“Finish off any ants you missed,” Det told the two wolves beside the alpha. As for the biggest wolf of the pack, he had other instructions for it. “Come with me to keep an eye on the girl. Then, I want to check on that little white one.”

  At his command, the wolf gave him a look that seemed to say you should get out of here while you can, and Det couldn’t really argue with the sage advice. On the other hand, he needed to make sure that smaller white ant that commanded the swarm was good and dead. It didn’t really look like a queen or anything like that, but what did he really know about ants?

  Just what he’d read in fictional novels. Not a great reference for giant, mechanical ants on an alternate world.

  “Hey,” Det said to the young girl as he carefully stepped over mechant corpses, the alpha at his side crunching ant-heads like walnut shells. Her terrified eyes looked in his direction from where they’d stared at the dead body of the man who’d tried to protect her. “I need to check on that white ant. You okay for a minute on your own?”

  No response.

  Not that that was terribly shocking, with the trauma of everything that’d happened to her.

  “You’re going to be okay,” Det said, softer, kneeling down in front of her with most of the weight on his good leg. He lifted his hands, and she flinched back, so he pulled away, making it clear he wouldn’t touch or hurt her. “Your mom is okay, and I’ll take you to her once I’m sure these things aren’t going to come at us from behind.”

  “Mom?” the girl’s quiet voice said, and her eyes looked up at him from behind tangled, sweat-soaked bangs.

  “Yeah,” Det said. “I won’t be more than two minutes, then we’ll go.”

  “Can we go now?” the girl asked quietly, then peeked up as the large, black ink-wolf sat down protectively beside her. Something about its calmness drew her eyes. Or, maybe it was the fact it was a painted wolf walking around like a normal one. Magic could be kind of attention-grabbing like that.

  “Not yet,” Det said. “Soon. I promise. Don’t worry, he’ll protect you until we leave.” Det made a purposeful gesture to rub the top of the wolf’s head like it was the best puppy in the world. In return, he got such a flat look, he had to fight not to flinch himself. Thankfully, the ink-wolf seemed to get why Det had gone in with head-pats, and stayed perfectly still. It even let out a gentle growl of affirmation to the statement, and the girl scooted closer to it.

  “Can I touch it?” she asked, curiosity at the dog warring against the carnage around her.

  “Of course you can,” Det said. “What’s your name? I’m Det.”

  “Meliza,” the girl said, one hand gingerly reaching out to stroke the flank of the wolf beside her.

  “Nice to meet you, Meliza,” Det said. “You’ve been very brave. Wait here with this guy for two minutes, then we’ll go to your mom, okay?”

  “Does he have a name?” Meliza said, eyes still on the wolf.

  “Uh…” Det started, just his eyes going to the ink-wolf, where it met his gaze. “He doesn’t. Why don’t you name him?”

  The ink-wolf’s eyes rolled at Det, and he mouthed “I’m sorry!” to it.

  “Can I really?” the little girl said.

  “Yes, but think very carefully about it. He needs a good name,” Det said. “Tell me when I get back, okay?”

  “Okay!” she said, her entire focus on the wolf. Maybe it was on purpose, anything to distract her from the body not so far away, and the dozens of dead mechants. Either way, the alpha would keep her safe. “The way you bit those ants to death,” she whispered to the wolf. “I’m going to call you Deathmaw.”

  Det’s eyes could only widen at the choice of names. Little dark and dramatic, but, hey, if it kept the kid from breaking down, who was he to argue? She would have plenty of nightmares after all this, so if the memory of Deathmaw made her feel a little safer, he wouldn’t stop her.

  His instinct was to reach out and hold her until things were better, but she wasn’t his little girl. She wasn’t Nat, and her first flinch at his presence was an important reminder. As soon as he was sure the white ant was dead, he’d get Meliza to the person who could hold her. Her mother.

  Good enough for now, he told himself. So, where is that little white bastard?

  Standing, Det spotted a path that would take him behind the mulcher—its gnashing teeth having stopped along with the ants—and he began limping in that direction. Now that he was out of the fight, the pain in his leg was knocking on the door, demanding to be let back in. Like any good homeowner, Det pointedly ignored the unwanted visitor, pretending it wasn’t there even as it spotted him through an open window.

  That didn’t mean he could move fast, though, with a grunting hobble being the best he could manage. To take his mind off the broken bone, he reached down and grabbed one of the smaller black ants to look at while he moved. One with a very crushed head, just in case. The last thing he needed was it waking up and mandible-ing his hand. Given his day, it would’ve been just his luck.

  Love this story? Find the genuine version on the author's preferred platform and support their work!

  A drip of crimson fell from one of said mandibles to the floor below, and Det glanced in the direction of the man near the mulcher. From the unmoving body and glazed-over eyes, there was no chance he was still alive. Det didn’t need to be a doctor—or a Medic—to know having his throat ripped out, along with all the other injuries, probably wasn’t survivable. Guess, all things considered, my luck isn’t so bad. His was worse.

  And, from the staining of the unmoving mulcher blades, the unnamed man certainly wasn’t the only casualty of this emergence thing.

  Nothing he could do about the man, and not really wanting to stay in the tunnel much longer than he needed to, Det looked away and continued his journey to find the little white bastard. After another step reminding him about the pain in his leg, he focused as much as he could at the mechant he was carrying. There had to be something he could learn from it.

  With a bit of effort, he pulled the mangled head free at the segment—the neck?—between it and the rest of the body. Interestingly, like he’d noticed before, there really wasn’t anything he recognized making the thing work. No wires or obvious power sources. No gears or motors that looked familiar. On the other hand, it didn’t take him long to guess how the thing functioned… the most basic of ways.

  Yes, the systems were wildly different, but, given time, it wasn’t something he couldn’t puzzle out. Maybe? Oh, and some tools would sure help. Something about the innards reminded him of a mix between a bean-bag chair and putty. The contents were both malleable and connected—with hundreds of tiny magnetized, or something, hexahedrons making it up—like it could take on multiple shapes. Even then, the most fascinating part of it all was definitely the outer shell—er, carapace?—that was made of a familiar ceramic-like material. That part aside, it was what lined the inside of the carapace that had him ogling it.

  A bee-hive like pattern inside just slightly reflected the limited light of the room, and when he touched it, he got something akin to a shock from it. It wasn’t exactly electricity, but it also kind of was. Whatever energy powered the ants ran along the inside of the carapace. Was that why there weren’t wires or traditional batteries? Then again, the power would have to come from somewhere…

  So caught up in the inspection of the ant, Det circled around the back of the mulcher before he really realized he was there. Only an annoyed squeak prevented him from tripping over the white-ant corpse on the ground and snapped him out of it. His ink-rat had somehow survived the whole melee—without doing a damn thing to help, apparently—and sat beside the ant like it was some kind of trophy.

  “Not what I asked you to do,” Det told the rat, until he spotted another body nearby. No, not another body, another survivor. This one, a teenaged boy from the looks of things, his skin pale and ashen from the trauma, and his eyes locked on the rat like he couldn’t believe what he was seeing.

  “Hey,” Det said, slipping the black-ant corpse behind his back. The last thing the boy needed was to see that. “Hey, can you hear me?”

  Slowly, like it was on a hinge, the boy’s head rotated in Det’s direction.

  “That’s good,” Det said. And, it probably was? He didn’t have a damn psych degree or any idea really what these kids needed. “Are you hurt?”

  Without answering, the boy lifted his right hand, the fingers clearly broken where one of the chonkier ants had gripped it with their blunt mandibles. Luckily—?—for the boy, the emotional damage was blocking out the physical pain from the injury.

  “Anything else?” Det said softly. “Can you walk?”

  Again, the boy didn’t speak, and instead looked down at his own legs where he crouched. Like he was confirming they were still there—and still his—the boy finally nodded.

  “Good. This guy,” Det gestured to the ink-rat. “He’ll take you to Meliza, just around the corner. I need two minutes with this ant…” he kicked the white corpse with his toe, and immediately regretted it with the pain of his broken shin spiking up his leg. Instead of spitting out a dozen expletives that could only be learned through a decade of manual labour, he swallowed the agony and forced the next words out of his mouth. “Then we’re leaving.”

  At the word “leaving”, something new entered the boy’s flat eyes. That spark of hope mixed with disbelief that he’d survived.

  For now. I really should hurry and get them out of here… but I’ve got to make sure this thing is good and dead.

  To the ink-rat, Det said. “Take him over to join Meliza and Deathmaw. We’ll leave as soon as I’m done.”

  The ink-rat replied with an affirmative squeak, then gently headbutted the boy’s leg, like a cat wanting attention would. The boy seemed to get the message, and with one more look at Det, followed the rat woodenly out from behind the mulcher.

  Not wanting the pair of survivors to wait any longer than they needed to, Det looked down at the white ant on the ground in front of him.

  “Huh,” was all he could really say as he got a good look at the dead mechant on the floor. And, really, there was no doubt it was dead, with his sword stabbed into one end and sticking out the other. How he’d managed such a perfect throw—running the blade the length of the ant like it was a sheath—was something he’d never know the answer to.

  Chalk it up to dumb luck…

  Kneeling down with a grunt of pain normally reserved for the extremely elderly, Det put the black mechant down to pick up the white version. One hand on the hilt of his sword, and the other on the body of the ant, he carefully drew the blade back out. Watchful for any tricks—who’s to say mechants can’t resurrect themselves!—Det had the sword free after a careful three seconds.

  He kept the unmoving ant at arm’s length, gripped from the back of its neck, while he inspected the blade to see just how badly damaged or nicked it’d gotten in the process. Then he brought the sword closer to his face. There wasn’t a single scratch anywhere on the blade. It was in perfect condition.

  Well, damn, these ReSouled smiths or whatever sure know how to make a good blade. A second quick look to make sure he wasn’t missing anything obvious, and he forced himself back to a standing position. The second grunt wasn’t any more flattering than the first was, and he could only hope Meliza and the boy were so distracted by the ink-animals, they didn’t notice.

  With care, Det got his sword sheathed back on his waist, and he inspected the ant in his hands. It was very similar to the black one he’d looked at before, except for the fact one of its eyes looked like it had a kind of eyepatch over it. Okay, that thing did look kind of steampunk, with it actually bolted to the thing’s face, and something like a telescoping lens on it.

  Before Det’s brain could even question why an ant would need something like that, it interrupted his thoughts to clearly tell him something more important. Namely, why the material beneath his fingertips was so damn familiar. Sure, it was the same as what he felt with the black ants, but seeing it up close in white put the final pieces together.

  Whatever the ants were made out of, it was the same material the mistships were constructed with.