A Soldier’s Horizon

Chapter 1

Chapter 1

A red-black line wider than his thumb appeared on his patterned thigh between one blink and the next. Cold, then hot followed the first instant of numbness as Selati’s dark scales peeled away in the same way he had seen an overseer split the skin of an orange apart. Pain lanced through his hip when the first dollop of blood overran the jagged edge in his hide. The gasp was corked with his sharp teeth.

Whispers of concern swept the tunnel. Frightened eyes met Selati when he glanced up. Injury, large or small, was a potential death sentence down in the bowels of Ilmare. Selati slapped a hand over the gouge in his scales and beckoned the closest construct to him, an albino named Lausai. “Get me the glue,” Selati asked, trying to keep his voice no louder than the wind whistling past the mine opening. The overseers would be vicious if they heard Selati speak.

Lausai crept across the floor, his creamy yellow hide hushed over the dirt and little stones, over to one of three baskets where their few tools were kept. There wasn’t much light to see the tube well, but Selati knew by the size of it, slim and no bigger than his index finger, the glue Lausai had clenched in his hand was the same one his crew used to seal splits in the wooden beams holding up the shaft. Selati’s skin tightened and a cold sweat beaded along his forehead.

His friend, and from what little he understood of friends Lausai was one, handed over the hateful substance without a word. A faint tension around the slitted gold eyes gave away Lausai’s trepidation. It was an expression Selati probably mirrored.

One of the others, a construct even bigger than Selati named Bunici, slung both arms around Selati’s chest and upper arms from behind. Fingers shook as he twisted the stubborn cap off the tube. The rancid, pungent fumes seemed to spin into a lazy thread aimed right for the nose. Selati’s jaw started to ache with the need to gag on the odor.

Cool gel spread across his fingers when he gathered some of the glue up on his free hand. He didn’t let himself think about it. Selati pressed his fingers to his palm, spreading the nasty gel across the whole of his hand.

Selati swiped his hand across the gouge in his hip, pressed hard over the center, like he was trying to remove a foul bit of mud from his hide. The numbness persisted for a moment, maybe two.

Fiery pain shot out in all directions through his scales and all the way up to his ribs. Selati’s breath hitched behind his teeth. Muscles seized under his skin, corded and bulging in Bunici’s impossible grip. His tail whipped through the black dust of the floor and collided with something. Scales and flesh slid around his limb. The fire spread until it burned in his eyes, a haze of dark red streaks and charcoal fog.

A voice whispered into the hair at the back of Selati’s neck. Messy long vowels and soft consonants, unintelligible. Words lost in the smoke filling his ears. Time stretched in the dark as the fire guttered out in his blood.

“…I need to pull you farther into the tunnel, Selati.” Bunici’s arm bunched and loosened around his chest as the dirt scraped the thick subcaudal scales of his tail. When had Bunici covered his mouth?

Selati nodded into the big construct’s chest. Breath rushed past the top of his head and Bunici eased his hand away from Selati’s face. The ground settled as his work mate rocked back onto his bright green speckled hide. Whatever had his tail released it, the thump of it hitting the dust sending a spiteful shock through his body. Selati managed to hold in a shout. He was panting too hard for any other sound.

Bunici withdrew his arm and rested it on Selati’s shoulders instead. Selati darted a glance up at his friend, caught those pale eyes assessing him. He turned his gaze to the big gash in his body. Such a mess.

The glue was already set. Blood had mixed into the clear liquid and made a shell of warped redness, bubbles trapped in the glue. His blood must have frothed with the substance when he smeared it over. The wound would stay that way for weeks.

Despair outlined the pain of his body. They were all going to die down in this disgusting hole, forever digging at the rocks in search of precious cobalt for the humans who created them. Live their whole lives in darkness and misery. No warmth. No sunlight.

“You need rest, Selati.” Bunici tried to herd him along toward the least ravaged wall where a shallow depression had been worn into the hard dirt floor. Their whole crew, ten in all, huddled together for sleep, trying to stay warm in the cold nights. So many heavy, big bodies in a tight space eked out the curve. It was better than nothing, and still leagues above the sterile factory where he was made.

Then, unlike now, Selati didn’t know he wasn’t supposed to sleep upright. Even after the humans had programmed him, it took him collapsing into an exhausted heap to figure out a prone position was better for rest. Yet another piece of negligence or cruelty at the hands of the makers. Why were they treated with so much indifference? Selati and his crew were more than machines for mining. Definitely more than the vats constructs were grown in.

Selati blinked, the burn in his eyes an irritant. His eyes burned all the time, whether they were working on extraction or sleeping or eating. Something made his eyes burn a lot in the dark. His chest didn’t always hurt when it happened. Maybe two different irritants. Selati wished he knew.

Pings and clanks filtered from the far end of the shaft while Bunici helped him lie down in the cold sleep space. His friend kept his torso off the floor with his big hands as Bunici slid into place, back propped against the wall and truly massive lower half coiled in a loose curve, to keep Selati from wandering off later. He knew this tactic. Selati had done this same thing for others when they were injured.

The scales under his cheek were cool to the touch, but flexible. Blunt fingers carded through his short, rough cut hair. Touch was something precious among them, given freely for the simple joy of it. Bunici’s easy caress made the pain in his hip fade some, and Selati whispered his thanks.

Bunici didn’t answer back. His friend wasn’t big on chatter at all. Selati was used to it by now. The dark beckoned instead, whether Selati shut his eyes or not. Deep in the blacker shadows was where he lost his thoughts.

Time didn’t move right down in the mine. In the Facility, clocks were one of many constants, like the steel and plastic fakery of the place. The too-bright lights overhead. The slight red tinge to every surface, thanks to the red giant Caniea. At least the Facility, cold and empty, had a set day cycle and night cycle, with the lights controlled on a timer. None of Selati’s crew had seen the sun in months. Years?

Mind wobbled around for a long period, with Selati focused for some of the time, and hazy for others. The gash throbbed with his fast heartbeat, fast like the wind through trees on a gusty day. That was the last time he had been outside the mine. Humans had marched them from the Facility to a strange box and he woke in the dark tunnel, closer to the top. But a storm hovered over them on the whole march, the air charged and heavy, wind roaring past his ears.

Bunici moved, but another took his place. Selati’s mind spun down into the dark.

The other, Racani if the red-green-black scales were to be believed, moved, and another took his place. The dark kept his attention, both inside and out.

Cold was constant in his life. Red heat from Caniea at his back was the one good memory he had, found between the merciless metal building where he began and the choking darkness below. Selati wanted to see the sun again. The need beat in time with his damaged body.

Tahahi came after, scales pale pink and gray, and it was somewhere in the midst of his watch of Selati that Selati came to one inescapable conclusion.

He refused to die down here.

More, he refused to allow the others to die in some filthy hole in the ground, where their existence meant ending by inches and infection and sorrow. Breath scraped his lungs, pressed them hard into his sides, a gasp of pain and anger. Those were easy to recognize, they were with him so long.

The slim hand in his hair stopped. Selati didn’t look up at him, because he was pretty sure Tahahi was blind, and growled with all the rage buried in his heart. “We won’t die down here.”

“No,” Tahahi murmured, a voice with very little strength. “I’m certain we will leave before that.”

Selati didn’t question him. Tahahi had a way of knowing things would happen before they actually did. It was uncanny. No one asked Tahahi how he knew the things he did, though Selati thought it must be compensation for his eyesight. On more than one occasion, his foresight had saved someone from gross injury, if not death, from tunnel collapse or the human overseers.

Hip throbbing still, dull but a deep cacophony from the inside, Selati managed to get his tail under him. He swooned for a few seconds and scraped his hand on the jagged rock wall when he caught himself. A battered hand was far better than landing on his face.

Every inch of grit from the floor seemed to dig under his scales as he moved back into the main work area. If Selati never saw this hole in the ground for the rest of his life, long or short, it would be too soon. All eyes turned his way when he came to a stop against the edge of the wall they were excavating. Lines spanned the faces of his whole crew, etched deep from exhaustion and too little of the necessities.

Selati smiled as they closed in on him, questions whispered about his injury and if he would make it. Somehow, this ragtag group of constructs had become his friends, bound through the hardship they faced. None of them were from his birth batch, but they were all the family he needed, if he understood the concept right. Humans were notoriously vague on things they thought he’d never have use for. Constructs were mindless animals to humans, after all. The creator, curse its name, saw to that lie.

“We’re not going to die down here,” Selati whispered. It felt like a demand, a declaration of war against the humans who kept them trapped. The words felt right. “We’re not going to die down here.”

Hushed gasps of shock or murmurs of agreement raced through the group huddled around him, tails swishing over the floor in agitation. Excitement gleamed in a few, made the rich colors of their eyes bright in the dark. Trepidation shadowed the rest. Selati understood those who showed anxious hesitation. Better the dark they knew, than the uncertain light of the wider world, no matter how big or small it was.

Lausai, close to the wall were Selati leaned, scowled. “That’s a fine idea, but we haven’t any weapons to fight the overseers.”

Behind the first loose line of constructs Asui, a construct covered in a perpetual layer of muddy dust, bared his fangs in fierce pride. “Have you seen the size of these overseers? Alone, neither you nor I have a chance to take them down because of their zap sticks, but all ten of us together can tear them apart like they were stale bread.”

“Asui’s right.” Bunici scraped along the floor until he stopped next to Tahahi. “I have waited, bided my time to say anything until Selati was ready, but we need to leave this place.”

The constructs moved, undulated until they bunched in close to Selati, much like the pile they slept in for warmth. Voices dropped even lower. Selati strained to hear them all.

“Where would we go?” Heki, a small construct by their standards and red as the sun, hissed at Bunici. “As we were brought here, all I saw was the Facility and some trees. We have no idea what’s out there.”

“Somewhere far from this cursed mine,” Nausai answered. He was one of the fearful, Selati could tell, though his friend was doing his best to hide it.

Heki slunk back a partial length. Guilt plucked at Selati, a foreign feeling he’d felt a handful of times in his short life. He didn’t like it at all, but Heki couldn’t infect the others with his doubt if they wanted to succeed.

“We have to win. If we try and fail, the overseers will kill the whole lot of us, so those who survive don’t taint the replacements with the idea,” Selati said, firm with the knowledge of his words. He had heard, when he was first awakened in the vats, of exactly that outcome from a couple of humans talking close to his tank. The conversation held no meaning for him at the time, but the memory surfaced crystal clear. Even the acrid chemical smell he was immersed in stung his nose for a moment.

“How do you expect us to fight the humans?” Kuypi asked. “They have the zap sticks and those noisy barrels. Nothing protects us from the barrels.”

Kuypi had a point. The noisy barrels, which Selati had never heard the human name for, were especially bad. After a batch of constructs were loaded up with the basics of function in their tasks, humans took them outside, selected one of the new constructs and brought it to the front of the batch. The barrel was pointed at the construct and then it made a bang like rocks hitting rocks. Blood showed up in a round spot on the construct and the construct would crumple up to die in the grass.

“Perhaps we should ambush them in the dark,” Tahahi said. “Humans are less active at night, just as we are.”

A thoughtful pause passed through the crew. Selati wasn’t as tuned into the world around him, not like Tahahi seemed to be, but he had noticed that about their overseers. The humans stayed to themselves when they weren’t harassing Selati or the others, sitting and chattering to each other close to the mouth of the tunnel.

There was a small problem, however. “When should we ambush them? Now? In a few days?”

“Now,” Bunici answered at once. “Before anyone loses their nerve.”

“Nightfall is a mealtime away,” Asui said. “We should wait for them to bring down our rations and eat first. Give them time to settle down for the night.”

“Okay,” Selati agreed.

“Why don’t we collect what tools we can use for weapons while you conserve your strength?” Nausai dropped a hand on Selati’s shoulder and added some pressure until Selati folded down most of the way to the floor. He hadn’t realized he drooped so far until that moment.

Tahahi eased in next to him, shoulder to shoulder. His weight settled into Tahahi like his body had given up on supporting itself, without his knowledge. Sounds reached his ears in the dark. When had his eyes closed? Metal clinked together and pinked on stone. Soft notes drifted from his left as Tahahi hummed low in his throat.

The tune changed and warped in time with his painful hip. Selati couldn’t force his eyes open to watch his crew work while they all waited for the sun to disappear, but he could almost hear the plans being made between them all. Selati wasn’t worried. Now that the decision was made, one of the others would see it fall into place. Probably Bunici. And someone would tell him about his role when the time came.

Dirt slid down the long slope of the tunnel opening. A human was coming down; the sound unmistakable after the months the constructs toiled down in the dark. The human, pale, tall for the species and with short light-ish hair, carried a large sack in its hands. Humans looked much the same to Selati, so he couldn’t tell if it was male or those strange females while they were covered in rough, loose pants and shirt.

It left the sack of their meal in the dirt near the bottom of the slope and walked back to the surface without a glance at any of them. They knew better than to approach the human. More stood at the top, noisy barrels at the ready no doubt. Jawidi had a spider scar on his shoulder from the one time any of them tried to get close to a human.

Heki retrieved their food bit by bit out of the sack, handing each portion to Nausai behind him. Nausai passed it along to whoever came up to him, saving two portions for last. He slithered up to Selati and held out the hunk of bread as Bunici came over to Tahahi.

Selati took his without a word, stomach in a knot from pain and anticipation both. Food was scarce as it was though. His body grumbled for the bread at the same time it rejected the idea. Selati grimaced and tore a small chunk off. The first taste of the coarse salt-sweetness made his whole belly flop over. With a deep breath through his nose, Selati fought down the urge to vomit. Chewing helped.

“After we finish eating, we’ll get ready,” Bunici whispered, words muffled.

Selati gagged on his mouthful as he gulped it down. When he finally had his mouth clear, he nodded. “I’m only worried about getting up the slope. My hip still hurts.”

Tahahi smiled, his milky white eyes focused on the far wall. “I’ll help you up.”

“You’ll stay behind me,” Bunici spat. “Heki can help Selati up the incline.”

“I will help Selati,” Tahahi said again. “Heki will be too busy fighting to help him.”

“I doubt Heki will fight.” Bunici tucked away another piece of bread, like he wanted to shut the rest of his thought back into his mouth.

Tahahi smiled, wide and enigmatic in the dark. Those two had different opinions on a great deal of things, Selati noticed often, but Bunici was protective of their blind friend. When this crew was put together, the humans laughed about Tahahi, trading numbers while they escorted the constructs on how long he would last in the mine. Bunici had been next to him during the march, hands clenched and shoulders bunched. Since that day, Bunici had taken Tahahi’s survival on as his personal responsibility.

In his own thoughts, Selati agreed with Bunici. Their crew mate would probably hide in the shadows while the rest dealt with the humans. He saw Heki’s fear and couldn’t blame him. Selati would fight for them all to get out, whether others helped or not.

As the sunlight shining on the dirt at the bottom of the slope disappeared, the constructs shifted in restless waves on the floor. Tail tips thumped in the grit, bodies coiled and straightened. Some teeth glinted in the dying, indirect light.

Fingers tapped his elbow. Selati glanced at Tahahi, who jerked his chin up, white eyes locked on the exit of the mine. “Now,” Tahahi breathed.

All ten of them shifted over to the baskets. Six crude picks rested heads down and four good sized rocks were tucked in the bottoms. Jawidi pulled the picks out and passed them off to the biggest of them, but when he tried to hand one over to Selati, he shook his head and pointed at Nausai. Jawidi didn’t ask questions.

Selati stooped, keeping the groan of pain stuffed down, and retrieved two of the heavy rocks. One he handed over to Tahahi and the other he tucked close to his chest. Tahahi budged up under Selati’s arm on his good side, wrapping an arm around Selati’s ribs and copying Selati with his own rock, kept in the upward curl of his free arm.

A last quick glance was traded between them all and they started up the slope in a silent procession of twos, the silent Kuypi and Bunici in front with the best picks. The shifting sound of their passage was covered by the raucous noise of the humans coming down the tunnel. Bunici stopped before his head could be seen at the mine entrance.

“You hear that?” Bunici’s whisper carried all the way down to Selati at the back.

Selati strained his ears. Somewhere under the loudness of the overseers a subtle rustle of the grass carried. It was like someone wasn’t trying to hide their movement at all, but the nature of the movement itself was simply quiet. Scales sliding across the ground.

A human shouted. Thumps against the ground followed and a barrel let loose with its awful noise. Hissing cries erupted in the darkness above them.

Bunici darted up the last of the incline. Kuypi and the rest followed, Selati’s every twist over the dirt agony. Tahahi had a tight hold on him though and seemed more determined to reach the top than Selati thought he should. It didn’t matter in the least.

Chaos reigned when Selati reached the tunnel mouth. Constructs numbered double of Selati’s crew. A blue-black construct came right up to Selati’s right side and planted himself between Selati and Tahahi and the fight.

Another, stunning cooper and ivory scales pristine as though they had never seen the inside of a mine, slinked over to them as well, spear gripped in a sure hand. Words more musical than even Tahahi’s impressive voice came out of the new construct. “One more minute and we’ll have this lot finished.”