Legend of the Sword Bearer: Tempest Chronicles Book 1

by Jeremy Fabiano

  I put my hand on his shoulder. “We’ll find out what happened. We just need to keep looking.”

  Quest Received: Find out what happened to Thasgrin’s brother Kronek.

  “Thank ye, lad. I appreciate it. Le’s keep lookin’.”

  We continued to explore the complex, finding small sentinel drones guarding key doorways. Unfortunately, we had to destroy them as well as nothing worked right, and everything wanted to kill us. We came across a supply crate with a label written in a language I couldn’t understand. Dwarvish, apparently. In it were spare parts for all sorts of things. Thasgrin rummaged through it for a bit and then started handing us parts. After a while, he became frustrated and overturned the crate, making a huge mess. He took the parts from us and tossed them into the crate.

  “What’s all of this for?” I asked.

  “We’re takin’ this stupid crate of stupid parts to get to fix’n the stupid computer. Then fix’n the stupid teleporter.” He gave the crate a kick for good measure. “Nothin’ ever works in this stupid place. Odin’s beard, but is it too much to ask fer the lights to stay on?” He shoved the crate forcefully out the door scattering objects in every direction as it cleared a path through the discarded parts. We followed a little distance away, the constant stream of swearing leading the way.

  We entered a huge room with wall-sized monitors and a massive table in the center. Inlaid in the table were yet more monitors. Useless scrambled garbage scrolled by on every monitor, some flickering and others dark.

  “What is this place, some sort of control room?” I asked.

  Thasgrin nodded. “Use’ta be. Just a pile o’ scrap right now.” He kicked a nearby console, and it shut down entirely. Garstil coughed and walked away, trying hard not to laugh.

  The Dwarf grumbled murderously. “First Noslen abandons us. Then Kronek. Then this pile of crap gets some sort of virus.” He kicked the console again. It turned back on with a loud hum, then smoke poured out the back, and it went dark. The swearing began anew. At this point, Sai and Morogan followed Garstil out into the hallway to…keep watch apparently. Thasgrin didn’t notice.

  “Anything I can do to help?” I asked. “I don’t know much about ancient Dwarven technology, but I’m a fast learner.”

  He grunted, “Aye. Grab that crate of parts and dump ’em all over the table here. We’ll sort this out sooner or later.” Thasgrin began opening the consoles, which apparently were hinged for easy access and repairs. He dove in headfirst and yanked a random part out. “Find me one of these,” he said. I grabbed the yellow rectangular crystal and swapped it out with a fresh one from our pile. He grabbed it and took it back into his little metal cave. The console restarted and started booting up. “That’ll do it. Only eight more to go.”

  We spent the next hour replacing random pieces throughout the room. Apparently, the crystals were called isometric crystals, and they housed entire data centers of computational power. Kind of reminded me of isolinear crystals from a sci-fi show I watched as a kid. The one with the bald British guy as the captain. The power flickered off and on, forcing all of the monitors and computers to power cycle. All of the scrambled monitors finished up their booting sequence, and actual error messages flooded all of the screens. They were in Dwarvish as well; however, once you’ve seen one error message, you’ve seen them all.

  Thasgrin grunted. “Looks like the satellite is out of commission too. We might as well get up there and fix that too.”

  “Wait,” I said. “There are satellites? Like, space? Satellites?”

  Thasgrin looked taken back. “Of course, there’s space satellites. Where else would ya put them? In the ocean?”

  “I… Never mind,” I said. So, there’s space in the game then. I wonder if there are ships or anything around. There’d have to be if there are satellites in orbit. I’ll have to look into that later.

  We gathered more parts from the previous room and loaded them into the crate. Thasgrin led us to another room with a massive machine in the middle. Rings of metal with cables and conduits wrapped around like spiderwebs dominated every available surface. Even the floor was an obstacle course to be tread over with care.

  “At least the teleporter’s only issue is it’s outta juice. Garstil, you think you could give this thing a charge?”

  Garstil looked at the crystals for a moment. “Is it safe?”

  “Aye,” said Thasgrin. “Well, as safe as anythin’ ’round here.” He chuckled. “Just zap those crystals, and stop when they start glowin’ bright blue.”

  “All right,” he said, unsure of himself. Sai, Morogan, Thasgrin, and I all moved several paces away. Garstil frowned. “You guys suck,” he said as he grabbed the two crystals. The sounds of electricity arcing and crackling filled the room, and brilliant blue light shone out like a beacon from the crystals in his grip. “I think that should do it?”

  “Aye, it should,” said Thasgrin. He pressed several buttons on the control panel, and the giant machine began to hum loudly. I could feel the vibrations in the floor plating.

  We hopped onto the teleporter pad, and Thasgrin pressed the giant glowing “transfer” button next to him. The room faded to white for a second and was replaced by chaos. It was dark. The only light in the entire room was from the occasional sparks that exploded out from broken ceiling panels. Cables and metal plates dangled everywhere. Skeletons littered the floor plating all around us. Tattered leather draped off the bones. They’d been here for quite some time. Morogan and Garstil dropped the crate with a loud clang which echoed around the chamber.

  Sai gasped. “What happened here?” he asked.

  Thasgrin knelt next to one of the skeletons. “Lookin’ like some of the undead made it into the teleporter. But how? There’s no way they could have made it that far into the mountain.” A doorway groaned as it slid open at the far end of the room from us.

  “For Noslen!” boomed a voice, echoing all around the metal room. A wave of energy knocked us all on our asses, stunning us. The lights dimmed, almost going out completely. The silhouette of a burly figure stood in a large doorway, electric blue eyes glowing back at us as blue lightning arced around his entire body.

  Thasgrin stood. “Kronek? Is that ye, brother?” The rest of us were able to stand a few moments later.

  “Trickery!” he bellowed. “Interlopers. Vermin.”

  Sai triggered Focused Instincts and surged toward the unknown attacker. A blast of blue lightning zapped him, sending him flying into the wall next to me. “Ow,” he said weakly.

  Thasgrin stepped forward as his skin turned metallic gray. His footsteps clanked loudly as he stepped forward. “Kronek. Son of Daetrin. Awaken!” Thasgrin’s mechanically enhanced voice brought us all to our knees, hands over our ears. He blasted the figure with a healing spell which enveloped its body.

  The lights returned to normal, revealing a ragged Dwarf with long unkempt hair and beard filled with debris.

  “Br-Brother?” Kronek fell to his knees, face in his brawny hands. He wept, his skin reverting from gray metal to flesh. “Brother! How?”

  Thasgrin pointed over to us. “I had help from some new friends. Tell me, brother, how long have you endured the metal form?”

  “I don’ know. We ran out of food about a week after we evacuated. They started dyin’ off a few days after that. I took metal form so I wouldn’t need ta eat. That was a few months ago.”

  Thasgrin frowned. “Kronek, that was a hundred and fifty years ago.”

  The color drained from Kronek’s face. “One hundred and fifty years? How is that even possible? I should be dead…”

  “The metal form must have kept you alive but at the cost of your sanity. It was never meant to be used for more than a day or two at a time, let alone a century and a half.”

  Kronek shook his head. “No, brother, that isn’t possible. You must be mistaken.”

  “Kronek,” said Thasgrin, “We need to repair the teleporter and guidance system. Will you help us?”

/>   “Can’t,” he said. “No parts. I used everything just to keep the air circulating. There isn’t anything left.”

  Garstil stepped forward. “We brought replacement parts with us. Quite a bit, actually.”

  “Aye?” asked Kronek, eyeing my bracers. He took a long look at me as if assessing my worth.

  “Aye.” said Thasgrin. “They’re a good lot. Dependable, honest. You can trust them.” Thasgrin helped Kronek to his feet. “Come, brother, let’s fix this place and make it worthy of our heritage.”

  The Dwarves spent the next several hours installing components. Morogan helped with the heavy lifting, and Garstil used his lightning to charge up several depleted power cells. Sai and I explored the satellite a bit. I found an observation window and looked out. The planet was beautiful. Continents and vast swaths of water covered most of my view. I could see the desert where we were heading and the lush green where we had recently teleported from. The mountain peak reached far up from the ground, at least as tall as Everest.

  “I never thought I would be in space during my lifetime,” said Sai.

  “Me neither. But technically, it’s not in our lifetime since we died and all. Still, it’s hard to believe this is a simulation. It feels so incredibly real.”

  Sai thought about that for a moment. “Whether it is a simulation or real, what is the difference? In the end, it is just our conscious mind interpreting input signals and reacting accordingly to the external stimuli. Who cares if the signals are fed into an AI construct or into a human brain? Is it not the same result in the end?”

  “Damn, dude, that’s pretty deep.”

  “Indeed,” he said. “Fancy some training?”

  I smiled. “Yes, Sensei.”

  “You will learn the low, middle, and high blocks. However, today, we will focus on the middle block. These blocks are vital to hand-to-hand combat, as well as blunt weapons. Some of the techniques will also cross over to swordplay as well.”

  I nodded. “What kind of stances do the blocks need to work correctly?”

  “They will work from either of the stances you have learned; however, they will work much more efficiently in a back fighting stance, as you will be balanced. Then you can shift to a forward stance to retaliate. The first is the middle block. This is good for attacks targeting the chest, throat, and face areas.” Sai took a forward fighting stance. “Punch toward my face. I will block.”

  I also took a forward fighting stance, shifted my weight, switching legs, and punched straight for his face. Sai swung his arm in a half-circle outward, deflecting my arm away and leaving me wide open. With his other arm, he punched for my chest, stopping mere millimeters from me. He followed up with a quick sequential left-right punch. “Wow, at that speed I doubt I could have blocked more than one of those strikes.”

  “That is the intended idea. Now, you try. The first few times, I will not strike you.” We took positions again, and Sai punched straight for my throat. I managed to connect the block; however, he powered through it. “Again. More power. Remember, this punch is a killing blow, do not let it power through.” We faced off again. This time, I was able to mostly deflect his blow, but he still managed to flick my ear. “Good. However, I could have torn your ear off. Even more power is required. Again. This time, I will strike you.”

  I could see the determination in his expression. I had no doubt whatsoever that if I messed this up it would hurt like hell. His fist came at me. I don’t know if it was from instinct or adrenaline or a bit of both, but the punch was slow. I was able to judge its trajectory and intercept it, knocking his arm out of the way. I followed through with right-left-right punches, barely stopping before hitting him. My back leg instinctively came up, crossed my front leg, and transferred weight, lifting my front leg. I stopped, realizing what was about to happen. Sai noticed it too.

  “Whoa,” I said. “I have no idea where that came from.”

  “Instinct,” he said. “That would have been a great strike. I was completely open, off balance, and would have just taken three strikes to the chest, throat, and face. With much practice, all of your techniques will become second nature. Available whenever needed, and as you just realized with that side kick, without conscious thought. That is all for today, well done.” And then the lights went out, followed by the hum of so many things I couldn’t identify. And we started floating. “Well then, this is new,” he said.

  “Yeah. My stomach’s not appreciating this too much.”

  “I would avoid vomiting if I were you. In fact, I am in here as well, so avoid it for both of our sakes.”

  “No promises,” I said. We floated in the air for several minutes, basking in the glow of the planet Tempest, far below us. “It really is beautiful. It’s worth saving.”

  “It is,” he said. We continued to enjoy the peaceful quiet for a few minutes more.

  A low hum in the distance began whirring up as the lights came on. Gravity returned. Sai did a flip midair, landing on his feet. I fell, sprawled on my ass. Quite gracefully, I might add.

  “Sorry about the gravity, are you guys all right?” asked Garstil as we entered the control room. Consoles lay propped open and spare or broken parts lay scattered all over the room.

  “Oh, you know, nothing like landing on your ass from five feet up. Some warning next time perhaps?” Everyone had a good laugh at my expense. I supposed it was a little funny. “So how are things?”

  Thasgrin, whose head was buried inside of a console, yelled out, “Be done in a jiffy, hold yer horses!” Sparks exploded from the console, and Thasgrin jumped. “Odin’s beard! That’s hot!” He extracted himself from the console, shaking out his hand. “Aye, that oughta do it,” he said.

  “What oughta do it?” I asked.

  “This,” he said, pushing the panel closed and flipping some switches. The entire panel lit up like a Christmas tree. “There we go. Good as new.” Screens on the wall lit up, displaying all sorts of strategic information regarding our orbit and power systems. “Now the satellite should be workin’ jus’ fine.”

  Kronek walked up to the screens, “Aye, great job, brother. You always had a knack for fixin’ things. What ye say we get down to the surface. I can bring some workers back to take care of the bodies later on.

  Upon teleporting back to the mountain base, we headed for the control room. It seemed that whatever passed for a computer system here was actually working now. The errors we previously saw on screen had been replaced with more strategic information from the satellite. A large map was displayed on one wall with several mountains highlighted green and two others in red.

  “So, there’s two other mountains that need investigating?” I asked.

  “Aye. Lookin’ like it. One in the desert and the other in the middle of the ocean. That’s one I’ve never been to.”

  “I ’ave,” said Kronek. “Always a problem, that one. The saltwater plays havoc on the parts. Probably some spare parts in the sub-basement, however.” I needed more information. A lot more.

  “Okay, that’s for later,” I said. “For now, how did everything go to hell around here?”

  Kronek stepped up to one of the consoles. “Ya know, that’s a wonderful question, laddie. Les’ see what that bastard Coinbranch was up to when the shit hit the fan,” he said as his hands flew over the console controls. The main monitor’s image was replaced with what looked like a security camera feed. A skinny Dwarf in a white lab coat sat at a terminal hammering away, writing some sort of program. “This must’a been when he was writin’ the virus.” As we watched, the door flew off of its hinges as someone shouldered it and ran into the room.

  “Belgruck! What in the bloody fuckin’ ’ell are ye doin’?” Belgruck didn’t respond; he just kept on typing away. “’Ey! ’ave ye gone daft?” The other Dwarf reached out to grab Belgruck’s shoulder and was blasted away with sickly green energy. The body slowly stood up, eyes flaring crimson. Belgruck looked at the camera and grinned.

  The screen went
dark.

  19

  Steel Chef Tempest

  “Well, fuck me sideways,” said Kronek. “Well, all of us, really. This explains how the ’ell they managed to get the undead inside. Belgruck made the bloody things right under our noses.” The rest of us just stood there, transfixed.

  “Is Belgruck still alive? Somehow?” I asked

  “There’s no tellin’,” said Kronek. “I never saw the body. And there’s no record in the computer after this one. He could still be here or on the other side of Tempest, for all I know.”

  “Kronek,” I said. “Why were these secret bases built anyhow?”

  “That’s a simple question to answer, really.” He took a seat in one of the chairs built into the consoles. “A few thousand years ago, necromantic cultists tried to enslave the planet with their evil magic. The gods of old decided that could never be allowed to pass. So, they created our technology. And their descendants became the Keepers; charged with maintaining and protecting this technology at all costs. If the evil ever spread, it was our sacred duty, handed down from the gods themselves, to stop it. At all costs.”

  “So, these Keepers, how many of them were there?” I asked.

  Thasgrin frowned. “Not enough,” he said. “Maybe a handful at any given time. There is my brother and I that we know of. Oh, and ye, of course, bein’ the new Sword Bearer an’ all.”

  “Me?” I asked.

  Thasgrin laughed. “Of course, laddie. Tha’s the whole point of The Sword Bearer. They’re the Keeper’s Champion who can go out into the world an’ effect change.” He paused to breathe. “Anyway, there was a Keeper at the desert mountain and one at the ocean mountain. However, no one has heard from either of them in at least a century.”

  “How is it that the Dwarves are connected?” asked Sai.

  Kronek smiled. “Only those of noble blood are usually Keepers. Because of our”—he hesitated, still smiling—“long lifespans.”