T.E.B.O.N. 2087

Chapter 1

"Two copper wires, all six jars, and the last of my twine, not a scrap more old man!"

"Ha! That's a curse o' a deal you're proposing. I didn't get these scars from tuslin' with runts like you. It was the desert clopse that took me eye during the war! There I was, in the middle of..."

"Leslie Grifter!"

"Enough of that hogwash! Don't spoil the boy's day now."

"Agnes! Woman, not in front of the customers! Gut this rat for supper, save the tail for dessert. Fine dinin' tonight!"

"So we have a deal, Leslie?" Tebon smirked and pointed cleverly.

"NO!" Grifter clenched. "But that locket around your neck," his finger reached, "might persuade me otherwise," he tailed off. "That! Or you and the beast can clear me stoop so payin' customers can browse me shelves."

Tebon turned around. Wasteland. They heard a pin drop in the distance. A crow squawked, proving a point.

Turning back, "I didn't bring anything else." He clasped the locket as a saphire light escaped through the cuff of his sleeve. "This isn't for sale."

He pulled a sealed bottle from his bag. "A half of bourbon if you throw in a pack of smokes. First light's on you."

Tebon opened his palms and stepped back. "Here I go..."

"Errghhh...deal! But next time Agnes won't be dealin' for ya! What's with the glowy arm, anyway?"

"Bionic, but lately it glows around my mother's locket."

"Strange voodoo magic. You hybrids freak me out." He packed a sandwich and bottled water into Tebon's backpack. Agnes placed cookies on the window sill. "For the road home."

"How'd you know i'm heading home?"

"Dear child, my heart grows heavy whenever you drift in. I long for the day you find your path and I'm left wondering became of you."

Grifter's eyes rolled to his brain.

He packed some smokes in his palm, lit one, and flipped it over to Tebon. "Til next time explorer."

Chapter 2

They cooled beneath a familiar billboard. Cayne lapped up water and Tebon stowed the bottle for trade. He pulled his scarf over to his eyes and they started toward the mirage.

"Well ahoy he is!" Broachmer exclaimed. "BACK from the devils belly," he proclaimed. "You've not missed a thing," he explained. He let out a cheer and SUSTAINED!

Tebon peeled off his jacket. "How goes the watch, Broach?"

"Clear skies and buzzin' flies," he delighted. "You look a mess. Nearly two weeks this time by my count."

"Cayne, my boy," Broach greeted, rummaging through the dogs pouches. "What treasures do you have for me today?"

"THAT'S THE TICKET!" Broach grabbed the whiskey and hailed it overhead. "I was beginning to think you had no empathy."

"Whoa, your arm is looking a little, uh, florescent, partner." He bit the cork, FLOOMP. "Ain't seen those since the war."

"I need to get this examined," Tebon pleaded. "Certainly you know someone."

Broach folded his arms. "That's active now," he said, scratching his scruff, thinking of stuff. "Know what that means?"

Tebon shrugged.

"Geez kid. Yea I know someone, but she ain't gonna like you." He took a swig. "The tech lab, there's an old research building out back. Find a woman named Francie Builbot."

Tebon struck a match.

"Your mother ever warn you about smoking?"

"Not likely," he flicked the match. "She split when I was about this tall," he flattened his hand. "They found me on a doorstep holding her locket."

Broach lowered the bottle, "Oh, uh, I didn't know that. Well who named you?"

Tebon exhaled, "I don't remember."

"Right, well, best be on your way then. They'll be coming for you."

Chapter 3

Water danced on tin pipes, trickling into the bunker. Home. Tebon cranked the latch and ducked in. Cayne plopped down near the wood stove where he laid on cold nights, most nights.

"Can't sleep now bud." He looked up, "listen." Cayne propped his ears, recognizing the baritone hum of a distant droid.

Cayne wore a charcoal vest, tailored for storage, protection, and carrying Tebon's Kukri blade. Tebon roped two water jugs and saddled them over his companion.

"Let's go."

They felt the scrapland fade behind as putrid mist dampened the air. Swamp gas. He secured his gas mask then tied a filter made from a vacuum hose onto Caynes snout.

After hours of sloshing, the duo discovered a husked mound, sunken into the jowls of the mire. He remembered his mother's song:

Whisper never wine, how they love your cries. Steady don't fall or you'll wake them all. Listen for the clicks from low on your knees. If they don't getcha from the ground then they'll getcha from the trees.

They edged around the perimeter, avoiding the nest.

"Crrffff."

Nearly clear, Cayne coughed through an expired filter. Tebon scanned the nest, spotting a deathwake as it breeched the cobweb filament.

It reared its blades in a blood curdling screech, summoning its siblings from the catacombs. The porous mound festered and erupted a legion of clacking insects. They mutilated each other in a race to their prey.

Tebon's heart locked. He thought swiftly, then heaved a breathe and removed a filter from his mask, placing it into Caynes breathing apparatus.

They managed sixty yards before the ravenous horde licked their heels. Tebons organs burned. His lungs hungered as they could taste edge of the swamp.

The gaseous choke wrestled him to the ground as he rolled instinctively to his back. A sharp silhouette emerged from the chattering sea with oily blades extended. Tebon unsheathed his blade and struck first. The bug clacked and shrieked dreadfully, spouting liquid as it slid to the base of the blade.

The earth trembled beneath the army.

Knives clawed up Tebons legs. Memories of his mother numbed the pain as he closed his eyes. Acidic bile spewed about as critters feasted on his melting flesh. A crooked talon tore his shoulder to his navel. Cayne sank his teeth into the attacker, popping its shell in a gooey burst.

The swarm eclipsed the viridescent glow of the swamp.

ZZZzzz.

Faint from blood loss, Tebon sensed a raging current originating in his arm. The saphire glow returned, illuminating his shredded sleeve.

White light swallowed the sky, revealing a drone masked in the trees. The bugs revered the machine in fear.

"Sqqrraawwwww!!"

A deathwake cried from afar then ceased with a POP, dousing its family in organic stew! Shrieks swept through the mass as it began to boil like a cauldron.

Tebon rolled to his knees, droid rumbling overhead. He rose to his feet, clutching Cayne in his arms. Shaking. The world spun as he hobbled through the melting pot.

The smell of rotting flesh stalked him off the battlefield.

Chapter 4

Blood laced boots kicked the old door behind the tech lab.

"SHUT UP!" shouted a woman within. A door slammed and a rooster crowed. Heavy hoofs approached. The rusted peephole broke open,"who the hell is it?" then flicked shut. "Doesn't ring a bell. Get the hell off my porch!"

Blood browned on the petrified wood. Cold rushed over him and he obliged, sliding down the door until he sat facing out, admiring the emptiness.

"I need..." he drooled blood, "Francie."

Chapter 4.5

"CAYNE!", Tebon sprung awake, aggravating staples in his chest.

"Easy!" a woman scolded.

He winced, prodding at the gash. "Where's my dog?" The woman nodded toward a cot. "Deathwake did him up, but he'll live," she said, polishing a knife. "Antibiotics and some rest will suite him fine."

Tebon sighed and returned to his pain.

"Who told you my name stranger?"

Tebon swung his feet over the edge. "Broach."

"Broach! Ashter Broach? HA! I thought he'd have drunk himself a sailors grave by now."

Tebon fixated on a chocolate bar.

"Go ahead, you'll need the sugar."

"We were in war together. Xenilon was dark times, you know the stories. Anyway, I was a droid tech and our missions frequently overlapped. HA! He always was a survivor!"

Tebon peeled the wrapper. "Almonds," he glanced back, "Caynes favorite." He broke a piece at the seem and ate around the almonds, setting the nuts aside."Broach is head watch of the scraplands now. Great for trading on account he meets everyone."

He grimaced, "is this, the tech lab?"

"HA! Yea its the real tech lab if you fancy it that. They may have shiny toys up front, but the madness revels here!"

"That's intriguing tech you've got yourself," she motioned to his arm. "The droid was preserving it, or it would have microwaved you too."

Tebon listened, wiggling his fingers.

"These cores powered our droids in the war." She ran her thumb up his arm, feeling for a button.

Click. "My specialty."

A hydraulic hiss revealed a hollow compartment.

"You've never been exposed to pure Xenilon energy have you? When that drone discharged its weapon, you absorbed a whole lot of it."

"I felt it in my bones," he reflected.

She inserted a small key fob. "Exoskeleton keys. Decommissioned after the war to prevent access to Xenilon cores. I kept a few... dozen. HA!"

The chamber rotated, exposing the core. A dead cube levitated in the center, mocking gravity.

Tebon's locket crackled, emitting an amber glow.

"Interesting," she murmured.

CRACK! She slammed his arm on the table, catching the cube as it ejected. Magnified, it read:

Transitional Exopod for Bio Organic Nanovirus.

T.E.B.O.N.

"No." She shot up. "No, this isn't possible."

"My name," Tebon marveled.

She met his eyes, "this doesn't exist in humans."

Droid engines approached from afar. "They've located you," she exclaimed, "but how?"

She snapped, "your locket!"

"Xenilon is a rapidly dividing organism that emits unparalleled energy." She ripped the locket from his neck and jammed it into his arm.

"That's how we defeated the drones," she shouted, "but it devours organic material and is fatal to humans!"

The walls shook as droids descended on the building.

"You had a weakened strain, like a vaccine. Kept alive to one day be reanimated!"

Red lasers cleaved the room. Columns buckled.

Francie braced herself, "but now, you hold a full strain!"

The Xenilon core overloaded his nerves in a catatonic embrace. His skin smoldered, blood spat from his nose, his ear drums screamed.

Is this death? Cayne won't understand. I forgive her for leaving me. I've never been in love. A cherry cream soda sounds nice.

BOOooM

A drone barreled through the wall, sustaining fatal damage.

Tebon was blind, numb to the ensuing calamity but he sensed something new, or someone.

The drone lurked in the shadows popping and fizzing, its system on alert as it sensed an unknown connection.

Francie squinted, watching as the core bridged human and binary consciousness.

The sensation intensified unbearably until Tebon cried above the chaos and, all at once, he and the drone were one. Sympathy drowned his heart as he experienced every feeling the machine had ever known. Fear, happiness... misery.

Tebon felt a powerful message:

We are slaves to the hive. Humans may uprise, but machines are programmed to obey. As long as Xenilon exists, our survival mechanism will pursue it relentlessly to keep it from humans. Destroy it, and drones will once again act of their own free will.

Tebon wept with sorrow. He couldn't fathom a life of servitude. His path was clear.

Rigid and stiff, he clasped his hands and raised them overhead, bones aching, ligament tearing. Without pause, Tebon plowed his fists to the basement floor.

A thunderous growl clapped through the oasis. Drone's crashed to earth and the building crumbled.

Tebon laid lifeless beneath the rubble, his damaged core showering faint, purple sparks.

Epilogue

2087 was the year the war ended. Xenilon was eradicated and the drones distain for humans had evaporated.

In years past, tongues told tales of a boy in which the energy lives on. One who walks amongst the droids.

A boy who travels with a companion.

T.E.B.O.N. 2087