911 Chapter 1: After the Rains

Only a month had passed, yet the pain of their tragedy still clung fresh.

The now extinct humans had a saying: Time heals all wounds. But could time even matter to beings such as themselves whose assessment of the passing of time was vastly different? They did not live as the humans had, or even claim a similar state of fragile mortality. Therefore, they were not entirely bound by a thought of time well spent or of time running out.

They need not eat. They need not drink. They didn't age. Sleep did them well, but was not a requirement of survival. Indeed, all that was needed to sustain their forms was the occasional replacement of cloth skin and wooden or metal parts. Yet they knew what it was to think and feel—to ache as real flesh sometimes did or to take a breath in both panic and relief.

Not to say that death was unknown, but it came less easily.

They were the in-between of life and death: They had the heart of the soulful and the form of the soulless. Such had always been their existence since their first awakenings. The very thought that the last essence of life hid within a mechanized shell!

He almost understood—and dare he admit have sympathy for—the Fabrication Machine's maddened quest of slaughter, even after the last of mankind had been eradicated from the Earth. It wasn't simply a matter of revenge, or finishing what started many years ago.

The Machine wanted the one thing it could never have or replicate—a human soul.

What was it like to destroy the sole purpose you were made for in a single lost moment? To have nothing, feel nothing, and know nothing outside of one's primary function?

Humans, however… They were born with nothing. Faith their only knowledge of their creator and philosophy their only knowledge of their purpose, and those they had to learn on their own. Yet in this nothingness beheld unimaginable freedom—a freedom to choose. They chose whether to let emotion or knowledge guide their actions. They chose what they would embrace as their purpose in life and what things should matter most. Most of all though, only they chose to make a moral decision—without the orders or influence of their masters. The most complicated and dangerous of creatures that had once lived had also been the most beautiful of spirits. What defined them all came down to the choices they made.

The Stitchpunks were the only abiotic beings offered that choice, endowed to them by their creator. The Machine had wanted what they had, and had no moral understanding of the destruction it caused.

It was their purpose to preserve the little life left in the world that resided within them; the last breath of humanity.

Five of them had already perished before knowing that: Only four remained. That was all that was left in the world, for both mankind and machine—all that was left to guard the talisman until their forms slowly fell beyond repair and there truly was nothing left in the world.

The world was entirely their own, but as he walked through the Emptiness—surrounded by rotting remains, shreds of shrapnel, and smashed bricks piled high in mounds of debris—Nine couldn't help but wonder what to make of it or what could possibly be done.

The rain had been an anomaly, for it hadn't rained in many years according to the data found in the library—the place where he, Three, Four, and Seven made their home. Despite all their research, they didn't know what to make of it or what it meant for their future. They only knew that it had been no strange chance of fate.

What other anomalies could now be found after the rains? Perhaps it signaled something brighter in their future, as bright as the light of the sun that had finally broken through the omnipresent smog above them—yet another strange occurrence?

The pile up of questions had brought him here, following the dusty, broken road leading to The Scientist's ruined dwelling. He had searched it over many a time, yet no answers had appeared as of now. He could only hope that something somewhere was hidden away from sight—lying undiscovered under the piles of books, papers, and old wooden boards.

He couldn't help but to pause in his trek before climbing of the large steps made for a much larger sentient, sparing a mournful glance over to the long since cold fire pit. Few ashes remained—blown away by the strong winds that often passed through here—however, the memories seemed to never fade. The unspoken goodbyes, the last smiles that had been shared, the ghostly essences of the deceased softly floating up towards a darkened sky.

Nine had done all that could be done to make amends to them, yet he still blamed himself. So, alone, he fell on his knees before the pit. His head fell into his wood and cooper hands and his fingers dragged over the top of his skull, metal scraping the metal underneath.

Seven had said to him that they were free, yet he still endured the agonizing entrapment of his own guilt for their deaths. He could only see their smiles as forgiveness he did not deserve, and only hope that whatever creators the humans had believed in would accept the soul fragments of The Scientist into their kingdoms. Perhaps there they would be truly free and not simply lost to the wind and sky.

A strong breeze tore through him and from behind himself he heard the clatter of old, rusted cans falling from the junk piles to roll across the dry earth. It would've broken the silence had his inner turmoil not been making so much noise.

How could it have come to this? How could he have prevented it? One had been right from the start that it was his fault Two was taken captive to later have his soul ripped out, even if he had only made the accusation to defend his own stance. Maybe there are some moments where there's little time to think—and so new was he to the post-apocalyptic realm he had awoken to that he hadn't known what to do or what sort of monster would be faced—but so often Nine wished he would've called Two to hide with him, or had been brave enough to fight alongside him. It would've been a long shot, but maybe together they could've escaped and this entire mess could've been avoided. So many lives could've been spared...

The tremors were so slow to build that he didn't notice them until the pebbles at his feet began to tremble—rattling loosely along the ground. Removing his hands from his face, he peered at the miniscule stones in both question and worry. The signs common prior to sand storms hadn't appeared, and though the winds were strong, they weren't bad enough for that sort of weather. Still, any storm could appear at any moment and the weather had only gotten stranger as time wore on. Nine rose to brush away the sand from his burlap skin, turning around to find cover as the tremors grew.

He couldn't hold back his panicked gasp as he watched a huge monster unlike any he'd ever seen race toward him, a trail of dirt and dust flying into the air as it charged. Covered in a mix of ruined leather, torn cloth, and aged canvas wrap that warped about the figure like tendrils—a badly damaged helmet from the Great War upon its head and a hideous face with two large, glassy eyes and a long, tubular snout connecting to a square container of something at its side.

Nine did the only thing he could do: He ran.

He had no weapons—he didn't think to bring any weapons! The Fabrication Machine had been the last of them, and its creations had been destroyed in the massive blast that overtook the factory! What was this…this thing?!

It was quickly gaining; it would be on top of him at any minute.

He couldn't fight, but he could hide! The monster was much smaller than the Fabrication Machine, but at least five times larger than the Cat Beast. He could get up the stairs to The Scientist's home quick enough, but if he could just reach the right sort of cover—

It was close now—so very close! The pounding steps rattling the earth not far behind made it difficult to run. He could hear a constant, loud hiss of air as whatever pumps and gears made such a beast function pushed stale air in and out of its body. It was going to kill him: It was going to crush him!

At the last moment, he dove into the safety of an empty bombshell trapped beneath a pile of crumbled stone. Falling back, he crawled until his spine met a dead end. The split seconds seemed to take minutes and minutes took hours as he waited for something—anything to happen: A large foot sliding in front of the only escape before the can, and a surge of panic coursing through as the beast tried to dig out the bombshell before pouring him out into its grasp; a hand reaching inward, cold fingers blocking out all light as they curled around his form; one of those unsettling eyes peering at him like the trapped prey he was.

He would find a way; he had too! He had to survive for Three, and Four, and Seven, and all those who had died before him. He couldn't be taken like this so soon after so brief a reprise from the nightmare he had escaped, nor could he fall to such cruel irony as this to die in the same sick way he thought he would on the day he first awoke.

He tried to slow his panicked breaths, gazing long and hard at the opening. Wait, he ordered himself, Wait until the last second. Wait until the beast had thought it had him, than escape in whatever narrow opening was available: Run away as it tore through stone to dig out the shell, slip through the gaps of its fingers before they could curl, smash against the glass eye and flee to further sanctuary. Survive. He would survive!

Its feet skidded to a halt right before him to spin around; facing the direction the creature came from. "Come out, you pest…" he heard the creature say above the hisses in a muffled, mechanic voice.

He was both baffled and frightened by the monster's speech—a show of intelligence greater than in the other demonic machines he had seen. It didn't move: He didn't move. It didn't make any advance to attack: He didn't make any advance toward the opening. Neither his curious nature nor his surprise would make him near what could be a member of new species of metal terrors.

A deep growl sounded outside, low and menacing; it made his optic pupils shrink with fear. The clattering clanks of rock and glass bouncing on aluminum and tin sheets echoed inside, vibrating off the walls of the cylinder. Suddenly its feet shifted in place to point in his direction as a sharp intake of air sliced through the still moment, followed by a demonic screech.

His feet slid across the bottom of the bombshell as the instinct to escape coursed through his circuits, as if he could back himself further away. Still, he only found himself curling up, drawing his knees to his chest to make himself smaller and cradling along the curved wall.

The horrid noises never ceased… But nothing happened.

Confusion drowning out paranoia, Nine took a few cautious steps toward the opening. Enough so that he could run in an instant of trouble—just so close that he could see what the beast was doing.

It fell— its back slamming into the ground with enough force to rattle dust which rained over the lip of the bombshell— a primitive cry ringing out from it. Its hands were flung above itself, wrestling with something. Something…

"Oh no…" Nine voiced in a disbelieved whisper. It was impossible…

The creature was wrestling with a Cat Beast.

Seven had killed a Cat Beast—what he had thought to be the one and only Cat Beast—back when the others had still been alive. Not long after he had first awoke: When they had tried to save Two. Spotting another was shocking as well as terrifying. Still, it was better for that the two monsters destroy each other than sniff him out.

Unfortunately, one of the parts of the Scientist's soul he had inherited was an insatiable curiosity. He couldn't help but wait and watch to see who would be the victor, and later which would be the bigger threat.

The large beast managed to squirm into a sitting position, and it was now that he saw that the Cat Beast had bitten into the leather at the former's forearm and that the first monster was trying to yank the other off. However, the Cat Beast was incredibly persistent, latching on with terrible force—fangs sunk deep into the leather.

The former swiftly rolled over on top of it, crushing the Cat Beat with its own mass. The spikes on its back stuck into the earth and its clawed feet kicked out against the first, to no avail. Still, the claws tore apart the cloth and leather at its chest further, and it let out a horrid cry as if in pain.

Pushing itself up, the giant monster raced off, leaving the other trapped in the dirt. The Cat Beast struggled to stand, shaking left and right to pull itself free from the ground. Slowly, piece by metal piece, the spikes were yanked out of the ground. It spun in place, getting back on its feet to run the way the other had gone.

The giant was already waiting for it. As the Cat Beast lunged, the other hefted a large piece of rebar from a pile of rubble. It held the piece above its head, fingers curling around the bar in anticipation.

Finally it swung, hitting the approaching Cat Beast with all its might to send it soaring into a broken wall from a nearby destroyed building. Sparks flew as the creature slammed with full force into the brick and fell limply to the ground.

The giant didn't waste a moment. Running over to the fallen monster and continually smashing the rebar at its much smaller frame, it let out a primal scream with each swing.

Up, down, bam! Up, down, crack! Up, down, fzzt! Up, down, smash! The latter was nothing more than broken chunks of bone and metal by the time former was done. Once the gruesome, brutish act was complete and the Cat Beast moved no more, it stood there—frozen in time—air heavily hissing in and out of it.

And now it was time for Nine to make his exit, before the creature caught on to his presence and turned that horrifying, destructive ability on him. As quickly and quietly as possible, he scrambled out of the can and began to retreat to The Scientist's former home. He hurried up the large steps—often looking back to make sure the surviving monster still hadn't caught on. All it did was stare at the fallen form of the Cat Beast—'breathing' deeply— as if in meditative contemplation of its actions.

So distracted was he by his frightful interest in the creature, as he reached the top step he accidentally knocked over a small piece of shrapnel. The bit skidded over the edge before he could stop it.

It clinked with every bounce down until it hit soil. The monster's glassy gaze snapped his way.