Poire’s home was in ruins.

Enormous fractures had split the cavern walls, and chunks of rock had fallen from the ceiling, smashing into the parks and avenues he had once played in. Only a few buildings embedded in the walls still stood, crumbling houses and apartments of his Conclave made unrecognizable by all that aged filth and muck. His own house was buried beneath a rubble avalanche.

His city might be dead, but a new one had taken its place.

A lone train sat at the top of a dirt hill, the polished metal untouched by age. Dozens of banners and muted, colorful sheets hung from its cars. Tied to the roof of its locomotive, a beacon as bright as a star filled the cavern with light.

Somehow, they had salvaged a single bulb from the old sunlamp that had crashed to the cavern floor eons ago. Which meant there might be other things down here that still held a charge.

Throngs of hobbled beings—Sajaahin, Eolh had called them—walked toward this light. They poured down the crumbling ramps, out of their hovels carved high in the cavern walls. Out of the ruins of Poire’s home.

They barked and coughed and argued with each other in that guttural half language as they gathered and stumbled toward the train, where a whole city of tents pushed out of the dirt and filth like patchwork fungus. They carried alien goods or dragged them in carts, some of which were made of reclaimed wood, while others floated over the ground. Salvaged repulsor engines, Poire thought.

The Sajaahin paid no attention to Poire, as if he were nothing more than another denizen of this dark place.

So he followed them. Followed them into their city.

It grew, like a maze, all around him. Hunched alien bodies tugged at ropes and put up ragged tents or built stalls to vendor their scavenged rubbish. The tables sagged with rusted metal parts and dried fungus and the cured carcasses of rodents held together by strings.

The longer he stared, the larger the maze grew. The musty, algae smell of the cavern was undercut by cooking meat and the rich earthiness of fresh mushrooms. Drums and howling instruments sang praise to the growing Grand Sahaat. And the Sajaahin . . .

Anywhere else, they might’ve looked sickly with their pale skin and hard-boned, malnourished bodies. But down here, with only a single bright light coming from the hill, it was Poire who felt like the alien.

Their faces were hidden deep within their robes or by masks made of scavenged leathers and bark and bits of metal. Some of them were hunched and hobbled and wore so much jewelry they jingled with every step. Others were stout and carried heavy, rusted wrenches as tall as they were. They almost looked menacing—except that the tallest among them only came up to Poire’s shoulder.

Some of the older ones had bones sticking out of their joints, spiky growths jutting out of their arms, their elbows, their shoulders and knees. Piercing through their ragged cloaks. Is this a disease, or are their bodies meant to do that?

What are these people, anyway? Where did they come from? Poire had one theory, but his skin crawled to think of it.

As he picked his way through the throngs of Sajaahin, the Sajaahin guards leaned on their wrenches, turning their heads to track him as he wandered through the sprawling camp.

Other beings walked through here too, other aliens, drawn to the Sajaahin’s clamoring drums and to the ever-present light at the top of the hill, shining down on the whole Sahaat. There were aliens with too many legs, or too many eyes, or no eyes at all. Most were weighed down with goods or surrounded by vendors who grunted aggressively, eager to trade with any passerby.

Still the maze of tents grew. The deeper he walked, the more the stalls seemed to overflow with scavenged junk. Hunks of metal and replacement limbs and other construct parts seemed to cascade out of one tent. Poire peered inside and saw many eyes—most crusted over with dirt and rust—staring back at him. They lit up and seemed to follow him as he rushed back out into the street.

Around one corner, he found an open bazaar. The crowd was a dull roar as they bartered and traded in that incomprehensible tongue; the slobbering consonants and gasping vowels were muffled by their hoods and masks. They haggled over stalls or offered their wares while towing carts behind them. All those robes and sandal-covered feet squelching in the mud.

Poire felt out of place in his formfitting cold suit. The Sajaahin noticed. One vendor caught at his elbow, pinching the fabric of his suit between bone-white fingers. The fingers were cold and had too many knuckles.

“No, thank you,” Poire said, trying to keep his voice from shaking. Trying not to scream.

The Sajaahin tugged again, coughing and slobbering and trying to press what Poire hoped was a cluster of egg-shaped mushrooms into his hands and not actual eggs.

“I said no,” Poire said, pushing the Sajaahin’s hand back. The Sajaahin craned its hooded face up. A single dim eye looked up at Poire. And the alien gasped.

Poire pushed past and almost tripped over a tiny creature that had scampered across his path. It looked up at him through thick goggles, cooing with awe. Then there were more of them, weaving around the legs of the adults. They touched at Poire’s clothes, chattering and sniffing excitedly at the fabric.

“Please!” Poire shouted. He pushed one away and two more took its place. “Get off me. Stop!”

They did. And so did the rest of the bazaar. All the snuffling, coughing, bartering, and crude conversation went silent, leaving only the sound of the drums and the piercing whistle of reeds.

They were staring at him. Hundreds of Sajaahin.

It wasn’t the first time Poire had felt so lost and so alone. The cultivars’ tests had made sure of that.

Poire pushed himself free of the Sajaahin children, stumbling away through the bazaar toward the train. It was sitting at the top of a dirt hill that had grown over the old rails. Tattered sheets had been draped over the train’s doors and windows. When they fluttered in the cavern breeze, it was as if they were beckoning him to come closer.

The train had not stopped, only slowed to a crawl. It hovered a foot or so above the ground, its gleaming metal bulk floating over the rails an inch at a time. It would be hours, maybe days, before the train left the maze of tents behind.

The tents stopped long before the foot of the hill. And when Poire started climbing, one of the Sajaahin guards detached from the crowds and barked after him, waving a rod of sharpened, rusted metal like a spear. Warning Poire to get back. Get off the hill.

Poire looked back at the guard. Looked up at the train. And kept climbing, using his hands to haul himself up one fistful of mud at a time.

The guard took out a horn and blew on it. More emerged from the crowds below, and the fabric sheets of the train car lifted. More guards, holding their wrenches like shepherd staffs.

He knew he should stop. He could see what they wanted from him. But this was his city. That was his train. And if it had power, maybe there was a guide he could talk to.

“I have to see!” Poire shouted at the guards.

They barked and jabbed the empty air, urging him to go back.

He tried to keep climbing, but they reached out and pushed him off-balance with those rusted, oversized wrenches and drivers, shoving him away from the train. He slid and squelched to a stop halfway down the hill, hearing only their barking cries. The crowds below were watching now.

But he had seen his opening.

The Sajaahin were short, stunted, malnourished things.

Poire might have still been a child among his kind, but he’d been raised on a biologist’s diet: hormone streams and machine-induced growth and nutrients regulated down to the molecule. Just like everyone else in his cohort.

Poire growled and started climbing again, half crawling, half running diagonally up the hill. This time, when a guard thrust their weapon at him, he grabbed it. The guard and Poire stared at each other, both in surprise. Then, Poire pulled hard and found that the Sajaahin was light and easy to shove away. The creature went sprawling in the mud, and Poire had the wrench now. He brandished it threateningly.

They paused, unsure of him. Giving him just enough room to rush up the hill.

When he looked down, Poire’s eyes widened. It wasn’t just the guards now. All the Sahaat was coming after him. Thousands of Sajaahin, streaming and shambling in files up the hill. Thousands of fingers and feet squelching in the mud, the drums beating over an ocean of hissing, slobbering voices.

Poire swung the wrench in a wide circle, cutting the air with a whoop. The guards stepped back, and Poire seized the opportunity to make his way to the front of the train. Not that he had a plan. He knew only that he had to go quickly.

Poire ran through the mud, his feet slapping at every step. The train rolled ever so slowly ahead. And when he put his hand on the cold, polished metal of the locomotive, it lurched.

And stopped.

And so did the gathering, shambling crowds.

The light from that huge bulb, that piece of the sunlamp, went dark blue.

A voice, beautiful and crystalline, rang out over the Sahaat. It rolled down the hills and over the tents and out into the darkness of the greater cavern beyond.

“Caution.” It spoke in a firm, digitized tone. “This is a live rail and may cause fatal injury.”

It was the most beautiful sound Poire had heard in days. A vocal fragment of the past. Of home.

All around him and all throughout the Sahaat, the Sajaahin fell to their knees, muddying their robes and gear and not caring at all. They gasped. They murmured and bowed until their faces were pressed into the dirt.

“Caution. This is a live rail and may cause fatal injury. Caution—”

“Silence,” Poire said, and it was so.

Out in the crowds, someone let out a cry of despair.

Poire looked down at them, saw hundreds of hoods and masks and goggles staring up at him. Waiting. And . . .

A low, groaning sound. Three words, repeated over and over. Catching like fire across the crowd.

Ach . . . In . . . Woan . . .

Ach . . . In . . . Woan . . .

They’re praying to the train? Why?

Thousands of them, worshipping a ruined machine that was nothing more than scrap metal.

Poire shook his head, turning his thoughts back to his mission.

The train should have a simple, built-in guide AI. Nothing more than a pathfinding oracle with a rudimentary personality. But, like all the Conclave’s systems, it was connected. Everything down here was supposed to be connected.

Even the humans.

Even Poire, except his wrist implant wasn’t working for some reason.

“Hello,” he said, speaking into the metal hull. Hoping it would recognize him.

The train was sluggish and slow to respond. He could almost hear it shaking off the digital cobwebs of its mind.

“Good afternoon, Poire,” the voice boomed out from the train. “It has been a long time.”

Instead of relief, hearing his name spoken out loud in front of all these watching faces made him feel exposed. Uncomfortable.

“Where is everyone?” Poire asked. “What happened to the city?”

“There are no other signals in the subterrane sections of the Conclave.”

“Then where did they go?”

“ERROR.” An alarm blared, short and sharp, making Poire jump back. And the voice returned: “Information unavailable. Is there something else I can help you with, Poire?”

Poire slammed a fist against the train.

Below, the crowds gasped, surged back as one. Even the guards along the hilltop gripped their weapons tighter.

He closed his eyes, trying to calm himself.

What would Xiaoyun say? he thought. Be in the center, Poire. Let it all flow over you, not through you.

He tried. Worry. And the harder he tried, the more his feelings welled up inside. Fear. Pressing against his skull. Darkness. Aching to get out.

The train interrupted him: “Energy levels: critical. Charge required. This train is now entering standby mode.”

“Wait!” Poire said. “Are there any other signals anywhere? Can you find anyone else?”

“Searching. Broadening search. Searching. Searching.”

The train let out an echoing chime. “Signal found. Marsim Collette is twelve miles away.”

Marsim the soldier? That didn’t make sense. Unless he was here on the director’s request . . .

Or maybe Auster sent him here, Poire thought, though he had never met the founder of the scattered conclaves of Kaia. But why would Auster send a soldier to our conclave?

The train said, “Forwarding coordinates to your personal console.”

“You can’t. My implant isn’t working.”

“You will find Marsim Collette in the east-central sector of the caldera. Thirty seconds until standby mode,” the train added.

The crowds of Sajaahin stirred and rippled apart as two figures pushed through the kneeling, bowing creatures. Two feathered avians, one carrying the other. One hanging limp, covered in blood.

Eolh.

The avian who carried him was tall and well muscled and had a vicious beak that might cut through bone. When the wrench guards tried to stop her from approaching the train, she withered their advances with a regal glare.

Even with the extra weight of Eolh in her arms, the avian climbed up the slick, muddy cliff easily, every sliding step bringing her closer to Poire.

But she stopped halfway down the hill. As if she didn’t want to come any closer. As if she’s afraid of me.

“Divine One,” she called out in a piercing voice. She bowed as deep as she could with Eolh in her arms. “We beseech you. Will you help him?” One of Eolh’s arms was painted red with his own blood. His hand—his whole hand—was gone.

A sick feeling rose in Poire’s throat, followed by a rush of panic.

“We beseech you.”

What am I supposed to do? He thought, trying to breathe, trying to push away that feeling of drowning. His schooling had covered basic first aid, of course, but nothing close to actual medical training. The cultivars were far too focused on the other tests . . .

The avian was frozen in her bow. Waiting for his answer.

“What’s, uh . . .” Poire fumbled. “What’s wrong with him?”

She raised her yellow beak. The tip was polished charcoal and as sharp as the crescent moon.

Now, her muscles strained as she lifted Eolh higher, showing Poire the corvani’s grisly wound. The corvani’s wound was dripping, and pieces of white bone stuck out of torn flesh. Eolh’s chest sank deeper with every ragged breath.

“Please, oh child of the stars. He doesn’t have much time. Help him.”

“How?” Poire said.

And the tall avian furrowed her brow feathers, confused.

“I don’t know how!” Poire shouted.

“Does not the blood of a god have the power to save lives?” she asked. “A single drop, Divine One. That is all I ask.”

What god? Poire thought. Me? How is my blood supposed to help?

Behind him, the train whispered, “Entering standby mode.” Its lights began to dim.

“Wait,” he said.

The train lit back up.

“I can do better,” he said. He turned to the train. “Someone’s been injured.”

“I do not detect any injury,” the train’s AI said.

“Can you dispense medical supplies anyway?”

“ERROR,” the train blared. “You do not have medical privileges.”

Poire grimaced at the Eolh, unsure what to do but desperate to do something for him.

He looked down at the sharpened rod in his hand. Its tip was covered in rust, and wet, filthy dirt streaked its length. A drop of my blood.

He pressed the tip against his palm, feeling the jagged bite of rust. Poire squeezed his eyes shut and ripped the weapon against his skin.

Blood ran across his palm and dribbled down his wrist. How many times had he thought of doing this? He had always been too scared to try. The world started to spin, and Poire held himself steady against the train.

“Injury detected! ERROR. Cannot establish medical connection. Dispensing emergency medical supplies.”

A hidden slot shot out of the train’s hull. The slot was full of dozens of small, slender tubes filled with silvery liquid, each one perfectly laid in place.

And before Poire could do anything else, the train spoke one last time:

“ERROR. Energy level: critical. Entering standby mode. Good . . . bye . . .”

And then, the sunlamp on top of the train went dark. The whole cavern was extinguished.

The distant masses gasped and shuddered as one. For a long moment, all was black. Then, torches and headlights and other illuminants scavenged from Poire’s dead city twinkled to life.

Thousands of faces looking up at him, chanting with renewed wonder.

Ach . . . In . . . Woan . . .

They weren’t praying to the train. They’re praying to me.

Even the tall avian was kneeling before him, cowering in awe beneath his gaze.

So this is what it felt like to be a god.