The City, Not Long After by Pat Murphy

Author:Pat Murphy
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: Fantasy, Science Fiction & Fantasy, Science Fiction, Paranormal & Urban
ISBN: 9781480483187
Publisher: Open Road Media
Published: 2014-04-15T04:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER 13

LATE AT NIGHT THE MACHINE heard metal claws scratching at his window. He moved the kerosene lantern from his desk to the windowsill, so that light spilled out into the alley.

Through the dirty glass, he could see a face of sorts: sickleshaped mandibles beneath multifaceted eyes. Jointed legs ending in crude metal pinchers gripped the windowsill, supporting the rounded metal torso and lifting the head to the window. The rest of the body was lost in the shadows.

As The Machine watched, the head swayed to and fro. Lantern light fell on one faceted eye and then on the other, glittering on the photoreceptors that made up the facets. Mandibles rattled against the glass.

She wanted the sun—The Machine knew that. Her photovoltaic cells converted the sun’s rays to electricity, which powered her movements. His kerosene lamp was a pale substitute, but the best that she could find in the darkened city. “Be patient,” he said to her. “It will be daylight soon enough. Sleep now.”

She scraped her mandibles against the glass. The wooden windowsill began splintering under the pressure of her pinchers. The Machine took the lantern from the sill, blew out the flame, and crawled into his narrow bed. He smiled as he listened to her retreat, and he imagined her raising her head to the feeble light of the moon. Reassured by the sound of metal on asphalt, he fell asleep.

The Machine’s bedroom had once been the office for the manager of Cole Street Auto Body Shop. In the adjoining garage, The Machine built metal creatures, which he turned loose to prowl the empty streets of the city. Some, like his late-night visitor, took their energy from the sun, storing the feeble current in banks of batteries that they carried in their bellies. Torpid and slow-moving, they basked in the sun like reptiles. Others were equipped with wind turbines that converted the breezes into power. Still others were wholly battery-powered, scurrying along the city’s gutters throughout their brief and unproductive lives. The Machine had experimented with a breed that ingested organic matter and fermented methane gas, but that proved too volatile, and after a few explosions he had stopped building that species.

He called his creatures “Children of the Sun.” Though he built their bodies, he felt that he did not truly create the Children. It seemed to him that the Children already existed in some other place or time. He assisted them by building bodies that they could inhabit in this world.

He searched the city for metal scraps that he could shape into abdomens, torsos, mandibles, legs. He recognized the hubcaps or metal pipes or oil drums or auto fenders that belonged to the Children. He could lay his hand on a set of vise grips and know immediately that this tool would become a claw, manipulated by an intricate set of gears. He could run his hand along the smooth metal surface of an industrial light fixture and know without question that the metal shape would become a head, set with photoreceptors that would guide the creature to light.

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