extract from ‘The Endless War - Part Two‘
Told from the POV of Agent Gehenna
“This way.” I said and led off through a narrow canyon that led into a deep dry valley. The valley opened up into a red wasteland devoid of water and vegetation except for the hardiest scrubby weeds here and there. Their roots must have found their way through the cracks in the rocks near the surface of the loose dusty soil to caches of subterranean water. “This used to be a mine, once.” I explained as we came across broken mining machinery. “They can’t fix these machines, but they take what they can to fix those machines that do still work. There isn’t anyone left alive who knows how to make more of these machines. The technology is lost to us, but we can keep them going, until something we can’t fix breaks and nothing we make can replace it either. Maybe you and Albion can find a way to solve this between you? No matter, we can come back another time. We were capable of so much once, but the war has drained too much of our intellect and ingenuity. That’s why we can’t indulge in it anymore, we have to win. Eve explained it to me on my first day, how once we had the power to make machines that could harness the powers of the sun, now we can barely make machines that boil water and use them to drive crude devices.”