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“…weren’t we supposed to create her for attacking the Nation of Sin?”
“Yeah. This is — a prototype.”
“Uh-huh. Sure. …Remind me again why you decided to make the most powerful enforcer a little girl?”
“…Have you forgotten?”
“… Oh. Forte—”
“If our parents were still alive, that unborn child would be around ten years old now.”
“…And also ‘cause you’re deeply sadistic and the sight of a kid brutally murderin’ people amuses you like nothing else.”
“Heh. Perhaps.”
“We’re really fucked up, huh.”
“Just a bit.”
“What’s her name, anyway?”
“Her name is—”
She opens her eyes.
“I’m Makina, hi!”
The two men in front of her look really similar, as if there’s a mirror between them. The man with frigid eyes and a thin mouth kneels down in front of her. His hand reaches out and rests on her hair, underneath her hood. There’s a smile on his face. Behind him, the other man, whose eyes are wild, grins at her. The first man removes his hand and rests it on his knee.
“Hi, Makina,” he says. “It’s a pleasure to make your acquaintance.”
The two men are called Assid and Forte, and they’re just like her! They’re good people who want to get rid of all the baddies in the world, of all the transgressors who’ve sinned. They say that she can have as much fun with them as she wants!
And she has a lot! None of them are very good at tag, or hide-and-seek, or even catch — they always shout too much and give themselves away, and no matter how huge she makes her wrecking ball, they never catch it. Her least favourite part is cleaning up afterwards. Assid uses water artes, so he usually helps her with that, but it’s still icky scrubbing the red liquid and the strange squishy skin off herself and her weapon. Humans feel so weird.
Most humans seem to hate bleeding, but the more of it that he has over him, the wider Assid’s grin is. She’s glad he’s having as much fun as she is! Playtime is always more enjoyable when you have a friend.
Forte rarely joins them. He says he has research to do — whatever that is, it doesn’t sound nearly as cool — but the few times that he does, he grins even wider than Assid does. He likes to drag out playtime for as long as possible, his eyes sparkling even as the bad guys are barely breathing and begging for death.
Everyone has fun! It’s great!
It’s been a few weeks since she woke up, and today, she and Assid are playing with some transgressors near Kio. These ones aren’t being very nice — they’re angry, with hammers and swords and all sorts of big weapons. Most transgressors don’t even try to fight back.
She’s only doing what the world wants! If people didn’t want transgressors to die, she wouldn’t be out here! She's the personification of the world's desires, after all.
Who knows better than she does? No one!
Who knows what the world wants more than she does? No one!
Still, despite their skill at her favourite games, it doesn’t take long until they’re down to the last few. Makina skips over to a woman who’s trembling on the ground, vomit smeared around her mouth and shirt after Assid had whacked her in the stomach. She looks so ugly, and yet she’s still clinging to life.
Makina doesn’t get it. She’s a sinner. Sinners have to die!
“Get away from me, you — you monster!” she screams.
“Huh?” Makina rests her hands on her head with a smile. “I’m not the one who murdered an old lady!”
Her face blanches. “That’s — that’s not the full story, I — I didn’t—”
“GET AWAY FROM MY SISTER!”
Something hard bangs into Makina’s leg. She cries and trips onto the ground, her skin burning. How rude!
Before she can do anything, though, the blunt head of Assid’s longstaff juts out of her attacker’s chest. She yelps and wheezes, blood spraying out of her mouth before she falls limp. The axe in her hand clangs against the ground. It takes Assid a few seconds to wrench out his weapon with a grunt — he must have pushed it in really hard!
The other woman yells something Makina can’t understand — her attacker’s name, maybe — but Assid smashes her face in. He brings his longstaff down once, twice, three times; Makina has to close her eyes and scrub away the splashes and speckles of flesh that land on her face, again and again and again.
She keeps them shut until nothing more flies on her face. When she opens them, it’s to the sight of the two transgressors' bodies utterly ruined. Makina can’t make out their faces or their clothing or anything. It’s all covered in red and missing lots of chunks.
She claps her hands and grins. “Great smooshing, mister!”
Assid doesn’t seem to hear her at first; he’s hunched over their bodies, heavy breaths heaving out of him, his longstaff buried in the woman’s stomach. He blinks, startles, and it’s as though someone flipped a magic lamp on; he looks at her with a cheek-splitting grin, eyes like tiny pinpoints. “Thanks—” He looks down and his eyebrows sharply narrow. “—hey, your leg, that’s…”
“Huh..?” Makina tries lifting it, but something sharp shrieks through her body and makes her bite her lip. Wetness springs to her eyes. It doesn't feel nice . “Am I… broken?”
Assid crouches down next to her, his longstaff tucked under his arm. He pulls a face. “Oh… ouchie.” She doesn’t like seeing him when he’s not smiling, especially not when his lips are thin and his eyebrows are drawn together, but for some reason, the solid white jutting out of her leg is making it impossible to speak. “Yeah, that’s. Uh. That’s not good. Hold on—”
His arms go underneath her, one under her knees, another around her back, and she’s lifted into the air. It’s weird to see Assid — who’s always having even more fun than she does, always grinning and happy — holding her with such gentleness and frowning.
He’s warm. Makina leans into him, her head resting against his chest, letting out a sigh. There’s a lot of blood on him and it’s getting over her, but it's from sinners, so it’s okay! They’d never hurt innocent people. Having it on her is just a reward.
“Forte knows some healing artes, don’t worry. We’ll get you patched up.”
“But I wanna play…”
“You can play when you don’t have any broken bones.”
“Huh?” Makina cranes her neck to try to see her leg, but she’s so tired. She ends up flopping against Assid again. “What’s that?”
“It’s…” She hears him hum. “You have bones inside you, right?” A pause. “I mean, you’re literally made of mana, but I think you do? I dunno. Forte’s the intellectual one.” He coughs. “Anyway. You can’t play when you’re in pain. We’ll get you to our bro; he’ll patch up your boo-boos in no time, and then we can play with the transgressors all you want.”
“Pain…” Strange noises start to come out of her mouth, like the ache in her leg is worming its way up through her throat. There’s wet clear liquid trickling down her cheeks. Bodies are strange. “Is that what this is?”
“Yeah.”
“It hurts.”
Assid lets out a noise that she thinks is meant to be happy, but he sounds all choked up, the same way she’s feeling. His chest rattles. “You’ve got no idea, kid.”
Speaking’s hard, so Makina closes her eyes and listens to the clicking of Assid’s heels against the ground, to the thudding of his heart — it’s way quicker than a normal heart should be, she’s pretty sure, and his palms are really sweaty, but she doesn’t have energy to ask.
The sky is turning orange by the time they find Forte. He’s knelt down in front of a pile of wood, staff in one hand, a circle of symbols underneath him as fire zips across his finger. He tilts his head towards them — and then stands upright with a slight noise, the ground underneath returning to normal. The wood smoulders and hacks out ash, but it stays dry.
“What—”
“Transgressors turned out to be a wee bit nastier than we expected,” Assid says. “You mind healin’ her?”
“You could have left her to die,” Forte replies. Makina doesn’t know why her chest tightens. “It’s not difficult to make another one.”
“C’mon, no need for the tough guy act.”
Forte rolls his visible eye, saying nothing. Assid lowers her down to the ground and tugs her hood down. His hand lingers in the air before he brushes back her fringe. Forte gives him a look; tutting, Assid leans over and grabs one of the smaller sticks from the pile.
It’s like the two of them can talk without words, which is really cool. Can they read minds?
“If we could read minds,” drifts Forte’s taut voice, “the world would be a much easier place.”
Oops. Did she say that out loud?
“Open your mouth and bite down on this.” Assid holds the stick over her. Confused, Makina follows his instructions regardless. Her playmates wouldn’t hurt her. They’re all good people!
The wood tastes of smoke. Icky! She wants to spit it out, but she clenches her teeth instead.
“Trust me, you don’t want to almost bite off your own tongue.” Assid’s voice is wry. He’s giving her a smile, but it doesn’t reach his shining eye at all. “Speaking from firsthand experience? It hurts like a son of a bi—”
“Language.”
“She’s a concentration of mana!”
“In the form of a child.”
Assid rolls his eye, but his smile’s reaching it now. His shoulders lower as he flops down on the ground next to Makina. He wiggles his hand under hers and grips it. “You get so captious about the weirdest of shi—”
BOINK, goes Forte’s staff against the top of Assid’s head. Assid grumbles and rubs at it, but he’s still grinning. If it wasn’t for the block of wood Makina knows she has to keep in her mouth, she would have giggled.
Forte pulls back his weapon, a slight smirk tugging his features. He looks down at Makina and he’s frowning again. Makina doesn’t like making good people look like that.
“Squeeze my hand if you need to,” Assid whispers. “Resetting bone always hurts.”
“That it does.” Forte puts down his staff. The purple orb embedded in its head stares at Makina. She glances away. “Healing artes are not my speciality, I’m afraid. I learnt them more out of necessity than natural aptitude.”
“Hey, don’t look at me like that…”
Forte peels off his gloves. There are a lot of dark burnt patches on his hands, like dried versions of the wounds Makina’s beams leave on transgressors. Some of them creep around his fingers. He flexes them — a minute wince crosses his face, so quick that Makina would have missed it if she hadn’t been looking — before he brings them to rest just over the bone sticking out of her.
It should probably feel weirder, having parts of her body not where they’re meant to be.
“This is going to hurt,” Forte warns. He pulls his lips in and pushes down and Makina’s world goes white.
When she comes to, Forte gives Makina a weird green gel — his gloves are back on — and says that she did a really good job. She spent it unconscious, so she’s not sure how she did anything, but the gel is tasty, so she doesn’t complain. She nibbles on it as he and Assid work on setting up camp for the night. They always move around as if they’re one person in two different bodies, never getting in the other’s way, effortlessly maneuvering around each other.
She can’t imagine having someone like that. It seems… nice.
Her leg’s looking a lot better. She can’t see any more white, at least. Her skin’s still a bit red, and there’s a zig-zag mark across where everything had been wrong, but it’s all right now! It only aches a little, the same way her knees did when she kept on tripping over stuff after she first woke up.
Forte cooks her a baked potato — her favourite! — and then he and Assid squabble for ages before Forte makes sushi and throws a roll at Assid’s head. Afterwards, he makes some egg over rice while Assid picks seaweed and sticky rice out of his hair, handing it to him in a bowl before they all settle down together to eat.
They’re weird.
As soon as they’re done, Assid pulls his bedroll up around him and wishes them good night before rolling over, his back to them. Forte gathers the empty bowls in his hands and then just… sits there. He only moves when Makina curls up next to him, pulling her blanket around herself. Even then, he just looks down at her with a raised eyebrow. He doesn’t move away from her, which is good, because he’s really warm.
“Why do you need to sleep?” she whispers. She knows that speaking in a low voice when people are sleeping is polite. Assid startles at the smallest of sounds and Forte wakes up screaming a lot of nights, well before morning. He always looks pale and sweaty, but he never answers Makina when she asks about it, so she’s stopped doing so.
"Us humans don't have infinite energy." Forte leans over Assid and places the bowls down before sitting back. "Sleeping is our way of regenerating it."
"Huh…" Makina pulls her face. "It sounds scary. People could bash and mash and smash you and you'd never know!"
Forte makes a low rumbling noise in the back of his throat. He's laughing! Makina knows what that is! "Yes, well. We're both light sleepers. Besides, the goddess is watching over us."
Makina nods. "Uh-huh!" She doesn't really get any of this 'goddess' stuff, but she knows that Assid and Forte especially really really like her, so Makina likes her too! "Only bad people try to attack other people when they're regenerating!"
"Indeed."
"Why don't I need sleep, though?" Makina hums. "I look the same as you.'
“You’re not the same as us,” Forte says. “Assid and I were born from our parents. You were created by us, from an amalgamation of mana from people’s prayers for justice.”
Makina tips her head. “Are you my parents?”
Forte’s nose wrinkles. “Goddess, no. Absolutely not.”
“But you created me..?”
Forte rests his hand on his chest and mutters something that sounds like “goddess protect me.”
The lump next to him is shaking. Forte thuds it with his fist.
“Stop laughing.”
“I’m sleeping!”
“No you are not.”
“Oh, I definitely am now. I am not giving Makina the cawcaws and the bees talk.”
“Traitor,” Forte mumbles, but he doesn't sound annoyed.
Makina doesn’t have any idea what they’re talking about, but Forte’s smile is impossibly fond. It’s as though the sun is shining out of him.
Assid rolls back over, quietly laughing. “Yeah, yeah. Good night, Forte. You too, Makina.”
“Night, Assid.”
“Good night!” Makina chirps.
Silence falls over them. Makina’s happy with that; she picks out another green gel from Forte’s item bag and snacks on it. She’s thinking.
She waits until Assid starts making a quiet, consistent rumbling noise that she knows is called ‘snoring’. She finishes off her snack and nudges Forte gently. He’s resting his head on top of his crossed arms, his knees pulled up to his chest, eye foggy. He looks… oddly child-like, but he sits up straight when she touches him.
“What is it?” He sounds tired. Makina will let him sleep soon; he must need to recharge!
“Is Assid a really fun playmate?”
Forte frowns down at her. “Pardon?”
She doesn’t get why he looks so confused. “You both play around a lot, and he makes you really happy.” What other word would she use?
“Assid is my brother,” Forte replies. The flickering flames luminate the slight smile on his face as he looks up at the sky. Makina follows his gaze, but she doesn’t get the appeal. All she can see are lots of tiny white dots and a larger one high in the sky, partly hidden behind clouds. “Despite his many flaws, I love him more than anything else in this wretched world. I don’t know what I would do without him.”
“What’s a brother?”
Forte raises his visible eyebrow. “You have a lot of questions tonight, don’t you?” Before Makina can say sorry, he drops his arm to his side with a quiet sigh. “Assid is a man and we have the same parents. Thus, we’re brothers."
Makina bites her lip. “...What’s a sister?”
“If Assid was a woman, he’d be my sister.”
“What if Assid wasn’t a man or a woman?”
“Then he’d be my sibling.”
“Huh…” Makina rests her fist on the side of her head. She can feel it starting to ache. “You humans have so many words.”
A low laugh comes from Forte’s throat. “Regardless of however it is described, our bond remains the same.” His face darkens. “A world without Assid… is not a world I’d wish to live in.”
“Wow…” Makina pulls her lips in, thinking. That sounds like a lot. She can’t imagine relying on someone else that much, good guy or not. “Isn’t it scary?”
“Hmm?”
“Being that close with someone?”
“He’s my only family,” Forte says, as if that explains anything. He goes back to gazing up at the night.
Makina mulls over his words for a while, because Forte is really smart, and then asks: “What’s a family?”
It’s several seconds before he looks down at her. He still has that strange small smile. “Nothing you need to concern yourself with.”
"Okay…"
The campfire in front of them is starting to die down, spluttering out ash and smoke. A chunk of it lands next to Makina's foot, just shy of her. She watches the white-hot ash quickly turn snotty and cold in the slight breeze. She yanks her hood down and her blanket around her as tight as she can at the night’s chill.
“Speaking of…” Forte turns towards the lump covered by the blanket and gives it a good kick with the tip of his foot. “Assid."
"Ugh."
"You removed your binder, yes?”
“Uuuuuuuuughhhhhh.”
“Take it off,” comes Forte’s stern voice. “Your ribs are already weak enough from wearing it when you don’t need to.”
“UUUUUUUUUGHHHHHH.”
“I’ll curse you.”
There’s shuffling, then a mumble of something that sounds like “you’re a sick bastard”, before Assid sits upright.
While the two of them chatter, Makina sits there, staring at her hands in her lap.
Family…
Forte says that he and Assid are a family. Makina is with them.
Whatever a family is, could… could she be a part of it, too?
The next transgressors they find are tricky. These ones can actually play hide-and-seek; they keep jumping out of the thick trees and catching her off-guard! Makina’s all for having fun, but it’s quickly getting into “why won’t you just DIE” territory. Apparently they’re a group of knights who defected from the Kingdom of Megagal, which would explain why they’re so good, but that doesn’t make it fun at all!
Still, between the three of them, it’s easy-peasy to slim their numbers down. Makina’s gearing up to release her super duper strong attack when she sees it; a soldier in the trees, about to bring their arm back to hurl a large javelin.
She looks ahead, and something in her chest comes to a stuttering halt.
Forte’s back is to them as he chants the incarnation for an arte. Assid is surrounded by three soldiers a good distance away, snarling and hissing as he shoves them away.
Neither of them have noticed the knight in the trees.
It’s instinct. When she sees them lift the javelin, something within Makina, something that she’ll never be able to understand, propels her to throw herself forward. She hurls her weapon at the ground and uses the force to send herself faster, faster—
She can be remade. Humans can’t.
Even if she’s broken, she’ll remember them.
Right?
Time seems to crawl to a halt. She sees Forte turn as she passes in front of him, watches his eye widen—
The javelin’s sharp tip rips through her stomach. Makina falls on the ground and howls and whimpers and sobs. Her hands stumble and slide off her stomach, coming away sticky and red. There’s so much.
“It hurts!” Pain pain pain IT HURTS SO MUCH— “It hurts it HURTS!”
There’s a roar. Tendrils of darkness shoot through the air. Screaming. Her head slams off the ground with her cries.
Her world is agony. She hasn’t done anything wrong she’s a good person she’s stopping all the bad people why is this happening why why why—
“Bro!” she screams. “Brother! Brother!”
Why won’t he heal her why won’t they help her it hurts it hurts IT HURTS—
“Shouldn’t you at least try?”
“There’s no point.”
Makina wails.
“BROTHER!”
There's blood leaking out of her and blue shards floating into the sky — that's not human that's not right — but no matter how hard she presses down on the giant hole in her it just continues coming out it won't stop she's so tired let it stop please pleasepleasepleasehelpHELP—
Everything is blurry. Everything hurts. She can barely make out the two blobs of white so far away from her. Why won’t they come closer she’s so cold so hot everything hurts.
“...too grievous, we can’t…”
“I know, but…”
Her eyes and throat are burning. She hiccups and heaves and shudders, writhing for mercy.
The sky begins to darken. The white isn’t coming any closer. Why? Why?
She stretches out her hand towards them.
"I… want… fam… ily…"
Darkness.
“We can’t care about her again.”
“But—”
“She’s a doll. A weapon. We can rebuild her as long as mana remains. She’s not human.”
“Forte…”
“You know as well as I do that we can’t rely on anyone else — on anything else — in this rotting world. We only have each other.”
“I know, I know. It’s just… she was a cute kid, y’know? I didn’t mind her.”
“Yes, well. I can’t change her appearance now. It was foolish of me to ever attempt to replicate a family that never even existed.”
“...I don’t think it was foolish.”
“Heh, well. The goddess surely will.”
“You kiddin’? I think the goddess will find our little dolly of justice awesome as hell.”
“...Perhaps.”
“You don't — hey, she’s waking up—”
She opens her eyes.
“I’m Makina, hi!”
The two men in front of her look really similar, as if there’s a mirror between them. The one with wild eyes and a savage grin bends down in front of her. His hand reaches out — the other man, his eye frigid, looks at him — and the smiling man drops it with a noise. His grin, now paper-thin, is back in a flash.
“Hi, Makina,” he says. “How do ya feel about playing with a whoooooole bunch of transgressors?”