16) Tempest on the Horizon (Tock)

She wished there was another way, but in the short time she hadgotten to know Ouihan, she knew he would volunteer for the mission which he was so very well suited for. In essence this was most likely why the Glass Darkly had placed such importance on him in prophecy. The one great soleus which was given her in this situation is Ouihan was an immortal. A very unusual one but an immortal none the less.

So, with all that in mind. she quietly laid out her plan to Ouihan while the others rested. Sister was sleeping fitfully, and she knew Sister would have an issue with the plan, but there was really no viable alternative in this situation. Brother was also finally sleeping even though he was trying to keep watch. The only others awake were the collective sentinels. Johann was the one actually keeping watch since Brother was sleeping sitting up at the hatch.

Victoria II was thinking there was one weakness in the plan even as she laid it out. Ouihan was immortal but he was still vulnerable to temporary injury and incapacitation. So, he was vulnerable to capture. Therefore, he would need someone to watch his back while he was about getting her an awful army.

While weighing out the plethora of variables she could think of, she decided Ouihan should be accompanied by Johann and at least one other sentinel. Johann had earned her trust. Not the least of which, he had been open and honest about his misgivings from the beginning.

So, which other one to send? She wanted the two original sentinels to stay with her since they were, without a doubt, trustworthy. So that left Sally and Willis. Neither one she really trusted fully and with Ouihan’s judgement on Sally’s hidden anger, she didn’t trust her at all. At least Willis was strait forward about his past and his intensions. Or at least he appeared to be.

With those considerations, she had decided if Sally turned, she would do the most damage if she stayed with her and not went with Ouihan. Ouihan had, at least, some override control whereas she had none.

The thought did cross her mind to send all the former shadow sentinels with Ouihan, but something was nagging in the back of her head that that would be a mistake. Since Cal had taught her to trust her instinct, she decided to follow her gut as he would say.

After she finished laying out her plan to Ouihan with Johann and Sally listening on she asked, “Any questions?”

Sally just looked away and Johann shook his head. It was Ouihan who spoke, “Your Eminence, I believe we can handle it. If you need any Clockworking done Sister and you should be able to handle anything which comes along.” He reached into his satchel and took out Gidget and said, “I think you might need Gidget, she can get into tight spaces which we can’t. She also is quite clever with basic clockworks.” He then looked down at Gidget and said, “Gidget, do what Her Eminence or Sister say to do.”

Gidget clicked twice.

“Gidget clicks twice for yes and once for no. She can also communicate with basic tele code. I have yet to see the limits of her capabilities.”

Victoria II took the hexagonal box gratefully and said, “She really is amazing. You’ll have to show me how you made her sometime.”

“It would be my honor Your Eminence.”

“Very well, be careful. I don’t need to tell you how crucial your mission is do I?”

“No, Your Eminence, you do not.”

She then turned to Johann and Sally, “You two watch his back. Keep him from getting captured.”

Johann said, “Yes Ma’am.”

Sally just nodded absently.

Ouihan looked sideways at Willis and then whispered something into Victoria II’s ear and then pointed at Gidget.

She looked surprised for a moment then nodded her acknowledgement. She then turned to Willis and said, “When they leave you take watch. We will be staying here for an hour after they leave then we will be on our way.”

Willis nodded.

Johann carefully picked up Brother and moved him over next to where Sister was laying and gently laid a blanket on him. Johann felt lifting this obviously heavy boy, young man rather, was like picking up a pillow. No real weight to his mechanical muscles. Somehow, he had a feeling he was going to need this strength before all was said and done. Despite the coldness he felt every time he focused on his new body he was becoming used to the strange sensations. In some ways he was rather pleased with his new advantages. He had been active for more than 24 hours now and he didn’t feel tired at all. He felt he didn’t need to rest. Recently, he was fidgeting and picked up an inch diameter iron bar and bent it without effort.

He could feel pressure, heat and cold but not pain. Or at least he hadn’t felt it yet, so he didn’t know what his limits are. He could feel well enough so he could gently pick things up. Earlier when he held Mousy, he was able to do so without crushing her.

Mousy, there was another thing which he felt. Logically he thought his human emotions would be gone with his mechanical body, but not so. Mousy reminded him of his daughter when she was younger in so many ways he began to feel love for her as if she were his daughter. His daughter which he may never see again. His heart, or whatever he felt his emotions with began to ache. But the emotions were there so he looked at Empress Victoria II and asked, “You will take care of Mousy, will ya?”

Victoria II looked back at Johann solemnly and said, “With my life if need be.”

The impact of her vow brought another flood of emotions to him. Gratitude, surprise and something else. What it was he couldn’t place immediately but he knew it was something he had never felt before. Not in his life. After a moment he realized what it was. Loyalty. He had felt devotion before to his wife, daughter and parents. This was to be expected. However, he never felt loyalty to anyone or anything.

Victoria II’s mere presence commanded respect and awe. However, no one before had earned his loyalty.

With this he felt himself compelled to confess this loyalty. He fell to one knee, took her hand and took her signet ring to his mouth speaker to feign a kiss. He then said, “I swear to you my fealty and loyalty to my death or till you release me.”

Victoria II had had many swear such loyalty and fealty to her many times over her life but never before had she felt such gratitude for it as she did in this moment. Her voice was emotional as she said, “And I swear to you my protection and loyalty as your sovereign, Sir Johann.”

After Ouihan, and his guards left, Sister woke up and looked around uncertainly and asked, “Where’s Ouihan?!”

By the time Cooper had reached Alexander’s outer office he had depleted most of his weapons and ammunition. He had maybe half a dozen bolts left in the magazine in his pistol and two or three throwing spikes. He also had one grenade and three incendiary devices.

His quick scan of the outer office, before he had to duck back out into the hallway, he saw there were about thirty Shadowmen in armor waiting in a very good tactical array. He quickly scanned the two destroyed automatons which were guarding the outer door of Alexander’s office for any weapons or ammunition which he could use, but to no avail.

His body was covered with many wounds, welts and bruises from hits which got by or through his body armor. He was near the end of his endurance and was beginning to doubt he was going to be able to breech Alexander’s inner office and remove him from the equation. To add to the misery, the automated sprinkler system had kicked in in response to the multiple fires started elsewhere in the building.

By the time he had destroyed the automaton guards the water had accumulated to about an inch on the floor. Cooper was doing a mental inventory of his remaining weapons and tools. He was trying to figure out how he was going to get past this final gauntlet without himself being incapacitated and captured. This would put a definite kink in his ultimate plans and his ability to protect Vicky and restore her to her rightful place in the palace.

While he was doing his inventory about half a dozen Shadowmen came rushing in from a side hallway, forcing him to expend his last grenade and half his remaining bolts. One of the Shadowmen got to him grappled with him.

While they grappled, Cooper wanted to shoot him but was forced to expend his remaining three bolts into another Shadowman who tried to rush him from the outer office to help his fellow.

The Shadowman had Cooper by his wrists and forced him to drop his now empty pistol. Coop continued to struggle with the Shadowman and tried to grab a weapon at the same time. Cooper was finally able to grab something off his harness. By the feel of it he knew what it was. “Oh well, this isn’t gonna be pleasant” he thought to himself.

He then peeled the adhesive strip and stuck the device on the side of the enemy’s helmet and with his thumb he pulled the safety pin and let the timer run. The default time for his incendiary devices was five seconds unless set otherwise.

The Shadowman heard the clicking of the device, whichdistracted him long enough for Cooper to roll back and, with his legs, catapulted him over and away from him towards the door. In midair the Shadowman’s head vaporized.

Cooper used his momentum to roll out and come back to his feet. He was alone again in the hallway, but he still had the same problem of the approximately thirty Shadowmen in the outer office. He finally patted himself looking to see if he missed anything in his inventory when he discovered the little gift which “Igor” gave him. He quickly checked the bodies of the Shadowmen which had grappled him and found a revolver on one and a sawed-off double-barreled shotgun on the other. He checked the load and function of these weapons then tucked the revolver in his belt, readied the shotgun and quickly cranked up the surprise package as much as it would be cranked up.

He hoped the device would be potent enough to do what was necessary. So, with all hopes and prayers he could muster he jumped through the door throwing the shock wand at the center of enemy formation while, with his left hand, unloading both barrels of the shotgun into the largest man in the room who happened to be standing right next to the doorway into the inner office.

While Coop was still airborne, the shock wand hit the wet floor sending out a heavy jolt quickly debilitating everyone who stood on the floor. Meanwhile the big man, with a bowler hat and red suspenders, took the full load of shot to his chest, sending him flying back through the closed door. Cooper hit the ground and rolled back to his feet. He felt a slight residual jolt, but it wasn’t enough to bother him much. Considering his body armor and boots were designed to mitigate as much shock as possible from the arc lights, so he figured there was still quite a bit current still flowing out from the wand.

He did a quick scan to ensure no one was still able to oppose him. Once he was satisfied he was indeed the only one upright he drew the revolver from his belt and stormed the inner office. Alexander was nowhere to be seen.

Cooper did a quick check to see if there was a safe room or escape hatch, but none were detectable. He looked at Alexander’s desk to see if there were any clues as to his whereabouts. This was when he noticed the thick ledger book with a beginning date entered on its cover. He grabbed the ledger and looked over to the bookshelf behind the desk where he saw a row of several more such ledgers with beginning and closing dates on them. He heard several more of his incendiary devises going off in the near distance. Since roasting alive wasn’t high on his list of preferable experiences he decided to leave. He grabbed the three newest ledgers off the shelf, set a device on both the shelves and the desk then left the way he came in.

Dark storm clouds gathered on the northern edge of the city. Early summer storms of this intensity are a rarity in this region but not unheard of. However, it wasn’t the charcoal black clouds the man who stood at the window was looking at. No, it was the soot black smoke which rose above the building down the street of the conflagration which was, until this morning, the Grandeur City Gentleman’s Club.

To any nascent observer, the man in question was the epitome of calm, cool and collectiveness. But to High Lord James Baron of Calador 16th of that name, it was easy to notice the slight grit of teeth and set of the jaw of the dapper dressed man. It always amazed Lord Calador how Mr. Alexander always dressed, as if in uniform, in a three-piece black and gray suit replete with top hat, cane and smoke colored glasses. Even at the ungodly hour which he was summoned into Lord Calador’s presence, not a piece out of place or in need of pressing.

Lord Calador looked back at the smoke column in question and knew it came from the building which Mr. Alexander had spent many years perfecting his most powerful organization from.

The Gentleman’s Club building and entity was very old as it was. However, the organization which was known to be the Shadowmen was much newer and definitely a product of the man in question. Granted there have been Shadowmen of one kind or another for hundreds of years, but they were members of regional or even local organizations. Mr. Alexander took it upon himself several years ago to consolidate and standardize all the Shadowmen across the Northern Continent. Even those belonging in the Western Pact United which were the sworn enemies of The Civilization.

The monumental task of uniting all the Shadowmen had finally culminated into the product which was an organization which was indeed unparalleled. And for this organization’s impressiveness was one of the reasons Lord Calador felt confident that his coup would be ultimately successful. Now the rot of doubt had set into his soullike a malignant cancer without cure.

Although Calador had never deluded himself that Mr. Alexander was his creature to control he took solus now the manwhich now stood before him had his ire set against their common enemy. Consternation upon consternation this enemy was now known to be an immortal.

It amazed Calador the bigger picture of power, control and wealth had suddenly shrunk down to the question of survival. The answer to this question had become very doubtful indeed.

Calador, after a long uncomfortable silence, finally said, “So Alexander, what do you intend to do now?”

Even through the smoke glass Calador couldn’t miss the coldness of Alexander’s gaze as he focused it on him. “I intend to finish this.” his voice had the sound of finality like a coffin lid being closed.

High Lord James XVI Baron of Calador shrugged and said, “Oh well, I am not devoid of means to finish what I’ve started.” He looked to Alexander and revised, “What we started.” However, the shadow of the cancerous doubt was still present in his voice.

The nearby explosion of an eight-inch shell made him shudder. He looked out the window again and said, “But we must carry on in another, more strategic, local I think.”

As if to echo the artillery there was a nearby strike of lightning with the subsequent clap of thunder. For someone who believed in omens and portents, they would take this as a bad one. However, Lord Calador wasn’t such a man. But this didn’t dissuade the chill which it invoked in his spine.

He turned and pressed the button on his desk to summon his secretary. The middle aged, balding man entered the room promptly awaiting instructions.

“Tell Lord General Byron we will be moving our headquarters to the Western Academy building. This should be much easier to defend and, as long as we keep the legions contained, be out of range of this blasted field artillery.”

“Yes sir!” the secretary turned and left.

“Well, Mr. Alexander, I believe we must be about our individual tasks.” In a rare sign of magnanimity, High Lord James XVI Baron of Calador offered his hand to Mr. Alexander not as a proffered ring to be kissed but as a sign of mutual respect, “Until we meet again my friend.”

Alexander took the hand firmly and said, “I do not believe we will be seeing each other again. At least not this side of Hell.”