Dark Iron King Volume I: Thy King's Will Be Done (Unreal Universe Book 1)

by Lee Bond

  Barnabas gestured grandly, eye-ring winking. Weapons as well? The man truly did not sleep! It was impossible, the man was impossible. Even he, the King of Arcade City, needed sleep! The King offered his left nut up to the Unreal Universe in exchange for wisdom enough to know learn the method by which Trinity had managed to create machines or organics or whatever Nickels really was that was powerful enough to resist The Dome’s influences, to deny Kingsblood proper root, to do … to do as Nickels did with every single second! Why, if things continued on in this manner, Agnethea the Vile would become besotted with the outsider and the two would have all manner of adventure before The Dome was powered.

  Impossible on the face of it, but wi’ how things seemed to be going these days, Barnabas Blake wasn’t about to discount anything as being possible.

  “By all means, appr… by all means, blacksmith. I have a few hours more of work yet on these trinkets before we pack up.” Weapons. Designed by the man who’d built the first suit of powered Geared Armor not off the assembly lines in Arcadia. Sickened interest curled the King’s guts.

  “How far away is Ickford from here?” Garth asked over his shoulder as he pulled out the first of the guns to come from Mental Marc’s gaggle. The microcosm of Arcade City never failed to amaze –and disgust- Garth; completely and irrevocably altered by Dark Iron, everything under The Dome worked to provide for the King’s mysterious will in some way and that held just as true for what happened inside gearheads as anything else.

  Not only had most of Thumper’s rigid skeleton gone into the fabrication of the armor now wrapped around him, the metal bones of his left and right legs had been entirely hollow. Easily and neatly repurposed into weapons, the right leg -slightly longer and so straight you could build a house with it- had become the barrel and stock for a proper sniper rifle, while the left –shorter, thicker- had honestly seemed intentionally … grown … to become a shotgun. Smaller bones, most likely Quick Wit’s, had gone into a cool-looking and one hundred percent bad-ass five-barrel repeat shot handgun.

  Beyond that, nearly everything from the dead gearheads had gone into the armor, but Garth was just as proud of the guns as he was with his brand-spanking shiny new steampunk battle armor.

  “No more than an hour or so.” Barnabas replied from his workbench.

  Garth sighted down the barrel of the sniper rifle. It’d been a bitch to work the long-range sniper rifle up properly. Not entirely sure if he’d made the right decision in using so much materiel for the armor, sitting down to build the sniper rifle had revealed several problems that could’ve been easily resolved had he not already devoted nearly all his spare parts for very nearly superfluous add-ons to the armor.

  Right from the start, the biggest problem had been power. Damn near everything forged by Dark Iron needed the same inky stuff to work properly, though most gearheads and even a few smiths had no real awareness of a simple truth; they, like everyone, believed that –in the case of buzzblades, for example- the ludicrously tiny steam engines provided power to the internal combustion engines, which in turn drove savage teeth that chewed a gearhead up good and proper.

  Or provided pressure for a gun to launch bullets, or spun clockwork jackets, and so on and so forth.

  Only … that was and wasn’t entirely true. It was paradoxical; his armor and a few other things he’d built contained no engines of any sort. It ran off ‘pure’ Dark Iron, and during construction, Garth had realized that most things could be built similarly to the armor, if only the smith or artificer took the time out to forge things that way.

  And that was how it should’ve worked for the sniper, which was where the paradox came in to play.

  No matter how hard he’d tried, no matter how expertly he’d caused King’s Will to buckle under his Willful command, this particular gun’s construction had demanded pure adherence to King’s covenant, a bitter blow.

  Garth wrinkled his nose at the thought of what powered his sniper rifle, but with everything of multi-purpose value already locked away in the armor, it’d been the beating metal heart or nothing; unbeknownst to Barnabas –who’d looked at the fucking thing like it was that golden statue from Raiders- he’d actually been ready to chuck the hideous organ in the ditch the moment the older smith’s back was turned long enough for him to get away with the deed.

  Garth had serious doubts about the heart’s efficacy. It looked like it’d take for-fucking-ever to build up enough pressure to launch a bullet at a target with anything approaching lethality and even then, calling his newest weapon a ‘sniper rifle’ was probably more wish fulfillment than actuality.

  Determined to find a bright side to a weapon he wasn’t sure he really liked, Garth decided that since the majority of his targets in the near future were likely to be Kingzillas, it didn’t matter how long it took for the rifle to charge. As long as it was ready to drill a hole through a gigantic metal forehead when the time came, it was all good.

  “Why are we farting around then?” Garth lugged the shotgun and sniper rifle over to the table he’d assembled at the far end of the clearing. “Couldn’t we just, like, get our asses in gear? Heheh. Gear.”

  “No, Garth, we can’t ‘like’ just get our asses in gear.” Barnabas snapped. “The woman we’re going to meet …”

  “Agnethea.” Garth stuck his good eye in the barrel of the shotgun. Like the sniper rifle, the shotgun wasn’t … perfect. When it’d become apparent that the rules governing guns and engines were unbreakable, parts destined for a proper auto-pump shottie had gone instead towards the construction of –in his estimation- a pretty piss-poor steam engine.

  It was just such a stupid way to build weapons! In the case of the shotgun, the miniature steam engine built up a good deal of steam pressure in a chamber situated in the stock. Pulling the trigger moved an actual gate out of the way to allow the steam to launch whatever was being used for shot through the smooth-bored barrel. Since he’d been forced to manufacture an engine out of parts rather than go with something … ‘homegrown’… Garth expected it’d need repairing after five or six shots. The mechanism was just too delicate.

  “How amazing!” Barnabas shouted mockingly. “He is capable of remembering names. As I was saying, Agnethea … she’s not a tinkerer, for the love of everything you hold dear, don’t call her that to her face … and I do not get along. Our last meeting went poorly. What do you call that thing in your hands?”

  “Shotgun.” Garth took aim with the weapon, sighting down the barrel. Single-shot. Honestly, it wouldn’t do much more than dissuade a gearhead for a few seconds, but an edge was an edge was an edge, right? “Close-range deterrent. Or, you know, get up inside the brain and blammo! Two shots from this should turn a Kingzilla’s brain into a bunch of metal splinters. So you two were fucking or something? Lord knows a little how’s your father can ruin things pretty quickly.”

  Barnabas fought to keep from losing his temper. Even the thought of touching an Obsidian Golem made him violently ill. King Barnabas Blake was not one to deny himself pleasures of the flesh, not like his stupid ‘Priestly brothers, but … Golems were an actual abomination. If he could but figure out a way to prevent another one from being spawned even now, so close to the end of things, he absolutely would.

  Nickels had no clue how close to the edge he skated with words like that.

  Or did he?

  “Not on your life, squire. Sooner stick my wick in that shootgun of yours.” Barnabas enjoyed the look on Nickels’ face at the intentional mispronunciation. “Er, shotgun.”

  Garth selected a bolt that’d fit nicely inside the shotgun and dropped it down the barrel; a loud tink indicated that a specially-designed catcher –a kind of hollow rubber donut thingy ringed with a bit of magnetized steel- was now holding the shotgun shell loosely in place. Then he tipped the thing downwards, waiting to see if said shell would fall out, struggling not to curse at the basic test: he hated, hated muzzle-loading anything. It slowed the whole process down, burning precious mom
ents cramming shot into the barrel that could be spent in better ways, like killing a roomful of people in a hurry.

  When the bolt didn’t come tumbling out, Garth pressed the stock against his shoulder until a faint click reached his ears; a plate –similar, in fact, to the one that’d powered Thumper’s pneumo-hammer- was set into the shoulder rest of the stock. Once depressed, a connection to the steam engine powering the weapon was made and … then it was hurry up and wait. A few seconds later, an even less-audible ting echoed from the stock. The ‘steam chamber’ was ready for discharge. A second pull on the trigger and hopefully things would work for the better. “So what, then?”

  Barnabas wanted the shotgun to blow up. How he longed to see that head erupt in a splash of bright red and squishy grey. Any chance of using the fool for a much greater purpose would be lost but still.

  No more Nickels had to be a good thing.

  The King fluttered a hand. “Difference of opinion. Fire away, Master Nickels, if you please. I am most curious to see this shoot… shotgun of yours.”

  Garth took a breath, prayed that a million different things didn’t go wrong. He pulled the trigger and then BLAM! The bolt erupted from the barrel with surprising force, smacking into the tree he’d been aiming at. Bark and pulp sheared away from the antagonistic tree.

  “Fuck yeah. You see that shit? Blammo! Pewpewpew.” Garth thrust his hips at Barnabas for a few seconds before picking through his stockpile of ammunition for another round.

  “I did indeed ‘see that shit’.” Barnabas replied dryly.

  The blacksmith and Kingly ‘Priest was impressed with all that Nickels created. Impressed and angry. How could you not be? From the looks of it, there was nothing beyond the man’s abilities. As time passed and his skill grew –in leaps and bounds already- so too did his natural talent at marshaling King’s Will to his call.

  It really were almost –almost- as if Dark Iron had taken a liking to the outsider. Which was impossible, naturally, save for the fact that it seemed as if this were entirely too true. No matter how ‘impossible’ it should be, evidence not only pointed to the contrary, it all but screamed it.

  Barnabas shook his head angrily when Garth’s back was turned.

  Didn’t matter, now. Not one jot. That very second, watching Garth fiddle with the shotgun, a most audacious and destructive plan leaped into the King’s brain. Oh, he were on his game now he’d decided on a final course of action for Nickels the Outsider. Oh, this were going to be delicious!

  He, King Barnabas Blake the One and Only, would depart Ickford with all due haste as initially planned, but from there, destroying Garth would now become a thing the children of Arcade City would talk about until The Dome destroyed the whole Universe.

  Kingspawn points, risen near enough to Ickford –at great cost of Iron and Will, aye, sure, given the difficulties in making his desires manifest near even a single Obsidian Golem- would summon forth mighty, mighty Kings. Greater than anything the world had seen before. These monstrous metal monarchs stamped across the King’s mental field, raining death and destruction on all who’d chosen to live in that blighted, foul clone of beauteous Arcadia.

  All the gearheads, all the wardogs, even them foolish ‘honest’ citizens who flouted his desires. Why, possibly even the Golems themselves would fall…

  All. All would fall ‘neath those Kings and their thunderous boots.

  And Nickels, so obviously suffering from nobility … why, he would rush to aid. Barnabas was certain of that. And so it would come to pass that those Kings would trounce Nickels into paste, shattering everything the man had built, leaving him once more with nowt but the Kingsblood flowing –however poorly- through him.

  From there? Barnabas grinned craftily at his plan. Well, he knew enough now about how Nickels would likely dispatch a Big’Un to ensure that the Specter would be caught like a fly in Dark Iron.

  And then … oh and then … Master Nickels the Fish would find himself hollowed out, oh yes, wouldn’t he just? Hollowed out and filled with empty hunger. More e’en than Specter could handle, and that howling, blithering madness ‘neath Nickels’ skin would rage through Existence.

  Garth bent himself to the task of test firing the sniper rifle.

  Barnabas paused from his devilish work, all manner of curious as to how the lad’s long gun would work…

  ***

  “Ickford. You will never find a more wretched hive of scum and villainy. We must be cautious.” Garth’s heart swam with absurd pleasure at finally having a realistic opportunity to bust the paraphrased quote loose. He’d been sitting on it for nearly a week.

  Granted, Barnabas was more ideally suited to the gag, but as an Unreal Universe version of Obi-wan Kenobi, the old bastard fell super short of the mark. Like, Nicked Jimmy was better suited to be Old Ben Kenobi before the grizzled jackass beside him.

  Down below … well, not so much ‘down below’ as ‘kinda sorta down over there a bit’, Ickford actually lurked. Like, it actually sat there, lurking. From where the two men stood high atop a hill overlooking the woman-made city within a city, Ickford hugged the Wall like an abscess or cancerous growth.

  “What are you on about, hey?” Barnabas had long since given up trying to decipher the strange things that came out of Garth’s mouth. Half the time he suspected the other man of talking gibberish on purpose. The other half, well, who could say?

  “It’s a quote. Sort of. From … a movie. That was never made.” Garth finished lamely, suddenly wondering what, if anything, gearheads and the other citizens of Arcade City did for entertainment. “Ever.”

  “Are you all right, son?” Barnabas was loathe to admit it, but given what’d happened a short time ago, the question was more than apropos.

  Good lord, if he’d known precisely what the damnfool idiot had done …

  Stopping Nickels from building a sniper rifle as the one he’d crafted would’ve been paramount. Up to and including revealing himself to be King of Arcade City.

  Garth rubbed his shoulder gingerly, eyeing bustling and strange Ickford cautiously. “Don’t wanna talk about it. Tell me more about this Ickford.”

  The King’s Wall, that devilish contraption literally carving Arcade City into roughly concentric circles of Hell, grew higher and higher the closer it ‘got’ to Ickford, describing a perfect bell curve for the whole world to see, proving instantly Barnabas’ claims that said Wall grew whenever a thing –or a fool- got too close to the top; the folks in Ickford had pushed their city right up to the Wall, forcing more than four miles of barrier to rise to a towering height.

  From where they stood, blacksmith’s mobile camp whirring and ticking loudly behind them, Ickford was –as promised- no more than an hour away. It exuded vitality … and danger. This was no bucolic Estate grown sleepy and used to a cautious pace of life. This was no little, out of the way community that was lucky it saw a visitor once every thirty years.

  This was Robocop’s Old Detroit merged with a King’s unholy passion for all things steampunk and slathered with a nice, healthy topping of crazy.

  Garth couldn’t wait to get closer, to learn exactly why gearheads like Nicked Jimmy and dinks like Barnabas hated it so damn much.

  “I should like to talk about the long gun … er, sniper rifle, as you called it. Just for a moment, if you please.” Barnabas pressed. Oh, if only he’d seen Garth assembling the sniper rifle.

  The King fumed over Erg, raged over all that’d been keeping his Kingly consciousness preoccupied when darkness fell across the land, giving that damnfool outsider all the time he needed to work on madness incarnate wi’out anyone being the wiser!

  Oh! If only he’d known! Or e’en suspected the true depths of the outsider’s lunacy. Why, what he’d wrought with the gun were worse than anything Specter might bring about!

  Garth touched his bruised shoulder absentmindedly once more. The sniper rifle, stowed across his back with the shotgun, had damn near torn that arm right off. If he hadn’t been
geared up almost from head to toe in clockwork armor, right about now he’d be getting a firsthand view of the so-called ‘healing properties’ of Kingsblood.

  “All right, we’ll trade for it.” Garth pointed at Ickford, sunlight glinting off a brass finger. “Even from here, that place looks like a goddamn madhouse. It looks nothing like any of the Estates or even the few small villages we passed through and by on our merry fucking wander through Arcade City.” Garth squinted, wishing to Christ DarkEye was working, even a little bit. All he was getting through the lens now was plain old static. “Sound fair? Oh, and we talk about this while we’re walking. You say it’s an hour away on foot and it totally looks like it is, but lugging these damn stupid metal cubes around means it’ll take way longer.”

  Barnabas looked back at the train of ‘metal cubes’. Every smith who took to traveling through Arcade City had something similar. Some used wagon wheels as Estate-dwellers used to move things about, others –those who plied their trade further north where the Bolt-Necks lived- used the massive gears that were to be found in the clomping monstrosity’s towers. Some few, those who had access to ‘proper’ forges made wheels.

  None had the gear train assembly and plated tracks of Barnabas the Blacksmith. Mostly because no one had ever seen a tank and the mechanisms required to run such things properly. What was the point in being the King if you didn’t allow yourself a few luxuries?

  Barnabas gave one of the tremendous winders atop the cube nearest him a hearty wind-up, motioning for Garth to do the same. “There’s naught wrong wi’ my cubes, Garth. These things have traversed more of this land than you ever will, and have been my tried and true companions. Plus, as you say, watching them unfold is ‘wicked fucking awesome’, no?”