A tireless march upon mechanised joints, the walking craft stepped into the mists, dragging them behind it as it moved. This machine was an extension of her body - her comfort and fortress. Its motions were a mask, a suite of sensations extended just before her skull. It felt as intuitive as her hands as she turned and redirected each giant limb, seizing the ground and pulling herself forward. Each link is a full-scale neural invasion where slivers of her own code replaced selected sections of the machine’s core. A handshake between machine and organism turned embrace. It was intimate, but not by choice.

The Wire-Witch swayed in her seat as the walking craft navigated the steepest reaches of the mediastinum. Body fastened in place, her skull rocked as each of the vessel’s steps brought the swing of inertia up and down. Opposite her, a comatose freak was bound in steel brackets. Its swollen head in a vice-tight grip, the slick wires connected to its brain swung with their advance. With a quivering jaw, it groaned. A trail of drool ran over its teeth, down its chin, and dripped onto its lap.

A screen snapped to life. The bloated image of their chancellor appeared, his wormy body leaning close to the camera as his mouth twitched, tasting the air. His visage was stained purple and white, muted and low contrast, by the transmission.

“Did your darling sister have ought to share?” he asked without pretence.

“She has nothing,” the Wire-Witch said quietly.

“Admitted as much, did she?”

“No. No, she didn’t have to.”

“Pity.”

The spineless creature tapped his fingertips together, taking a moment to consider that before continuing.

“Well, I have demanded an audience. All the old families of Acetyn have sworn attendance. Even some lineages of the trailing city have said they shall make it.”

The Wire-Witch stared downwards, mute and moving only with the sway of her vessel. Such brooding drew out a terrible silence. Only after considering her pause did the chancellor speak.

“Lady Djay, what will you do now?”

“I will speak to my mother,” she whispered.

“Is that wise?” He carefully asked.

“No. If she wanted to talk, it would have already happened. Never-the-less...”

“Well, I know better than to attempt overtures.”

“Mhm.”

“Do take care then, Your Highness,” the chancellor said, looking aside, briefly letting his attention fall upon something beyond the camera’s reach. “I shall ensure everything is ready, for your stately return.”

The signal cut off without fanfare. Only when the chancellor was gone did the Wire-Witch raise her gaze back to the screen. The asymmetrical shape of a city chasm appeared upon it - flickering void and distant lights. But the footing of the craft meant that the camera was steady, and the image was clear. So the video panned upwards, following vast, winding arteries that throbbed with the colossal forces contained within. Finally, it resolved, distant and titanic, Acetyn’s forward heart fed the city’s highest functions. Its train of chambers contracted with violent force, channelling vast amounts of blood and constructive nanomaterial upwards.

There, eclipsing the heart, was home, or at least the place of her birth. The head of a great spear, kilometres in length and suspended in a vast network of connective tissue, reached through the dark and threatened to impale the heart of mighty, old Acetyn. The freaks of this age, who did not know the truths of ancient times, believed this to be the remnants of a battle fought so long ago as to be forgotten by waking minds - a weapon that could slay a city. So they rightly gave it a wide berth, and not even the most violent and insane monsters nested in its shade. They were right, of course - not about its origins but its threat.

Too frightened to advance further, the Wire-Witch looked away from the screen. Her fists tightened until her titanium nails bit into her palms. But, despite her reticence, the results were the same. It started as a flash of light on the periphery of her vision, a sound in colour-scape.

“No,” the Wire-Witch whispered. “Please.”

[AU sync confirmed - 31,541,361,001,932.]

[Lace Adapted Interface, Handshake Complete - Confirmation signed T01 @ L001,933.]

[Pre-refereed security clearance granted - Ref. Daughter & Genekeeper Systems, “Hope for Humanity”.]

[Signal Murder Protocol, disabled.]

[Signal Sequence log unlocked, disabled.]

[Warning: chemosensory feedback, via: Lace Adapted Interface, Shell Opened, potentially arbitrary code execution detected.]

[Packet Filtering, disabled.]

[Stateful Inspection, disabled.]

[Deeper-Level Inspection, disabled.]

[Circuit-Level Gateway, disabled.]

[Signal Sequence Fixity Assessment, disabled.]

[Thank you. Proceeding:]

[Internal format significant properties readout Access.: Daughter & Genekeeper Systems, “Hope for Humanity”.]

[Internal format obsolescence assessment initialised.]

[Trusted Digital Repository Model adoption initialised.]

[Warning: chemosensory feedback, via: Lace Adapted Interface, Note Well: Attention: Hot model repository detected. Substrate refreshment may result in alteration of engram data.]

[Migration warning readout aborted.]

[MUSE systems coterminousity, disabled.]

[Be Quiet.]

["TextTrans" Record Event function disabled.]

Time was lost to Djay. Distantly, she recalled exhaustion and pain, her hands and feet blistering as she summited another cartilaginous vault in the spires of webbing, climbing higher. Then, struggling, her hands reached the railing of the grand stairway, now raised so far from the surface by the city’s relentless growth. Both feet took the grated steel walkways and the gaps in the scaffolding slowly, bridging the manifolds she once ran through at play.

A vast port in the superstructure, cylindrical machinery securing it with the image of a pentagram, inverting, opening, and belching out scorching air. Walls that wept rivulets of black oil. A golden candelabra with a fat, waxy candle. The fire burned bright, sending a chill up Djay’s spine.

The gaps in her experience grew, a whirlpool pulling her under, drowning her. Then, finally, the Wire-Witch fell to her knees upon a smooth, silicon floor. It was hot with the electrical process. Pain as her weight pressed hard on her knees and toes against the burning die. She clutched her skull in her hands and screamed.

Mother.

Creator.

Please!

Her image, a cascade of light, the shape of a woman picked out, projected not against the eyes but against the mind. When she moved, it was a stain on memory and space, advancing but never letting go of the area she once inhabited. The Immortal reached forward and touched the Wire-Witch’s mind.

Is a mother not entitled to the achievements of her daughters?