Heroics for Beginners

by John Moore

  At the other end of the workbench was a standard business desk. It held a few pens, an inkwell, some plotting paper, and a small portrait in a frame. The portrait showed a pretty girl with reddish brown hair and a scattering of freckles across her nose. A quite ordinary-looking man, of late middle age, was sitting at the desk, doing calculations on an abacus and writing the results in a blue exercise book. He had thin brown hair shot through with gray and a slightly unkempt beard of a similar color. He wore a long white lab coat, stained with grease. A pair of thick spectacles sat on his nose. He looked a little surprised when Kevin dropped from the ceiling. But thanks to the near-magical power of name badges, he accepted the intruder without curiosity.

  Kevin waved his brush at the ventilation opening. “Dirty work.”

  “It’s about time they did something about it,” said the man. “Especially on rainy days when it gets that musty smell.”

  “We’re getting rid of that,” said Kevin. “It’s all being taken care of. You’re Professor Mercredi, right? Stan said I should talk to you. He said he wants me to work on the room with the—what did he call it—the Ancient Artifact?”

  Mercredi brightened. “Ah, good thinking. Stan’s a bright fellow. Yes, a clean, dust-free environment is essential for the workings of the phlogistocator. The tolerances are very close.”

  “Yes, that’s what Stan said.”

  “Of course, the production model will be a sealed unit, so dust won’t be a problem. But since this is the prototype, we constantly have to open it up and make adjustments.”

  “Yes, his words exactly. ‘Make sure no dust gets into the Diabolical Device,’ he said.”

  Mercredi stood up and fished a brass key from his jacket. “It’s a restricted access area. I’ll have to let you in.” He opened the office door and led Kevin down yet another hallway. Since Kevin had come in through a ventilation duct, this left him even more disoriented. They went around several corners and by the time they reached a heavy set of double doors, the Prince was completely lost.

  They were thick, solid security doors, oak reinforced with iron bands, with a heavy lock. The doors alone told you that something important was inside. Then, next to the door, a burly guard sat behind a desk. He looked at their ID badges, noted the time on a nearby clock, and wrote down the badge numbers on a clipboard. “We all have to log in and out of the phlogistocation chamber,” Mercredi explained. He unlocked one side of the double doors, entered, and motioned for Kevin to follow him. But Kevin stopped in the doorway. For it took a moment to absorb what he was seeing.

  He realized now that he was in the circular tower that could be seen from outside the Fortress. It rose some sixty feet from floor to ceiling. All around the base were tall windows, so that all of the surrounding country could be kept under observation. The inside of the room held a machine.

  In his university days the Prince had been required to take a course in philosophy. The course had touched on Plato’s discussion of ideal images. Chairs, for example, came in all shapes, sizes, and styles, yet people were always able to recognize a chair when they saw one. Plato said this was because the mind contained an image of the ideal chair, from which all other chairs were derived.

  Kevin hadn’t given this much consideration. Now he decided there must be some truth in it. He had never seen a Diabolical Device, not even a picture of one, nor had he even heard one described. Yet he instantly realized that the thing he was staring at—staring at with horrified fascination—was a Diabolical Device.

  He blinked and looked away. It’s just your imagination, he told himself. The Device is not horrifying. It’s just a machine, neither good nor bad in itself, a collection of innocent gears, cogs, and—um—those round spinning things. And yet there was something evil about this machine, something in the streaky blackness of the cast iron, something in the glint of the polished brass fittings, something in the twisted array of copper tubes that told the observer, “This is a machine with a bad attitude.”

  “See what I mean?” Mercredi tapped an access panel. “How can you expect precision work with all this dust?”

  “Yes, I can see that would be a problem. Dust, soot, cobwebs—I’ll get them all cleaned out in no time at all. You can count on me. So where is this famous artifact that I’ve heard so much about?”

  “Oh you can’t see that.” Mercredi had his back to Kevin as he twisted his key in the door. “It’s kept locked up.”

  A firm hand seized his shoulder and turned him around. Mercredi found himself looking into the young man’s eyes.

  They were friendly eyes, yet the hand remained clamped to his shoulder, and the strong fingers were digging into his skin. “Ow!”

  “I’m a diplomatic sort,” said the young man with the smiling eyes. “Diplomacy is what I’m trained for. I think of violence as failure of diplomacy, a breakdown in communication. I’d much rather give people a chance to change, to reason with them, talk things out, try to come to an understanding before resorting to violence. Do you agree?”

  “Ow!” The hand on his shoulder was squeezing really hard, pinching some sort of nerve. Mercredi felt his arm getting numb.

  “Now I’m a man in the prime of life, somewhat taller than you and—if I may be so immodest—a good deal more muscular. Whereas you appear to be about thirty years older than myself, and I’m guessing that you haven’t spent much of that thirty years exercising. Am I right? Yes? I don’t expect you’ve had much recent experience in hand-to-hand combat. No? So don’t you think it would be so much more comfortable for everyone involved if I took the Ancient Artifact without having to pound your face against this stone wall?”

  “Ouch. Let go of me! Who are you?”

  “I’m Kevin Timberline, Prince of Rassendas. You are an accomplice to a murderer. Cooperate with me, and maybe I won’t kill you.”

  “This is your idea of diplomacy? Threatening to kill me?”

  “You misunderstand. The diplomatic part is when I offer not to kill you in exchange for your cooperation.”

  “I can’t help you! I didn’t want to do it! I was kidnapped.” Kevin gave him a skeptical look but removed his left hand from Mercredi’s shoulder. At the same time he put his right hand around the alchemist’s throat. “I swear to God,” Mercredi choked. “Voltmeter forced me to work for him.”

  “Oh yeah.” The Prince swung him around and made him face the Diabolical Device. “Yeah, I can tell how reluctant you are to work on that.”

  “He gave me no choice. You don’t understand. He has my daughter!”

  Kevin stared at him for long moments, trying to decide whether to believe the alchemist. Finally, he relaxed his grip on the man’s neck. “Your daughter?”

  “My daughter Laura.”

  “The girl in the picture. On your desk.”

  “Yes. He threatened me with her. He said if I didn’t work for him, she would meet a terrible fate.”

  “He’s kidnapped her, too?”

  “No, she’s away at school, thank God. But he showed me that he could get to her, no matter where we tried to hide. He has a tremendous organization. You have no idea how powerful he is.”

  “Yes, I do. I know he’s powerful. I also understand he’s a complete madman.”

  “Quiet, you fool!” Mercredi looked around in panic. “You don’t call a man like Voltmeter insane.”

  “Sorry. I meant to say that he’s working through a lot of complex personal issues.”

  “That’s better.”

  “All right,” said Kevin. He pushed Mercredi into a chair and released him. “I might be able to help you. You swear you only built this thing to protect your daughter?”

  “Of course. I’m a quiet, placid man. I don’t want to hurt anyone. I would never assist a fiend like Lord Voltmeter, except to protect my daughter.”

  “Okay.”

  “Also my grant money dried up.”

  “What!”

  “Times are tough,” Mercredi said defensively. “It’s hard to
get funding for research these days.”

  Kevin glared at him.

  “But I didn’t expect it to come to this. I wanted my ideas to be used for good and peaceful purposes, in ways that would benefit mankind.”

  “Like what?”

  “Like what what?”

  “The good and peaceful purposes.” Kevin looked over the huge stack of tubing, valves, and gears. “I don’t like the look of this. Just what, exactly, are the good and peaceful purposes for this kind of device?”

  “Oh. Yes. Well,” said Mercredi. “I haven’t worked out the potential applications yet. Um, not precisely. There’s all sorts of things, really tons of neat stuff, but it will take more work to bring them to the final product stage. Anyway,” he continued more assertively, “that’s more of a marketing issue. I’m just research and development.”

  “Uh-huh. Better start updating your résumé, because your device will not be activated. I’m here to defeat Voltmeter.”

  “You can’t,” said Mercredi.

  He said this with an absolute certainty that Kevin found immensely irritating. “If you’re going to tell me this job needs a professional hero, you’re wrong. And if you’re thinking about calling for help, I’ll break your neck before you get out the first syllable.”

  “No, that’s not what I mean. Good heavens, young man, do you think you’re the first person who has wanted to kill His Lordship? Many hate him, and many have tried.

  But Voltmeter possesses a magical power. I don’t know how he obtained it, but it makes him invulnerable in single combat.”

  “I’ve heard of spells like that. It’s a trick. You’re invulnerable because your enemy thinks you’re invulnerable, so he never really tries very hard.”

  “Nonsense like that has led better men than you to their deaths. It’s no trick. Voltmeter has cut down professional heroes, barbarian swordsmen, and that sort. I have felt his power myself. But I gave you fair warning. Believe what you like. I tell you again that a single man cannot harm him, and a force of men cannot enter this fortress.”

  Kevin was pretty sure that a force of men led by Black Jack Logan could crack any castle they cared to try. That, of course, was the crux of Kevin’s problem, disposing of Voltmeter before Logan arrived. “This fortress seems undermanned to me. What makes you so certain it’s impregnable?”

  “The phlogistocator, of course.” Mercredi waved his hand at the Diabolical Device. “It saturates the air with phlogiston. It will, quite literally, take your breath away. Once powered up, it surrounds the castle with a cloud of death. One man or an army, it makes no difference. Suffocation is a matter of minutes.”

  Kevin took another long look at the machine. The brass valves seemed to wink at him with malevolent glee. But there was something wrong with Mercredi’s story. It was too pat, too simple. He had to roll it over in his mind for a few moments before the flaw occurred to him. “If the machine suffocates everyone around it, then the people in the castle will die, too.”

  “Right.” Mercredi looked approving. “Good thinking. That held us up for a long time. But I’ve come up with a solution. When the machine is turned on, a separate component neutralizes any magical field within the castle walls. Inside the walls, we’ll be safe. Outside, anyone within range of the field will die.”

  “Okay, but you’re still working on that, you say. So the machine can’t be used yet?”

  “No, the machine can be used. The neutralization field works. I just have to tweak it a bit. It isn’t specific enough. My goal is to only stop phlogistocation. Right now it will neutralize any and all magical fields inside the Fortress of Doom. But we’ll still be safe and the people outside will still be exposed.”

  “Okay, so much for that idea. I like this machine less and less each minute. Where does the Ancient Artifact fit in?”

  “The Ancient Artifact is a source of energy for the machine.”

  “Let’s see it.”

  Mercredi looked as though he were about to refuse, indeed, as though he might summon the guards. Kevin had to pick up a spanner from a workbench and tap it against his palm in a meaningful manner to get compliance. The alchemist then shrugged. Kevin followed him to the opposite side of the chamber, where a sturdy cabinet rested beneath one of the large windows. Mercredi opened it to expose a rugged iron strongbox with a puzzle lock. He had to work on it for a couple of minutes before he was able to swing back the heavy door. The Prince looked inside.

  This time the strongbox was not empty.

  “That’s it? That’s all it is?”

  “What do you mean? This is the most powerful model of any Ancient Artifact ever produced.”

  The strongbox contained something that looked like an ordinary pottery bud vase. It was the length of a man’s arm but thinner, just wide enough to hold a few roses, except that the top was sealed with a tin plate. It was painted in light blue enamel, with a thin line of gold filigree along the top rim. It had a handful of cryptic occult symbols running down the side, a few mysterious runes around the middle, and a nine-pin DIN connector at the bottom.

  And it appeared to be brand-new.

  “It looks brand-new,” Kevin said.

  “Factory rebuilt. Just as good as new, and you save about thirty percent. Of course that didn’t make a difference to Voltmeter, since he stole it.”

  “I thought it was an ancient artifact.”

  “It is.” Mercredi reached into the strongbox and turned the vase around, so Kevin could read the engraving on the other side. “JOHN B. ANCIENT COMPANY,” it said. “MODEL 7 ARTIFACT.”

  “The John B. Ancient Artifact Company?”

  “They made the best Artifacts of Power,” said Mercredi. “Sturdy, reliable, powerful. Expensive, but worth the cost, in my opinion. The craftsmanship was second to none. They’ve been out of production for quite some time, you realize. They sold out to Sunbelt Sorcery Supplies, which was later bought by Universal Magic Equipment. Then Universal diversified into buggy whips, millstones, ladies toiletries, candlestick holders, porcelain chamber pots, boot polish, and embroidery thread, and changed their name to UnMaCo. Then they merged with National Necromancers—you’ve heard of them.”

  “I think so. Didn’t they used to have that chain of stores called Spells ’n Stuff?”

  “Right. Until the retail market got saturated, and they were absorbed by Wizard Systems, which was formerly Wizard Products before it became the Wizard Group. After the merger they reorganized as National Wizard, which later spun off most of its acquisitions so it could focus on its core business.”

  “So the Ancient Company is gone?”

  “Well, it’s back now, because it was one of the spin-offs. But when National Wizard let it go, the parent company retained the rights to the artifact-manufacturing process, even though they don’t make Artifacts of Power. So now the Ancient Company just makes party crackers and trick playing cards. Oh, and those birthday candles that keep re-lighting when you blow them out. Of course, John Ancient is retired, although he was pretty much just the designer. It was his wife that took care of the business end.”

  Kevin had a sudden flash of insight. “I think I’ve met her. Old woman, mysterious manner, given to prognostication?”

  “You know her? Excellent! Did she make a prediction?”

  “Yeah. She said I would not defeat the man in black.”

  “No, I meant did she say anything about convertible bonds, for example? Or long-term annuities? Pork belly futures?”

  “I’m afraid not.”

  “Too bad. Anyway, if you’re looking for an Artifact of Power, of magic power . . .” Here Mercredi’s voice took on a tone of dramatic urgency. “If you want access to evil power, dreadful power, insidious power, power that corrupts by its very presence, a power that was meant for the use of no mortal man”—his voice rose until it was nearly a scream—“a power that is very nearly beyond the ability of any human to control, of an awesome, terrifying, unearthly power, then you must . . . then . . .
”

  His voice faltered. “What?” said Kevin. “What must you do?”

  “Then you pretty much have to go to the used equipment market,” Mercredi said matter-of-factly. “They don’t make them like this anymore. We were lucky that King Calephon had one. In near-mint condition too.”

  “And it’s the only thing that will run the Diabolical Device?”

  “It’s the most powerful of the Ancient Artifacts.”

  “Then there’s no problem.”

  “I know what you’re thinking, and the answer is no. I’m not going to help you steal the Ancient Artifact. Don’t try to threaten me—I still refuse. The danger to my daughter is too great. The danger to myself is too great. You would never get away with it, and even if you did, Voltmeter would blame me, so I’d be dead either way. Leave the castle now, while you still can.”

  “He won’t know you’re involved. I’ll take it tonight, after you’ve left. You’ll have an alibi.”

  “He’ll still hold me responsible.”

  “It won’t matter. I’ve got news for you. Lord Logan is about to attack this castle.”

  “Let him try. He can’t get past the device, and you can’t defeat the man in black. If Mrs. Ancient said so, that’s the way it is. She’s got a very good track record.”

  “You’re not thinking. I don’t have to defeat the man in black. Logan will defeat the man in black. I’ll be halfway back to Deserae with the Ancient Artifact when Logan attacks. The machine won’t work, Logan captures Voltmeter, and you and your daughter are both free. Game over.”

  “No!” said Mercredi. “No. Absolutely not! My daughter’s life is paramount. Never will I place her in jeopardy, no matter what the circumstances. I stand firm on this. Nothing—do you hear me—nothing could induce me to put her life at risk.”