Jeurridam Ch. 02: The City of Rust

The same Dhole that smelled Heaven earlier came back to investigate. It sniffed him, assessing him thoroughly with a wagging tail. Heaven extended out his hand to touch the Dhole.

"Don't touch it!" Tanzanir warned, but it was too late. The creatures snarled, snapping it's jaws at him before whimpering loudly at his imposing hand. Heaven quickly withdrew his hand and all the Dhole's disappeared, all darting with a turn of speed so great they seemed to vanish.

"You just love touching shit..." Tanzanir said to himself.

"What?" Heaven asked, being terribly standoffish. Tanzanir looked up at the boy, those cute eyes of his emitting raging waves of heat. He obviously wanted to give the boy a full load but for my sake, he sighed and refrained.

"You're just a little pussy...hidding behind your robots..." Heaven said to himself.

"What did you just say to me?" Tanzanir asked, looking at the boy with those piercing eyes.

"You heard me..." Heaven said.

"Beth," Tanzanir said through the grit of his teeth, "You better get em."

"He brought this upon himself. I told him to go home but he's still here so..." I sighed.

"Let me just...get back to my work. I really don't want to hurt him." Tanzanir said, somehow able to find his composure. He got up, heading back for the tent.

"Hurt me?... Pussy..." Heaven said.

Then and there, a fine particle sifter was flung across the campsite, hitting Heaven in the head. He grabbed his throbbing face as he fell from the impact. Tanzanir rushed over to him, picking him up off the ground.

"BETH!" Heaven screamed, thinking I'd come to his aid.

"Listen here you little twerp. Your little comments won't get you anything but a thorough ass beating. Now I can drag you all up and down this campsite if I wanted to but I want you to listen, and listen closely. You are a stupid little fuck who doesn't believe shit until shit happens. Well tomorrow, shit is gonna get real inconvenient for all of us and I bet you'll be the first one to crack under the pressure. And you sitting here, acting like a little bitch like you're the baddest of us all isn't helping any of us. Now I'd suggest you shut your mouth, get the brain washing out your head get with the program because I sure as hell am ready to leave you behind.." Tanzanir growled through the grit of his teeth. He threw Heaven back down to the ground, returning to his tent.

Heaven looked on, shocked that this escalated to this level.

"I can't believe that n..."

"Don't act like you don't deserve it..." I sighed. He looked at me shocked, as though I was wrong for not siding with him.

"No I did not deserve what ever the fuck that was tossed at my head! Why the fuck am I always being hit with shit? This is getting old...old real fast!" He refuted.

"I bet you think its so fair to treat him the way you do don't you?" I asked waiting for a response, "...Like he didn't hear anything you said to me about him. Like the walls of that tent are ten feet thick and utterly sound proof. He heard it all, and I think you owe him an apology."

"An apology." He asked, obviously reluctant.

"Yeah, for putting him through hell! He already had to deal with it for ten years with father forcing him to build shit so he could monopolize it. You honestly didn't think Tanzanir did that work because he wanted to, did you? You think he wanted to spend six years cooped up in a shack by the only family he thought he had and made to work for the rest of his life? You think it's fair how you, dad, uncle your cousins and everyone else treated him, as though he was second rate to all of you when he built us? That doesn't warrant an apology?" I asked.

"I mean..." Heaven responded, trying to justify why he wouldn't apologize.

"I have nothing else to say to you.You better not fuck up anything tomorrow!" I threatened.

"I won't!" He said throwing both hands up in surrender.

I really was pissed at my brother. I never had known him to be such a dumbass, only Zion and Ezekiel. At this point, I truly had lost all hope in my family. It was hard to sleep that night with that on my mind. Hell, even Heaven didn't sleep and god knows Tanzanir never slept.

"Hey, Zanir." I said.

"Yeah?" He responded openly.

"Where's the Big Daddy?" I asked.

"He's in hyper lock to conserve energy. He's under the tarp where the rations sat on." He said back.

"Wait, he can fold down that small?" I asked, astounded.

"What's big daddy?" Heaven asked.

"The giant thirteen foot robot that wanted to kill you all but I insisted no..." Zanir said plainly.

"Oh..." Heaven said, unsure how to respond. Zanir sighed, obviously having a lot on his mind.

"You wanna know why the android is so important, Beth?" Zanir asked.

"I told you that you didn't have to tell me..." I sighed. Heaven looked on intently.

"Well, my dad was the chief engineer for the UCAC. He designed a lot of cybernetic machinery that is currently used by the UCAC today, including the left half of my brain. I'm too a cybernetic." Zanir confessed.

"Whoa what?" I asked, taken aback.

"Yeah, my brain, my spinal column, my nervous system, even my blood, it's all inorganic... mechanized. My dad did it to me when I was a baby because he knew one day, he'd succumb to his work and indeed he did. The designs he had were placed in my mind and I always, always, always strived to build em from the time I was a child. Only recently have I become skilled enough to build it after many, many prototypes...then your brother sold it off." Zanir continued.

"Yeah about him, we need to talk." I said.

"About what..." Zanir asked, unintentionally defensive.

"I saw what happened that night. He said it was...authentic he just wasn't expecting a no so abruptly so he did what he could to be spiteful." I explained, trying to be vague for the sake of Heaven.

Zanir stopped in his tracks, slowly turning to face me.

"So that night could have went totally different if I..."

"No, no! This is not your fault! He was wrong, he admitted it and everything! Don't you blame yourself for this... you did nothing wrong!" I said trying to reassure him of this.

"Sometimes," He began, clenching his eyes tight, "Shit like this makes it hard to believe that everything happens for a reason...when you..."

"Everything does happened for a reason, Zanir." I said.

"Yeah, but you know how soon this was? This was supposed to be a year off." He said, his eyes watering up, obviously very frustrated, "It wasn't even supposed to turn out that way! I was supposed to leave in the night without a single life having to be threatened! I just got shit luck..."

"Don't say that." I said, shaking my head. Zanir fell silent, "I just don't want to hear you speak that way. When Ezekiel was strapped to that bed screaming for mercy, I nearly lost my mind because of this shit he was saying. This is like a rehash, just stop..."

"I guess..." Zanir said, closing his laptop screen and sliding onto the floor. It was like when he was finished, we all were able to sleep.

The sleep wasn't very comfortable but it surely was a godsend. We woke up to the blaring of Zanir's watch. It was about eight in the morning. We all woke up, stretched and prepared for the day. Zanir stayed on his watch, obviously concerned with the sanctity of the mission.

"Ok Heaven," He said, removing the crate and tarp off the android, "This is what I need you to do. You just follow Beth's lead; try to keep attention away from me. If all else fails and a battle ensues. I got you all covered..." His floating blades began to rise around him. He opened his robes and the blades settled on the inside. There were even more than I previously thought, two long floating swords settling in the rear of the robes.

"Those aren't heavy?" I asked.

"No, all together, they weigh about twenty pounds." He said back.

"What are they made out of?" I asked.

"Space metal and ceramics..." He smiled, touching his watch.

Suddenly, the Big Daddy began to configure. Zanir paid no attention to it, only concerned with the cybersecurity of the surrounding city. It all looked so bad ass how fluid he moved, as though he had done this a thousand times over. We began to move without a spoken cue, heading deep into the rust jungle.

Zanir kept eyeing the spires, looking for something but I knew not what. Suddenly, a laser sight locked onto the Big Daddy. As it did, Big Daddy's cannons became online.

"Bingo," Zanir said, "And done." He touched a single key on his hollowatch and the laser sight disappeared.

"You shut down the turrets?" I asked.

"Yeah, but I put up a security front that made it look like they were still active. Based on the pings from the turrets, I can pinpoint the routers that emit the wireless signal. I got a feeling I can use that if we have to make an escape." He said, thinking diligently.

"You think the dude will notice?" I asked.

"I doubt it. It's pretty much a mirror image of his current security bypass. As long as he doesn't reboot the system, we should be alright. Considering how peaceful this place is, I doubt he'll have a reason to touch it." He said.

We walked for an hour, heading deeper and deeper into spiraling matrix. It was beyond beautiful. The red orange and blue hues of the rust with the blue and green pools of acid made for a vibrant set of ruins. The temperature was very cool here, the spires blocking out the blaring heat of the sun.

It didn't take long to reach the epicenter of The City of Rust, where stores and markets were. There were some pretty premium junk dealers here, and surprisingly, this place was busy. And to no one's surprise, we did draw some attention, maybe due to the giant thirteen foot robot following us. It definitely made us all nervous.

A group of people literally froze and stared, I guess the sight might have been that breathtaking. The Big Daddy waved at them, diffusing the tension. They obviously had never seen anything like it before.

It was good too, taking all the attention away from Zanir. His robes and turban were not a common sight this far west.

"Seems like someone's stealing all your attention." I teased.

"I am cool with that!" Zanir laughed. I pushed him, he grabbing me we both laughing loudly.

"Is there a problem here?" A big burly man asked. He had his hand on his gun holster as he approached us.

It froze us both in our tracks. It was quite unclear what this man's intentions were.

"No..." Heaven said in our defense. The man eyed Zanir before backing away to his perch. I looked at Zanir who just had this faint grin on his face.

"I told you these people don't like anything different." He sighed.

"I see that." I said, honestly astounded.

We continued walking, the man with the gun obviously bothering Heaven more than we thought.

"What was his problem?" He asked.

"See, I'm a dark skinned dude of hamitic and congoid decent. How many other dark skinned dudes you see running around here? People don't like what they never have seen before. That was just one vocal dude... There's no telling how everyone really feels." Zanir explained.

"Yeah, it was one of the fears I had for when Zanir left! Who was not going to like him for something he couldn't help about himself? People will often judge you for how you look and not who you are. And there are some very wicked people in this world." I added.

"Oh..." Heaven responded, having little else to say.

Twenty minutes later, we neared the northern tip of the City of Rust where the Merchant Flats were. Ther pools of acid were more prevalent here than further south, making traveling between here very dangerous. Yet, a group of boys carelessly played a game of football between the pools, obviously not caring about the danger.

"Oh my god..." I said, just completely at my wits end watching them.

"They have some serious balls." Zanir laughed.

As we passed by, the boys took note of us, probably due to the giant thirteen foot robot accompanying us. Again, the robot waved at them. The boys waved back, obviously awestruck. Hell, I was too when I first saw the Big Daddy.

We entered the flat, drawing a lot more attention. Zanir fiddled with his watch, looking up at the sky multiple times before pausing. The Big Daddy stood in the center of the Flats, waving at everyone.

"Everything's in place... The android is definitely here." He said.

"Let's get her then..." I said, proceeding.

The ping originated from Alistair's Mechanics and Repairs. I entered the shop, surprised by how similar the machines were to Zanir's work. At the front desk was a young man, really tall maybe about six foot three inches. He had the sweetest freckles and the most boyish face you'd ever see. His hair was oiled and swooped to one side making him look very, very clean. He wore a thin white tee, leather pants and boots, looking at us all with quite a bit of intrigue.

"About two or three days ago," I began, noticing someone was hovering around back, "A very important piece of machinery was stolen from us. It was a small deer-like android that was sold to you all. We need it back and will reimburse you your money."

The young man kept eyeing Zanir, maybe because the boy was vigorously working away on his watch.

"I um..." The young man said, obviously at a loss for words. He looked back to the inventory room, the hovering figure coming out to the front desk. He looked at Zanir and grew on edge.

"It's not here..." The man said.

Zanir looked up at him, his eyes heavy with rage.

"What do you mean it's not here?" He asked.

"We sold it, to some traders a few hours ago... I'd suggest you find them and get lost." The man said. Zanir was beyond angered at this point. I already knew it was going to take a very serious turn. The boy returned to fiddling with his watch, a strange noise being heard from the Inventory Room.

"What the...?" The young man at the desk asked, startled.

Zanir slowly walked up to the desk, giving the man four hundred dollars. It was more than what they Merchants bought it for, twice as much. Then suddenly a cute little silver, fawn-like android came prancing out of the inventory stash.

"See, things like this... are priceless. You can't sell them," Zanir began, "And I really hate being lied to. We came for one simple thing, and you tell us you don't have it and try to turn us away. Well, we got what we came for and will be on our merry way."

We walked towards the exit, the tiny android following us. We then heard the clank of a shotgun.

"If you walk out that door, you'll be blown to bits either by everyone in this town, or our turrets. You return the bot and you can leave and won't be killed." The man threatened. He too had a gun, aiming it at us. He rushed out from behind the counter.

Zanir began to smile.

"You don't think," He laughed, "I'd just come here unarmed did you?" He showed the two men a thermal image feed of him from three different angles, "There's two Orb drones with fire and forget missiles and thirty millimeter cannons, and a giant mech with two one hundred ten millimeter cannons and a tack missile array. And not to mention, I shut down those turrets, shut down your entire wireless network... you're defenseless..."

The young man behind the desk began, tapping on his computer.

"No...no...NO!!" He said, panicked. It was now clear that he was the local computer expert who had built the wireless infrastructure.

Zanir turned and headed for the door. We followed, the tiny android in close proximity. Heaven constantly kept looking back at it, hoping this little thing was worth all this trouble. It just looked so unassuming, like one bullet could ruin it.

Suddenly, shots were fired. We all ducked down, the tiny android darting towards the Big Daddy. The Big Daddy scooped it up in his hand and placed it in his chest compartment, safe and sound. It then rendered those two one hundred ten millimeter beam cannons, ready to destroy this entire town.

"DON'T DESTROY THE SHOP!" Zanir said to it.

All the blades he had hidden under his robe came flying out in every direction, scrambling to a pre-picked target. The blades sliced through a considerable amount of gun barrels. It still didn't stop the men from running forward, with their machetes and cleavers. Still, the blades stood toe to toe with these adversaries, fencing them back and forth.

"Aye, she's coming from the north!" Zanir said to me, looking at her watch.

"The north? How the fuck are we gonna get out of here in time?" I asked. The City of Rust was divided into two parts, the Canyon and the Outskirts. The way the spires jutted out of the ground divided the east and west sectors of the city. This divider ran incredibly far north and the only way to get past the divider was to head south. There was simply no way we could trek south in time. Not only that but going through center of The City of Rust would be a suicide mission. Ultimately, this did not look good.

Suddenly, the Orbs came swooping down with their four static, gravity-reversing wings.

"Hop on them!" Zanir advised. Without hesitation, I did so. Heaven was a bit cautious but did not hesitate as well. As soon as he did, the orbs wizzed forward, flying at eye watering speed. I looked back, trying to see how Zanir was going to get out.

Those two long swords out of the thirty odd smaller daggers he had floating around, connected to slots on the wrists of the gauntlets. Like the blades, the buzzed all around him, Zanir lifted off the ground, flying after us. The remaining blades were in close pursuit.

The Big Daddy was last to leave. He rocketed up into the air with powerful combustion boosters. However, they did not sustain his flight, only giving him extended jumps. He followed us closely as we exited the spires, entering the junky hills of the Outskirts. Soon the hills of junk turned into the sands of the Sonoran desert.

As we flew by, there she was, my truck waiting for us in the sand. The Orbs landed, giving us a chance to run towards the truck. Zanir landed soon after, followed by his flock of angry blades. With a massive thud came the huge Big Daddy, quaking the ground as it landed.

"Shit, that was more fun than I anticipated..." I laughed.

"Yeah! We got what we came for," Zanir smiled, "I guess this is a farwell..."

"No..." I said catching sight of dust rising from the desert floor. Zanir turned, seeing an onslaught of desert buggies and bikers getting ready to chase us down.

"Shit!" He growled.

"I'll run distraction! You get past those mountains, OK?" I said.

"I'm not going to leave you!" Zanir said.

"Trust me, we'll be alright!" I said, patting Heaven on his shoulder. Zanir looked at one of his Orbs! Follow her and blow up anything that gets too close!" The Orb buzzed and chirped wildly, flying over to the truck.

Zanir then turned to the Big Daddy!

"Give them some suppression fire..." He said. The Big Daddy's tack missile array opened. Dozens of tiny five inch missiles fired. They didn't hit a target in particular, just blowing in front of the oncoming buggies to put a lot of debris in the air.

"GO!" Zanir demanded.

I put the truck in drive, heading east as fast as the drivetrain of this truck would allow. The sand engulfed Zanir, the Big Daddy and the Orb, the last I ever seen of them. It was such a hollow way to say goodbye but much better than the abruptness of before. This time it was on our terms and that all we could have asked for.

All I could do was cry, not tears of sorrow but tears of joy. My best friend was about to embark on a mission to save this miserable world and I contributed. The dust settled and I could see the desert buggies were gaining. No less happy, I took out my pistol and began firing at the trucks. Heaven did the same, his heavy ball bearings doing a heap of damage with each shot.