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“We’re going to leave a mark, you guys!” Arx says enthusiastically as they and the Jazz Hands robot lead the way up the hill to Miasma Pass. They are in a good mood, glad to be doing something active. And they’ve just had a hit of their FungX. Given how long they’re going to be outside in a miasma-prone location, they need to be cautious. They’ve already coughed once or twice!
“C’mon, Tinker Tenoch!” Takuto calls behind him to the group’s chief.
The frail Tenoch moves more slowly through the rough terrain. They’re the oldest person in Data Haven, having had a long career back on Earth even before coming to Chiron. They’ve learned a lot since getting here, but most of it has been about engineering principles and mechanical capabilities. The wilds of Chiron itself have held little interest to them. Arx and Takuto have personally witnessed a siege worm attack, but in thirty years, Tenoch has never had any direct experience with one. It is a hypothetical threat, certainly, but not an imminent danger. “Yes, wildlife is dangerous,” Tenoch acknowledges when Takuto begins reviewing the steps of their plan to have Jazz Hands activate the summoning device.
Takuto’s eyes go wide. “You don’t understand,” he says, a quiver in his voice at the memory of what he saw happen to Mariah.
“No, no, it’s more than that,” Arx insists, backing him up. “You get too close, and they’re going to slap you around! You gotta be real careful. You jink to the left or juke to the right, and they’re still going to get you. You could lose a leg or an arm!” Despite the seriousness of their warnings, they throw a wink at Takuto as they say, “And we’re too handsome for that!”
“Mariah got better in a few days and is fine,” Tenoch observes, unconcerned. The young man did share some pertinent data about the reach and strength of siege worm tendrils, which Tenoch takes into account for planning the demolition. After some time spent observing the terrain, they chose the angle of attack. “This approach will provide us with a certain degree of safety, provided the device is operated correctly,” Tenoch announces, after sharing the details with their underlings. The Planetary Security Force will be able to get through the pass eventually, but not until they fetch excavators from Morgan Prospecting and haul them into place. This will slow them down quite a bit.
Under Arx’s orders, Jazz Hands begins literally undermining the stability of several key parts of the pass using the excavator Cleve retrieved. “This is going to go down in history!” they cheer. From their calculations, the siege worm’s antics should devastate the entire mountainside above the pass.
“No, it is a pile of rocks and mushrooms that will be falling,” Tenoch says.
“They’re going to write poems about this!” Arx insists.
“Some people might do that,” Tenoch acknowledges. “That is a thing that people do sometimes.” It does not seem relevant to the task at hand, though.
Takuto’s responsibility is the siege worm summoning device itself. Once done digging, Jazz Hands will carry it to the trigger point and activate it following his programming. It’s a lot of personal responsibility, and Takuto is nervous. “You got this, sweet cheeks,” Arx assures him. Takuto flushes, but Arx isn’t done. They lean down to where he is working on Datapad++ and lay a kiss on his cheek.
Following a display of its eponymous dance move, Jazz Hands takes charge of Cleve’s Progenitor device and rolls away from the humans. Once in position, it adjusts the settings precisely as Takuto dictated and begins its patrol. When the siege worm erupts from the ground, Takuto and Arx are shocked by the violence of it. With no warning other than the shaking ground, this one bursts out directly below Jazz Hands and engulfs the robot. Jazz Hands does not go quietly. “Please step aside. You are too close to [Data Haven]. Stop. You will accrue more [lameness].” It issues warnings—reprogrammed days ago by Arx as a lark—as the siege worm crushes it in its trifold maw. The raw edges of metal exposed by the robot’s destruction slice through the siege worm’s thick hide along the edge of its mouth. There is no way to know for sure if this is the same siege worm that assaulted Mariah, but from this point on, it will be recognizable.
Rather than satisfying the siege worm, swallowing Jazz Hands further infuriates it. Now the device that was so annoying is no longer attackable—it is within the siege worm itself. The creature convulses and flails around, smashing everything around it in fury. Shroom trees, boulders, chunks of hillside—all is torn asunder. Takuto and Arx flee, but Tenoch watches in wonder. “We’re going to need a new device,” they observe. Even now, with the siege worm before their eyes and the walls of the pass collapsing around them, they don’t properly recognize the danger.
Arx and Takuto are both cut and bruised by the natural shrapnel caused by the flailing tendrils and spasming tunneling. Remembering their frail mentor, Arx turns back to check on Tenoch.
Tenoch finds the potential here fascinating. “This has such an incredible capacity for terraforming! We could tunnel out new colonies with this. If I can just get a little closer—” Those are their last words as an airborne trunk slams into them, the force of the impact killing them instantly.
Arx screams in rage. Takuto cries in terror and catches at them, stopping Arx from running back into the fray. “We’ve got to go! Let’s go, let’s go, let’s go!” he begs.
“I’m going to kill ‘em!” Arx shouts. “This isn’t over, Scarmouth! I swear vendetta on you!”
Takuto has seen enough people injured and killed by siege worms for a lifetime. He is bigger than Arx, strong enough to pull them along with him away from the pass. Arx keeps shouting, formulating wild plans to go after the siege worm. “It’s got a device in it! We can track it!” they insist. There’s still another partial Morgan Autonomous Security-Tron back in Tenoch’s workshop, and Arx is confident they can revive it to use as a tool of vengeance. “Yeah, swallow this robot, why don’t you?” they mutter as they make plans to load it down with explosives. “It’s all good, all good in the neighborhood. We got this, Takuto, don’t you worry. I’ll protect you. We’ll get justice for Tenoch.”
But Takuto has no intention of ever getting near a siege worm again. Nor even of ever going out on a mission again, maybe. The world outside Data Haven is too dangerous. Someone else will have to come back for Tenoch’s remains once the dust has settled.
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