by J. S. Miller
A realization switched on like a lamp in a pitch black room. Fen wasn’t the one calling the shots. Someone or something else was pulling his strings, and whoever it was had more important things on the agenda than one lackey’s love life. I remembered the godlike figure on the glass throne and realized I had bigger problems than one sad little Laughing Man. Or rather, this world did. I was going home. But that question still dangled overhead, taunting me: Why send his entire army to Astoria?
OK, West, stick to the facts. If Fen and his boss both thought I was dead, the city no longer had value as collateral — so this wasn’t about me, either. Maybe they were aiming to expand their zombie army, but that also didn’t track. Fen had influence in the city and must have been recruiting there from the start, carefully selecting only the dullest and dimmest before slipping black glass into their food or beer until they belonged to him, like junkies jonesing for a fix. If the size of his army was any indication, it had been working just fine, meaning an attack on the city would only tie knots in the supply chain.
A strange sound snapped me back to reality. I glanced around. The monastery was no longer visible. Panic set in as I scanned the forest but failed to find anything familiar. As I spun, a small, shadowy shape darted behind a tree, leaving a flurry of disturbed leaves in its wake.
“Hello?” I asked. No response. “Well, whatever you are, if you’re feeling more helpful than hungry, I could use some directions.”
About 10 feet up a nearby tree, yellow eyes peeked out around the trunk. The head that held them had tufted ears and tabby stripes, but pink burns marred the fur around its mouth. It was the spidercat I'd rescued from the burning farmhouse. Had it followed me all this way?
“Oh, hey. It’s you. Uh … ‘sup?”
It purred loudly, and I hoped the sound’s meaning was universal among felines. Then it leapt from the tree, spread its wings, and glided in a spiral around me until it touched down nearby. It glanced back at me once and took off in the other direction. Well, I could keep walking in circles, or I could follow this animal and pray it had a better sense of direction than I did.
Following the spidercat, I soon realized how lost I’d been. The trees in this part of the forest were indescribably huge, bigger even than the largest redwoods on Earth. Wandering among them, I caught glimpses of creatures whose evolutionary threads my mind couldn’t begin to unravel.
The cat guided me onward, leaping from tree to tree, glancing around nervously each time before gliding on. Its body language, rigid with fear and instinct, made me appreciate my apparent luck during my previous excursions through these woods. Clearly, predators larger than a lynx lurked within them. Perhaps I had been in safe zones before. Areas protected by guardians of stone and crazy old gods.
The little beast bounded from tree to tree, and I struggled to keep up. This went on for what felt like hours before a familiar shape emerged from the darkness — it was a mansion, although that word still seemed somewhat generous. From this angle, Coppersworth’s old home was more like a misshapen mountain of bricks and glass. The creature landed on the intact side of the partially caved in roof and gazed down at me.
“That was you, too, huh?” I asked.
It didn’t answer. Instead, it jumped from the perch and glided down in a wide circle, flying into the house through a shattered window. I got the impression there was something inside it wanted me to see, something that had made it follow me through fire and death and the depths of the woods.
After everything that had happened, stepping back inside the house without Coppersworth by my side made me feel like a grave robber — an impression aided by the building’s interior, which still resembled an active crime scene. Not because of blood or bodies, but because the fragments of two lives were strewn about like high-velocity impact spatter.
First thing’s first: It was dark as hell in there, and since I was probably still digesting the last of my glowsticks, I needed some other source of light.
Old lanterns containing half-melted candles sat on a nearby shelf, but come on, there had to be at least one steampunk flashlight in this madhouse. I rummaged through the drawers in the hall and eventually found a box of old matches. So I was going to have to light a fire like a normal person. Damn Max Fen straight to hell for stealing my ability to use magic on mundane tasks.
With one of the small lanterns lit, I started walking the halls — but then, remembering my encounter with a certain toaster, decided to return to familiar ground first.
The study was much as we’d left it. I moved to the desk and began examining the blueprints and formulae with the scrutiny of a man who no longer had anyone watching over his shoulder.
Most of the information was so far beyond my skill level it was embarrassing. Arthur must’ve been top of his class. I was digging through these documents when a thick stack of papers bound in twine caught my eye. These were different from the rest. They were faded, ripped and stained, and yet also organized with greater care than anything else on the desk. I pulled loose the knot and removed the cover page.
On top were schematics for a familiar construct. It resembled a suit of armor, but with no space for a man inside, only gears and belts and pistons. Flipping through each failed version was like following an evolutionary timeline … or would’ve been, if anything like it had ever occurred in nature.
Farther into the stack I found a series of sepia-toned photographs, categorized by date. In the first, a middle-aged man with a massive handlebar mustache stood next to a boy who looked about 10. They wore identical Victorian era khaki safari garb, and both smiled proudly. Scrawled at the bottom, in the same hand that adorned the rest of the documents, were the words “Coppersworth Club — 1846.”
I flipped through the photographs, and the boy grew into a young man. But as time went on their smiles faded. The young man turned gaunt, his eyes growing weary, most of his hair falling out. The older man looked grimmer with each passing photo. He experimented on his son with the relentlessness of one whose only hope was that the end will justify the means. In the last few images, the Coppersworth I knew stood in the background. Always backed against the same wall, always hanging his head, eyes not yet filled with the blue flame of life.
I returned to the first image and stared a moment longer. The Coppersworth Club. I flipped it over and was surprised to find a hand-drafted map of the house.
So it hadn’t been my imagination; the place was a literal maze, and it appeared to have been designed that way on purpose. At the center of the winding hallways, a small room contained a single, neat asterisk. My eyes found its twin in a legend near the top, next to a pair of short sentences: “Command center and laboratory access. Butcher the seraphim to clear the path.”
I picked up a pencil from the desk, found the study on the map, and drew a line from my current location to the asterisk. Might as well check it out.
Following the map through the halls, I began to feel a presence tugging at my senses. Something I had felt before but couldn’t place. It grew stronger as I walked, becoming a glowing shape in my mind, a force that promised strength, vitality, and a returning of things lost.
I turned the final corner, eager to locate whatever it was that called to me — but found only a dead end. The hall ended in a riveted steel wall, which stood ominous sentinel in this dungeon of wood and brass. The other walls were bare aside from a small mirrored stand holding a porcelain wash basin. I remembered this place. I had stumbled upon it after getting separated from Coppersworth during my first jaunt through the mansion. Seemed like years ago now.
The strange presence kept beckoning me from beyond the steel wall. I checked the map again. This had to be it. I started searching for a button or switch, something that screamed “press here to open the secret door.”
After floundering for a few minutes, I glanced back at the map. “Butcher the seraphim to clear the path.” What the hell did that mean? Seraphim typically referred to the highest order of angels in old Ch
ristianity, but the hallway was bereft of any decoration, let alone religious iconography. No crosses, no Biblical paintings … hell, I would’ve settled for one of those baby cherub statues.
As I stood there scratching my head, the spidercat swooped down and landed on the ledge of that oddly placed washbasin. It meowed in that demanding way all cats have and then scurried away. I approached the basin, and for the first time, I noticed it had a drain. Was indoor plumbing commonplace in Coppersworth’s era? Either way, the stand featured no religious artwork or engravings. Still no seraphim in sight. Just my own reflection in the mirror.
Wait. When Max Fen had spoken of angels, he’d mentioned wanting to make the word synonymous with “alchemist” again. In this world, I was a figure from myth. Practically an angel to Astorian eyes.
I checked my pockets for something sharp but came up empty-handed, so I broke the mirror with my elbow, picked up one of the shards, and drew my own blood. No, it wasn’t one of those ridiculous Hollywood jobs where the hero practically cripples himself with a melodramatic palm slice; this was a quick, careful jab to one finger, the pinkie on my off hand. I held it over the drain, and I did my best to channel my life force as red droplets splattered on white porcelain. Without my ring, I couldn’t do much but hope.
I waited in silence, but nothing happened. Sighing, I started to turn away, to leave this place, to finally give up for good, when the building shook like a giant roused from slumber. Machines deep in the foundation began to move, and the riveted steel wall groaned. It scraped the floorboards as it slid aside, leaving dust and cobwebs floating in its wake.
Beyond was a small room. The far wall glittered with screens, switches, levers, and dials, but their glass was broken, their steel twisted and covered in scorch marks, as if the equipment had exploded during an extreme power surge.
Hunched over the ruined controls, on a small, metal seat with no back, was the body of a man. He wore khaki safari garb, and his skin was dry like untreated leather, but the huge handlebar mustache had somehow survived decomposition.
On one desiccated hand, the corpse of Arthur Rundale wore a ring. Its gold and silver runes glinted in the light from my flickering candle, which shone most brightly on the philosopher’s stone at its center.
Chapter 27
Hands shaking, I stepped into the small room and reached down to remove the alchemist’s ring. Holding it up to the lamp, I knew this was what had called me here. Like all such rings, it was unique, a handcrafted totem tied to an alchemist’s power. That didn’t mean I couldn't use it; after all, I'd been wearing a borrowed ring for years. That one, however, had belonged to my father, and it had been given to me. Could I really take one from a dead man and use it in good conscience? If I did, I would once again have the power to act. I could try to stop The Laughing Man. And I’d probably die — or get others killed — while doing so.
Did I even want that anymore? When I lost my first ring, my father’s ring, a single emotion had stood out from the rest: relief. I could still find my way back to the tunnel. No one would know I’d had a chance to do things differently. I could go home and start over. Try to live something resembling a normal life. Maybe even find someone to share it with.
“The planet withdrew beneath me,” Coppersworth’s voice said in my memory. “And I looked down upon it as if from a great distance. It was burning, along with a thousand other worlds.”
Sure, I could leave. Abandon this world as Coppersworth thought his father had abandoned him. Try to live the rest of my days in peace. But how long before The Laughing Man’s army showed up on my doorstep, its ranks swarming with the transmuted races of a thousand other worlds?
I put on the ring, and existence itself seemed to refocus. Everything became clearer, sharper, more definite. I reached for my power, and this time it didn’t shy away. I coaxed it back, letting it flutter and hum as I centered it. The air around me shimmered like heat waves.
Electric lamps started clicking on, illuminating the space in stark detail. The door slid closed behind me. I tried to turn, but the room dropped with a jolt that felt only slightly slower than complete free-fall. Something told me Arthur had skipped Elevator Design 101 during his time at the Royal Academy.
After a few nauseating moments, the room screeched to a halt, and with a small ding the opposite wall glided open. The light from the lift illuminated the first few yards of a long hallway. Staring into the pitch blackness made my heart beat harder, my breath come quicker. Maybe the past few days had given me post-traumatic darkened tunnel disorder. PTDTD. Catchy.
“My kingdom for a glowstick,” I muttered, eyeing my puny lantern without much confidence.
As if translating my words into action, my new ring began to glow, and one by one, more electric lights blinked on in response, seeming to yawn and stretch after their long sleep. They revealed a plain wooden door at the end of the hall. It had no visible knobs, hinges, or handles.
I set down my lamp and ambled up to the door, which turned out to be an irritating combination of sturdy and locked. Running my hands along its surface, I found a small indentation in the center. Its shape was familiar, so I raised my fist and ring-bumped the slot. The door dissolved before me, and cool air rushed out.
“Neat,” my mouth said without asking permission.
Inside the room was a pristine and functional alchemist’s laboratory. The place must have been hermetically sealed for all these years, because the long counters, thick shelves, and rows of tools looked almost new. Perhaps that was how Rundale himself was more than just a pile of bones.
Vials and jars lined every shelf except two, one of which held a long blunderbuss decorated with intricate carvings, the other a sword and scabbard on separate stands. The glass containers were filled with powders and liquids, many of which even I could identify. I heard pistons pumping in the walls and noticed large vents placed around the room. They created a crosswind, keeping fresh air coming in and stale or toxic air flowing out. Arthur Rundale really had been a pro.
I ventured farther into the room, trying to look everywhere at once like a kid in a store that sells candy and toys and axes and cherry bombs but somehow isn’t a Wal-Mart. In one corner I found pieces of sculpted, golden metal laying in a pile, looking at first glance like a discarded suit of armor. Atop them rested the face of my friend, which glared at me with gleaming, empty eyes.
I turned back to the lab. Each piece of gear, each stoppered bottle, each many-hued substance … they seemed to come alive in my mind. These tools had been sitting here for years, maybe decades, waiting, hoping that one day they might serve a new master — and that they’d be ready when that master needed them. Or, perhaps, when someone else needed his help. The sight of it filled my heart with purpose. Not guilt, not obligation, but true purpose — something I hadn’t felt in a long, long time.
I started scooping up formulae by the armful, then carried them over and dumped them onto the large center table. Circling the room, I began to pluck chemicals, containers, tools, and stoppers from the shelves and cabinets. It was time to get to work. Hopefully I could remember how.
A few dozen beakers were glowing softly over small fires when the first one exploded. It wasn't a serious explosion, really. Just a small … fireball … that shattered three adjacent beakers and erupted toward the ceiling in a miniature mushroom cloud. Luckily, as I mentioned, the previous owner had the foresight to install adequate ventilation. My clothes and hair were a bit singed, but that wasn’t the worst part. I would need to start over with that mixture, which was an experiment of my own design.
I don’t much like talking about the science of alchemy. It’s dangerous, obviously, but also cryptic and arcane, which makes discussing it feel like teaching a music class for dogs; explaining the core concepts is easy enough, but when it comes time to sing, it will just be a bunch of barking. I'll disclose this much for now: Alchemy has three branches. The first is Restorative, which contains healing elixirs and the like. The next i
s Destructive. Most of the Chemslinger’s ammunition falls into this category. But the third and most important branch is Transformative.
Being an alchemist, at its core, is about channeling energy to change the world around you, making Transformative alchemy seem less like a branch and more like the trunk the other two branches grow from. It’s like beer. Ales and lagers and dozens of styles within those two categories exist, but they’re all still beer.
All alchemy is transformative, whether it’s blowing a hole in something or patching that hole back up, but certain formulae refuse to fall into either of those two buckets. Exploring this idea was the original goal of alchemy; my ancient predecessors sought to turn base metals into gold. My goal here was to trigger all three categories at different stages during a single alchemical reaction, which, as far as I knew, had never been attempted before.
After another two hours of trial and error, I tapped the bubbling beaker containing my transformative mixture, paying close attention to how it reacted. It was time. I removed the vial of black glass from my pocket and poured the contents in. Then I pricked my finger and added a single drop of my blood. Alchemical steam puffed out of the beaker, and the resulting fumes were dizzying. I stepped back, watching it swirl up into the large vents, and once again gave silent thanks to Arthur Rundale.
Walking to the other end of the table, I scanned the rest of the mixtures. It took me a moment to find the one I wanted: Arthur’s “Lacquer of Stoneskin.” The Laughing Man had swiped my jacket, so I was going to need a new suit of armor. The concoction bubbled cheerfully but was not ready just yet.
While those brewed, I put my weapon-modding expertise to good use. The custom molds required to craft new Chemslinger rounds were back in my own lab, but using materials scavenged from this one — and cannibalizing parts from my own weapon — I rigged a pneumatic chamber onto one side of the blunderbuss. Its design was similar to my hand cannon’s, albeit somewhat slapdash. I didn’t have time for minor technicalities like testing. Fingers crossed.