The Magi's Society

Mevi sat with the Sentinel for several hours in silence. Hellion attempted, on several occasions, to ingratiate himself to her. Yet Mevi remained distrusting of the man and his crew, sticking close to the Sentinel at all times. Her attitude didn't stop Hellion’s attempts however, and several times Mevi almost felt herself begin to reason why she should listen to him. Ignoring his charisma, and the poor decisions that came with it, Mevi remained stalwartly unimpressed in her outer demeanor. Mevi still wasn’t sure if trusting him was a good idea, or if he had ordered the attack on her Sentinel since Vin had said Hellion was his boss after all.

The time waiting swapped between tense silence and boredom to loud attempts to socialize from Hellion to Mevi. In the last hour of her wait, which at this point had felt like a day’s worth of stress and worry about her captured companions, Hellion finally quieted. The roguish man seemed to begin strategizing with his crew and checking what little equipment they had for flaws. From what Mevi could hear Hellion’s plan was pretty simple. He would escort Mevi and the Sentinel in underground passages connected to their base, while the rest of his crew did jobs on the surface. They had to first gather up the crew that was hiding after the Sentinel’s brawl, most of their present crew left immediately to do this while a few stayed behind to strategize the rest of their ‘heist’. They began calling their plan the ‘Grand Heist’ or something to that effect, they were going to use Mevi and the Sentinel as a distraction so they could use all their equipment to begin cutting into all the nearby buildings and spires. They seemed to expect treasure or loot within, Mevi expected all they would find were more trapped souls within the horrible stasis pods.

The air in the rogue’s base was tense with anticipation, Hellion’s crew must have taken apart, cleaned, and then put back together their gear four or five times now. Mevi felt her own anticipation as well, her excitement at rescuing her companions was brewing as the minutes passed so slowly by. Almost without saying anything Hellion’s crew started getting up and filing out of the base until only Hellion, Mevi, and the Sentinel remained. Hellion grinned with silent excitement and Mevi couldn’t help secretly sharing an eager hope. Suddenly Hellion’s head darted up like he heard something, Mevi noticed the Sentinel doing the same, they both heard something Mevi didn’t somewhere in the distance. As if that were his signal Hellion stood up to face Mevi with a wide eager smile that refused to leave him. “Time to go!” Hellion said with excited confidence.

Hellion darted across the base to the central pillar, then he began pulling up a large panel that was obviously dislocated. Revealed under the panel was a narrow drop that seemed to go forward as an equally narrow tunnel. As Mevi got up to look into the tunnel she worried the Sentinel wouldn’t fit, and she saw the moment of hesitation on Hellion’s face when he obviously wondered the same. Almost as if sensing the unsaid question, the Sentinel began removing the bulkier parts of its armor. Its pauldrons, waist guard, cloak, and a few pieces that seemed like spiked decorations. Its armor thinned down untill it seemed to only be wearing a thin metal exoskeleton rather than the impressive golden armor from before. The new outer shell was still impressive and decorated with gold with inlays of silver runes, but it reduced the Sentinel’s bulk by a significant amount.

With the Sentinel slimmed down and Hellion eager to proceed, Mevi readied herself for whatever conflict was ahead. The three of them vaulted down the tunnel, the Sentinel making a snug fit but able to move, and they began to crawl through the narrow tunnel. Yet the tunnel was still large enough for Mevi to only need to be on her hands and knees, even Hellion was almost on his stomach in a crawl like the Sentinel was. The passage didn’t seem suited for their travel and many spikes, wires, tubes, and other obstructions poked out to slow their progress occasionally. Mevi could only guess at how Hellion found this tunnel, and what poor person lost a bet and had to explore these tight confines.

As the three of them crawled through the expansive technology, whirring and beeps echoed from many directions. They passed by various turns and sudden angles that had strange mechanical sounds echoing out of them. Mevi began to wonder if there might be other things lurking within these technological mazes. Yet despite the strangeness Hellion seemed confident of what directions to take. They only turned into different tunnels twice before Hellion began to slow and occasionally bang on the metal roof.

Suddenly, after a more hollow bang than the rest, Hellion turned back with a boastful grin like he had just won the lottery. Turning himself fully around, then backing up slowly, Hellion pointed at the bare metal roof, “I need your friend to bust us a hole outta here.”

Turning back to the Sentinel, and seeing how it struggled just to crawl, Mevi asked, “Are you able to position yourself to do that?”

Without further words the Sentinel crawled under the designated spot and began the process to turn itself onto its back. Once it was positioned, its arm came up in a tight posture ready to punch at the hard metal. After a short struggle to position itself properly, the Sentinel launched a swift strike against the metal surface above. The strength of the hit was greatly reduced from the awkward positioning, but a loud crack and metal bang rang out as the metal was left with a large dent. A second strike later and the panel above the Sentinel was sent flying upwards, detached from whatever it was once secured to.

The Sentinel quickly pulled itself out of the tunnel to investigate the area for threats, as Mevi and Hellion watched quietly the Sentinel looked back and forth to scan the entire area. After a few tense moments the Sentinel reached a hand down as if to help Mevi out of the cramped tunnel. With the three of them clambering onto the surface, Mevi got a sense of her surroundings. They were exited onto some kind of metal courtyard, like a garden in mimicry of Odion’s own artistic experiments, but sculpted from crude metal imitations. They were within the innermost wall, and the barbed spire stretched upwards in an attempt to reach the far off ceiling. The crude dagger-like spire twisted with cruel inspiration upwards and cast down a shadow over the entire courtyard. In the distance Mevi could hear frantic beeping and robotic yelling, but before them was an immediate threat.

From the base of the central spire there was an ornate entryway, a pair of solid metal double doors covered in etchings of indecipherable runes. The doors to the spire began to swing open, and the Sentinel prepared to fight. Out strode four impressive figures, almost identical in style and bulk to the Sentinel in its full gear, save for a iron color to their armor instead of the pure golden sheen of the Sentinel’s. The four of them carried halberds in the same fashion as the Sentinel’s own, and they crackled with electricity. The Sentinel didn’t hesitate or wait for instructions, pulling out its energetic rifle that was still slung over its shoulder with a thin leather-like strap. Pulling it up to aim, the Sentinel fired the weapon after a second of energetic buildup. A swirling pulse of color carened out of the weapon leaving an iridescent trail of energy behind its path. The blast slammed against one of the lead iron sentinels, scattering glittering power in arcs past the target’s form. The one that was shot staggered forward, but caught itself at the last moment to stand back up again. A massive spot of char and melted metal was left where the weapon’s attack had hit, a strike that would surely kill a normal creature only left this target slightly slowed.

After witnessing the Sentinel’s powerful weapon, the other iron sentinels began to sprint full force forward, while the one that was attacked slowly jogged behind them. The Sentinel only had enough time to place one more blast, and as the other iron sentinels began to run in a way to dodge the attack the Sentinel simply finished off the first target. The second blast tore apart the upper half of the iron sentinel and the automaton fell to the ground in a smoldering heap. Yet that didn’t deter the others from attacking the Sentinel in close quarters combat.

The Sentinel pulled out its own golden halberd and engaged the remaining three attackers in a swirl of frantic motion. Hellion took no time to debate his plan and grabbed Mevi and began pulling her forward towards the still-open doors. Mevi almost fought against Hellion’s direction, but then she looked back towards the Sentinel. The three remaining iron sentinels jumped to engage. One was skewered by the Sentinel’s halberd, while the other two were dexterously dodged with a sidestep. The skewered iron sentinel flailed at the Sentinel without any hint of real intelligence. The cheap copy was thrown to the side, and the Sentinel moved to quickly follow Mevi and Hellion. As the three of them dashed towards the open doors the iron sentinels picked themselves up to pursue.

Mevi and Hellion might as well have not even been moving compared to the speed the automatons and the Sentinel displayed. Turning to face the attackers, the Sentinel hefted its halberd high and threw it straight as an arrow and with the force of a cannon. The halberd flew faster than the iron sentinels could react, and the previously wounded pursuer was skewered once again but this time was subsequently pinned to the far wall from the sheer force of the throw. The other two iron sentinels charged and were met by the golden protector. These iron copies tried and failed to skewer the Sentinel, but the Sentinel was able to wrestle the halberds into the ground by quickly shifting the automaton’s own momentum against them. The two remaining threats responded quickly, moving to abandon their weapons and brawl with the Sentinel. Yet the Sentinel was still faster, the three of them wrestled in place as the Sentinel struggled to fend off the attackers with one arm each. The Sentinel did its job to stall them because Mevi and Hellion reached the open doors to pass into the spire itself. Hellion began pulling one of the large metal doors closed, and made decent progress despite the massive metal door. Mevi moved to help while she watched the brawl, but then she noticed the horde of robotic monstrosities flooding up the main road and flying over the walls. Calling out to the Sentinel, Mevi got the golden protector’s attention and he managed to throw both of the iron sentinels to the ground. In the moment they were staggered the Sentinel charged towards the entrance and easily pulled shut both of the large metal doors.

Just as the doors shut tight, a loud bang thudded against the other side. Not wasting time, Hellion moved to grab the Sentinel’s rifle. The Sentinel seemed to instinctively react, almost attacking Hellion, but the Sentinel was too preoccupied with holding the doors shut against their new enemies. Ripping the rifle from the Sentinel, Hellion held up the rifle towards the Sentinel and Mevi feared she had stumbled into another trap. But with an expertise Mevi hadn’t expected, Hellion flipped a switch and adjusted the rifle to some strange setting. After finishing his tinkering the weapon fired, but it wasn’t aimed at the Sentinel or Mevi. Aiming just above the Sentinel and trained on the astragal of the doors, the gap between the two doors where they met one another, a bright-hot stream of plasmatic particles began to rapidly melt and seal the metal of the doors. When Hellion’s target approached the Sentinel, the guardian moved out of the way to let Hellion finish his work. In a few short moments the doors were sealed, and the three of them were protected from the cacophonous banging coming from the other side.

The Sentinel retrieved its rifle, which Hellion gave to the golden figure with a wink. Hellion turned to look into the spire, which prompted Mevi to likewise stare. A massive base floor stretched before them, with two spiraling stairs on either side of the spire leading upwards to other levels of the tall structure. The floor and walls were bare on this base level, but a dreadful energy hung in the air that made Mevi’s skin crawl. With their destination reached, Mevi looked upwards towards the only direction that might hold her companions. Hellion turned to Mevi and bowed, “I promised you I could get us here, didn’t I?”

“Yes, you did. I am almost surprised, I feared you might turn on us when you stole the Sentinel’s weapon.” Mevi couldn’t help but let a small smile lift the edges of her lips.

“You had nothing to fear, m’lady. But since we are here, we should head upwards. I can only guess what treasures I’ll find here!” Hellion exaggerated his reassurance with another over the top bow.

“I hope you have an idea for us to escape, but I agree.”

“Don’t worry yourself little missy, I have most of this planned out.”

With a sigh Mevi again looked upwards towards the staircase leading to the impossibly tall spire. Without much choice, and not knowing what to expect, Mevi began towards the tall stairs. Now, for the first time in a while, leading the group forward to find her captured companions. Wherever they were, Mevi was determined to save them, but they had a time limit. Mevi could only guess how long it might take such a horde of mechanical monsters to break through the door. It was almost strange to her that they hadn’t already broken in, was there no other entrance or exit to this structure? If Modrak built this spire, this Tower of Pain as the rogues had called it, he surely built the robots that swarmed the place. Surely Modrak would have designed a way for their servants to enter and exit without the need for a door, or at least multiple doorways. The thoughts and questions that swarmed around her were almost as many as the horde of horrors outside the spire. Yet no answer was clearly obvious, nothing could be gained without ascending the spire.

Reaching the base of the spiral stair, Mevi carefully began to ascend upwards to the unknown. Whatever might lay above she would face with courage to save herself and her companions. She would complete whatever task the Magi had given her here, and prove herself useful after all. If not for herself, she would never stop struggling for the sake of her comatose mentor; her only family in this metal alien world.