II - Micah
A lone woman strode through the ruined halls of the Eventide Complex, the icy floors creaking as she walked over them, sure of her footing. Icicles clung to the metal roof, and a sheet of frost lay glazed over the walls, obscuring the smooth metal and chipped paint. Each door she passed led to a dark, cold room, or was simply frozen shut. The only illumination shimmering into the hallway was a thin strip of sunlight, barely shining past the huge piles of snow that lay up against the windows.
A Ghost had sent a distress beacon to any nearby Guardian channels. Micah-10 had answered the call. Her ship was mounted upon a lake of blue ice across the facility, and she had spent hours circling the many sunken buildings, each potential doorway either completely destroyed or buried under a treacherous amount of ice and snow. Finally, she had scaled the rime of a glassy cliff, and found an unobscured access panel atop the peak. From her vantage atop the building, she had seen a Fallen skiff mounted to the steel bridging of a nearby building, with a perilous scrap-metal platform lashed to the ship for ease of access. She had not seen the Fallen, but their work was shaky and often fell apart. If she saw it, they lurked somewhere nearby. The aliens had hung their ravaged banner from the side of the building, blue with a complex symbol adorning it. Micah did not recognize the shape, but she had been confined to Earth for all of her second life. Outside its orbit, she was a stranger.
She slid down a snowbank and entered a large atrium, with huge pillars of ice stretching from floor to ceiling. The beacon pinged louder, signaling that she was close. Micah was dressed in brown leathers, with a hood stretched over her metal skull. Knives were strapped to nearly every spot on her body, in all varieties, and a shock pistol was holstered at her hip. As she inspected the large room, a static shimmer caught her eye. It moved slowly, flashing in and out of her sight as it moved along the upper wall of the room. In a flash, she slung a large knife at the glinting mass, which shrieked in pain. A Fallen vandal fell to the ground, dead and revealed; its cloaking device severed by the thrown blade.
A chorus of clicks and roars echoed throughout the room. Fallen pirates dropped from the ceiling and clambered up through vents in the floor; they brandished voltic cutlasses and shock pistols in their many arms. They were draped in blue and white and alien fur. They too had to contend with the frigid cold of the planet. Carbon tubing ran from packs on their backs and chest and into their gaping mouths, feeding them a rationed supply of their Ether, their lifeblood. A dreg lunged at her, his dagger crackling with charge. She grabbed a knife from her belt and parried it easily, sending him reeling back in surprise, she crouched and rolled, ducking under a tracer bolt from a wall-mounted sharpshooter. She came out of the roll and swung wide at the dreg's throat, slicing it open and spewing white, glowing mist out into the air. She ran forward, heading straight for a group of Fallen huddled in the corner. They opened fire on her, sending a barrage of blue, dancing projectiles humming through the air, most finding their mark. She shrugged off the pain and threw herself into a flying kick, slamming one of the aliens into the hard metal wall. They both fell to the ground, and she rolled over, dodging a stabbing cutlass, aimed for her chest. She was at the feet of another, who she quickly brought to their knees with a swift stab in the leg. She kicked up, slamming her boots into its face, and jumping backward into a crouch at the same time. Four lay dead, three remained.
She pulled her own shock pistol from her hip and fired behind her, catching another as he ran up to run her through, the bolts eating through his carapace and cutting into his organs. A shot sizzled through the air and caught her in the belly, throwing her backward. The sharpshooter scuttled along the walls, using his six limbs to quickly maneuver over the frost and metal. Micah fired off more bolts, but the Fallen swung down the wall past them, his rifle heating up for another energized shot. Micah dodged behind a pillar of ice, the shot blasting into the chilled column and sending shards of blue crystal scattering across the room. Micah ran out the other side and sprinted to the ground beneath the sharpshooter. Feeling the Light in her boots, she leaped upward, grabbing the enemy in a vice-like hold and bringing them both careening into the hard ground. He was on top of her, and quickly he grabbed one of her knives and plunged it into her chest, the blade cutting through metal and circuitry as it tore through her. She grabbed the assailant's neck and broke it, throwing him off of her, lifeless.
There was one left, a hulking captain covered in white armor, with a bright blue, tattered cloak draped over him. He hefted an energy spear over his head, and each of his lower arms unsheathed shock daggers from his hips. Micah's knife grew white hot, smoke cascading down her wrist. The captain charged at her, swinging his array of weapons wildly. Unexpectedly, he jumped, slamming into Micah and cutting her with an arsenal of charged steel. She drove her dagger into his chest, sending an incendiary explosion rocketing through his body. He was blown off of her, and he fell, dead, to the ground nearby. Micah lay still, her wounds overtaking her will to stand. Her Ghost, Twister, blinked into existence beside her.
"Did you get them?" He asked sarcastically.
"Seems like it. Help me, smartass."
Twister passed over her, repairing her wounds and mending her destroyed chassis. In a matter of minutes, she leapt to her feet, and began collecting the knives of the felled Fallen.
"Say what you want about these things, but they know how to make a knife."
"Surprising. All the shit I've seen them make is rusted over and falling apart."
The two strode down a corridor as the distress beacon pinged louder in Micah's sensors. She ducked into an older room, the lights blinking on and off in the ceiling above. It was an old dormitory, filled with rows of double beds. She ducked under one and pulled out a metal box, and cleaved it open. A Ghost flew out, and she shut down her ping.
"By the Light of the Traveler, thank you!" He cried out in utter joy.
"It's what I do." Micah answered simply, her eyes looking past the Ghost, into a neighboring bunk.
"I-I've been locked in that box for years, I-I wasn't sure I'd ever find my way out…" The Ghost looked down, speechless and amazed, wondering at the great fortune he had come across.
Micah had picked up a rotting penguin plush from the bed. It was dressed in a miniature, bright orange, astronaut outfit.
Twister came up behind her, also ignoring the newly freed Ghost. "Micah?"
"I'm keeping this thing. It seems… nostalgic." She turned, "What's your name, Ghost?"
The Ghost's voice was quiet and full of wonder, "Last I was in the City, they called me Jade." His shell was indeed a deep green. He seemed unsure of himself, what to say, how to act after so long.
Micah huffed, her hope of getting no name another Ghost gone. "Alright, Jade. Me and Twister here are heading over there now, if you wanna come."
"Uh, yes. Absolutely. I've had enough of this icy rock. Not that I've been, uh, out. Out and about." His thoughts moved so fast his words couldn't keep up.
Micah squeezed through a tiny window, arms first, and pulled the rest of her body through the tight gap. She was halfway up the building, and she leapt down and landed in a snowbank, the two Ghosts hovering down behind her. The sky was a deep, dark blue, with twinkling stars scattered across it. Jupiter dominated the horizon, its angry red spot boiling and seething. The three moved down a frozen embankment, the buried ruins of the Eventide Complex stagnant behind them, doomed to lie frozen for eternity.
Micah's last act on Earth had been a theft. Spacefaring ships were rare, and so she had lied to and killed an Iron Lord, named Dryden, and stolen his ship. The Iron Lords would not leave Earth to pursue her, but she worried about their retribution. They had famously good memory. Dryden was specifically a spiteful son of a bitch. It would not be surprising if he had placed a longstanding warrant on her in the City.
She climbed into the cockpit, shutting the hatch once the Ghosts had entered, and sprawled herself across the seat.
Micah's stolen ship touched down in the City for the first time in decades. She landed in a field on the outskirts, with the Traveler looming overhead, its great metal hull floating silently above the many people and buildings of the city. She left furtively, drawing a huge plastic tarp over the ship and tying it down. Nobody was around. The closest structure was a yawning tower of scaffolding near the very edge of the city. Both human workers and automatons worked on the structure. The people were building a wall.
A woman approached Micah, who quickly finished concealing the ship under a pile of plastic and wiring. The woman was short, a good head lower than Micah. She wore dark clothing, and a blue scarf was wrapped around her neck. Her hair was pulled back into a tight bun, and she looked tired, with sinking bags under her eyes. Besides her face, she was covered in tattoos.
"Oy, Micah!" The woman shouted over at her friend, the first words spoken between them in years, and yet no fondness was lost. "Haven't seen you around for a while!"
Micah grinned, and shouted back, "Tallulah! Glad to see the place hasn't fallen apart!"
Tallulah gave a rueful smile, "It's a lot of work, Micah. A lot of work."
Micah reached her, and placed a hand on her shoulder. "That's what you get for being so damn quick." She embraced her. "It's been too long. I think I'll be hanging around for a while."
Twister cut in, "Micah? What about the, uh, the ship?"
Micah stepped away from her friend, now wary. She looked around, scanning to make sure no figures in gilded armor lurked in the field. It was clear. A low wind drifted over the cut grass, bringing with it the echoing noise of the city. Talking, metal scraping, engines rumbling.
Tallulah stared at her friend. Micah-10, the legendary Den-Mother, acting paranoid.
"Micah? What's up?"
"Have the Iron Lords said anything about… me? Am I in any trouble?"
Tallulah raised her eyebrows. "Micah, you've been gone for way too long."
"What?"
"They're fucking dead, Micah. The Iron Lords are gone."
Micah and Twister were shocked. Jade seemed apathetic.
Micah asked, eager for information. "What the hell happened? All of them? They're all dead? Weren't there, like, hundreds?"
"Not all, there's a few left. But the Iron Temple's abandoned. No one's maintaining it. Felwinter is dead."
"Damn, Felwinter too? He was one of the good ones. One of the few good ones. What happened?"
Tallulah crossed her arms in recollection, "They all gathered together to raid a golden age bunker, and they activated its defenses. Have you really not heard? It happened a while ago."
"No, I haven't heard. I would've come back sooner if I didn't think they were gonna get me."
Tallulah stepped back; her arms still crossed. "Now, this is what I'd like to hear. What exactly did you do to them?"
"I stole one of their ships." Micah gestured to the wrapped-up form parked behind her.
"One of the FTL ones? I'd be pissed, too. Who's ship was it?"
"Lord Dryden? You heard of him?"
"Never. He must have been high up, or he wouldn't have had the ship."
Micah questioned further, "Do you know if he survived?"
"Not sure. Y'know, there's a Lord staying here in the city, just ask them."
"Which one? Half of them are assholes."
"Lord Saladin Forge."
"Haven't heard of him. Hopefully that's a good sign. Thanks, Tallulah. Can we catch up later tonight? I wanna sort this out before I start unwinding."
Tallulah smiled slightly, "Sure, Micah. I'll be done with work late, I'll message you."
"I've missed you, Tallulah. Thanks for the info."
Micah embraced her friend, gave her a short squeeze, and ran off toward the City's core. Tallulah sighed and stretched her shoulder, before moving in the same direction, slower. She wasn't eager to get back to work.
Micah ran over the short, patchy grass, which slowly became cleared ground, then gravel, and finally paved roads. The City grew in size and scale around her as she progressed deeper. Large transports hauled material to buildings on the outskirts, slowly expanding the reach of the urban environment. The corpse of the Traveler, the space god that had brought humanity to its highest, hung in the sky above the city, a great quartz orb.
Micah entered the core, a bustling bazaar full of light and sound. People and vehicles were packed together and moved in concentric lines, with buildings and vendors lining the roads, advertising their wares with neon signs. Lord Saladin stood out among the crowd, his iron armor gleaming with the fluorescent wash of color that poured over the many people. He was shorter than most Iron Lords, and he stood quite a bit shorter than Micah. What he lacked in height, he made up for in sturdiness. He was broad, with huge, flat shoulders covered in wide pauldrons. He was purchasing a large belt of ammunition, and slowly feeding it into his machine gun, his movements stiff and mechanical.
Heads turned as Micah waded through the crowd, workers and citizens watched her tall, wiry frame bob through the swathes of people, slowly and deftly. She stood behind Saladin, who stood twenty centimeters shorter than her. He turned, slinging his machine gun over his back. He had short hair and dark skin, his mouth was permanently stuck in a grimace, his eyes hard, his skin rough.
"Den-Mother," he said roughly. His voice was like gravel.
"How many Iron Lords survived?" Micah spoke loudly, trying to shout out the tumultuous crowd.
Saladin's lip twitched, his grimace deepening. "Why do you ask?"
"I need to know if Dryden is still alive."
Saladin's eyes widened. He gestured for her to follow him, and the two walked off down a thin alleyway, away from the noise and bustle of the core. The alley was littered with trash, metal junk and decaying plastic material. The sounds of the street echoed against the walls of the buildings, and Saladin's gear creaked and rattled with every step he took. They emerged into an empty lot, so close to the teeming core, yet so empty. Saladin's steed sat parked in the corner, a bronze machine, thin and beautiful, hovering silently against a gray brick wall.
Saladin turned, addressing Micah, who sheepishly stood before him, much less impressive and regal. He said, "What leads you to ask about Dryden?"
Micah scratched the back of her head, taken aback by the seriousness of the situation. "Well, I stole his ship."
Saladin snorted, his eyebrows raising, "The Den-Mother, a thief?"
"Well, if you knew him, you'd know he was an asshole."
"Indeed, he was," Saladin muttered. "There was a man. He ran an establishment at the foot of Felwinter Peak. One day, he climbed the mountain and asked an audience with Lord Felwinter. He showed Felwinter something, and next I heard Felwinter had gone to kill Dryden and strip him of his titles."
The crowd boomed from beyond the alley. Micah's mouth widened, relief slowly tingling at the back of her head. "He's dead?"
"He ran." Saladin spoke simply, his face contorting in disgust. "He was unbefitting of the iron he wore, truly. I hope the wolves devoured him whole."
He strode over to his sparrow, his steed, and mounted it, his metal boots falling cleanly onto iron pedals, the machine's engine humming to life. Micah stood with her arms at her side, defeated. "So, he's alive?"
"Perhaps. Keep the ship, Den-Mother. The Iron Lords are relics of the past, and so are our creations." His machine floated higher off the ground, the thrusters on the back shooting sputtering orange flames into the still air of the lot.
Micah remembered something. "Lord Saladin, what was the name of the man who turned Dryden in?"
Saladin sat upon his craft for a moment, contemplating.
"Wu Ming."
He shot off down another alley, his steed weaving between people and transports on its way out of the city. Micah stood with Twister and Jade in the alley, listening to the roaring of Saladin's thrusters slowly fall among the many sounds reverberating throughout the City. The sky was darkening, lights flickering on across the Last City.
Jade spoke slowly, making sure his words meant exactly what he wanted them to. "Micah, I… I've been away too long. I know my… my Risen is close. I can feel them, somewhere out there, somewhere relatively nearby. Maybe only a few hundred kilometers. I appreciate you for letting me out of that box, but… I'm leaving." He flew down the alley they had come from.
Micah was broken out of her thoughts, "Shit, what?" She looked after him, "Jade! Stop!" He had already disappeared amongst the crowd. Micah stayed put.
Twister said, "Shouldn't you go after him?"
"He's gone. Fuck. Ghosts never seem to know how much danger they're in." She looked back towards Saladin's exit, staring off into nothing.
"Wu Ming, huh? I'll thank him if I ever meet 'em."
Micah retreated back to the noisy din of the street. It would be a long night back in the City, but it was home. She rummaged through her memories and found Tallulah's address, and started making her way there.