The first sound you hear when you're born isn't your own crying, or the soft voice of a loving parent or even the beeps and buzzes of a busy hospital ward.
You don't see a nurses face staring back at you, or smell the tinge of blood and sweat in the air or taste the sweet nutrients of breastmilk.
Everything is drowned out by this.
By Her.
The harsh grinding of Her gears. The droning sound of explosions in Her engine keeping you afloat. Of the thumping of Mother's heart that vibrate Her metal walls. Of tracks barely keeping traction on slick mud mixed with popped skulls. Of the cyclical groans and screams of Her turret being loaded, aimed, and exploding. Launching a shell that accelerates towards a violent death for those not under Her protection. Mother rends bone into dust and flesh into red mist. Mother obliterates all.
But not you.
Mother keeps you safe.
To the rest of the world Her thick plating is cold and uncaring. But the drumming of combusting oil in Her motors is the only sense of warmth you've ever truly felt.
You haven't felt skin on your own, or looked into the eyes of another. You haven't known what it means to be human. But, you don't need to. You exist within Her deafening amnion, and Mother takes care of the parasites that live off Her steel.
The only thing you do know.
The only thing you have ever known.
Is.
Noise.
Your ears never deafen to it. The drone never quietens. Always present. If it were to ever end, your hearing would be lost to ear piercing tinnitus. But it won't end.
Your eardrums have ruptured every second for your entire life and they will continue to rupture every second for the rest of forever.
This is all you know.
All you need to know.
This is the closest thing to love you have ever felt.
This is love.