Dawn hadn't cracked yet, but Dee Megus had.
He shot up from his cloak in a jolt of mad inspiration, hair tousled, eyes gleaming with arcane fervor. "Brilliant!" he declared. "Absolutely brilliant!"
He spun on his heels and kicked Hiro awake. "RISE, young fleshbucket! The hour of genius is upon us!"
"Mrrgh—wha?" Hiro squinted against the early gloom. "Are we under attack?"
"No," Dee beamed. "Better. I'm going to enchant a boulder."
Across the fire pit, Vampher sat up slowly. "A boulder?"
"Yes. For travel." Dee gestured with both hands as if unveiling a great work of art. "We walk too much. I hate it. So I'm going to give mobility and loyalty to a rock."
"…So we're going to ride a rock," Hiro said, deadpan.
"No, Hiro," Dee said proudly, "we're going to befriend a rock. We're going to bond with it. It will be the first of its kind. A true companion. The First Golem."
Vampher snorted. "This is going to end in trauma. I feel it in my blood."
Dee ignored him and turned to a particularly round, dignified-looking boulder nearby. He clapped his hands, raised his staff, and began to chant in a voice that reverberated with absurd power:
"Stone of silence, hear my plea,
Rise from earth and walk with me.
Mind and soul, I now bequeath,
Break thy slumber, breathe… and seethe."
Lightning struck nowhere.
The wind stopped moving.
The boulder trembled—and then moved.
Legs burst from its base. Arms unfurled like twisted stone branches. Eyes blinked open—glassy, swirling with the weight of freshly downloaded emotion.
Then it spoke.
"…What… am I?"
"Oh yes!" Dee crowed. "YES! It speaks! You're glorious!"
The boulder—now a full-bodied stone golem with hunched shoulders and a constantly furrowed brow—looked down at its arms. "I… I was asleep. I was nothing. Now… now I feel."
"Welcome to the team," Dee said, already tossing his bedroll onto the golem's back.
But the golem flinched. "Is this… is this my purpose? To be sat upon? To be a mule of meatbags?"
"Transportation companion," Dee corrected cheerfully.
"I… I remember before," the golem whispered, shaking. "The peace. The silence. And now—thought. Burden. Pain. Crippling self-awareness. WHO AM I?"
Vampher folded his arms. "Yeah, he gave the rock anxiety. Fantastic."
The golem looked at him with trembling stone lips. "Do you think I deserve happiness?"
"I think you need therapy," Vampher replied.
The golem turned to Hiro. "Do you believe I have a soul?"
"I think," Hiro muttered, "we should have let you stay a rock."
The golem recoiled, hurt. "So I am a mistake… an abomination!"
"Now, now—" Dee stepped forward, raising his hands. "You're unique. Revolutionary, even! The First Golem of the New Age!"
But the golem staggered back. "No. No, no, no. I must find myself. I must wander. Perhaps... I shall become a poet. Or a monk. Or a lighthouse keeper."
It clenched its rocky fists and screamed toward the sky, "I SHALL NOT BE YOUR MOUNT!"
And then it ran.
Loping across the plain, thundering toward the mountains, weeping and singing a terrible haiku:
"Stone was once at peace
Now cursed with breath and purpose
Please, unmake my soul."
Dee watched it go, stunned.
"…Well," Vampher said after a long pause, "that's going to start a new religion somewhere."
Hiro turned to Dee. "What now?"
Dee sighed, putting his hands on his hips. "Now we walk."
Then, a grin. "But next time—I enchant a bench."
"No," said Vampher.
"I will name it Sadie."
"No."