Harvest Time

5 - Beyond Between

It took me a while to haul myself out of the hatchway. I was covered in sweat – whether that was from my fear or due to the unnaturally warm, moist air, I wasn't sure. What I saw when I finally managed to raise my head above the top of the Harvester made me gasp out loud in horror.

That I was no longer within the citadel was obvious, for no citadel had ever been fashioned with such a room. My mind whirled at the realisation that, if I was no longer in the citadel, then the Harvester had taken me beyond Between. I was where the Harvesters went when they disappeared.

Above me was a metal ceiling. There was just so much metal – I had never before seen such a huge amount of metal all in one place. Girders and panels, I supposed – though I had no idea how such a roof could hold itself up without solid mud brick walls to support it. But, within this cavernous area was what horrified me even more. There were rows of Harvesters. More than a hundred, I'm sure, all in regimented rows and columns. Most rows held five of the monsters, but there were gaps and I could see that one row furthest away from me only held a single Harvester. To my relief, all of them were immobile.

I was in some sort of rectangular building whose regular walls were punctuated by the occasional glass window. But the glass was dulled and smeared with dirt, preventing a clear view of what existed outside.

I crawled across the top of the Harvester and peered over the edge towards the ground. A machine like a smaller, squat Harvester approached. It moved on segmented, tentacle-like legs instead of the caterpillar tracks of its larger cousins. It poked a tentacle into the side of my Harvester. I nearly gagged as I saw liquid flush from the inside to flow into one of the metal channels that ran underneath all the Harvesters. The sticky mess that sludged along that channel had once been breeders and others of us – I could make out pieces of bone and hunks of still-solid meat drifting along it. The small machine became agitated as something appeared to be blocking the channel. It reached under the Harvester with two tentacles and hauled out the obstruction – it was the remains of the breeder girl, her torso intact but devoid of legs. The machine dragged her away, leaving a trail of blood on the ground and fed her remains into another free-standing cylinder, which finished off the job. The resulting liquid was flushed into the channel with the rest.

Trying to keep my stomach contents inside me, I looked for a way down and saw nothing obvious. However, I could see that the outsides of all the Harvesters nearby, being made of smaller plates of metal held together with large bolts, provided plenty of places that would serve as hand grips and toe holds. I pulled myself to the edge of my Harvester and, after making sure that none of the smaller machines remained in the vicinity below, swung a leg over the side. But, my leg felt heavy, as did my body, and I wasn't sure I could prevent myself from falling. I worried that, if I should fall, it would be far more dangerous for me than a drop from a similar height at home.

"I can't stay up here," I told myself. So, after resting for a moment, I began to inch my way downwards.

Even though the Harvester was no more than eighteen feet in height – a distance I had dropped without issue on more than one occasion at home – my trepidation about falling in what, I had now decided, was much higher gravity, meant that it took me several minutes to reach the ground. It also didn't help that the air was dense and heavy, being full of moisture plus the miasma from the channel of blood. It made breathing without gagging difficult.

Once at ground level, I searched for a way out of the building. Passing several rows of Harvesters as I headed for the nearest wall, I spotted an open doorway in one corner. To get there, I had to step over several of the channels cut into the floor. Most were empty but a couple still contained the remains of what the Harvesters had brought back and, this close to them, the stench was overpowering. I could see that all the channels merged into a large pipe that exited the building through one of the walls.

I ran out of the doorway and stopped, aghast at the sight that confronted my eyes. So used to seeing for miles into the distance back home on Nervanna, the closeness of the jungle was enough to make me gag. Trees at home were restricted to smaller clumps between the fields outside the citadel, not towering up into the sky.

"Boy, quick, before you are spotted. Run this way."

I jumped at a voice that felt totally out of place. But then my eyes saw the man, his head poking around the trunk of one of the trees. He was tall – almost five feet in height, by my estimation, with a full white beard. He was dressed in what appeared to be rags.

Hearing a clunking sound inside the building getting closer, I ran for where the man stood. As I reached him, one of the smaller machines exited the door. Despite the man's appearance, he was still less scary than the machine, which halted as if unsure of what to do next.

"This way," the man said, before turning to lope off into the jungle. I had to run to keep up with his extra-long stride, which was difficult not only due to the heat but also because my weight felt half again what it had been on Nervanna.

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