Authors: Unknown
It was Jak's turn at watch, so I had a chance to speak with Billy. She showed me a shoulder patch she pulled from one of the dead men. I couldn't see the details in the darkness, but the fact it was there at all suggested either Military, a group that wanted to act like it's military, or looters. We both thought the last might be the most likely scenario, and hoped any we find in the daylight hours would be more willing to talk before shooting. We could only hope.
Were they human? Gholem? Probably the latter, and as much as I dislike violence, especially against our blue skinned friends, all bets and restraint is off if I'm fighting for my life, or the lives of those around me. I never did care too much at who shot at me unless it helped solve the problem of how to make them stop. I was tired and we had only a couple hours before we needed to get going again. Sleep Now.
Date: September 11
Mood: Disturbed
Even with the attack last night we still woke at dawn to get started. We had no choice really. The question now was where do we look? The courthouse, Library, and Council buildings turned up nothing that suggested more than casual passes at looting what weather and animals hadn't already destroyed, and there seemed no signs that a particularly large group had passed this way recently.
Let me make this clear. I didn't know what these buildings were actually called. Sure there were a few have names carved into the stone facing, but weathering, neglect, and such had made much of it unreadable, so I called each building by what it most resembled to me. Plus there is the inevitable shifting of the language to consider. Look at how English mutated over the centuries, and for proof of that, just go find any play Shakespeare wrote. People didn't talk like that when the United States had been founded. People didn't talk like how they did when the United States was born when the great emptying happened, and we don't talk much like they did then. For all I knew the 'courthouse' could have been a bank, or the library a warehouse, or... I think I explained myself well enough.
After these buildings yielded nothing we weren't
sure where to take our search next. This place was too large for four people to reasonably look through, at least in the time we had available to us. Instead we decided that since nothing here near the middle gave us answers that we would travel through to the other side and try seeing what we could see there. We would have wanted to loop around the whole thing, but that would take days, possibly weeks to do as methodically as we wanted. Additionally there was the problem shared by most abandoned cities in that there was no clearly defined edge. In most cases there was a gradual spreading out as one left the center and moved into the residential areas, which could connect two separate cities if they were close enough together. Beginning to see the problem I had mentioned about with scale? Too large to do more than what we were doing.
We first saw people when we passed through what I am going to refer to as a grand market. Couldn't say really if that's what it was, but all the lots in this mammoth building all seemed dedicated to commerce of some sort. I could go into whole pages of detail in describing just this building, but I won't because few of the details actually mattered, though there was a fountain where several corridors meet that I would have liked to make a sketch of if I had the talent.
Sara stayed with the horses outside, armed with one of our newly acquired rifles, while the rest of us explored the inside of this place. Other people, all of them wearing bits and pieces of uniforms we had seen in heaps around Belleberg were inside this place. They could have been army regulars, but Billy and Jak both though that since most of them wore only bits and pieces. It was, in their judgment, far too piecemeal to be regulars. Well then. Let's see if our new neighbors were friendly.
Date Unknown
Discord
Disorientation. Flashes of disconnected images and sounds. People were talking, couldn't understand the words. On reflection that was probably due to getting thrown into a building. At the time I knew nothing of where I was or how I had gotten there though. This next segment was written after. Where was I? Oh yes, I was in the care of unknown persons, hurting everywhere, and unsure of the basics like who I was or what I was doing much less able to spare a thought for my companions. Everything had a dream-like feel to it.
I woke on a cot in a wall tent. My body hurt
and I couldn't move. "Where?" At least I could talk without moving. I didn't know if anyone was in the tent with me since moving my neck hurt. I spoke only to break the silence. "Where am I? What happened?" Though I could speak I could hear the weakness in my voice. I wish I could say I knew the others weren't with me. I wish I could say lots of things of the situation, but I'd be lying.
Time passed and a slender gholem in a mishmash of army fatigues, homespun material, and of all things a Milton Ligers scarf around his neck. How he could wear the thing in this heat I couldn't say. When asked why gholem seemed to always dress too warmly in the summer Billy had always been somewhat evasive on the matter. This man looked me over and, on seeing my responsiveness, patted me gently on the shoulder and told me that he would get Thomas.
My head felt too stuffed full of cotton to care who this person was, but he introduced himself as in charge of the band that found me. He explained that... I forget the word he used, but calling them Robots seemed to fit. He said that me, my group, and the people we were trading fire with were attacked. As his story went, he had led his group in a hunt for the constructs in retaliation for the deaths of a larger group.
I asked if they were part of the refugee group Billy and I had negotiated with last may. They were, and they found what they were looking for, though only after they had been rounded up, people tortured either to find out why they ran here, or possibly just for sport. A few were led to what remained of a warehouse that held not only these robots, but weapons and armor. I asked how any of it was still in usable condition; since all of this stuff has to be centuries old. He wouldn't tell me how, but he did say that though most of it looked in good condition he thought there had to be some sort of damage associated with the extended time spent in stasis... whatever I suppose.
When the Robots were activated they were ordered, by the officer in charge, to 'eliminate these vermin', indicating those that were drafted as laborers. The machines responded by asking for authorization codes. The officer repeated his order. They then went to the weapons lockers, started inspecting the contents, and started repairing what they identified as Cellular Disruptor Rifles. Once they were satisfied these things were in working order they opened fire on the officer, his men, and anyone wearing a uniform.
As described to me these weapons dissolve living tissue, but don't affect non-living matter. I won't pretend how to even start explaining how this was supposed to work; but the account given to me matched stories passed down from the tail end of the war and into the beginning of the Great Decline, stories I had tossed out as being too far fetched to consider when Sara and I were racking our brains for possible things we would have to contend with. Weapons that remove a population and leave the material goods, infrastructure, and the entire reason one would invade an area; on top of leaving no messy demoralizing cleanup of the dead would have been very appealing in my estimation.
Any momentary thoughts of salvation for the draftees were crushed when the robots fired on anyone attempting to flee. In fact the only reason any of this is known was because they left one human and one gholem alive. They surrounded these two, explained to both of them the only reason that they survived was to provide these machines with information on where they were, the general disposition of military and civilian centers, and to spread terror by telling others what they had seen.
If this account did not give you reason to fear then either you lack the imagination I do, or you hadn't paid attention. There were close to forty of these things out there armed with weapons that not only kill, they disintegrate. They had armor capable of stopping anything smaller than a cannon. These things had no goal other than chaos, murder, and their continued survival. The worst part of this; worse than the image of whole towns suddenly being depopulated by these things was this:
They had no demands to meet; no ransom to pay to make them quit. They would not be bargained or reasoned with. They had nothing to report to or any way of ordering them to stop.
I was with Thomas and his group for two days. In that time we had to relocate several times due to finding a richer source of whatever trinkets or scraps of pre-war information that hadn't long ago rotted into oblivion or was stored on useless bits of plastic and metal.
They didn't do this out of some sense of duty to preserve history, or even to learn about our past. They do so because both information and artifacts fetch high prices in Troy (Pennsylvania, Eastern Coalition). There was urgency in their movements, not by threat of immediate attack from these nightmarish super-weapons as I first
thought, but because they wanted to beat any other looters Salvagers from beating them out of the best stuff.
When I asked Thomas why stay when there are now things out there that could kill them and everyone else he had the following to say. "We all die, whether it's tomorrow or twenty years from now. Unless one of these Ubermench walks out in
front of me than I am going to file them away with all the other things that could theoretically kill me and not give them another thought."
They would not allow me to aid in the repeated breakdown, transport, and set-up of their equipment. They were kind to me, but they were adamant about keeping me separated from what they considered sensitive material. Couldn't blame them. I was, however, allowed to help with the pack animals so far as I was able to between occasional bouts of weakness.
I find it hard to describe, but it's like everything is fine one moment, and the next I had no strength in the limb I had bee exerting. After a few minutes it would pass and everything works as it should, but I'm concerned by this and hope it is only temporary.
After repeated attempts to get a straight answer out of anybody, I have found that nobody knew where my companions went. I could not say anything about either Sara or Jak, but if Billy was still alive she would try finding me. She did so once before when I was taken by a group of Humanists and left in a field somewhere with numerous injuries. She could find me now if I stay put long enough since I've walked along with the majority of the group I have been with.
I have not made mention my injuries before because it has remained warm and any rains relatively light. Were this in the middle of winter, or a storm stopping to dump a small lake on my head over the course of several hours I would have made mention of the various aches and pains I
go through on a daily basis. I hurt, but the pain isn't bad enough to keep me from doing the things I need to do.
September 15
Mood: Somber
They let me go with a minimum of fuss and ceremony. I was grateful for their kindness, but they didn't have room for me to stay longer, and I could not stay without knowing what happened to my friends. Also, on the off chance that they were not simply lying to me about these Robots it would have been a better idea to split up, with each of us carrying warning to different places. However now that I had time to sit and think it over I was not so sure about what Thomas told me.
They were far more concerned with mundane looters, thieves, and the like than they were of something that, if I had even heard of from someone I had reason to trust, have run for dear life and Salvation from. It made an interesting, if grotesque and nightmarish, story if a lie. On the other hand if true, I hoped it wasn't. That's all I am willing to say.
I'd taken this time to catch up on my writing, and had transposed things from my shorthand note-pad to my journal book, which was written in longhand. The day was mild and there was a nice breeze going. Other than the sounds of nature reclaiming the ruins around me little made noise. This place has it's own beauty about it.
This transference of notes took most of the morning. I started walking about to stretch my legs, and found that I had been followed. Even though I was hopeful it's Billy I tensed. Visions of remorseless human-like automata killing anything not like themselves filled my mind for several moments. I waved both arms over my head and make noise. Even if it wasn't one of my friends I hoped they would be able to give me news on the attack that landed me with Thomas's group for the past few days.
Wait. Something didn't fit here. If these machines used Disruptive weapons, than how could I have been thrown against a wall? The way it was described there was a dot of light wherever the weapon was pointed. Blink. If what it was aimed at living, poof; Up in smoke.
Maybe, going on the idea that Thomas wasn't lying, they had other, less selective, weapons. It made sense in a way, save the really frightening weapons that turn people into nothing for large crowds, or at least wait till there was an audience to be terrified by their use. No matter how I looked at it though it didn't add up. Oh well, like Thomas, unless one of these things showed up I won't worry.