FLARE

His glove was wet.

Throughout the night, it had grown more and more damp, and now, it was dripping. It would start to smell if this kept up for another day or so, and bacteria and fungi could breed. If he had bandages, he would have used them, but he had nothing. So he kept walking and hoped he’d be able to clean it off soon.

The sand in front of him shimmered, the sun bright and intense. He wasn’t entirely sure what direction he was going in, anymore. When he’d stopped to reply to Kiki, he’d gotten turned around. It didn’t really matter as long as he wasn’t going backwards, since he didn’t know where Lyre was in relation to him.

They seemed… honest. Like they didn’t think before speaking. Maybe he could use that against them, by asking them where they were, and then moving away from that position. It was a thought.

The desert was mostly featureless. There were bits of debris here and there, maybe from the crater. There were a few cacti. It all blended together in a boring tan smear. Luckily, he was used to long, boring walks, some in worse conditions than this. Walking in the day was also easier, where he could see where he was putting his feet instead of tripping over sand dunes every fifteen minutes.

Lyre had said not to go too far. He wasn’t sure what that meant or even if it was directed at him. They could be saying that because they didn’t want him moving too much, since they wanted to catch him. Or they could be warning him of some danger further ahead. Or, again, it could have nothing to do with him. In the face of all these contradictory ideas, Spike decided the best thing to do was to ignore it for now, but keep it in the back of his mind.

After an immeasurable time of walking, sensation fled and he watched his body collapse in front of him.

This happened every so often. He didn’t know why, or how, or how to prevent it, or how to tell when he’d go back to his body. He knew what he saw in this state was real. He’d verified it before. For instance, he noticed a new bruise on the side of his face, accompanying the many already layered over each other there.

This was… good and bad. Bad because now his body was immobile and vulnerable to anything that might pass by. Good because he moved much faster like this, so he could go ahead to scout. Maybe if he went far enough in the right direction, he’d see Lyre and know where they were.

If he chose a specific direction to scout, either Lyre would be there or they wouldn’t be. Ideally, he would see them there and move away. If they weren’t there, he wouldn’t be able to confirm that direction was safe, but it would be more likely to be safe than any of the other directions.

There was no sense in staying here with his body. If something happened, it’s not like he could do anything to prevent it.

He started gliding forwards, desert sands blurring underneath him as he abandoned the crumpled form behind him. Hopefully there were no animals here to be attracted by his open wound.

When shiny metal and movement caught his eye, his speed dissipated in an instant and he floated as he watched. Drones. Mechanical workers, some on the ground digging, others hauling bins of stone. Some of the stone glinted a bit. Raw ore, maybe. The drones were new, chassises still clean and shiny, but there were many dents. He drew to a foot away from one of them to take a closer look. Cheaply made. The welding had gaps along the edges and the pieces fit together sloppily. Nicks and scratches were visible in the soft metal.

Where were they from?

There was a line of them, going back and forth. Not quite towards his body, but close. He followed them, an invisible, intangible ghost haunting the desert. As he flew, an idea began to coalesce about just where, exactly they were going. He wasn’t sure whether he was hoping or dreading that he was right. Sure enough, a shimmer of heat appeared on the horizon, reforming into a dark depression as he moved closer.

The crater.

He could have looked further.

He didn’t.

Strategically, it would have been a good idea. Figure out where in the crater they were going, what they were doing with the ore, if they were being manufactured there or were made in a secondary location. Figure out if they were possibly a threat, if there was a way to safely disable their production. But when he thought about going back into that jagged, molten hell, even as a spectre, his mind recoiled so violently that it took a good chunk of his willpower just to stay there and not flee back to his body.

When he thought about that place, it felt like he was close to remembering. Remembering what had taken him from his previous life and his family. Remembering why he projected, why he no longer felt pain, why he could wander forever without rest. He’d said that he hoped he would remember someday, but truthfully, he didn’t know if his desire to know what happened outweighed his fear of it. And he knew, at least, he did not want to remember it now.

He turned, and left the crater and its servants behind him.

He couldn’t keep going that way, or he’d run into them. He didn’t know how they’d react if that happened and didn’t care to find out. He’d go a different way, and hope Lyre wasn’t waiting at the end of his path.

When he returned to the mining operation, he registered that while it was large, he could theoretically go around it. It would add an hour or two to his travel time, but he’d be on the other side of the line of drones and it would only take one detour before he continued on his path. He would do that, then.

He was about to leave, when he stopped.

The ground was trembling.

Basins of ore were rattling, ever so slightly. The drones didn’t notice, but he did. It wasn’t localized, but diffused across the entire operation, no stronger or weaker in any one location. There was no visible source of the tremors. He flew a little bit away, towards his body, and the tremors held the same strength as debris on the ground shuddered. It lay limp, swamped by the layers it was wearing, completely still except for the way the ground shifted under it.

He’d tried flying into his body multiple times before, in an attempt to wake up prematurely. It had never worked, so he didn’t try now, instead looking around for any clue or possible threat he’d have to deal with once he woke.

He didn’t see anything until he looked back the way he came.

Shiny metal caught his eye as a distant drone steadily made its way towards him. Slow. If he were in his body, he’d have plenty of time to react. As it was, he watched helplessly as it approached over an agonising minute.

It crouched by his body. A scanner unfolded from one of its arms and ran over the crumpled mass. It beeped.

More sensors came out, poking the body here and there.

And then, he was laying prone on the sand, the drone above him and the world shaking gently.

Lifting his upper body out of the sand with his arms, he scrambled to his feet, whipping around to face the drone with arms up.

It straightened, freezing for a moment. A faint ping sounded, and while he couldn’t be sure, he suspected it was a signal.

Then, it ran.

He turned and went in the opposite direction at a brisk walk, glancing back once to make sure it was really leaving and not waiting or going around to ambush him. He had a feeling more of them would be here soon, and he didn’t care to be around when that happened.

What’s more, he didn’t know what these tremors were or if they were dangerous, and if he ended up needing shelter, it was best to start looking now.

After just a few minutes, the tremors increased in intensity, and he stumbled and fell. He tried getting up again, only to fall again as the sand shifted under him. He attempted it one more time, staying standing only to fall as soon as he took a step. At that point, he decided to take the blow to his pride and stayed on his hands and knees, slowly crawling forwards.

A few more minutes later, when he looked up, it was into the camera lens of another drone. There were several more around him, all peering down curiously past their basins of ore. He’d crawled right into their midst, and hadn’t even noticed thanks to the tremors drowning out sound and the feeling of footfalls.

He had just enough time to think, shit, before all hell broke loose.

There was a crack, and white-hot melted metal shot up about ten meters to his left. More geysers quickly followed, raining fire down. The drones mobilized quickly, some spraying a freezing solution that caused the geysers to solidify in strange shapes, others simply fleeing.

He needed to get out of here, now. If even a small drop of that metal hit him, it could fuck him up beyond belief. The ground was still shaking, so there was no way he could run. He lunged for the nearest drone, grabbing it from behind and holding it up over his body, arms and legs facing away so it couldn’t grab him. It struggled, but he held on grimly with his good hand, crawling between the geysers on three limbs.

Hell rained down around him as he crawled. Sand bubbled, turning to glass around him. He nearly put his hand in a patch, readjusting just in time. He couldn’t see where his knees were landing, so he made sure to only place them where his hands had been before, where he knew it was safe. Something struck the drone above him with a hiss, and it spasmed and died. Good. Easier to hold onto, now.

The path was narrow, dissolving like sugar on either side. The sand was probably burning to the touch, but he had no other choice. He could only hope his pants and the wet glove would protect him from the worst of it.

It took a long time to get to safety, slow as he was, but by some miracle, nothing touched him. When he stopped and examined his hands and knees, there was no new damage. His clothes weren’t even singed, though the front half of the drone he’d sacrificed was warped and melted.

This far away, the tremors had faded, he could walk, and he had no idea where he was. He was used to that, so, like he’d done countless times before, he decided to pick a random direction to walk in.

First, however, he checked his phone. There were a lot of texts, and as he scrolled through, he saw that the others had had a pretty bad time as well. As opposed to the molten eruption he experienced, Kiki had nearly been torn apart by a dust storm based on their panicked rambling. Gaunt had also had to take shelter from the same storm. Lyre… nothing from Lyre yet.

It seemed like nowhere was really safe. He put his phone away, sand sticking where he’d gripped it and coated it in fluid. He might tell them what happened later, or he might not. He needed time to think about what he was going to say. So for now, he thought about which way to go.

He couldn’t really remember- no, he did. He was between the geysers and the mining operation. The crater was… to his right, maybe, or was it his left? He had planned to go towards the mining operation and then detour around, so it didn’t really matter. He would continue the way he was going before for now, and hope there were no other unpleasant surprises along the way.

He stood, dusting the sand off his pants. His wet glove was absolutely coated in it, no matter how much he tried to scrape it off. Oh well.

He took a step, then another, continuing his sleepless journey. He thought about his contacts as he walked, what threat he thought they posed, what they had to offer him, what he could say to get the most information for the least risk. Maybe he could try to build up some trust. He was beginning to think that the other two really were what they claimed to be, lost strangers, in which case he and they could benefit each other by sharing resources. He’d have to be careful not to reveal too much to Lyre at the same time.

A delicate balance, but one he thought he could achieve.