For a long moment he sat up staring at the dull gloss on his arms in shock, failing to comprehend what he was seeing. The arms were different dimensions than the ones he remembered having. Longer, as well as thicker in places. His steel fingers were thin, almost spindly. His arms artificially hinged to form mechanical hands and wrists and elbows.
Quicker than he anticipated the calming thought came to him that, like the Soulcage, he had been in this sort of metal body before. Yes, many times before. He was simply in shock at being Soulcaged again after a short period away.
“Up! Up!” shouted a voice.
Montgomery stood up, finding the action remarkably easy, as if he had the body of a triathlete. He marveled at the twisting of his steel knee joints as he stood on oiled legs, with a strange hinge to his robotic torso, free from the spatial, structural limitations of bones and organs and ligaments. He could not breathe, and had no physical need to do so.
He turned to the man who had spoken: a tall, muscular soldier in full combat gear. His face was forested with dark, thick hair, and a scar severed the bridge of his nose. A machine gun was strapped to his back and he wore dark dust on the un-bearded parts of his face.
All around Montgomery were other robots with the exact same features as himself. Twenty or thirty of them gradually stood up from seated positions on the muddy ground. Like him, they stood about six and a half feet tall, metal skeletal-structures bristling with fearsome power, hardy steel plates guarding their broad torsos. Some of them looked more weathered than others—one was completely covered from head to toe in tiny bullet-sized dents. Machine guns were attached to their backs, ready to be deployed and fired. They were a colossally terrifying force standing all together.
Their faces were thin, noseless and lipless as skulls. A thin line stretching all around the circumference of their heads functioned as their eyes.
His sight was extended, he realized with amazement. He literally had a 360-degree view of his surroundings. His mind could scarcely comprehend it.
“You’re Squadron Nine,” said the man, the only human around. He did not lower his voice for fear of not being heard over the sound of gunfire or falling bombs.
The sound was slightly scratchy, faintly digitized, as if coming out of a radio speaker. Montgomery realized that was merely how this body received sound through its robotic “ears.”
The man went on. “Assume Code Fifteen and follow me in Formation Eight.” His loud tone carried the tired casualness of a command given hundreds of times.
Squadron Nine. Code Fifteen. Formation Eight. In the bizarre and inexplicable way of the Soulcage, Montgomery understood almost immediately what those phrases meant by virtue of his being Soulcaged in this artificial body pre-loaded with coded information.
He was Soulcaged as a battle robot somewhere in the Africa District of Greater Europa, trying to retake D.C. (District City) #48 from the Slav-Asians. They had been at it for a fortnight now and the battle still seemed as fierce as it ever was.
How many of these other robots were prisoners like him, he wondered? He had no way to know—were they from his prison block, or were they willing soldiers? Or civilian volunteers with Soulcage proficiency? Montgomery suspected he’d never know for sure.
Squadron Nine followed the sergeant as he charged through a copse of sausage trees laden with fruit.
They marched at a dynamic pace. Montgomery’s senses were distorted and strange. Gunfire and bombs rattled the thin jungle, and the soundwaves came into his mind as if through a filter: digitized and slightly unreal. He could see behind him even as he ran forward. He had no sense of smell whatsoever, nor taste, as if a part of him was deadened. Although he had a sense of touch, it was simulated and false, not distinguishing between textures. The touch of a passing tree covered with yellowish-green moss felt the same as the machine gun as he, prompted by a mental command, pulled it off of his back and held it forward in two steel arms.
Nothing felt real. And yet he knew it was all-too real.
The grainy sounds of battle raged closer and closer as they marched to a village just ahead. Straw huts and a few wooden structures were broken or in flames.
Memories of a few dozen previous Soulcage battles surged through Montgomery. He’d been in plenty of other real battles before he’d been caught and imprisoned—even fought against and beside some of these sorts of battle robots before—but this…being a robot himself…was always worse.
It was worse for any Soulcage user, because the sergeants knew they could do anything with you. You weren’t human. Your pain was meaningless and temporary. Your injuries could be easily repaired, your body replaced with another. You were the definition of expendable.
Not for the first time the thought crossed Montgomery to aim his gun at the sergeant and blast him to bits. But the foolishness of the idea pervaded him, well-taught. He assumed that this squadron was composed wholly of Soulcage users previously briefed on the consequences of disobeying orders, considering how the sergeant hadn’t bothered to say anything on the subject.
If you tried to shoot at friendlies or cause any harm to them whatsoever, your body would be shut down and your mind ejected from the Soulcage immediately by military operatives monitoring each robot’s camera feed. The high-tech machine gun was automatically prevented from shooting bullets if it was aimed at anyone it shouldn’t have been. Once they ejected you from the Soulcage you’d be back in the cell where you were still trapped. Your captors would be notified of your crimes and promptly punish you.
Disobeying orders or trying to flee would also result in being shut down and ejected from the Soulcage. It was futile to try and do this as a way of frustrating their military efforts, as there was always another Soulcager they could send into the abandoned robot body. They had more than enough, some willing, some not.
Meanwhile, you went back to your body in your cell to become subject to torture and starvation until you complied with their demands.
Montgomery knew this because he had done it.
He couldn’t even remember why he had changed his mind and agreed to Soulcage again. He had been so staunchly against committing any more killings, against being their puppet, not caring when they burned his body and starved him for days as he languished in that cold, hellish waste, growing weaker in willpower and physical strength by the hour.
But just a day ago, in the early morning, he had come to his senses and gained strength to tell them he would not try to escape again. He would do as they asked. If it would mean no more pain, he wanted to be obedient.
And Hell had faded.
So, now here he was.
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