by J. Stone
“Come in,” he called out.
Alice twisted the brass knob of the door and pushed in. Crowley was seated behind his wide oaken desk that was cluttered with various papers. He did not look up from his work, as she entered and shut the door behind her. Taking a seat in front of the desk, she waited patiently until he finally scribbled something on the paper and raised his eyes to meet her own.
“Hazel Weaver,” he said. “Are you familiar with her?”
“Should I be?” Alice asked.
“Weaver was one of Fiona’s infected,” Crowley explained. “Before being converted, Weaver was an escape artist working at her father’s traveling circus. While under Fiona’s influence, the magician was somehow gifted with an ability for teleportation. She was the one responsible for the slaughter in the Anointed Temple.”
“That was her?” the operative inquired.
“Indeed it was,” Crowley answered. “After Fiona was destroyed, Weaver and the other remaining infected that she had used were acquired, locked up, and heavily sedated. It seems that Weaver woke up and escaped her captivity. Early test results showed her loss of the teleportation ability, but there is simply too much to be learned from the woman to allow her to go free. Your mission is to find her and bring her back. Once you’ve acquired her, you’re to drop her off at my private wing of the C.E.R. Do you think you are up to this task?”
“Of course, sir,” Alice said. “Is there anything else?”
Crowley paused a moment, staring down at his paperwork. “This assignment,” he eventually replied. “It is to be off the books. Specifically, it would be best if you were to avoid mentioning it to our new empress, should the opportunity present itself.”
“That won’t be a problem, sir,” she said.
“You don’t have issues keeping things from our empress?” Crowley asked.
Alice considered how to respond for a moment before finally giving into her baser thoughts. “I’m fairly certain that woman is not my empress, Councilor.”
A smile crept across Crowley’s face. “That’s good to hear, operative. You’re excused.”
Chapter 9. Ryn’s Gift
Anything was possible, she kept telling herself. For days on end, Erynn had been working to build a special mechanical glove that was not unlike the chelas used by many manual laborers. She sought something that would allow her to pick up heavier objects but without all the bulk inherent with the chela. She wanted something slimmer. Sleeker. Something that was hardly even there. Thus far, that goal had proved to be just out of her reach.
Her work building and rebuilding Tern over the years had taught her quite a deal about how hands should work and how she could mimic their behavior. Her brain worked almost like an encyclopedia of everything she had ever constructed, and Erynn continued to pour through each iteration’s schematic in her head. Certainly, Tern had the strength she sought to recreate, but his was gained through not just his hand, but the whole arm itself lent its support. Trying to minimize that design into just the small frame of the glove was what she needed.
Immediately after getting the mansion fixed back up, Erynn had set to her various creations. Back before she was selected in the lottery, she had been constantly at work on her inventions but never quite like this. Every waking moment seemed to be spent in her workshop. She hardly ate, barely slept, and feared she was constantly ignoring her companion, Pearl. The urge to create, however, was proving to simply be too much to resist. She had to realize all the ideas she had spinning in her head.
Luckily, Pearl didn’t seem to mind how reclusive Erynn had become since their return to Cultwick. She genuinely wanted to spend more time with Pearl, but her compulsions were too demanding of her own time. She had recently, however, managed to make it a habit to eat breakfast with her every morning. Despite her mind pulling her in dozens of directions at once, she set aside this time for Pearl, and Erynn had found that it was the best bit of her day.
Having just finished the meal that her companion had prepared for them, Erynn took the plates back to the kitchen and dumped them into the sink. She twisted on the water and allowed the water to vaguely run over the dirty dishes before turning off the faucet. Wiping her hands clean on her jeans, she was about to head back to her workshop and try to continue her work on the glove. Before she could, a knock sounded at the front door of the mansion.
“I’ll get it,” announced Pearl, getting up from the dining table. “While ya finish washin’ those. A drizzle of water does not equal clean, kitten.”
“You can’t even see them,” Erynn countered playfully. “You don’t know.”
“Nope, but I know how ya think,” Pearl replied patting the side of her temple with a finger.
Erynn smiled, somehow happily returning to a task that she hated. She pushed aside the dishes, clogged the drain, and was about to start running a bit of hot water to fill the sink, when Pearl called from the other room.
“Ryn!”
There was nothing more specific added, but Erynn could hear a strange pitch to her companion’s voice. Something was clearly not right. She again wiped her hands and quickly ran to the foyer, where a strange sight indeed awaited her. There was a momentary flashback to the day that the corps had come to collect her for the lottery, though this situation struck her to be quite a bit different. Two men, largely concealed by a strange collection of armor and clothing stood in the doorway.
Their faces were partially obstructed by the black hoods that hung over their heads. The cowls continued on to their torsos, but part of their arms were visible peeking through the hanging cloth, revealing dark black skin. Both had strangely white hair, which she didn’t think was terribly common for individuals from Targeaux, which is where she assumed that they originally hailed from. Layered leather straps ran around the length of their arms, rotating its way down to their wrists. Along the course of the black leather, what looked like archaic runes were etched into the hard material, spelling out some arcane message. Fingerless, leather gloves covered their hands with a metallic buckle at their wrists, where the two garments met. Each had on black pants as well, but laid out over the top were tarnished, ancient-looking greaves that ran up from where their thick boots ended to just above their knees. Hanging from one of the men’s belt was a sword of some sort that had strange markings on its hilt. The other man held a gnarled staff upward, resting it on the ground of her porch. At its upper tip was a strange crystalline rock that was cracked and worn from age.
As strange a sight as these two men were, they were nothing compared to the woman who stepped forward from behind them. There, on Erynn’s own front porch, stood the empress of Cultwick, Viola Arkmast II. Though she wore a black hood as well, her face was instantly recognizable to the chromesmith. As Erynn caught sight of her, Viola raised her hands to remove the garment from her own head. When she did, Erynn saw some strange bandage wrapped around the empress’ hand, but she quickly dismissed that, as there were far too many more important events for her to focus on at that moment. Erynn had never seen Viola up this close before. She was quite attractive. The dark black hair that framed her face was in stark contrast to her very pale complexion. Hanging from her chest was a strange orange medallion that looked slightly macabre. Strapped over her shoulder, she carried a small bag but was otherwise empty handed.
Erynn wasn’t certain whether she should be horrified, threatened, honored, or some combination. Instead, she simply found herself baffled and beyond words. Beside their guests, Pearl stood looking fairly in shock, matching Erynn’s own thoughts. Crippled by inaction, both Erynn and Pearl stood there, waiting for the moment to move forward.
“I apologize for what must seem an intrusion,” the empress began. “Might I have a few minutes of your time?”
“Uh… sure…” Erynn replied, her hand instinctively reaching toward her waist hoping to find her absent pistol.
Viola stepped forward past the robed men, saying, “Thank you, Ms. Clover. My guards will stay outside.
”
As the empress came inside, her two men stepped back, and Pearl gently closed the door. When Erynn’s companion turned back to face her, her eyes were wide with amazement and disbelief, looking over the empress’ shoulder.
Unsure where to begin, Erynn managed to say, “What can I do for you, uh…”
“Viola, please,” the empress interjected with a warm smile.
“Okay… what can I do for you, Viola?” Erynn asked again, still quite wary of the situation.
“It is quite the opposite, actually,” Viola explained. “I fear that my pardon of you is simply not enough to correct the wrongs that were done to you.” The empress grabbed the strap of the bag hanging from her shoulder and lifted a flap that was flung over the opening. Handing the bag to Erynn, she continued, “I’m not sure how best to make amends, so allow me to start by returning that which belongs to you. I don’t claim to know much regarding chromesmithing, but these look like quality built items, that I’m sure you’d like returned.”
Erynn took the bag from the empress and inside found three familiar items. When the chromesmith had been captured while looking for Pearl, she carried with her the very same items that were now in that bag - Rowland’s respirator, his spectacles, and her gun that she had recently been wishing she had at her hip. Glad to have her weapon back, and certain that Rowland would appreciate his own things returned, Erynn was still hesitant to trust Viola. The empire had never been generous to her, and that seemed unlikely to change. If she had her way, she probably wouldn’t have returned to Cultwick at all, but the professor had insisted it would be necessary to delve into the Pocket.
“Don’t take this the wrong way,” Erynn began, “but what’s the catch?”
“Ryn…” Pearl gently prodded.
“No, it’s okay,” the empress said to Pearl. Turning to Erynn, she continued, “I understand your reservations. My mother made a lifetime of mistakes, and I’m sure I will spend mine correcting each of those in turn.”
Erynn took another look into the bag, noticing something she hadn’t before. “What else is in here?” she asked in a slightly accusatory voice.
“A gift,” Viola answered. “As a chromesmith, I am confident you are familiar with Dahlia Burton.”
Erynn was more than simply aware of the woman. Growing up, Dahlia had been something of an inspiration to her. Though her death was mired in controversy and disdain, the woman had been a chromesmith ahead of the time. One of the first and certainly the best of her age.
“What you’re seeing is what is left of the fusion chamber that she built,” Viola explained.
“It can’t be,” Erynn replied. “I thought it was destroyed in the Purification…”
Viola merely smiled, as Erynn stuck her hand into the bag and pulled out the last remnants of what had been a fabled weapon. The only piece in the bag was the chamber itself, a rather hefty chunk of varying metals. How it fit into a gun remained to be seen, but even the piece she did have was fairly strange in design. The name fusion seemed to come from the fact that the device actually had two rotating slots that fit together to form one cohesive chamber. Each section had six holes going through it, allowing for up to six bullets.
The first chamber was a black metal, while the second was made of a light green-hued material that she couldn’t quite identify. Her understanding of how the chambers combined to work together was very vague, but looking at the pair of tubes, she thought that the back one looked like a normal gun chamber. The design was not unlike the one she currently had in her own revolver, and on its own it would have been enough for use in a pistol. Etched into the metal at its bottom were the initials, ‘D.B.’
The forward chamber, however, was very unfamiliar to her. The section didn’t appear to rotate like the front chamber, but rather worked under some separate logic that she hadn’t yet identified. The six slots were slightly wider, which she expected would only have weakened the design of the gun. The oddity of a contraption was very much a mystery to her. This piece too had initials, but these instead were ‘C.B.’
With only the core piece that remained of the gun, her mind began to work to complete the design of what it had once looked like. The schematic in her head was of a rather short, thick, and stout pistol; she suspected that the original had almost looked like a sawed-off shotgun. The handle for a gun this hefty would require something a bit thicker than the standard pistol grip.
After examining the outlandish device, Erynn finally said, “This is... amazing.”
“I hoped you would like it,” Viola said.
“How did you get this?” the chromesmith asked, looking up from the device. “And why would you give it to me?”
“The gun has been held in the empire’s vaults for quite some time,” the empress explained plainly. “As history writes it, all of Dahlia’s possessions were acquired upon her execution. This was among her things. It seems to have done no one any good sitting on our shelves, so I thought you might get more out of it.” Viola paused for a moment before continuing. “Did you notice the pair of initials on its base?”
“Yeah,” Erynn said, flipping the chamber over. “I assume D.B. is Dahlia Burton, but who is C.B.?”
“Cordelia Burton,” Viola answered. “Dahlia’s sister.”
“Why have I never heard of Dahlia having a sister?” Erynn asked.
“History isn’t always written from the most… unbiased perspective,” Viola replied. “Dahlia was certainly not appreciated by the empire at the time of her life, but her sister was outright hated for what she was.”
“Who was she?” the chromesmith asked.
“Cordelia practiced nexomancy,” Viola said matter of factly.
Erynn looked baffled, as she had never heard of such a thing. Pearl, having remained silent for most of their conversation, stepped around to join her partner and asked, “What is nexomancy?”
“The reason for the empire’s disdain for her,” the empress explained. “Nexomancy is an ancient form of hekta by which a practitioner can imbue objects with immense power. Dahlia created the gun, while Cordelia created the enchantments which powered it.”
“Hekta?” Erynn scoffed. “You mean magic?”
Viola smiled pleasantly. “Hekta certainly isn’t greatly understood or even acknowledged within the Cultwick Empire. You can thank the Purification for its absence. Like I said, history isn’t always written based on facts. It only survives today through sources outside Cultwick’s grasp.”
“Like Targeuax?” Pearl asked, seemingly greatly interested in what Viola described.
“That’s correct,” Viola said.
“Yer a Vaseevist, aren’t ya?” she asked. “That’s how ya destroyed the infected of the Carrier Plague. Some hekta spell.”
“Again, you are correct,” the empress replied. “It seems you’ve taken a bit of an interest in the craft.”
“It’s interestin’ if nothin’ else,” Pearl said.
“If that’s the case, allow me to impart on you a gift of your own.” Seemingly from nowhere, Viola presented an old and musty looking book and handed it to Pearl.
“What is it?” she asked.
“The smallest of insights into the world of hekta,” Viola explained.
Pearl took the book and smiled, saying, “Thank ya.” Across its cover, Erynn could read An Insight into Hekta. The name of the author, Katrina Mason, was written across the bottom edge of the book, while a strange symbol was illustrated over the rest of the cover.
“I suspect I have overstayed my welcome,” the empress said, folding her arms behind her back. “One last thing to hopefully ease both your minds. Though I can never hope to fix the monstrous acts that were done to you both, I can assure you that never again will you have to fear this empire. Particularly, I am aware of what Owen Sloan attempted to subject you to, Ms. Hicks, and it seems that he was killed in such monstrous endeavors. Please know that there will be absolutely no repercussions forthcoming for his death. As far as I am conc
erned, he got what he deserved.”
“Not nearly,” Pearl replied bitterly.
Viola nodded in agreement. “I’m certain that the two of you will be able to find peace now. Please, if there is anything else I can do to help put things right again, do not hesitate to ask. I’ve alerted the attendants in the tower to treat you both with every courtesy. I wish you both the best.”
“Thank you… for returning my things,” Erynn said.
Viola nodded once more and turned back toward the door. She was soon outside, and Pearl and Erynn watched, as she was escorted off the property by her pair of guards. After the empress left, both Erynn and Pearl stood there for a moment, looking from one another to the possessions that had been left with them.
It was then that Rowland walked into the foyer looking rather confused. “Did I hear someone at the door?”
Chapter 10. Rowland’s Research
Working in his lab for what he could only have imagined was now being measured in weeks, Rowland continued his search for a way to both prolong Germ’s life and bring the rat back from the pocket dimension that he had been trapped within. Both tasks had thus far infuriatingly eluded the professor’s mind. Too many years had passed, since he created either the Pocket or the genetically engineered rat man. His thoughts were scattered between the two goals and therefore quite chaotic, which was easily visible to anyone who happened to look at his laboratory’s current setup. He had a number of experiments running concurrently across the various work areas he’d put together.
In one corner of the room, what appeared to be something like a black hole consisting of a misty substance was hovering inches above one of the workbenches. Another table had the dissected and exploded contents of a small rodent’s innards displayed over a metal pan. Besides that, Rowland had left a blue liquid inside a spherical glass container over a lit flame. The solution had been left like that for some time and was now beginning to boil and foam out from the glass. He appeared not to have taken notice. Plugged into a socket at the wall, his centrifuge spun with yet another concoction of a dubious nature. The large, man-sized cylindrical tube that had at one point birthed Germ was also closed and occupied with yet another experiment that Rowland hoped to give him additional answers. Green mist slowly leaked forth from the cracks in the glass and metalwork, wafting up and disappearing into the ceiling. The chamber had been used so much and been running so frequently that the white paint of the ceiling overhead the device was now tinged with a light green color. Additionally, several cages were scattered around the room with clearly doomed rodents that would certainly serve as test subjects for further experimentation by the manic professor. Somehow, he had even acquired a stray alley cat for purposes even he had yet to fully decide. Better to have too many subjects than too few, he thought.
