To be fair, there was a lot of it. The waist-high heap of equipment was already so big that it threatened to spill back into the food. We weren’t exactly sitting on a gold mine here, but it was far, far better than nothing.
Patch picked up the head of a mace and returned to us. It looked like it hadn’t held its shape well enough to be sold, way back when. “I know some of these maker marks. They’re not all from the Lost and Foundry, but every single one of them was made in Hallow.” She pointed back at the pile at random. “This one’s from the Hammer It Out, and those are the golden arches of the McManufactory. Cheap, but plentiful. All of the big metalworks have probably been dumping the stuff they couldn’t salvage into the food pits for as long as the trash chutes existed.”
Bingo’s eyes were smiling. “Yer welcome. Now, dat food’s callin’ me. Good chat.”
“Oh no you don’t,” Patch said, catching him by the ear and dragging him into an adjoining room in a move that would’ve made Mother proud. I followed them, closing the door behind us so that we could talk without being overheard.
“What’s dis about?” he demanded.
Patch handed him the coin, and his face fell. “Explain.”
“Gods, I was a ‘andsome cuss.”
“True. Now spill the rest of the story,” she told him. “Tell us everything and all’s forgiven. Fair warning, though. Whatever you leave out is going to piss me off.”
“Deal,” he rasped. “‘Ow ‘bout I just show ya, instead? Faster for us all, dat way.”
“Sounds good,” I said. I’d been expecting him to put up a lot more of a fight than this. “No tricks, though.”
“None.” He handed the coin back to Patch, who stuffed it into her cleavage, making use of one of the two extra pockets girls got that guys didn’t. “We’re a crew, right?”
“Right!” Patch agreed.
“As fate would have it,” I said, which was as close as I was going to come to saying yes, at the moment. I trusted Patch to the moons and back though, and Bingo was growing on me.
He nodded slowly. “Ya wanna see what we’re gonna crew, den? If ya say no, none of us’ll be breathin’ past dawn.”
Patch was beside herself. “Yes! Now show us, because I can’t take the antici-”
Bingo waited, but I bumped his shoulder. “Just do your big reveal and ignore her.”
“‘Kay.” He went behind a machine that was pouring molten metal into pickax molds and stepped up to a panel in the far wall. There was a keypad beside it, and he punched in a code.
Nothing happened. “Try 1337,” Patch supplied helpfully.
“No. I know da code. Ya need to buy access to da stagin’ area.”
“I already did. Reset the code too, but didn’t poke around down there.”
“Da lasers woulda gotcha if ya did.”
He plugged her numbers into the keypad and the door slid open to reveal a big service elevator. “Ya comin’?” he told us, stepping in and waving us onboard. “‘Cause it’s well an’ truly time for da third act.”
“-Pation,” finished Patch, finally.
Chapter 28
As soon as the elevator doors closed, I turned and cornered him. I was pleased to see that Patch did the same, and his eyes darted back and forth between us. “What?”
“Not ‘what’.” I said. “Your story doesn’t add up, so I want to know ‘how’ and ‘why.”
Not to be outdone, Patch threw out, “Also, ‘who’?”
“Answer me first.” I didn’t want to get sidetracked with her usual nonsense, since this was important.
Bingo held his hands up in front of himself. “Relax. Da Silvertongues ‘ave always been involved in Rule Of Cool. My great-great-grandfather built da company up from nothin’, and his son did an even better job schmoozing the investors. Dat guy’s son and daughter were both primo weapon designers of da highest caliber, pun intended. Once some genius decided that dere should be a Board of Directors, dey were unanimously voted on to it along with a handful of meddlers and copper pinchers.”
Proficiency Check
Ancient History: 48
Result: Failure
New Skill Values:
Ancient History = 16/100
I made a ‘hurry up’ gesture at him. “Get to the part where you bud from the family tree.”
“Almost dere. By da time I took an interest in da Silvertongue’s business, Rule of Cool had lost dere way. We used ta care about bigger, badder, better, but dey’d entered an era where profit was da end-all-be-all. I had good ideas, but dey all got voted down. By the time I realized dey were only keeping me around as an escapegoat, it was too late.”
“You mean ‘scapegoat’,” I told him.
“No. Grandpa designed a rocket-propelled goat dat you could strap yourself to an’ light da fuse. Nobody could catch ya, once it took off. Hence, escape goat.” He ran his hands up the sides of his mohawk for a second. It was as magnificent as ever, somehow devoid of the sludge he’d recently been swimming in. “Ya don’t know everythin’, Raze…”
“That’s true,” Patch agreed. “He doesn’t. But back to you. If they weren’t listening to anything you said, why’d you stick around?”
Bingo rubbed his thumb against his index and middle fingers in a ‘money’ gesture. “Cashola. Dey needed a Silvertongue on da board to reassure da public, and by den I was all dat was left. Da bottom of da barrel.”
That didn’t really explain how he was still around a thousand years after all of this went down. “So you’re immortal, is that it?”
Bingo nodded so hard I was worried his mohawk might knock me out. “Absolutely.”
“Wow,” Patch said, and before I could stop her she’d pulled the metal awl from her tool belt and plunged it into the back of Bingo’s hand.
“Ooof,” Bingo grunted, his gas mask rumbling.
“Do you feel the pain and not take the hit point damage, or does this not hurt at all?”
Judging by the look on his face, the stab wound had certainly done him some harm. “What da *shhh*uck’s goin’ on in dat ‘ead of yours, girlie?” he demanded.
“You said you were immortal!”
“No.” He snatched the awl away from her. “My ears aren’t what dey used ta be. I thought Raze said ‘immoral’.”
“Why didn’t you die a long time ago, is what I want to know,” I restated, trying to over enunciate every word before Patch went Brutus versus Caesar on him again.
“Ya ever ‘eard of cryogenics?”
“Sure.”
“Time Dilation?”
“Yeah…”
“Carbonite?”
“Like in Star Wars? I guess so, but…”
Bingo made a stirring motion with his hands. “Take all of dem and throw in a couple more plot coupons and dat’s how. The chamber was experimental, but I’d rather be a guinea pig den a pinata, and da Heroes were already running rampant in da mountain. Da effect lasted until thirty or so years ago and when it wore off. I woke up hungry and alone.”
“And thirsty,” Patch reminded him.
“Dat too.” He held up a finger for quiet as he listened to the sound of the elevator descending. “We’re just about dere. Gets bumpy in a se-”
My stomach fought for space inside my throat as the elevator went into freefall and then, at the last second, kicked on the brakes and screeched to a halt.
Ding!
I don’t know what I was expecting, but the thunderous pulse of a kickass bass line rumbling the doors so hard that they would’ve shaken themselves to pieces if they didn’t slide open wasn’t it.
Once they did, the music was even louder. Bingo led us from the elevator as drums and a ramrod of an electric guitar joined the frenzy in a face-melting blitz of sound and fury.
“Megadeth,” I said, though the song was so loud I couldn’t even hear myself. “Take No Prisoners. Nice choice!”
Bingo looked like the music empowered him. He stood up straighter, striding down a long hallway
as the ground convulsed beneath us.
I instinctively checked my ears for blood, but there wasn’t any dribbling out of my burst eardrums yet. The operative word was ‘yet’. Ozone filled the air as the speaker’s happily rattled themselves into rubble, throwing thrash metal power chords at us as the cacophonous swell swallowed every drop of my awareness.
The walls shivered.
The ceiling cracked.
Patch and I slowed to a stop, and when Bingo noticed he came back and put his hand against the small of our backs and guided us forward. The lights overhead throbbed and exploded in strobing showers of sparks, dusting us with powdered glass.
There were huge screens along the walls, and once the lyrics kicked in the words appeared in tandem with them, followed by a slow pan along each piece of equipment that they were designed to showcase. The whole thing was slick and well-produced, and I could feel myself salivating.
Got one chance, infiltrate them!
Modular Composite Mechronite Armor with Blastless Kinetic Dampening and Ensorcelled Laminates
Get it right, terminate them!
Triple-barreled ‘Venomous Goblin’ Lead Throwing Chain Gun
The Panzers will, permeate them!
Head Canon Recoilless Artillery
Break their pride, denigrate them!
‘HAM 9001’ VTOL Retractable Jump Jets
And their people, retrograde them!
‘Banshee Flux’ Sonic Radar and EMP Crowd Controller
Typhus, deteriorate them!
Ouroboros Caustic Laser Sight
Epidemic, devastate them!
Alchemical Storm Missile Swarm and Rocket Battery
Take no prisoners, cremate them!
Vorpal-Bladed Voidsaw with Flame Spewer Underbarrel Attachment
“Dave Mustaine is a God,” I shouted, right before the song ended in full-throated glory.
“Damn straight,” Bingo agreed. “Hope ya liked da intro, since it can only ‘appen da one time. Speakers’ll be shot, and we don’t have da Credits to buy da rights from da band again.”
“Worth it!” Patch called, still playing air guitar for all she was worth. It wasn’t until she darted forward and slid down the polished hallway that I wondered if we should be worried about the lasers Bingo had mentioned.
“Is this place safe, Bingo?”
He put his hand out, palm down and gave it an indecisive wiggle. “Ish. Nobody’s been in ‘ere since da Smash. Heroes never found it, an’ it seems da countermeasures still ‘member me.”
“Why doesn’t Source?” Patch asked, which was actually a damn good question.
“Yanked his memory an’ wiped it mostly clean on my shirt when I woke up. Didn’t wanna hear him tell me ‘I told ya so’ for years and years on end.”
I pointed back at the screens, still silently running through the list of weapons and subsystems. “What was all that stuff?”
“You’ll see.”
“Just tell me one thing. Do we get to play with them?”
Bingo’s wicked chuckle was exactly what I wanted to hear. “If you’re good…”
Patch was bouncing around beside me. “This is fun! Are you excited?”
“Yeah.”
“Me too!”
The hallway came to a dead end, and one by one a spotlight pinpointed a sigil on the bedrock blocking the way.
Alchemy. Sorcery. Wizardry. Thermatology. Electricity. All five of the dreaded Dreg magics were here, and when the gel filters dropped over the lights each of them had a different color.
Bingo smacked his glow vial, then reached over and whacked mine. Patch got the hint and took hers out of her pocket, shaking it with gusto. I allowed her milkshake to bring me to the yard before I realized that her ampoule was shining with a red light, just like the Thermatology symbol.
My blue matched Electricity, and Bingo’s green lined up with Alchemy.
“Don’t have a Wizard or a Sorceress, yet. One ‘em will prob’ly be Mother. Don’t matter, since three’s enough ta open da door and say ‘ello.” He touched his vial to the stone, and Patch and I both stepped forward and did the same.
Achievement Unlocked:
Magical Mystery Tour
3/5 Ain’t Bad
Reward: All Crew Members who pass through this door will have their negative status penalties removed, their Hit Points replenished, their credit card debt wiped clean and their hearing rejuvenated. You’re going to need that last one, after what you just went through.
The wall in front of our faces slid backward and then pulled way in five directions at once, revealing the wide-open throat of a monstrous cavern.
The path we were on gradually sloped up, and as we walked along it the walls that had previously been so cramped now got farther and farther away. A chasm opened on either side of the walkway we were on and when I dared to look down, a blast of heat and a whiff of brimstone told me just how deep below the surface we actually were.
“Is that molten rock down there?” I asked.
“Ya. Was s’posed ta go all da way ta Hell itself, but I got outvoted. Dey stopped diggin’ when dey hit da core.”
“Saved your life!” Patch squealed, simultaneously grabbing my arm and pushing me toward the brink.
I shot her a dirty look. “You know, if anyone else did that I’d shove them straight over without a second thought.”
“But you didn’t, and you won’t. Must be love, huh?” she said, flouncing off ahead in an attempt to get to the end of the path before the rest of us.
I sighed. She was probably right, but thankfully there was still plenty of time to change my mind about murdering her.
The engineers who’d designed this space and then successfully carved it out of the rock had done so one with one goal, to flatten the brain of the viewer with a sense of sheer awe.
Everything was off the chart in terms of scale, and our destination remained cunningly hidden from sight by the angle of the ramp and the way the lights only picked out the next few yards instead of the whole place at once.
Bingo started to huff and puff beside me. His earlier energy was flagging, and when I glanced at him he waved me ahead. “You two go on,” he said. “I still see ‘er every time I close my eyes. Don’t ‘member it being such a steep climb to get dere, is all.”
I sped up, but Patch was too far ahead which meant that when I finally reached the top I was basically alone.
I stepped out on to a huge, flat-topped pillar jutting out of the depths below. Part of it stretched off to the right and left, bridging the yawning chasm above the magma. There was still a death-defying drop in some directions, but the size of the plateau meant that it would be almost impossible to accidentally fall off.
The space was empty, though.
“There’s nothing here!” I breathed. “All of that buildup, and this old bastard drags us here to show us the biggest waste of space I’ve ever seen in my life!”
Patch’s eyesight, though voluntarily lacking depth perception, was still sharper than mine. “Chill out,” she called. “There’s a trap door right here.” She ran over and jumped and down on top of it. “I’ll get it open, just give me a sec.”
I watched her absently as Bingo finally arrived. “Get over ‘ere, girlie,” he said, waving her back. “Show a little caution, why don’t ya? Anticlimactic I know, but I gotta tell ya some stuff first.”
She dutifully returned, standing beside me with barely restrained excitement. “Make it fast!”
Bingo nodded and started ticking things off on his fingers. “One, it might not work.”
I felt my shoulders slump. This wasn’t starting out very promising. “Right…”
“Two, we ran outta ore, so it ain’t all da way complete.”
I closed my eyes and hung my head. “Go on.”
“Three, in case da Heroes got down here I ordered the guts of what was finished dismantled.”
I threw my hands up in the air. “The hits keep coming. Anything else?”
<
br /> “I’m giving it to you two.”
The trap door slid open. Ten thousand spotlights snapped on and swiveled to pierce the blackness within as the most gloriously hideous Mech my not-very-limited-by-the-constraints-of-reality imagination could have possibly cooked up rose smoothly into view.
“It’s incredible,” I murmured, even though some of the wind left my sails when the spotlights dialed back and I could see the shape of it better.
“Yes!” Patch cheered, without the slightest hint of sarcasm. “And it’s totally in pieces. More work for me!”
The armored behemoth would have been bipedal, had the left leg not been missing completely. A heavy-duty frame held the rest of the assembly upright in a brace, with countless components laid out in front of it in a meticulous methodology that meant nothing to me.
The Mech’s right arm ended in a lengthy, triple-barreled gun. The upper part of the left one was a bulky blast shield and the lower was an articulated gimbal on to which some evil genius had mounted a multi-bladed spinsaw half my size on an extendable actuator. Both of its shoulders bristled with artillery, one an exposed missile rack with an open, armored hatch revealing the warheads within and the other a five-foot cannon that looked like it might just turn out to be a rail gun.
I could tell that Bingo was beaming behind the mask. “She’s da first of ‘er kind, a one and done. Da *shtt*heads wouldn’t let me call it a Mech ‘less I could make da acronym work, so technically yer lookin’ at a ‘Mobile Executioner Conquest Headquarters’.”
I didn’t have words worthy of the war machine in front of me. All I could do was, with tears in my eyes, give him a solid, well-deserved high five.
Achievement Unlocked:
Mutual Respect
You have to give it to get it
Reward: Respect is, literally, its own reward. Sorry!
Know Your Roll Page 26
