Lil guys let me handle him ok?
*Pets his leg gently rubbing the ends of the caps there*

W҉e҉ ҉h҉e҉l҉p҉e҉d҉

These poor things didn't deserve this, and I didn't either.

What did you do to me.

Branches snapped. Leaves tore. The forest swallowed the limping shape, moss and shadow closing eagerly around it. Spores drifted behind like a trail of sickness, settling into bark and soil, already beginning to take hold.
The clearing fell silent again.

A servo rose, trembling, and scraped against the growths on its leg. The contact tore free a cap, releasing a burst of spores and a sound like a muffled sob escaped his half frozen faceplate. The mech recoiled, staggering back, then forward again, driven by something panicked and desperate.

The intact half of Beachcomber’s face turned sharply, jerking in pain. The ruined side did not move at all.

Mushrooms blossomed directly from his face.
Their stems threaded through exposed wiring and fractured plating, rooted deep within. Some brushed against the remaining intact side of the faceplate, releasing a slow, drifting haze of spores that clung to the air like breath in cold weather.

where a cheek might have been if this were a body meant of skin.

Then his faceplate twitched.
Half of it, only half began to deform. The smooth metal warped outward, stretched thin from the inside. Cracks spidered across the surface, and through them bloomed more fungus: clustered growths forcing their way out where an eye should have been,

A wet sound accompanied each step.
The mech staggered, compensating badly, posture collapsing inward like something trying to protect itself from pain.

into the air in thin, ghostlike clouds.

Where plates should have sealed tight, they bulged and split. Pale mushrooms pushed through the seams their soft, swollen caps forcing their way out of steel as if the metal were flesh. Thick mycelial threads wrapped around cables, pulsing faintly, alive. With every movement, spores puffed -

The reason became clear as he took another step.

The hatch opened.
Beachcomber stepped out.
At first glance, the mech’s blue, white, and gray frame looked intact, clean lines, polished plating. But as he moved, the illusion fractured. His right strut dragged behind him slightly, stiff and uneven, metal joints resisting their own purpose.

It settled into a clearing with impossible delicacy, untouched by the rot and chaos around it, as though it did not belong to gravity at all.

their mycelium holding the cables together in a horrific mix of organic and metal. Which lucky for him hid well under plating and protoform.*