Lincoln Grimshaw

Just Outside Of Imafenduwell Hall

Aureate, The Gilded State

 

Earlier…

 

“Alright, you all know the plan,” said Grimshaw as he started inspecting his crew and their preparations on last time. “We go in, we grab the tech that the councillor has already hijacked, and then we get out. No slagging behind either. If you get left behind, no one’s coming back for you. That whole ‘no man gets left behind’ crap does not apply today.”

Grimshaw and his newly gained street gang, the I.M.P.’s, were standing in the shade of an alleyway that was not too far off from the grounds of Imafenduwell Hall. At their feet was an open manhole and the sewers beneath it. It was through this way that they would enter the Hall.

Like all the other gangsters he now surrounded himself with, Grimshaw was today wearing one of their imp masks rather than his own white wolf mask. This way, it would be harder for anyone amongst the Hall’s residents to connect him to Gausswinder.

At his command, the imps began following him into the sewers and they began making their trek towards the hidden entrance as they followed the map that Gausswinder had drawn up for them. Using oil lanterns to light the way, they eventually made it to a dead-end where the flowing sewage water travelled through some tunnel underneath them, leaving the path they were on to end at a brick wall. Grimshaw tapped on one brick, and the bricks that made up the wall began to shift and separate from each other, creating a door that opened up out of the wall.

The crew quickly made their way up the steps, through the other hidden entrance, and stepped into a corridor of Imafenduwell Hall. While the interior of the building was fanciful enough, it struck Grimshaw as oddly frugal and not nearly as dramatically furnished as he had imagined the place to be. In fact, a part of him actually admired that about the place and the people who lived there.

“Alright, we’ll stay here for a minute.” Said Grimshaw. “Hand me the House’s package.”

“The House” was a simple code name that Grimshaw had instructed the imps to use when referring to Gausswinder. The box that the imps dragged out from the secret passageway behind them was a large wooden crate that was half his size. Upon opening it, Grimshaw pulled out a gigantic cannon of sorts with three electric coils at the firing end.

“Wowee, Boss.” said one imp as he and his fellow gang members eyed the shiny hardware that Grimshaw was arming himself with. “What you got there? Are we really expecting that big of a fight from the elf and her nulliwumps?”

“No.” Grimshaw replied, flatly. “This is a gausscannon. One of the newer ‘Nth Storm’ models. Freshly made and curtsy of the House’s family company—before they gave her the boot. Apparently, Imafenduwell Hall has a ghost dog problem. This is for them should we come across them. It is not for the actual residents of this place. That’s what you lot are for. Now then, let’s start making our way to where the stash of goods are.”

They followed the former councillor’s map to the place where she had parked the giant, dwarven brasshulk that she had hijacked a few days prior. It was hidden away in a large chamber, along with several ancient scrolls and tomes—no doubt each of them contained schematics and notes for some of the ancient innovations and machinations of the Dwarfs. And sitting on top of the head of the dwarven brasshulk was Gausswinder’s last remaining spider drone looking down at them.

“Alright, let’s get this all secure and start making our way back out quickly. Looks like we might just manage to get in and out of this place without even being seen after all.”

“You got it, Boss.” said one of the lankier henchmen by the name of Mohawk.

Grimshaw watched as Mohawk and the others worked away as instructed. It was all going well. A little too well. As used to high stakes ventures like this one as Grimshaw was, he couldn’t help but notice the slight uptick in his own heartbeat due to the idea that perhaps he had proclaimed victory a little too soon.

Deciding to make sure they were in fact, still in the clear, Grimshaw placed his gausscannon down for a minute and had a quick peek around the corner just to make sure there was no one nearby. Thankfully, there was not. The only form of security present were the nearby brasshulks that were stationed at various points in the hallways, but they were stationary. Gausswinder had already told them she believed that these particular automatons were either deactivated or simply defective, as none of them whirled to life when her drones or the hijacked brasshulk encountered them. And given that none of them stirred to life when Grimshaw and the imps came through, he was inclined to believe that.

And yet…he still had a bad feeling about all of this.

“Alright double time it you lot,” Grimshaw ordered. “I want us out of here as fast as we—what the hell are you doing?!”

While his back was turned one of the gang members, Mohawk had apparently picked up Grimshaw’s gausscannon and began playing with the controls, apparently trying to figure out how it worked.

“I’m just having a look at it!” said Mohawk, just as he got the weapon to whirl to life, with sparks beginning to fly from the gausscannon’s coils.

Almost instantly, the weapon began to sputter and bounce around in the air while still in the imp’s hands. The weapon spun with three coils growing red hot and panic spread across the gangster’s face as it twisted around in his hand, unintentionally aiming at Grimshaw.

Grimshaw just barely had enough time to realize what was happening and jump out of the way as a massive bolt of purple lightning fired out of the coils with deafening ZAP and collided with one of the dormant brasshulks. The air was then filled with the sounds of electrical discharges and the explosion of the brasshulk that had been fired upon. Metal chunks of it flew up into the air, some pieces of it became lodged in the ceiling and walls, while the rest of it fell hard to the ground with loud CLANGS and THUDS. The only bits of the machine that remained intact were its two legs that were not only still rooted where the thing was once stationary, but they had also been set ablaze with bright orange fire.

This was not the end of the unfolding catastrophe, though; Grimshaw was about ready to rise off the ground, charge at Mohawk, and ring his scrawny neck. He never got the chance, though.

The other brasshulks stationed along the hallway had awakened.

Each one whirled to life—their eyes slowly turned from black, lifeless bulbs to ones of glowing red vision. Lights all over their bodies turned on, like veins that now had fresh electricity running through them. They shifted their gaze to the smouldering remains of their fallen comrade and then turned to face Grimshaw and the imps.

“Intruder alert.” A brasshulk said suddenly.

“Intruder alter.” Said another.

One after the other, the brasshulks down the hallway and even further into the building itself could all be heard joining in and echoing the haunting chant. They left their podiums and made their way towards Grimshaw with a freighting level of swiftness for machines of their size.

“House! HOUSE!” Grimshaw barked at Gausswinder’s drone that was still attached to the hijacked dwarf brasshulk and looking down at him. “Get your brasshulk up and running again! Get it working now!”

 

*

 

Keridwen of Khar Vell

The Old Aureate Wing

Imafenduwell Hall

 

It wasn’t easy keeping up with Grannie, given the speed at which she was bolting down the hallway. A little eight-year-old’s legs could only go so fast for so long after all. However, Keridwen did her best as they raced to get back to the closet where Lalauri was locked up so that the two of them could take on whoever had infiltrated Imafenduwell Hall.

All attempts that Keridwen made to ask Grannie what or who they might be up against failed, as she received no response from Grannie. This could have simply been because of the loud noise of all the brasshulks sounding off the alarm of the intruders. Although, a sinking feeling in her stomach told her that Grannie was more likely too cross with her and too focused on rescuing her granddaughter to bother conversing with her. For that, Keridwen was kicking herself.

Dang it Keri…now look at what you did…

Both Keridwen and Grannie came to a grinding halt, though, when out from around the corner of the hallway they were in came barrelling in a mass of people wearing devil masks and shooting what looked like flintlock pistols and rifles at something behind them.

“Keep pushing!” shouted one man who was shooting. “We’ll make our way to the front doors!”

Then the group came to a hasty halt in the middle of the hall when they spotted Grannie and Keridwen standing between them and the way to the front doors.

Grannie quickly grabbed one of the ornamental weapons that was hanging off a place on the wall—a massive, silver war hammer. “I don’t know who the hell you are or why you’re in my granddaughter’s home,” she said. “But mark my words, you’re not going anywhere.”

To answer her pointed defiance, all but one of the mob of masked gangsters all raised their firearms and began shooting at Grannie and Keridwen. With seemingly unnatural speed, Grannie rushed to Keridwen, picked her up and pushed her behind a suit of armour that was in a glass display.

“Don’t kill them!” one gangster roared over the gunfire. “Under no circumstances can anyone of them die here today! The House cannot be responsible for murder. That means shoot to injure only!”

“Huh.” Said Grannie to herself. “So a House sent them here. Interesting…” then she turned to Keridwen and said, “I’m sorry. I honestly forgot that you were still with me. Stay here and you should be fine. I cannot protect you on the battlefield and fight on the battlefield effectively at the same time.”

A strange thing happened as Keridwen watched Grannie stand up to go battle the trespassers: a shimmering aura filled the surrounding air, and within seconds, she was surrounded by barely visible hounds. The leader of the Hounds of Twilight then addressed her by saying, “We must leave this place, child.”

“Wait,” said Keridwen, as Razzalar lowered himself so that she may climb aboard him. “Where are we going? What about Grannie and Lalauri?”

“The elves will have to fend for themselves. They will be fine.”

“I can’t just leave them, though! It’s my fault Lalauri isn’t here to help! Mine!”

“Perhaps,” Razzalar replied. “However, we cannot allow you to get involved in this battle. Come now. It’s time to go.”

Pouting, Keridwen once again took a peek out from the cover she had and saw that Grannie was indeed deeply into the fight. Though outnumbered, Grannie seemed to almost be enjoying herself as she bashed several of the thugs with her massive war hammer and the shield that she had grabbed from who knew where. Then, just as it looked like she would finally be overwhelmed, Cecil came flying from seemingly nowhere and collided with one thug’s head with a flying kick. Then, as several of the adult nulliwumps joined the fight with weapons of their own, Keridwen made her choice.

I’m going for it.

Keridwen jumped to her feet and bolted out from the cover of the suit of armour and into the fray.

“Keridwen!” Razzalar barked at her. “Stop! Come back here this instance!”

Keridwen ignored the hound and dodged through gunfire and the legs of those fighting in a desperate attempt to get past it all and get to Lalauri.

At one point, Keridwen tripped on something and tumbled to the ground. She landed at the feet of one of the gangsters. With horror, Keridwen saw the man lift his foot, as if to crush her, only to hear a loud CRACK as Cecil brought down his sledgehammer on the man’s kneecap.

“Keridwen, get up!” was all he said to her before colliding with the next thug that came her way.

Scrambling to her feet, Keridwen yelped as bullets just graze her arms and one even grazes her face. As fresh blood streamed down her face, she watched as one of the masked men pulled out a strange-looking ball, pulled a pin out of it, and tossed it in her direction.

“NO!” bellowed the leader of the group as he dived to place himself between Keridwen and whatever had been tossed.

As his voice reached her ears, a small part of her mind tried to place it. A sudden blast of blue fire and light disrupted her focus, causing her to lose consciousness.

When she opened her eyes again, the masked leader was on the ground next to her. The man’s clothes were charred and the hallway itself was in total shambles: paintings, the displays along the walls, and even the sections of the walls that were caught in the blast itself were either scorched or burning with blue fire. To Keridwen’s relief, both Grannie and the nulliwumps—while they were clearly bruised from the explosion—were alive and were already beginning to pick themselves up off the ground. The same could not be said for all the criminals that were now littering the floor of the hallway. While a few of them looked functional enough and angry enough to continue fighting, most of them were clearly badly injured. Some of them weren’t moving at all.

The masked man that had saved Keridwen’s life started coughing so violently that for a second, she thought he might actually hack up one of his lungs.

“Retreat!” the leader spat out to the other gang members. “Retreat! Fall back! Take what you can carry and—”

The low rumble of a bone-chilling growl filled the hallway. Keridwen turned around and saw that Razzalar and the other Hounds were standing over her, growling at the enemy. Their stellar aura illuminating the hall, Razzalar fixed his eyes squarely on the masked leader, and he growled at them, “Remove yourself from this Hall. Now.”