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Part II

A Nerevarine, no longer within an Akulakhan, directed the souls of a cloud of cliffracers into Anumidium. As the brass fists smote the glowing ghosts, the Nerevarine held up Azura’s Star. With a wail, a ghost with flaming hair and twin swords of light tore into existence to fight the robot.

Is that me?

You sound shocked Ayem. A lot of them use your soul in one way or another

An Akulakhan, covered in mirrored plates, shown even though the sun was blocked by ash. Every blow the Anumidium hit upon the mirrors was reflected back onto itself. The Akulakhan stood undented, hitting brass mecha with fist and knee. Broken and leaking oil, the Anumidium still stood. If it gripped Akulakhan it gripped itself, and if it shouted at Akulakhan it shouted at itself. Words of Dreaming and of Enlightenment surrounded every mirror, protecting them from Anumidium’s world-refusals. Still, Akulakhan could not beat Walking Brass into the ground.

Both of the demigod robots were smushed under the foot of the Tribunal as they grew in size and rushed to stand beneath the falling, glowing Anumidium falling from the sky. They raised their three-in-one arms, and with flat palms, greeted Anumidium. The earth below their feet shattered, throwing bones into the air. Divine knees buckled, thunder echoing at the sudden tension. With an exhale of calm, the Tribunal stood fast. The Anumidium’s falling body was halted on top of a tower of Divinity. The massive brass limbs continued their downward flight, but ended before they hit the ground; still, their force caused the ash to clear. The sun shown brightly over brass skinned moon. Beneath its shadow, the Tribunal stood, and beneath them both, fights continued.

Nerevarine shook, a buzz of energy that grew as each other Nerevarine eventually met their end. Within Akulakhan, Nerevarine prepared a spell and slung it through Akulakhan. A fire ball made of all fires smote the middle of the Anumidium before it; the oil caught, and the Anumidium burned from the inside out. Anumidium made a tone, but Nerevarine made fifteen and one and two. Anumidium paused in confusion to listen, and was finished before it realized the trick.

In another spot, the battle took another form. Anumidium shouted, and Akulakhan grabbed the shouts and put them into itself, for it was a circle made of hard strings and flowing water. When Anumidium struck it’s adversary, a word would escape and the blow never hit. Made of water and strings, the Akulakhan sought not to defeat Anumidium with strength, but by gathering as many NOs as possible and then unleashing them all upon Anumidium. Occasionally when Anumidium landed a blow, and refused the refusal of it’s blow, the loop of shouts made the Akulakhan lose a number of its vibrations, but within the ever pressing conflict around Nirn the strings did not want for input.

Underneath the Tribunal’s foot, Anumidium was broken, but not completely shattered. It shoved its hands into the Tribunal’s foot and gripped at the Divine with more than physical hands.

NO

it demanded, and Seht was gone. The giant-form was out of balance within itself, and no longer walked on clockwork words. Divine knees did not buckle but instead fell apart. Anumidium, once held by the Tribunal, continued it’s fall as though it was never stopped. The falling members of the Tribunal were caught in the flames of the burning atmosphere and were ripped apart by fire, pressure, and gravity.

When Anumidium fell onto the land, Nirn shattered. Water, where ever it still remained, was either flung off into Oblivion or boiled. Most of the steam and ash in the air was flung off into empty space. Cracks in the earth became running torrents of lava, and the snow that had never before been water but only tears melted and evaporated. Any remaining life on the planet was destroyed, and only demigod robots and the pilot of the Akulakhans still fought on those hunks of rock that were still solid enough for metal feet to land. There was a hole in Nirn that lead to it’s core.

A noise like a clock the size of a moon ticking resounded, reverberating in every ear within Mundus. The hole disappeared and golden Clockwork was in it’s place. At the border of the disappearance lava ceased to be. Blue lines of equations that could not be understood revolved over the face of the Clockwork City, feeding each other input.

On the surface of the red moon, two pairs of eyes opened. No time had passed since their closing, and they witnessed the land above them break. Tears ducts, for a multitude of different reasons, clenched tight against the seething rivers pushing upwards.

“I can’t feel Seht _I can’t feel Seht! Vivec!_”

“Calm yourself,”

“I CAN’T FEEL SEHT! SO-T-HA SIL!”

“Lexie!”

“_HE DOES NOT RESPOND!_”

“ALMA PLEASE!” Vehk shouted, perturbed. “I need silence for a moment.” The dual-toned God concentrated for a moment, closing his eyes. Ayem paced in front of him, her eyes wide and her lips trembling with fear and fury. Vivec opened his eyes look at nothing.

“Well?”

“He’s still there.”

“_Where?_”

“There,” Vivec said without emotion, opening his arms as to embrace the half red, half gold planet above them. The Clockwork moved without qualm. “He’s there. I don’t think,” Vivec said quietly, “that he’s going to speak. I don’t know if he can anymore.”

Ayem’s shoulders tensed together. She stared at the ruined planet, at the moving blue lines of math. Fury seized her and with rage she grew seventeen times, gathered lightning in her hand from nowhere and threw it into Oblivion at the planet were war between demigod robots was still waged. Vivec grew too, and held Ayem close to him.

“Time is broken, and is breaking further. We’ll find a Seht,” he said.

“But not our Seht,” she replied through gritted teeth. Tears like stars trembled on her lower eyelids, but did not streak down her perfect mer face.

“Maybe,” admitted Vivec quietly. “Maybe not. Maybe soon that term, ours, won’t matter anymore. Every refusal wrecks it.” Almalexia turned away from the planet and hugged the Vehk and Vehk tightly for a moment.

“Let us go attend to the arrivals.”

For some the trip was nigh instant, but for most it was days, not hours, and for many it was months, and for a few, years. Oblivion around Mundus was breaking, and Time was broken, and everyone experienced the flight differently. They came to the surface of the Moons, where still Terror waged furious battle with those that sought to beat it somehow, or to only take it away from the vessels that approached and thus save more innocents.

The first face that most saw upon landfall was a golden one, and in black robes the Altmer hurried the refugees down into their new lunar home. Thus the moments passed, in fear and in haste, every heartbeat in the mouths of those that had witness the NO of Walking Brass. Flying Brass. Unbeatable Brass. Unrelenting Brass.

The cosmic shattering continued, and Nirn above them was sometimes more golden clockwork than melting land, as it fought to maintain what it could. Aside from the Altmer and those that went to fight the Anumidium on the moon, only the cats ever came out from the tunnels. They came to flash beacons between Jone and Jode, and to farm light from the surfaces of the lunar landscape.

Then, with hair brighter than fire, Almalexia descended on the Altmeri leader as they lead a group of Dunmer toward the tunnels, and placed a hand on her shoulder. Behind the Goddess hovered the Two-Toned God, a spear in one hand and a book in the other. He was cross legged, and staring at nothing mortal eyes could see. Aside from the Altmer who Almalexia was talking to, everyone else there got on their knees and faces.

“You brought this upon us,” Almalexia said to the green-blue eyes of the Altmer. “Man was the temporal myth, but Man is longer. Only Mer remain. The Hist have fled with their army, those few that survived.”

“What would you have me do, Seat of Mercy?” asked the Altmer, making a hidden plea. “No one can fight that golem. It refuses to be beaten.”

“Your most powerful mages made use of math, of lines of logic. They held fast for centuries.”

“And lost the fight!” came the urgent reply. “It warps logic and breaks it, there is no way to tell the thing that since we have folded the Echo this way, it must cease to be, or that because words are faster than sand, its fists are made of glass!”

“I have seen, mortal,” said Almalexia, her eyes narrowing at the outburst, “that some things even Anumidium cannot refuse. When it tried to refuse my brother, Sotha Sil, it was unable. If he was not busy maintaining Nirn right now, he’d be here now.”

“We are not Living Gods,” the Altmer replied, “and we are too easily slain. If the Tribunal is safe from refusal, then why do you not go fight it.”

“Do not be impertinent,” Vivec said, turning his eyes away from Memory to the Altmer. “Know we are not enough, and let that be enough.”

“My apologies Lord Vivec,” the Altmer said, not moving to make a bow due to Almalexia’s hand still on her shoulder. “Still, I know not what you would ask of us.”

“You brought this upon us,” Vivec said, “so take care of your mess.”

“It cannot refuse that which it is,” Almalexia continued, “and you can mirror it.”

“You’re joking,” the Altmer replied, shocked.

“I am not,” Almalexia said gravely.

Part IV