Original fiction: "Azure" by Steven Francis Murphy

Introduction: Our second story is a tale that brilliantly interweaves two different worlds in a fast paced and engaging narrative.  This is spec fiction writing at its best. - Lou Antonelli
            ---
Winter in the Southern Gulf meant the need for extra layers of fat.  With a net in one hand and a trident in the other, Azure swam with her family in pursuit of rockmouth packed in a tight school.  Behind and to the left her father herded them into a tight mass.  Ahead and to her right her mother and young brother swam a tight orbit.  Two other tribal families worked other parts of the cloud, compressing, herding, bringing in the strays.  Azure's powerful strokes pushed her right to the edge where, with a hand outstretched, she could feel the rockmouth brush against the grey, mottled palm of her hand. 

            Silver rockmouths were half as large as she was, a challenge for dolphins and the People to catch.  Muscular, agile swimmers, their size made them a fine catch.  Just one would fill her aching belly for days.  First there would be the fresh, fine bits of fat and organs, best consumed raw.  Later they would drop down to the vents and boil the tougher pieces of flesh.  What they could not eat would go into the brine pots against the spare weeks ahead.

            Harvest time.

            A glint below captured the Abovelight and held it like a secret.  Distracted, Azure looked down.  When the People first came to sea they lived for a time in the crumbling ruins beneath her.  Better suited to Dry Dwellers, the towers had decayed within, trapping and smothering in the nebulous shafts and passageways.  Food remained well above the structures.  No coral grew upon it, or any other life.  Grey, dirty, and full of sharp teeth, it killed anyone who lingered for long. 

            Azure wanted to go down there, just once.  Distracted, she looked down, her head dipping into the school.

            The rockmouth swarmed around Azure, bumping and thumping into her.  She lost her trident, then her wits, caught in a vortex, flailing against them.  The Rockmouth took their opportunity, rushing out past her through the gap in the tribe's net.  Sucked into their wake, Azure struggled to break free and get back to the tribe.  Twisting and turning, the Rockmouth pulled in tight around her body.

            She couldn't breathe.  Fists balled together, she beat at the mass, lost in the fury.

#

            Patience cannot be programmed, nor does it need to be.  Made by humans to protect humans, it did not take note of their long absence.  Instead, Sentinel Seven performed the daily duty protocol.  Each morning started with a check of the exterior hatch monitor.  Outside dune grass and sand blocked the rusted, steel door.  No one waited outside to come in.  No one pressed the buzzer to request entry. 

            Sentinel Seven selected a zero for negative maintenance presence, the same zero it had selected for years, and progressed with the protocol.  It took note of the faded red and white exterior coating which had faded toward pink and grey.  Another request for a maintenance crew or for the materials to do the work autonomously was sent.

            No one and no thing acknowledged it.

            The air temperature held steady at 25 degrees Celsius with light precipitation along the entire primary zone.  Motion detectors, audio pickups and passive sonar cleared some of the gloom away.  Schools of fish were flagged, tracked and sorted as a distracting data point to be ignored.  Birds skimmed the wave tops, plucking tasty treats out for themselves and their nestlings.  It checked the local media feeds, part of the daily protocol, and heard silence.  Unit Number Three checked in with the other sentinels up and down the beach, also part of the protocol. 

            One signal, Sentinel Forty-Three,  twenty-seven kilometers to the southwest could be detected.  Otherwise, Sentinel Seven alone was responsible for the deserted beaches to the front.  Rolling waves washed onto the sand, bringing up glass bottles, Tupperware cups and tampons.  Turtles and seagulls picked at it all, looking for something to eat.  A trio of humans chased the seagulls away and grabbed the turtles.  None of them wore the proper uniform and thus were disregarded.

            Pleasure cannot be programmed either, or at least the Humans had not foreseen the need.  Cold, emotionless code buzzed, processing the available relevance, discarding the rest.  Sitting in the launch silo, it dismantled a scavenged drive unit and examined each component before reassembling it.   Time's passage had imparted the need to obtain sufficient spares for any contingency.  A check of the sea water tanks showed them to be full, ready for conversion to rocket fuel.  Skeletons, power units, fuel cells and spare optics crammed the other three silos which had formed a machine quartet, Sentinels Five through Eight. 

            The other three were gone now, lost or worn down.  A neighboring silo holding Sentinels One through Four had been destroyed, vandalized by Humans who were not authorized access.  Sentinel Seven had been out on a mission at the time.  Attempts to contact local authorities had been fruitless.  It returned, made a note in the log and surveyed the silo for salvage.  That had been sixteen years ago.

            Planning and strategy, it turned out, could be programmed. 

            A red light winked into existence, unseen.  Sentinel Seven did not need it and never understood why it was there.  It never drew a connection between the object of interest in the primary zone and the red light.  Placing the part it was working on aside, the faded red and white machine stood upright in the workspace.  Focusing on the object, programs spun into action, assessing, matching the object with known profiles.  As it did so, the launch rocket behind it warmed up for action. 

#

            Released by the Rockmouth who continued on to the East, Azure took a moment to catch her breath.  Hovering not far from the Above, she could see rays of light reaching down, faint compared to other days.  Squinting, she tried to get her bearings.  In her head she could already hear her mother and father, the same warnings she received after every mishap, mistake, error, and accident.  If only she wasn't such a dreamer.             

            "Someday," she mouthed to herself, mocking her father, "You are going to get yourself killed."

            Azure could hear panic in her mother's call, the wailing of her brother, and her father's anger. 

            A giggling fit fell over her the moment her father's bearded face emerged in her mind, veins and eyes bulging, his hands roiling the sea into furious foam.  Giggling bubbled into full throated laughter until the fit passed.  She took a deep breath, passing stale seawater over her lungs.  In it was the taint of the Dry Above close by.

            Others called as well, exasperated, annoyed, irritated and concerned.  Their songs roiled the ocean, scattering the rockmouth to the seven seas, leaving her alone. 

            Below her the ruins extended out in all directions, poisoned places once held by Dry Dwellers long since vanished.  Seaweed and coral encrusted structures crafted from stone, steel and driftwood.  Openings protected by shards of clear, brittle material remained to cut and gouge those who wandered close.  Floating above it all, Azure could passageways, canyons in between the towers. 

            She looked down below.

            Skeletons were all that remained of the Dry Dwellers below, lacking a flipper, featuring two strange limbs instead.  Not efficient for swimming though Sages told stories about their ability to swim.  Within their limitations, they were quite capable.  A scavenger had brought back a white stone statue, missing arms, it rested upon a pillar, the unflippers ending in two stumps with malformed hands.  Persistent legends told one and all that the creatures roamed the land above still to this day.  When the world changed, it spawned the People, crafting them from the best materials, discarding the rest. 

            It was a long myth, Azure slept through the myth tellings after a good meal.   

            Below the ruins spread out in every direction beyond the rolling hills covered in coral.  Nothing familiar lurked to provide clues.  Songs of the People echoed and reverberated through the water.  Turning one way, then back to the other, Azure listened.  She thought her mother was behind her, then in front of her.  Her father might have been to her left, then to the right, before calling from the ruins beneath.  She steadied herself, took a deep breath and concentrated.

            Her ears told the same story, they were all around her.  That was impossible.

            Frustrated, Azure headed up to the surface.  Dry land would give her the bearing she needed and she had always wanted to see it anyway.

#

            A Single Contact rose sure and steady.  Performing a 180 degree pivot turn, Sentinel Seven faced the rocket and climbed into the harness which snapped carbon fiber straps over the torso.  Signals passed between the machine and the rocket, handshaking their way to full interface.  Surfing multiplex data streams, it performed the standard pre-sortie checklist.  Well past the expiration date, Sentinel Seven overrode that element of the checklist.  In the neighboring three silos and maintenance bays amid the spare parts were enough one use only launch rockets to sustain another thirty-eight sorties.  It would have to send another resupply request to higher authority when the last rocket was used.

            Seventy meters, then fifty meters, far deeper than such a Contact should be.  Scenario files indicated a wrecked craft, perhaps waterborne or airborne.  Contacts could be attempting to reach the beach or await extraction. 

            Thirty-five meters and climbing, the machine could detect no beacon.  Per protocol, Sentinel Seven contacted the local response units in the region and waited.  The pre-launch checklist processed green, the machine moved onto final checks.

            Twenty-five meters, the Contact was still rising.  Sentinel Seven logged negative contact from local response units.  It informed Sentinel Forty-Three of the Tally and prepared to sortie. 

            The machine calculated the distance, set three projected approach vectors and consulted Air Traffic Control, which also did not respond. 

            At ten meters it opened the silo door, letting the rain bead upon the red and white shell.  It broadcast a readiness signal and sounded the warning siren to clear the launch area.  Birds scattered into the clouds, driving from the sea grass around the rusted chain link fence.  Limbs coiled into flight mode, the machine watched the Contact break the ocean surface.

#

            Her father, at more than one evening meal, reinforced the importance of the rituals for breaking the surface into the Dry Above while Azure doodled crabs and fish into the sand with her fingers.  Menarche had brought pain but also the undeniable pleasure to be found in looking at boys from other families.  When they ate as a tribe, her father's voice became unintelligible.

            Azure, thus, was at a bit of a loss just a body length away from the surface.  Foaming green with upside down peaks and valleys, she had never done this before.

            She took a deep breath, threading the maximum volume of water over her gills before popping through.  Blinking in the pale light, she caught a wave full on in the face, knocking her off balance, arms outstretched into the air.  Exhaling, she tried to catch a second breath when the wave passed, leaving her above surface.  Her lungs filled with unfiltered gasses, reddening her features.  Panic set in alongside the gagging. 

            At that moment, in the struggle to get below the surface and clear her lungs for the pure, wet life she needed, Azure gained a gut level understanding for what dry meant.

#

            The Contact breeched the surface, bobbed and flailed.  Arms waving about, the Contact was scanned, assessed and reassessed. 

            Sortie imminent, Sentinel Seven warned the static filled response net.  Outside the silo an off tune klaxon screamed, frightening seagulls and a quartet of passersby from the rusty, collapsed, chain link fence.  Surveillance cameras tracked their flight from the beach, dropping their trash and scavenged items in their wake. 

            A female, age approximated between ten to fifteen years, struggled alone on the white capped surface, sinking beneath the waves.  No other contacts were in evidence.

            Launch clamps released, umbilicals dropped, the rocket idled.  Final potential trajectories were programmed onboard, each drawing a precise line from the silo to optimal points of impact. 

            A final time her head poked above the surface, face matted with black hair, before catching a wave full on in the face.  The Contact submerged. 

            Autonomy protocols checked for higher clearance, when none was given, the machine took the initiative. 

            Sortie approval. 

            Compressed air shot into the hollow center, shoving the machine twenty meters above the silo.  Hovering for a brief second, the rockets throttled to maximum, creating a column of grey-black smoke, pushing it away from the silo.  Climbing in a parabolic arc, Sentinel Seven passed through the grey storm front, pushing through the mists until it emerged in the Gulf Sun.  The flight computer triggered main engine cutoff and extended the wings for unpowered flight.  Moments later the booster detached and fell away from Sentinel Seven. 

            Coasting on thermals and stored kinetic energy, Sentinel Seven circled until a break in the clouds appeared.  Number sensors fixed the Contact in place for the machine.  Nevertheless, sortie protocol required a visual acquisition before descent.

            Sentinel Seven reacquired the Contact and zeroed in. 

#

            The muffled roar beneath the surface became an all encompassing sound pounding on her eardrums when Azure surfaced again.  Holding her breath this time, she kept blinking in an effort to keep her eyes moist, her vision clear.  A fire born column climbed in a long arc into the sky from the shore in front of her and reached into the clouds. 

            If the shore is ahead of me, she reasoned, then I need only to turn about.

            She turned her back to land and submerged with the intent of leaving it behind. 

#

            Sentinel Seven flattened and spread forth arms for the descent segment, scanning the waves for the Contact.  Networking with surface sensors and sonar buoys in the water, it spotted the Contact as it emerged from the clouds.  Manipulating the wing mode limbs, the machine channeled the air to make impact in close proximity to the Contact.

            Turning away from the shore, the Contact had submerged and was picking up speed.  This did not match any known mission profile.  It did, on the other hand, match recorded responses covering recent sorties.  In the few seconds before hitting the surface, the machine sent a query to higher authority for instructions. 

            There was no response. 

            Firing the retros once, twice, and a third time, it dropped into the water with a gentle plop after shutdown.  Opening the ballast tanks, the machine took on water.  It submerged beneath and activated the search lights. 

#

            Blinded by the grey above, Azure swam into the dark.  Her racing heart hammering in her ears slowed down as her breathing returned to normal.

            Which way was dry land again?  Azure slapped herself in the face.  In the rush to sink back into breathable water she had lost her way.  She listened in the dark for her tribe's calls and sent out a call of her own. 

            Nothing.  No one answered.  Instead, she heard a low whining sound.

            What is that?

            Two blue lights popped into existence, shining down from above her.

            Sages told of the blue light filtering down through the water when one was near land.  By time Azure reached child bearing age she was convinced it was meant to scare children who were prone to getting lost.  More than one parent over the passage of time had lost a child to the fatal shores above.  The ruins near land consumed their portion of offspring as well.  Hubris filled and invincible, she did not give it much heed, preferring to flirt and dose a bit after dinner when the Sages held forth, droning in their traditional low, dull tone. 

            The blue light surprised Azure.  She rolled over onto her back and looked up, blinded, trying to find the source. 

            It was no myth, she realized when she spotted the creature.

            Azure screamed.

#

            Unknown auditory anomaly detected, Sentinel Seven logged.  No one cared, their control centers deserted, left open to the elements and long since shorted out.  Additional units did not launch in support nor did other response agencies signal their readiness.  Without guidance from the scenarios it made the only decision it could, to follow the script in a linear sequential process. 

            The female, it was ninety-five percent certain the Contact was a female, continued to swim away from it.  The swimming alone, controlled and steady, contraindicated the programmed response within the machine's protocols.  In any case, the machine dived further, reaching out for her. 

#

            The monster closed swift and sure toward her.  She had lost her trident but Azure still had her knife, a valuable land forged knife her father had found for her.  Knife drawn in her favored hand, she waited.

            It swam past her, leaving her in a trail of bubbles.

            Never let it get beneath you for it will draw you to the surface where you will perish. 

            Azure pitched head first down, slipping past the machine, swimming with all of her might. 

#

            Over the past one-hundred and thirty-seven years of operation, Sentinel Seven had entered the water many times on solo and combined sorties.  Cross checking the current female with recorded sorties, it noted that she matched with more than seven hundred and sixty-three other mission profiles from Year Twenty-Eight forward to the Present.  Too deep to send a signal for further guidance, the machine continued to descend, pursuing the female.

#

            Azure's body burned from exhaustion.  Each additional tail stroke felt as if she were trapped in a lava flow.  Behind her, the creature came on at the same, measured pace.

            There is no out swimming it, she realized. 

            She stopped swimming and went limp.

#

            The female stopped her rapid progress into the dark depths.  Increasing impeller power the machine pushed to reach her before she descended beyond the point of no return.  Limbs opened on the torso and reached out, extending with a pneumatic clack. 

            Three meters to contact.

            Chest movement continued, another anomaly which did not match with established mission profiles.  At this depth there should be no movement at all.  The drowning process would have brought that to a halt. 

            One meter. 

            It changed the exterior lights to a soft blue glow and embraced the female.

#

            The pounding in her chest would not stop.  A grinding sound filled the water, along with a gaseous hiss followed by two loud pops.  She flipped the knife round in her hand, opened her eyes and saw the red-white thing looming above.  Like a crab, it had a hard shell.  Unlike a crab, there were gaps in the hard shell where the arms were at. 

            With all of her strength, she stabbed straight into the right arm pit.

#

            Right limb failure, a damage control protocol reported.  Control cable severed. 

            Vandalism and intentional damage of a machine was a felony offense, punishable by five years in prison.  When it reached the surface, the machine would alert the proper authorities.  For now it could get by with one limb, locking firm into place behind the female's back. 

            One secured, it was time to return to the surface for the third phase. 

#

            Azure was pinned in place tight, her chest compressed to the point where it was difficult to get a breath in.  She stabbed at the hard shell, searching for a soft spot, hitting the shell hard enough to lose her grip on the knife.  It slipped between her fingers, down into the ruins from Once Above.  One of the limbs fluttered on the creature, limp, flapping up and down.  She reached inside and felt around. 

#

            Ascension in progress, the machine reported, request additional assistance. 

            The only other sentinel, some twenty-seven kilometers out, acknowledged and declined.  It sent a fuel report along with a mission protocol statement forbidding it to abandon their primary zone.

            No one, nothing else, responded. 

            A warning indicator ticked over.  The female had shoved her hand into the gap between the right limb and the torso.  With the limb floating free it could snap down and break her forearm, causing more problems. 

#

            Azure grabbed hold of something, a muscle, perhaps a vein.  She pulled hard. 

#

            Female is combative, the mission protocols clarified.  Take the proper precautions. 

            Sentinel Seven released the female at precise moment she pulled on the hydraulic cable.  Fluid spilled into the ocean around them as she fell back and away.

            Toxicity hazard, the damage control center reported, hydraulic pressure dropping. 

            The female continued to descend, out of the toxic cloud of hydraulic fluid. 

            Mission outcome non optimal for survival, the machine decided.  Without additional assistance or immediate repairs, it would succumb to the damage it had sustained.  A decision was needed.

            It clamped off the line leading back to the hydraulic reservoir and detached the affected limb.  A pop and a hiss severed the broken part which continued to spew fluid.  The machine resumed the ascent as the limb sank alongside the female.

#

            Freed from the creature's grip, Azure swam for the depths to get some distance.  Exhausted, she did not get far before turning Aboveward to see the severed, hard shelled limb floating down to her. 

            Eyes and skin burning, she remembered the Sage's warning too late.  Azure pushed away, blinking and rubbing at herself, trying to get the searing pain to stop.  In her blind swimming, she bumped into someone.  A male voice began to sing, soft, calm, the voice of her father.  He took her in his arms and pulled her away.

#

            Sentinel Seven propelled itself back to shore, wave riding the tides to conserve power.  There was no guilt or sense of failure, only rumination upon the latest sortie.  The Contact matched the profiles of some sixty-three previous sorties out to a drowning victim in the surf or further out into Gulf of Mexico. 

            Floating past deserted food barges and listing steel hulled ships, the ruminations showed that it had executed forty-three successful extractions, some at record depths.  They were all brought to the surface where medical diagnostic programs had ascertained that the drowning process was in the advanced stages.  Early intervention was needed in every case. 

            The machine did what it was programmed to do.  Intubated the victim and provided one hundred percent oxygen. 

            Depth detectors found the sandy bottom on the approach to Corpus Christi Bay.  The machine dropped treads into the sand and rolled up out of the crashing surf.  It rolled past discarded automatic external defibrillator pads, epi pens and at last, strange skeletons.  Skins turned to leather stretched tight across bleached bone, all ending in a single lower limb. 

            If it wondered why Emergency Services had not come to collect them, it gave no indication.  Once the victims expired it waited by each body until it was evident that the primary mission was in jeopardy.  Then it would return to the silo for another mission. 

            Sentinel Seven had repairs to make and drowning people to save. 

#

            Azure nuzzled her mother's breast and hugged her tight.  Monster blood still burned on her face and arms.  Her mother swayed back and forth with the currents, working her way back to camp. 

            She felt her father's hand at her neck, calloused, thick and strong.  Her mother let her loose as Azure swam under her own power.  Biting down hard, she searched his face for the telltale ticks of anger.  Instead, his face was slack, soft, bearing a rare smile.

            Her father held up severed pink and grey limb from the monster.  A bit of whale hide covered the poisonous severed end.

            "You never listened," he said.

            "I remembered enough," she replied.   

            He nodded.  "Today, you will rest.  Tomorrow, you will join with me."

            "For the harvest?" she asked, reaching for the flat, turtle fin limb.  At the end she found a set of iron fingers clenched in a fist. 

            "No, tomorrow is for warriors," he laughed.  "The harvest is finished for now.  Bring your trophy.  You have much to tell us, my daughter." 

THE END

About the Author: This story was written by a community college history professor, who works as a lifeguard.  With more than a hundred and fifty-six saves to date, of homo sapiens, he knows a thing or two about the water.  However, he once served as a soldier in the U.S. Army Signal Corps during a minor war, which means he probably knows a thing or two about how fickle machinery can be, especially when it has a mind of its own.  He lives in Kansas City, Missouri, is deeply attached to the love of his life, Cindy Marie, and he has a dog too, her name is Abbie.  He thinks KC BBQ is better than your barbecue, and ever so often, he writes science fiction.
And he is really happy Lou bought this story too.