The machine was on his way back to the stone cabin when he was suddenly ambushed from behind.
He was startled at first since he was caught off guard, but he quickly relaxed when he realized it was just another noctic abomination. This was the fourth time today he was attacked by one of the gnarly-looking brutes. They were creepy as hell, but the machine quickly discovered that they didn't really have the means or perhaps the intelligence necessary to be a real threat to him. Their teeth and claws just bounced off his metal body, not even leaving a scratch or a dent.
The machine gave a mental sigh, wishing these creeps would just give it a rest already. Currently, the abomination was gnawing mindlessly on his leg but making no progress in its attack. He looked down at the struggling creature with nigh pity. The machine wondered what would happen if he just waited. Would the abomination ever realize his attack was pointless? Perhaps it would grow bored after a while and leave him alone.
He watched for a moment as it fumbled against the unmoving frame of his metallic body, trying to find a soft spot to bite or claw into. However, his attitude changed when the beast discovered the bag slung over his shoulder and sunk its teeth into the soft leather.
Suddenly distressed, he plunged a claw directly into the abomination's chest- delivering a fatal blow with one strike. With holes through multiple vital organs, the creature was ruined. It fell to the ground, barely moving. Uninterested in his latest assailant, the machine turned away and ruefully checked on the condition of his bag. Holding it up, the machine lamented the new tooth-shaped punctures in its side.
'Damn. I'm honestly lucky its still usable at all.'
Frustrated at himself for his oversight and carelessness, the machine shouldered the satchel once more and continued on his journey home. After a few minutes of walking, a notification floated up in the corner of his vision, but he waved it off without so much as glancing at it. The abomination probably just bled out and awarded him some amount of experience. But he wasn't interested in that right now, so he just ignored the notification and kept walking.
Arriving in the cozy study of his stone cottage, the machine dropped the satchel he had been carrying onto the wooden desk. The bag's contents clinked against each other upon falling on the wooden surface. The satchel's leather was aged, but still in excellent condition with minimal wear... as long as you were willing to look past the new bite marks.
He mourned the damage and decided to search some other nearby cottages for a replacement before his next outing. For now though, he moved to the hearth and prepared to start a fire. Firewood was hard to come by since everything outside was made of stone. He was lucky to find real firewood stored in a nearby cabin's cellar.
With the kindling and tinder in place, he reached up and grabbed a small matchbox from the side table. His claws were large and somewhat cumbersome, but with enough patience he could maneuver them with great precision.
Striking a match, the machine turned back to the fireplace and held the flame beside a crumpled piece of paper. Soon, the paper was lit and flames began to rise around an orderly collection of twigs, each one resting on another in a square shape. Once the flames began to consume those, he threw on a couple of logs to keep the fire fueled for a while.
Once it was burning, he leaned back and stared into the flames.
He had no need for warmth, but the flames brought back a few memories from when he was younger.
...
A group of young boys were chattering away as they roasted marshmallows over a campfire.
Two or three different conversations were going on all at once, some talking about sports while others were conversing about video games. A few boys were just staring into the flames and a few were playing card games.
Ding! Ding! Ding!
A boy named Drew tapped his fork against a metal cup to get everyone's attention.
"Its time for the moment you've all been waiting for! That's right, its time for the ghost story competition!"
Everyone cheered, waving their marshmallows around in the air triumphantly.
"Joey, you're up first!"
Joey was a scrawny boy with a crooked smile. He told a story about a witch that lived in the forest. In his story, a brother and sister had been playing tag and got lost in the forest when the sun went down. Finding a shack in the woods, they knocked on the door to ask for help. However, it turned out to be the witch's home, and she promised to help them only if they could beat her in a game of hide and seek.
Joey went on with his story, describing the events of the game of hide and seek. The brother and sister hid themselves in the woods while the witch counted to one hundred. Soon, she would come looking for them.
Joey waved his arms around expressively as he told the story.
"The sister climbed an oak tree, sitting in the upper branches while the brother laid in a hollow, rotting log. It wasn't long before the witch came by, looking for them."
Joey got up from his seat and started circling around the campfire, intentionally staggering his steps in a strange way to make his act more frightening.
Up until this point, the boys were completely quiet. The story was actually pretty good so far, a few of them might even have nightmares depending on how the story ended. Joey continued with his act.
"The witch hobbled around and almost passed by them, but then stopped under the oak tree and sniffed the air with her big, fat nose! Like this! Sniff! Sniiiiff!"
In the blink of an eye, the scary atmosphere was gone and everyone was doubled over, laughing at Joey's pitiful acting.
As the night went on, the boys took turns telling ghost stories. Some were scary while others ended up being funny. The machine's mind, however, was more on the friends who told the stories than the stories themselves.
The machine relived the moments where each of his friends recounted a ghost story. Next up was Brandon. After that came Chase, then Jake, Austin and Kyle. Each boy was called in turn to tell their newest ghost story. The memory went on smoothly, filling the machine with a sense of bittersweet longing, until it was his turn to tell a story.
"Your turn, dude. What kind of story do you have for us this time?"
In the memory, he went on to tell a story not too different from the others. But as he did, the machine realized there was something wrong.
Something was missing...
Why didn't his friends ever call him by name?