THE STRONG SCENT OF IRON

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There was burning metal and charred flesh everywhere. The Shell had collapsed around the entire planet, covering it in destroyed remains. A hand tore free of the wreckage, and pulled its connected body up, out of the smoldering mound. Rose was in shambles. Her mechanical exoskeleton had mostly given way, revealing her true form; a rotted, hole-ridden jumble of organs and an exposed, worn down skeletal structure, loosely held together by a nervous system, muscles, and bits of sickly, yellow fat.

She slowly pulled herself along the sandy ground, the immense pain forcing what was left of her face to distort in agony as her delicate organs were slowly torn apart behind her and strewn across the beach. She looked up, her single remaining eye slowly rotating in its bony socket.

The ocean was gray, with streaks of red. Shaking, Rose turned her head. The Earth was completely devoid of life. The planet was entirely scorched and burnt, the ground tan and cracked. A waist-high rusty metal wall appeared to wrap around a city, a thick line of broken glass ran along the top of it. Even in the areas where wreckage of The Shell hadn't fallen, there stood partially melted buildings within the shattered dome. Bodies of humans and animals, frozen in time, littered the ground. Their corpses had seemingly been burnt, yet they remained frozen where they stood. The ground leading from the beach inland was crowded with head-high marble slabs, not unlike tombstones, all covered in small images of human faces. Protruding from the sand nearby was a road sign, "Ptolomea, 190 mi." A massive, green and bronze head lay in the distance in the walled city, staring back at Rose's drained body with enormous eyes, perfectly round, and glowing white. The marble headstones seemed to cradle the head from a distance. It was the head of Aorta unit X.

[SOULLESS BEAUTY AORTA]

Rose wept.

Thunder rolled as rain began to fall lightly, soon turning into a downpour. She dropped, the remains of her body completely ceasing to function. She felt her consciousness fade as the tide came in, and dragged her out into the ocean. "Forgive me".

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