"This is a land better suited to plants than men," said Bear, his voice roughened by thirst. It was all he said for quite some time. Pollen choked them.
After what felt like several days, Bear stopped and pointed. "Look!" he said. "The sun has moved at last."
Richards raised his sunburnt face to the sky. His body itched and his skin was tight. He was tired and hungry and thirsty. Humanity had worn thin.
The sun was several degrees lower than it had been before.
"Hmmm," murmured Bear, "this is most peculiar. The sun is setting, but it does not seem dependent on our passage through time, but more on our traversal of distance."
"Right," said Richards. He badly wanted to lie down. "Well done."
Bear waggled a paw with a rattle of beans. "I'm a curious kind of bear."
They walked through sunset fields where the unripe wheat reached Richards' chest, then came to a place where a sooty twilight reigned, and the wheat stopped altogether.
"I was afraid of this," said Bear. "I've been able to smell it for some time."
Ahead of them lay an area of blackened land. Patches of stubble poked up through fine white ash. The air was acrid. Dust devils whirled, and the ground radiated a dangerous heat. The swollen sun melted away into tears of fire at the ruin of the world.
An eerie howl sounded across the plain.
"Hmm," said Bear. "Let's stop here."
Richards, more tired than he thought possible, sank to his knees and was asleep before he hit the ground.
Day came as day does, the normal order of things holding sway at the edge of the wheat, and they continued onwards.
Soon after, Richards and Bear found a village that had been sacked. A small place of twenty or so cottages whose blackened beams stood exposed to the sky, walls bowed, close to ruin or ruinous already, revealing tangles of bones inside. There was a broke-back church and a mill whose wheel lay smashed in the river. The crackle of dying fires and wisps of smoke still haunted the place.
"I smell trouble," said Bear, "and it is trouble of the worst kind. We best be careful, sunshine." He fell to all fours and slunk across the river, a scowl on his face. Richards followed, the water warm and stinking, his trousers clinging unwelcomely to his legs.
Bear crossed quickly, leaving Richards to scramble up its far bank alone. At the top, he came across a body, a brightly hued rabbity thing the size of a five-year-old.
It couldn't have been killed more than a day ago, but it looked as if it had been dead for centuries. Its bright skin was a thin, dirt-lined parchment, eyes sunken in cavernous, glitterrimed sockets. Where Richards touched it, its flesh felt hard and brittle.
"YamaYama," said Bear, coming to Richards' side. "Had a quick scout, there's lots of 'em dead, all like that, poor little blighters."
"This is a YamaYama?" said Richards.
"Toy of the year, 2102," said Bear. "Fully interactive, cute little beggars, bit like rabbits, but more soppy."
Richards nodded. "I heard of them, although 2102 was a couple of years before I was born. I've had to interrogate one as a witness. Big learning capabilities, but then what doesn't possess heuristics in this day and age? There was a controversy: too close to true AI. Neukind rights people said they were alive, like me, or you. They were one of the examples the rights movement used."
"Yeah, well, that didn't stop them being trashed in their millions when they went out of fashion," said Bear. "And I complain about my box in the attic."
"Some of their minds got out onto the Grid and ended up here?" said Richards.
"Mm-huh," said Bear. "Their collective was already up and running when I got pulled in. It was all going so well for them, and now look at this." A paw swept round the devastation. "Shocking."
The YamaYama looked like he'd been sucked dry, his face an expression of agony that suggested he had been alive to suffer it.
"What did it?" asked Richards.
"Haemites," said Bear. "One of Penumbra's lot," and he shook his long head until his little helmet rattled.
"Who is this Penumbra?"
"I've said too much. Got to keep you fresh for the debrief. Forget it, if you're not shamming, that is." The bear squinted suspiciously. He wrinkled his nose. "Hey, can you hear that?"
"What?" said Richards.
"That."
There was a ring of metal, then another.
"Is that a swordfight?"
Bear shrugged. "Mebbe. I'm going to check it out. You can stay here if you want."
"Aren't I your prisoner?" said Richards.
Bear grinned a daggered grin. "And where you going to go, sunshine?"
They hurried to the far side of the village, toward the sound of melee.
"Get back! Get back, I say!" Clang! Clang! "Avast! Avaunt! Begone!" Clang, clang, clang-clang.
There was a tumult of steam whistles, a frantic scrabbling, and four figures came haring round the carcass of a smouldering house, stumbling to a stop of blades and curses twenty metres from Richards and Bear.
One of them was a man, his face furrowed with concentration. He wore slashed velvet clothes of eye-watering purple, a goatee on his face. A large hat sat atop his sweat-damp hair, decorated with a long, bedraggled feather.
"A cavalier!" whispered the Bear with some delight. "Or he looks not unlike one. He certainly fights with their panache. Let's watch," he said, and pulled Richards into the shelter of a ruined cottage.
The cavalier handled a silver blade with an ease that belied its unwieldiness, shaped as it was like a huge feather. In and out it went, turning away the weapons of his adversaries. Yet his movements were slowing, flickering a semaphore of desperation.
His opponents were iron homunculi a metre and a half tall. Stooped and misshapen, they moved with an ugly grace.
"Hee hee! Hee hee! Kill him! Kill him! Eat his eyes! Stab his heart!"
"Ha ha! Break his bones! Smash his skull! Strip his meat! Take him apart!"
Each was the colour of ancient rust. Their faces were intricate masks. Clanking mechanical noises issued from them, a ratcheting hum underlying the swordplay.
"Hoo hoo hoo!" chittered a third. "Take his blood! Eat! Eat! Eat!"
"Bloody Hell, clockwork goblins," said Richards. "This place gets weirder by the minute." The bear was watching with an expression approaching enjoyment. Richards elbowed the toy in its gut. "Go on then, help him," he said.
Bear shrugged. "Not my problem."
Richards scowled. "Some soldier you are. Well, I can't just stand here." He stepped out into plain sight. "Oi!" he shouted, his plan running out with that.
One of the haemites turned from the fight. "What's this? What's this? Fresh meat! Fresh meat!" A whistle on its shoulder tooted. It whirred towards Richards.
"Run, you fool! Flee!" shouted the cavalier. "Be away swiftly before they are upon you!" And he redoubled his efforts to drive back the haemites besetting him, but to no avail, and they tooted as they pressed him harder. "For the love of god! Don't let it touch you!"
The creature came closer to Richards. It smelt of furnaces and stale water. "Hee hee, hee hee hee!" it gibbered. "Slow we'll go, slow and nice. Best for me!"
Richards scooped up a house brick and bounced it off the haemite to no effect. "Ah, balls," he said.
"Oh, for the… Ahem!" shouted the bear. "Hands off my prisoner!"
"A bear!" the machine screeched.
"A bear?" queried a second.
"Where?" cried the third.
"There!" hollered the fourth.
"More, more!" cried the creature approaching Richards. "Oh, joy joy! Iron and meat for us to eat! Plenty!" It whistled, jaws clacking together. "You later!" It giggled. "Kill the bear!"
"I wouldn't be so sure about that if I were you, matey," said Bear, flexing his claws.