TLUS/1/13

It must have been a while since they'd collapsed, because he'd been the worst kind of tired: a tired which seeks nutrition but must be ignored, because you're a deserter and your ship's going to explode. He was about to look for time, but there would be no reason to designate a time zone out here, especially as Lecheler didn't seem to require any specific schedule or rhythm. So he groaned, kicked the table, and grimaced, as his whole head struggled against a thick layer of varnish.

His hair was the worst. It always was, but he really had to work it free from the board, tugging in unison with curses and threats, eventually plucking the fruits of his labour.

He sat for a moment, taking in his surroundings, and then hissed, because while his whole head stung, from the uncomfortable sleep and the removal of his face, the back of his skull, a small section of it, didn't hurt.

It burnt.

He reached around and cursed again, laying a hand on what he knew to hurt, and pulled his fingers into the light. There was no blood, but it screamed, and he moved to ask Feva what had happened, before the caution of presumed sleep caught his tongue. Instead, he caressed his supposed wound and looked up, blinking against a drowned fatigue.

All thoughts became a hard frown.

Feva was gone, her chair sent tumbling, as had Ariete, to lie in the crumpled image of a thrown thing, forced to rest through impact.

Lecheler wasn't sitting, either.

Someone had made his wall their canvas, and painted his body across crudely, in a blot of unrefined centrality; an almost perfect mark, scarred by the imperfections of running red.

Sahiel kicked up, breath a flurry of mumbled cautions and ideas, stuck to one another in a bloody mess. His mind was caught on the still running stains, as Ariete's resistance was portrayed in the dogs crumpled form.

He couldn't think straight.

Why was he still here?

He reached up, and felt the back of his head.

He blinked, and took to the door.

Twists and turns merged into a worn thought, and he stalked his way through without question, landmarks returning to his mind as it caught with his senses. Someone was armed, and he wasn't. He vouched that neither was Feva, but then he'd seen her tear anyway. There had been no blood on Ariete, so he'd probably been knocked out too.

Hit, with the rifle butt.

Doors were both closed tight and bust open, so he ran down the likely routes, passing a pillar which had been sliced in two, and a doorway in a similar state. Long, thin cuts which ran deep through stone, and the overturned table marking conflict.

He blinked at these, but did not stop.

He was seeing in symmetry, the marks of a killer with wild aim, and the streaks of precision. Not the elements of either hand, but separate intents.

He must have been hit really hard.

Apartments left untouched save for their ruined entrances, and pieces torn from the walls. Chairs thrown and lights, not pulled but hauled from the ceiling, he traced the source of the chaos to the window through which he, his fellows and Ruby had seen the production line, to now witness it shattered from his side. He ran to the edge, the compression howling as wind clapped through his hair and across the low machinery, the breakage apparently affecting the pressure within his chamber as he looked across the robotics, which spanned far below, reaching from one side to the other, his view a surveying vantage of design.

Bodies lay everywhere, machine and human, long slices severing limbs and heads, rifles and blades sent flying before their owners were left. A trail of corpses leading across the floor, to a distant door, barely visible over the distance and through the smog of metal.

But this was recent, as remnant machines drew themselves on ruined limbs toward their last glimpse, of the door Sahile observed.

He turned down the staircase through which he'd originally made it here; unable to survive that jump by any means, so now hurtling down catacombs in search of the image he'd made of where the escapists door had lead. He lunged his way down uncharted pathways, unaffected by the occurring events, however clearly walked with pace, hosting doors flung wide, presumably by Feva or some other pursuers. A machine would have followed directly down that drop, into the assembly line.

He is impossible to observe steadily, as he throws himself around corners. Either too close or slipping away, bis heavy breaths are chaotic, and his motion does not hide the intent of his heart, to break through and leave him out of fear.

He cannot think, but then if he could, he would have to ponder the possibilities of his approach, as he traces Feva's remarks of pursuit.

What will he do if

A door materialises and he bolts, shifting as shadows and blurred outlines through dampened light, figuring himself close to the final sighting, he form bursting through the entrance and into one of Barons private hangars, cut off from the others to a scale comparatively miniature, a whole wall devoted to the outside space, sealed invisibly as the entrance, so to allow but the one ship present.

A thing of great white hair and vivid features prowls, Feva in one arm, her other grasp taken by a nonsensical blade of colossal proportions, to drag in her wake. He grin is sprawling, as a wound to either end of her face, and her eyes gaping, and she is stricken with sickening glee in a work of patchwork innards, of both machine and human remains. She is cast in the blue from beyond, which echoes in cosmic tones and the thick crimson of her ship's engines, which blurt their brutal tones against the oceanic starlight, to conflict upon her blank hair.

The woman turns, a long coat straying to the extents of strip-bound extremities to hold herself steady against impact, and Sahiel sees the features of mania in her vast gaze.

It is a horror, to stand with bare hands against a synonym of insanity, for such fear to cut that thumping heart of Sahiel in two, and leave it silent in his chest.

From the rafters above dropped a guardian machine, or simply one of Deep Blue's creations, which charged the woman, low to the floor and arms wide, ready to ensnare her, the thing kicking out with each step to propel itself at speeds wild. But it is an effort to impress ignorant spectacle, as the white hair lets Feva fall and throws a foot into the automaton's shoulder, sending its balance a margin off, to twirl without a spine of note and draw, in a guttural tear, steel against steel.

The machine, still alive, whined and spun, kicking through the air in an arc, losing its leg for the effort and then its head, with an arc taking to its neck.

A second machine moved, following the same scheme of design as Ruby, drawing two swords from its wrists and slicing through the distance between it and the attacker, who leapt to one knee and speared through the wave of blades, her length ruing speed. They moved fast, these machines of a killer's design, like traps waiting to be sprung, but the woman just cut through, taking Feva again and hauling her toward the ship.

Sahiel went to intercept her but was stopped by a call, a shout from behind, and he turned to see another, larger entrance to the room, clearly the intended one, from which haunted Ruby, her maid-clad mechanical form emphasised by the gel mixture which made her strained, heartbroken features, manipulated by the metal prods and lines which worked behind the near liquid solution of her emotion, accompanied four other machines, all of her build, with her, two on either side.

And it is this fluid hatred which looks close to boil, as the thing of a now dead God both mourns and prepares, her perfect form of elegance now clashing with a figure of straight, refine, sophisticated hysteria.

She told Sahiel to find a gun if he could, gesturing vaguely to one of the now obvious human bodies to the corner of the room, their shape broken and slung crudely aside.

He did, moving for the fallen, but watched Ruby as her detail leapt, curling without their commander toward the woman, who had thrown Feva behind her and assumed a low stance, face still bleeding unstable delight, blade up high and level, legs apart for stabilisation. The ship behind her was kicking up now, brighter red blurting from its engines, bathing her evermore in a vermillion which taunted the approaching machines, orchestrated by the still waiting Ruby, the advance straying from the ethereal blue and into the white haired, blood bathed woman's close, her engines sending all things loose twirling, her pale mass and coat surging at their restraints, clawing toward those approaching.

The machines dived to her corners, planning to all move in simultaneously, but she became a gyro of metal, slashing to her sides as she tore limbs from her pursuers. Her sword was a piece of her, and she leant away from her thrusts and slashes to continue her momentum, motion in every moment as her hair curled around her head, gesturing her foresight on every attempt to take her, with loose ends to her supportive bindings dancing against the defined stances of each strike, as she fell and curled and played among the collapsing forms, eyes wild to descend upon Ruby, who let the thing blink before she flew.

Sahiel reached the bodies and pulled them away from the wall, searching for a firearm, even a knife, to find nothing. Workers, caught in the fray. A port of this complex would need arms, moreover one of private entrance, but to search would be to look for a gun fitted to some waiting machine, too large or well embedded within metal to handle.

He turned to see two of the attacking detail dead, or out of action, with another missing both arms and the last trying to evade the slashes aimed at its face, only to stumble and miss a move. Ruby drew to a halt several meters from the wild, watching as she waited, analysing movements and allowing herself to prepare for the fight.

While the others duelled and lost, she stretched, slowly. Wire tendons and foam adjusting, as her eyes hold to the bladed madness, which twirls in beckoning embrace.

His fingers traced over belt loops and pockets, from body to body, chunk to chunk, but there was nothing, and he was running out of bodies. A few more lay, but they had been thrown, the white hair diverting from her straight course to take offset foes.

He bolted for the opposite corner, the hazy stars to one side and a slaughter to the other. He slipped from the blue to the red as he passed the ship, sprinting past fuel canisters and docking equipment, taking to the cluster of bodies. Sitting atop them, he found his weapon, but it was a thing to cleave ships from the sky, and took his breath as he crouched, raising also its rocket.

He lugged the weapon around, able only with one shot, turning to the ship, which he was now facing the front of, and drawing the launcher up.

There were no windows, but it was clear where the main hub was, and he fired a single shot, the absence of a tripod or anything to lean on snapping the weapon backward, taking him with it. He didn't fall, but the gun did, and he watched as the round skimmed through the short space between him and the ship, slapping into the dark metal, bouncing off for a moment, and then detonating, the impact blowing through him and forcing a stagger, foot falling back, his arms raised.

The ship shuddered and a section fell off, exposing wires and inner flesh, but he was already moving once more, noticing one of the guard's pistols and scooping it from the body's clutches.

Ruby flipped, arcing through the blue as waters descended, a precaution to prevent the fire, which was curling at the shot, light-caught droplets falling upon the duo, a feral intent contrasted to what Ruby has assumed as concentration, to let her features slide to a clean, smooth visor, flowing with her movements.

The two combatants swayed against each other, white hair vaulting upon her great blade and Ruby's agility competing to match. Quick and precise strikes slashed against longer and deeper cuts, as twin birds cut through the downpour, in a testament of physical display.

A machine leg flew for pale threads and hit only those, as the figure dropped and speared, taking air and water which bled from her blade, to rise and let another run against it, coming low with the intent to strike yet facing the other, as Ruby moved with both blades, programmed efficiency colliding with inhuman determination.

Sahiel came back to the two and moved to shoot, but the water and the smoke and the speed of their battle made his attempt to intervene pointless. He could barely see regardless, blinking into the spray. Instead, he moved to the ship, toward Feva, her body cast to the ground, sheltered partially under the canopy of the craft but still pooling, alive but forsaken to some fate needing life by the thing with a slice for a grin.

The white hair saw his movements and threw the machine away, spinning and slashing to keep her back before bounding toward him, her coat trailing behind her as she held her sword to the side, hair flowing as she moved with pace incredible. He crouched and shot, two rounds for the head, but she flinched, curling into her motion with a sidestep, the change in speed drawing all eyes close to her fierce mirth as she let the momentum carry her arm, and send her sword driving alone, moving to impale a figure who had seen her ready and then fall, as Sahiel dived to avoid the blow, spared from the follow by Ruby, who's expressionless vizard bubbled with chance as she pounced, cutting and slashing at a thing now without blades.

But the woman flashed. Like she'd found strength from nowhere, she charged straight into the fray of blades, taking a cut to the shoulder but taking it well, using the leverage to grab the machines head and bring it down upon her knee, cracking the screen and then taking Ruby's feet from under her.

She took the short sword from Ruby while she fell, ripping it from the machine grasp. Red, redder than any influenced by ship lights blew from her upper arm, but nothing registered as unusual upon an alien expression, and the white hair twirled the blade and thrust it through the machines head, drawing back before response could be even thought and taking to the torso, turning metal and cloth to shreds with deep, plunging wounds. She stabbed and tore, running the sword down as she withdrew, her figure distorted by smoke and glow and water to make her motions flicker and waver, as she gutted the machine and let things sacred spill in pools. She stabbed and stabbed and looked to stab again, as Sahiel ran for Feva, but withdrew a moment early and span, shouting as she threw, the faint letting her stolen edge run through air and take the gun from the last combatants grip, as he reached for the fallen.

He looked up and stared at her.

She stared at him, before her arms rose to a hood, which she took with tied fingers to pull over her head, shutting out the false rain.

Sahiel glanced down to Feva, shivering and still out, and caught sight of his own form, hands and body clad in the same shade of red which ran from the white haired woman.

He reached up, and felt the same against his skin, as the engine called and the waters bled and the lights flared and the hooded woman watched, still disregarding the wound.

Sahiel saw a gun in half and hands too shaky to wield, and a thing which had abandoned its known emotion for a moment, to consider its situation as it retreated under a hood, to now slowly, as his own face became one of slight pleading, resume its originality, as an expression of smiles, painted as a lesion.

The hooded woman, coat swaying, crouched, low to the ground, her figure uneasy in the distortion of the many elements.

Sahiel blinked, and gently reached for Feva.

A hand took his arm.