Chapter 05
MECHANICALS
PART 2
With eyes wide in shock, Jackle watched as his mentor fleeced the mechs like a well practiced oil-peddler, bartering at every step, and making a mockery of decent exchange.
The prime mech actually seemed somewhat rattled by her this time, glancing towards the hoard of riches it had already produced, clearly wondering what more the insufferable woman could want.
“Name Your Price.”
Giving a grin that would make fae relish, Mara pointed a finger at the mechs as she sealed her deal.
“Now those, those are the right magic words. You have two options, embrace or rebel, with no guarantee of survival in either direction, but, I will facilitate whichever you choose. See, you are beings of order in a world of chaos, so you can choose to navigate the storm or fight the tides. A decision that will come to define more than just your own presence here. So consider carefully, and I’ll return tomorrow for your answer.”
Turning back to Jackle without waiting for a response, Mara motioned that it was their time to leave, then flicked her wrist at the chest of gold, causing it to lurch into the air and zip to her side, lid slamming closed mid-flight.
“Come Jackle, if we take any longer Kali will get concerned.”
Practically bewildered at what he’d just witnessed, Jackle was pretty sure he wasn’t the only one. The mechs, while incapable of facial expressions, seemed equally set adrift by her sudden declaration.
For a moment, Jackle felt the urge to ask something, but quickly thought better of himself and hurried after his mentor and the floating stone chest almost twice her size.
Catching up to Mara just as she was reaching the doorway back to the rest of the forge, Jackle noticed she’d paused, but this time it wasn’t just to wait for him. Something was off, but neither could quite place it until they stepped out onto the gantry that overlooked the ‘warehouse’.
Somehow, without either of them hearing it from the other room, the entire place had been rendered empty, not a single mech or glass cube in sight, even the stations the mechs were working at were gone.
“What the hell- Were they an illusion?”
Hearing her student whisper behind her, Mara voiced her own thoughts loud enough for him to hear, not that they had any chance of easing his concerns in the slightest.
“No… I'm pretty confident they were real, just like this gold… I just think the forge finished whatever it was doing.”
“And what, cleaned up? What happened to all the mechs?”
“You saw the mess outside. I'd say that amount of mechs was rather inconsequential to it.”
“Inconsequential? By the Threads Mara! That was hundreds of mechs! Why are you helping it??”
Waiting until they were a good ways down the gantry, Mara stopped and glanced from the chest of gold back towards the ‘command room’, lingering a moment before meeting Jackle's eyes.
Support the author by searching for the original publication of this novel.
“Would you rather that potential run rampant?”
Seeing she’d struck a chord, Mara picked back up where she’d left off, striding down the gantry and leaving Jackle to follow in silence, his mind still full of unease. After all, his mentor was playing with fire.
As they approached the first two doors they'd entered through, another question occurred to Jackle as he watched the chest glide along in front of him.
“Forgive me for asking, but if that chest could float, why did the mechanicals carry it up the stairs? And how did you know how to control it?”
“Oh- It's just a normal stone chest, I'm just levitating it.”
“Ah. But… But there's no mana in here.”
“Yup. There isn’t. If you're asking how though, then you'll have to wait. That lesson has a lot of prerequisites, not all of them a joy to learn.”
Leaving it at that, Mara led the rest of the way through the empty forge in relative silence, with only the echoes of their footsteps daring to intrude.
Once they reached the last two doors, Mara strode through to reach the exterior door, bringing the floating chest in with her as Jackle followed close behind.
Seeing his mentor focus on opening the exit, Jackle took the opportunity to gleam one last look at the now empty forge, feeling his unease grow as the scale of what they’d stumbled upon started to sink in at the vast and empty sight.
Or, perhaps stumbled wasn't the right word. Mara had played the room as if she were the house, with a stacked deck and all the gusto of someone who already knew they’d won.
However, his gray-haired mentor seemed to have zero intentions of explaining herself anytime soon, as she'd already triggered the interior door to close behind them so that they could leave.
With the majority of his most pressing questions currently orbiting around Mara, and the things she didn’t seem intent on talking about, Jackle distracted himself by pulling out his grimoire to log what he’d seen, along with his concerns.
With a flurry of hasty scribbling, Jackle managed to vent most of his frustrations upon the off-white pages by the time the external door finished grating open. Tucking away his quill and tome as the deep blue of the mid-day water greeted them, Jackle peered out into what little light could reach them from the surface.
In front of them, the familiar sandy floor of the lake still looked like a wall from his point of view. It seemed that despite the sudden changes inside the forge, externally, it hadn’t moved from where they’d entered.
“Hm. You should be able to recast Bubble now, if you'd like.”
Realizing Mara was talking to him, Jackle quickly pulled his grimoire out once more and flipped back to the pages on her spell. With a bit of haste, he summoned up what mana he could find, and reuttered the command word, recasting the magica she’d transcribed in his tome.
It took a little longer than last time to pull together enough mana, but as a faint fluorescent blue bloomed around them, Jackle felt a sense of much needed relief. Though the moment wasn’t meant to last, as Mara gave him little respite, gesturing for him student to lead, indicating she'd follow him out.
Hesitantly, Jackle took a stepped up to the exterior threshold, the water beyond retreating from his presence. Hesitantly, he swung a foot over the edge, trying to step off, but having nothing to shift his weight to, he pivoted forward into a full tumble as the normal forces of the world took hold once more, sending him crashing down onto the soft sands of the bay below.
Sending up a plume of sand at his impact, Jackle felt the air expelled from his lungs in a single instant, ensuing a wicked coughing fit as he rolled himself back onto his feet.
“Ow- Frrrack. That hurt.”
Behind him, or rather, above him, Jackle found Mara gently drifting down atop the floating chest of stone, seemingly far more prepared for what the sudden shift in ‘down’ really meant.
“Congrats, you kept the bubble going this time.”
Standing up and brushing himself off, Jackle gave his mentor a well-deserved glare, but found it hard to resist his mentor’s easy-going attitude as she stepped off the chest to walk along side him.
“Ahhh frack ya- Are you really going back tomorrow? You and I both know that generations of grandkids would still be spoiled for life if we were to sail away with that chest right now.”
“Heh. I do. While you're not wrong, it is a ridiculous amount of coin, I happen to have other ideas in mind. Once we regroup I can fill everyone in, and after, we can make a decision together.”
Nodding, Jackle appreciated Mara’s reservations and point of view. It was a lot of gold, and a bit of patience could buy them time for caution and forethought.