A trio of flash fiction stories, total about 1400 words. I’ll critique something here soon! 
The Lost Race
“If I drop dead studying, what will people think of the Lost Race then?”
Brother Rocket glared at Almat, who sprawled with sunlight on his fur. “Nothing. They’ll stay poor and ignorant.”
Almat stood. More guilt and pressure! “Can I play after lunch?”
Rocket said, “Today, you should learn something different. Come.”
Almat twitched his tail in curiosity and followed the human. Rocket marched him toward Sacred Hill, waving to farmers with polymer hoes and Sister Vaccine with a motor-crossbow. He entered the salt mine, passed the cathedral to Arkanae carved from salt, and kept going past the classroom. He saw the girls of his kind fussing over circuit diagrams alongside human kids.
They entered the metal Vault of ancient documents, technology, wonders. The solar panels, printers, and other hardware were now deployed elsewhere. The room hummed with the might of Arkanae, who had cast his light into a primitive future. Everyone had prayed before the electric hand-crank with pictograms saying “Turn To Begin”.
Rocket stopped at the birthing-tank room, where his kind and other forgotten species came from. The monk jabbed buttons and a screen lit with ancient script: “Journal Of Arkanae”.
“What?” asked Almat.
Eerie light illuminated Rocket’s angry face. “Watch. Then report.” He stomped away, slamming the door.
Almat’s ears flattened. The god left notes? He pressed a button, then gaped.
A muzzled, striped face like his own, neither human nor divine, appeared. The world’s savior was panting, bleeding. “I did it. Vault’s sealed. But the war has started and the cities are crashing. Future people, get it right when you rebuild! Here’s one more lesson…” Soon he trailed off, slumped and died.
Almat murmured, “He was one of us?”
The first entry showed Arkanae younger than Almat. He was onstage wearing a cape and looking terrified. A human said, “The Ministry of Science is pleased to unveil our first ‘Durian’ bioroid, bred for versatile support of the State.”
Someone called out, “But what’s this kind for?”
Arkanae, prodded, said, “All hail the State!”
Then there was footage of the boy in a classroom of humans, and a voice boasting about how smart he was. It ended suddenly and a tearful Arkanae stood in a laboratory, saying, “They’re mean! They say I’m a prototype slave! Stuck-up Party member kids. Why do I have to work for them?”
Almat kept watching. Arkanae met younger ‘Durians’ like himself, trained by the ancients in many skills. There were other artificial races, curvy idiots for sex and brutal warriors, but his kind were undefined. The State people had pressured him like the monks did to Almat.
“They took me off the streets!” wailed Arkanae in another entry. He held up an article saying “Bioroid Saves Child”. “I became a cop to be seen helping people, but they’ve rewarded me with a desk job. The Ministry got scared when a duke said I should be treated like a human. I… have to be good, if my kind’s ever going to be more than slaves.”
Almat watched how his ancestor saw the world rushing toward war, and preserved the best of it. Then Almat wiped his eyes and left to find Brother Rocket.
He stood underground with Brother Highway, conferring on how to make their namesakes live again. Almat said, “Why did you hide what Arkanae was?”
Rocket shut the door. “So you could find your own identity. Outside our home, you’re a myth. When there are more of you, what will you be to the world?”
“That’s unfair! Arkanae lived and died not knowing what he was for, either!”
“Wrong,” said Rocket. “He decided.”
Almat’s tail flicked. The man hadn’t died complaining, or aimless. He’d given the future a gift. The monks had hid that their “god” was of Almat’s kind, not to lie but to spare him. To give him space to find his own purpose. He said, “I need to work hard, then. Not for the Lost Race’s reputation, but for me.”
The monks objected, but Almat thought he’d gotten his ancestor’s message.
Leaving Sacred Hill
Almat was studying electricity under Sacred Hill when the alarm rang. Monks ran, snatching motor-crossbows. He hurried into the sunlight. The Baron and his knights scowled at Brother Rocket and Almat’s other friends and teachers.
“You hold this land under me,” said the Baron, “yet you dare withhold its ancient magic. I will take both.”
Rocket said, “Our ancient Vault is a golden goose. It takes time to recreate its wonders.” He spotted Almat, whose fur and tail stood out. “Get inside.”
The Barron interrupted. “That one is part of the ‘Lost Race’? What other secrets are you hiding, if you’ve revived mythical animals?”
“I’m no animal!” Almat shouted, checking his crossbow’s battery. All his life, he and the girls had been Sacred Hill’s treasures, tutored in pre-apocalypse science. “I can build dynamos and radios.”
Rocket said, “My lord, we’ll try harder to export our technology, but we need time.”
“Years of excuses!”
Almat wondered about the outside world. It sounded poor and miserable. This outsider would bring darkness to his home.
Monks pushed him back, saying, “This fight isn’t for you.”
Almat met the Baron’s gaze, seeing anger – and curiosity. Though Almat was armed, he’d barely understood what it’d mean if fighting began. Sacred Hill and its growing bounty, the monks rebuilding past glory, the Lost Race girls he was made to be with, were all in danger. What was his life for, if not for their cause?
He pressed forward. “Baron! What if I go to help you?”
“A hostage?”
“A teacher, like the monks.”
Brother Rocket objected, but Almat was right. He’d make peace. Besides, if the land outside needed help so badly, the Lost Race should offer it.
Maybe it’d even be fun.
The Relic Adviser
Almat, whose knowledge and species came from a pre-apocalypse Vault, saw resentment on the peasants’ faces.
The Baron scowled. Almat’s pledge to serve him had dulled his ire against Sacred Hill, the Vault’s village, but the ancient technology Almat brought wasn’t being implemented as the Baron wished: instantly.
“Should I help in the fields?” Almat asked, curling his tail uncertainly. He crouched beside the dynamo he’d built.
“Light, first.”
Almat strained at the wheel meant for two humans. A glass ball flickered to life.
“A tiny star at my command! Continue your miracles, boy, and Sacred Hill will make us all rich and mighty.”
“It will improve. The wire, the magnets…”
The Baron’s smile was predatory. “I expect so.”
Almat supposed the farmers were avoiding him because of his unfamiliar fur and muzzle, but their iciness persisted. He walked through fallow fields and saw a father and son swearing at a plow. “Sirs?”
They froze. Almat approached. “I built that. Having trouble with the moldboard?”
“We’ve wasted hours!” the father said. “It’s too heavy.”
“It’s more efficient than your old plow.” The Baron had approved building them.
“If we could pull it.”
“You’re supposed to use horses.”
“Great. Pull some out from under your tail, beastman scholar.”
Almat blushed. He’d built ancient, proven designs, adapted to the fallen world’s resources, but hadn’t asked what people actually needed. “Not enough horses. I should’ve guessed.”
The father spat. “His Lordship’s had scholars here before. Not with your ancient mysteries, but all thinking they knew everything. Your magic hill is farting broken miracles and expecting praise.”
Ashamed, Almat returned to the Baron. Ideas whiled through Almat’s mind. He would propose gathering advice before having the Baron issue more machines and orders, so he could know what was best.
Then Almat realized he might never be wise enough to orchestrate the world.
He told the Baron, “Don’t wait for me to dribble weapons and tools to you. Instead, let’s build a school. You’ll have a whole domain full of sages with my skills, finding new ideas.”
The Baron lacked Almat’s humility, but gave a smile of ambition.