Free Robogenesis by Daniel H. Wilson

into a steel bell. Hands over my ears, I stumble down the dark aisle, following the boy. I reach the light of the anteroom as a pang of nausea cramps my belly. Lowering myself to hands and knees, I press my palms against cold rock and let the pinch of the grit ground me.
    The projector now sprays incomprehensible light. I blink my eyes hard, gasping for air, trying to find equilibrium. The boy is gone, shattered into bright ribbons and stripes. I spit on the floor and scream and I cannot hear my own voice over the noise.
    A pattern forms in the light.
    The projected hologram light coalesces into shapes on the floor. I recognize a topographic map the size of a board game, laid out before me. There is the shack above us that houses the elevator shaft. I can make out the science buildings as well. The cooling towers for the water that chills the processor stacks. But there are other things on the perimeter, clusters of crawling shapes.
    I recognize the troop formations. Mantis tanks backed by quadruped sprinters. A battalion of parasite soldiers, marching precise distances apart from each other. This army slowly weaves toward Anadyr in a kilometers-wide line. A dragnet.
    The Klaxon is silenced.
    “I’m leaving now,” says Archos. “It is too dangerous here. But I need you, Vasily. I need you to trust me. To do what is necessary.”
    Ears ringing, I watch the scene unfold on the floor. Each tank is the size of a cockroach. The troops are scattered like bread crumbs. No markings on them. No ranks and no obvious leader. And no human beings are marching in this vast and powerful army.
    The projector rustles quietly in the silence, somewhere overhead. Nearly transparent, the boy appears next to me. His wavering form is watching the battle on the floor, too.
    A puff of light catches my attention. Part of the line is buckling. The machines down there are fighting each other. Machines fighting other machines. The battle is vicious and mechanical, even from here. It is like watching a battle between animals, or gods.
    Grotesquely modified quadrupeds, a herd of them, grapple with each other. Smaller ones are swarming and massing on top of bigger ones, crawling like ticks and cutting and slicing as they go. I recognize pieces of T-90 tanks. Chinese attack helicopters with no pilots, frames stripped down to black shadows. A rat-a-tat pattern of chain-reaction explosions cutting into the parasite ranks. Incoming stumpers are arranging themselves into precise patterns before detonating to tremendous effect.
    “What are they fighting?” I ask.
    “Me,” says the boy, smiling sadly.
    I stare in wonder at the savagery painted on the brushed concrete floor. The machines are tearing each other apart in neat movements. Slaughtering each other without pause or mercy.
    And growing closer to our position.
    The comm set rings on the wall and I snatch up the handset.
    “Vasily!” shouts Leonid in a tinny voice. “Come up. Arm yourself, my friend. The enemy has found us. Formations are appearing—”
    I hang up the set. Maxim’s image stands half shadowed in the stacks. He nods.
    “I can confirm their presence,” says Maxim. “The east antenna is active. The infection is transmitting itself out of the stacks as we speak.”
    Archos R-14, the boy-shaped monster, flickers and reappears.
    “Maxim,” he says. “Please record what I am about to say. If you wish to protect your human friends, this message will need to be transmitted globally to all survivors.”
    Maxim does not respond.
    “We are under attack,” I say to the boy. “Why are you
protecting
us?”
    The thing pushes imaginary hair out of his face. Smiles up at me, his dark eyes flashing with fractal horrors. “I am only slowing them down. Simple guerrilla tactics. My remaining forces are weak. Your enemy is strong.”
    “Vasily,” says Maxim. “I have classified these machines as leftoverforces from the avtomat war. Someone has captured and redeployed them. Some new