by Phil Foglio
“The empire is in chaos,” Tarvek explained. “There are rebellions and uprising all across Europa. This was the plan of some of those fools who were trying to ‘help’ me declare myself as the Storm King. I thought I’d squashed that aspect of it, but I can see it was just too tempting.
“I’m sure a lot of private scores are being settled and power grabs are under way while this ‘popular uprising’ is keeping everyone busy. But all this chaos was caused for someone’s benefit. The plan is to have the empire appear to revolt, and then the Storm King appears! He allies with the newly discovered Heterodyne, and together they overthrow the old empire and declare a new order. The people who ignited the uprisings calm them down, and thus it appears that the new Storm King/Heterodyne government is supported by the people and is fully in control.”
Tarvek shook his head. “Morons. That’s not the sort of genie you can easily stuff back into its bottle. From what I saw when I was on Castle Wulfenbach, these uprisings have spread farther and faster than anyone expected. The Wulfenbachs will really have their hands full setting things right.”
He gestured up at the chess-king clank as it stood quietly, staring out over the parapet. “The Baron must have calculated it would be easier to calm things down if he could display an actual usurper who, ostensibly, was the cause of the problem.” Tarvek gave an evil smile. “Not a bad plan, and the trial would be an excellent place to dump some information I’ve been hoarding.”
Krosp rubbed his head on Tarvek’s leg. “I really like you.”
Agatha stared at the clanks. “Maybe we should move a bit farther away.”
“YOU WILL COME WITH US!” It was a voice that Agatha would remember for the rest of her life. Rising over the parapet came an eerie figure: long, green limbs folded before it, topped with a golden, conical hat and veil. “YOU ARE THE HETERODYNE,” it moaned, “AND YOU ARE TO COME WITH US.”
“Dreen,”139 Zog gasped, and without another word, he and Tarvek hoisted Agatha up between them and dashed for another stairway— only to find the unearthly creature now standing before them, sepulchral arms raised towards them. “YOU ARE TO COME WITH US.”
With a great metallic crash, the leader of the gigantic white knights swatted the Dreen flat beneath an enormous white hand. “NO,” it thundered.
A hatch on the titanic chest irised open, and a tall, broad-shouldered man appeared. He was dressed in white and gold and his long hair was contained within a shiny gold circlet. He waved when he saw Agatha.
“Lady Heterodyne,” he boomed jovially. “Would that we had met under better circumstances. I, Martellus von Blitzengaard, by the grace of God and the Voice of Europa, am the newly ascended Storm King!” He held out a hand. “Come with me quickly, and I will get you to safety!”
Agatha glanced at a now-appalled Tarvek. “The Storm King? But I thought—”
“Tweedle, you idiot,” Tarvek shouted. “Get out of there! You’ll be killed!”
The man caught sight of Tarvek and looked surprised. He recovered quickly and sneered. “Give it up, cousin. Whatever pathetic webs of intrigue you are currently spinning are in tatters. You’ve been replaced.”
“Just shut up,” Tarvek screamed, “and jump!”
Martellus paused, suddenly uncertain. “What are you—” he was cut off as the clank beneath his feet shattered into fragments. Martellus hit the ground with a bounce and rolled to his feet in a large puddle in time to see the shards of his clank continuing to crumble into smaller bits, and the Dreen slowly rising—apparently undamaged—from the wreckage.
It again extended a finger towards Agatha. “YOU WILL COME WITH US.” It paused as it saw Agatha and the rest of her party disappearing down the stairs.
It swiveled about in time to see Martellus von Blitzengaard tumbling down the same stairs after them. It nodded to itself in satisfaction and turned back towards the Wulfenbach lines. Its preordained task here was accomplished. The Heterodyne girl and this iteration of the Storm King had been brought together. It observed other, less desirable possibilities evaporate into theoretical clouds of mathematics. Events would now proceed as they must.
Agatha and the others were off the wall and moving fast. “Hy dun see dot creepy ting followink us,” Zog muttered. “But ve should get to der cathedral. Der are tings dere dot might schtop it.”140
Behind them, Tarvek and Martellus were arguing. “Replaced?” Tarvek snorted. “By you? I’m still the rightful heir and don’t you forget it!”
“You are a sniveling weakling and you’re supposed to be dead,” Martellus snapped back.
“Oh, I’ll just bet I am. Too bad that didn’t work out for you.”
“I was told you were dead when I was called here!”
Tarvek frowned. “Really? And who would call you?” As they turned the corner, they skidded to a stop. Before them was a woman on an armor-clad stallion. She wore an ensemble that was obviously supposed to evoke a nun’s habit, but she was also wearing greaves and held aloft a shining sword. Arrayed behind her was a troop of squat horse-headed clanks, all armed with serviceable-looking pike axes.
“Lady Heterodyne!” The mounted woman saluted her with the sword. “I am the Abbess of the Red Cathedral! I and the Bloodstone Paladins stand ready to take their sworn place alongside the Storm King and his Knights of Jove!” For the first time, a slight uncertainty filled her face as she peered behind them. “Um . . . I was told they were here?”
Martellus strode forward. “I am the Storm King, here in answer to your summons.”
“Where are the rest of you?”
Tarvek raised a hand. “Tarvek Sturmvarous. The legitimate Storm King. This fool—” he indicated Martellus “—landed his force directly in front of Wulfenbach’s main army. The survivors may have managed to get within the walls, but they’re being targeted by Wulfenbach.” As he spoke, another of the tall clanks toppled off the wall, a flaming ball of oily smoke billowing out from where its head had been.
The abbess looked at Martellus, who waved this inconvenient fact aside. “Their task was to deliver me here. This they have done.” He turned to Agatha. “Obviously this is not the place for flowery declarations. For now I shall let my actions speak for me, and hope that they shall serve as a proper introduction later.” He turned and shouted, “Bring me a horse!”
At this point, an obviously put-upon Moloch stepped up with a horse equipped with a splendid saddle and bridle. With a single bound, Martellus took the saddle. He turned to General Zog, who was watching all this with a bemused expression. “General, if you would please show me where we can be of the most use?”
Zog folded his arms and jerked his chin at the ranks of clanks. “Doze tings do belonk to us, hyu know.” He glanced to Agatha. “Bot dey vill be uzefull. Heef hyu will excuse me, Mistress?” Agatha nodded, and with a sharp whistle, Zog led the clanks and Martellus off at a brisk trot.
Agatha and Tarvek watched them go off through the rain. Agatha glanced at Tarvek. “He’s going to be all sorts of trouble, isn’t he?”
Tarvek sighed. “Well, of course. He’s family.” The last of the clanks turned a corner and were gone. “To be fair, Tweedle’s good in a fight, but in this case I don’t think he has adequate firepower. I mean, those clanks looked impressive, but they’re pretty old. All they’ll do is buy you some time, but not much of that.”
He turned to see Agatha staring up at the clouds overhead. “I think I have an idea . . . ” She turned to Tarvek. “Forget the cathedral, we have to get closer to the Castle. As high as possible, and I’ll need Gil’s lightning rod . . . ” This chain of thought was suddenly cut off by the point of the abbess’s sword, which snapped to position directly in front of Agatha’s face.
“You are going nowhere,” the abbess coolly informed her. “Do not commit the folly of believing yourself a true Heterodyne, young lady.”
Simultaneously, Agatha and Tarvek glanced at the Doom Bell. The abbess flinched at the memory. “You may have tricked a broken Castle i
nto accepting you, but we both know you are nothing but a pawn to help smooth the ascension of the Storm King.” She glared at Tarvek. “And a pawn that has fallen into the wrong hands at that.” She waved the sword imperiously. “You will both come with me to the catacombs, where you will be kept safe until you are neede—” but the abbess never finished her orders. Mid-sentence, she slumped to the ground. Behind her stood Moloch von Zinzer, who had stepped up behind her and smacked her in the head with a length of pipe.
Agatha and Tarvek stared at him. “Trust me,” he assured them, “you wouldn’t have gotten anywhere trying to argue with her.”
Tarvek relieved the fallen woman of her sword. “You really are the best minion ever,” he told Moloch.
“I am not her minion!” Moloch clutched the pipe like a man trying to hold onto his sanity. He turned to Agatha. “Mistress! Tell him I’m not your minion!”
Agatha glanced at Tarvek. “He’s not my minion.”
Moloch stared at her. “You’re lying,” he screamed. “I can tell!”
Suddenly, three grinning figures appeared from out of the rain, and Agatha recognized Dimo, Ognian, and Maxim. “Ho, dere, sveethot,” Dimo sang out. “Der general sez dot hyu vanted dis oldt ting!” With a flourish, he placed Gilgamesh’s lightning stick into Agatha’s hand.
She examined it eagerly. “It looks okay,” she said relieved. “I was worried it might be broken.”
Moloch gave it a suspicious look. “So what does it do?”
“It tells lightning where to strike!”
Moloch nodded as he pushed the tip away from his face. “And what are you planning to do with it?”
“The Castle needs a lot of power and it needs it fast. I’m going to hit it with a big bolt of lightning!”
Moloch flinched. “From here?”
Agatha pouted. “Of course I can’t do it from here. I need to get a lot closer to the Castle.” She turned back to the Jägers. “I’m thinking the Heterodyne Observation Tower?”
Dimo rubbed his hand together. “Hoy! Nize choice!”
Moloch sidled up to Ognian. “This place—it’s really high up, isn’t it?”
“Ho, yez!”
He glanced up as a roll of thunder traveled the length of the town. “And we’re going up there in a lightning storm.”
“Hyu betcha!”
“I knew it.”
The group came to a small overlook. Moloch pointed. “Let me guess. It’s that really tall, exposed tower? Way over there?” Everyone nodded. Moloch gave a nod of satisfaction. “You’ll never make it. Listen, the Castle had me running all over this town making repairs. Forget the troops outside, there’s a whole bunch of forces already in the town. Now all the non-empire stuff is just wandering through the town. They’re disorganized, but they’re still dangerous.
“Ever since that damn bell rang, the imperial troops have been falling back to the Great Hospital. They pretty much control that sector. Even though the hospital’s been destroyed, there’s a lot of medical stores in the area.
“There’s also that large park they’ve been using as a staging area. The Castle can’t effectively clear the skies anymore, so they’ve been able to set up an airfield. That’s allowed them to bring in enough support that they can hold the South Gate.
“They can’t advance against all the town’s defenders, so they’re no longer trying. They’ll destroy the town from the north, which will funnel the remaining enemy forces, the townspeople—and hopefully, you—through their checkpoints. This tower you want is behind one of their fortified perimeters, so you going there will just make things easy for them.”
He looked at everyone around him and frowned at their slightly open jaws. He rolled his eyes. “I was in the military for over ten years! If you can’t read a battlefield you could accidentally surrender to your own officers, which is super embarrassing, if only because it’ll get you shot.”
Maxim nodded his head. “Hyu iz vun heckuva useful guy.” He snagged one of Moloch’s arms. “Hyu gets to come vit uz.”
Oggie grabbed the other arm. “Ve’ll figger owt a vay to get dere mit hyu alonk!”
“NOOO!”
Dimo glanced at Agatha. “Bot even vit meester expert guide, ve iz gun have trobble gettink over dere. Ken hyu use dot lightning schtick to clear a path?”
Agatha shook her head. “No, it’s too fragile. If I use it too much, I could burn it out.”
Dimo frowned. “Zo iz worse den useless. Not only ken ve not use it, but ve gots to protect it.”
Agatha blinked and then reexamined the stick. “That’s true. All right then, I’ll improve it. I’ll bet there are all kinds of things I can do to make it stronger.”
Dimo raised an eyebrow. “As ve iz fightink our vay through a var zone?”
“It will be an excellent way to get parts.”
Dimo grinned. “Vhen hyu poots it dot vay, hit almost makes sense!”
Meanwhile, Oggie had sidled up to Tarvek. “So hyu iz der new guy efferyvun is talkink about. Vhat happened to der odder schmot guy?”
Tarvek shrugged. “We don’t know. I think it’ll depend on how smart a guy he really is.”
Ognian nodded. “End how schmart are hyu? Vhat do hyu tink ve should do?”
Tarvek looked out over the town, examined what he could see of the surrounding army and glanced up at the machine-filled sky. He turned back to Ognian. “At this point I could make a very good argument for running away and starting a career in piracy.”
Ognian’s eyebrows shot up. “Hyu iz a schmot guy,” he marveled.
A few minutes later, they were moving through the rain-soaked streets, when Dimo, who was in the lead, held up a hand. “Qviet,” he hissed. “Get back.” They huddled in the shadows as a mechanical creature lumbered past on the connecting street. Its red eyes glowed, and a sleek scorpion-style tail swiveled back and forth as it moved. “Iz vun of der Baron’s phlogiston-powered mantigoons. He got dem off ol’ Professor Ponglenoze last year. Dey’ll burn anything to a leedle crisp.”
“Professor Wuburtus Ponglenoze,” Agatha asked.
Dimo stared at her. “Maybe? Hy dunno.”
“Doctor Beetle said Ponglenoze developed a brilliant interlock system for regulating energy flows.”
Tarvek nodded. “I think I read about that. It’s supposed to improve switch efficiency by a factor of five!”
Agatha turned to the Jägers. “Can you get one for me?”
With a whoop, Maxim and Ognian leapt out, dragging a terrified Moloch along. “Wait,” he squealed. “Why me?”
Dimo pushed him along. “Somevun got to tell us vhat an inter-vhatchamacallit looks like!”
Soon enough they were back, and Ognian handed Agatha a small glittering part. Dimo had an arm companionably slung over Moloch’s shoulders. “Hy schtill dun understand vhy hyu hit der driver in der head mit dot brick.”
Moloch glared at him. “Because going for the weakest part gets the fight over quickly.”
Dimo nodded. “See, dot’s the bit hy dun underschtand.”
Agatha clicked the final connection into place and held it up for Tarvek to inspect. “How about that?”
“Nice!” He tapped the cane. “You know what this needs? Some sort of phase-lock inverter.”
Agatha bit her lip. “Oooh, now you’re talking. But where would we find—”
“HOY!” Mamma Gkika and a squad of Jägers poured out of an alley. They clutched a variety of weapons and local delicacies. “Vhat iz hyu keeds doink here? Dere iz a sqvad of bloater tanks comink up dis road! Ve’s plannink an ambush!”
Tarvek rubbed his hands together. “Are these the same bloater tanks featured in Baron von Twangsnekken’s book Twenty-Seven Amusing Thoughts on Urban Warfare and After-Dinner Mints?”
Gkika looked lost. “Deyz der vuns mit beeg gons on dem.”
Tarvek nodded to Agatha. “Good enough.”
Agatha finished a quick sketch and handed it to the Jägergeneral. “Here. The parts I want look l
ike these.”
Ghika examined the sketch and grinned. “Hokay, boyz, ve’s going shoppink!”
Fifteen minutes later, Agatha swung the refurbished stick up into her arms. What had begun the day as a sleek walking stick topped with a glowing blue bulb, now resembled . . . (Note: Um . . . the authors are forced to concede that at this point the Lady Heterodyne’s device did, in fact resemble nothing else. It was almost twice its original length, five times its diameter and everyone who saw it unanimously agreed that it looked like trouble.) She showed it to Tarvek. “But it still needs something.”
Tarvek rubbed his chin. “I see what you’re going for, but I can’t quite figure out . . . ”
“I know what it needs,” a voice boomed from behind them. They spun to see Othar Tryggvassen with a bedraggled Violetta at his side peering down at the device. “It needs one of those . . . ” He snapped his fingers in annoyance. “Oh, how embarrassing, it’s on the tip of my tongue. Hold on . . . ”
With a leap, he cleared a low wall, surprising a Wulfenbach trooper clank that had been creeping up on them. It lashed out, connecting with Othar in mid-air. Othar grabbed hold of the metal fist, swung about so that his feet were planted on the clank’s chest, and tore the arm free. He then proceeded to beat the clank into fragments with the detached arm. As soon as the mangled device fell over, he was rummaging about within its chest cavity. With a grunt of satisfaction, he pulled forth a glowing tube, which he presented to Agatha with a flourish. “You know, one of these!”
“Oh!” Agatha was delighted. She snatched it from his hand. “Yes! That’s perfect!”
Tarvek shook his head. “I keep forgetting he’s a spark.”
Violetta glanced at Moloch. “Really. So you’ve completely missed the fact that he’s overbearing, self-aggrandizing, and certain death to be around?”
Tarvek looked at her blankly. “Well, no, but what’s your point?”
