04-332 Dorthorviken

  The forest sensed the steel cutting through the soil, mycelium, and underground filaments. It launched a spore cloud, forcing men to hold their breath under the protective hoods that covered their faces. The gently floating spores were accompanied by sharper movement as silent birds took wing to transport messages from tree to tree.

  The leader of the expedition was called Patrik. He glared at the birds, and his nerves screamed for him to shoot all the winged ones to the ground. He wanted to stomp their bodies under his soles, to break their fragile bones, and to ensure that the information the birds carried would not reach its destination, for the forests were alive, the trees talked to each other, and Patrik hated and feared the artificial organisms.

  Patrik, or strategej Patrik, as the 31-year-old was officially called, breathed slowly out, restraining his violent instincts, for secrecy was of utmost importance in this mission. He kept an alert stance and surveyed his men, who were digging a hole between the unnaturally straight lines of trees.

  The team had been tasked to destroy the forest’s production to prevent it from competing with the northern metal wells. Patrik suspected that the forest knew what they were doing and tried to poison them. Spores had already made one of his men sick; he was left in the base camp, unable to walk.

  Patrik had planned to postpone the operation and search for a better location, but he had received new orders the previous day. The message commanded him to complete the mission as soon as possible and to proceed south towards the city called Haven.

  The men worked to remove a missile’s deformed shell from their excavation. Reminders of the past war were buried everywhere; if one broke the ground, debris waited there. Most of it was useless rubbish, but some pieces were still alive with uncontrollable energies. This time, the shell was empty, and the men lifted it away before continuing their work.

  Lance Corporal Ketsura signalled to Patrik. He was a career soldier suffering from an algal infection he had caught in a mission in the south. In his despair to search for healing, Ketsura had turned to the southern beliefs and was nowadays carrying a blue wooden spiral, hoping in vain that the Olds of Watergate would heal him. “Strategej, there is something. It was below the shell.”

  “Dig it out,” Patrik said, crushing a lone leaf under his sole. It crumbled into powder and changed colour, its behaviour unlike that of any natural plant. These trees were refinery machines: they sucked substances from the ground and air, processed them, and secreted the products to their scaly leaves and hard, smooth trunks.

  These kinds of industrial organisms grew all over Watergate, and they were dealt with utmost superstition, for the knowledge about their care and operation was lost. There were many rules, practices, traditions, and rituals related to the forests, and Patrik, born and raised in the north, felt a weary suspicion towards them. He hated the trees growing in the even chequered pattern, detested the lack of undergrowth, and above all else, he loathed what the forest represented: they were a creation of the past dragonkillers.

  The dragon Agiisha was the one whom Patrik and his people, the Ainadu, served. Patrik had sworn his heart and soul in the servitude of the dragon he had never seen, and his faith, together with his ambition, had raised him through the ranks. All had been well until this mission, for Patrik had started to question his Commander’s sanity.

  The hole Patrik’s team was digging was an attempt to reach a root. This was the fourth try, for they were searching for a specific root, which was ‘smooth and thick, growing from every third full-sized tree towards the forest’s centre line’. Patrik had memorised the description, but he doubted that it was as faulty as all the information he had been given about this forest.

  Their briefing had been based on another forest, an organism that produced carbon fibers. The presumption had been that the basic functions would be similar from forest to forest, but it had been proved wrong, and this mission had been teetering on the verge of failure even before the order to rush had arrived. Patrik drew a deep breath, forcing calmness into his being.

  ”Strategej, here is a root, but it goes in the wrong direction,” Ketsura called from the pit.

  Patrik pushed his hood away to see better. This revealed a face with straight features and unmarred skin. Patrik’s severe attitude towards responsibilities showed in the set of his jaw. He smiled rarely, never laughed, and the shadow of the first vertical wrinkle had already cast itself between his eyes.

  If the face had been livelier, Patrik could have been considered a handsome or at least a nice-looking man. His eyes were cloudy green and looked brown when the shadows hit them right. His skin was kissed to a shade of toffee by the sunny days spent in the south. The haircut was short and neat, but still, the sun had found a way to bleach the ends, and the brown carried lighter streaks.

  The revealed tree root was as thick as the thigh of a large man, grey and smooth like a rolled cloth. However, it grew along the tree rows, not against them. Patrik dropped agilely into the hole and touched the root. The matter was soft as dough and moved under Patrik’s hand like a pouch filled with lukewarm water.

  If you encounter this narrative on Amazon, note that it's taken without the author's consent. Report it.

  Patrik felt the pressure to finalise the mission. The freakiness of the forest and the fear of getting caught were getting on men's nerves, and they had already spent too long in this area. The original plan had been built around speed, for the forest was guarded.

  ”We will use this root,” Patrik decided. If it didn’t work, they would disengage and try again on the route towards Haven.

  The strategej took a sharp metal cylinder and a packet of white powder from his bag. He waved for one of his men, a conscript so promising that he had been chosen for this mission. Or more likely, his parents had bribed someone to get their offspring into Patrik’s team to advance his career.

  Without a doubt, they were pushing young Kvenrei towards officer ranks. Patrik considered it a futile attempt, for he saw the man’s name as an omen. Kvenrei was a skilled soldier, but he shared the trait of avoiding hard work with his namesake, Patrik’s younger half-brother.

  Patrik guided, and Kvenrei pushed the cylinder’s sharp end into the root. Cloudy liquid with a pungent smell rose to the cylinder, and Patrik poured the powder inside. Patrik mixed with his knife until the powder had dissolved. Kvenrei watched with curiosity, but the others had retreated.

  ”It has to be activated before the injection,” Patrik said, pointing his knife at the matrix engraved in the cylinder wall.

  “What will it do?” Kvenrei asked, and Patrik considered whether the young man was as talented with matrices as his untrustworthy namesake. Patrik’s brother was stationed in Haven, but Commander Anhava had decided not to give the mission there into his hands.

  “It spreads to the root system and ignites the trees. The carrying medium is a metallic salt that reacts with the matrix.” Patrik took hold of his glove to get the work done, but remembered the spores. He didn’t want any of the cursed half-alive micro-organisms in his bloodstream.

  Matrices needed Ainadu blood for activation, or precisely, the resonance carried in the blood, the dragon’s fingerprint in the Ainadu.

  Patrik had been chosen for the mission because his blood carried enough power for the task. The amount of weaker blood needed to activate the matrix would have drawn an ordinary Ainadu empty, and Anhava operated with limited personnel when it came to terrorism in foreign territory.

  The original inhabitants of Watergate considered Ainadu’s blood connection with their dragon to be anathema, and viewed everything achieved through such means as witchcraft and the work of the ash demons.

  Patrik ignored the southern religious fanatics, who imagined the end of the world had happened in the war with the dragons 332 years ago, and assumed everything after that was the afterlife. They prayed to their Olds and believed the Ainadu were the purgatory monsters, sent to punish them for their sins.

  Young Kvenrei nodded, eager to see what was going to happen. His presence reminded Patrik why he fought this shadowy war, ensuring the nation’s and dragon’s safe existence. The Ainadu were newcomers in Watergate, having arrived two centuries after the war. Their forefathers had initiated a rebellion that had culminated in Agiisha leading them here.

  Watergate, a half-dead moon orbiting a red gas giant, infested with dragon killers, was Ainadu’s only future. Now, a specific part of that future depended on Patrik to burn a few rows of trees from a living-dead machine forest. He squared his shoulders: they needed to hurry, for he had a man to kill in Haven.

  No spores were visible, and the air smelled only of soil, powder’s metallic bitterness, and men’s sweat. Patrik took his knife, removed the glove, and cut open his left index finger, which was adorned with a tattooed matrix, done to provide blood when activation was needed. Red drops fell into the metal cylinder, and the blood’s resonance, its connection to the dragons, was absorbed inside the carving. The residual blood oozed away, mixing with the liquid in the cylinder.

  A dim glow marked the activation as it moved along the lines. When the glow finally reached the end of the matrix, Patrik let the cut in his finger close. It was done, but no change could be seen in the liquid. The strategej could only trust his orders. He nodded to Kvenrei to close the cylinder and push the piston, the motion sending the liquid into the root.

  Patrik decided to leave the pit uncovered. He wanted to hurry and get his men away from the potential fire. Patrik had no reason to suspect his commander, but he suspected the forests in general and specifically the insufficient information used in the planning of this mission.

  Soon, the patrol was advancing towards the forest’s edge, utilising the uneven ground for cover. In the ancient war, something had crashed here, crushing rocks and churning soil. The trees tried to keep on growing in the even rows, but a few of them were off as something in the ground prevented the programmed growth pattern from being realised.

  Patrik scanned the landscape for a reason for this end-of-the-world battle, but nothing betrayed the function this site had in the past. Maybe the forest had already been growing, and it had been enough of a reason for the ancient bombardment, or maybe a dragon had attacked something. Patrik pushed the idle thought away.

  They had covered some ground from the pit, but the forest showed no signs of the poison in its roots. The only sounds were their own steps and the wind’s gentle rustling in the trees. Patrik halted in a rock’s shadow to wait for a signal from the scout, who checked the path forward.

  Patrik was reaching for a water bottle when the man behind him fell to the ground, an oversized crossbow bolt quivering in his chest.

  Tall camouflaged shapes appeared like spectres manifesting from the shadows. Kvenrei was nailed to a tree by another bolt, his precious blood flowing to feed the roots. Patrik took cover and unsheathed his sword, cursing silently. The Nocturna had ambushed them, and not a word in the mission briefing had hinted at their presence.

  Ketsura shot someone with a rifle, and Patrik registered that the attackers were not using firearms, although they carried them. An instinct made him turn and raise a sword in time to meet a long knife directed at his back. Patrik stepped past his attacker, to push his blade into the man’s armpit. The Nocturna was a head taller than Patrik, his reach was longer, and his reactions were unnaturally fast as he danced away.

  Patrik followed him, stepping over dead Ketsura, when he felt something hitting his head. His knees buckled, and he fell into the darkness, face down to the forest floor.