As any good story, mine starts with my abrupt death.
My name is William Corbyn, or Will “many-hands”, and in my past life I was known as an alchemist, I built automata’s, machines that made the world go round, well not me per se… but the greatest alchemist made great things indeed, monstrous giants that that carried city’s on their back. Hundreds of meters tall and impossibly large, the tallest of them were humanoid, usually on two or four legs, with their main body rising to the skies; but truly the largest were those that dwelled underground, some say they could pierce the world through, another’s naysay… But well what do I know.
I built the simplest of automata’s. Machines that help the mankind on their day to day activities, be it simply a tray on wells that helps get stuff around, or something a bit more complex, my proudest creation was my “hydra” a pair of mechanical arm attached to my back and helped me build whatever I needed, I had a “crown” that let me control them telepathically, it was hard at first, and it was not without some headaches, but I can say, that I now can control them with pinpoint accuracy. I think I could have built something with actual sapience, but for that, I would need a world gem… and those were highly regulated by the courts since the great wars.
But enough of that I’m dead and if I’m not mistaken about to be reborn, at least the shining light seems to be getting closer, or maybe I’m getting closer to the light, in this monochromatic tunnel I really can’t tell shit. Anyway, so yeah, I died. I can’t say I died a hero’s death and saved thousands, on the contrary, I kind of fucked-up.
I wonder if I will be reborn in this world? Maybe I might see him again… What am I supposed to do? Really, how does someone ever move on from an entire life…?
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That morning started like many others, the sun shining annoyingly up high, for it had no right to look so bright so early in the morning….
“Will! Get your ass out of bed! It’s already 10 am! If we are late again because of you, I’ll fucking kill you.”
“Oh shit!”
That is the co-owner of “Manyhands and Co.”, the love of my life, Alan Prescott. We meet in the Arcanum of Autumatum, the university where I studied what where, what are, and how to build automata’s. Alan frequented the university next door, the Mercantile association of Ussex, it teaches the “exciting”, oh so he says, world of economics. We meet in the most disgusting cliché way of bumping into each other on the way to the cafeteria. We started talking, then dating… and the rest is history.
We had a meeting at 10:40 you see, a new client... A new seriously LOADED client, had taken an interest in something we had built, and we couldn’t afford to pass up such an opportunity, you see.
And then… it all went wrong on the way to downtown.
“ATTENTION ALL CITIZEN’S, ROTE A12 HAS SUFFERED AN UNEXPECTED MALFUNCTION, ALL CITIZENS ARE ADVISED TO TAKE A SUBSTITUTE ROUTE”
“I fucking knew it Will….”
“Hey, hey, don’t look at me like that, we’re still on time, it’s not my fucking fault they closed the bloody road”
Taken from Royal Road, this narrative should be reported if found on Amazon.
“…”, Alan looked at me, and then “Fuck it, I’m taking it anyway”
“whoa, whoa, whoa calm down, if we take the A13 we can get there in 30 min, we will be a bit late but I’m sure the client will understand”
“You don’t understand Will, we really, really, can’t afford to pass this up… I got a warning from the council this morning if we don’t start selling they are going to take the shop.”
“What, how? I looked at the numbers, they were fine for this month.”
“I…ah shit… might have changed them a bit for you… I’m sorry, but when you get all stressed you know things don’t flow as smoothly for you…”
“Alan... Jesus… fuck”, “alright… I understand, but we are going to talk about this latter. Gun it”
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And then,
“What the hell happened here…?”
What should have been a closed road with some cancels and such, maybe some tape, was completely destroyed the road. There were two, ginormous holes, eating up into the ground impossibly deep, one of them went straight through one lane and the other missed the road by centimeters.
And peeking into one hole, was, of course, our client.
“What was his name, again?” I said to Alan
“Ah, Mr. Weinstein, or something”
“So do we go up to him?”
“And get near the hole?”
“It is the client”
“…” and on careful steps we went
“Hello!” said Alan, maybe a bit too loud
“Argh, Jesus Crist, fuck! You’re trying to get me to fall down?” and then, the fucker, slapped me.
And I kind of… pushed him. I didn’t mean to of course, but I was really jumpy from finding out you have two giant holes to hell on the way to a meeting, and then, of course, go to stand near those said hellholes.
And he just went fwush
“Will….”
“Oh, fuck”
“Will. what the hell did you do?!”
“He slapped me!”
“So you fucking pushed him!?”
“I didn’t mean to, it just… yeah”
“…”, “What do we do?”
“We call someone and explain?”
“Alright, bloody hell, this day can’t get any worse. You’re alright?”
“Yeah, I’m fine”
…
“The phone doesn’t have a signal... That’s impossible, unless, do you think… maybe someone’s blocking it? To hide whatever happened over here.”
“I don’t know”, “Alan, I think we should leave”
“Yeah, I’m getting those vibes too, and since we don’t have a meeting anymore…”
We were about to leave, but just as I looked at the hole one last time, a black car shimmered into existence. A man dressed in a blue suit, and four not very happy men armed with some crazy tech, got out of the car and slowly came up to us.
Alan, of course, entered in full business mode, bullshitting his way through this.
“Hello, Mr.? “
“Ah, Mr. Weinstein? I see they already called you…” the man took a break to really look at us “to see the legend, the brain behind all the operations for the very first time it’s quite the honor. I thought you perhaps a bit older, but no matter. I’m from the council they sent me to figure out what succeeded, you can call me Mr. Blue. So tell me what’s the plan? Do we know who is it? The rebel’s maybe? They have been acting strange recently.”
“Ah yes, the rebels...” I don’t know where he was pulling this from, but I was seriously wowed, “they have been a thorn on our side indeed. What do you believe is the right course of action?” said Alan with the best poker face I have seen in years
“I’m not sure Mr. Weinstein, I’m hardly the expert, we should not dawdle, time is of the essence, I’d rather leave such decisions to yourself”
“Hmm, Hmmmmmm, I will form a special team and send them to investigate, inform the council of such.”
“Very well, then I shall contact you later through the usual means, to know of your results”, “Just one more thing Mr. Weinstein it is just a formality but it must be done “ The falcon may fly high, but the 3867 eyed fly sees all”
And just like that, when we were so close, we got fucked. We just looked at each other, and he knew what I was about to do.
“Run”
The “hydra”, my automaton arms burst through my shirt. I didn’t see if Alan ran, at this point, I’m not sure if it would have even mattered… I rushed at the man closest to me while at the same time I turned a blowtorch at them, I’m not sure if it blinded them or not, but I got to stab the one I was after right through the shoulder, he screamed. By the time I managed to get the arm out, the other, unfortunately, had already gotten over the blowtorch and with a thump my lower body just… pain.
I don’t remember very well what happened after that, I think I saw Alan run? Maybe I imagined it… well, that’s how I died.
Oh, look we got to the end of the tunnel.