Chapter 410

The three female Terrans all nodded at my words. Two began attaching the last of the armor, beginning to pray, the other put her hands to either side of her fallen sister's head, on the thick, heavy shoulder pauldrons. I watched as the face began to change, becoming rounder, softer, the fur changing color to white with streaks of pink.

The burning bird of prey on her chest slowly faded and went out.

I felt a cold wind go through the tent, with a faint moan of suffering.

It was strange. I was not a religious being. I had not begun following the Terran's digital religion. I had no belief in superstition or magic or mythical events.

But standing there, watching, I felt a chill down both of my spines.

The armor, formerly white with red markings, began to change colors. Pink and white, smeared in a strange amateurish way. The woman's face began to look more youthful, more innocent, more childish.

Her lips parted, showing sharp interlocking carnivore teeth had replaced the even white squares of omnivore dentation. She drew in a shuddering breath.

The monitor displaying her neural function gave a hiccup as on line spiked and the others twitched.

"doki" the fallen one whispered.

I don't know why, but I swallowed thickly, feeling a trickle of fear.

I could see her datalink on the side of her head. There was white and pink enamel crawling across it, covering the black warsteel. It began to look more ornate, gold and silver inlay starting to form on it like frost on a window.

Beep.

'doki'

I watched fur crawl down her arms from her shoulders. White with pink stripes and swirls and blotches. I could see circuitry spreading on and under the flesh right before the soft looking fur covered the pale bloodless flesh. The two sisters covered the fallen one's arms with her armor, locking the heavy plates in place. The white and pink enamel and paint started spreading from the armpit and shoulder, again reminding me of frost spreading on a window.

beep

'doki'

She shifted slightly, the power armor hissing and clattering. I reached out, picking up one hand, and was startled at how light her arm was. I took her hand and placed it on her cutting bar where it rested on her torso, the handle beneath her chin. The Sister of Wrath on the other side lifted her arm, her power armor hissing and her face hardening with effort.

Her hand and arm were as light as a child's as I put her hand on the hilt of her blade, folding them over one another.

beep

'doki'

Shuddering and tremlbing, I picked up the thick plate for her thigh and lifted it into place. The Sister of Wrath beside me lifted the woman's leg by her knee, letting me put the armor beneath her leg. I saw spikes erupt from the armor, long thin barbed spikes.

A part of me didn't want to place the woman's leg into the armor, but I did so anyway.

Fur started moving down from beneath the groin armor. I picked up the front of the leg armor and set it into place, hearing it click and lock into place. I could hear internal systems start to click as I knelt down and picked up the piece to go under her lower leg. I wasn't sure what the Terrans called it. I doubted they called it a fetlock.

"You do her honor, dressing her," Sister Dargetta told me, her hands still on the heavy shoulder plates. "The last suit she shall ever wear."

"It is good that she be clad," I said. I locked her foreleg into the armor.

beep - - - - beep

'doki doki'

I heard another song start but could not hear the worlds, just the melancholy tones of the woodwind and the words.

One of the Sisters handed me her heavy weapon, but it was lighter than I thought it would be. The bird of prey on either side was dark, no longer blazing fire. The weapon was dark, black and dark green, looking heavier, bulkier somehow.

At the Sister's motioned instructions I took one of her hands and carefully wrapped her fingers around the grip.

The pink and white smears and daubs spread from her hand up the weapon. A round circle with eyes and an upturned mouth appeared where the bird of prey had once been.

beep beep beep

'doki doki doki'

The words were still soft, more breathed than spoken, but sounded to me as if they were a lot stronger than they had been initially. There was more spikes in all six of the lines on the monitor that was displaying her neural functions.

I moved around to the other side, putting her armor on her arms and legs with my own two hands.

While I did not believe in magic or superstition, knew that the Terrans used nanotechnology in dangerous ways and that could account for what I was seeing, I still felt as if I was caught up in something I did not quite understand.

The Sisters of Wrath removed the torches from their fallen sister's armor and motioned at me.

"Carry her outside, beneath the sky, so she can hear the voice of her sisters," Sister Dargetta said.

Part of me knew she was too heavy for me, that she weighed literal tons of armor and dense lemur muscular-skeletal structure.

She was as light as feather in my arms. One hand holding tight to her weapon, the other to the hilt of her cutting bar.

She kept whispering to herself, her lips moving over sharp teeth, as I carried her outside. She should have been too heavy, I should never have been able to carry her.

But she was as light as a feather.

I laid her down on a pallet of expended rocket tubes, stepping back as the clouds seemed to part just enough for a silver ray of sunlight to pierce the clouds and illuminate her face.

The sisters put banners of blank cloth, held up by cruel iron rods, on her back. They replaced the torches, now unlit, on her shoulders. The round smiling emoji on her chest suddenly had hearts replace the eyes, the hearts beating slowly.

"She nears wakefullness," Sister Dargetta said.

"Will she be confused?" I asked.

"She has fallen from grace and is now Enraged, knowing nothing more than Wrath," one of the other sisters said. "She will seek out combat, seek out war, know nothing more than carnage and fury."

I stared at her innocent looking face, now completely covered with fur. "Will she be in pain?"

Sister Dargetta shook her head. "She will dwell in fury and ecstasy, surrounded by beauty and carnage, beyond such things as pain or doubt," she said softly.

"Why is this happening to her?" I asked, watching as her eyelids fluttered. For a moment I could see her eyes. They were feline pupiled, but bright pink, as if she was an albino. Then the eyes seemed to fill with a pink glow and the eyelids closed again.

"She is the fate that awaits all of us, all of the Sisters of Wrath, should we fall from the Digital Omnimessiah's grace and embrace the wrath that fills us all," one said.

"But... why?" I asked.

"She, and we, are bound to Murdered TerraSol," Sister Dargetta said. "Soldiers of the Combine and Imperium, led by Daxin the Unfeeling who became Osiris of the Warsteel Flame, touched and reborn by Vat Grown Luke who became Legion, nurtured and guided by Bellona the Grave Bound Beauty, shown the way of truth and beauty."

The names, although they meant nothing to me, still made my skin crawl as a cold breeze played over my skin despite the Terran armor I wore.

"But our children, the Kawaii Neko Marines, are the youngest of us, the oldest of us, and they await, with open loving arms, all of us who fall from the Digital Omnimessiah's grace," she finished.

doki doki doki

"When she awakens, she will seek out the enemy, consumed with rage, and seek to wipe them from the universe," another sister said.

To the side of me the tank sat silently, "GREAT HERD EMERGENCY SERVICES" written on it with blue paintstick.

"She will be the champion of those without hope consumed with wrath and fury," the other said.

I realized that the Terran female may have been sentenced to a life of horror and I wondered for a moment if I should have just let her die.

"Will she remember who she was? Will she be full of sorrow for what she has lost, what I have consigned her to?" I asked. "Would she have been better off dead?"

They all three looked at one another for a long moment.

"Concern yourself not with such things," Sister Dargetta said. She put her hand on the pink and white hair on top of the fallen one's head. "She will burn with a light of her own."

Her eyes suddenly opened. Bright pink, a low malevolent growl came from her mouth then she smiled wildly. A sweet, innocent, naive smile that made me start to smile back. She struggled to her feet, still smiling, her power armor hissing and whirring. She held her cutting bar in one hand, what I had been told was a heavy magac submachine gun in the other.

The torches on her back erupted in flame, white cored with pink edging. The banners unfurled, showing crude drawings on them.

"Come, sister," Sister Dargetta said, holding out her hand. "Joan Mentissa wishes to bless you."

The furry faced fallen Sister attached her submachine gun to her waist and took Sister Dargetta's hand.

There was a strange fzzzt on my back teeth as all four of the Sisters vanished.

I just stared at where they had been standing, feeling the hair rise up on my spines.

"Most High Ha'almo'or," a voice said.

I focused my attention on my rear eyes, seeing a small Telkan female in white paper clothing waiting patiently for me to see her.

"Yes, little one?" I asked.

She motioned back at the tent. "The Matron wishes to see you. She says it is quite urgent."

"By all means, lead the way," I said. I took two steps and almost went down on my knees, the strength suddenly leaving my body. I stumbled, almost fell, but managed to stay on my feet as I staggered into the medical tent.

The Matron and the doctor were waiting for me.

"Your wounded have been treated, Most High Ha'almo'or," the Matron said, staring at me with a weight of authority that made me want to duck my head in shame. She patted a medical sling. "This sling is for you."

I sighed, allowing the Telkan female to walk me over to the sling and help wrap it around me. The doctor and his assistants removed parts of my armor, stopping when several pieces were stuck to me.

"See you on the other side," the Telkan female said, her face hidden by a sterifield mask.

She pressed a button and darkness took me.

---------------

I awoke to the rumbling of atomic weapons shaking the ground. My biological eyes were thick and gummy but my cybernetic eyes were instantly clear and crisp.

A Welkret in a nurse's uniform sat near me, looking at a dataslate. She looked up and smiled. "Welcome back, Most High."

"How..." I swallowed around the thick paste in my mouth. "How long?"

"Nineteen hours," she told me. "You were suffering extreme exhaustion, shrapnel injuries, and second degree burns under your armor."

"My crew," I managed to get out.

She moved over to me, holding a pitcher with straw. I drank deeply, the biting citrus washing away the taste. "Your crew all survived. They will recover."

I hung limp in the sling and breathed a sigh of relief. After a moment I stirred, trying to get my arms and legs to work, but found the anesthetic beam was still in effect.

"Help me out of the sling," I said. "Turn off the beam."

The Welkret shook her head. "The Matron Nurse has stated you are to remain in the sling for the next twenty hours to give your body a chance to heal."

There was the rumble of another atomic detonation that I could feel through the sling.

"There are still people who need me," I told her. I stared at her, blinking with my cybereyes so they made clicking noises. "As you needed me."

The tips of her ears flushed slightly and she looked at me closely. She checked her dataslate, then gave me a once over with a scanner, checking her dataslate again.

"Your hearts look good. Your muscles are responding well to quikheal," she said softly. She looked around, then backed out. After a moment she came back. "We must hurry."

I nodded as she released the anesthetic beam. I clumsily helped her get the sling off me, then had her help me get my Terran armor back on. It was damaged and discolored, but it still fit well.

The Welkret nurse checked for me then motioned. "Go right and out the back of the tent. They're bringing in Terran wounded out front."

"I thank you," I told her.

"Go with grace, Most High," she said softly.

I trotted out, grabbing up a Terran rifle as I did so.

Outside was a whirling chaotic blur of motion, with beings running every which way. I saw two strikers land, one of them smoking, and techs run over to them, one hosing down the smoking one with a fire prevention foam ejector. I realized I had to urinate and followed the sign to where the 'urination station' was located.

I stared in surprise. It was merely pipes sunk into the ground at a high angle, set waist high for the various races. It startled me to see Terrans and other expose their genitals to urinate in the pipes. Still, my body wasn't going to wait much longer as it woke up from the anesthetic, so I trotted over to the line and waited.

It startled me that the Terrans talked to one another in the line. Joking, or asking how one another was holding up, what they were doing. Small talk, as if they were sitting down for a polite lunch, not waiting to urinate in a pipe for everyone to see.

When I got up there I felt somewhat foolish straddling the trough. I looked at the human across from me, a male with dark brown skin, who gave me a Terran smile.

"Straddling the gash slash is the big reason I always reskin as a male for deployments," he told me. "Being able to piss standing up. That's the shit, right there."

I just nodded, unsure of what to say as I let my bladder go.

"Good luck out there, Lanky," he said, buttoning up his fabric pants and moving away. Another took his place, but mercifully didn't say anything.

I finished up and trotted away, feeling somewhat embarrassed by the whole thing.

It only took me a moment to see a tank. It sat off by itself, the armor scarred and pitted. It wasn't my old tank, but it had "GREAT HERD EMERGENCY SERVICES" painted on it with blue paintstick. I trotted over to it, seeing that the loading ramp was down and open.

"Hello?" I asked, moving around to look inside.

A human was kneeling down, looking at the cannon's breach mechanism. He looked up and grinned at me. His face was sweaty and red, his face shield retracted, and his armor had the slight blurring effect of their 'active camouflage' system.

"Specialist Grade Six Lumundaroo," he said, nodding.

"Ha'amo'or," I told him, moving inside. I looked at the interior and noticed it looked a lot different. The breach was heavier, wider, and it looked nothing like any of the main weapons I had trained on. "What kind of gun is that?"

"One-hundred-fifty-five millimeter smoothbore main battle tank gun, right there," he said, patting the breach. "Maximum effective range of seven miles, mission variable munition capability."

"No plasma?" I asked.

He shook his head. "I couldn't fab up plasma gun parts," he admitted. "Your people are running through entire barrels every ten to twelve hours," he shook his head. "No offense, but your wargear is pretty crap."

"None taken," I said. I sat down on the gunner's couch. "How different will this be for me? I am a gunner."

"Superficially, well, you don't have to worry about standoff distance, minimum safe distances, atmospheric attenuation, microprism cloud dispersion, or any of that," he told me. He shifted how he was sitting.

"What about ammunition, I was able to carry seventy-five rounds prior," I said. I flipped the switches so the gunner's sight went live.

He gave a slightly sheepish look. "Well, that's complicated," he said.

I pressed the self-test tab and watched it go through the startup checks. "Explain."

"In the ammunition bay, and now you have two of them, you have a grand total of one hundred rounds. Twenty-five in rapid storage. Seventy-five in the lower storage, which is heavily armored," he said. He shifted again. "I might, and I stress might have gotten authorization to strap a Class-IV nanoforge to this beast, along with a heavy enough mass tank that it can dry-print one round every fifteen seconds or wet-print one every three seconds."

I turned and looked at him. "I welcome such alterations. Anything that will enable me to protect the people of this city."

"This thing has heavier shields, new laminate armor, dual hover-system, replaced reactors. The only thing that's basically the same is the software, and even that's been heavily rebuilt over the last day or so," he told me. "I'm just trying to figure out a problem."

"What problem?" I asked.

He looked at me. "The autoloader isn't working. It doesn't want to work, and I'm not sure why."

"Is the mechanism jammed?" I asked. "Sometimes the rotation cradle's axle can get jammed."

"No," he said. He pulled open the floor plate, exposing the rotation cradle. It acted like the cylinder of a revolver, bringing up ammunition from the ammo hopper. The cradle would extend up as the gun recoiled, loading a round into the chamber as the breach went forward. The cradle would drop back down and rotate, loading a new round into an empty cradle.

He used both hands to shift it back and forth. "It moves, but," he started.

"Most High Ha'almo'or," a young voice said, panting. I turned and looked and saw a young Hikken standing on the loading ramp. He had on a headset and a radio on his hip.

"Yes?" I asked.

"There's a group of survivors in the city. They're pinned down and the Precursors have reentered the city," he told me.

"Do you know how to operate a communications board?" I asked, pointing at the commo station of the tank.

"Yes, Most High, I was a maintenance technician," he said.

"Do you know of any others?" I asked.

He nodded.

"Get them. The tank needs a crew," I said. I turned to the Terran. "If it cannot be repaired, I must go into battle without it. Do the secondary guns still work?"

He nodded slowly. He reached behind him and got a heavy looking tool that I recognized. It was used to manually rotate the cradle. "Secondary guns check out fine," he said slowly. "You know, there's a way to do this."

"How?" I asked. I watched as he moved the metal tool into place, wiggling it to set it.

He slapped the lever for the gun with one hand, the breach rolling back, exposing the empty chamber. The other hand he pushed on the bar, rotating the cylinder. He grabbed the exposed round, slammed it into place, shut the chamber, and then pushed the breach shut.

In less than five seconds total.

"How... how long can you do that?" I asked him.

"Probably longer than this tank will survive," he told me. He gave me a sudden grin. "I've spent all day putting this thing together, I might as well go with you."

"If you wish," I told him. "I would require you to follow my orders."

"I can do that," he said. He chewed his lower lip for a second. "We should probably take two Mantid combat vehicle engineers if that's all right. Maybe even a medic."

I looked around the crew compartment. "Will they all fit?"

He nodded.

"Then I welcome them," I told him. I pulled my helmet off and pressed my face against the gunner's sight. "Hurry. We have little time and the civilians depend on us."

Through the sight I could see the city.

It was still burning.

I touched my implant and heard the filly-Matron answer.

"Gather your ambulance crew, we are needed once again," I told her.

"As you command, Most High," she answered.

I commed the bus crews next, even as my new crew boarded the tank.

The ramp whined as it closed.

--we ride this tank to glory-- one of the Mantids chirped over my implant.

"Victory or death," I said as my new driver rotated the tank, following the instructions of my new navigator.

I pushed my face against the gunner's sight.

"Either is fine."

--Excerpt From: We Were the Lanaktallan of the Atomic Hooves, a Memoir.