At the Shores of Ostia

His heart raced, a red hot ball of molten iron squeezed in the vice of his ribcage. Cold fire raced down his left arm threatening to consume him. He coughed to clear his airway, ragged and wet spines on the way out, stalagmites piercing the fleshy roof in a concerto of pain on the way in. Blood spattered against the interior of his environment suit. He fell to the hard packed earth beneath a sickly orange sky, tarnished and stained by the scrap metal fires leaching out the precious heavy metals.

"Please remain calm operator 44318. You are experiencing a medical emergency."

The auto-monitor hovered over him, its singular orb reflecting his agony through the crimson streaked face shield.

"Aid is being administered. Remain still."

A long proboscis emerged from the floating drone and extended menacingly to the emergency input port on the hip of his suit.

"Remain calm."

The probe struck lightning quick, stabbing into the open port and into his flesh like a shimmering, silvery mosquito about to gorge on so much exposed flesh, but just enough.

The pinprick stung deep into the muscle and burning embers of pain radiated from the injection site growing into a roaring conflagration that burned the pain out of him, two towering infernos that battled over his charred and desperate corpse.

He knew they'd never let him die.

The probe withdrew its applicator, drops of his humanity still glistening from the tip.

"Treatment complete. Your account has been updated. Total balance now stands at two hundred twenty four thousand eight hundred forty four credits. Calculating...estimated time remaining in contract now twelve years, fifteen weeks, four days and eleven hours. Please return to work in a timely fashion to avoid further time-debt accruals."

His breath came slower, more even. Solvents sprayed at his faceplate from the inside, cleaning his blood off the transperasteel. He propped himself up with his telescoping boom and saw his vision swim before him. He doubled over and put his head between his legs. He couldn't let the drone return, he couldn't take another twelve years stirring blackened bits of waste metal. He dug the forked end into the ground and looked at the mountains of scrap and decay around him. Pole in hand, he imagined Charon on the river Styx, ferrying souls of the damned to their final desolation and torment.

Figures moved through the orangish yellow haze. A small gathering of amorphous blobs like himself, other lost souls running out the clock that had been ticking for far too long. Any time one of their number fell, they gathered to kindle the hope that one of them could finally escape, one of them could finally be free of their shackles. They returned fumbling about with their mindless tasks.

He looked up at the impossibly tall mound before him. Corroded and bent pieces jutted out in millions of grotesque angles, a monument to the sins of a world that had long forgotten him, long moved on to better pastures.

Mars thrived, the high altitude bacteria strengthening the atmosphere and promising an end to the underground shelters and biodomes dotting the surface. The red planet was turning green as sunlight refracted across the manufactured sky and lit up the days in a brilliant emerald, a byproduct of the sun's distance and light phase shift the climatologists claimed. Soon, children could run outside and lay upon an alien grass and never know the world their forebears had choked and poisoned, never know the hurricanes of smoke and weeks of duststorms that only settled far out over the brackish and congealed oceans, turning them to sludge in a runaway acidification effect, never know the planet where the wretched now toiled in perpetual despair. Too poor to have afforded a place on the great Ark ships that hovered in orbit, too hale to survive the waves of plague and famine that had preceeded the perfection of their environmental suits. The first medibots were promised to be a deliverance from suffering, they instead became the marshals upon the plains of Purgatory, casting all the unworthy souls back into their penance.

He stirred in a nearby pile of ash and soot and the ground shook beneath his feet as a repulsorlift transport skimmed low overhead. He looked away from the bright lights of the fusion reaction that powered the unmanned craft and felt a pang in his chest as teardrops spattered against the inside of his faceshield. As he blinked to clear his vision, he remembered her last words.

They had chanced upon a crashed transport so long ago, its engines firing intermittently in final death spasms. Sirens immediately began whining in the distance and securibots hummed to life to cordon off the area. They saw their opportunity and had raced for it before any of their steel wardens could arrive.

"We go together" she had said as they ran, but he could hear the high pitched screech of the securibots closing in behind them.

"Just go, I'm right behind you!" he had shouted.

"Promise me" she had said as they ran for salvation, "Promise me I'll see you on the other side."

"I promise, we'll be together again soon my love" he gasped as they drew near the blinding flare.

Then she was gone in a flash of light and smoke as the plasma jets from the engine engulfed her. The ground heaved and he was lifted off his feet as a blast of fire and radiation knocked him backwards. He had only been two steps behind her, she had always been faster when they used to run through the sweet smelling fields of poppies in the summer, but the engines coughed and gasped, the light extinguished. The securibots crested the ridge behind him. He staggered to his feet and ran headlong into the wreckage, desperate to follow his wife. He ignored every twinge, every ache and stitch of his many years crying out. His blood pounded in his ears as his feet flashed on the glassy ground beneath him. He launched himself head back, arms spread wide in exultation as he impaled himself on the twisted, molten struts and for a moment, there was unimaginable agony and then a soft, warm numbness as his vision faded.

A sudden gasp filled his lungs and he stared up at the spotless steel orb of the auto-monitor hovering over him. He looked down at the still smoldering repair in his environment suit. He screamed against the ignominy of his resurrection by the prowling observers, his sardonic saviors. She was gone, and he was still here.

"Unauthorized early terminations will result in additional time debt penalties operator 44318. Operator 44317's account has been added to your own. Your balance stands at one million, four hundred fourteen thousand..." Tears streamed down his face as the auto-monitor had reproachfully droned over him.

Years later, his hands still shook at the memory, her words still echoing in his mind. He couldn't remember how long it had been, how many revivifications, how many additions and penalties and fees since he had been steps behind her. Throes of panic writhed through him. He hugged his head, desperate to feel his face, his head, his hair again with his own hands. Did he even have hair anymore? He would never know, he would never feel the warmth of another's embrace, another's touch in companionship or malice. Only the autoinjectors let him know he was still capable of feeling, that he still had skin.

A sudden pressure and then the feeling subsided. The suit had administered more anti-anxiety meds then flashed a warning that he was building a tolerance and repeated offenses would result in time-debt accrual.

He looked balefully from his valley of corruption. He could stir a pile the wrong way, send tonnes of metal careening toward him, an avalanche of blades and shards and sweet surrender. The suit would protect him, just as it always had. The triple-layered nanex polymer was nearly impervious to rips, tears, stabs, burns, corrosion, explosion, and erosion. In event of a long fall or sudden impact, the nanites would respond faster than the speed of thought, cushioning the blow with the inner gel layer and stiffening into traction to protect the spinal cord. It didn't matter anyway. The medbots could fix any ailment, any injury, stop the slow ravages of time, even turn back death itself.

He pushed the thought from his mind. He had stabbed and shot and blasted and fired his environmental suit but it was no use. It provided all he needed intravenously: nutrients, medicines, mood enhancers free of charge on major holidays. It was the perfect system to keep him in perfect working health, year after year, century after century until his time ran out, his clock stopped ticking. He let out a long sigh and got back to work.