Karel gazed up at her silently from where he lay.
‘Karel, listen to me! Kavan is losing it. This battle could well be his last. You don’t know how Artemis works: if Kavan isn’t the right leader, then he’ll be replaced. Kavan knows that, and if he thinks he is wrong for Artemis, he would be happy to be replaced.’
‘What’s that got to do with me?’
Eleanor held his gaze. She wanted him to understand.
‘I can’t kill Kavan,’ she said.
Karel said nothing. Eleanor turned on her heel and resumed her climb up the hill. The weather was going crazy: the icy wind drew itself across her body like a saw, frost patterned her chest, and yet, across the bowl of the North Kingdom, the land was dissolving in a warm mist.
She continued her climb, listening for the sound of Karel’s feet. What would he do? Would he attack her again?
Through the wind she could hear the clank of metal as Karel began to follow her.
Kavan
Kavan’s forces had been pushed back on two flanks. In response he concentrated his remaining troops into one force, intending to push forward like an awl, deep into the heart of the North Kingdom. He would stab right up against the skeletal tower that stood at the centre.
He stood on a splintered shelf at the edge of the broken maze, looking down over the ever-present railway lines that reached from Artemis City, so far to the south, now preparing to probe deep into this last northern post of resistance.
He looked over the remnants of his army as they ranged down the nearest slope, barely three hundred infantryrobots and sixty Storm Troopers. No one knew for sure how many Scouts were still out there.
His troops were forming into the shape of a knife, ready to thrust forward. The mess of the train wreck had been heaved to the side; ahead of it engineers were busy lengthening the track, piercing their way forward.
‘We’re almost ready,’ said Wolfgang.
‘They can see us massing,’ said Kavan. ‘They’ll need to strike soon if they are to finish us off.’
He gazed over at the far side of the bowl. ‘Wolfgang, what’s making that mist?’
The far side of the bowl was filling with a white haze. The magnesium flares reflected eerie white light back from a rising fog bank that was engulfing the land beyond the tower. The wind blew tentacles of mist out across the bowl, which slowly insinuated themselves throughout the Artemisian lines.
‘Heat,’ said Wolfgang, suddenly. ‘The snow is evaporating.’
‘What are they burning to produce such heat?’ wondered Kavan aloud.
‘Something beneath the ground,’ mused Wolfgang. ‘Something that burns for longer than petrol. Coal, maybe? Charcoal?’
And it struck Kavan then, with such force. They really believe, he thought. They are burning their land, rather than surrender to us.
‘Come on,’ he said, as he began to make his way down the hill. Behind him, through the wail of the wind, he heard Ruth’s voice.
‘Where are we going?’
‘To join the troops, of course,’ answered Wolfgang. ‘This is the final attack.’
Even some of my aides don’t really believe, thought Kavan. Even some Artemisian soldiers still believe they are more important than Nyro’s philosophy.
In some ways, the people of this kingdom are stronger than we are.
Eleanor
Eleanor watched the troops forming into lines. She saw Kavan and his aides making their way to join them.
‘Come on, Karel,’ she called. ‘We’re going to join the attack.’
‘Why should I? This isn’t my battle. I’m a Turing Citizen!’
‘There is no Turing City any more. If you’re not an Artemisian, then what are you?’
The words struck home more than she had intended. He came to a halt in the middle of the dirty snow, churned up by the feet of so many robots.
‘What am I?’ he repeated. ‘What am I?’
Eleanor took hold of his arm, dragged him onward.
‘You’re wearing the body of an Artemisian, soldier, so get marching. If you are still a Turing Citizen, then think on that when you meet Kavan.’
Down they descended into the bowl.
‘Look.’ Karel pointed. Faint red lines traced their way across the stone landscape. ‘The hillside is burning on the far side.’
‘Does that matter? Come on!’
She pushed and pulled and cajoled him forward, eager to rejoin the fight. A group of Scouts, limbering up against the wind, saw them coming. They gazed at them as they approached, their blades now half exposed.
‘Get this soldier a rifle,’ called out Eleanor. ‘We’re going to join Kavan.’
The Scouts recognized her and moved apart. One of them found a rifle and lazily tossed it to her. She caught it, slapped it into Karel’s hands.
‘Get behind him,’ said Eleanor, right there at his ear as they walked on. ‘Then shoot him through the back of the head.’
Kavan
All was ready. Wet snow blew through the mist that rolled around the hillside; it barrelled around the copper sphere atop the skeletal tower. The red cracks of fire in the slope opposite were widening.
Kavan was ready. ‘Give the order to advance.’ The call went out. Rifles slapped against metal hands, feet stamped on rock. Silver metal flashed as the Scouts scattered, running forwards and sideways to secure ground. The Storm Troopers stamped their feet as they advanced, rattling stones from the few buildings that were still standing ahead of them. Such was the force of their advance that one or two of the smaller hovels seemed to give up their hold on life, suddenly collapsing in a tumble of stones. Iron feet stamped through the rubble as the stream of metal flowed around the larger buildings.
‘Hello, Kavan.’
Eleanor appeared at his shoulder, paintwork scorched and body scratched. As ever. There was another robot with her. An infantryrobot.
‘Who is that?’ he asked.
‘Karel.’ She gazed at him intently with her yellow eyes, as if trying to read him, and he wondered what game Eleanor was now playing, right in the middle of an attack. It hardly mattered.
Metal spheres curved through the air, before landing amongst the advancing troops.
‘Keep formation,’ ordered Kavan. The troops did so. The wire bombs exploded in a blue tangle of wire that quickly contracted, snaring the arms and legs of infantry-robots. Grey soldiers collapsed, some of them emitting electronic squeals of pain. A few of them snapped off useless limbs, attached new ones, and rejoined the march.
‘Some of the bombs didn’t contract,’ observed Wolfgang, staring at one blue tangle of wire that washed across the snow.
The wind whipped the sound of the crackling rifles towards them. Over there, on the left flank, enemy robots were attacking. So thin and fragile, they were reduced to throwing rocks that bounced ineffectually from the Artemisian bodies.
Two Scouts had seen what was happening and they ran towards the enemy, a length of razor wire held taut between them. The wire sliced through the thin bodies of the northern robots, cutting them down.
Now more of the enemy appeared, running headlong towards them. The infantry shot at them, the impact of the bullets flinging their light bodies backwards in the snow. They wore only tin and pig-iron, their metal shattering and shrieking under each blow delivered against them. Still they came running, more and more of them.
Children now, tiny bodies dodging closer and closer. Coming in amongst the troops, they rubbed themselves against the Artemisians, they rubbed their hands over arm joints and knee joints. They clasped heads and embraced necks, they clung tightly onto the infantry, even as they were stabbed and shot, even as the twisted metal of their minds was unwound.
The Artemisians tried to prise those dead children free. But the corpses were unmovable, they clung on, the sand and adhesive that covered their bodies hardened, gluing up the joints of the Artemisians. Kavan watched as soldier after soldier stumbled, fell to his knees, gripped hold of a tiny body and tried to tear it loose, only to find that his hands were stuck to it.