The Hungry Past by LemuelMcMillan

A fist breaks through the dark sand, a bloody limb in the shadows of the tilting necropolis once known as Indianapolis.

A harsh, dry wind rasps across the dunes to eat away at the ancient structures of glass and metal. Not a single living soul remembers what the city once looked like or any other element of the old world.

None but the sands.

Generations ago, a great calamity toppled the last empire and left the world dark. Survivors scrambled to gather the dregs left in the power vacuum that followed. When it was all over there stood two new powers.

The first is The Corporate Coalition. A collection of companies ruled over by a legal constitution of legal engagement, studied and enforced by their cold and barely human board of directors. Each wars with the world and one another with armies of synthetic labor forces, soulless caricatures of human beings grown not born into this new world.

The second is The Megachurch of God. A zealous religion built around the worship of worship, the belief that belief makes one righteous. Their faith is enforced by highly trained and deadly clerics dedicated to the eradication of non-believers and those opposed to the authority of the church's teachings. These heretics are anyone who refuses indoctrination. Their bodies decorate the walls surrounding the holy land.

Stuck in the middle are the free people. Nomads, wanders, enclaves, warbands. Anyone who is neither a worker under the yolk of the corporate industrial machine or a believer in the divinity of the teachings of The Megachurch is, by default, an enemy of both. Strongest among these unaffiliated are the people of Fort Greenwich. Mystics, dreamers, freethinkers, and rebels, the people of Fort Greenwich live a life of constant fighting to maintain their sovereignty and spiritual independence.

The sand knows all of this because it was here centuries ago, before the empire's fall, and it will be here when the blistering sun rises over a new world when new factions pick up the pieces.

In the meantime, a bloody hand reaches towards the brightening sky.

"I've found her, Pete!" A young woman calls. A shock of pink hair covers a badly scarred face, a constant memorial to the time a Synth Torcher attempted to immolate her family's homestead.

"How can you be sure, Tink?" replies a young man as he hurries to her side. He's blond, slim, and as rugged as the wild desert itself. "How do we know it's Dreya?"

The fingers of the bloody hand stir, curling into a fist. The middle finger slowly rises, a flagless pole to represent an ancient belligerence. Tink and Pete look at one another.

"It's her," they say in unison.

"I'd better call Darling." Pete jumps to his feet and fills his lungs to shout.

"Stop, you buffoon. There are Synths and Clerics all over this place." Tink closes her eyes and wiggles her nose. "I'll use our aura-bond."

The air around them takes on a pink hue and the smell of popcorn.

"I see her," Pete says excitedly, as he starts digging with his hands. He pulls sand away from the hand as carefully as he can.

Tink releases her concentration and the strange atmospheric phenomenon stops. A hover bike rushes towards them, trailing a flatbed behind it. Its gentle whistle grows louder as the device speeds across the sands. When it stops the driver raises their dust-stained goggles. Darling is tall with piercing ice-blue eyes like one of the Megachurch's huskies. Their fingers are long, their navy blue hair is short. Despite the corded muscles of their arms and calves, Darling's face is composed of the most gentle and alluring curves.

"Did you find Thorn?" Their voice is as androgynous as their appearance.

"She's here," Pete says, grabbing a shovel from the netting on the side of the hover bike. "Hurry."

Tink and Darling grab their own shovels and start digging. They dig around the body in an effort to avoid injuring their friend even more. A distant explosion echoes through the empty sand-covered streets of the necropolis. As the sun rises, the fighting between The Corporations and The Megachurch begins anew.

"With this level of activity in the area, there's no way we'll get out of here without being spotted by one side or the other." Darling says, tossing aside a spadeful of sand. "We're going to have to fight our way out."

"We knew that when we volunteered to find her." Tink mops gritty sweat from her brow.

"I for one would have brought a bigger gun if I knew we'd be running into a full fledged war zone." Pete smirks, but neither of his companions seem to find his words funny.

Shaking his head, he throws his shovel aside and begins using his hands to scoop away sand. The sand spills away, triggering a minor cascade effect. He reveals her body in sections: shoulders, arms, torso.

"I've got her, but I don't think she's breathing!"

Darling comes around from her own side and starts to scoop away more sand. Together they free her, pulling her body from its sandy grave.

"She's carrying something, grab it."

Darling takes hold of Dreya and pulls her out of the hole and lays her down on the flatbed. They press their ear to the woman's chest, listening for a heartbeat. Hearing nothing, they begin chest compressions. Pete and Tink grunt as they pull another woman from the sand. She's as tall as Darling, but more broad in the shoulders and hips. The flatbread wobbles as they add her weight to the load.

"She's heavy," Tink says, catching her breath.

"I think she's a cleric," Pete whispers.

"What?"

"Look at the bodysuit. It's what they wear under all of that combat armor."

Dreya Thorn, The Drinker, found buried and locked hand in hand with a cleric. Darling doesn't like the implications.

"Is she breathing?" Darling asks as she pumps her hero's chest.

Tink listens and nods. "Barely, but she's breathing. There's something sticky on her arms... smells like tar and corpses."

Pete stares down at the black gunk sticking to his fingers. "What is this stuff?"

Dreya's spews sand and some of the same black tar into the air. The stuff clings to her face like a thick oily phlegm. Darling helps her into a seated position, keeping Dreya's hair out of her face as she coughs.

"I'm here. I've got you," they say.

"R... n..." Dreya wheezes.

"What is she saying?" Pete calls from the pit they'd dug, retrieving the shovels.

A smoking Aramark drone streaks across the sky, trailing a tail of black smoke and sparks. It explodes just beyond the city limits in a shower of computer chips and unspent ordinance.

"R... run." Dreya moans. She pushes Darlings arms away and rises to a knee. Taking in her surroundings, her eyes settle on the other woman pulled from the sand. "Darling, get us out of here."

"Look," Pete calls.

Another hand rises out of the sand. Then another and another. Two more people crawl out of the earth, caked with sand and covered in the foul black tar. One is tall, broad, wearing a battered suit of paladin armor. The other is short, squat and draped in dirty white and gold robes. They look up in unison, the same wide and crooked grin on both of their faces.

"They're Zealots," Tink shouts, drawing her pistol.

Pete and Darling go for their own weapons.

"Stay your hands," the filthy pair say in tandem. The paladin turns towards Dreya and Darling. The little man faces Tink and Pete. "There is a greater will at work here that has brought you to me. To us. Bigger than the megachurch and bigger than profit margins." The pair open their arms wide. "Join us."

"Get down on your knees with your hands on your head," Tink orders.

"Become one with the collective. Put an end to the violence and fighting."

Dreya moves past Darling and hops into the seat of the hover bike. She begins the warmup sequence.

"Let's go," she hisses.

"We cannot allow these women to leave. They have been chosen. They will be a part of the collective."

"Pete, Tink, get on or get left behind."

Tink climbs onto the flatbed, her pistol steadily leveled on the robed figure's chest.

"We cannot allow it!"

The pair rushes forward, dirty hands reaching out, and the group opens fire. The robed man takes two shots to the chest and sprawls out in the sand. The other shrugs off their small arms fire like paladin armor was built for. Bullets ricochet off her shoulder plates like annoying flies. The sound of their weapons mingle with the ever increasing sounds of combat within the necropolis.

"I will have the heretics Thorn and Alba," the paladin calmly stated.

Pete charges her with a machete, slashing at her. She grabs his wrist and lifts his arm high into the air. He screams as his muscles make a sickening pop. Limp fingers drop the blade.

Darling and Tink jump from the flatbed, running to their lover's aid. The strange paladin turns her sinister grin upon Dreya and takes a bullet to the temple. She falls over, Tink's gun smoking from the kill shot.

"My arm," Pete cries. "I can't feel it."

"Get him on." Dreya says as the bike finally hums its drive readiness.

"They're dead, Dreya-"

Gigantic pale tentacles erupt from the sands, launching sand thirty feet into the air. The bike and flatbed tilt sideways as the desert surface roils. The ground falls away as oily black tendrils crawl up and out of the growing chasm. Sickly white feelers ooze out of the robed man's blasted chest and seal the wounds. The paladin rises to her feet even as the hole in her head mends itself. Subterranean rumbling becomes a jarring primordial roar, the bellow of a creature from before the fall of the old empire.

Darling grabs Tink by the collar and shoves her towards the flatbed. Tink hops on and pulls Dreya's unconscious companion away from the teetering edge. Darling grabs for Pete and three tentacles wrap around his waist, mouth, and limp arm. He's snatched back and down into the growing maw.

"Pete!" Tink screams.

Darlin takes a step forward and nearly topples forward into the opening. The sucking sand and slithering black tentacles come for Darling next.

"Darling, get your ass over here," Dreya croaks as she revs the hover bike.

A long white tentacle lashes out and Darling hurdle jumps it, landing beside the flatbed. The sand at her feet spills towards the chasm and the monstrosity within, pulling them back. They run up the slanted flatbed.

"Go!"

The flatbed shakes as the strange paladin lands between Darling and Tink.

"You will join us," she says, her unsettling grin stained with blood.

The hover bike flares to life and rockets across the sand. Darling tumbles towards the paladin and comes up with their hunting knife, aiming for a gap in the paladin's armor plating. The paladin grunts and grabs Darling's throat. The paladin's smile splits impossibly wide.

"Welcome," she hisses, a dozen tentacles snaking out of her mouth.

Beating against the paladin's arms, Darling feels powerless. A tentacle brushes their forehead and pain surges through nerves and muscle like lightning bouncing through a pinball machine. Darling's limbs dance in random directions, but the paladin holds firm. Darkness nips at the edges of consciousness.

The vehicle tilts left as Dreya banks. Geysers of putrid ichor spew into the air, narrowly missing them thanks to her evasive maneuvers. The acrid stench stings the eyes, and burns the flesh. Darling punches the paladin in the face, strength waning with each blow.

Tink clips the unconscious woman to the flatbed. Crab-walking across the shifting platform, she fires into the back of the foul paladin. The rounds deflect like impotent pebbles against the defensive walls of a great city. Holstering her weapon she draws a serrated cleaver and goes for the paladin's arm. Tentacles slither around Darling's head as the cleaver bit deep into the paladin's armor plates. Tink yanks her weapon free and attacks the same point, spraying blood and pus. The vehicle banks sharply to avoid another geyser and she loses her footing, spilling from the flatbed.

As she falls away from the speeding vehicle, Tink pulls on her aura-bond with Darling and Pete. She can still feel him, though his energy seems different, changed. Spectral fairy wings sprout from her back and propel her towards the flatbed. Her gift allows her to turn the aura of her lovers into power. Tink concentrates, afraid of what will happen if she lets herself be distracted.

Zipping up beside the paladin, she transforms the energy of her wings into brute force and brings the machete down on the zealot's elbow. She lands on the flatbed and nearly spills again as Dreya takes another wreckless turn. Darling hits the platform beside her, a bloody appendage still gripping their throat. The paladin stares coldly at her bleeding stump, tentacles already reknitting the arm.

"Your bodies are so fragile. Allow me to make you stronger than you once were." The paladin flexes her newly formed fingers. "The collective will make good use of your flesh-"

They escape the shadow of the leaning necropolis and the rays of the rising sun bathe the craft. The paladin roars out in pain, flailing about as her exposed flesh bursts into flames. She jumps from the flatbed and hits the sand in a beastial lope that should have been impossible for her limbs to accomplish. Like a grotesque hound she bounds back towards the shadows.

Tink helps Darling pull the melting hand from their throat and tosses it aside. "You okay?"

Darling nods, unable to speak.

"Dreya, what the fuck was that thing?"

"I'm not sure. It lives under the old city... I think it is the old city."

"It took Pete." Tink states, staring back the way they'd come.

"I know. And I'm sorry."

An Aramark drone passes overhead.

"We have to get out of here-"

An explosion rocks the craft as a corporation missile hits its target, sending debris and bodies in multiple directions.

Dreya Thorn sits in the shadow of a crescent-shaped rock outcropping, a small fire adding warmth to the cold desert night. Drag marks in the sand illustrate her path to this temporary shelter, trailing three bodies behind her. She listens to the sounds of distant fighting and stares into the dwindling flames. Her body aches, but most of her wounds have already healed.

As a child, Dreya had been chosen to sleep beneath the Syphon Stone. Many did not survive the first night. Those who did developed the ability to siphon the energies of others. Drinkers, as she and Tink are called, use it to heal themselves and a multitude of other gifts unique to each individual.

Thinking about her gift, her healing, accelerates the process.

"Dreya... where are we?"

She looks up, surprised to hear the battered voice. Forest Alba, former paladin turned heretic, leans forward. Sand spills from her hair, it's gotten everywhere.

"We're a couple miles out of the necropolis," Dreya says, as she makes her way over to the slumped woman. "We were rescued." She gestures to the bodies in the sand.

"How did we get out of the building? How did we get away from the thing in the darkness?"

Dreya tucks a lock of Forest's hair behind her ear. "I'd found a tunnel I thought would get us out, but something followed us. It looked like a man, but it felt like the thing under the building."

"The thing?"

"The Corporate Entity," Tink groans as she sits up.

The young woman looks good as new. No one would ever guess, she'd been at the center of an explosion. Being bound to multiple partners has its perks. Dreya kisses Forest on the cheek.

"Forest, this is my little sister Tinkerella. Tink, Paladin Forest Alba."

"Tinkerella?" Forest barely stifles a chuckle.

"Yes, my dear sibling felt the need to name me after some ancient text she'd stolen."

"Ancient text?"

"Yes, it's a long story," Dreya interrupts. "You aren't a Paladin anymore so let's leave the past in the past."

Dreya remembers Tink's reaction when they'd learned there'd been some misinterpretations. It helps her resist the urge to touch Forest, a side effect of their aura-bond.

Forest chuckles. "I guess that explains how you've been on the heretics list for nearly thirty years. Even young Dreya was a troublemaker."

"You have no idea," Tink scoffs.

"I've seen the church reports... no single heretic holds a greater kill count." Forest looks down and Dreya drags her face back. "Why do I want to kiss you even though I'm disgusted with you right now?"

"It's the bond." Dreya presses her lips to Forest's and a soothing sensation runs through the two of them. "The intimacy will help us both heal."

Their lips pull hungrily. Their hands explore, searching for softness and heat.

"Wait..." Forest comes up for air. "Tink-" Her mouth hunts for Dreya's, needy like a spiraling drug addict.

"Yes?" Tink sings, clearly amused by the scene.

"What's a corporate entity?"

"The mystics who created Fort Greenwich say the Corporate Entities created the first corporations. They are eldritch primordials who ruled the old world."

"I've heard a cenobite preach about the corporation and their corrupt origins, but I was young and didn't understand."

"We don't have much on them back home either." Dreya eases back from Forest, running her hand through her hair to maintain contact. "The mystics say the corporations are concepts given life by legislation, but no one knows what legislation really is. Tink, how do you know so much?"

"I saw something when that monster grabbed Darling. It tried to get into their mind... our bond allowed me to get into the collective's instead."

Tink struggles to her feet and moves closer to the dying fire.

"That thing under the necropolis was once a man, human like us, but his aura became entangled with an idea. A concept, something about an apple. One of the old corporations grew out of that concept and changed him into something more than a man. The collective lives to consume. It will swallow everything within the necropolis, then it will spread..."

"All the more reason we need to leave," Dreya says, tossing one of the last pieces of firewood into the embers. If Darling isn't awak by morning, we carry her. Once we're behind the walls of Fort Greenwich, we'll be safe."

"I don't think we will. I don't know how much it learned from Darling, but, if it knows how to breach the defenses, Fort Greenwich won't stand a chance."

Dreya stares into the fire, processing, contemplating. She'd dedicated her life to protecting the fort and the people within. After Giving everything she has to Fort Greenwich, the idea of letting some monstrosity from antiquity consume it makes her blood boil. Forest fidgets, feeling the agitation through their bond.

"We have to kill it," the two say in unison.

Tink chuckles and claps her hands excitedly. "Sounds like a fight is on the horizon!"

Darling sits up with a loud groan, bones popping as they stretch. "We're gonna need some weapons... and water."

"I've got the water," Dreya says, tossing a canteen she'd salvaged from the wreck.

Darling catches it and slakes their thirst.

"Now all we need is to find some guns and ammo." Tink moves over to her bond mate and the two embrace.

"If Aramark is here in force then they'll have Synth tanks and weapons trucks." Forest looks around the fire at the three heretics. "I'm fairly sure we can hijack one."

"It's doable."

"Definitely doable."

"Sounds like we've got ourselves a good old fashioned rumble coming."

Three synth sentries stand watch in a triangle formation around the smoking weapons truck. It had suffered a blast from a zealot gunship before drones could chase the vehicle off. They await a towing craft to cart the vehicle off to a repair depot. Being on the outskirts of the necropolis, the heavy fighting is something heard but not seen. Their guard detail is out of protocol rather than necessity, though synths aren't trained to know the difference.

A blade whistles through the air, taking a sentry in the chest. He gasps, but falls to the sand clutching the hilt of the weapon. Tink flutters in with the sun at her back, covering her approach until she's close enough to drop Darling onto a second sentry. Darling is quick and efficient, killing their target with barely a struggle. The third sentry senses something is wrong and scans the area, but he doesn't leave his post. Synths find it hard to deviate from direct orders.

Dreya bursts out of the sand like an orca breaking the water's surface to claim her prey. The synth fires into the blinding curtain of sand, but hits nothing as he is bowled over. Two blows, one paralyzing and the other fatal, render the weapons truck undefended. Forest and Darling join Dreya in front of the cab, carrying newly acquired corporate rifles. Tink lands on the truck and snaps the antenna off the roof.

"We can't use these weapons," Forest says, cleaning blood off her knife. "They are coded to synths. Touching the triggers will cause them to overload."

"So we have explosives." Darling chuckles.

"Exactly," Dreya responds giving Darling a high five. "With these, we can open the cache and find some gear we can actually use."

Forest nods. "What about them?"

Inside the cab are two engineers, highly skilled technicians bred for labor and not for combat. Wide-eyed and shaking, they seem to be awaiting a grim fate.

"We kill them, of course."

"Darling! We never kill them if we don't have to." Dreya stares at Darling for a long moment. The casual cruelty has never been their hallmark... it has sometimes been her own, but never Darling's. "They're mentally little more than children. We give them to the desert. Maybe they find their way back to corporation territory, maybe the elements take them."

Dreya signals Tink and approaches the driver side door. Dropping down beside her, Tink taps on the glass with a toothy grin.

"Open up, sirs. We've got a proposition for you," she sings.

Tink makes the engineers an offer and they choose the desert over meeting bloody ends like their security detail. Forest offers the pair food rations and they punch in the access code to the weapons. Darling watches them run towards the unforgiving sand dunes while the others search for goodies. Forest and Tink debate what equipment best suits killing a lesser eldritch god. Dreya holsters a pair of pistols and goes back out to Darling.

"You okay there, beautiful?"

The cold look in Darling's eyes makes Dreya's hair stand on end.

"I'm fine," they say, the light seeming to return to her eyes in increments. "You shouldn't have let them go."

"The synths? They're engineers. They fix shit, that's it. They can't hurt us, they don't even know how."

Dreya hands Darling the double holster she'd snagged from the truck. Smirking, Darling shrugs into the harness and tightens the straps. They strike a sultry pose.

"Looking good as always." Dreya smiles, accepting her paranoia for what it is. "For a moment there I thought... Never mind. Here, take these."

"Thanks." Darling holsters the guns and turns her attention back to the open desert. "We shouldn't have allowed it," she whispers.

Dreya Thorn stares down the scope of a standard issue synth rifle as Darling and Forest Alba, stealthily move into position. Three filthy combat synths scamper back and forth like agitated primates, snarling and moving on their knuckles like beasts. A pair of clerics stand in front of a pair of double doors. They wear half-chewed armor, covered in familiar black ichor. Drooling and slack-jawed, they look more like monsters than zealot soldiers.

"They're in position."

Dreya puts down the rifle, careful not to toggle the trigger and blow herself away. Concentrating on her aura-bond with Forest, she funnels strength and agility into her counterpart's life force. Steam rises from Dreya's skin as sweat evaporates and power flows.

"About time," Tink chuckles as she does the same for Darling.

A synth hoots like an excited ape, drawing the attention of the others as Darling rolls past him and splits open his gut with a long sword cut. The other synths bellow and charge them as the first falls to the ground, bisected. A chewed cleric raises her weapon and a synth pike takes her under the arm. Forest drops down from her perch above, driving her knife towards the second chewed cleric. He throws up his arm and the blade lodges in the bone. The two hit the ground and tumble.

Darling's blade cuts up through a second feral synth from groin to chin. The third grabs their shoulder, spins them around and hurls them into a knot of jutting stone. Tink shutters as the pain is shared between Drinker and mate. Darling kicks off the rocks to meet the charging synth. Loping in on all fours, it leaps up and brings its fists down. In a blur of speed fueled by Tink's gift, Darling slashes and dodges in one arcing movement. Blood splatters the sand and synth hands fly in separate directions. As the feral synth lands, it is struck by the twisted body of a chewed cleric. Neither rise again.

Dreya and Tink join Darling and Forest over the bodies. The surrounding streets are littered with bodies. Most bear the marks of the intense fighting between the two factions, but the freshest remains are stained with black ichor and riddled with signs of feeding. The black worms have feasted and the collective has grown strong. It wasn't difficult to locate the enemy stronghold, the collective has made no effort to hide.

Forest puts her arm around Dreya's waist and sighs. The feel of her skin touching Dreya's is cool and soothing. "I still don't understand this aura-bond, but it felt like you were there beside me, fighting with me."

"That's the gist of it. We are bound together, stronger as one than we've ever been as individuals. I've never tried it before, but I believe we could learn to uses each other's gifts."

"You've never tried to use someone else's power?"

"I've never been with a zealot before, I've never had access to your faith-based abilities." Dreya slides her hand down to Forest's rear and gives it a squeeze.

Startled, the paladin lets out a yelp. "Dreya!"

Forest looks to Tink as if hoping to find help, but Tink and Darling are deep in their own embrace. Darling's scrapes and cuts close as steam rises up from the couple. Forest pulls away and Dreya lets her. Their relationship and their bond are new. She'll need time to get used to it. The megachurch doesn't demonize same sex relationships entirely, but it has strict rules and codes of conduct. Public displays of affection are deemed heretical in nature.

"If those things," Forest glancing over her shoulder at the dead sentries, "I have to call them things just to maintain my sanity. If those things are all connected as part of this collective, then it knows we're here. Either more of these ruined creatures are on their way or they're waiting in ambush."

"A hive mind like the honey bugs?" Tink rubs her chin. "I wouldn't be surprised."

Dreya slings the synth rifle and collects the zealot versions instead. Though heavier and less accurate, they are easier to maintain and don't self-destruct. After checking the clips, she tosses one to Forest.

"Guess we'd better get moving then," Dreya takes another look at the dead sentries. "What exactly is this corporate entity trying to do?"

The wounds on the bodies are stained white where maggot-like tendrils crawled out into the sunlight and died.

"I told you, it's consuming and growing." Tink joins her and uses her boot to flip one of the bodies onto its stomach.

"But to what end?"

"To grow and to consume... that's all it knows."

Dreya meets her sister's gaze, her expression fiercely determined.

"I won't let our people turn into this. Not zealots. Not capitalist drones. Not monsters." Dreya turns towards the thick steel doors and slowly raises the rifle's weapon sight.

"What is it?" Forest asks, sensing the tension. She puts space between them and widens her stance. She looks from Dreya to the door and back again. "Dreya?"

"She knows," Darling hisses.

"I do," Dreya spits.

Smashing the butt of her rifle against the side of Tink's head, she hops back and shoots as the overturned feral synth jumps to its feet. Tink drops to the floor as the bullets rip through the creature's head, leaving a terrible exit wound full of flailing maggots that burn in the sun. Darling shrieks, a sound that mixes the primordial nature of the collective and their impressive vocal range. Raising their sword they back pedal, a sinister grin stretching their face impossibly wide.

"Forest, be ready."

"This is why we need you, Thorn. You're just too clever," Darling says, tone deadpan and cold.

"Forest?"

"I'm ready."

"Good."

The doors burst open and dozens of feral synths bound out. More ape than men, hooting and shouting like wild animals. It is only because she is still watching Darling and can see her lips that their sounds make sense.

Join us, be one with us.

Forest opens fire cutting through the press of bodies as they pour out of the buried structure. Dreya does the same as she goes after Darling, riddling the front line of their horde as she runs.

"Fire in the hole." Forest jumps back and tosses a grenade from her belt.

Dreya turns and rolls behind cover as a flaming explosion rips across the battlefield. The rifle fire resumes and Dreya peeks out from cover. Burning feral synths and white maggot tendrils flop around in the sand. Forest stands atop a stone slab, firing bursts into the remaining ferals with the discipline of a trained paladin. A master of the battlefield, she towers over a sea of bodies.

A bullet rips through her shoulder, knocking her from her perch. Two chewed clerics emerge, laying down suppressive fire. A second then a third team exit. Dreya pulls the pin and fastballs a pyro-grenade at a cleric's head. He drops like a rock and the device goes off as his peers turn in her direction. The explosion takes out the six soldiers. The sun cooks the maggots that try to repair them.

An uneasy quiet settles over the entrance.

"Forest?" Dreya can feel her through the bond, but that doesn't alleviate her fears.

"I'm okay. It's only a flesh wound."

"Liar!"

"Yeah, but I can heal it." Forest swears loudly. "Hurts enough to make me miss my armor."

"Armor's always good."

"Hey, Dreya," Darling calls from within the necropolis ruins. "What gave us away?"

"Darling is the most loving and passionate person I know. They're the reason we stopped killing engineers on sight."

Dreya crawled from cover to cover, moving towards the source of Darling's voice. She changes rifle clips, replacing the spent magazine with one she'd collected on the team's trip through the body-littered streets.

"Ah, I spoke too much."

"You also forgot about Pete. Neither you or Tink have mentioned him since you woke up. He's the glue that holds your bond together." Dreya eases into position behind a slanted collection of blackened metal. Raising the scope of the synth rifle, she searches nearby windows for Darling's short-cut navy blue hair. "Tink's bond with the two of you is unique. A strange triad. She can't manifest her wings without the two of you believing in her." She switches to the zealot gun as she catches a glimpse of her target. "You might be able to imitate them, even use their memories, but some things you just can't fake."

Movement to the right catches her attention. Dreya turns as a filthy blond figure drops down from the slanted metal. She fires, but jerks her rifle off target as she realizes it's Pete. He stands with a hunched back and black ichor stains all over his arms and mouth, but she recognizes the eyes and the hair.

"Hey, Dreya," he says with a grin. Teeth stained black, he looks like a handsome monster.

"Hey, Petey. Are you still in there? I miss you."

"He's in here. A part of the whole, a valuable member of the collective."

A body hits the sand with a thud and Dreya backs away to keep all the immediate threats in front of her.

"So is Darling," they say, rising to a standing position. "They are both so vibrant in their individuality."

"Not like the clerics, who strive to conform." Pete flexes his fingers and cracks his neck. "And nothing like these synthetic men, who feel like half-empty jars."

"The collective needs people like them, Dreya. People like you and Forest Alba. Your memories will be invaluable." Darling examines the edge of their blade. "You all will be the board of directors, leading the collective into a new future."

"That's not going to happen." Dreya removes the fresh clip and drops her rifles in the sand.

The near-distant sound of intermittent gunfire speaks of Forest's continued battle with this thing under the ground and it's minions.

"You're unwilling to kill these two, that's why they were sent for you. You're so close, it would be wasteful to allow you to escape now."

"Oh, I'm not interested in escaping. Not without these two. My sister would never forgive me."

"She'll be mine too."

"Fuck that."

Dreya charges Pete as Darling advances with a trio of slashes. The three dance in the shadows of the necropolis, sand and blood flying as they move through the ruins of the old world. Dreya weaves under a high kick, punching Pete in the kidney before dropping prone. Darling's sword sails overhead then whistles as it is brought back to cut a line in the sand. Dreya sweeps their leg out from under them and flips to her feet. She accepts a cut to her arm as she closes the distance between Darling and herself. Locking Darling's wrist, Dreya disarms them, sending the blade falling. Pete snatches it out of the air and strikes, opening a rent in Dreya's belly.

She jumps back, holding her gut as blood spills out. The pain makes her see stars, but it isn't the worst pain she's ever felt. Pete and Darling take a second to catch their breath, both breathing heavily. He tosses Darling the blade and takes on a grappler's stance. Calling on her bond with Forest, Dreya closes the wound on her stomach.

"You're going to make us carve you up until you've sapped every ounce of your gift," Darling warns.

"But don't worry. The collective will put you back together. Make you stronger." Pete opens his mouth and a long maggot-white tentacle slithers out.

"Petey's dead," Dreya says, grunting through the pain of her reknit gut.

"Not dead. Different." Pete cracks his neck as he swallows the tentacle. "His meat and brain has been kept intact to maintain our connection to Darling and your sister."

"A meat puppet."

Darling and Pete chuckle.

"Meat puppet. What a fitting name."

"I'm sorry, Petey."

Dreya charges the pair. Darling lunges forward, their blade singing through the air and across her shoulder. Pete moves in to grapple, but closes his arms around nothing as Dreya spins past him and dives for her guns. The pair, hot on her heels, press the attack. Darling paints a line of blood across Dreya's forehead with their blade's edge. Pete grabs her arm, but can't lock in his hold before she pulls free.

Slamming a rifle into his chest, Dreya kicks him backward and tackles Darling to the ground. The synth rifle explodes with a high pitched trill. Darling's body spasms violently, random words spilling from their lips in nonsensical violent spurts. Dreya keeps their sword arm pinned until the fit subsides.

Looking over at Pete, a vaguely humanoid form lies in a puddle of white slime. Long maggot tentacles flop around, sluggishly trying to pull the parts back into a recognizable whole. Swallowing down her sadness and revulsion, Dreya grabs his arm and drags him out of the shade and into the deadly sunlight. She doesn't watch it burn, but instead grabs the rest of the body and tosses it into the cleansing light as well. What's left of Pete burns like kindling.

The stink of the burning worms is reminiscent of spoiled garbage.

Ignoring the sound of burning meat, Dreya rushes off to join Forest. Navigating through sand, jutting metal, and stone she follows their aura-bond and the sound of dwindling gunfire. She passes the double doors, ajar and surrounded by bullet-torn corpses, following the trail of bodies. A bullet whizzes past as Dreya rounds a bend. Forest stands in the second floor window of a long forgotten building, firing down on a group of staggering feral synths.

Their eyes meet from across the battlefield as the last drops. Smirking, Dreya does a poor imitation of the zealot salute. Forest smiles and shakes her head.

The necropolis shakes violently, buildings sway and the ground wines. Dreya looks for higher ground as the sand falls away, revealing a yawning pit. Pale tentacles lash out, grabbing hold of the nearby buildings and pulling. As the buildings lean in on one another, creating an overlapping canopy of shadows, a pulsating coil of pale fetid flesh rises up from the hole in the ground. The stink of rot and decay fills the air as do moans and snarls of unearthly origin.

Dreya's skin crawls as she scrambles up the side of a sandblasted mound of stone. Reaching the top, she looks down on the foul bud of flesh at the center of the tendrils. At its base stands the paladin who had tried to capture them the day before. The left arm of her armor is missing and from it dangles a trio of fleshy tentacles. Her face is split at the center by a grin stretching from ear to ear, revealing teeth and feelers. Dreya levels her rifle at the twisted warrior's chest.

"Forest!" the woman shouts. "Forest, come out, come out, wherever you are. You and Thorn made me work for it, but I've got you both here. Join us and end this pointless running."

"Christina?" Forest stares down the metal sight of a zealot rifle from a few floors up.

"Yes. Paladin Christina Kiko is how the collective learned so much about you, Forest Alba. You were her teacher and... nearly something more intimate."

"It's not her anymore," Dreya shouts.

"She's herself and more! Being a part of the collective has allowed Kiko to transcend." The paladin cracks her neck. "The two of you will learn soon enough. Then we will take Fort Greenwich. From there we will roll over the church lands like a divine plague. The corporations will fall soon after that and a new world will rise from these ashes."

"Give her back," Forest demands, her voice full of emotion.

Dreya can feel her connection to the puppeteered paladin. The two were closer than family. "Focus, Alba. That thing is a husk for those maggots. Your Kiko is gone." Dreya levels her rifle right between the meat puppet's eyes. "The best thing we can do is put her out of her misery-"

Kiko is gone in a blur of movement, too fast to track. Dreya rolls away from her perch on instinct alone. The whip-crack sound of the paladin's lashing tentacles reverberates as they pulverize the stone. She lands beside Dreya and vanishes again with the speed of a hummingbird's wings. With a running start, Dreya leaps from what remains of her stone perch into the window of a nearby building. The ground shakes as she lands on knee and hands. She looks up and Kiko is nose to nose with her.

"This one is far more capable than Pete, Thorn," she hisses. "Quite the specimen."

"You're fast," Dreya says between clenched teeth. "But I'm Dreya Thorn."

Dreya throws an aura-fueled uppercut, connecting with her chin. Shifting her footing, Dreya spins into a round house, but Kiko snatches her out of the air and tosses her out of the building. The air rushes out of her as Dreya hits the hard sand on the edges of the strange tentacle flower.

"You may be a living legend, but my vision created Macintosh and Apple. I am eternal." Kiko places a foot on the window sill and leans out. "All of this will be mine."

A bullet blows off the side of Kiko's face, rocking the paladin back as Forest sprays the building. The strange flower blossom-like mass of tentacles shakes as Kiko screams. From her vantage point on the ground, Dreya can only see her grotesque staggering silhouette, tentacles, tendrils and a form that was once human.

Dreya looks up and Forest is right beside her, aura a red flame emanating from her body. Forest pulls Dreya to her feet, her expression resolute despite feelings of sadness welling up. Taking a deep breath, Dreya uses her gift to pull from Forest's flame, amplifying her own attributes.

"We have to kill it." Dreya raises Forest's hand to her lips and plants a gentle kiss.

"I know." Forest scans the area. "Where are Tink and Darling?"

"They were infected by the collective... I'll have to look for them when this is over."

"We'll have to look for them."

Dreya smiles and nods.

The tentacle bud peals open with a wet and oozing sound, revealing a skeletal man dressed like a cenobite of the zealot church. Tentacles jut from his back like two sets of phallic wings. The cenobite cackles and the shadows begin to darken.

"You want the demon priest or the paladin?" Dreya asks.

"I need to put down Kiko myself." Forest's muscles bulge and veins become more prominent as the flames intensify.

"I understand."

Dreya fires into the cenobite's chest, destroying flesh and bone. The spreading darkness slows as the creature flails under the barrage. Sand flies in every direction as Kiko lands beside her. Dreya ducks under a savage haymaker and brings her rifle to bear on the paladin. A mass of tentacles grabs her arm and tosses her into the side of a building. Kiko jumps after her and Forest knocks her out of the air. Dreya rolls aside. The two tumble out of sight as the tentacle mass punches through the building, shaking desert floor and structure.

Dreya sprays the mass with gunfire then targets the cenobite. The darker shadows recede as the monster heals its wounds. She pulls the pin and tosses a grenade into the cenobite's lap, sprinting as more tentacles chase her across the sand. The explosion sends hungry flames eating along the pale body. Tentacles fall to the sand in stinking clumps.

"Burn," she says as she lobs two more grenades.

A tentacle whips out from the center cluster and sends one grenade into a building. The second explodes in a flaming display of fouled flesh and oily sludge. She laughs at how easy it was to slay a corporate entity. Then the cenobite rises, a slender figure backdropped by black smoke and fire. He shrieks and shoots into the air, a sixteen limbed spider grabbing for Dreya. She runs into the leaning building at her back and the monstrosity crashes through the wall behind her.

Dodging, ducking, diving, Dreya runs through sand-covered abandoned halls, ever climbing higher and higher. Crashing through a stairwell door, she emerges into a vast room dimly lit by holes in the wall and ceiling. Her chest heaves, sucking in centuries old dust. Her heart races.

Creaking metal is her only warning as tentacles burst out of the floor. She jumps back and is caught by a knot of maggots smashing through the doorway. Behind it slithers in the cenobite, it's lower half a serpentine collection of tentacles. The maggots tighten their grip as she struggles in vain.

"Why?" the cenobite hisses, it's voice coming from within and outside. "Why fight this gift we offer. I will make you greater than you could ever be alone."

"I don't need you," she grunts, grabbing hold of the tendrils as they lift her off the ground. "We don't need you. Creatures like you ruined the world. We're still trying to put it back together."

"Ruined the world? You foolish thing." The cenobite wheezes, a sickly laugh that makes Dreya's skin crawl. "Without our vision, civilization would have never reached its peak. This broken world is nothing without us."

"You're wrong. You're nothing without us."

Snatching a knife from her belt, she stabs the tangle of tentacles holding her aloft, driving the blade to the hilt repeatedly. Black and white ichor sprays out as she hits something vital. The cenobite shrieks and tosses Dreya, launching her through the wall and into the next room. The creature slithers forward, but stops short.

She lays in a pool of sunlight, pouring in through a ruined wall. Rubbing the back of her bruised head, Dreya sits up.

"What's the matter? Is it a bit too sunny for you?" She rises to her feet and stumbles. Looking down she sees a metal shaft jutting out of her foot. "Come on in"

The cenobite stretches a single tendril towards her. As the appendage enters the light, the foul flesh blackens then bursts as it catches fire.

"I'll make you a deal. If you come and get me, right now, I won't run." She crouches down and yanks the metal out of her foot. She screams, the pain is sharp and radiating. Using her gift, she shares a bit with Forest. "I wonder which side is winning."

"You are but two mortals. We are an idea."

"I have an idea for you: slither back into the hole you crawled out of."

"Your words are starting to anger us."

"Love or hate me, I've heard being vexing is my trademark." Dreya draws a pistol from her rear holster and puts two bullets in the cenobites head.

The creature snarls and lunges forward only to recoil as the sun claims a couple of its tentacles.

"Thought I'd try." She takes an exploratory step and cries out. If she pulls on their bond to heal the wound, it might distract Forest at the wrong moment. "Looks like we're at an impasse."

"Wrong. You are at the end of your natural cycle." Tentacles stretch out, encircling the circle of sunlight. The skeletal cenobite moves to the very edge of the light. "You will end here and we will begin anew. You prolong this for no gain."

"Just strengthening my resolve," she whispers. Opening herself to Forest, she sighs. "Be ready to make your move, heretic"

Dreya shoots the ceiling and spears of light burn holes into the surrounding tentacles. The cenobite hisses and she charges him, using her gift to augment her speed. His tentacles wrap around her and the room erupts in triumphant laughter.

"Clever, but ultimately pointless."

"We'll see."

She jams her blade up under his jaw. The creature shrieks, spasming as ichor pours out of the wound. Calling on her strength and the power of Forest's fiery aura, Dreya throws them both backwards into the light. The cenobite howls, bestial and ancient. Violent tremors shake the building.

A wall collapses as Kiko barrels into the room. One arm is missing and she bleeds from multiple holes. She grabs for Dreya and Forest grabs her by the hair, yanking her back out of reach. Kiko and the cenobite flail wildly as the sun cleanses them. Forest's red flames burn blue as she puts the paladin in a headlock and wrenches with inhuman strength. Her head tears free, trailing hundreds of grasping maggots. As the light touches them they explode with loud pops.

The headless body turns in her grasps and rains blow after thunderous blow upon her, knocking her back into the shadows.

Sunlight burns foul flesh and the monster attempts to retreat, but Dreya pins him down even as the flames eat at her own skin. They wrestle and she pulls more and more from her gift. Fire seers her flesh as tentacles whip her savagely. She fights the cenobite until her well runs dry. With her last bit of strength, she pulls away before allowing the pain to overwhelm her.

Dreya Thorn awakens on a pile of old stone that had once been part of an ancient city. A massive pit burns black and caustic a few dozen feet away. Her sister, Tink, and her dear friend, Darling, sit on a ledge beneath her, watching the flames dance within the foul pit. The ex-paladin, Forest Alba, stands near the edge of the hole. She holds a rifle in each hand and a bandoleer of grenades over her shoulders. She makes a striking image of strength and resolve.

Dreya sits up. "Is it dead," she calls out.

Her friends look at her and smile despite their wounds and bruises. She watches the flames, but in the back of her mind she wonders:

Can you truly kill an idea?

...

The End.