A Tale of Artifice

Dalkan Sulf had never gotten used to the bells. It wasn’t the sound that got him, it was the Message spell built into the bell itself, ensuring that everybody heard the message inscribed into that particular bell as if it were whispered into their ear. This bell meant that the Meteorologic Engine had been engaged, conjuring the nightly storm over Ketelswatch. It meant that the lightning collectors were about to open up like ravenous flowers, harnessing the storm’s energy to fuel the factories for another day. It meant that Dalkan instinctually brushed his fingers across the Pin of Precipitation Protection they wore on their coat, projecting a hydrophobic energy field across their body. It meant that they were almost out of time.

Dalkan twisted the screwdriver one final time, securing the casing on their arcane firearm, hoping that it would hold this time. Next to them, Llwellyn “Lullabye” Lewis finished his own preparations, shadowboxing in order to test the freshly oiled joints on his arcanoprosthetic limbs. Dalkan looked off the edge of the spire, gazing at the barges drifting past on the canal. Across the way, another cluster of manufacturing spires loomed over the ancient university campus. Illusionary runes flared, presenting a message into the sky. “THIS METEOROLOGICAL EVENT BROUGHT TO YOU BY ZADELRAZZ INDUSTRIES!”. Lulla glared at the letters projected across the rapidly forming clouds.

“Are we really doing this?”

“We’re the only ones who can, besides, it’s our fault. Delvar Reek would never have gotten this far without the work we did.”

“Maybe the work You and Aisha did. You’re the artificers, I’m just the moron unlucky enough to know you two.”

“That’s not what you said when you agreed to help us break into Zadelrazz’s archive.” Aisha dropped onto the ledge with a practiced motion, deactivating the dampening field built into her armor. “Two guards and a Sentinel at the dock, Runedoll pilot on the Skyhopper.”

Dalkan nodded. “Got it. We do this like we did the Train Job. Aish and I take the guards, Lulla takes the Sentinel.”

With nods of assent, the trio began to scale the side of the spire, their spider-climb imbued gloves carrying them past the illusion projectors proclaiming the many benefits of purchasing the fine products developed by Reek Thaumic Solutions Inc. In one motion they crested the spire’s summit. The first guard turned his head just in time for Dalkan to drop him with a blast of concussive force. The second was about to raise the alarm when Aisha clasped an invisible hand over his mouth and charged her gauntlets with electricity.

Lulla had the hard job, charging a seven-foot construct with terrifying scythe-arms and an inbuilt energy cannon. The boxer lunged inside the sentinel’s reach and delivered a barrage of pinpoint blows with his prosthetic limbs. With an audible crack, something got displaced inside the sentinel and the construct stopped moving. Delkan twisted a nozzle on their weapon and sprayed forth a burst of grease, coating the ground between the stunned construct and the spire’s edge. With a grunt, Aisha and Lulla pushed, sliding the construct across the grease-slick concrete. The Sentinel came back online just as it toppled over the edge. Fulfilling its programming to the last, it activated its energy cannon and fired a blast up at the trio, who all dropped prone to avoid it.

“Damn it Dalkan” said Lullabye, “why did you decide to put blasters on those things.”

“It seemed like a good idea at the time.”

With that, the trio pushed themselves up and made their way into the waiting skyhopper. The blank face of a runedoll with a carved captain’s hat stood at the controls, awaiting authorization and instruction. Aisha flashed a stolen badge. “Please fly us to Mister Reek’s Manor on Urgent Business”.

Silently, the Runedoll nodded and began activating the system. Lulla shuddered. “I hate those things, you never know what they’re going to do.”

“What? Runedolls are the most stable construct base out there. They do whatever they’re programmed to do.”

“Yeah, that’s the point. This one’s been turned into a pilot, put the right runes in there and you can get a chef, or an assassin, or a chef-sassin. At least with the Sentinel you know what it’s for just by looking at it.”

Aisha sat on a bench, inspecting the enchanted bands of her armor. “A runedoll can be anything, that’s what this is all about isn’t it?”

The trio sat in silence as the Skyhopper rose into the clouds. Beneath them, the city spread out as far as the eye could see, beyond the great corpospires and sprawling manufacturing complexes trains wove their way through the labyrinth of residential blocks. As the clouds rolled in and the sun fell, the Lumenpods released thousands of dancing lights that spread out to illuminate the streets. Below in the stadium, a swarm of dancer runedolls performed intricate choreography for an adoring crowd, the glowing auras around each one presenting a spectacle even at this height. They watched and waited as the skyhopper approached the flying manor, the house and its grounds suspended above the city by flight cores. The hopper’s flight path had been designed for maximum visual impact, so the craft flew above the mansion and grounds before passing behind the massive picture window.

That was what the Artificers were waiting for. Dalkan and Aisha lept from the Skyhopper and crashed through the window, picking themselves up to survey the room. A massive machine stood in the center of what was once a stately ballroom. Shocked servants and guards stared at the pair of them. Standing in the center of it all, a gnome in a fine runestitched suit and silken top hat oversaw the whole operation while swirling a glass of something expensive in one hand. A pair of Sentinels stood at his shoulders, immediately turning their weapons towards the threat. Seconds later, the doors flew open as a small army of guards and henchmen rushed into the room, drawn by the sound of breaking glass.

With a sigh, Delvar Reek turned to look at them. “Ah, if it isn’t my wayward contractors. Ms. Tevil, Mx. Sulf. I thought I had your whole little crew firmly in my pocket. Sure, you hated me, but you loved my money more than your principles. Before you try something idiotically clever, you should know that these sentinels” Reek gestured to the two constructs, “are my personal bodyguard models. Their reaction times are more than fast enough to kill you before you could harm myself or my device. There is nothing for you to do but wait and bear witness to my triumph.” He paused to take a needlessly long sip. “Although if we wanted to pass the time, you could tell me what tipped you off? I went to such lengths to conceal my plans, even from you.”

“The Lumenpods, the new ones you had installed for the street lighting contract. We cracked one open and saw your “modifications”, spell relays for a specialized transmutation spell. It wasn't too hard to work it out from there, especially after we raided a few labs to get a sense of what you’ve been working on. You’re insane if you think this will end well for you.”

Reek smirked and swirled his glass of brandy, gazing down at the city. “They say that old Zadelrazz got sick of creating bespoke constructs for each of his experiments, so he whipped up a generic model in an afternoon that he could tweak as needed. When his bean counters heard about it they told him he could fund all the experiments he wanted by putting them into mass production the mad fool jumped at the chance. They’re sturdy, versatile, and best of all,” Delmar Reek gestured to the machine behind him. “Modifiable. Thanks to your work recovering old Zaddle’s codex, plus your help ‘influencing’ the city council to grant Reek Thuamic Solutions the street lighting contract, and of course your exemplary design work on my line of battle constructs, I have everything I need to rewrite the control modules on every Runedoll in the city, an army at my command, built by my biggest rival and paid for by my newest subjects. They won’t be a proper army until I get their weapons and combat protocols installed, but even base model Runedolls are dangerous enough to unaware civilians. Enough to let me seize control of the city and its manufacturing facilities… at least if my numbers are right.”

Aisha grinned “You were always good with numbers. Just two questions for you, Mister Reek?”

Delvar’s mental countdown was complete. “First, how long have we been talking?”

Aisha’s turn. “Second, how many Arconex demolition charges can a fully trained monk of the hydraulic fist, wearing R.T.S Rapipace Prosthetic legs, place in that time? Factor in that all the guards who should be getting in his way are here” Aisha gestured around the room “listening to their employer monologue about how smart he is.”

Somewhere, Llwellyn “Lullabye” Lewis pushed a button. The casings on the manor’s flight cores cracked with the explosion. Suddenly, it was easier for the cores to shatter their housings and rocket into the sky than to keep holding the manor aloft. Suddenly, every person on the Manor began scrambling for feather fall tokens.

The Sentinels, for their part, obeyed their programming, unleashing a barrage of energy as Dalkan and Aisha sprinted towards the broken window. They hurled themselves into the storm, activating the feather fall charms they had prepared before this job. Dalkan felt the burning sting of the blaster cannons finding their targets. Their last thought before blacking out was regret tinged with pride. Those blasters really were something.

Dalkan’s shackles clunked onto the table; even with the healing they had received, their back still hurt from the Sentinel’s blast. “And that’s basically it. I know you have no reason to believe a word of it, but it’s the truth. We had to stop Reek, even if it meant spending the rest of our lives in prison. Maybe I should have lied, but I know how this all looks.”

The elf across the table nodded while flipping through a folder. “It looks like an incredibly talented artificer, albeit one with criminal tendencies, figured out that their regular employer was planning something monstrous and took the necessary steps to thwart the scheme.”

Dalkan sat up with surprise. “Yeah, that’s how I should probably have my lawyer say it. Are you not from the adjudicator’s office?”

“No, no I'm not. Sorry if I gave that impression, but it was important to see how you acted when you thought I was your enemy.”

“So you’re not going to tell me I’m too dangerous to be on the streets?”

The elf laughed. “Oh, you’re certainly dangerous, and if all goes well, you’ll certainly be off the streets. Allow me to properly introduce myself. My name is Fern Larchbrook; I am an Agent of A.R.C.O.S. I know many things, and I believe many things more than I know. Specifically, I have an offer I believe a hero of your skill and conviction will want to accept...”

[Next Time: A Record of the Ages]