Just after dawn, the silhouette of the city emerged from the horizon as a shadowed contour. The Senior Operator ceased her idle humming and drove in silence.
"A city."
This journey, spanning nearly a month, was drawing to its inexorable close. The sight of urban sprawl after so long felt starkly novel—new structures had risen where none stood before, and the once-still metropolis pulsed with constrained vitality.
We halted at the inspection gate, awaiting clearance.
Even in that brief interlude, the Senior Operator pored over medical texts via hologram. Since the incident with my wound, she had redoubled her self-flagellation, pushing her tolerances to their limits.
After I'd intervened—witnessing her use stimulants far exceeding my own dosage—she had forsaken such idle respites entirely. I kept my gaze fixed forward beside her.
As I peered through the sealed gate toward the building's distant lights, a voice emanated from beside us.
"Later than anticipated. I expected you last night. Was the wound that severe?"
The Doctor. He gestured faintly on the screen, facing us with polarized luminescence flickering at his back—not the pristine gray walls of his usual office.
Receiving no reply from either of us, he scratched his vizor and relayed our entry vector. As his connection severed, the barrier concealing us dissipated, and the path irised open.
A city. Profound and radiant, yet cloaked in shadow.
We slipped quietly into its umbral embrace.
The city's topography had transmogrified beyond its distant outline. No true horizon remained. Lengthy thoroughfares had yielded to contiguous building clusters; experiments demanding space were sequestered in dedicated facilities. This was a metropolis distilled to its essence: research apparatuses, sterile equipment, and austere voids—high-rise spires entangled like a thicket of thorns.
Yet amid this, an open expanse had materialized. A manufactory, perhaps. The Senior Operator betrayed no alteration in expression, though her thermals spiked steadily. Surprise. Or duty's inexorable pull.
"To the site. The Doctor is on the fifth floor."
"Affirmative. Moving out."
We circumnavigated the skeletal framework of some apparatus—still raw girders—and ascended the chain-link stairs. The device visible from the treads bore scant resemblance to any vessel.
The Senior Operator registered no reaction. I, however, could not suppress my skepticism. No matter the angle, it evoked not mobility, but an offensive main battery.
I craved explication.
Was this the marvel meant to astonish me? What did they fabricate? What imperative drove it? For what end? If my assessment held, what prey demanded such ordnance?
Suppressing the cascade of queries, I crested the stairs and unsealed the flimsy metal door. Beyond lay a spartan chamber: manipulation consoles and screens overlooking the factory floor. The Doctor welcomed us alongside assorted researchers.
He manipulated a hologram wordlessly, appended instructions to a subordinate, then approached, skirting my still-ruddy wing.
"Good work. I'd grant you respite, but regrettably, all leave—annual, half-day, what have you—has been prospectively denied for the coming year. So, your next directive."
He extracted a terminal from his pocket, interfaced it with the display, and stepped aside. The researcher he'd addressed doused the room's lights.
"Schematics," I noted.
The Doctor nodded, then spoke.
"Blueprints for the apparatus under construction. Ama-10, you'd intuit its purpose, no?"
He canted his head toward the Senior Operator. A cue for her to brief. She interpreted it as such and opened.
"Orbital frame laser cannon. Yield approximately twentyfold that of mining lasers. An item whose deployment license would never issue here. Military armaments from a non-militarized research site. Unprecedented."
"Enough. You need know no more. Ignorance bestows its own benedictions at times. You'll learn when required. You as well."
Concluding with me, he advanced the display. There, a terse video: a colossal organism displacing earth. At a glance, it dwarfed 160 meters—mountainous in scale.
"We intend to reforge that into a vessel. Waiving minutiae, our constraints are time and budget. Your remit: monitor targeting and precision telemetry. Indefinite, but projected at two weeks—shorter than your prior sortie."
He appended:
"Not commencing immediately, of course. Treatment imperatives intervene, and the target's motility remains tractable within drone survey range. Grace period: two days. Use it for maintenance and recuperation."
The Senior Operator's eyes narrowed as his words concluded; she exited abruptly. Through the momentarily ajar door, drone rotors whined discordantly.
The Doctor regarded me alone in the chamber, then spoke first—but I preempted.
"Ah. Got my answer. Returning now."
He deflated with a hiss, rigidifying. Leaving him thus, I descended the stairs.
The Doctor's promised two days elapsed with velocity. Wing inspections, therapies, scant convalescence complete—departure loomed anew. This sortie included no vehicle; drones accompanied instead.
"Presuming you know drone protocols, attention to caveats: the specimen exhibits telepathic faculties. Neural corridor transduction, perhaps—data inconclusive; suffice awareness. Range maxes at 500 meters, averages 300 to 400. Within, prioritize drone feeds over visual."
The Doctor issued parting injunctions. The Operator who'd ferried us handed over the drone-laden case and cautioned.
"May not affect you two, but prior observation crews lost two or three per shift—will attrition or nocturnal aberrance. Drone protocols mitigated, yet feedback through feeds occurred. Caution advised. Details in your dossiers."
"Understood. Rally point: 30 meters upslope. Anomalies report immediate; briefings dawn and dusk. Safe return."
The Operator tousled my head—mindful of our disparity—before boarding and departing. Ignoring the receding vehicle, the Senior Operator scaled the hill on foot. Modest elevation by local metrics, yet the barren wilds afforded unobstructed sightlines.
"Linkage gear primed. Comms nominal. Frequencies clean, no drop. Prior drones consolidated at far edge, per brief."
As she emplaced her gear, I audited the legacy kit. Most functioned within tolerances; contaminated units the researcher mentioned were excised. En route to inspect residual drones in their crate, an anomalous resonance registered.
The signature anti-grav whine from days prior. Ducking low, I peered. The case thrashed, emitting muffled thrum like a jar of captive wasps.
I forwent the cliché of solitary, horror-reel approach.
Yelling for the Senior Operator, I summoned her posthaste. She arrived swift, her aide growling low at the crate. She pinned it and demanded report. I relayed the Operator's caveats and drone malfunction vector; sans hesitation, she mandated seal and stasis.
"No surplus for reclamation crew this instant. Self-disposal lacks anomaly intel. Contagion vector unclear. Imperatives: maintain status quo, interdict escalation."
She omitted that multiple drones animated within—her aide's warning rumble obviated articulation. The crate, fracturing under battering impacts, emitted buckling shrieks discordant to its design tolerances. Outmatched by internals rampant beyond its structural remit, it reached criticality.
Dozens of drones erupted unfettered, scattering. My sidearm cleared leather.
In that instant, the third tenant in my corpus stirred from reticence, asserting volition.
The insectile drones halted in sync, canting toward me.
Behaving as beasts issuing territorial warns to an intruder predator, they amplified signature tones and accelerated.
The spectacle evoked a modicum of visceral dread.
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