Silverlords
A Story in Two Parts by Charles Hackney
Click here for Part One of this story.
Caspar fought not to gag as he slid himself into the dead mouth of the Colossus. As his boot touched the back of the enormous throat, the muscles of the creature jerked and spasmed, and Caspar felt the awful sensation of being swallowed. He took a deep breath as the terrible strength of the tissues surrounding him pulled him down the crushing darkness of the all-surrounding esophagus into the monster’s gullet.
The Colossus’ stomach had been modified, per the instructions of the Antediluvian Watchers, to serve as the command center of the grotesque construct. Blind and helpless, Caspar felt tendrils gripping him, holding him still as a slippery tentacle forced itself down his throat. Once in, it filled Caspar’s lungs with air, and he could breathe. He twitched with pain as fibers pierced his skin and seized his nervous system.
The feeling of violation was overwhelming, the intolerable vile intimacy of being invaded by the creation of Nathaniel Smith’s diseased brain. Words committed to memory long ago now came to his with new force: “I am counted among those who go down to the pit; I am a man who has no strength, like one set loose among the dead, like the slain that lie in the grave, like those whom you remember no more, for they are cut off from your hand. You have put me in the depths of the pit, in the regions dark and deep.”
And then it was done. Caspar could see the ceiling of the hangar, and feel the concrete floor beneath him. The Colossus’ body was his body.
He slowly rolled his body to one side. He lifted himself to a seated position, and looked down at the tiny creatures beside him. Lorne. Smith. Smith was dancing and capering in his triumph, and Caspar felt an urge to reach out and crush him. Anger flowed through him like rivers of bile, a pressure on his mind to destroy and kill.
The minute figure of Lorne raised a phone with a thick blunt antenna to his mouth, and the receiver in Caspar’s ear conveyed his words. “Can you hear me, Caspar?”
The immense head nodded.
“Don’t try to stand up; there isn’t enough room. We’ll open the bay doors.”
Sunlight poured in as the doors were opened to the opposite side of the hill, well below the entrance. Caspar crawled, emerging into the open air. Outside the facility, there was room to stand, and Caspar raised himself to his full height.
Only the hills and the oldest of trees match my size, he thought.
The Colossus did not breathe. Neither did it blink. These things were not necessary.
“We’re bringing out your weapons now,” came the Colonel’s voice. Two large trucks came from the building, their flat beds bearing constructs crafted of solid bone. The Archons’ sensors were designed to register metal, so even Caspar’s weapons had to be made of alternate materials. Caspar lifted the first object, a shield, round, with a spike in the center like a Scottish targe. The other object was a spear, thick shafted, as long as he was tall, with a wickedly-sharp stone tip the size of a kayak.
“Smith made these as well. Remember the plan.”
Caspar nodded.
With footsteps that left deep prints in the earth, the Colossus pushed through the foliage until he came to the seashore. Step by step he went into the water, until the surface of the ocean closed over him. Carrying his shield and spear, Caspar half walked and half swam as he went toward his goal.
***
It was midnight in Cuba when the Colossus made landfall. The Grays preferred their methanol from hardwoods, so the island’s palm trees had been left relatively untouched, and a full beautiful moon shone down on the tropical beach. Caspar took little notice of the beauty of the scene as he emerged from the waves of the Caribbean Sea, waterfalls cascading down his blasphemous flesh.
The trees came only to the waist of the Colossus, so Caspar crouched low as he made his way through the jungle, spear and shield in hand. He ascended to the top of a high hill, and lay low as he peeked over into the wide valley below.
In the distance was the aliens’ launch site, massive silos containing tens of thousands of gallons of alcohol waiting to be loaded onto the booster craft. Those craft would then take them into orbit, to rendezvous with the gargantuan starships for transport back to the Gray’s home planet. It was too far away for Caspar to see any of the diminutive aliens themselves. But he could certainly see the Archon.
The metal giant was a different design than the one that had destroyed Denver. The hundred-foot biped did have the same thick ponderous legs and bulky torso, but this model had a gigantic coilgun mounted on its right shoulder, the electromagnetic weapon fed by a belt that extended to the bulky ammo box on its left shoulder. Between the two was the faceless head, where the Gray pilot sat, controlling the massive armored thing. Below, one powerful arm ended in a four-fingered claw, while the forearm of the other was a short-range multi-missile battery. Jump engines mounted on the back would allow the vehicle to make leaps that spanned several miles.
Caspar had his target. If there had been lips on the nightmare face of the Colossus, he would have snarled. His grip on his spear tightened.
Bowstring-taut, Caspar watched the Archon as he edged the crouching Colossus forward, toward the treeline, behind the sentry. The immense metal figure did not move; it did not need to, so long as the sensors were active. Caspar regarded the armor, the weapons, and the powerful limbs. This was not going to be a fair fight; the Archon had every advantage in bulk, strength, and both offensive and defensive capacity. Could Smith have made this thing bigger and stronger if he had a thousand corpses to work with, instead of half a thousand? Caspar banished those thoughts; the idea of even more human bodies stripped for parts, welded onto this grotesque hulk by a lunatic’s necromancy, sickened him. I’ll make do with what I’ve got. Organics don’t set off the Archon’s sensors; that gives me surprise. And there is one thing this Colossus body can do that the Archon can’t.
Archons can’t run.
Caspar broke cover and sprinted toward the Archon, the ground shaking beneath the pounding of the Colossus’ feet. When the Archon’s head began to turn toward the sound, Caspar sprang into the air, shield in front of him and spear held aloft for a downward strike.
The heavy shoulders of the machine began rotating, and it shifted its weight to turn and face the newcomer. As it did, the stone point of the spear was driven into the swivel mechanism beneath the coilgun as Caspar landed on its back. The rotation continued, the spear snapping in half, as one of the Archon’s arms swept around to throw off the Colossus. The powerful limb hurled Caspar back the way that he came, and he tumbled to the ground in an ungainly collapsing stagger.
There was no pain. Not as one ordinarily understands and experiences pain, at any rate. Caspar was aware that the tissues that made up the flesh-construct in which he rode were being damaged, but only as a matter of intellectual awareness of fact. He turned the stagger into an awkward roll, and lurched back into a run, intent on following up on the attack.
The Archon completed its turn, now fully facing Caspar, and the coilgun rotated toward him. Before it could complete the movement, though, the gun faltered and ground to a stop, its passage blocked by the embedded spearhead, and the underlying mechanisms too damaged to do more than twitch. The shot that was meant to be directed toward the Colossus went harmlessly into the trees.
That moment gave Caspar the time he needed to cover the distance, swinging the shaft of the broken spear in an overhand arc like a cudgel. The dense bone impacted at the base of the Archon’s neck, but shattered without inflicting any significant damage to the armored titan.
The Archon clenched its gripping claw into a crude fist, driving a crushing blow into the ribs of the Colossus. Caspar was aware that many of the ribs shattered, and he felt the shockwave of the impact in the depths of his vile cocoon. The Colossus fell backwards, reeling from the attack, just as the Archon brought its other arm to bear, firing a short-range missile. Caspar’s loss of balance proved to be fortunate, as the missile passed above his torso and blasted a wide crater in the soil beyond.
Caspar regained his footing as the second missile erupted from the battery, and was only just able to bring the shield up in time for it to receive the impact. The hardened bone construct cracked but did not break, as most of the explosion was redirected away at an angle, sparing the shield from taking the full force of the attack. Caspar dove toward the Archon, striking it again and again with the shield, metal denting before the force of the repeated blows, more and more of the shield cracking and falling away with each impact.
Caspar tried to scream his hatred into the face of the Archon, willing that the Gray inside it would be deafened by the intensity of his rage. No sound emerged from the hideous mouth of the Colossus, though. The jaws gaped wide, but he could only continue his assaults in silence.
As the last of the shield crumbled, the fist of the Archon rose up, striking the Colossus in the face. This was followed by a return stroke, a crushing downward hammer-strike that knocked the Colossus to its knees, and then another that cast it down on the earth. Caspar registered the damage as the Archon pounded down on the Colossus. Bones snapped, flesh tore, and Caspar struggled to move.
Then the claw opened, and the Archon grabbed hold of the grisly head and lifted Caspar high. Half the world went dark as the metal giant dug its fingers into one of the Colossus’ eye sockets, then squeezed and crushed a portion of its skull.
The Colossus dropped to the ground. I can’t let them win. I can’t let Denver go unavenged. Caspar flailed blindly as he flung himself at the Archon. With a contemptuous shove, the titan pushed the Colossus back, and then fired a missile at point blank range, the explosion ripping the Colossus’ right arm apart.
Bits of gore rained down, and Caspar looked at the damage with his good eye. The arm was gone; only shreds of flesh remained hanging from the ruined socket.
Slowly, the Archon raised and extended its missile arm, taking careful aim at the Colossus’ chest. Caspar forced himself to focus, wrathful energy building within him as he remembered the smoking ruins of his home town. He remembered what they had done to his family. Mom. Dad. Nora.
The missile fired.
Caspar twisted the body of the Colossus, and the missile bypassed him. He reached out as he did, and grabbed at the only weapon that remained to him. He took hold of it, and wrenched the spearhead from its place in the Archon’s shoulder.
He let the aggression take control. The wrath of the Colossus, half a thousand victims crying out for retribution, flowed through him, and he attacked the Archon in a berserk fury. He closed the distance even farther, bringing himself face to face with the blank helmet of the Archon as he hacked and slashed.
When the spearhead broke, he attacked with the empty hand. Driving the Archon back with the force of his assaults, it stumbled. A low hum began to come from the jump engines on the heavy armored back. It’s trying to escape. It’s afraid of me.
Caspar wrapped his remaining arm around the thick chest as the Archon’s engines began to fire. He twined his leg around the metal knee, bringing the leg beneath the exhaust vents of the engines. The smell of burning rotten meat filled the air as the engine flames touched the corrupt flesh. Caspar ignored it. It was just more damage. With a surge of strength, Caspar tripped the giant, causing it to fall backwards.
The engines died as their intakes were buried in the churned soil, and the Archon began struggling, trying to roll off its back enough to bring itself back up to its feet. Deep within the body of the Colossus, Caspar tried to laugh at the sight of the great machine of death flailing like a turtle on its back. But he could not laugh, of course, so he did the next best thing.
Caspar threw himself onto the Archon, pinning it to the ground. He swarmed over it as if he were trying to defeat an opponent in a wrestling match, not letting it get purchase with a hand or foot to right itself. Shifting over, Caspar grabbed a hold of the coilgun’s barrel. With the one hand gripping the weapon, he placed his feet against the shoulder, and pulled. Wrenching back and forth, Caspar tore the long cannon from its mount.
He stood up, and placed a single foot on the chest of the fallen Archon. Casper turned his head slightly, so that the pilot of the machine would know that he was looking directly at him with the one remaining eye. He then turned his face to the coilgun, and hefted it like a baseball player about to take his turn at bat.
As the Archon writhed beneath him, Caspar beat it with its own weapon, blow after blow landing with the ring of metal on metal. After a time, Caspar considered that it sounded like a blacksmith at work in his forge.
Finally he saw that nothing was left of the coilgun but twisted shredded metal. He dropped the remains of the weapon, and knelt down beside his fallen enemy. The Colossus’ immense hand, now broken and tattered from the fight but still basically functional, gripped the faceplate, and Caspar forced it open. He drove his fingers into the cockpit, and felt the squirming little thing, desperate to escape his grip. And then he clenched his fist, and the squirming stopped.
***
“Can you hear me, North?”
The voice was faint and distorted, but the receiver in Caspar’s ear was now picking up the transmissions from the facility.
“Caspar North? Come in, Caspar. Are you there?”
The Colossus slowly limped its way along the ocean floor, approaching Matul Island. The floor rose as he drew closer to the island, and the voice of the Colonel was coming in more clearly. Finally, the ruined head of the monster broke the surface of the water, and Caspar emerged onto the beach.
There he collapsed, falling to his knees with an impact that shook the surrounding palm trees and caused several soldiers to lose their footing, and then fell facedown. With his last act as pilot of the Colossus, Caspar turned the construct’s head. He then disengaged himself from the tendrils, and from the ghastly tentacle that had been inside him for the past three days. With only the last bit of oxygen from the thing to sustain him, Caspar fought his way up the esophagus. He felt hands grabbing him as he clawed at the inside of the enormous mouth. He fell onto the sand, a wretched sight covered in mucus, and bleeding from the many places where the control tendrils had drilled into him. He could do nothing except lie on the ground and breathe, lungful after lungful of real air.
Medics began swarming around him, and he saw through blurry eyes the face of Colonel Lorne. “Oh thank God,” Lorne was saying. “We lost contact when you left the island, and we had no way of knowing how the mission went.” He looked toward the ragged form of the Colossus. “Until now.”
The hand of the Colossus gripped the cargo that he had been dragging through the ocean.
It was the body of the Archon. And inside was the body of the pilot.
Caspar drew a painful breath. “I remembered… the plan. Technology specimen. Biology specimen.”
“By God you did.” The Colonel laid a hand on Caspar’s chest. “You may have just saved all of humanity today. Now we have a real chance to learn their tech, adapt it, and make our own weapons. And now we can learn more about the Grays themselves, and what can kill them.”
“Squishing him between my fingers seemed to work.” Caspar smiled weakly.
The smile died as Caspar heard the insane laughter of Nathaniel Smith. “Oh indeed! Indeed! Squishing them between your fingers! Oh yes! My Colossus succeeded!”
Caspar turned his face away from the lunatic sorcerer. The last thing he needed now was to have to look at the diseased face again.
The necromancer continued his babbling. “The Watchers are wise! The Masters of the Outer Darkness are praised above all things! They have given us power, and this is only the beginning!”
Caspar heard the voice of Lorne. “What are you talking about”
“Do you think that the plan was for there to be only one Colossus? How long do you think it will take to reverse-engineer that machine, and begin to manufacture your own? Until that day, I will provide you will an army of the dead! Colossus after Colossus! And the more humans that the Grays kill, the more Colossi will rise! Think of it, Colonel! Our own dead will fight against our foes, and the Grays will know this world to be a place of horror.”
What have we done? What have I done? Caspar had a vision of a factory beneath a blood-red sky, an assembly line, with a never-ending stream of human forms being fed into a meat grinder for processing, as the demonic butcher cackled.
He whispered, “It’s not worth it, Colonel. Don’t let him do it. Smith had it backwards, before. What does it profit a man to gain the whole world but forfeit his soul?”
Lorne’s face was grim as he stared past them at the fallen Colossus. “I guess we’re about to find out.”
The End
_______
The Story Behind the Story:
Silverlords was inspired by Clark Ashton Smith’s novelette The Colossus of Ylourgne, (which appeared in the 1934 pulp magazine Weird Tales) with a bit of Attack on Titan in the mix. I originally submitted this story for publication in an anthology about giant robots, but apparently it did not fit the tone that the editors were going for. Fair enough.
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