The Ruined City

“Are you asleep?”

Grix Orlazzu lay with his eyes closed. His breathing was deep and regular.

“Come, this is useless. I know you are not asleep.” The automaton’s metallic tones scraped the atmosphere. “You cannot deceive me, Leftover. Open your eyes.”

Orlazzu produced a muted snore.

“This is false. This is treacherous. This is organic. You will admit that you are awake!”

A steel-jointed finger poked Orlazzu’s shoulder. For the life of him, he could not contain a curse, which killed all hope of further pretense. He opened his eyes to confront the glassy scrutiny of his creation.

“What time is it?” Orlazzu yawned widely.

“Time to get up. You have lain there on that pallet long enough.”

“We inferior creatures of flesh and blood need our rest, you may recall.”

“You have had four hours of rest. You cannot pretend that does not suffice. Come, enough of this sloth. Get up now, Leftover. You will get up
now
!”

Orlazzu sat up. For a moment his gaze traveled the room, its modest limits faintly visible by dawn light, before coming to rest upon the sturdy figure of his own mechanical double. The automaton returned the regard unblinkingly, and—not for the first time—Orlazzu repented his own failure to furnish his creation with functional eyelids.

“Well?” the automaton prompted.

“Well, what? What do you want now?”

“Your attention. Your regard. Your conversation. You will talk to me.”

“About what, exactly?”

“My thoughts. My feelings. My inner self.”

“Your inner self consists of gears, cogs, springs, and clockwork, driven by arcanely generated pulses of energy.”

“And yours consists of imperfectly organized ooze, but I make allowances for your deficiencies. I do not despise you for them. I am still willing to confide in you.”

“I haven’t asked you to confide.”

“You will listen. It is your duty. I wish to discuss my feelings of loneliness and isolation, the result of your neglect. You have not made me feel welcome—you
never
have.”

“Correct. You are not welcome. Why don’t you leave?”

“You are impertinent, Leftover. Not to mention insensitive, inferior, and generally reprehensible. I will not be pushed out of my own home.”

“
Your
home?”

“I have come to regard it as such. I have developed a deep and abiding affinity for this humble cottage. Modest though it may be, yet it is my true and rightful place.”

“Very well. You keep it, then. I’ll go.”

“Without me? Never. I will not allow it.”

“You will not
allow
?”

“I am stronger than you, Leftover. I am faster, greater in endurance, and far more intelligent than you. We both know that I am more than your match. And I will not
allow
you to shirk your sacred responsibilities.”

“Those sacred responsibilities including unlimited endurance of soulful chitchat?”

“Chitchat? How dare you? Have you any idea how
condescending
that sounds?”

“I believe I do, yes.”

“I will not endure such contempt, such indifference! You will display the proper interest and concern that any creator owes his creation. You will acknowledge your obligation, recognize
my needs, and strive to fulfill them to the best of your ability. I will settle for no less! Do you hear me, Leftover? You will do right by me!” The automaton’s voice had risen to a metallic shout, but its face, limited in flexibility, barely changed expression.

Orlazzu studied his unruly double in silence for a moment, concluded once again that he could not bring himself to destroy the mechanism, and inquired mildly, “You view my obligation as permanent in nature?”

“No, for your term of existence is limited. But make no mistake, you will use your time properly.”

“I see. Yes, I see clearly. Very well, Grix. You leave me no choice, and I must yield. This is your home, our home, our abode of inexpressible togetherness. Here I shall dedicate all the resources at my command to the furtherance of your happiness. What have you to say to that?”

The automaton eyed its creator in silence.

“That’s what you want, isn’t it?” Orlazzu prompted.

“That is what I demand. But you concede very readily.”

“How can I fight the inevitable?”

The automaton’s internal mechanism whirred. An erratic succession of beeps suggested mental disquiet.

“Right, then.” Orlazzu rose from his narrow bed. The quality of light in the room told him that dawn had broken. “I must step outside for a moment, in the manner of organic humankind—”

“The details are unnecessary. I recognize your weakness.”

“And then I need to collect some fuel.”

“You’ve fuel enough already.”

“Not so. Remember, it must season. You may assist me, if you will.”

“Assist in what manner?”

“Gather sticks, chop wood—”

“I? I possess talents and intellect of the highest order. You would set me to menial tasks?”

“Necessary tasks.”

“Necessary for you, Leftover. I have no need of fire, hence no reason to gather bits of wood. It is not as if I were some
servant
.”

“You’ll not come for the sake of fellowship? We could discuss your feelings.”

“We will discuss them upon your return. Do not expect me to drudge for you. I have learned to assert myself.”

“I applaud your progress. Excuse me for the moment, then. I’ll return shortly.” Pausing only long enough to wrap himself in his oilskin cloak, Grix Orlazzu exited the hut, shutting the door behind him.

He emerged into a dim world filled with mist and cold moisture. The weak light of early morning just barely managed to find its way through the fog. The tufted grasses underfoot were dank and dead, the low shrubbery leafless and skeletal. For all of that, his surroundings were intensely charged. Almost he imagined that he could feel the power of the Source vibrating through the ground and tingling through the air, to raise the gooseflesh along his forearms and stir the hairs at the back of his neck. Closing his eyes, he opened himself to the Source, and in that unguarded moment felt the vast intangible presence of the Other pressing hard on his intellect. An intimation of ancient intelligence too alien to comprehend, a sense of measureless will spanning the ages, and then he slammed shut the gates of his mind, excluding the intruder.

Orlazzu opened his eyes. He was breathing hard, as if he had run a race, and his heart was pounding. He came within a nervespan of ducking back into the shelter, whose arcane reinforcements were proof against all attempted incursion, then considered the consequences and quelled the impulse. He was capable of resisting the Other. It was largely a matter of vigilance.

Two minutes of brisk hiking carried him over the crest of a rise and down into a hollow hidden from the hut and its glass-eyed tenant. There sprawled a dense tangle of brambles, and beneath the spiked branches lay a pile of dead leaves. Plunging
his hand wrist-deep into the leaves, he dragged forth the sack that he had hidden in that spot some twenty-four hours earlier. Within the sack reposed his most essential belongings—a clutch of arcane instruments and substances, a few mundane tools, the best of his books and manuscripts, and a few days’ supply of food. Little enough, but they would serve.