12 Miles Below-Chapter 41Book 7. : A trip to visit Bob

Bob was an interesting fellow. Or spore mass? Biological weapon? Might need to workshop a better quickhand for that one. Either way, I had to go visit it, ask about it’s stalker-crush, and see where that took me.

Get the mite in my lantern, get a headstart into being a mitespeaker, connect to Wrath and go on from there.

Of course, reality outside the digital sea wasn’t just going to take a pause. As I stepped out of the ruined Odin watchtower and jumped down a few stories to the bottom, I realized the entire outpost here had now filled up with Odin.

And they looked different compared to the deadland Odin. For one, there was a blue and silver motif to their feathers and accessories. And for two there was a squad of them approaching quickly to where I’d landed.

A search through the soul sight found nothing dangerous on them, but a few cerimonial looking weapons. Made sense since at the center of their formation was one bird I’d seen prior through a monitor screen.

Septimus.

He landed on a powerline cable, escorted by the others.

I matched his gaze, “If you’re here to sell me the latest cricket peeler, I’m going to get violent.”

Septimus, one of the three leaders of the Odin and a bird who’d built this entire outpost’s defense structure to stop both Bob and the machines, didn’t seem at all phased by my nonsense. Mostly because he couldn’t speak the same language without Rashant, who wasn’t here.

“You are worried my forces will turn on you. Have no fear.” He said, in perfect old human, which Journey translated. “I am here to offer assistance instead.”

…

So he could speak old norse this whole time?

“Proving to the others on the Icon I did not speak human gave them more confidence I would not turn on them when I left. I always keep my full list of skills to myself when I can.” The bird said, already guessing my next question.

“And… are you going to turn on them?”

“Not fully turn, but subvert. That was the plan.” Septimus said. “All three of the Víkingr knew from the start that the infestation was a greater threat than machine kind. We’ve had years to prepare, contingency plans drafted, and weapons forged to fight them. They are specialized in eliminating land-bound targets, the Odin would have advantages the ancients did not. A chance of victory exists, difficult as it is. And even before hostilities with their kind, there are better ways of escorting you through this strata and out of it without notice of our help.”

“Ah, so you want to help speed me up so I get out of the strata faster?”

Septimus gave a beak movement of some kind, that I hoped meant yes. But I could see the logic - why throw a few thousand birds after a walking tank, when you can just help the tank get tank business done and leave in peace? So long as the machines didn’t notice, they’d follow behind where I went leaving the Odin behind without a fight, and none of them dead from a pyromaniac with an occult blade.

Good plan.

I ran the talley on what I knew so far about the Icon’s generals. One of the Víkingr had apparently rebelled openly, and the other two beat him up and locked him in the Icon. Then Septimus had flown over here with his army to go beat me up in turn.

Except if all three had already plotted to rebel against the Icon government, “So the Víkingr you beat up at the Icon was a false flag?”

“He is. He willingly acted as the opponent, and allowed himself to be defeated. Capturing him in battle secured the trust from the rest of the Icon. The one who remained behind on the Icon and his forces are feeding me information on the events there, and subverting leadership’s direction. And I have come this far away from their influence to act as a rogue element.”

Plots within plots. The birds really had all the snow piled up in their corner and played deep in it

“Well. That’s nice to hear.”

“I don’t trust them.” Cathida said at my side, hidden from all the others since only my helmet could project her into the world. “I’d say I don’t trust them further than I can throw them, except I could throw them very, very far, so my favorite saying doesn’t apply here.”

“I weep for your losses.” I told her, before turning to the Odin ahead. “All right, so what’s your plan?”

Septimus gave me a regal beak stare, which looked a bit ridiculous considering all the ornaments that bird was carrying. I had no idea how he could even fly. “Do you have no need to verify my stance Human Keith?”

“Power cells are the only way you’d be able to take me out,” I shrugged. “And I can tell there aren’t any nearby me as you promised. Good start.”

Septimus pause for a moment, as if updating his knowledge on what I could and couldn’t do.

“The Icon forces are not yet aware of my deception, the Víkingr will feed them false information on the state of the war against you from here.” He said, “That part has been done. It will take them months before they realize my forces have turned, and months more for them to understand the rest of the Víkingr are also running false operations. In that time, we can deal with the infestation and setup contingency plans for the machines and your escape from the strata.”

“I’m more surprised you don’t plan on just killing me right after the infestation’s dealt with.”

Septimus gave me a measured look. “Trust is not needed. Machines will follow you where you go. Assisting you to leave the strata back to your home is the easiest path for the Odin.” The Odin’s gaze turned around to the surrounding deadland outpost. All watching us speak in a language they couldn’t understand. “I do care for the forces under my command. I will still do what must be done if required, however attempting to assassinate you runs far higher risks than assisting you escape. If we fail, you will kill thousands before being taken out. In every possible metric, including morally, assisting you is the better option. The Icon’s council of representatives are too blinded by fear to see the proper paths forward. This is why military matters should be left to the military, not fools who specialized in popularity metrics.”

I gave him a nod at that, ruthless pragmatic as usual. He wasn’t double-crossing the Icon out of any kind of feelings for helping the lone human running around. It was a calculated choice for the entirety of the Odin race.

“We Víkingr are born for this role. Our families trained us from the moment we hatch. I’ve defeated all of my clutchmates, and they are now my seconds, among the Hersir. The council has not done any training, not even theoretical. Their decisions are beyond merely vapid.”

Journey’s language module gave the Odin a very annoyed tone, the derision for the council here crystal clear.

Well. For once the world seemed to throw me a bone here. I had expected the non dead-land Odin to behave like idiots and turn on me, but it turns out the Odin military has pulled a semi-covert revolt against the Icon itself. “Why not just take over the entire Icon yourself, if all the Víkingr are on board with this?”

Septimus clicked his beak. “We serve the Odin by protecting them from external threats. We will do that, and nothing more.”

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This… sounds like convoluted politicking. “I don’t think you’ll need to be worried for too long about that.” I said, “Appreciate the plans you already set in motion here to subvert idiots and help me out, I’ve also been doing work on my end that might cut to the heart of the matter.”

“What plans are those?” Septimus clicked his beak.

“I got in contact with the machine general that terrorized the Icon earlier, and made an agreement that he calls you off if I go and meet him in combat.”

Septimus stared me down. He looked more pissed off about this than anything. “You run the risk of death against the machine, and if you die, our means of defeating the infestation is greatly hampered.”

“Hampered, but not completely gone.” I said, “I don’t plan on dying anytime soon. I’ve got a plan to deal with the commander of the machines.”

Technically. If I could get in contact with Wrath, or get the mites to turn that portal back on, I’d have a lot of ways out. Fighting To’Orda directly would not be a great idea just yet. I’d be using up a lot of my tricks just to survive.

We talked shop, plans and side-plans and eventually got something ironed out. One of the big issues was that To’Orda likely isn’t going to duel me in a one on one fight. He seemed more the type to send an entire army to drown me and then come by and wack me into the ground.

Technically, I was a duelist primarily. The only enemy I could fight en mass were runners. But other machine models weren’t something I had infinite amounts of practice against. Some tactics had carried over, but not that raw instinct on how runners fought and moved as a wave.

So I needed a counter to To’Orda’s possible use of a giant army. And as it turns out, I might have just that with the Odin here.

Especially when Septimus got a call from the Icon headquarters themselves, ordering him to stand down and hold off on ‘attacking the human’ - new orders from the machine general who’d now taken command of the Icon herself, along with direct command over the Odin stationed there.

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The bird gave me a measured look, which I think was one of respect. “This opens more possibilities. If my Odin fight against the machines, I will be considered a fringe faction. The rest of the Odin can pretend to be following orders, only too far to assist. If you drag this To’Orda back to this outpost and field ahead, we can assist in defeating him. I will have the field prepared.”

One look over the Odin kill wall and all the fortifications here told me this place could handle the machine army To’Orda might have behind him. While I had to deal with the Feather himself. And that was far more possible to handle.

Free army, and I could leave it to Septimus to handle the politics and logistics of it. Absolutely perfect for my future schemes. With the plan setup, Septimus gave me one more show of good faith - additional fully powered cells, fueled up and ready to go. They were in long term storage mode, so no chance of blowing up. With those tossed into a sack along with my other four cells, I now had enough to travel into Bob’s domain. I’d run out of water before I ran out of power. Should be enough time to find and yank a mite into the mite seeker.

With that, I left the outpost before Septimus could double-cross me or do anything of that nature. The doorways were open, and no turrets shot me in the back, while the birds all started discussing and getting the outpost back to speed, this time preparing to hold off a machine assault force instead of Bob.

“I still protest about this course of action.” Cathida said, walking next to me over the ashen soil. The path here was familiar - I’d sprinted from the other way down, while being harassed by Odin. Now I was on my way back with a list of questions Septimus wanted to ask Bob, and get feedback on.

“At this point, I have to ask if you just protest every course of action Cathida. Bob, the Odin, the Icon, Aztu, Abraxas, - What’s next, are you going to tell me the Feathers who want to cut human heads off shouldn’t be trusted? They seem completely stand up and honest to me, I’m sure they won’t cut my head off.”

“Bob is a sentient bioweapon that’s built to kill humans originally.” Cathida pointed out. “And the Odin are birds. Don’t trust birds.”

“Right right, next you’ll tell me the nice salesman at my estate gate trying to sell me a crate of premium snow shouldn’t be trusted.”

“No chance deary, I know when to keep my trap shut if I get to see something funny.”

The bickering kept up for most of the hour of walking past the deadlands. Up ahead, Bob’s territory loomed. Besides the complete lack of small plantlife, the trees looked just fine there. Peaceful even. But stepping through, there was that feeling of something wrong. An invisible death floating around here.

I also knew what was inside those trees, like wet slimy tentacles reaching through the bark, slowly strangling the life out of everything, as calm and steady as Bob could keep the process down.

Biohazard warnings flared up on my HUD, blinking red and beeping loud. The armor itself was growing nervous as Bob’s spores began to wrap around my frame like an invisible blanket.

“We’re here.” I said, feeling the dirt under me grow more spongy.

No animals in sight. No insects or smaller plants anywhere, all of that couldn’t survive Bob for long. The larger animals were also going to soon die off, leaving only the trees to last the longest. But they too would eventually have every last calorie sucked dry.

And Bob was helpless to stop it all.

Little tragic, I felt for the tiny (okay, massive) biological weapon of ecological destruction. And speaking of, I got a comms request on the side of my HUD, shortly after I silenced all the alarms and warning that I’d die if I took off my helmet.

“Greetings.” Bob said.

“And a fine hello to you too Bob. I’m back.”

“I have noticed. Have communications with the Odin come to a satisfying conclusion?”

“Yep. Boy do I have a story for you buddy.” I said, patting my sack of power cells. “And plenty of time to tell it.”

---

Bob was happy. At least as happy as a sentient bioweapon could be. The negotiations with the Odin had finally begun, and they’d understood now that speech was possible. As Bob explained, it had been considering using animals themselves to die off in a specific pattern, so that the Odin could read letters off the dead bodies all assembled. It just didn’t have as direct control over them to do that.

“I can send intrusive thoughts into my infected animals. And lower their inhibitions. However, my impulses are generic ideas. Attack this. Move in this general area. Do not attack these others. Search for this. I am slowly learning how to induce a sense of general happiness while sitting still in one area. To have them remain still like a spider would, for days until they expire in the right position. I have not yet reached this level of mastery.”

“All right, first of all - incredibly creepy Bob. Seriously, didn’t we have a talk about this earlier?”

“They are not suffering.” The bioweapon answered back, clearly upset. “The logic follows your original requests. I do not understand.”

“That one’s more on me, I know technically speaking, it’s a better fate than most animals get, but still - very creepy.”

Imagining a rabbit sit in one place for hours, even days, slowly dying of thirst, while its brain simply made it feel a general sense of happiness and contentment to remain still.

“Nature has already done this task for me.” Bob said, insisting. “Birds remain in their nests for hours in one day, sitting upon their eggs. I study that feeling of contentment, and eventually I will discover how to induce it on my flock.”

“Reminds me of an imperial story.” Cathida said to the side as I walked with her to sit on a rock. “Minnera was a woman who loved a statue. Turns out the statue was her dead husband, who’d been petrified by a machine. Lots of things happen in the story, but eventually she finds no cure for her husband, and sits down by his side instead. Drinks some kind of mite-potion, and simply stands there for days, slowly turning to stone herself. The story’s oddly one about finding peace in lost situations, and how even while dying over time, Minnera was content with her fate. She ends up standing next to her husband for the end of time, together. It’s romantic.”

I stared at Cathida. “Romantic? That sounds straight depressing. I never knew imperials had tragic stories like that. Surface songs are all about overcoming a situation, or if they can’t, struggling to the end. They’re very heroic.”

She waved an armored digital hand at me. “Your stories are predictable, boring. Ours had actual meat in there. Tragedy, loss, failure and success.”

“I see the bait, but I’m not going to rise to it. I have two days to find a mite colony around here, or possibly more if I find spots where Bob’s not around and I can get some water in. So let’s keep focused here. Ask Bob if he knows where a colony in reach is.”

She shrugged, rolling her eyes. “You’re just running because you know I’m right. Imperial stories are far better. Anyhow, Journey’s relaying your message to Bo-- oh that was fast.”

The text appeared on my HUD along with the distorted voice of Bob that Journey had generated for the entity. “I do.”

“That’s exactly what I was hoping to hear from you, you little stalker, you. Is the colony in reachable distance from me? I need to yank a few mites and stick them into this box.” I patted the side of my belt where Tsuya’s miteseeker was. Cathida looked pleased at that, given she’d died to eventually get this very thing into my hands and away from a machine’s.

“It is. You will need to dig through a tree deeper down the forest, for the colony is shifting under the earth there, terraforming a new project that will emerge in the next year. I do not know more of what they plan, for all my scouts and spores are eliminated if I overstay within their presence.”

“How far away are we talking about?”

“Thirteen hours of your walking.” Bob said.

Which meant a short trip if I ran for it at full speed. And fortunately, I just so happened to have all the fuel I needed to do exactly that. I sat back up and cracked my neck. I had that list of questions from Septimus, on how to better communicate and organize their end goals, and I was going to have nothing else to do the whole time otherwise. “Well Bob, hope you can keep me company here, we got plenty of time to chat while I go visit your girlfriend.”