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| The Call; The call from West World | |
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| Topic Started: Jan 13 2011, 09:49 PM (242 Views) | |
| Narration | Jan 13 2011, 09:49 PM Post #1 |
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The door burst open with a bang. Ben rushed inside the steam-filled room that always felt like a blistering noon right after a rain; hot vapor hung in the air like a solid curtain. Hephaestus never kept it so hot in here, but Hep had been the first one to vanish. Ben wiped a shaking knuckle across his mouth and knew, knew down into his soul that he was the last. Why had he come here? Perhaps because it had been where so many last chance miracles had been performed: the flying machine that had crossed the gorge just in time to deliver the much needed medicine, the talking devices that let them scout Burton’s plans and relay them back in time to prepare, the flame-shooters, the combustion-engine rail car, and so many others. Ben looked across to the Thinking Engine, half of its bulbs were blackened and shattered and new spouts of steam leaked through the joints. “This is it, I reckon,” he said to the hulking form of metal tubing and glass. “I rode through town like the devil himself was after me and it was falling apart. Won’t be long now,” he said and clutched at his temples. It’s over. Stop fighting. There’s nothing you can do. The thoughts, so alien to his Ben’s own nature coiled deep in his mind like poison. The others have already abandoned you. “No!” Ben grimaced as he fought off the pain in his head and tried to remember. The others had fought and sacrificed themselves, one by one, starting with the Sheriff. Suddenly, there was a clutter of typing and Ben looked up in surprise. “You still kickin’ too?” He mumbled in amazement as he made his way to the glass-domed typewriter. Ben gathered up the thin stream of ticker-tape paper that fed out the side. / All not lost. / “It’s lookin’ pretty damned lost to me, Sam.” S.A.M. – Simulated Artificial Man. / Idea. / The machine wrote as another rivet popped and a geyser of steam plumed into the air. “No no no,” Ben muttered through gritted teeth as he watched the needles on the brass gauges begin to lower and the billows stop pumping. “No,” he told the air, as if an unseen enemy hovered nearby. Rushing to the furnace, he stripped off his shirt and used it to open door. Grabbing the nearby shovel, he started working like a man possessed, shoveling coal and feeding the dancing flames. Sweat poured off his skin and his dark, curly hair was plastered to his head when he finally heard the ticker-tape machine clatter to life again. He buried the shovel blade into the coal bin and went to the thin length of paper. As he read, his eyes widened at the incredible, unthinkable suggestion. It was something that no person in Dodge City, or Tombstone either for that matter, would have thought of… not in a million years. But Sam wasn’t a person, not really. “Could this work?” he stared at the typing machine under glass. / Yes. / He grimaced and grabbed his forehead. The strange thoughts were starting to take over, he could feel them whispering their Devil’s Advice into his mind. Break the machine. “Do it,” he spat through gritted teeth as he staggered to the door and out into the wilderness. Inside the hidden workshop of Hephaestus the blacksmith, Sam reached out through the wires to the world beyond. |
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7:25 PM Jul 11