The Message

TW: Mild body horror.

Today is April 31st.

I know April doesn’t have thirty-one days because my birthday is April 30th and my baby sister’s was May 1st. Memories that remain mine. Real ones. Ones that haven’t been tarnished with the burden of attempting to keeping humanity intact.

These thoughts I’m ordered to collect—fragments, snippets of the past, what-ifs. Orders that insist Roberta’s World’s Best Macaroni Salad recipe she hacked out of her lungs last Wednesday is worthy of studying. Maybe a spark? A recollection of knowledge that’d remove the sour tang hanging in the air? Maybe the precise measurements of salt and paprika will teach us how to reverse the ash that once was gentle rain. Or maybe after the salad has chilled for exactly two hours, it will return the sky to blue.

Not likely.

But I record it anyway.

Because mustard-colored skies streaked with gray and spattered with red flakes that look like infection don’t compute with any of the picture books I’ve pulled from the rubble over the years.

That plump little bear may not wear pants or know dietary control, but I believe he knows happiness simply from the color of his sky. A sky I long to see.

The trail ahead of me hasn’t changed. Not in color. Nor in success. It still reeks of burnt pennies and fatalism. But I still press my perfect feet into the glass-packed earth.

My feet never bleed.

I grind them harder just to see…

But no.

Not today.

Not ever.

The glass mounds around me illuminate from the little sun that reaches us. Caked in dirt—like the hope we face—but they refuse to dim.

I admire that.

The haze clears the closer I get to town, but the silence thins and turns loud. Shovels pierce the chunky blades, shattering them further and filling the air with violent melodies.

Glass keeps the town in motion.

After the fall of humanity, the bots stuck to what they knew best:

Reduce. Reuse. Recycle.

Of all the tragedies in this community—glass recycling ain’t one of them.

“15884 Core Cove. Unit 12,” I exhale, breath disturbing the dust motes suspended in the amber air.

Sampson Wells.

He claims he remembers something important.

They all do.

But whatever he offers today won’t make the still heart in my chest beat the way the books claim. Nor will it change the harsh reality that has etched itself into our lives.

Stepping into town never brings me serenity—a word I learned last week from a mangled dictionary that still tries to educate despite its shredded existence.

Most of the damaged humanoids look at me with bitter eyes and tight smiles. Others attempt optimism with patched, mechanical faces. It’s become apparent my presence brings resentment instead of solutions.

A mirrored panel catches me in an alley.

Perfection.

Tan flesh. Two legs. Arms marked with pictures. A soft belly. And an even softer chest. I don’t understand the two padded lobes, but the same book that described a beating heart insists they produce food.

I have a hard time believing that.

Brown corkscrews of hair fall into my face as I jog down the mangled stairwell into a blackened courtyard packed with steel-sheet shacks and hollowed homes gutted of anything resembling comfort. They offer shelter from sandstorms—and a place for bots and hybrids to recharge. Nothing more.

Glass fuels the city.

Once prisms, now ground and packed, then shipped underground where it’s burned and processed into renewable energy.

I offered to help once. My skin tore too easily. The Hive didn’t appreciate that. It took a month to remake me—into what they call beauty.

I rake back my hair as I stop at a small uneven door painted blue. It’s different from the others. But that’s Sampson.

Different.

The hinges squeak before I can knock. What answers isn’t like me. Not quite. They lack the soft chest. Their body is mostly wire and wax. Melted wax.

“Rue! I’ve got it. I’ve—I’ve found what’s been lo-o-o-st.”

My lips curve. Their glitch has improved.

“Have you? Let’s hear it.”

I press the seamless pad at my neck. Microfuses hum, ready to record.

“The heat—350. No more than ten.”

I nod.

“We register at noon, but it’s important to wait for the rise. Butter. Crust. Butter…”

“Butter?” I ask.

Sparks burst behind them. I flinch but stay. The Hive requires a full report. I often wonder why they don’t collect the information themselves. I wonder who they are. They’re never seen. Only felt.

“The crust is black. From black to tan. Soiled. Bad.”

Silence.

They blink.

So do I.

“Is… that all?”

They twitch “Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.”

The repetition doesn’t stop. I reach for the small pin at their neck, forcing it back until it nearly snaps. The reset takes hold.

Sampson turns without a word, shuffling inside. The door closes softly behind them.

My sigh feels empty, like the answers I’ve collected.

The recording replays automatically in my ears. I cut it off.

“Burnt what? Bread? Pie?” I shake my head. “Food. Again. He must’ve been talking to Roberta.”

The townfolk often mimic one another. What’s portrayed as valuable is often just shared confusion.

Turning away, I weave through bots collecting debris.

“Two more,” I mumble. “Let’s hope they’re not about food.”

Beyond the courtyard, the space thickens with life. Bots on a schedule. Humanoids that jerk, sputter, and shake. Glares follow me. Mutters. The occasional shout—

“Anomaly,” they say.

Why am I whole when everyone else is stitched together from parts? Gruesome in ways that resemble reanimated death.

I flinch when I meet certain eyes. Smile at others who offer the same. But we never speak. Not unless they claim to have a report.

A breeze drifts in from beyond the town, carrying the scent of rot. The trenches along the outskirts harbor disease—and questions no one answers.

Questions cycle throughout the town. Wonder. Desperation. Curiosity. But what lives out there—is something dark. Something that wants.

Wants what? We don’t know.

Anyone who’s gone beyond what The Hive allows has never returned.

I shake off the chill climbing my spine and make my way to a small corner lot marked by a wooden sign: Repair and Replace. A bot mechanic shop. One of many.

I stop before the withered sheets that serve as a door. Wrench wind chimes clink.

“Rue, from the council. Ready for report.”

I wait.

My hands feel clammy—though I cannot sweat. Something in my system misfires.

Something here is… off.

When no one answers, I request playback of the submitted claim.

A measured voice fills my ear:

A citizen of Stockton Omes has placed a claim. Please report to Orbs Repair Shop on Acer Way at—

The message cuts out in a burst of static. Heat spikes through my system, alarming and sharp. It jolts me backward. I reach for the reset at the back of my neck—

But the curtain is yanked open.

A humanoid stands before me. Or what remains of one. Its face is gone. Worn down to bare steel. The rest of its body is intact. Precise. Almost perfect.

I’ve met everyone in Stockton. I know their builds. Their repairs. Their flaws.

But this one—

I don’t recognize.

My voice lowers. Cautious. “State your name.”

They don’t respond. Something ticks inside their chest.

One.

Two.

Three.

A hollow tone hums from a speaker embedded in their palm. They step forward and lift it to my cheek. Our faces nearly touch. Our stare bores into one another.

Their voice bypasses everything. Their message plays directly through my system. That shouldn’t be possible. How are they syncing with me?

The message comes fast—too fast to fully catch:

The-trenches-dig-deep-fourteen-thirty-twelve-two-once-solved-it’s open.

I stammer. “Come again?”

They don’t repeat it. The nameless humanoid slips past me and moves quickly down the street.

I step forward to follow—

but something stops me.

Heat surges through my feet. It alarms my system to move.

Running.

Why am I running?

A pounding fills my ears. A malfunction? A failed reboot?

The bots and jangled citizens react as I push through them. Some barely move. Others I collide with and chaos litters the street from the crash.

I hit the ground.

Get up.

Keep moving.

This behavior isn’t permitted. But something inside me doesn’t care.

The town blurs past. I fumble for the communication panel at my neck.

No connection.

The Hive doesn’t respond.

What is happening?

I reach the edge of town. The air shifts. It fouls with the scent of death. My lungs, though artificial, tighten anyway.

The heat in my system builds beyond anything I’ve known. It clouds my vision, pulls my steps uneven, and slows me.

The ground sharpens beneath me. Glass. Razor edges. Familiar but this time threatening.

And for the first time—

I feel something like pain.

The message spikes again. A shrill, piercing tone drills into my skull. I clamp my hands over my ears. It doesn’t help.

I try to outrun it. My feet pound against the ragged earth. Something wet streaks down my face. I can taste it. Salt? Is this salt?

The sky darkens. A heavy shadow pressing down. I feel it in my bones—manufactured or not. I shouldn’t be here.

“Comms,” I whisper. “Comms… come in.”

Something snaps. My head jerks toward the sound.

“Comms?” My voice comes out small. I’ve never needed them before.

Now I’m desperate.

The heat in my system vanishes and is replaced by something cold. My teeth chatter and my arms wrap around myself instinctively.

I’m whispering the message before I realize it and the pain in my feet has found its way into my hands.

I’m digging.

I don’t remember deciding to. Glass slices into my fingers. Shards lodge beneath my nails.

I don’t stop.

I can’t.

There’s something in the ground. A familiar voice. Someone I once knew… Someone born on May 1st.

My breath stumbles over itself. I sob. The pain pulsates through my arms.

“Comms… please!” I beg.

No response. Doesn’t matter.

Glass, soil and rock scatter until light pierces the earth. It washes over me and halts my hands completely.

A chrome microchip.

My fingers shake as I lift the glowing metal. It’s marked with the numbers from the message. I don’t understand.

A soft flick taps the back of my neck. The reset tab has opened.

I hesitate.

Then lift the chip—

and insert it.

The second I do, screams from the town erupt into the air like a massacred symphony.

Every injury I’ve ever sustained crashes back all at once. It rips the air from my lungs. I double over.

And the weight thats always hung in my chest punches my ribs and my skin finally bleeds.