GODBODY

Chapter 1: YOU FOUND ME

"THY WORLD PUSHED TO RUIN; YOUR CRIES WERE MADE"

WE WILL DENY YOU...

The cargo hauler had been traveling through the sands for quite some time now. A new dive site opened and plenty of eager mechanics sent out their best hunters to grab whatever loot they'd be able to get their hands on. One such robot by the name of S01 is the hero of this setting, brandishing a gold emblem adorned with a single red M. As they walked forward, the nearby hunters made way for the machine both in fear and awe because S01's presence meant that there was a good haul to be had. There were cheers until they found their seat at the helm of the top deck.

In the distance the ruined building came into view. All the while, one of the older hunters began to explain to the younger ones aspiring to get into the delving business:

"After the big shift many eons ago, people began scavenging these lands for resources. Though it's still plenty dangerous out in these parts thanks to the leftover Gearborn, the things we found were amazing. They hoard weapons, ores, mech suits, cybernetic parts, you name it. As far as we know, no one has an idea why they do it but it has come to our benefit. The value of our job as hunters went sky high after the radiation mutated people to be able to use technomancy. Basically, the shit looks like if a mechanic had telekinesis; they can build shit with their minds. Technos are the backbone of our society but we make sure they have what they need to build with. Now let's get to it!"

The hauler pulled up to the ruin entrance just as the old man finished his explanation. The whole group made their way to the lower deck to prepare to depart. Everyone loaded up whatever weapon they brought along as the offloading brief was run through. The lower hatch opened slowly. As the people started to file out of the vehicle, S01 stood at the top of the platform before slowly sauntering behind the rest of the crowd. A Seven-foot robot would have no issue catching anyone even at a slow pace. Inside, the hunters were already rummaging through the overflowing heaps of scraps at the entrance.

"You fool; everyone knows that all the good stuff is further insdiAHHHhhhhh!!!" An overconfident hunter had missed his step. Eyebrows went up; he went down, falling to his doom while eliciting a unanimous look of both surprise and disgust from all in the vicinity of the incident. “That’s not what I meant by "let's get to it!"." The weathered, storytelling hunter slapped his knee before cackling down the nearest corridor.

Meanwhile, S01 had already made their way into the bowels of the ruin. Each step brought them closer to an opening illuminated with a ghastly Vermillion hue. Against the very far side of the wall through the entrance, the source of this light was emitting from a pristine cybernetic arm. A tarnished body was attached to the arm, the stark contrast in the condition of the two parts made it seem unrealistic.

As S01 took steps to close the distance, the air appeared to resonate with violence and then a sudden calm. S01 Contemplated shooting the corpse and being done with it all but their contractor would frown upon the idea of something so wasteful. If S01 had eyebrows, they would be furled in frustration. They collected their prize and dragged it back to the hauler until it was time to depart. Several hours had passed before the rest of the hunters began to return to the aircraft. Their next destination would be the city of ION, but for now, there was a seemingly endless ocean of sand to be crossed before the journey would be over.

The captain of the hauler seemed to be a bit restless as they made their way back. The captain turned towards the older hunter and asked, “Hey Ullman, is it usually this calm when you’re out hunting?” Ullman turned slowly towards the young captain seemingly out of annoyance “well since you asked, wouldn’t surprise me if a couple of ems wanted to get in our ass all of a sudden.” He spat over the edge of the railing before continuing, “You ever hear someone stealing from a dragon’s nest without getting a few flames here or there?” “It’s always a risk but I’ll have to say; it is mighty quiet this time around.” The captain laughed at the snarky retort of the old hunter. Ullman looked off into the distance and gazed into the soft amber glow of the sunset. The change in the atmosphere made the sun and moon so much more captivating than it had ever been. Except that wasn’t the sun.

“HOLY SHIT!” “You might wanna get a move on!” Ullman urged the captain while pointing to the massive, tsunami-like horde of Gearborn trailing behind them. The hunters began shooting down the flying Gearborn and whatever else decided to get close enough to cause a problem. “Better hold on to ya cheeks cause this hauler’s bout to get movin!” Ullman yelled to high heaven as the Hauler reached its maximum speed. Luckily these models are built purely for speed, the Gearborn had no hope of catching up.

Several hours had passed since the Hauler escaped the Wastelands. The Far-reaching walls of ION could be seen on the horizon. These walls were an ode to castles; tall enough to keep out giants while defending every angle should there ever be an attack. Most cities were designed this way now to keep the Gearborn out, as well as whatever else was unlucky enough to greet the defense systems. The Hauler pulled into its designated bay so that all of the hunters could unload their findings for the trip. The captain made his report to the guards about the Gearborn activity while filling out the necessary paperwork for the expedition.

Ullman grumbled to himself, as old people tend to do, then turned towards S01. It appeared to the old man that the robot was deep in thought; this was something he had never seen before as S01 was always deliberate in its tasks as far as his memory could recall. So, then he asked, “why is it you only ever bring back so little from our outings boyo?” “I mean, we all know who your boss is so I can’t imagine they’d not like to have as much as you can find.” S01 turned slowly as the old man droned on. “Bah! It’s alright, I know you don’t like to speak much so it's fine.” The old man had given up on the chance of conversation as the silence began to pile up.

“01010111 01101000 01100001 01110100 00100000 01110011 01101111 01101110 01100111 00100000 01100100 01101111 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01101100 01101111 01110011 01110100 00100000 01110011 01101001 01101110 01100111 00100000 01110111 01101000 01100101 01101110 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 01111001 00100000 01100110 01101001 01101110 01100001 01101100 01101100 01111001 00100000 01100011 01101111 01101101 01100101 00100000 01101000 01101111 01101101 01100101 00111111”

S01 sang a harmonious collection of sounds in reply to Ullman. The old man looked back bewildered. He was more surprised that he got a response from S01 rather than the fact he couldn’t understand anything that was said. No one understands the language that the "old ones" speak to begin with. “You know I don’t understand ya!” Ullman replied as he patted S01 on the shoulders and proceeded to walk off while laughing.

S01 sat for a few minutes staring in the direction that Ullman had left. S01 racked their newly packaged cargo over their shoulder and made their way towards their next destination:

The Big M.

S01 walked through the cities main streets being greeted by some of the citizens along the way, nodding their head in reply. Vehicles traversed both on the land and in the sky, typical for an advanced civilization but definitely convenient. Several street vendors could be seen around the city with various bits and bobs. your traditional fast-food restaurants got their usual traffic. Down the end of a particular street, a large building with a giant garage bay door stood, adorned with a fluorescent M. This was a place that was home to one of the biggest mechanics known in ION. There were stations for all types of vehicles as well as areas dedicated to cybernetic body maintenance. S01 walked through the open garage towards a door neatly placed in the very guts of the building. S01 stopped at the door. THUNK! S01 headbutted the door and remained there before speaking harmoniously:

"01110111 01100101 00100000 01101000 01100001 01110110 01100101 00100000 01110010 01100101 01110100 01110101 01110010 01101110 01100101 01100100"

A few minutes go by before the hiss of the intercom could be heard. A hearty, feminine voice boomed from the tiny speaker “You may enter.” The door proceeded to swing open with S01 maintaining their balance before comically returning to an upright position. They stooped low enough to clear the door’s entrance and made their journey inside. Each footstep echoed across the metal floor lining every area of the indoor workshop. S01 made their way down the wide corridor stretching deeper into the area. There were several doors smattered on both sides of the area with a small bulb above each door lighting the darkness. At the very end of the hallway shone sparks flying from a welder illuminating the wall periodically. Metallic thump after thump, S01 made their way to the end of the hall just like a moth to flame.

“I’m glad you made it back safely.” The girl spoke to S01 in a familiar and warm tone as she continued to work. Her voice was muffled by the protective suit she had on. “Come on now! Show me what you brought back!” she proclaimed excitedly to S01 in an impatiently playful manner. They had gone through this routine several hundreds of times. She would work and S01 would bring back new parts for her every time there was an outing. She neatly put away what she had been working on and cleared the bench space to make room. S01 dumped the body onto the table billowing tufts of dust and metal. “You always bring me the same type of parts.” She slowly probed every section of the robotic corpse as she lamented on the fact, “it’s almost as if you’re looking for something. She ran her hands across the body, frowning as she felt the obvious change in material condition. “This Arm doesn’t feel a day old if I’m being honest; if I did know any better, I would’ve thought you had stolen this from someone.” The girl let out a boisterous laugh but suddenly paused as if something spooked her.

“WAIT… n-no... NO. YOU ACTUALLY FOUND ONE WITH A CORE INTACT!?” “Never mind these botched piles of robot parts,” she gestured dramatically to a pile of robot corpses haphazardly piled in one of the corners of the room. “A CYBORG WITH A PRISTINE CORE IS PRACTICALLY UNHEARD OF. YOU BEAUTIFUL BLOCK OF METAL'' she gave S01 a massive hug then started hastily folding up the Cyborg body. The girl dragged it from the table, knocking over anything that was of value and slid it around the corner into another backroom like some rabid serial killer.

S01 lurched around the corner to follow her. By the time they entered the room she already had the core hooked up to her computer. She ran a program to diagnose the condition of the core and the other processes that it would conduct if the body had been running. She began to read a few of the initial command prompts aloud. "Condition stable, energy output stable." "Hmmm I wonder what the manufacturing date for this core is?" "Could probably sell for a good lump of credits and then some!" She then gestured to S01 without turning to speak "Would you kindly tell me the date and serial for the core?" S01 picked up the core and inspected it in a similar manner to how you would treat a Rubik's cube. It was the shape of a dodecahedron and gave off an orange glow in between the slots of the metal housing protecting the more delicate parts powering it. S01 began shaking the core out of frustration as they had trouble locating the information. "It's on the bottom, silly." The girl verbally jabbed at the confused cyborg humorously.

"01000001 01101000 00100000 01111001 01100101 01110011 00101100 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01100001 01110011 01110011 00101110"

S01 continued. "01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01110011 01100101 01110010 01101001 01100001 01101100 00100000 01101110 01110101 01101101 01100010 01100101 01110010 00100000 01101001 01110011 00100000 01011010 00101110 01000101 00101110 01010010 00101110 01001111 00101100 00100000 01110100 01101000 01100101 00100000 01111001 01100101 01100001 01110010 00100000 00110010 00110011 00111000 00110000"

They both turned towards each other. The air itself seemed to hold its breath as the shock of what had been said was incomprehensible. "D-did you just say...?" The girl stands up and walks towards S01. She takes the core to verify what she had been told. Her eyebrows raise and she calmly places the core down on the bench and begins to rub her temples in frustration. “This completely changes things.” “This is more than 10,000 years ago!” “Cores only last two hundred years when inactive and yet you have one right here in front of us damn near factory fresh” the girl picks up the core and places it back near the corpse before scrounging her workspace for various tools and cables.

“01010111 01101000 01100001 01110100 00100000 01100001 01110010 01100101 00100000 01111001 01101111 01110101 00100000 01100100 01101111 01101001 01101110 01100111 00111111”

S01 asked aloud, only getting a response after the girl took a break to wipe the sweat from her forehead. “I’m going to see if I can get it to work again.” “If I can do that, then I can figure out why this core is still functioning after all these years.” “Only problem is that this might take a while; the language used to code this OS is something I’m not familiar with.” “Hand me my phone, I need to make a few calls.”