god that had killed Pehr’s cousin and the Gods
only knew how many others, now finally lay dead itself.

For a moment they stood in silence, staring at it, and then Tasha spoke.
“That … was unexpected.”

Pehr was rendered momentarily speechless by the sudden and violent nature of
the RDIS unit’s final moments. He looked down at the pile of metal and then at
Tasha, and he felt tears spring to his eyes. He blinked them back, battling
against the rage and grief that threatened to overwhelm him. This was all it
took? Two years ago his cousin had stood before this creature made of rotting
metal, and it had paused in its delivery of flaming death. If Jace had simply
strode past the machine, causing it to turn, his life would have been
spared.

As if reading these thoughts, Tasha stepped up next to him and put a hand on
his shoulder. She leaned in close to murmur in his ear. “It would have done no
good for your cousin, Pehr. If he had broken this machine two years ago, the
both of you would have died under their blades. Because of his sacrifice, you
went free, and the world may yet be saved.”

After a moment more Pehr found his voice. “Saved? Is that what you think is
going to happen now?”

“What do you mean?” she asked, but her voice told him that she already
understood.

“All that protected the plains from the Lagos was this machine, this thing
that those creatures worshipped like a god. Now we’ve killed it. How do you
suppose they will respond, Tasha? How would
anyone
respond, if someone
came to their place and destroyed their god?”

“They don’t know it was us,” Tasha said, and Pehr gave a bitter laugh,
turning away to stare again at the dead god lying at his feet.

“What difference could that possibly make? They will know two things: that
none of my people could have come here and done this, and that there is a path
leading in the only direction from which this assault could have come. That
will be enough. The path will lead them to Havenmont, or to Tassanna. There is
nowhere else.”

“They can’t go to Havenmont. The next RDIS unit will kill them on sight …
Allen said so.”

“Then that leaves only the plains,” Pehr said. “They will come for us, and
it will not be a small raiding party. They will come in force.”

“We must not let this keep us from our path.”

“Is that it, then?” he asked, whirling on her. The sorrow had left him, and
any fear he had felt was rapidly being consumed by the anger rising within him.
“Is this what you would have, then? The burning of all that you’ve ever known
in the service of this … this Gods-damned
quest
of yours?!”

Pehr was shouting by the end of it, hating himself for it but unable to
stop. He knew that Tasha would no sooner sacrifice a single life than he would,
but there was too much anger to let such rational thoughts win out.

Tasha did not return his anger, and she kept her voice soft. “My people are
dying, and so are yours. With or without the Lagos, they will die. You heard
what Allen said … there’s nothing left for us here.”

“There will be nothing left at all!” Pehr cried, and he grabbed her
shoulders. “You’re not the only one who has dreamed, Tasha. I have seen how
this ends: a host of Lagos so great that their coming stains the very sky red
with dust. An
army
of the creatures thousands strong that comes not to
maim or pillage. They will come to eradicate everything ... to wipe every last
man, woman, and child from the plains. That was what I dreamed, and now we’ve
made that dream reality. We have
killed their god
, Tasha. Do you
expect them to forgive us?”

Tasha shook her head, still unfazed. “I do not.”

“Then what? What would you have us do now? What group shall we lead to
Havenmont once they are all dead? Would you have us hide in the city and wait
for the bloodshed to end, or shall we simply go die at their hands like
everyone else and end this pointless waste of time?”

Now at last he had brought Tasha to anger, and he saw her eyes blaze. She
grabbed Pehr’s hands, yanking them from her shoulders and squeezing them hard,
baring her teeth.

“This has
not
been a waste of time!” she snarled. “Don’t you
understand what we’ve
done
here?”

“We’ve damned every last person alive,” Pehr said, pulling away from her
grip. He felt suddenly old. Old and tired. Worn out. Sick.

“We have given them the only chance they will ever have!” Tasha cried. “What
the Lagos might do to them will seem a mercy compared to what will happen
should the Everstorm fail and radiation sweep in upon the land. If it means we
fight to the death, then so be it! This long, slow death that we’ve been going
through since our fathers left us must end.”

Pehr turned away from her, feeling exhausted. He took a few, faltering steps
toward Jace’s body and then fell to his knees, covering his face with his
hands.

“My cousin, I have now failed you twice,” he said, struggling with the
emotions that threatened to overwhelm him. He wanted to fall upon the ground
and beat his fists against it, to tear his hair out, to rend and wreck and
destroy, and to curl into a ball and weep for the slow, sad extinction of
humanity. He wished he had never come to this place, never known of the horror
of the Lagos and the miracles of Havenmont. He wished he could have lived in
peace with Jace and Nani, Truff and Anna, and the rest of his village.