Someone without context might have mistaken them for ragtag defenders making their last stand, with their apparent disorganization and motley raiment, but their ease had more to do with confidence. They turned from their ad-hoc conversations to face the darkness, colourful tchotchkes bouncing and jangling.

The tide fell and they set to work. They seemed completely unphased by the twisted shapes clawing at them. With easy assurance, they worked in small groups to pull apart the attackers and peer more closely at them. After each diagnosis was made, they would retreat to a niche—as designed for by the battlements and defended by their comrades—with the isolated malcontent, and establish an intense and individual connection. Within moments, the shade sloughed off the critter, and they handed her or him gingerly back down the wall, to a network of ancillaries.

The task seemed absurdly big at first, their impact on the roiling volume utterly negligible. And it would have been—but their actions were fomenting strange things. Big things.

They worked steadily toward areas where the gloom was blackest and thickest and tightest. As they undid the lynchpins which affixed those places, the morass began to unravel. Recoverees were passed back up the wall, small but bright, and their efforts far surpassed those of their primaries. They could dive headlong into the mass of the tide, their work leaving long streaks of glowing embers behind them which lit up the night.

Casualties were few, but they were keenly felt. A rotund, beatific protector, reaching too boldly into the fray, saw something which froze her spirit. Darkness raced along her and into her heart, and she grew limp as her eyes dimmed. The attackers subsumed her quickly, and she wasn't seen again for many months.

Hours passed. Fatigue threatened to drain the last of the light's fighting reserve. They were making clumsy mistakes and taking unnecessary blows—the casual ease they'd shown at dusk had given way to desperation and fear. The wall had not been breached, but darkness still lay thick on the land out to the horizon.

And then the sun rose.

Its first scintillating rays melted huge troughs in the gloom–sea. It seethed and surged, creatures seeking the respite of shade, but time was not on their side. A final mountain was crested and the full majesty of pure sunlight fell on the land, and all darkness was replaced by searing brilliance.

The gates to the gleaming citadel swung open, and a tide of shimmering white spilled forth from it, each timid helper finding a fearful child stripped of its cloak of shadows, and filling it generously with warmth and love.

The next night, as seen from a high enough vantage, it was clear: the tide was turning.

The stocky one swivelled up to look at the same thing. It had no neck, so it was forced to swivel its entire body. It swivelled so far it caught itself from falling on a thick, shiny arm with too many joints.

Then they variously swung and swivelled to look at one another.

There was a hole in the craft. It seeped dull purple fluid, shimmering, and awash with texture as its misbehaving control system sent it sporadic and meaningless shapeforming commands.

Inside the hole, a small, spherical ball of fur was busily gnawing its way inward. In a direction which could only be described as 'toward the drive coils'.

They had tinkered together long enough to have dispensed with communication, but this novelty warranted a break from their comfortable silence.

"I don't know what that is." The thin one looked quizzical, in sort of the same way a cat can look quizzical despite lacking very many facial muscles.

"I am still pretty sure that's holographic," the stocky one said. It had now fished some instrument out of its arm and was waving it cautiously in the hungry furball's direction.

"I'd agree, except for the-" the thin one was unceremoniously interrupted by a bit of routing tube coming free and slapping it across the face. "That sort of thing." 

"Hmm. So. This is why we're here, right? The problems which defy prediction."

"Well. Hmm. Yes. Of course."

"So."

"So."

"The problem is surely one of education. Does it know it's entropizing an irreplaceable artefact dating back two galactic rotations?"

"Yes! Exactly. I think we ought to tell it."

"Of course, it's unmapped, so we'd need to bootstrap communications from zero."

"Yes! Just what I was thinking. I'll fetch the projector and the storyteller."

Having finished devouring the second of the three drive coils, the ball of fur was beginning to lose interest in them. It scuttled back out its excavated warren a short way, and then set off munching in a new direction which tingled its sense organs in a less delicious but more electric fashion.

The pair had set up two fairly inscrutable bits of machinery on the floor outside the warren, which they now prodded to life. Rich soundscapes filled the space around it, which the creature had no way to hear. Photons dense with meaning-scaffolds poured up the hole in the craft, and were promptly absorbed by its fuzzy rear.

"Do you think it's working?"

"It's certainly taking longer than it usually does."

The thin one was peering at one of the control surfaces on the noisy piece of machinery and gently prodding it with a long, crooked appendage.

"Oh! I understand. The-"

The rest of the insight achieved by the stocky one was lost to entropy, as the ball of fur pierced a fuel chamber and bathed the museum floor in enough gamma radiation to melt all the unshielded organics.

The machines continued to warble energetically.

A soft rushing sound began to build. Where it was exposed, her skin began to tingle. Her spine arched involuntarily. She smelled combustion products.

The rushing built faster now. It gained texture, a bassy thrum which rattled her ribs and melodious overtones which caught her ear. She had to keep her eyes closed, now. The gestalt was overwhelming.

A fantastic choral sigh released the sensory pressure all at once. She peeked under her eyelids. Unfurling before her, manifestly well-made, was an edifice which vaguely resembled a creeper. Glowing bulbs hung from its boughs and it furled around and inside itself.

She stepped forward and peered more closely. It enclosed something. That something was undertaking distinct efforts to unfetter itself.

It seemed to get the hang of co-ordination all at once. Two long slits appeared in the sides of the - was that an amniotic sac? - and a bundle of thin, sleekly curving legs thrust out of one of them. Several more of those legs gingerly pushed the deflated remains of its vessel off as it stepped neatly out to one side.

It resembled a spider in the same way a star resembles an egg. Its limbs looked almost like fur, impossibly fine and implausibly prehensile. She struggled to find its nexus, some point to which everything attached and received innervation and symmetry. There was clear structure to it, but like the light of its birth, the sense behind the structure swam beyond reach.

It approached her - "sidled" being the closest approximation she could think of to its movement - at an incredibly slow pace. She couldn't make out obvious sense organs; nevertheless, she had a strong sense that she was being examined with some intensity.

She extended a hand toward it, palm up, almost on reflex, before grinning at the effectiveness of the training programme. "Automatic", as advertised.

It seemed to split its focus, devoting most of it now to the extended limb. Jauntily protruding bristles enfolded her hand, but she couldn't feel its touch at all. Its bulk moved slightly closer. She couldn't see which limbs were holding it off the ground, but in aggregate, it moved like gravity affected it. Well, that's something.

It reached some conclusion about her hand. All at once, a thick bundle of limbs splayed itself into space, intricately surrounding a hand-shaped void. Hmm. They all retracted, making the void larger, then rearranged themselves around her hand and advanced again.

This should be interesting.

They all entered her skin at once. It was almost painless, a kind of dull pinch which came about as much by expectation as by sense. She kept her hand as still as possible. Then, an instant of wild furious feeling. She was briefly sensate in a way that was uncomfortably vivid. It passed as soon as it began.

Now her hand was in cool, running water. She glanced at it, testing the illusion - it held. She could feel the eddies tugging at her skin, the pockets of warmer water sighing past, the skin just above the surface exalting in the swells which washed over it.

She slipped into a bright memory of sand and seafoam and the overpowering smell of brine. She was holding her daughter's hand, smiling as she picked her way delicately around the shells and strands of seaweed. Voices rose and fell around her, calling to one another, playing games and clambering over rocks.

A gleam of prudence lifted one of her eyelids, but it was far too late. She was ensconced in a wide cradle, shaped like a bird-bath, thick ropes of dark hair snaking all around her, branching fractally to enter every exposed inch of skin, and snaking under her encounter suit, hungering for more. It looked, she thought, like an odd inversion of a central nervous system.

And that was the last she thought.

The footmen lounged around the campfire, heavy steel helmets neatly arranged behind them, alongside a stack of swords and shields.

"Honestly, I think you've lost it, mate. I love my country and I love my king, but this is dirty work. I do it despite myself. I miss me mam and me kids."

"Lad, the alliance takes care of its own. How much do you know about healing magick?"

The younger soldier grinned. "Look, alright, the priests back in Stormwind can save a soul when God deems it right. And even then, it's God, right? Not so much the priests. But the men in robes here..." he jerked his head at the newly minted sacred halls. "They're mostly to get us fired up, right? Willing to die for the cause."

The older soldier shook his head. His face was deadpan, earnest, serious. "It's completely real. I have no idea how God figures in this-" he crossed himself briefly "-but they can and do heal you. Listen. I had a brute of an orc cut my leg open. Waist to knee. I could see white bone the whole way down. I'd a puddle of blood beneath me... well, I was pretty sure I was done for."

"Go on. You're having me on."

"Like hell I am!" The grizzled man flipped up his cuirass and lifted his breeches. Almost invisible in the flickering firelight, but sure enough, there it was: a long, thick, pale scar, meandering down all the way to the side of his knee.

"God, that must have been hell to recover from."

"But that's what I'm telling you! It wasn't. It wasn't at all. I was on the field, with his Lordship, clearing out murloc infestations. We'd just slaughtered a camp of little ones, and this pack of slavering grunts rounds the tree-line. We were bruised and exhausted, and outnumbered - I was pretty sure we were done for."

"So what happened?"

"They fell on us. Instantly. You've heard what they're like. No hesitation, no mercy. They were like a tide. I was closest, I took one of the first hits." He gestured to his leg. "But we had one of those battle-priests with us, right? So he starts murmuring. I didn't think much of it, but he was looking right at me, and I felt it."

"The headache from all the drink you'd had before making this up, you mean?"

"Piss off! I felt the holy spirit. It was hot, like my leg had been lying in the baking sun for hours, but it didn't hurt. It felt like I was standing right in front of something I'd been cowering from my whole life. And that something was right, and good, and pure."

The younger soldier blinked, bewildered. "That sounds incredible."

"It gets better. You know Mikhail? Came over all funny a few weeks back, started going to seven services a week?"

"Yeah, that was odd. I figured he had a near scrape."

"Those orcs had a troll with them, and that troll threw a spear right into his heart. It didn't miss. I saw it happen. Right into the centre of his heart. I saw his eyes. That man was dead. And Lord Manadar, he just turns around, opens that massive tome he's always carrying, raises his hammer into the air-"

"No bloody way."

"Yeah bloody way. This pillar of light streams down from the heavens, and the spear falls out. Not a single scratch on him. Once he got over the surprise he took to arms with more vigour than ever. Beheaded that troll himself."

The younger soldier was looking at the older with a mixture of fear and awe. His pulse was racing. "I... why don't they tell us about this? The stories get around, but everyone knows they're just stories. Nice lies to keep us hopeful."

"No idea, lad. I'm sure they've got their reasons. But let me tell you this. You sustain injury in service of the Kingdom, you'll be taken care of. And the feeling of holy warmth within your flesh..." He shuddered and closed his eyes. "Nothing comes close. Fight well, fight fiercely, and fight without fear." His eyes snapped open and he leaned close, his face a solemn rictus. "God is on your side."

Peter rolled over. An insistent cloud of ephemeral wisps floated around him. They sang tinkling, crystalline notes. The sound was unsettling, discordant. He was afraid. He dismissed them with a twitch of his head. His pod was cramped and profoundly isolating, but he felt nothing but a distant, dull innervation to further the social good.

He keyed his con and felt the filter envelop him. It was almost pitch-black. With careful, concerted effort, he swung his weight so that he sat on the side of his bed, feeling for the ground. Then he stood on weak, shaking legs. His implant finished cycling and took over. His back straightened and his facial muscles assumed perfect tone and expression.

The perceptual filter didn’t come with settings any more. In dark, abstract disconnection, he was vaguely aware of his body vigorously and efficiently washing, clothing and feeding itself. He was not he. Prisoner or passenger, he was all but irrelevant.

He was aware of movement. Murmurs of razor-honed rhetorata wafted in as his filter permitted conditioning here and there. He piped the same memory he always did. Too much time had passed for the visuals to be coherent, and he was numb enough that all he experienced was the idea of a sensation, but there it was. Together. With her.

The filter dropped a small square in the centre of his vision. He could see the dark, distant shapes of the lattice around him. Perfectly efficient. He felt his mind dull as grey matter was repurposed. He heard something. A glitch; psychic stomata made manifest. Long-term mind-feed catching up to him. It was a laugh - gentle, kind, quiet.

Peter rolled over. The neon of his alarm’s LCD was dim, muted, designed to promote restfulness. It tinkled placidly but insistently. That was pretty restful, too. He had long stopped resenting the alarm. He pitied and envied it, bound as it was by its singular vision of design intent. He had no such luxury. His eyes fell on the picture stuck to the wall. He recoiled within himself.

With shambling, machine purpose, he heaved back the haze in his mind. He couldn’t move it as far as he used to, but it was enough. Enough to plan the next few minutes. Escape the tiny bed. Dress. Eat. Pills. More pills. Out the door. He had to be at work soon.

The light making it down to the street was watery and pale. It still made him squint. People moved around him, inchoate, seething. He struggled to make out faces or colours. He knew the route well enough that he didn’t have to think about it, and yet he could not find enough emptiness in his mind to allow it to wander. It was stifled, damped. It was all he could do to make his way steadily through the city. 

His mental absence precluded asking himself bigger questions. He clung in quiet desperation to the knowledge that he had been able to, once. He clung to the memory of broad, confident thought. It would return, eventually.

He arrived at his office. Above the reception desk, the company’s logo was set deep in a broad orb of jade. It held a dark, black, central ring with delicate filaments meandering to the edges. It stared at him familiarly.

Peter rolled over. His clock’s second hand marched unerringly across its face. He clamped a hand on it before it could shriek at him. His eyes wandered to the empty side of the bed. The sheets were still crumpled. He felt emotion well up and set about quashing it.

He turned on the news, and watched it as he ate and washed and dressed. Eight hundred dead in the country since last night. Forty in his province. Seven in his city. Two in his suburb. Global lithium reserves at a hundredth of a percent from fifty years ago. All armaments now actively deployed on both fronts. His fear was large and lithe and strong, and it barely needed to bother with him. 

He felt emotion crumble under its strong, steady pressure. He had dreamed a little - of walking outside in the sun - but that was all but forgotten, now. He gathered fear around him like a cloak and headed outside. Every person he made accidental, fleeting eye-contact with reacted as he did: with suspicion and apprehension. 

He knew the dangerous areas, knew the crime stats. He paced a wide loop to avoid the corner where a woman had been mugged just that morning. He walked indoors whenever possible, avoiding the light which wavered and glimmered and burst in at windows and seams.

He hurried past reception and sat down at his desk. Today would be hectic. He pulled three stories in and set about unpicking them. Deeming itself unable to compensate, his mind made him aware of piercing glare reflecting off the table’s surface. He walked to the window and let the curtain down. It cascaded, gently falling over and around itself in bunched locks.

Peter rolled over. His tranquility was pleasantly punctuated by the twittering of birds from outside. He stretched with some relish and wriggled over to the window. Drawing the curtain, he basked in the light that streamed in. Unbidden, perhaps spurred by the splendour of the vista outside, his thoughts wandered to her. He set his jaw.

Stoking a fire under the rainwater tank, he shaved carefully and washed his face. He chopped fruit and made himself a modest breakfast. He ate slowly and deliberately on the verandah, taking in the calm vista before him. He watched a bird make its nest one twig at a time for a few minutes. After eating, he washed, cleared the fire, dressed and looked toward the rest of the day.

There was a lot to get done, and he dove in with relish. He mucked out the chicken coop and the stables. He collected eggs and replaced feed and water. He renewed his attack on the invasive weeds growing about the periphery of the stone footpaths he’d built. He turned and moistened the soil in two large rows at the edge of his vegetable garden, and planted sprouts and basil. He watered the rest of the vegetables and the garden. He swept the three rooms in his modest cottage, and scrubbed the handful of dirty cups in the basin.

He was exhausted, and he liked it that way. He washed again and set off for a walk through the forest. His legs pumped and his arms swung with purpose. The smells and sounds of the wilderness laced his senses and filled his mind. It was a substantial assault, and he drank it in hungrily. 

Dense greenery forced him to slow his vigorous conquest. He stomped stolidly through heavy reeds and plants, forging a new path among them. The air was thick and heavy, rich with the smells and tastes of undisturbed undergrowth. A frond brushed his arm languorously. He gasped.

Peter rolled over and looked at her. The world around him fell away. She looked back and smiled. He found himself, whole and unafraid.