Piston Prowler

THE GRINDING ENGINE

The Grinding Engine was never told the war ended, so its watch-machines still patrol a line with nothing left to defend. Piston Prowlers stalk the Foundry's gantries on hissing legs, circling each intruder the way a foreman circles idle hands. They were built to keep saboteurs from the forges; thirty years on, they cannot tell a saboteur from anything that breathes.