“Taste good.” I took a sip of the supper the lieutenant concocted, before taking a spoonful of it. Dried corn and three whole different types of canned beans, drop in some cuts of squash, carrot, and onion, and I managed to spot a hint of cheap alcohol. Fat broth, from the pork he got in the bottom there, which seemed to be not canned - a welcomed surprise. It is a mishmash of tried and true field ration mixed with some fresher stuff, done with some skill.
“Nice, huh? I got both of your meal tickets and decided to make something good out of the stuff they served at the mess hall. Dunkey got a boar on his patrol, and I managed to snag a share.”
“Mhm. It does break the monotony. The rice crackers are most of what I eat nowadays, with how many bodies that get sent my way last week, there is no time for lengthy lunches.” Despite what she said, I could clearly see doc take some of the rice crackers and dip them into the stew. When we give her a look, she just shrugs.
“What, I don’t say the taste is bad, it's just boring!”
“My compliment to the cook,” I said, taking a whole bowl of the broth and draining it in one go. There are some leftover bones there, a rare sight in the stuff we eat nowadays. I happily took the new few minutes to chew on the tough bones and crush them into bits, savoring the taste of its marrow. You need every bit of protein you could, right?
“I could see why the whole camp is intimidated by you, despite your small stature.” the doc eats her share surgically and methodically, picking a part of the stew to only consume one bit of its ingredient at a time. It’s amazing how she could survive on field ration with an appetite like that.
“It's not that, Nascha.” the lieutenant laughed. “They avoided him because he is weird. He murmurs to himself all the time. They thought they would catch the Shiver.”
“Nonsense!” She chides “You can’t ‘catch’ the Shiver! Most ailments of the souls are personal in scope, and those that seemingly don’t, like the dancing plague, are not of the soul.”
“Now, most of them aren’t educated folk like you and him, but they are good people all, they going to come around to him sooner than later.” He clasps my back. “If you make effort to be a little bit more friendly.”
I shrug. “I am what I am.”
The lieutenant looks disappointed, but he quickly picks up the pace and slides onto the table a bottle of something… he then slides back to his seat, looking mighty impressed with himself, as if we should know what that is.
I run my hand through the particular bottle, noting the dull, green glass and the faded label on its side, the fancy font used to stamp its bottle cap. I stirred its content slightly and was surprised to find that the liquid within started to produce a thin layer of vapor from the motion. What am I looking at?
Saint of the Midsummer Hunt, roughly translated from Prauben. It looks like the stuff they called uh, al-kee-hol..
Alcohol.
Right, the shit that they used to get drunk. The quality kind, probably made by fairies. That guy managed to snag something expensive because we all fucking know that the Praubuhlers don’t typically put in the title of “Saint” around lightly.
You feel like he expected you to be impressed by it. But…
“Mackey, if you want to drink, we can have the stronger stuff I stashed behind my bed, not some stuff you salvaged from some enemy officer's cabinet that you raided,” Doc said, examining the bottle content, before just throwing the cap off and taking a gulp directly from it.
“Kinda light, isn’t it?”
“But Nasch, that imported stuff from Prauben! We don’t get those anymore, with the war with them and all…”
She considered the bottle, before taking another swing at it. “You know, I do like the taste. It's just not very invigorating. Maybe I can mix it with something stronger-”
“MIX IT!?” He looked like he was about to die of a heart attack, before looking at me for support.
“Well, I don’t drink so… I don’t see what the big deal is.”
“Look, Vic, wait, are you still going by Vergoti? Did you get that memory thing sorted out?”
“Yep. It's Vergoti, Victi, Vic, however, you wanted to call it. Can’t be bothered to think of a better name for myself.”
“Right, right. Vic, it's a massive fucking deal.” He makes an overtly dramatic expression with his hand, something mimicking his head exploding.
“Fifty-six of the best fucking herbs known to man. Gathered from all around the world. Exotic. Special. Mundane. All the best qualities of life itself, distilled into liquid form, the essence of a thousand miles and a million years of life condensed into a single drop, weighted, perfected, like the philosopher stones of old…”
“Yes?”
“AND YOU WANTED TO MIX IT WITH SOME RANDOM SHIT YOU GOT LAYING AROUND YOUR BED?”
“Mackey, what’s in my bed makes people happier than a thousand litter of this stuff.” The doc said, emerged from her tent, two additional bottles in hand.
You could see the lieutenant's wide-eyed wonder every time she do it. He could have hidden it better.
“And before you make an unsightly joke about it, *lieutenant*, I am still talking about the alcohol.”
“Uh-ah, yes.”
“But, I will, however, only going to force you to drink my concoction once. Let's see how good my alchemy is versus those Praubuhlers winemakers, huh?”
I raised my hand.
“Yes, Mr. Vergoti?”
“I don’t drink.”
“Good. Then you get to watch.”
“Don’t you got work tomorrow?”
“I can hold my liquor. These hands never shake on the operating table. How about you, Mackey? Feeling lucky?”
I glance toward the lieutenant.
His face is flushed red. You feel like you read his thoughts just through the loud beating rhythm of his heart. Don’t do it, Mack. You won’t get lucky.
Because this woman is the real deal.
“Alright. But, if I win…”
“Yes, yes, the usual. I will think up a poem in my spare time for you if you do win.”
“NICE! Vic, you’d be the witness, right?”
“Um… sure?”
“AGREED!” He slams his cup down, and the doctor glint a mischievous smile.
…..
….
…
I yawn, throwing yet another relic into the bin, and grabbed another one for scrubbing.
“Another sleepless night. But at least I got it better than you do.”
I glanced toward the lieutenant, who is nursing his head with a bag of river pebbles next to his throbbing temple. His eyes seemed like they would burst into rivers of blood at any time.
An old method used to conserve or distill heat from farmers and well, alcoholics. You polished a bunch of pebbles into a small bag, then dip them in cool water, then dip a fistful of salt into the water, before using any miracles that would produce heat. The salt will catch fire and drain the potential for heat out of the stones and boils the water while keeping the stones from freezing to the touch for days.
And somehow, that helped with a hangover, I suppose. Know anything about that?
…
Whatever you were… you are not THAT smart to be constantly asking your overworked mind to be your encyclopedia about anything and everything. Note that down, yeah?
“You tried too hard. Besides, the doc already fancies you already, it's kinda desperate looking, you know?… Well, just a tip - when you know you are beaten, just surrender instead of digging a deeper hole that you can’t get out of. Passing out on the table and failing your way, face first, onto her paperwork is probably not a flattering move.”
“Vic, it's an honor-bound bet. I got my pride on the line there. I gotta try my hardest.”
“Mhm.” I examined the relic, before tossing it into the bin and grabbing another one. “Well then I am obliged to give you another tip - when you have everything to gain on winning but not your opponent, it is probably either a bad bet or your opponent is stupid.”
“And the doc is never stupid, I know, but still… urgh, my head.” He leaned back on the wall again, groaning.
“...Feel weird, right?”
“What?”
“I don’t know. We are supposed to be at war. Well, you are supposed to be at war, while I, a hired, foreign laborer, am supposed to be a mule out in some random scorched, crater-filled mud flat for a spanking from the enemies as I try to build some new leyline trenches for you to hide behind. But we are just here lazing around.”
“The empires are at war, Vic. I am not. We are not.”
“Yeah… I guess. What was it for, again?”
If you find this story on Amazon, be aware that it has been stolen. Please report the infringement.
You honestly couldn’t remember.
“Who the fuck knows. I think it was some dude in the Booleaanse Imperial house who got a dagger in his back when this whole mess started. Not like it wouldn’t happen regardless if he didn’t. The world feels like … a boiling pot of water on a rocking chair. Just moving back and forth and back and forth until it spilled all over to some unlucky kid playing with it.”
I glanced at his exposed arm, a rare sight given he tends to hide it with his coat, but now is only in a tank top. A long, outstretched burn mark ran through from the elbow to his shoulder, almost creeping to his neck. A gem sits awkwardly between it and his neck.
“Believe me, Vic, at the front, it is thousand times more boring. At least we got the night to ourselves instead of being alert all the time, at nothing at all. Just straining your eye out into the darkness until you got bored of seeing things, huddling behind leylines barrier until a lucky shot hit you and your head turned into a chicken or something like that. Or whatever sorcery they do that kill you faster and for real.”
“Yeah. I read my autopsy. Shrapnel and resurrection gas.”
“Fireball for me. Well, for my whole squad. Just whoosh…”
He makes a kapow sound with his mouth.
“And you are gone. Singed into dust. Not much left to bring back from. Our counterthought guy was too slow. Running out of catalyst for it, which means improvising. And around a quarter of a second is all it took.”
“Did anyone make it out?”
“Yeah, the same guy. You are looking at him.”
“Oh.”
“Heh. Cheer up. It happens. I won, though. So there is no point in reminiscing about it. Can’t outfire the fire breather.”
I tossed another relic inside the bin, before checking how many there are left. A lot. Well, at least the lieutenant is here to keep me entertained.
“Say, do you ever wonder what these are?” the lieutenant picked the relic it just cleaned, a hollow cylinder attached to a metal and plastic handle. Inside, an ancient mechanism waiting for a moment to spring unto life. It carries fiery death.
It doesn’t carry fiery death. You already checked twice. No rounds in the chamber.
“I don’t. I already know what it is. It is mostly useless here, though.” I took it back from him, before showing him how to actually hold it -
Firm grip, straight back, sight forward, trigger finger relaxed. Safety is still on.
I aimed it at the empty field, away from the lieutenant's direction. Weird. In so many worlds, I treat it like a toy, because honestly, they were toys. Deadly toys. Yet this time, I feel like I am touching the real thing. I respected its danger. Even though, deep down, I knew that…
“Hmm. Have you seen them before?”
“I used them before. Well, mostly basic training, though. Safety measures and all that. We were…”
Afraid? Expected? Hoping? That if the planet is indeed occupied by the time they got there… and if it were that the natives were not to be cooperative…
I chuckled. “Shit, I was part of that whole thing. Well, once upon a time, I’ve seen people use these, and I myself have a chance to try them. I have never used it on anyone for real, though. But I know how dangerous they could be.”
“Dangerous? Are we looking at weapons, here?”
“Yeah. All of them in the bin are weapons. Very effective weapons.”
He nodded. “No wonder we get sent here. After the chimera project, and the resurrection gas, who knows what they will resort to in this war? We’d need every advantage we get.”
I shook my head. “You would be disappointed. They were not made for this world.”
“How so?”
“Think of them like, well, alchemical implement to conduct what would be miracles, albeit less versatile. They took a projectile and push it very, very fast.” I toss him a box of ammo I found in the bin. “These.”
“Like bows or slings?”
“Yeah, like that but faster.”
“So like a Fireball?”
“Close, but still faster.”
“Crackling Lance?”
“Slower. It is fast, but not instantaneous. But you get the idea. It basically makes a projectile go in a straight line in the shortest amount of time possible.”
“Is that all it does?” The lieutenant examined the ammo carefully. He easily crushed them with his finger, spilling out the black powder inside.
“Yes. What you got there is a cartridge filled with unprocessed firedust, like the one they used in the south sea.” I take some bullets from his hand and begin to load them into a clip.
“Does it do anything else?” He narrows his eyes as if it would make understanding this strange object before him any easier.
“No.”
“Well, that seems a bit useless.”
“It isn’t, well, not when it was the popular mean of killing someone.” I finished loading the gun, and turn the safety off, before looking at the lieutenant.
“Can you counterthought Kinetic Toss? I know it is a basic feat, but still…”
“Uh… Yeah.”
“Speed?”
“Three to two clicks.”
“Good. So that should be around…” I counted my step away from him. Thirty or so should suffice.
“Fortify,” I said. He immediately understood what I am trying to do, and raised his defense with a click of his tongue.
TAT.
TAT. TAT.
“So? How does that feel?” I asked, removing the remaining ammunition from the gun and checking its slide for any leftover rounds in the chamber. None.
Chinks of crumbled metal dropped down onto the ground from the lieutenant's shoulder, chest, and forehead. I am a messy shooter.
“Manifold Missiles. That's what they are. There was barely anything to strip from it with my counterthought but the weight and the velocity.” The lieutenant said, picking up the failed projectiles.
“Bingo! You could say they are an archaic form of it. Simple and deadly.” I patted his back. “Sorry for hyping you up with that fortify request there. Realistically, these things should not even be a problem for anyone with a week of training in counterthoughting, so a secondary countermeasure would be overkill. But for some reason, I still can’t get over the fact that they were, at one point, the deadliest thing a person could reasonably possess.”
He returns some of them to me, but I just toss it away. “This is quite ingenious design, nonetheless. I couldn’t detect any miracles-”
“It's because they aren’t. They are the product of simple alchemical reactions within the casing to propel it forward. Much like the tension of a bow that brought the arrow flying forward. Make it easier to bypass esoteric defenses like the leyline barrier - they are usually calibrated for miracles of the esoteric kind. Fortify, however, will stop this thing dead on its track.”
“It flies much faster than a bow. Couldn’t that still be a worthwhile use for it? After all, we still imbue them with-”
“Sadly, no. As you already deducted, it has a role on the battlefield, if we want to apply it. Too bad the role is already filled by better means, such as Manifold Missiles. A bow - you have any experience working with a sniper?”
“Well, one or twice. Never that directly. We just know that there is support. Seen their work, though. Jeez.”
“Yeah. Impressive, ain't it? What stood out to you first?”
“The size of it. I didn’t know how they could draw a shot so fast with bows that big. Taller than me.”
“It's because they don’t draw it. They hold it until a shot has been called from the spotter.”
“Wait, really!?” He seems genuinely surprised.
“Yes. And furthermore, such big arrows would not fly as far as they did. It is impossible to bring something as big as your calf to travel across the hill in a few clicks at worst.”
“Yeah, Kinetic Toss. Super easy to counterthought, but faster than you could sense to react in time. Bypassed most normal esoteric defenses, save for Fortify. I hate keeping that up.”
“Yeah, it would certainly exhaust even the best after the first one or two hours of sustaining it. Locks your joints, yeah? Feel like you are neck-deep in quicksand with every motion.”
“...Yeah. All of which we have established that this device could overcome, right?”
“Not all."
“No?” He scratches his neck.
This reminds the man of the feeling when he is being questioned by his mentor in college. It is not a good feeling. A grown-ass man has his pride. At least this one is humble enough to not let it bother him. But still.
So maybe, just maybe, you felt, you should just cut to the chase. Be nice, yeah?
True, I do feel bad for Mackey. He is still in a hangover, so maybe a live showcase will help him instead of forcing him to theorize it out.
“Do you know Navigator Sight?”
“Yeah. Every blaster needs to know it. We are taught to pre-cast it before releasing any big destructive barrage for maximum effectiveness, prioritizing it over density, firepower, or any other support for our miracles.”
“Yes. A miss is a miss, and there are only many Fireballs that you could drop in a day. It would either be Scatter Core or Navigator. Covering more ground with the ability to manually course correct your most valuable assets would outstrip any other priorities. Hitting your target without needing to see them is so valuable in the current combat theatre in fact that missing it would be a major hindrance to any tactics you decided to use.” I pick out a fistful of ammo and throw it at him.
“Navigator, then Kinetic Toss them. Focus the center of force on that small dot you see on the bottom of the bullet there. It will ignite the primer, and it is how the projectile is pushed forward out of the weapon. In this case, Kinetic Toss can mimic it just fine.”
“Alright. Here I-”
POP! The cartridge exploded inside his hand. The lieutenant reeled back to cough, having swallowed the black powder into his mouth before he could see the result of the experiment.
The bullet didn’t go anywhere. No, to be more precise, it was actually ejected from its casing, just that the casing is the object that actually gets propelled, but backward to hit the lieutenant's body instead.
“Wait, what? I feel the Navigator Sight. It certainly went forward!”
“Try it again, but this time without igniting the primer on the bottom of the bullet. Just toss it normally with your miracle.”
He looked at me doubtfully - he must have thought that this was a prank, but just shake his head and do it anyway.
To his surprise, it went swimmingly. The bullet went almost as fast as if it has been fired from the gun. He did it again, and this time just before it could hit the tree, with just a twist of the palm he brought the bullet curved back toward his hand through Navigator Sight, where he dispersed its kinetic energy with a simple counterthought, which burst into a small flash of light and heat.
“Huh. Alright, tell me your secret.” He eyed me funny, before throwing the discarded bullet at me.
“I’m observant is all. Typically, the *soul*, as universal theory would call it, is the intent of an object - that is, the intent you have for… urgh. I am so bad at explaining this. In short, imagine it like a force. You apply miracles like how you would apply a force to say, swing a sword. An arrow from a bow works because it is transferring kinetic energy from you to it directly. A crossbow works because its kinetic energy is anchored through you, the arrow pushed against you to fly forward, like how you jump by pushing against the ground with your legs - that caused some differences in the techniques that you can apply to them, but generally, you have some mild control through it…”
“Right, hmm. So from how I understand this, it is just basically a crossbow in function? The bullet is pushed by a force that isn’t from me, but instead pushed against me to move?”
“Not quite. Think about how a crossbow transfers force from its string tension to the arrow. The only way it could do that is by pushing against you. Compared to the bullet here, which generates its own force from within - I won’t explain this in detail, just know that there is a great deal of force, a sudden expansion of it that separates the metal tip there from the casing that holds the powder, leaving the casing behind. And it is the way such force was generated that is the problem for your miracle to catch on. It is not retained in the same way a bowstring would. It dissipated after the reaction is over, and that is it. Not an ideal transfer of *intent* between you and the projectile, and thus our miracles failed to modify its behavior correctly."
“Hmm. Is there no way to generate this force without the powder mixture?”
“Well, there are some alternatives, but I am not smart enough to say. I know that there are magnetic variants of these, but are too cumbersome to use on a personal scale, and are too complicated for me to understand. Either way, magnetic is a force that is kinda… difficult to really theorize about. On one hand, whatever you used to generate magnetic force would still be there after the projectile has left the weapon. But it also is a temporary reaction, and not an object…”
“By the Sun. Vic. Who the hell are you? Like, shit…” The lieutenant looks at me with utter confusion. “You some sort of alchemist professor or something? Wait, no, you are one of those mad physickist people they show in theater-dramas. Maybe… a warrior philosopher? Or perhaps you are a… mathematician duelist.”
“Ok, now you are just throwing the first cool academic title you could think off around and see what stick. I don’t know a lick of deeper academic theories, and I certainly don’t engage in math duels to prove my mental superiority and rise to the rank of some dusty old academic circle. I just take the basic knowledge of how miracles worked and apply it to the information I’ve already possessed to derive an answer. So in short, I just think really, really hard about it for more than ten minutes.”
“So you are just like me? That no fun.”
“The hell Mack, you only have two impressions of me or something?”
“Well yeah. You either very cool or very lame.”
“WELL, I don’t-”
“WHAT’S GOING ON HERE!?” A voice came booming from behind me. Oh, shit. Its the quartermaster.
“We are just cleaning the relics, ma’am!” I quickly raised my hand for a salute, but she grabbed it before I could do so.
“Only YOU, long coat, are in order for cleaning. The other one, get off. NOW.”
“Y-yes ma’am!” The lieutenant quickly rushes his salute before retreating, mouthing back at me a wordless “I am sorry” as he moves past.
“I do not pay you to laze around.” She said, before inspecting the black powder that is spilled everywhere from our previous *experimentation*.
“Yes, ma’am.” Besides the fact that no, she does not pay me. At all. I guess, well, since my paperwork is still a mess, I am technically doing all of this for free. At least a meal and a place to sleep is still better than nothing, out here in the wilderness, amidst a war.
“And you managed to ruin them. Six months of work, tedious work, by everyone involved here, for the crown. Fortune is invested in these relics that you so casually treat like toys. Do you know how much you just cost us?”
“...” Shit.
Think.
Think.
There's no good way to spin this.
Let's just try it anyway.
“N-No, ma’am, I was just inspecting them for how they work to better repair them. I am experienced with these relics, you see. Some of them could still be used, and I thought that it would be better if I could make sure that it still work properly.”
“And WHO gave you the idea that you know a damn about how any of this work, long coat? Some fucking subhuman yanked from the barbaric colonies can lecture me? Is that what you are insinuating?”
Yes. I fucking lived in it. The leviathan that you so coveted to understand.
No… don’t say that. But…
“I saw them work with my own eyes, ma’am. I could demonstrate-”
She twisted my arm. Her fingertips hardened like steel. Empowered.
Creaking under your flesh. Your forearm bone has popped out of its socket, misaligned, and bent in a way that it doesn’t suppose to. The pain is oblivious. Yet.
We didn’t make a sound. Screaming, crying, whatever, it is just an animalistic instinct. For attention. Alarm. Protection. None of which the creature possesses at this moment. Like a wounded shark, the very act of sowing blood into the water will just invite other, bigger sharks.
“A warning. Now, do them all by noon, or you will lose the other arm. And if you can’t work after that - disposable. You hear me?”
“...Yes, ma’am.”
“Done. Now, if I see you mingle with anyone else, or that arm get treated before I am satisfied with your performance - the same thing, but I will break your leg too. Understood?”
“...Yes, ma’am.”