Necroepilogos

Melyn’s home was full of zombies. She didn’t know how to feel about that; at least they weren’t trying to eat her.

Home — that was a difficult word, one she had not used in a long time. Whenever she and Haf ventured beyond Pheiri’s hull — up to the outer deck, or out on one of the few excursions that she could recall — she would say things like ‘we should return’, or ‘time to get inside’, or ‘I want to go back to Pheiri’. Never ‘let’s go home’. 

But Pheiri was home. The events of the last twelve hours had clarified that definition.

Haf had gone beyond Pheiri’s hull to help the friendly zombies fight other zombies; Melyn wasn’t very useful in a fight even when she wasn’t feeling so unwell and confused — she could hold a small gun, point it in the right direction, and pull the trigger, but little more than that. So, Haf and the first of the friendly zombies had left her behind, swaddled in blankets in Pheiri’s control cockpit, half-blind, drooling, singing snippets of poetry to Pheiri. Haf hadn’t wanted to go; Haf had pretended that nothing was wrong. But Melyn knew what it meant when Haf put on all the pieces of her armour; even scrambled up and shivering, Melyn knew. Haf had kissed her on the forehead and said she’d be back soon. Then Melyn had been alone, without Hafina for the first time in longer than her notebooks recorded.

Minutes had crawled into hours — two hours, then more. Pheiri had waited with most of his insides dark and quiet; Melyn knew that Pheiri was repairing the parts of himself that protected them. Melyn’s mind had started to unscramble. She’d stopped singing poetry — she had no idea where the poems had come from.

But then she’d gotten scared.

What if Haf got hurt? What if Haf got overwhelmed by the zombies? What if the zombies ate her? Zombies were different this close to a worm — they were smaller, more numerous, a little bit less dangerous, and apparently they weren’t all bad. Melyn had not expected Pheiri to let a zombie inside. But then the zombie had spoken like a person, so she was okay.

But other zombies weren’t so friendly. What if Hafina never came back?

Melyn had started to say all sorts of things to Pheiri. Some of them she wasn’t proud of. Most of them didn’t make sense. Her mind was still very jumbled and she couldn’t make the words stay put in the right order. But eventually she had settled on a phrase that felt correct:

“What if Haf doesn’t come — home?”

Home.

That word had generated a string of complaints upon the screen of her mind, all about ‘designated charging cradles’, ‘assigned divisional quarters’, and ‘medical corps assistant storage’. That was useless, so she made it all go away. Then her mind had filled with other nonsense about ‘home’ being breached, overrun, and abandoned. Home did not exist. Home was gone.

But Pheiri was here. Pheiri was safe. Pheiri was home. She made all the other stuff go away.

Then Pheiri had done a lot of shouting and running about; Melyn had strapped herself into one of the seats. Haf had returned with half a dozen zombies — two of which were very badly wounded and about to die. Melyn had not seen the point in saving dying zombies. Wouldn’t they just come back anyway? She’d stood in the rear airlock door, overwhelmed by the shouting, by Pheiri throwing them all about again, by the blood all over the floors, by zombies screeching at each other, crying, clawing, and—

And the screen of Melyn’s mind had filled with clear instructions.

She’d opened the infirmary; she’d remembered the scalpels and stitches and staples, and how to use them. She’d followed the screen of her mind, cleaning and cutting and clamping, gluing and stitching and bandaging, working for hours until she and the floor were coated with blood. She had made a lot of mistakes — her instructions were clear but the screen of her mind was broken and incomplete; she knew that now, she knew she was filling in the gaps with guesses and experiments. She made so many mistakes that a human being would have died under her knife. But these two were not human beings, they were zombies. She made them live.

And now they were all over Pheiri’s insides: resting in the infirmary, sleeping in the bunk room, talking to yet more zombies over the airwaves. The presence of all these outsiders had finally clarified the truth: Pheiri was home. Her home. She loved her home.

But home was changing.

And this zombie — Elpida — called herself ‘Commander’.

The screen of Melyn’s mind suggested several alternative designations for Elpida: ‘nanomachine conglomeration’, ‘level nine XZ military threat’, ‘compromised network output node’, ‘officer class leadership priority engagement’ — along with several others that made no sense to Melyn, like ‘zed-head’, ‘necro-fuck’, and ‘deadite’. All those suggestions had cleared away when Elpida had called herself ‘Commander’.

Elpida needed Melyn’s help to stand up from the infirmary bed. She needed Melyn’s help to step over the small, blonde, angry zombie — Ilyusha? Funny name — who was sleeping all untidy in the doorway. She needed Melyn’s help to step out into the crew compartment. The Commander needed a lot of help with everything. Was that what Commanders did? At least she didn’t complain about Melyn smearing more blood all over her arm and hip.

“Thank you,” Elpida croaked. “Thank you, Melyn.”

The crew compartment ceiling was much higher; Elpida straightened up.

Melyn watched Elpida’s strange purple eyes rove over the crew compartment. She looked at the benches, the blankets, Haf’s equipment, their various clothes, a couple of half-eaten nutrient blocks; Elpida’s eyes paused with special interest on the books — Melyn’s notebooks, and her other books. Then Elpida looked upward, at the  ladders which led to the storage racks, and the diagonal passage on the left which led to the top hatch airlock. Then she returned to the most important thing in the compartment — Hafina.

Haf was sitting cross-legged in the middle of the floor, naked except for her loose underwear. She was bent over the disassembled parts of her biggest gun, the one Melyn couldn’t lift, busy rubbing grease into the components. She returned Elpida’s curious stare with a big goofy grin.

Melyn looked back and forth: Elpida was tall, but Hafina was taller; Elpida had that long snowy white hair — but Haf’s hair was golden, and fluffier; Elpida’s skin was a rich pale copper-brown, but she had nothing on Hafina’s shifting colours; Elpida’s muscles were exposed because she wasn’t wearing a shirt, but Haf had more muscles and she was more naked; Elpida’s purple eyes were interesting, but Haf’s big black orbs were better, just like Melyn’s eyes; Elpida had big breasts, Haf’s were larger (Melyn wasn’t sure why that mattered to her, but it did). Elpida was pretty, but nowhere near as pretty as Hafina. Melyn decided not to say any of this out loud, because it would make Haf insufferable for weeks.

“Melyyyyyyy,” Hafina purred. “Does she understand you yet? Hey there, big girl. Can you tell what I’m saying now?”

Melyn tutted. “She can understand us fine. Understand us fine. Shut up, Haf, don’t be silly. Be silly. And she’s not big, she’s smaller than you. Smaller than you.”

Elpida cleared her throat. “Haf — Hafina? I apologise for staring. You look very different without your armour.”

Haf let out a big rumble, the sort of purr she made when she felt smug. She stretched her top two arms upward to touch the ceiling of the crew compartment, while rolling the others forward to make her back muscles ripple.

Melyn huffed and rolled her eyes and wanted to poke Haf in the side. But she couldn’t do that because Elpida might fall over without her support.

Instead Melyn snapped: “Haf. Stop showing off.”

Haf purred again.

Elpida made a funny pose — she tucked her right arm halfway over her chest and bowed her head to Haf. “Thank you, Hafina, for your help in getting out of there. We wouldn’t have held off the Death’s Heads without you. Thank you for saving me and my comrades.”

Haf grinned even wider, ducking her head and looking away, being all big and stupid for Elpida; Melyn really didn’t like that. It made her chest feel wrong.

Haf said: “Been a long time since I did a big fight. Got a bit dunted? Dunted? Dunt-ed?”

“Dented,” Melyn corrected. “Wear more armour next time. You’re so stupid, Haf. So stupid. You should have taken the shield. The shield.”

Hafina raised four hands and wiggled her grease-coated fingers. “Needed more hands for more guns. Don’t tell me how to shoot, Melyyyy. You don’t know how to shoot.” Hafina purred and grinned, like she always did when teasing. But Melyn didn’t want her to tease in front of Elpida.

Melyn snapped again, “Just because I can’t doesn’t mean I don’t know how. Don’t know how. Don’t know how. Don’t know— don’t— don’t—”

Her words refused to line up; her mind felt scrambled all over again. Melyn hissed with frustration and thumped herself in the chest.

That wiped the grin off Haf’s face. She sat up straight, eyes going wide. “Mely! Mely, you’re still worn out and tired and not all there. Go slow, Mely. Go slow, slow. Okay? Be gentle with yourself.”

That made Melyn feel even worse. She couldn’t look at Haf’s face. This was all going wrong — and it was all the zombie’s fault.

Elpida said: “Everyone has something to contribute, even if you can’t fight. There’s no shame in that. Thank you again, both of you, for helping us. I don’t yet understand why, but—”

Melyn said to Haf: “She says she’s our Commander.”

The screen of Melyn’s mind liked that designation, ‘Commander’. Melyn made it go away.

Hafina squinted. “She’s what?”

“Our Commander.”

Hafina squinted the other way. “No she’s not.”

“She’s not. She’s not,” Melyn agreed. That felt much better.

Hafina closed one eye. “But she did save the other one.”

“The other one? The other one?”

“Pira,” Haf said. “Or … Leuca. They kept calling her both. The zombie that helped protect Pheiri. So, if she’s their Commander, and she commanded them to protect Pheiri—”

“That’s not how it works, Haf,” Melyn said. “Not how it works. Not how it works. Works.”

Elpida cleared her throat again, and said: “Excuse me, may I clarify something?”

Melyn tried to say ‘you may’ — but the screen of her mind stopped her with that designation again: ‘Commander’, the same way it had stopped her when she’d tried to tell Elpida to stay put and rest in the infirmary. She couldn’t say the words. She couldn’t say what she wanted. She couldn’t say no.

Melyn hissed with frustration and deleted the entry for ‘Commander’. She replaced it with one of the other suggestion: ‘necro-fuck’.

Then she said to Elpida: “You may not.”

Elpida smiled awkwardly. “Okay then.”

Melyn felt much better now. She corrected herself: “I mean you may. You may.”

Elpida said, “Thank you. Um, I should probably apologise. When I called myself Commander I didn’t mean to claim any authority over either of you two. I’ve done nothing to prove myself to you, except stagger into your home and bleed all over your floor. I’m … Commander, sort of, to the others, but when I called myself your Commander, I was trying to … to commit to return the same protection and hospitality that you have extended to us.” Elpida squeezed her eyes shut for a second, as if somebody was speaking to her and making bad suggestions; did she have an irritating problem with the screen of her mind, just like Melyn did? Elpida said: “I was treating you like my … sisters … my cadre, when I should be treating you like the Legion. Allies. Important. Not mine.” She opened her eyes and blinked several times. Such bright purple. “You choose your own leaders. Pheiri — he’s your leader, is that correct?”

Melyn deleted the ‘necro-fuck’ entry and replaced it with Elpida’s name. But then she added (zombie), in brackets.

“Pheiri protects us,” she said.

Haf said to the ceiling: “Thank you, Pheiri!” 

Elpida nodded. “Thank you, Pheiri,” she echoed softly.

Raindrops were beginning to patter against the exterior of Pheiri’s hull, a slow wave of muffled static to match the nuclear heartbeat from beneath Melyn’s feet. Elpida looked up at the ceiling as the rain got heavier.

She said: “Raindrops? His shields are offline?”

Haf said, “Pheiri knows best.”

Melyn grunted, “Pheiri’s tired.”

Elpida nodded slowly and looked around the crew compartment again. “You two live in here, don’t you? Me and my comrades, are we intruding?”

“Yes,” said Melyn.

“No,” said Haf.

Elpida almost laughed, but then she winced instead. “How long have you been living in here? Inside Pheiri?”

Melyn and Hafina shared a glance. Melyn looked at the nearest stack of her notebooks, on one of the benches. They’d been tossed around when Pheiri had to move fast earlier, so Haf must have piled them back up. Then Melyn looked at her blood-stained hands. She sighed; she had already ruined one notebook with bloody smears, when she’d tried to record what was happening with the zombies. She didn’t want to damage any more of them.

Elpida said: “You keep notes? You write down your history?”

“Yes. Yes.”

“Mely is super smart,” Haf said. “Mely’s got the biggest brain even if she’s got the smallest body. She knows all the words and the right orders for them, too. She can read all the books. She knows what Pheiri is telling us as well. She writes everything down and it’s always there.”

“Haf!” Melyn snapped. She blushed. Haf kept smiling.

Elpida turned her head to look at the words on the spines of the notebooks. “Do you have a dating system? Is there a way to locate your earliest notebook?”

Melyn said: “Probably. I don’t know. I don’t have time to read them all.”

Elpida nodded. “What do you two do — I mean, what are you doing? Do you have a … a mission? Something Pheiri is trying to do, perhaps?”

Melyn and Hafina shared another look. Hafina shrugged. Melyn said: “Living? Living. What are you doing?”

Elpida smiled, but Melyn could tell it was a difficult smile. “That’s a very good question, Melyn. I don’t know.” Then she pointed at the open bulkhead hatch, opposite the infirmary. “Is that the bunk room? Is Amina in there?”

Melyn led Elpida across the crew compartment and into the bunk room; Haf started to get up, but Melyn frowned at her to stay put.

Elpida was almost too big for the bunk room; she filled the entire width of the narrow passageway between the bunks built into the walls. The rain outside was louder in here, a muffled drumming on Pheiri’s exterior. Three of the lowest bunks were crammed with equipment and weapons: Haf’s armour, easily reachable from the doorway; the zombies’ various weapons and guns and boots and bits of armour — including their really big massive scary gun that one of them had used to defend Pheiri. One bottom bunk was filled with Melyn’s notebooks and various other kinds of books, so dense that the scratchy blue blanket and thin mattress were entirely obscured; she couldn’t remember when she’d last added to or taken away from that pile. The screen of her mind said it was forty two thousand three hundred and seventy eight hours since she’d last been inside the bunk room.

The smallest of the zombies — Amina — was asleep in one of the top bunks. She was almost as small as Melyn, so she fit into the bunk with room to spare. She hadn’t closed the flimsy privacy curtains. She was curled up tight beneath her big heavy dark coat, hugging a blanket to her chest.

Elpida whispered over the rain: “Was she wounded?”

Melyn answered, “Bruises. Bruises. Nothing bad.”

“How long has she been asleep?”

Melyn read off the screen of her mind. “Five hours thirteen minutes forty four seconds. Forty five seconds. Forty six seconds.” She stopped herself with a click of her tongue.

“Thank you,” Elpida murmured. Then she reached out and gently brushed Amina’s dusky hair back over her scalp.

Amina’s eyes eased open. She stared at Elpida, groggy and sleepy

Elpida whispered, “Just wanted to check that you’re safe. Everyone’s okay. Go back to sleep, Amina.”

Amina made a sleepy sound and closed her eyes.

When Melyn had been performing surgery on Elpida’s stomach and Pira’s many wounds, some of the other zombies had tried to help, or gotten in the way, or shouted at each other, or made a mess. None of them had succeeded in doing much — except Atyle, who seemed to know which tools Melyn needed before Melyn knew herself, and kept handing her things before she reached for them. But Amina had done the least of all. She had stood in the doorway, crying and clutching her knife. Like Melyn would, in a fight.

But Elpida cared about Amina, the smallest and most useless of the zombies.

Melyn wasn’t sure, but she thought perhaps this made Elpida a little bit like Pheiri. She examined that word again: ‘Commander’. She did not restore the designation.

Elpida turned back to Melyn and indicated the rest of the bunk room. She murmured, “Is this your bedroom?”

“We don’t sleep in here. We sleep in the crew compartment. Haf can’t fit in the bunks so I would have to sleep alone. There’s no point.”

Elpida smiled. Melyn thought it was a sad smile. Elpida said: “I know that feeling. You and Haf always sleep together?”

“Yes. Yes. Always.”

“Don’t let us get in your way.”

“I won’t. I won’t.”

Elpida looked down at the bunk which was filled with old notebooks. They’d all tumbled around as well, thrown about by Pheiri’s fast movements earlier. A few had slipped onto the floor, but most of them were held in place by weight and friction and the lip of the bunk. That was to stop people rolling out if Pheiri had to move fast while they were sleeping.

Elpida said: “Do you mind if I take a look at your notebooks, Melyn, or are they private?”

Melyn shook her head. “Can you read? Haf can’t read them. I don’t mind.”

“I can read, yes. Would the oldest notebook be at the rear of this pile?”

Melyn shrugged. “I don’t know.”

Elpida smiled another difficult smile. “That’s alright then, thank you anyway. Let’s leave Amina to sleep.”

Melyn helped Elpida back into the crew compartment. Elpida seemed stronger now; she was putting less weight on Melyn’s arm. Melyn left Elpida to stand on her own two feet for a few moments while she went to the dispenser controls. The blood on her hands was truly dry now, so she rubbed some of it off on her jumper before she pressed the buttons. She had Pheiri disgorge three shiny, dark-brown food-sticks. Hafina crooned “Melyyyyyy, Melyyyyy,” until Melyn tossed her one of the sticks. Hafina caught the food-stick in one hand and ate it in three bites, then spent a long time licking crumbs out of her teeth.

Melyn offered the second stick to Elpida, but Elpida shook her head, and said, “Sorry, but I’m not sure I can eat anything except meat.”

“S’good fuh you,” Hafina said through a mouthful of nutrient block. “All the things a growing girl needs.”

Melyn said, “Haf. Don’t grow any bigger or you won’t fit inside Pheiri. Won’t fit inside Pheiri.”

Melyn stuck one food stick into her mouth and tossed the spare onto a bench. She spent a few moments doing nothing but chewing and listening to the rain.

Elpida glanced down Pheiri’s central corridor, and said: “Is that the way to the front? Is Atyle up there?”

Melyn nodded. She finished her food stick, wiped her hands on her jumper again, and led on, into the jumble of Pheiri’s innards. Elpida followed. Haf rose from her sitting position and squirmed along behind them.

Melyn and Hafina could have wriggled down this passageway with their eyes closed, over the abandoned seats and auxiliary systems, beneath the dark screens and dead readouts, past the hatches and ladders which led to other, smaller parts of Pheiri’s body. Melyn crossed the armoured bulge of Pheiri’s brain and absent-mindedly patted the metal. She shook a little bit when they passed the hatch which led down into the engines; her concealed wounds still itched, from when she’d descended into Pheiri’s secret parts to fix his heart. She was careful not to look upward when they passed beneath the turret ladder; she didn’t want to feel sick again.

Elpida moved slowly and carefully. She had promised she would not fall over and force Melyn to stitch her belly shut a second time. Melyn approved of that effort, and did not hurry her along.

But Elpida paused beneath the turret ladder. Melyn stopped to look back. Elpida was squinting upward into the dark. One of her hands wandered to the back of her neck, rubbing at the base of her skull.

Elpida asked: “Is that an MMI uplink helmet? It is. Crude, but—”

“I don’t know,” said Melyn. “I don’t want to think about what’s up there.”

“If that’s a direct communication uplink with this combat frame— I mean, with Pheiri, then I should—”

Melyn’s head started to hurt. “I don’t want to think about it. Stop asking. Please. Please.”

Elpida looked back down at her. She seemed surprised, but then she nodded. “Understood, Melyn. I won’t mention it again. Lead—”

Cruuunch-crack—

Pheiri’s tracks bit into concrete, crunching through brick, crushing stone; the sound floated upward through the hull, muffled by layers of armour. Pheiri slewed to one side suddenly; Melyn grabbed the back of a seat and Haf stuck out all her arms to grip the walls. Elpida was slower, lurching with the sudden motion — but somehow she reached out and closed a fist around one rung of the turret-ladder.

Thunk-thunk! — Thunk!

Heavy gunshots pounded from outside — one-two, a pause, then a third. The hull shuddered with recoil. Several seconds of silence crawled by, filled with the static of the rain. Then Pheiri’s innards growled and thumped — the sound of him reloading a weapon,

Hafina and Melyn both relaxed. Elpida didn’t look good. Her face was covered in sweat and she was wincing with pain.

Elpida said: “What was that?”

Melyn shrugged. “Pheiri shooting at something.”

“Keeping us safe,” Hafina said. “He just does that sometimes. It’s okay, he’s not shouting and flashing a lot, so it’s not a big deal. It’s only a big deal if he makes lots of noise and moves really fast a lot. Whatever it is has already gone away. He’s good at that!”

Elpida straightened up, let go of the ladder, and nodded. She wiped her face with one hand. “Does that happen often?”

Melyn shrugged. “Depends what he’s doing. Come on.”

Pheiri’s control cockpit was tall enough for Elpida to stand up straight. Melyn watched as Elpida’s eyes roved over the screens, the data readouts, the instrument panels, the many seats, the jumbled headsets, the sockets and levers and buttons and switches. Elpida stared for a long time at one of the seats at the very front — the one with the foot pedals and the big levers. Melyn had never figured out what that one was for. Elpida also stared very hard at the tiny observation window, high up on the right; that window had been unarmoured for as long as Melyn could remember, but sometime in the last twelve hours Pheiri had covered it up from the outside with his knobbly white armour plates.

Pheiri clicked and hummed and flickered and buzzed. All just like normal. All as he should be. Melyn felt — proud? That was a nice word. The screen of her mind didn’t complain.

She was proud of Pheiri. Proud that she was part of him.

She wasn’t so proud about the zombie sprawled in one of the chairs, with her hands behind her head and her big dark coat pooled on the floor. But at least it was the smart zombie, the one who had helped with the surgery.

Atyle looked up and around from Pheiri’s screens. She was dressed in an under-shirt and trousers; her strange green eye turned inside the socket. Her dark face split with a smile.

“The warrior rises from her fitful slumber, brought forth by the titan’s maid,” she said. Then she rose from her seat and gestured at it, while looking at Melyn. “Little maid, I have usurped your rightful place. Sit, please. This is yours.”

Melyn frowned. “You talk worse sense than Haf. Worse sense than Haf. Wish you would shut up, too. Shut up, too.”

But Melyn did not turn down the seat. There were many seats in Pheiri’s control cockpit, but somehow it seemed right that the zombie should offer Melyn the choice of whichever one she wanted. Atyle was a friendly zombie. Maybe she should be designated ‘Commander’.

Melyn sat down. Haf hung in the entrance, holding the metal walls with her six hands; Atyle glanced at her too. “And the titan’s great ranger. Care to sit as well?”

Hafina just grinned and shrugged.

Elpida grunted: “Atyle. You wounded?”

Atyle shook her head. “No, warrior. But you are.”

Elpida snorted. She gently lowered herself onto the threadbare stuffing and scuffed metal of one of the cockpit chairs. Several screens flickered to life above her; Melyn peered at those, but they were just Pheiri’s usual. She didn’t feel like standing up to examine in greater detail. Atyle leaned against the wall and stared at Elpida with her weird green eyeball.

Elpida said: “Atyle. Thank you for coming back. Thank you for rescuing me and Amina.”

Atyle dipped her head in silent acknowledgement.

Elpida said: “Kaga? Vicky?”

Atyle answered, “Still inside the great fallen god. They endure well enough, though they grow impatient.”

Elpida laughed softly. “Kagami especially?”

“The scribe was incandescent. She is glorious when she is angry. It sharpens her mind to an obsidian edge. She is beautiful from that angle, when she is thin and dangerous.”

Elpida squinted. “Right, okay. They’re safe. Good.”

Elpida’s eyes drifted shut, as if she was done now and it was time to go to sleep. Raindrop static filled the silence. Melyn was about to suggest that Elpida return to the infirmary.

But then Elpida said, “Any idea what that firing was, just now?”

Atyle replied, “We are pursued, though without passion. Hunting hounds, sent by your scorned suitor.”

Elpida’s lips twisted in disgust. “Yola. Don’t call her that, it’s not funny. Are we safe?”

“The titan assures me we are. The animals are wary. We are too deep for them.”

Melyn frowned at Atyle. “You can read Pheiri’s screens?”

Atyle smiled at her. “The titan speaks to me, little maid. Though without the great intimacy and affection he holds for you. You have nothing to be jealous of.”

Melyn kept frowning. Jealous? She wasn’t jealous.

Elpida croaked, “Too deep? Atyle, where are we? What are we doing?”

“Hiding beyond the graveworm’s aura,” Atyle said slowly. “The titan replenishes his strength, mends his armour and his spears. His maids have informed me of many things. The scribe informs me of many other things, but most of those are insults or critiques.” Atyle chuckled softly. “We rest and recover, warrior. There is nothing else to be done.”

Melyn found the conversation difficult to follow. Atyle and Elpida spoke differently to each other — they used different words in different orders. Elpida used verbs first, but Atyle’s verbs were all at the ends of her sentences. Elpida used a lot of funny suffixes and prefixes, all very neat and quick, which seemed to change depending on who she was talking about and where they were — or sometimes depending on how she felt about them; Atyle had none of those, but her verbs changed wildly, growing extra parts at the slightest provocation. The other zombies were just as irritating; the little angry one called Ilyusha didn’t use any ‘articles’ — the screen of Melyn’s mind provided that word, and she wasn’t sure what it meant, but she understood it in practice; Amina spoke with less vowels than everybody else; only Pira and Ooni sounded like they were speaking something similar to each other, though Melyn had not heard Pira do a lot of speaking. Despite this, the zombies all understood each other perfectly.

Melyn could understand them all, of course. But following the conversation took effort; she felt too slow to say anything much.

Elpida squinted her eyes and sagged in her seat. “Kaga and Vicky are still in the combat frame. We need to link back up. We can’t leave them behind. I’m not doing that, not—” She grunted and closed her eyes. “Yeah, okay, yeah,” she hissed, then opened her eyes again. “And the frame itself. I can’t— can’t just leave it— leave it there—”

Atyle said, “You need rest, warrior.”

Elpida snorted. “I thought you were all about following me wherever I went, because I’m so entertaining. What happened to that, huh?”

Atyle kept smiling. “You have a betrayer still to deal with, warrior. Not to mention our captured animal. And your little scorpion, she is so very sore.”

Elpida smiled too, but it was another difficult smile. “Yeah, yeah. Atyle — how did you do all that?”

Atyle’s strange green eye twisted and rotated in the socket. “All that, warrior?”

“The stealth field. The sudden competence. All of it.”

“The machinery of the gods holds an infinite bounty, for those who know how to receive it.”

“Nanomachine self-modification?” Elpida said. “Like Pira explained?”

Atyle nodded.

Elpida said, “Are you a Necromancer, Atyle?”

The screen of Melyn’s mind did not like that word; it suggested ‘nanomachine control locus’, ‘corrupted silicon life mind imprint’, and ‘blob’. She made those go away. She was too busy trying to listen to the zombies.

Atyle smiled wider. “Would I tell you, if I were?”

Elpida sighed and rubbed her face. “You saved us anyway. Fine. If you are, I don’t care. You’re one of us. I don’t actually think you are a Necromancer, but being mysterious all the time doesn’t help.”

Atyle seemed — pleased? Smug? Too clever for her own good? Melyn couldn’t decide which.

Elpida sat up straighter, and said, “I want to speak with Pheiri. I’m not going back to sleep before I do that.”

Melyn said, “You can talk to Pheiri from anywhere. Even in bed. In bed. It’s easy. I already told you. Already told you. He can hear you.”

Elpida gave Melyn a gentle smile; Melyn didn’t like that.

Atyle said, “The titan’s maid speaks truth, warrior. He hears our every word. We stand inside his body. His senses are turned inward as much as out.”

Elpida frowned at Atyle; Melyn could tell that the ‘Commander’ did not quite believe this. But she believed it more from Atyle than from Melyn.

“Okay,” Elpida said. “But I need to speak to him in a way he can respond to. I need to understand what’s going on here. I need to understand why he rescued us.”

Melyn said, “Because you’re a pilot.”

Elpida replied, “Maybe so, but that’s not enough. I need more.”

Atyle said, “What is to understand, warrior? Lost souls have found each other, in the deserts of the afterlife. Why must there be meaning? Can we not cling together, for no other reason but solace?”

Haf said: “Yeah. Yeah! That! That. I like that. Mely, I like that.”

Melyn grunted. “Mm.”

Elpida locked her tired eyes with Atyle, and said: “A giant armoured vehicle wearing a piece of my home just turned up and rescued me and my comrades. I want to know what he wants, or what he needs. I want to know if he wants us to be his … his crew? His friends? If his … ‘maids’—” she gestured at Melyn and Hafina with one hand “—if they need our help, somehow. If he needs our help. I want to know if we’re on the same side, and why. Or maybe his side is just himself, it doesn’t matter. I want to know what he needs — because if it’s within my power to grant, I will.”

Melyn revised her designation again: Elpida (zombie) (‘Commander’, provisional.)

One of the control cockpit screens next to Elpida suddenly cleared of Pheiri’s usual green-text data. New letters appeared on the screen, printing slowly, filling the black background. Elpida watched; the glowing green text coloured her face with ghostly light. Atyle leaned for a better look. Haf tilted her head. Melyn shot out of her chair and pattered over, then grabbed the back of Elpida’s seat and peered close, to make sure she was reading it right.

>
///ERROR division HQ non-contact
///re-designate command structure
///fallback protocol legacy version ERROR
///elevate permission control
///input Human-Human mastergene code access
///permission control overridden 99999999 ERROR hours previous: authorization Chief Engineering Officer Rhian Uren

///re-designate begin

.fallback protocol Telokopolan Officer recovered
.age unknown
.era unknown
.rank unknown
.designate Commander Elpida
.designate non-authority advisory role

///re-designate command structure complete
>

The green text stayed on the screen long enough for everyone to read it thrice. Nobody spoke, only the rain against Pheiri’s armour. Then the text vanished, replaced by a single line.

>Request orders

“No!” Melyn yelped. “Pheiri, no!”

Elpida said: “No. No, Pheiri, no. I-I can’t command you. I can’t. I keep getting everyone killed, or nearly killed. You— what— whatever you are, you’ve survived out here for longer than I can imagine, I— I can’t. I’m sorry. I can’t command you.”