"You seem to be glossing over the large hole in the plan," Five said, gesturing at the wound in the body's chest.
"I have already figured that part out."
"Do you care to share?"
"My plan involves secrets that are not my own, and thus not mine to freely share," Jester said.
"So who amongst us has to leave?" Five asked.
"Doctor, would it be an imposition to ask for privacy?"
The pathologist checked the wall clock. "I have a lunch break coming up, I suppose I can get on that."
"I appreciate the understanding."
"No big deal," the pathologist said as he walked out.
Jester waited for a moment before speaking. "It should be possible to provide circulation using a Heart of Ma'at. The severity of the damage, however, mean that it would be insufficient in and of itself."
"Well, yeah, you can stick your hand in there and touch the table."
"So we need a means of inducing regeneration that will not interfere with the implantation of the Heart," Jester said.
"What were you thinking?" Donny asked.
"The creation of a Tomb Guardian involved implanting a Heart of Ma'at into a were-jackal," Jester said. "They would heal around the wound in their chest and take on the aspect of Anubis."
"There are no living were-jackals," Five said, "The Romans exterminated them."
"Actually, it was the Ptolemys," Jester said. "They supported the old regime and were purged. There were only a handful left by that point anyway. But that is not insurmountable."
"Come again?"
"Therianthropy is mutable by its very nature. While someone is first being afflicted, it is possible through the proper ritual to change the animal into which they will morph. Though once set, it will not be possible to change it again."
"But we're back to-"
"There are still Werewolves in New Port Arthur."
"Like the girl this morning."
"So," Donny said. "You plan to turn this guy into am extinct type of were-creature to allow him to heal around a ritual artifact that no one has made in thousands of years?"
"Yes."
"Well, doesn't it sound crazy when he says it?" Five asked.
"I will, of course, discuss the matter with Dekker before we proceed with the plan."
"Who's Dekker?" Five asked.
"The not-dead dead guy," Donny said.
"So things are no less strange now than they were in my time," Five said. "Good to know some things are consistent."
Donny had bad memories of Ward Seventeen of Vanguard Hospital. The security ward was sealed off from the rest of the hospital by a heavy blast door and had a constant guard of SRTs. The Exosuits of the SRTs were not quite true powered armor, but extended the time they could stand up to powered criminals who might be treated in the security ward. The SRTs verified Donny's identity before letting him in. All of the damage that had been done was fixed, and the plain hallway of heavy-duty doors was as cold and uninviting as ever.
A young man with flaxen blond hair and faded blue eyes sat in an otherwise empty room. A needle in his left arm fed blood down a tube and into a hanging bag. He had a white button-down shirt and beige slacks. He glanced up at Donny and shrugged. "I was sort of expecting Sennofre."
"He'll be along," Donny said. "I'm Baron Mortis. Who are you?"
"Preston Doolittle," he said, reaching up with his free hand to shake Donny's. "I hear you met my sister Mercy."
"We didn't get to talk much."
"You weren't seeing her at her best," Preston said.
"Doolittle?" Donny asked. "As in the Doolittle Club?"
"The family business. It's kind of how we have such strong ties to the Community Fund."
"So why are you giving blood?"
"I didn't ask why they want to give someone a transfusion of lycanthrope blood, but apparently I'm the better blood type match. Can't have someone rejecting the transfusion while you're cursing them, now can you?"
"A bad typing match is tantamount to torture, as they are continually regenerating and rejecting the blood," Jester said from the doorway.
"Who ran the tests to find that out?" Preston asked.
"Franz Volk. Do not look him up after eating," Jester said, checking through the blood bags. "He did most of his work out of concentration camps."
A disturbed look crossed Preston's face at the implications. "You sound like you speak from experience."
"I killed many of his creations," Jester said, "And personally burned his wretched lab to ash."
"I thought heroes didn't kill," Preston said.
"It was war, and I wasn't a hero yet." Preston winced as Jester disconnected him. "We should have enough. Thank you for your contribution."
"No problem," Preston said, standing up.
"Don't let your sister skip her meds again."
"I'll try, but she doesn't listen to me." Preston walked out of the room and headed down the hall. Jester gathered up the blood bags and moved them to the middle of the empty floor. He set them up as the edges of an octagon and began scribbling on the floor with his finger.
"How much blood did Preston donate?" Donny asked.
"His regenerative ability means that four pints is not dangerous. He will need to get something to eat and stay hydrated, but will be fine."
"That must come in handy."
"The lunar rage tends to negate any benefits from the condition."
"Does it effect all therianthropes, or just werewolves?" Donny asked.
"It is most pronounced in lycanthropes, but responds to medication." Completing his markings, Jester put his hands down on the floor and poured energy into them. He began an ululating chant that put Donny's hair on end. Donny moved back near the door and watched as the blood bags began to glow red. The energy and the sigils sucked into them and the glow faded. Jester fell silent and carefully collected the bags.
"What did you just do?"
"I revised my initial procedure. On my way back from Sterling Towers, it became clear that it was a lower risk proposition to transmute the blood prior to transfusion than attempt to modify the affliction while in the process of implanting the Heart of Ma'at. I have made it so that the blood will induce Thosanthropy on its own."
"'Thosanthropy'?"
"I forget sometimes that they don't teach Greek as often as they used to."
"Do we need to call up the Fifth Baron?"
"Can he push pedestals around?"
"No."
"Then I don't want to hear him." Jester sat the armful of blood bags on the chair Preston had occupied. "A cart of supplies should be on its way up from the loading dock. I would appreciate it if you helped me set up."
"All right."
After a pause, Jester spoke again. "This would also be the sort of work an apprentice would be tasked with doing. If you're serious about learning magic, this could prove informative, though your part is mostly manual labor."
Donny nodded. "I understand." He suppressed the mild annoyance at the thought of manual labor and sent it scurrying from his mind. "I never knew you fought the Germans."
"It was part of the deal that got me legal residency in the United States. While there was a powers gap in the Pacific theater, there was practically a 'powers arms race' in Europe. I was going to sit out the war, but Rookhound talked me into signing up."
A weird look crossed Donny's face. "The current Rookhound is my grandfather on my mother's side."
"It was the previous one," Jester said.
"That was his father."
"Small community."
"Sometimes it is." Their conversation was cut short by the arrival of the supplies from Sterling Towers. Two low carts, laden with equipme
nt and crates, sat in the hallway. The lead workman handed a clipboard to Jester.
"Sign here." Jester made a chain of marks that were in no way English, or even in the Latin alphabet. The workman frowned, but a second glance at the seven-foot-tall, jackal-headed figure told him it probably wasn't a forgery. The workers left the hand carts and departed. The first thing Jester picked up was a small table. He moved it into the room and put it by the wall.
"Find a crowbar and open the large box," Jester said, pointing at a wooden crate on the second cart.
"Crowbar? Me?" Donny asked.
"Don't ruin the panels. We'll need to use it again later."
"Gotcha." Donny turned towards the box. With a gesture, he caused the lid of the crate to raise, pulling the nails free from the main body. He jumped back as a domed, metallic head popped above the rim of the crate. Its round eyes glowed blue with continually shifting bolts of purple jolting through. Jester chuckled.
"Very funny," Donny said.
"I understand why I was boxed up, but that doesn't mean I'm terribly happy about it." The robot stood. It was vaguely humanoid in form, though it carried a pair of glass canisters on its back. Inside these, a maelstrom crackled with a torrent of purple energy. A white glow came from smaller transparent tubes flanking the lower half of its torso. The tubes vanished inside the metallic chest cavity. Its limbs had been reinforced in a hodge-podge fashion, and many of the welds were still strongly discolored. The purple gaze turned on Donny. "I remember you, you are Baron Mortis, correct?"
"Yes," Donny said.
"Help him out of there," Jester said, "But remember, we need the crate to ship that chassis back when he's where he is supposed to be."
"This has been a very strange experience," Dekker said as Donny pulled off one of the sides of the crate. He set the panel aside as Dekker stepped down from the shipping container. The three set about moving the components from the carts into the hospital room. Jester directed the efforts while sketching signs and glyphs on the floor. Eight carved wooden pedestals were set at the apexes of the pattern. After each was placed, Jester fine-tuned the position. He placed a compass on top and nudged them into a precise alignment.
"Why are you a few degrees off north?" Donny asked.
"I'm aligning to stellar north. It is not perfectly correlated with magnetic north."
Donny looked at the hieroglyphs carved into the sides of the cedar columns. Donny couldn't figure out their meanings beyond the base images used. Jester placed a small idol on each of the pedestals and adjusted their alignment. Donny started to wonder what he was supposed to learn if Jester wasn't going to explain anything. Once Jester was satisfied with the setup, he walked away.
"Where are you going?" Donny asked.
"To oversee the body transfer."
The way robot Dekker stared at his seemingly inert organic form, Donny wanted to know what was going through his mind. He couldn't bring himself to ask. The surgeon they'd borrowed hooked the body into a cardiopulmonary bypass machine. While he was doing so, Jester had begun part of the ritual proper. He quietly intoned unnatural syllables over a cedar box containing a perfectly clear, symmetrical quartz crystal about three inches long. Preston's donor blood was hooked into another part of the machine to be fed in once it was activated.
Donny sat down in the chair and waited. Robot Dekker was hooked into the siphon and attached to the body on the hospital bed. The surgeon headed off, making a comment about being needed elsewhere, but wearing a slightly disturbed expression. Jester's chanting had grown louder and more complex. As he reverently lifted the crystal above his head and presented it to the cardinal directions, it began to glow. Slipping it into the hole torn into Dekker's chest, Jester switched on the pump and the donor blood began flowing.
"Ohh," Dekker said. Donny turned to look. The ragged tear down the middle of Dekker's chest had started closing of its own accord. The glow in robot Dekker's backpack was ebbing, and the faint hint of purple appeared behind his organic body's eyelids. Donny stood and took a step closer, but Jester nudged him away with an elbow, not breaking meter with his chant. Donny suppressed a grumble and headed into the hall. After a few moments of staring at the detritus of their earlier unpacking, he heard an animalistic snarl from within the room. Donny turned. Jester was continuing his chant while trying to prevent the thrashing form on the bed from ripping out the tubes pumping blood into his body. As Donny watched, Dekker's right foot twisted and reformed, becoming paw-like and sprouting sandy-brown fur.
With an incoherent roar, Dekker bowled over Jester and vaulted towards the door. He had taken on an animalistic aspect halfway between man and jackal. Lean and covered in sandy brown fur, he tried to make a break for the hallway, but snagged on the siphon line with its quarter-ton robot anchor. Glowing purple eyes raged from behind an elongated muzzle as he slashed at the siphon with his claws. The thin hose linking him to the heart-lung machine proved to be no such impediment.
Leaping out the doorway, Dekker collided with the wooden crate panel Donny threw up in front of himself as a shield. Ropes of spittle strung between snarling, pointed teeth as he clawed his way over the panel. His claws and teeth drew ever nearer to Donny as the boards cracked.
With a yelp, Dekker was yanked back towards the room. Donny peered cautiously over the wood. Jester had the smaller hybrid in a full-nelson. Dekker's feet slipped along the tiles, pawing for traction.
"Shh," Jester hushed quietly. "Calm down and gain control over yourself." Dekker growled, glowering. Jester turned, bringing the smaller thosanthrope along. "Baron, inside the room there is a tray of medications. Find the syringe marked 'ZSV' and bring it here." Donny nodded and worked his way past, trying to keep away from the wild swipes of Dekker's half-restrained arms. The tray was easy to find, and there was only one syringe. An adhesive label had the three letters written on it with a felt tipped marker. Donny gingerly picked it up and carried it to the door.
"Now what?"
"Inject him," Jester said. "I can't exactly let go."
"I've never given anyone a shot before."
"Just aim for a large muscle."
Donny pulled the cap off the syringe and jabbed it through the fur into the meat of Dekker's right thigh. He depressed the plunger and pulled it out. Dekker continued thrashing. "It's not working."
"Medication is not instantaneous," Jester said.
Donny backed away and put the syringe back on the tray where he found it. "What was in that thing?"
"Ziprein, Sholtrix, and Vianix. They mitigate the most dangerous symptoms."
Dekker's wild thrashing slowed. His limbs slackened, and he closed his jaws, falling silent. His feet continued to slip along the floor as he was unable to gain traction. "How long are you going to hold me?" Dekker asked, his voice deeper and gravelly.
"Until you turn back into a human."
"I don't know how."
"Figuring out how will help focus your mind and clear the lunar rage."
Slowly, Dekker's form faded back to that of his human self. His eyes still glowed with a purple light. Jester set Dekker down on the hospital bed. Looking down at his chest, Dekker gingerly tugged at the hose still connected inside his thorax.
"We will take that back out," Jester said.
Iron Conjurer
"Can't we approach above ground?" Syd asked. He cast his gaze around the darkness of the tunnel. Crumbling brickwork and cement swarmed with colonies of small vermin. After a moment of trepidation, Syd clicked on the night vision built into his helmet. The darkness gave way to a blue-hued representation of the tunnel, roaches and all.
"So you want to get caught?" the voice in his earpiece asked.
"I just find the thought of a failure in this particular underground to be particularly distressing."
"So you'll be sitting around in the dark fo
r a while. Stop whining and advance towards the first intersection." Syd sighed and strode forward. The bulky plates of his armor slid over each other with none of the grinding or clanking his visage would imply. It was not perfect silence, nor could his heavy footfalls be fully muffled. His motion scattered the nearby roaches, sending them scurrying into the cracks in the brickwork. The rats, however, ignored him. With a hum, one of several compressors in the mechanical pack started up. When the coolant running through the operator's harness chilled, Syd knew which it was. The retrofit had almost completely obstructed the airflow through the armor, mandating alternate methods of keeping the wearer from overheating.
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