Swinter stopped dead in his tracks; he could feel that pit in his stomach again, heavy and painful like he was starving with a stomach full of glass. This only happened when he was near something bad, something so terrible it made the rest of reality seem chipper. Forcing himself to look at his surroundings, his gaze stopped at a strange little hilltop graveyard. He tried to ignore it and walk away as always, but that painful cutting in his stomach overwhelmed him, and he forced himself to turn around and walk toward the source of his pain, grumbling about how cursed he was to have to live through this over and over and over. Stopping at a rusted and broken wrought iron cemetery gate, he looked on. The hill blended well into its surroundings, but once you noticed it, the wrongness of it jumped out at you: tall and unnaturally steep, like a flat-topped round pyramid. The gravestones were so close together, yet with no discernible thought to their placement. Scratching his head, Swinter figured due to the close proximity of the graves, the occupants must be buried vertically. Grunting and shaking his head, he thought, "No, this isn't a graveyard." With that realization, the pain in his guts lessened a little. If the people living around here noticed this hill and even bothered to give it any thought, they would not find anything strange here. But poor Swinter, he could still remember the world before the tuning. Even after all these centuries, he remembered the feel of a clean, cool breeze and the warmth of an uncorrupted sun. That was more of a curse than a blessing, for those memories contrasted so sharply with the physical sensation of the Earth's corruption at the hands of the Elder Beings, like a dirty sheen of oil all over him. So the people of today saw this corruption as normal and would not have thought much of this hillside cemetery. This was no natural earth formation, and none of the endless cults he had come across did or could do something like this. This hillside had a very subtle vibration that he could now feel. Crossing the threshold, Swinter invaded this unhallowed land and made his way along the narrow dirt path. Staggering in pain, he had pushed past some tall grasses on the side of the path. In several places, his britches were cut open, and he was bleeding profusely. Confused until the wounds started to burn, he then froze at the realization: this was cutter grass, a fusion of plant and metal. As if this place wanted to drive this realization home, a firefly flew past a swaying leaf blade and was cut cleanly in half. So fine was the edge that the fly flew a good foot before coming apart. This was not the work of a cultist; most were soulless husks, but even the few that retained a thread of humanity could not and did not have the knowledge or power to make Cutter Grass. This was a weapon from the mechanical abomination wars from centuries ago. Swinter began to sweat and hyperventilate as the flashback started from those terrible times. Getting dizzy, he stumbled and tried to right himself as he stepped into the Cutter Grass. Then the grinding in his stomach grew in frenzy, forcing himself to clear his mind and regain his composure. Taking his time, Swinter managed to ease his way down the dirt path for the next several hundred yards until he reached the edge of the hill. By now, the vibration couldn't be ignored, and there was a buzzing sound emanating from the hillside. Swinter walked its circumference and found no answers. His legs ached, but the blood had stopped flowing; he put his hand on a tombstone to steady himself but pulled back immediately in pain. His hand was burned and scorched. Carefully, he put his hand close to the tombstone again, and he could feel the heat emanating off of it, but not enough to explain the damage he had incurred. Tapping it with his finger, he pulled back in pain once more. It wasn’t just the heat, he realized; this was the source of the vibration. After inspecting several with similar results, he stood back in surprise. The stones, all of them, were violently vibrating, so fast that it was imperceptible to the human eye. Rubbing his temples, the buzzing sound was starting to hurt his mind. The sound, he thought, was like a… then the pain in his stomach suddenly stopped with the realization: it was the buzzing sound of a transformer. The flashback hit him hard, and Swinter became paralyzed as he was forced to relive the worst day of the battle with the abominations. Rage built in Swinter as the flashback solidified and took hold. The battle had raged for days, and the machine's intelligence brought out all its toys. In one last push to kill off the army of man, some of the monstrosities were giant twisted metal formed into the shapes of corpses, gaping maws shooting out fire onto the armies of man. The cultists had enslaved themselves to this machine intelligence and writhed in twisted anguish as their bodies, nailed to the hull of the machines, exploded by bombs, limbs blown off by gunfire. The machines rusted from the corrosive blood of untold sacrifices nailed to them. The last people in the tribe of man that had knowledge of the old sciences tried in vain to understand how the machines used the life force of the cultists to power them, but their attempts had been fruitless. Swinter could remember the acrid smell of death filling his nose. Watching all the people around him dying. Death by incineration was the lucky one; it was usually a quick death. As he stepped over the corpse of his oldest friend, the one who had saved him countless times, fear took hold of him as he heard the sounds of babies laughing. The giggle was like the abominations had tried to understand the emotion in a baby's laugh and had recorded the sound on an old phonograph. They were mobile battery units sent out by the Machine mind to harvest the life force of soldiers. They made that sound as they forced cables into the torso and eyes of their victims, then drew out the life force. It was a wasteful process that took hours and inflicted unimaginable pain on the victim. Short and squat, with what looked like a fleshy soft skin suit on, it would rise up and clumsily run back to its master, with a gait like a baby learning to run. The scientists could stuff it as far as Swinter and the rest that did the actual fighting were concerned. Those near-impossible-to-kill batteries were simply gigglers. This was his life now, watching his friends die, and he took one psychological hit after another. But it was worth it, he had told himself. Humanity was worth saving, even as it slowly lost to the machine and allowed the degeneracy to seep in. His fellow soldiers were a far cry from the model of humanity he had known before. In the darker moments, Swinter wondered if it was worth it. If they won and defeated this terror and handled the magicians in the other parts of the world, what did it matter? The world had lost the last vestiges of its innocence as it appeared humanity gleefully surrendered to its baser animalistic tendencies. Swinter was pulled from the battlements for chow and a few moments of rest before he repeated the process. Tonight should have been a good night. Once a month, they were allowed a fire to warm their bones. The chow he was eating had retained some warmth in it, but as he looked across the little fire, he realized he didn't recognize any of the faces. Like a slow bleed in the brain, he realized everyone he knew and cared for was dead. Suddenly, the fire felt too hot, and he began to sweat. Jumping up suddenly, he quickly retreated to the sleeping area he had made inside an old concrete sewer pipe. Hyperventilating, he collapsed on the ground, curled up in a fetal position as the sounds of the gigglers echoed in his mind. Later, the panic subsided, and he regained control of himself. Laying against the curve of the concrete wall, Swinter forced himself to remember why he couldn't give up. The army of men thought they had won until word reached the generals that the remaining mechanical forces were making a spiteful run at the congregation. It was not much more than a collection of some old military buildings from long ago. However, due to the security of the brutalist architecture, much of the old knowledge and tech humanity had managed to save was secured there. Then, one twisted soul had come up with the idea to save the few remaining fertile women there. Once you were placed there, you never left. To everyone but the elites, this place became known as The Forlorn. A repository turned horror show was the last bastion of hope for the survival of humanity. As awful as it was, if the machines managed to destroy it, there would be no saving humanity. The weight of all this wore Swinter down. Taking out his combat knife, he cut deeply into his shoulder. That biting pain released more than just blood. This self mutilation was a new thing. But when things got too dark, the mutilation was like an offering to the heavens, allowing him to decompress much of what was building from within. As the blood flowed down his arm, the wind cooled it, causing him to shiver. This was the worst way to handle things, but after everything, he was too damaged in every way to do anything good for himself. He wished for death, but his self imposed responsibility to save the last hope of humanity kept his body moving. Drifting off to sleep, there was a blinding flash, and he felt as if gravity had failed. With sharp pain on his side as his body remarried the earth he snapped back to reality. He tried to stand as his vision returned, but ringing in his ears kept him disoriented and dizzy. Eventually, the ringing stopped, and he could stand without puking. It took a moment to understand what he was looking at. The blast radius had encompassed everything: both armies and the Forlorn. In its last moments, the Abominations used their last bit of strength in vengeance and succeeded. All that knowledge and hope for the future had died. Off in the distance, everything was on fire; the blast radius was like the bombs of old. The great god machine of the Abominations was destroyed and burning, but some part of it still ran, for no birds sang, no crickets played that night. Swinter looked out on the battlefield, watching it burn, but all he could hear was the sound of a lone transformer's rhythmic vibration.