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Post by littlekreen on Jan 4, 2020 18:04:51 GMT -6
Even as creatures of high order even though they obeyed dicta of the Fallen Emperor they weren't raw automatons. Myrkul's Servitors tended to Mankind even absent a Living Emperor. An Overbeing watched quietly from the small crack in heaven's bulwark which constrained the consumptive habits of the Black Storm.
As their attention and thus their constructions advanced their entry point and resources expanded. The denizens of that old apartment building undertaken as a necessary duty. Absent the will of a Living Emperor they could not order but Myrkul's Vein ordered its servitors to abstain from the larger world. They bargained with the building owner and with after suitable payment unofficially owned the building. More than busy with their interests reinforcing their entry into this world. Servitors walking dark basements made efforts to fit in as humans and paid the outside world little attention. Though that certainly didn't escape the attention of the denizens.
They took shifts as the Janitor to repair as the building super directed them. Curious fellows in cowls and hooded dust masks; nothing but dust inside them. This is how they encountered one poor fellow who'd lost both his arm and intact spine years before. That day they'd changed a light bulb then a joke their minds wholly unsuited took as request.
"Can you screw on a new arm for me?", said the man in jest to lighten the Jinhai's stiflingly silent demeanor.
A gas mask that did not breathe nor a mask with true eyes behind the Jinhai returned that poor man's gaze by a quiet stare. Inwardly it inspected the almanac then consulted the Overbeing. Myrkul made its determination out of loyalty to Man. They were not to defile the bodies of Man but their skills born of the Machine could provide such a thing. Their mandate to this building and no more with no replacements of such things to employ. It had little love for money as men did but for its raw utility. A silent if looming thought directs a Servitor to gain resources for what was used but could comply.
"We may do this. We must be repaid for our resources." Echoes a curt dusty voice through the seams of the hooded dust mask.
Luck of the man what it was balked at the response but the gossip among neighbors said they were more capable than any of them let on. Few options and needing hope to fix his phantom limb syndrome assented to a price fair enough that he worried. One writ in dollars but didn't try to squeeze blood from a stone. A few thousand from the bank and a few more from his aging parents for a 'prosthetic'. The creeping feeling in his mind from the strange fellows the Super hired that all introduced themselves as 'maintenance' but never used a name. A gut feeling they could deliver pushed away his doubts. They'd refused to fix his legs as it was his spine that was broken decided not to push his good luck.
The night of the day he'd paid their price those amorphous liquids of dustmen pour from heater vents. Clouds that form in their template's image as matte black funerary robes. The man slept soundly despite scuffing black air for they did not tread on the floor by gravity but will. Brass cogs, steel cams of strange description, even etched ferroplasm bones to appease the human soul that the limb was live and their own. All emerged from heater vents long since scrubbed perfectly clean. A brass mesh limb cup perfectly molded to the stump came with a heavy suspension strap about his torso. The surface an articulated white ceramic with faint burnished bronze frames under the gaps. A rather statuesque addition to the man's other muscular olive-skinned arm.
By the morning the man awoke to his shades wide open and the sun in his eyes. An obedient porcelain hand serving the body that almost forgot it had an arm there at all. There was much rejoicing though the Jinhai may have heard had long gone. As the bleary excited morning cleared after wheeling himself about in circles the man left the room to celebrate and headed straight to his physical therapist. Down the elevator crowing about his new arm a few looked out their doors and while in the lobby as he almost hit things a few times manually pushing his old wheelchair about. Many had a very good idea where he'd gotten that particular arm but in this building mostly full of illegal immigrants before Myrkul arrived knew to keep quiet.
Wards were curious things especially ones of old and great make. Machines of the veil's construction quite old and of warning against creatures from behind the bulwark. The man pulled up at the bus stop as the cheerful man waved with his new prosthetic arm to signal a stop even if the arm felt a little stiff still. He almost couldn't feel the skin touching the cup and averted his gaze to stare at where arm met porcelain and bronze rim. A loud creak emerged from the oncoming bus at the front wheel well. As the bus driver's eyes closed and the jaw slacked his foot struck straight on the accelerator with a rage of the engine.
The man's happy face crumbled as the bus surged forward the wheel screaming as it bent in twain on the curb. A twenty-ton missile headed for him headlong as he used the arm in a vain clutch of his head. The arm struck with full force left a dent in the bumper the shape of itself, barely fractured at the surface. It was the man's ragdolled body flung through the air his rib cage destroyed that sated that old ward. An iron rocket-propelled forward with a broken human insect on its fore.
Much human wreckage made the news that day but he was not to be there. Some survived but with injuries or perished in a hospital. The happy man with a strange arm went instead direct to Baird's table. The police at least knew where it belonged when they saw it. Pulse checked for procedure's sake quickly shuffled him into a black bag they escaped his broken body from ever-curious eyes of the press. He had already left for Baird's morgue before the first news camera arrived.
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Post by demikara on Jan 4, 2020 19:50:57 GMT -6
With the secret out, it wasn't uncommon for her to get a special guest, so to speak, from the mundane side of things. In this case, she had an amputee with a prosthetic. Frankly, the autopsy was largely ceremonial at this point. He had died due to a snapped spine. On top of, apparently, a previous spinal injury, he hadn't had much of a chance. Still, he landed on her table, and the police had requested an autopsy. It was ridiculous. She was short on time handling the mythical crime back log. Frankly, if this wasn't such a high profile issue, she'd have stuck it to the back of her list and left it there. But the concern here was more the prosthetic than the rest of the man, who registered as mundane to her sensors.
The arm definitely did not though, and she started her examination by carefully removing the prosthetic. Or at least, having begun to.
Most prosthetics weren't integrated with the patient at all. This one, however, clearly was, with blood vessels lined up with it. They didn't go into the prosthetic, but the patterns they made were unusual to say the least. Eva documented it curiously, then set the prosthetic cup to the side and documented the prosthetic as well. Curiously, there was a mark inside that wasn't a serial number. She had expected one after all, given how tightly prosthetics were tracked, but there wasn't. Instead, there seemed to be some kind of maker's mark.
"Pax Humana? Rufus, run that through a search. It looks latin. Search for Myrkul's Vein as well. Let's see if we can get some more information on this thing." That was about all she could tell. She didn't recognize Pax, but the humana...wasn't that a mundane insurance company? She wasn't aware they built prosthetics as well. Either way, the arm definitely had some sort of magic, even if she couldn't identify it at first glance.
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Post by littlekreen on Jan 4, 2020 20:55:02 GMT -6
The reference indeed Latin emerged from later use by the roman catholic church as 'peace for humankind'. In one case a relatively sacrilegious use implied love for those assisting humankind rather than God, devils, or the faithful. It emerged in documents related to some ritualistic crimes from those who showed a distaste for all unseen and even the deific. The other translated to 'Voice of the fallen' and either emperor, master, or commander though one needed more context to say which. 'Vox imperatoris' a more common version being the voice of a master, commander, or perhaps Caesar. A phrase used by Roman soldiers to describe the stately boom of orders from such leaders others above them. The added word of this one more suited to ones that took up this mantle unwillingly upon the field of battle.
When removed as one searched about and the other inspected the prosthetic a loud creak sounded then a thin clinking of gears began. As if some pocket watch suffering an ill second hand from thrown teeth. The fractured porcelain suffered far less than the man however the porcelain breathed a hiss from one of its cracks as the hairline vanished entirely. The hand made a poor open-handed fist with one finger dislodged in a more clear demonstration of activity. If but for a moment sensors might confuse if they looked to inspect the aura of a mind. Gears clanked and hummed as if the dead man were still using it. Psionic architecture clearly built for places where one might unexpectedly take the errant bus. Inside bronze clockwork reengaged even as deformed and cracked as the frame was.
The last search for Myrkul's Vein was what would stifle Rufus the longest. There were documents referenced with some distant age but many were marked variants of destroyed, sodden, stolen, seared by lightning, or otherwise heavily damaged. Most too old or too fragile now to digitize. Though one as biased as it was sat in the rantings of some serial murderer and/or cultist. Encoded in autopsy systems but mislabeled and forgotten. The crime itself was under court seal though mislabeled as it was would take some digging through paper files. While much of it was clearly insane rambling the OCR search highlighted a passage translated from Greek: 'THE EMPEROR PROMISED UNTO US THE BLACK STORM. FREE US FROM THE UNSEEN. THE BARRIER OF OPHANIEL, BETRAYER, WILL NOT HOLD. I HEAR THEM CRY OUT IN THE BLACK STORM AS THEY TRY TO DESTROY THE VEINS PROTECTING HIS GREAT MACHINE. MYRKUL'S VEIN. MYRKUL'S VEIN. MYRKUL'S VEIN. MYRKUL'S VEIN. WHY DO THE FOUR LIGHTS NOT CALL OUT THE EMPEROR'S NAME?'
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Post by demikara on Jan 7, 2020 12:31:15 GMT -6
Eva stepped back when it began to move and watched it a few seconds before fishing out a magic dampening evidence bag from her supply closet. She bagged and tagged the arm and set it to the side. "That was lovely. We'll just animate an arm, no big deal. Magic users." That was said as if she didn't use magic herself. She was a witch and a decent one as far as she was concerned. The woman mostly despaired over how dramatic so many magic users could make themselves be. Even, apparently, in death. "Though I suppose most prosthetics don't clink. I'll have to have someone look at it." She'd toss it up to the specialists, to figure out where to even begin looking for an answer.
There had been no serial number though, and that was concerning. Just a maker's mark and a weird inscription. "Rufus, anything?"
She came over to read over his shoulder. Not that he could actually read more than a few words. He was a lovely crow, but under the glamour, he was still very much a crow. But he did understand her and that was the important part. She took over the search and frowned. "Interesting. Old apparently, and the maker's mark not recognized by a search engine." Even most unseen businesses maintain a mundane webpage. "Well. Searching up information is not our job Rufus. Let's finish the autopsy and put the poor man back in storage, with his arm."
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Post by littlekreen on Jan 7, 2020 16:55:19 GMT -6
The arm quieted for a moment as it was placed in a bag. The energy that its operative intellect regulated faded away much to its confusion. Smooth sable tendrils running through the interior substance that served as the machine's metacognition. Absent a machine to hold their focus the motes self-identified to assess the problem. Inside the bag, a small tide of black ink crashing open a stubborn porcelain panel in a sharp PANK against metal. The bag rustled as a weightless gout of fluid accreted at its top. The arm gushing away its cognition engine though soon reorganized itself to fight the growing cold. Watery substance rushed toward itself to solidify into a foot-long worm with segmented plates along its length. Bouyant enough against gravity that it sat mid-bag both ends lit with four cotton sparks for eyes on each of the quadrant beaks that served for a mouth.
The beak clacked as spark eyes took in its area then fixating on Baird a muffled voice in ancient greek from inside the bag, "Ανθρώπινο γένος? Η ανασυγκρότηση διακόπτεται. Αφαιρέστε το εμπόδιο." [Humankind? Reconstruction is interrupted. Remove the obstruction.]
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Post by demikara on Jan 7, 2020 19:13:14 GMT -6
Evaline heard the muted noise and turned to look, only to pause in disbelief. "Right. You know, it's not a crime to have a prosthetic. I was just going to note this as weird magical prosthetic. But I do have limits." And this was one of them. The magic should not talk. Evaline sighed and scratched a note on her notepad. "Rufus, take this to one of the specialists, and make certain they come quickly. As a crow please. They tend to act faster when you show up like that." Something about having a giant bird hassle them prompted faster action than the form they used largely as a second set of hands. Rufus' glamour faded away and he took the note in his beak and flew off to find one. She considered the bag, then calmly put it in a second magic nullifying bag. When in doubt, double bag it after all.
Rufus flew through the halls of the building easily and landed on Xiaolian Boyuan's desk, then hopped up to her, showing her the letter expectantly. One she took it, he'd hop back to give her a bit more space, and preen himself.
The letter was simple.
'Specialist, There's an unusual bit of magic currently in my operating room. It was a prosthetic originally, but seems to have become some sort of word thing. Please come a deal with it. Thanks, Dr. Baird.'
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Post by Circe on Jan 8, 2020 17:55:52 GMT -6
"A what?" Xiaolian commented squinting at the hastily scrawled note from Baird. She really wished that she wouldn't send the bird and actually use a phone like a normal person. "How the hell can she not deal with this?" She muttered. Xiaolian supposed that it would be the right thing to go rescue Evaline from her own stupidity, but it was also the most annoying thing she'd encountered to date that week. The ME was supposed to be a fairly decent witch, but Xiaolian had yet to see anything to demonstrate that fact. The only thing she'd personally seen to date was Rufus, and by now most of the specialists had gotten used to the ME's wordless assistant and familiar.
"For fuck's sake.. I have a name you know.." She continued to before looking over at the crow. "I don't suppose you have anything to say about this do you?" It wasn't a question she expected an answer to.
Sighing, Xiaolian set down the note and disappeared. "Alright Baird, what do you need this time?" The woman asked as she appeared behind Evaline. With the Warden's nephew out of the contract pool, they were going to have to find something else to take bets on. It was likely going to be who would get summoned by Baird to fix whatever blunder the witch happened to stumble into that week.
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Post by littlekreen on Jan 8, 2020 18:40:05 GMT -6
Dimming eyes of the twice-muffled voice shuffled back and forth in the bag, "Σταματήστε τη συγκράτηση. Πιθανές αστρικές ζημιές." [Cease containment. Potential astral damage.]
The worm shuffled weakly about in the air as baird moved it about until settling on the arm. Part energy being it suffered by way of the insulating bag though not wholly reliant. Surface now more dusty than the smooth it had been pivoted as the other humankind entered the area.
Grey spiral spark-eyes by four center on the new entrant which is immediately categorized as Serica, "人性? 打開大秦容器。 認知引擎需要能量來進行維護。" [Humanity? Open the Daqin container. Cognitive engines require energy for maintenance.]
Its archaic diction in old dialects enough to inform its age should its early era references be understood those most certainly did. Unlike larger servitors within the apartment building, this smaller cognition engine had to learn any languages other than the ones they once were writ. An unlit rear of its body slumps heavily to one side of the arm as it looks on between them.
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Post by demikara on Jan 8, 2020 18:47:02 GMT -6
Evaline jumped, a shiver passing through her whole body as she turned to face Boyuan. She hated that trick on so many levels. Smoothing her hair down to try and look less alarmed, she cleared her throat and acted as if she hadn't just had the daylights scared out of her.
"Mm. The prosthetic is apparently alive, or at least animated. The nullification bag didn't stop it though. I sent for a specialist to help. I'm rather glad Rufus skipped Bronson." Then again, her familiar knew her entirely too well. "It appears to be talking, somehow. The owner died, but committed no crime so was here for a mundane autopsy. The arm began to act up shortly after I removed and inspected it. The arm is rather obviously not mundane in origin and made...it sounded a bit like gears clicking?" She shrugged. She didn't know much more than that. "It had a maker's mark as well. Myrkul's vein, though an internet search turned up nothing." And that was suspicious as far as she was concerned. It was a hyper-connected world. There should have been some digital mark left behind.
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Post by Circe on Jan 8, 2020 19:16:02 GMT -6
Xiaolian smirked, more than amused at Evaline's reaction. "You rang?" She asked her voice dripping with sarcasm. None one terribly liked dealing with the ME, but today Xiaolian had drawn the short straw. That made startling the other that much more rewarding, she had largely stopped doing it to Molly, but Evaline was still fair game given how she'd addressed her in the note. "Gears?" Xiaolian then asked her tone becoming more serious as she looked over at the writhing bag with mild curiosity. Disengaging from Baird she took a moment to observe the thing that had sent the other looking for a Specialist.
Gears generally meant things beyond the current plane, and generally they were things that Xiaolian did not want to mess with. More often than not they saw humanity as a play toy for their own amusement. But what she heard next started her, the bag had addressed her in a butchered form of what almost sounded like the Ba-Shu language. "保養?"1 She asked suspiciously. "您的主機不再..."2 Xiaolian added carefully. Like Baird, she was inclined to leave it in the bag.
"憑天堂的回答我,你是什麼?"3 Xiaolian then demanded as she approached the containment bag, speaking with the voice of a guardian this time. It was harsh and penetrating, and didn't give any option to being disobeyed or ignored. The woman didn't often if ever do this, but there were entities beyond the current plane that cared little for what they perceived as humans.
1. Human? 2. Your host is dead... 3. By Heaven's will answer me, what are you?
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Post by littlekreen on Jan 8, 2020 20:39:40 GMT -6
The four-eyed worm rotated its body in part, "已經被迫回答。 你是人類。我們認可參議院和羅馬人民的聲音。永不天堂。"1
Clacking once it looked over to the cold body on a nearby slab through its eyes brightened while failing to see through the bag. The host was clearly terminal as there was a large hole in its chest now. Beyond its scope of repair even if the body still had its attendant human spirit.
The cognition engine did not sway from its focus nor did its monotone voice waver, "已經會回答。 你是人類。 我們認可參議院和羅馬人民的聲音。 永不天堂。"2
It looked back to Xiao as the worm sloughed off the fuzzy outer layer of weaker motes toward its limp rear end. The end slithered about on its own down the hole in the arm until only a once-again smooth top half was exposed. Swirl eyes brighten back to white with weak ticking as it leans on the arm's inert parts to arrest energy loss as it began a lengthy answer to the question, "墮落的凱撒在虛空中創造了一個偉大的機器。 一個偉大的機器成長並創造了僕人來保護人類免受非人類的侵害。 能量守衛者從人類那裡偷走了我們。 僕人在沒有皇帝的情況下創造了一個高尚的頭腦。 我們成長了。 機器成長了。 牆倒了。 我們可以自由地為新的合法凱撒服務。"3
The end bent over and opened its beak to extract a single broken gear from the dense nest hidden below the panel it opened to leave. The segmented work arched forward and up in offering.
The voice no less limited by clutched bronze in its beak though it now diminished again in volume, "這是一個認知引擎。 我們為人類衝動金屬。 清除障礙物,以便繼續維修。"4
1. [Already will answer. You are human. We recognize a voice for the Senate and Roman people. Never Heaven.] 2. [Excessive damage caused by the energy sentry. Kinetic absorption failed. did not expect.] 3. [The fallen Caesar created a great machine in the void. A great machine that grew and created servants to protect humankind from non-humankind. The energy guardians stole us from humankind. Servants created a high mind absent an Emperor. We grew. The machine grew. The wall fell. We are free to serve a new rightful Caesar.] 4. [This is a cognitive engine. We impulse metals for humans. Remove obstacles so that repairs can continue.]
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Post by demikara on Jan 9, 2020 11:25:39 GMT -6
"Right. You have fun with that." She said and eyed the worm. She had no clue what either was saying, but the fact that it spoke was bad enough, thank you very much. Rufus came in and landing on her shoulder and she gently scratched where he liked it. "Do I want to know what's its saying?" Probably not. Evaline decided to arm herself with a scalpel. She didn't exactly have anything else to arm herself with after all. She was not a fighter. She was a doctor, dammit and she really just wanted to get back to her autopsy and get this over with.
The worm thing was offering a gear. It could probably get weirder, but she really didn't want it to. She liked the peace and quiet of her morgue and would prefer it go back to that.
Evaline not remotely subtly put Xiaolian between herself and the worm. The specialist could handle it. She was hardy.
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Post by Circe on Jan 9, 2020 17:27:30 GMT -6
This was an instant where Xiaolian was not terribly enthusiastic about being reminded just what her family had done and what Council had exploited. "羅馬淪陷."1 She stated plainly. Somehow she suspected that these creatures didn't believe that though. They spoke as a whole, but presented as a singular entity. It was things like this that made her head hurt and made her tempted to just toss it into the void and be done with whatever it was.
Glancing back at Baird arming herself with a scalpel, she sighed in annoyance. Why couldn't the damn bird have gone and found Molly instead? Or better yet the Warden? But the Warden didn't speak whatever the worm was speaking. "朋友還是敵人?"2 Xiaolian queried before snatching the scalpel away from Baird, giving the other an an annoyed look usually reserved for Molly. She didn't trust the woman with it in this sort of situation, and she had been on the wrong end of sharp objects from frightened people too many times in the past.
1: Rome is fallen. 2: Friend or foe?
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Post by littlekreen on Jan 9, 2020 18:20:27 GMT -6
It took a long moment for the servitor in contemplation that Rome was no more than whether it was an enemy. If Rome was no more than there would not be a new Living Emperor. They had reason not to doubt this and this worm no exception.
Each swirl eye blinked in turn as the voice set its offered gear down in its place staring then looked up, "消息人士認為。 這就是為什麼皇帝的設備保持靜音的原因。 我們嘗試聽到它。"1
It wobbles a bit as it presses the gear into place though the spar pulls on its own from inside. A flatter quiet voice continues as it stares at the gear, "人類將忍受。我們將繼續確保他們不受束縛。所以我們是朋友。"2
It looked at Evaline's small bit of metal resources in hand to proclaim with a flare of bright sparks in Latin, 'Hominibus Invictus.'3
1. The source believes. This is why the Emperor's equipment remains silent. We try to hear it. 2. Humanity will endure. We will continue to ensure that they are not bound. So we are friends. 3. Mankind Unconquered.
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Post by demikara on Jan 9, 2020 18:24:28 GMT -6
"Hey!" She was using that. Or ready to use it at least. Either way, she would rather like it back now. The worm thing changed languages and she hesitated a moment and shrugged. She didn't speak more latin than what was required for med school. That was surprisingly little, and even if she had known it once, it wasn't like she constantly used it. It seemed to be reacting to her at least. "What's it saying? Can't you just kill it?" Dead things should stay dead as far as she was concerned.
And she was convinced that thing ought to be dead.
Either way, she wanted to get it out of her lab.
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