Factory Core

by Jared Mandani

  Pausing for a while in an abandoned dwarven tavern, he studied the map of the area he had been given. It seemed that he was getting close to the palace—this was where he was sure the Factory Core would be, given that most of the city seemed to be in demon hands now, and the palace was the most heavily-fortified place in it.

  Trapper not only had excellent eyesight as a master thief, his powers of hearing—which he had fine-tuned since he was a boy—were exceptional. Thus he was able to hear the dark rumbling of demon voices a few seconds before they walked into the tavern. He managed to scramble behind the bar and crouch in a corner under it just before they stepped in.

  He peered through a small hole in the wood, with fear pumping cold blood through his veins. This was the closest he had been to any of the fiends, and they were just as terrifying close-up as he had imagined them to be. He had a long dagger on his belt, but he was a thief, not a fighter—and even a tall, strong knight in armor, armed with a sword, would have had a hard time dealing with one of these heavily-muscled beasts, with their claws and fangs. As for Trapper, he wouldn’t have stood a chance, and decided that if they saw him, he would stick his dagger into his own heart to have a quick death, rather than being ripped limb from limb and eaten alive.

  He tightened his grip around the weapon, placing the tip over his chest. If they spotted him, he would drive the blade in … and then it would all be over, nice and fast. The demons grunted and snorted and sniffed around for a while, but eventually they left, and Trapper let out a long sigh of relief, releasing the air he’d kept pent up in his lungs. He waited for a long time, giving the demons plenty of time to move on, before he crawled out from under the bar and resumed his mission.

  Through the deserted city he crept, moving like a phantom. It was eerie, terrifying and fascinating at the same time. Fires reddened the horizon, and the smell of smoke and ash was thick in the air … as well as the stink of blood and death. In this section of the capital, which had suffered a lot of damage, there were few living things besides rats and cockroaches. The debris of items the demons had smashed in their frenzies of destruction littered the streets. Trapper thought that this was what the end of the world might look like, one day.

  With these dark thoughts running through his head, he made his way to the royal residence. As soon as he got within sight of the high walls that surrounded it, he began to notice more of the mechanical spiders and geckoes he had observed elsewhere in the city. They seemed to be gathered here in much higher concentrations. And the closer he got, the harder it was for him to evade them and avoid being spotted.

  He knew that these strange steel beasts were tools of the Factory Core, intelligent weapons made by the dwarven machine. He also understood that they were all part of one hugely intelligent mind—that each of these creatures was simultaneously independent, yet part of a hive mind, as weird as that idea was to try to wrap one’s head around.

  According to what he had been told, these things could see in the dark, so the shadows would no longer help him to remain concealed. Trapper leaned against a wall and waited for a while, looking up at the hundreds of mechanical geckoes and spiders perched on walls and rooftops and standing sentry in the streets. He was the best thief in Merador, but no thief on the planet could sneak past guards like these. There was only one thing he could really do at this point … and that was to take a gamble.

  Breathing in a deep breath and holding it in his lungs for a while, to try to maintain a semblance of calm, he prepared to make a move that might very well be his last.

  “Better to die quickly by one of these beasts’ projectiles,” he muttered grimly to himself, “than be tortured slowly to death by that bastard Pavanir’s thugs.”

  Then he did it: he stepped out into the open, where the creatures of metal could see him, and started walking calmly toward the palace.

  CHAPTER 43

  The Factory Core followed with its myriad of eyes as the man stepped out of the shadows and into the center of the street. It had been observing him for quite some time, even though he believed he had not been seen. The Core had been quite certain he would eventually reveal himself … and now he had.

  The Factory Core was not sure who this stranger was, or how he had managed to sneak into Karak-Drang, but it did know that he likely came from Merador, where the dwarven population was taking shelter. It did not regard him as a threat; he seemed like quite a weak and pathetic individual, to be honest … but it was not about to underestimate him either. He could very well be a foe, perhaps even working in the service of the Dark Lord somehow.

  The Core aimed the crossbows of a few of its geckoes at his chest as he walked along the street, doing this in a very obvious way, so that the man could understand he was being watched very carefully. He raised his hands above his head in a gesture of surrender, and stopped walking.

  For a minute or two the Factory Core took this opportunity to examine him more closely. He was armed, but only with a dagger; he was definitely no warrior. He carried a leather satchel, but it was small, and the Core knew that it couldn’t possibly contain any weapons, at least not any powerful ones.

  Questions burned with relentless persistence in the Factory Core’s mind; who was this stranger, and why was he here? What was it that he had in his bag, and what had possessed him to enter this city, which was full of tens of thousands of ferocious demons?

  The Core could quite easily have killed him, of course, and then this mysterious outsider would be turned instantly from a possible threat into no threat at all. But then, these questions would go unanswered … and few things annoyed the Factory Core more than questions that it could not find an answer to.

  This puny-looking individual was definitely not a wizard; the Core’s creatures would have sensed magic crackling at his fingertips. Not a wizard, not a warrior … and he certainly didn’t look like an inventor or engineer either. A thief … that’s what he looked most like, the Core decided. Had he come here to loot the deserted buildings, to search for valuable treasures the dwarves may have left behind in their hasty exodus from the city? This did seem like a likely possibility. But why then was he revealing his presence to the spiders and geckoes now?

  There really was only one way to answer all of these questions. And since neither the spiders nor the geckoes could speak or write, the Factory Core itself would have to be the one doing the interrogation.

  The geckoes lowered their back-mounted crossbows, silently signaling to the man that he was free to proceed. The Core watched as he released a huge sigh of relief, and then began walking briskly through the streets, making a beeline for the palace gates. And then, when he finally reached them, the Factory Core opened the gates for him … and then he was inside, for better or worse.

  ***

  The Factory Core watched as the man approached it. He was clearly intimidated … yet he appeared to know exactly what he was looking for. He was staring at the outer structure of the Factory Core as if he had seen it before, somewhere, and this made the Core suspicious. The dwarven engineers and inventors would not have sent a Man to communicate with it. The more the Core’s mind thought about things, the more it began to suspect that this thief’s intentions were not simply to loot the city, but rather to do something to it—to the Factory Core, itself.

  The solution to this problem was quite simple, though. The Core locked its outer doors, and that was that; it became an impenetrable fortress. Short of knowing the correct combination of runes that would unlock the doors—and, of course, activating these runes with molten gold—there was no way this thief could get into the Factory Core. There was nothing he could do to damage it from the outside, and even if he was the most skilled lockpicker in the world, he could not have picked the Core’s locks for they were intelligently controlled, and the Core could simply move each individual pin in response to the thief’s maneuvers and thus prevent him from succeeding.

  And, of course, there was another way that he coul
d be kept out of the Core, if it came to it: a spider or gecko could quickly be sent to dispatch him. His scrawny, unarmored form didn’t look like it would stand up very well to a crossbow bolt or a musket ball.

  For the moment, though, the Factory Core decided it would simply keep observing him and let him reveal his true intentions through his actions. Only then would it decide whether he got to live … or perish.

  Before either the stranger or the Core could do anything else, though, a tremendous crash boomed through the city, rocking the ground beneath the man’s feet so violently that he almost fell over. On the horizon, a massive fireball billowed up into the sky, and clouds of debris showered down like black rain.

  Alarmed, the Core sent a gecko to scurry up to the top of one of the tallest towers in Karak-Drang, one that was able to peer outside the city walls, and get a view of the demon army beyond. The sight that the Core caught through the gecko’s eyes was one that sent a rush of unpleasant surprise tearing through its mind: the demons had constructed gigantic trebuchets, and these massive siege machines were now launching huge flaming balls of molten rock and devilfire—each weighing a few good tons—into the heart of Karak-Drang.

  When these projectiles hit a building, no matter how strongly it was constructed, it was blown to smithereens by the titanic explosion that was detonated on impact. But, the Core realized as it watched groups of cave trolls directed by Grakk’n loading the enormous shooting tools, the intent was not to simply destroy the city; they were trying to adjust and dial in the range so that the missiles came down on the palace.

  Grakk’n was aware that the Factory Core was the only thing controlling the city’s defenses and that if he destroyed the Core, the city would be his for the taking. And now, it seemed, he had come up with a plan to do exactly that.

  The Factory Core was strongly built, but it ignored if it could take a direct hit from one of those devilfire projectiles. It certainly couldn’t survive two direct hits … and if Grakk’n managed to achieve this, the game would be up, and the war lost.

  The Factory Core knew what it had to do; there was, in fact, only one thing left for it to do, since it now faced possible annihilation. It had to gather every one of its troops together, send out every single weapon it had produced … and face the Demon Horde in a gigantic winner-takes-all open battle outside the city walls.

  No more skirmishes, no more back-and-forth fights raging in the city streets. Just one final clash to end this war, to decide everything.

  With this thought burning in its super-mind, the Factory Core prepared to attack.

  CHAPTER 44

  Bomfrey, Randor and Akzad stared with wide eyes at the Seeing Crystal as the massive flaming projectiles came hurtling over the walls of Karak-Drang and destroyed everything they crashed into, leaving nothing but burning craters in the earth in their wake.

  “The demons have constructed a truly potent weapon this time,” murmured Akzad through twisted lips. “Those enormous trebuchets and their missiles of devilfire will be the death of our city, and the Factory Core. We built it strong, yes, but not strong enough to resist something like that. It is lost, it is all lost.”

  “Not yet, it isn’t,” said Bomfrey, his voice bolstered with a quiet determination. “The Factory Core will find a way to overcome this. It will find a way to prevail against this new hurdle.”

  “If one of those balls hits it, though,” said Randor, “it may very well mean the end of it. We all know how potently destructive a substance devilfire is. And the demon commander seems to be getting the range of those trebuchets dialed in.”

  “The Factory Core will overcome this,” insisted Bomfrey, although it was plain to see that there was doubt written across his haggard face. “It will find a way. It cannot die like this. It just … it cannot.”

  “And what of the thief?” asked Akzad. “The Core seems to have decided that he poses no threat, but I am sure he has been sent by King Pavanir, and the fact that he has gotten this close to the Core means that he possesses a degree of skill when it comes to stealth … and thieving.”

  “The thief is the least of our worries at this point,” muttered Bomfrey grimly. “If the Factory Core doesn’t take out those siege weapons, and deal with the peril of these undead cave trolls, the battle is lost.”

  “I don’t know, my friend,” said Akzad warily. “I do not think we should simply dismiss this man’s presence as nothing. It is true that these trebuchets pose a massive danger … but this thief makes me anxious too.”

  “And you would be right to be worried,” said Randor, frowning deeply. “I too suspect that he has been sent by King Pavanir. And Pavanir, while a greatly ambitious man, is also a very cautious one. He would not send this rogue on this mission unless he had done extensive preparations, and he certainly wouldn’t have sent him unless he was sure this fellow would succeed in his mission … whatever evil purpose that might be.”

  “Isn’t it obvious?” asked Akzad. “King Pavanir wants control of the Factory Core for his own selfish purposes of conquest and empire, to make war against the other cities of Men, and to defeat them and subjugate them to his rule. This thief, somehow, is the key to that goal. I don’t know how that filthy creature could have learned the Core’s secrets, but I’d wager that he knows more of them than we suspect he does.”

  “How?” scoffed Bomfrey. “How could a lowly human thief comprehend the inner workings of our mighty creation?”

  “You forget, master dwarf,” said Randor, “that there are experts in this city who are well versed in your dwarven runes. They are as fluent in their reading as any educated dwarf. And your General Khazum, we are all painfully aware that he knows at least some of the Core’s secrets. His friendship with Ser Greenfield is now established, and all of us know that Khazum has no love for the Core.”

  “They have all conspired,” said Akzad bitterly, “to infiltrate the Factory Core and bend it to their evil will. And that thief, he is somehow the key for them to achieve their ends.”

  “So,” said Randor, “your Factory Core now has to fight against the mightiest demon weapons it has yet seen, and also worry about this thief possibly taking control of it?” He shook his head and sighed sadly. “Things are not looking good for Karak-Drang. And we all know what may lie ahead for the rest of the world if the Demon Horde is not stopped by the Factory Core. If that damned rogue succeeds in his goal, and manages to get inside the Core and claim control, he might well be dooming not only Karak-Drang but the entire planet. Without the Factory Core to fight off the Demon Horde, all will fall before the armies of the Infernal Realm.”

  As the wizard was speaking, Bomfrey’s hands were curling into tight fists.

  “Not if I can help it,” he murmured in a soft but determined voice. “Not if I can help it.”

  “What are you talking about?” asked Akzad.

  “We have to stop him,” said Bomfrey. “We have to stop that thief, and let the Core focus all of its attention on the coming battle.”

  “And how do you propose to do this, master dwarf?” asked Randor.

  “We enter the city, the three of us … and we put an end to his mischief ourselves,” answered Bomfrey. “Are you with me?”

  Randor and Akzad looked at each other. They both knew how dangerous a mission this would be, but they also understood the immensity of what was at stake here.

  “We are,” they both answered solemnly.

  “Then there is no more time to waste,” said Bomfrey. “There is a secret passage from the depth of Merador’s crypts that leads to Karak-Drang. We must go right now.”

  With that, the three of them got up and prepared to embark on this perilous quest.

  CHAPTER 45

  Trapper needed to act quickly; if the Factory Core caught wind of what he was about to do, it would surely kill him instantly with one of its snipers. He had been told that the Core’s locks were unpickable, even for an artist as skilled as himself, and tha
t there was really only one way to gain access: to use the correct combination of runes, triggered in the right order. This would force the Factory Core to open its doors, and prevent it from attempting to kill the one who activated the runes—a safety feature built into the Factory Core by Bomfrey and his team, in case of it going rogue and turning against all living things instead of just the demons.

  Bomfrey and his engineers had looked down on General Khazum and his warriors with scorn … and in doing so they had made the fatal mistake of underestimating their opponents. All along, Khazum had secretly been bribing a senior member of the engineering team for sensitive information on the Core. Bomfrey and Akzad and the others had made a grave error in writing Khazum off as nothing but a violent meathead. And now, their oversight in this area had proved to have dire consequences.

  Khazum had passed on to Ser Greenfield every bit of information he had gleaned about the most secret inner workings of the Factory Core, and Greenfield, Professor Alandarus and King Pavanir had used this material to ensure that Trapper was very thoroughly prepared for the mission he was on. Luckily for them, the thief had an almost photographic memory, and was able to remember things very precisely.

  Using the intel Khazum had bribed from Bomfrey’s inner circle, the professor had put together the exact sequence of runes needed to gain entry to the Factory Core, and immunity from its many traps and weapons.

  While it was true that gold would normally have to be melted down to activate the runes—a process that would take a few minutes, and one that would most certainly get the Factory Core’s attention, marking Trapper as an enemy to be eliminated—through scouring Merador’s vaults, Professor Alandarus had found an ancient enchanted alchemist’s chalice that would instantly melt any item of solid gold placed into it. Using this enchanted chalice, Trapper would be able to turn on the runes in seconds … hopefully, for the conspirators, before the Factory Core recognized what he was doing and tried to silence him forever.