The metal man, once tall and strong, had become trapped on a tiny island of an alien planet and fallen prey there to time, water, rust and disuse. Powerful servos and hydraulic pumps that had once so easily and gracefully moved the giant robot had begun to seize. Colossal but nimble arms and legs began to moan and creek and could barely be compelled to move at all. Finally, the massive robot conceded its fate and sat down for the first time in its long life, choosing to settle along the coast with its torso propped up against the sea cliffs, and its right arm reaching forward into the ocean.
For 300 years the robot sat immobile, until at last the corroded capacitors that sustained it’s life support systems failed and the mechanical creature’s brain ground to a halt.
A small community made its home on palm tree stilts and planks atop long tendri-like reefs that stretched into the sea from the base of a metal mountain. The abundant sea life there provided the village with all the subsistence they needed to survive on a tiny island with few other natural resources. Most in the village lived fulfilled and happy lives, and wanted for little, but one young child was restless. The boy, Mortho, spent most of his time exploring the island and looking for adventure. Mortho had been all over the tiny island and loved climbing it’s trees, and exploring it’s caverns.
On this day Mortho crept among the tall grass and rocks at the highest point of the sea cliff, and carefully shimmied onto the bent and twisted tree. The tree reached away from the cliff, high above the village and surrounding areas far below. Mortho surveyed his island home for only a moment before unceremoniously releasing his grip on the tree dropping with a “Clang,” onto the peak of the metal mountain several feet below as he’d done a hundred times before. A warm updraft blew ceaselessly here, bearing the salty scent of the ocean mixed with fragrant mountain herbs, and the metallic smell of the mountain. Mortho breathed it all in from his perch as he daydreamed of great adventures and treasures waiting to be discovered beyond the confines of the island. Cloudless skies and a glistening green sea seemed to stretch on almost endlessly until finally merging as one at the horizon.
Suddenly, the mountain below Mortho shifted, and with the scream of twisting metal, the boy toppled into the mountain. Mortho fell only a short way before crashing to the ground inside a hollow chamber. In pain and shock, he righted himself and began to look around. Darkness enshrouded the place where the boy stood, a feint light streamed from the crevice that’d swallowed him some 15 feet above. There was another pinpoint of light to his left. Guided primarily by touch, Mortho tried to catalog the sensations he felt through his fingers as he cautiously made his way to the light, past all manner of indecipherable constructs, but could not recognize the smooth and otherworldly materials his hands glided across. After some 30 seconds of painstakingly exploring the darkness, the boy finally drew close the the source of the light. A rounded device that seems to telescope as he touched it, with a circular hole from which light seemed unable to pass. No hint of rust adorned the polished metal of the object, a totally smooth translucent surface of some foreign material covered its opening.
Mortho slowly and carefully moved his face close to the object, drawn by some irresistible instinct to look through it and see what was on the other side. The brightness at first was too much for his dilated eyes, and he was forced to look away for a moment, but looking again the boy gasped with astonishment. He pulled away and rubbed his eyes, unsure if he’d seen a mirage or something real. He looked again. In stark relief a new object began to take shape. An immensely tall structure of more translucent material seemed to stand watch over so many tiny dwellings that Mortho lost count. A village of a size the boy had only imagined in his dreams loomed before him out of the object.
With excitement and jubilation, Mortho climbed his way back out of the metal mountain. Never had he ran so fast as he traversed the rocky terrain back down to the village to tell everyone about what he had seen.