LotS/The Story/Because I'm the Wanderer/Crush (1)

Crush (1)
Existence rushes by. Each little piece of creation flashes from future to present before disappearing into history, gone from sight and mind unless you deign to gaze upon its diminishing form in the rearview mirror.

A twist of the throttle. The engine roars -- a demon raging in hell, bellowing defiance at the deity that damned him, promising eternal rebellion and unending war on heaven. The din is utterly superfluous, an unnecessary affectation that could be shut down with the touch of a button. Utterly superfluous, but completely glorious.

Your right hand slips away from the handlebar. The bike veers to the left before you correct it. On a busy road, that might be the first step towards an unpleasant crash or the mowing down of a pedestrian. But here, on the sun-kissed plain, you'd have to go out of your way to find something to hit. Save for the birds gliding far overhead, little black shapes against the soft blueness of the sky, you could almost imagine you had the entire planet to yourself.

The hand celebrates its newfound freedom by passing the wealth on. It taps the button on the right side of your helmet before returning to its duties and spurring the engine to another hellish cacophony. A series of gentle mechanical clicks and clacks fills the space around your head as the helmet gives way. It pulls back from your face first, like a receding tide, before collapsing away from the sides of your head in turn. Tessellating squares of hard armor and softer shock absorbent material withdraw in a waves of geometric precision, retreating and folding in on themselves until they form a collar around your neck. An almost imperceptible bleep signals its new state of readiness. In the event of a crash, it'll reassert itself.

Gusts of wind kiss and caress your exposed face, run their fingers through your hair like ardent lovers celebrating your speed and mastery.

"Come on, captain! You ride like an old woman!"

The voice spirals its way through your memories, its joy undiluted by the years.

You twist the throttle. The bike zooms forward like the magnificent beast it is, turning the environment into a beautiful blur. Talia's remembered laugh expresses its approval.

Last time you were here, you were riding a military issue cycle. A good enough bike, though an obsolete hunk of junk compared with the exquisite vehicle that thrums with power beneath you now.

It was Talia's idea. Something to celebrate your elevation to captain of Princess Illaria's bodyguard -- one of the most prestigious positions in the Sian military. With that promotion came a period of leave. Ostensibly an opportunity for the honored warrior to meditate and contemplate the nature of her new duties. In reality it was seen as a chance to enjoy a little fun before assuming the role.

The gunslinger first suggested an interstellar pub crawl, a drinking binge that would likely have painted several systems with your combined vomit. You declined, however. If word (or worse yet, holo-vids) got out that a person elevated to so lofty and respected a station was reveling like an unruly teenager... The repercussions would have been undesirable, to say the least. Talia rolled her eyes when you told her that. Then she suggested a bike ride.

"Race you!" she yells.

"Where to?"

"Until something gets in the way!"

You're racing the same path now, albeit without your friend to compete against and mock you after her inevitable victory.

It started as an aimless flight, heading from Varlec out into the depths of space. But when you glanced at the display and saw Eclogue's system on the map, you just couldn't resist its allure.

Sunlight warms your shoulders, cooled by the whirling breeze into something pleasant and soothing, as though the planet is celebrating your decision or its own irresistibility.

It's a pleasant place. A lonely little world that boasts only a single colonized landmass, and that sparsely so. A planet for rustic peace, pastoral calm -- dotted with hobby farms and archaic townships in the style of Earth's distant past. The thought that Talia of all people introduced it to you is amusing beyond measure.

But it's great riding country...

The engine growls in approval, giving vulgar voice to its power. The bike is great too... Your friends filled the Silver Shadow's cargo hold with all manner of things. When you went to check on its store of supplies for the first time, you found great stacks of provisions -- sufficient to feed you for months on end. And that wasn't all. There were enough small arms and crates of protective clothing to equip a small army. Perhaps they didn't know what you'd need, so they just packed locker after locker with your vast collection of weapons and armor.

And there it was, standing proud in the midst of all that useful debris -- gleaming with glorious gold and majestic purple, its sumptuous body shaped in the image of a creature from Chinese mythology. The Dragon Cycle. A vehicle you obtained under the strangest of circumstances, both a challenge and a gift from a well-meaning madman. Its draconic eyes seemed to glitter as they met your own.

You tweak the throttle again. The dragon rumbles its satisfaction, roars its acquiescence.

There's a tree on the horizon, a lone guardian watching over the surrounding plain. As it grows larger, drawn towards you by inexorable velocity, you see that one of its long, twisting branches is dead. It's slowly rotting like a gangrenous limb.

Your right hand relinquishes the handlebar again. This time there's no swerve -- your left is ready to compensate.

The pistol leaves its holster and takes aim. This is so reckless, so stupid, so... Talia.

Your first shot goes wide. In your head the gunslinger laughs.

"Nice try, captain. Leave the fancy shooting to me."

But the second shuts her up. It clips the branch, searing its way through the dead wood. You're going so fast that you're beyond the tree before it falls to the ground. You have to watch your triumph in the rearview mirror.

"Beginner's luck..."

The Doom That Came To Eclogue

The Doom That Came To Eclogue

The planet's twin moons creep into the still-blue sky, mischievous children sneaking out after bedtime to be part of the diurnal bliss or else to simply watch you ride. The silvery orbs -- one large and looming on the horizon, the other a dainty little sphere above her larger sister's shoulder -- complete the image, turning the landscape into a wondrous painting.

Perhaps it's the moons' appearance reminding you of the passage of time, or else their tidal effect on your water-based biology. But whatever the cause, you feel a sudden pang of hunger. Your stomach seems displeased at being neglected for so long, and is making its feelings known in the disagreeable way of disobedient innards.

You didn't leave the Silver Shadow empty-handed. Even amid such bucolic beauty, it never hurts to have a few weapons to hand. It's not likely that any of the UHW's agents could have tracked you here. Not when you flew into the atmosphere aboard a stealth ship. But there's no sense in tempting fate. If someone does confront you, you'd rather they did it whilst looking down a potentially death-spitting barrel.

However, you didn't bring any provisions. And a woman can't live off munitions alone.

When you rode here with Talia, the two of you bought your meals along the way. There were farmhouses and small settlements dotted about the landscape which were keen enough to offer a little rural hospitality to a couple of off-world visitors with credits to spend. Wholesome rustic fare is tempting (your stomach bubbles in agreement) -- and it'd be much quicker to reach a town than return to your ship.

So you turn the bike, placing the moons straight ahead as though you yearned to ride all the way over the edge of the world and onto the larger one's argentine surface.

The ground becomes harder, the grass patchier. Little clouds of dust caper in the air on either side of the Dragon Cycle's wheels. This terrain is familiar. The nearest town is one you've been to before. A quaint little place, built in emulation of a settlement from America's Old West. You remember walking into the saloon and being swamped by the wave of history -- the archaic photographs of long-dead lawmen and criminals on the wood-paneled walls, the pseudo-antique furniture and dialects. If you hadn't known better, you'd have thought the place a tourist trap. But it was how its inhabitants chose to live, with a historical veneer overlaid upon the comforts and conveniences of modern technology.

To each their own. You've seen far stranger things in this universe.

A smile crosses your lips when you recall Talia at the makeshift firing range behind the saloon, a revolver in each hand -- exact reproductions of historical armaments, the names and importance of which now escape you. The barman said he was the best shot in town. But after he saw Talia's marksmanship, the look on his face made you think he was about to drop to one knee and propose.

The smile remains there for some minutes, sustained by pleasant remembrances and anticipation. Then the town comes in sight, rising over the horizon to slap the happiness off your face.

A button on the left handlebar makes the bike fall almost silent, its powerful engine shunning affected anachronism and demonstrating its true capabilities. Another one opens the communications system. But all channels are as noiseless as your vehicle. Something's blocking the signal. Or else the local coms satellite has been disabled...

You twist the throttle. The Dragon Cycle zips across the dusty plain, bringing the grim sight closer and closer, throwing atrocity into sharper and clearer focus.

Buildings have been ravaged, ripped open -- as though ruthless explosions gutted them from within. Ruined structures stare at you for several moments, like the corpses of prisoners mutilated and then strung up as a warning to others. It's only when you get nearer still, slowing the bike and drawing your weapon, that the true extent of the atrocity is unveiled.

The town square is a scene of slaughter. Pools of blood glisten in the sunlight, crimson lakes and rivers that assail your nose with their coppery tang. And the bodies... They've been smashed. Strewn about the square and crushed into great depressions in the ground. It's as though meteors rained down from above in apocalyptic judgment, annihilating the population.

Your gaze roams the sky, searching for a ship or aircraft. But only circling birds mar the blueness.

You dismount, letting the bike's stand hit the dry ground with a soft thud. Weapon raised, you move across the square -- searching for survivors to aid or enemies to punish.

Path of Destruction

Path of Destruction

Inside the buildings there's only wreckage, the detritus of old-fashioned facades and the technology beneath -- an eclectic scattering of electronics and wood, historical clothing and the gadgets of modern leisure. Not a single survivor. Or a single body. The townspeople were all killed outdoors, slain in the streets and the square by whatever weight descended to crush them to death. It's as if they were herded outside for execution.

But of the murderers, the vicious forces responsible for the atrocity, there's no hint -- not a single clue as to their identity.

They haven't left without a trace, however. On the far side of town you find more impressions in the ground, shallower than the impacts which annihilated the victims. These lead off in two directions across the neighboring countryside -- stretching to the horizon. But only one contains crimson, painted with blood from the massacre. Whoever did this went that way, their vehicle marking the route with casual nonchalance.

Perhaps heading for another settlement...

You sprint back to the Dragon Cycle. In moments you're zooming across the plain once more, following the tracks, your mind swimming with images of broken bodies and flowing blood.

It's a walker. Nothing else leaves prints like these. And from their spacing, it's a large one. But who the hell would bring a walker to Eclogue? It's prime terrain for wheeled or tracked vehicles, or for aircraft. Generations of cartoons, toys, and videogames may depict giant mechs in gleeful abundance, but no serious armed forces employ such walkers when another form of vehicle will serve better. This isn't a military assault...

Theories flash through your brain as the ground zips by, still indented with the machine's passage.

You've never heard of space pirates possessing anything like this. And that level of wanton carnage, of casual destruction with valuables left among the debris instead of being snatched up... It isn't their style.

A small building comes over the horizon. It's a farmhouse. Or at least it was... It's been torn apart, just like those in the town. You slow down, scouring your surroundings for any sign of survivors. Again there's only death.

You're no scout, but the signs are so clear that even a simpleton could read them. The walker's footprints leave its former path. They approach the farmhouse. And then...

Two crushed bodies, a man's and a woman's, lie framed by blood and compacted soil.

After that, the tracks continue onward.

A turn of the throttle. Rapid acceleration. You have to reach the next town before the walker does, warn them, rally whatever defense forces they have...

The Colossa

The Colossa

A few hundred yards from the farmhouse there's another corpse, this one splattered and smeared across harder ground. Once more the footprints tell the tale. The attackers, invaders... Whatever they are... They didn't even get out of their vehicle. Instead they ran him down and stomped on him. Then they continued on their way.

The terrain is hillier now, the plain giving way to big mounds and ridges of rock and grass, surmounted by trees. The tracks disappear around them. You start turning the Dragon Cycle to follow.

Then you stop. Was that...

A voice. A woman's voice. Wordless... Moaning in pain. It's soft but loud, as though projected. Yes, there's a faint hint of electronic 'fuzz'.

An image smashes its way into your mind. A lone survivor, an injured woman, crawling over to a broadcast terminal to cry for help -- but managing only a frustrated, agonized moan.

The Dragon Cycle zips round the corner.

Then it stops for a second time. The breath catches in your throat.

The footprints end. They go no further, for the walker went no further. There it is, right before you -- amidst the ruins of a large building. It's sitting.

It isn't a transport. Or a weapons platform. Not a bulky, boxy walker or even a rigid, blocky mech like those you've encountered in the past. It's shaped like a woman -- a titanic, metal, curvaceous female figure lounging among the wreckage as though it were a living being, its head turned skyward. Its movements are lithe, subtle. The shifting of its limbs is fluid, the smooth motions of the fingers that stroke the debris so natural they're somehow chilling.

A giant robot! No mech moves like that! It has to be...

The moan is repeated. It comes from the thing's head. Its upturned jaw even moves, like that of a flesh and blood woman giving voice to the utterance. Its body twitches, shudders, shifts. It's not groaning in pain. It's moaning in ecstasy.

One of its feet presses against the ground, twisting and turning -- grinding -- against the earth. There's one final moan, accompanied by a hard, sharp twist of the foot. Then it rises and moves aside, angling backwards so you can see its sole. There are glowing yellow lights across it, large luminous discs with a network of lines running between them. And there's crimson...

On the ground, where the robot's foot was a moment ago, is a smear of red. A few chunks of unidentifiable gore are all that remain of the person the thing just crushed to a bloody pulp.

Then the robot's head tilts downwards, revealing a face as perfectly shaped as the rest of its body -- as though the entire machine were one great sculpture designed to capture feminine beauty and render it in the unliving coldness of steel.

Bright red eyes fasten on you.

Metal lips widen. The robot giggles.

"I didn't know I had company!"

Time freezes. You stare at the colossal robot, your mind awhirl. It stares at you in turn, an engine of destruction that wears a female smile.

The gear strapped to your bike... Could one of the heavy weapons damage that thing? Are its eyes weak spots, offering a path to sensitive systems? Would you even have time to try? These thoughts and a myriad others batter their way through your brain, a tempest of stratagems for an insane situation.

The robot giggles again.

"Well? Aren't you going to say anything?"

"Who... Who built you?" The question tumbles from your lips. Yes... Get it talking. More time to think, to plan... "You're not a TALOS design."

"Built me?" Its laughter is musical, as lovely as it is terrifying. "Do you think my Crush Colossa's a robot?"

"But..."

"Have you ever seen a robot like this before? What would I be -- a hundred foot tall pleasure bot?" She laughs again. "But I don't suppose you've ever seen a mech like this either..."

The toes of the raised foot wiggle in the air. Their movements are perfect. What the hell kind of mech has lifelike toe motions engineered into it?

"A custom design," she replies, as though reading your thoughts. "My own specifications. Very expensive. Worth every single credit."

"Why?" you ask. The word is foolish, inadequate... One syllable to encompass all this insanity, the slaughter...

"I wanted to squash people, silly!" She laughs once more -- a charming, pretty, seductive laugh. It's the most appalling thing you've ever heard. "I wanted to feel them squish under my feet."

She gives a soft moan of remembered pleasure. The balls of her feet press against the ground.

"You can't imagine what it's like... To move through a town like a girl in a candy store, to rip a building open with your hands, to see the people running out into the street... And then step on them."

She moans the word 'step', as though it were a lover's name. Then she giggles again.

"But sometimes I like something a little different... I talk to a person. Tease them. Toy with them. Before I crush them."

Giant metal feet push against the ground. The Crush Colossa rises, its feminine form towering above you like a wicked goddess.

Riding for Your Life

Riding for Your Life

The Dragon Cycle speeds across the ground, silent and determined, as though it knows it's racing for survival and can't spare the breath to cry out. It zips past the hills, out into the plain beyond.

Footsteps thunder like earthquakes, crashing inside your head.

There are huge grey-brown clouds in the rearview mirror. Everything behind you is one great explosion of dust, broken only by the gargantuan, pounding metal feet.

She's fast... So fast...

The throttle is twisted forward, held in that position in your frantic grip. The bike accelerates, picking up speed with each passing second. But the crashing footsteps are still close, so near and so loud that you expect one of the mech's feet to fall upon you at any moment, smashing your bones, bursting your organs -- leaving you smeared across her sole, crushed like an insect.

"Keep going!" she laughs. Her projected tones are soft and playful, even as her feet crash and thunder. "It's the first time anyone's ever given me a good chase!"

Your eyes leave the rearview mirror, catching something at the periphery of your vision. A huge rock face -- right ahead of you. A range of mountains, breaking the plain.

"You're running out of road, sweetie!"

She thinks she has you. If you turned, veered away from the mountains, she might catch you, stomp you, squish you. But you're not going to do that. She hasn't seen what you've seen...

"No!" she shouts.

Now she has...

The motorcycle flashes across the ground, so fast now that it barely seems to touch the world beneath. It's like you're in your ship, flying through space. The cave mouth is ahead. So close... A gaping black hole offering safety and sanctuary.

Her tread becomes louder -- each crashing, earthshaking step further apart as she runs.

Grasp of the Colossa

Grasp of the Colossa

Her angry scream rings in your ears.

But your bike careens into the cave. There isn't time to slow down. You go in fast, your wheels bumping against the rocks.

The light from the entrance goes dim. In the rearview mirror... A giant metal hand, thrusting its way through the cave behind you. Titanic metal fingers open, ready to grab and crush -- or to seize and capture, to pull you out so that she can step on you like all the others, moan with pleasure as she squishes you underfoot.

Bachanghenfil

Bachanghenfil

Something jars under the bike. It hits something... Turns, twists, slides like an injured animal in its death throes. You fall, thrown as though from a bucking horse. The bike screeches on, sliding deeper into the cave amid a shower of sparks.

The world is slow. Each agonizing detail is crystal-clear to your fighter pilot's brain as it unfolds. The Crush Colossa's grasping hand rushes towards you. Tessellating plates move around your body, the biker gear's protective systems triggered by your unceremonious dismount.

You hit the ground hard. But the armor is in place. It absorbs the shock as you roll and tumble, bump and bang against the rock. When you come to a stop, sprawled on your chest, you're alive and unbroken.

"Where are you?" the woman howls.

Metal fingers claw at stone, thudding and scraping. But you're out of reach.

You gasp as you scramble to your hands and knees, exhaling relief like a thick mist.

The colossal hand slaps against the ground. A tremor undulates across the cave, tickling your body as it filters through the shock absorbent layer. Then the great metal limb withdraws, slithering back out of the cave mouth by degrees like an immense serpent.

The hand vanishes. Sunlight pools on the ground by the entrance. Then darkness returns, as an expanse of metal and a glowing red eye fill the opening.

"Maybe I'll come back for you later," she hisses. "After I've squashed everyone else on this little ball of rock."

The Colossa's face disappears.

There's a crash. It booms its way through the cave, making the entire world shudder around you. Then another. And another. The pounding blows of giant metal fists, reverberating from wall to wall in a hellish cacophony. Rock trembles. Then it gives way. Tons and tons of it, collapsing beneath the assault, smashing down in a massive heap of tumbling stone and surging dust.

The mouth of the cave is blocked, choked by the Colossa's vindictive assault.

There's one final laugh, cold and cruel. Then the faint thud of her departing footsteps.

Entombed in darkness... For one long, seemingly endless moment, it's like a starless void -- black and silent. Then something growls behind you, a low bestial sound that shivers along your bones. It's followed by a shuffling, lumbering noise.

You whirl round and press a button on the left side of your helmet. A broad beam of light pierces the blackness. It illuminates the face of a hulking monster, a great yellow-brown mass of thick muscle and armored hide, with big curved claws at the ends of its arms.

The creature blinks in the sudden brightness, stunned by the rush of light. Then it roars, revealing a maw filled with vicious teeth.

---

You duck, throwing yourself into a roll and letting the monster's huge claws flail above your head.

A bellowing roar echoes across the cave as you rise into a crouch beside the Dragon Cycle. It's followed by a series of fleshy pops.

Thick spikes push their way up from the creature's shoulders and the outsides of its arms -- forming a fresh layer of brutal weaponry that threatens to rend flesh and break bone. It's as though the thing were covered in primordial switchblades... Two more pop out from its head, creating a pair of demonic horns. The beast roars again. But the sound is different this time, bearing an unmistakable note of challenge -- almost arrogance.

Two can play at that game... You reach towards the motorcycle and unhook something from its side. Then you stand, brandishing it before you in a combat stance. You don't know if the creature's ever seen a sword before. Either way, it doesn't seem impressed. Until you press a button, and green energy flashes across its blade.

The monster growls. It charges, arms raised high -- claws ready to descend with tearing, bludgeoning might. You lunge and thrust.

Your sword passes through its face, plunging into the middle of its grotesque features in a large but precise incision. Emerald energy parts flesh and bone and brain, until it burns its way through the back of the thing's skull.

For a moment it stands there, arms still aloft as though it's being held at gunpoint. Then it topples backwards, slipping off your sword with a soft hiss of seared flesh, and thuds against the rock.