Her father was dead, her mother dying. Running through the freezing winter woods Alice could hear the soldiers close on her tail. It hurt to run, it hurt to breath. Despite this she refused to stop, even as her body cried out for rest her mind only turned to the horror that had become of her home, the thought drove her forward. Breaking out into a clearing she could see it in the distance, the guard tower. All she had to do was make it to the outpost and she would be safe, they would alert the city knights, they would save her mother, they would save her home. It was so close, if she could only keep up the pace for a few more minutes she would be close enough to grab their attention.

Then she tripped.

All it took was one odd rock, one poorly placed obstacle, and all her hopes were shattered. Tumbling to the ground Alice scrapped her knees against the hard, frozen dirt. Failing to get back onto her feet she prayed to anyone who would listen, pleading in her mind for a way out. Then she made the fatal mistake of turning around, the three men were just now emerging from the tree line. Continuing to pray for a miracle the young girl could only crawl forward as they approached her, two of the trio chuckling at her desperate attempt to escape. One of them picked her up by her hair, a man with a crooked grin and a plume on his helmet, grinning as she cried out in pain.

‘Sorry missy, no one’s getting out of here alive today’.

Then his partner of them stopped laughing.

‘Captain’

‘What is it, Arthur?’

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It’s… there’s something in the sky!’

Unable to turn her head she continued to listen as the knight began to worry.

‘Captain… It’s getting closer!’

‘I can see that! Morgan, I need you to cast anti-magic.’

Turning to his third companion, a serous, older man in brown robes, Alice watched as he snapped a sigil between his thumb and forefinger, making arcane movements with his other hand as runes began to glow in the air around him.

‘On it Captain… Sir, it’s not working!’

‘What do you mean it’s not working?!’

‘I mean it’s just not working! Whatever it is it’s not magic!’

‘Captain! It’s coming right for us! What do we do!’

‘Shit- RUN!’

At that the captain dropped Alice and began a mad sprint for the forest. Falling to her bloody knees she cradled her scalp for a moment before turning to face whatever it was that had seemingly saved her life-

Fire.

A massive orb of fire hurling towards her, larger than her whole house. Hitting the dirt, she heard it hurl overhead close enough to feel the heat. Feeling the boom of the meteor hitting the earth. Alice slowly rose, after a moment of hesitation and a glance towards the men hiding in the underbrush she began to limp towards the crater, towards the watchtower, towards safety.

Then she saw it.

Rising from the pit, a metal hand, clawed and massive. It grabbed and dragged at the dirt at the edge of the trench, heaving up the rest of its body. The creature appeared armored head to toe in grey iron, yet it was more than that, for beneath the plates shone only more intricate details, like the insides of her father’s prized pocket watch. From under a crown of jagged steel shone two glass dots of yellow, flickering light. Trying to comprehend them Alice would later compare them to lightning trapped in a bottle.

The creature, which would have stood no shorter than 16ft tall if it were not crouched half beneath the ground locked eyes with Alice and spoke, in a deep, synthetic voice.

‘Um, hello there, little lady. Would you mind telling me where I am?’

And so it was that in that moment, all the exhaustion, desperation, and terror of the day caught up to Alice, and she collapsed on the spot.