Entry: 006
“The alchemyst seeks nature’s secrets. The true geneticist seeks to improve on nature, and damn the consequences. To tamper with the soul is a sin; to tamper with the body is a spectacular curiosity.”
— The Surgeon General of the Vhenari Science Collective
Architallis had been silent for most of the day after his release. At the moment, the incomplete lance was within the walls of the Canor Dennell settlement. Architallis was leaving the Canor Dennell postal office with a fine wooden box in hand. He made his way to a secluded alley, away from the bustling streets. Trash cans overflowing with refuse were scattered throughout the narrow space. It smelled pungently of rotting food and the metallic ozone aroma of spent myst crystal batteries. He hadn’t been treated for his condition for more than a week.
He could feel the deleterious effects of his genetics slowly fraying—the weakening muscles, declining memory and cognitive function, and regularly feeling sick. The prison had been legally bound to provide his required medical treatment, but they never did it completely correctly.
Architallis opened the box with stiff and shaky hands. He hadn’t used the syringe for years. He couldn’t help but wonder if his body would reject the process, even as he eyed the vials of genetic material within the wooden container, each preserved with Stasis Myst. The vhenari examined his options and decided on Barracuda DNA. Architallis drew the genetic material into his strange syringe and injected himself with methodical motions, careful not to slip.
Moments after Architallis injected himself, his scales shifted, turning from dark red and black to a gray-blue and a more aquatic shape. His teeth fell from his mouth to scatter across the alley, rapidly replaced by sharper, needle-point teeth. Webbing grew between his fingers and toes.
Architallis let out a hissing sigh of relief from between his jagged teeth. He could feel the new genes binding with his own, the scent of decay and myst ozone suddenly sharpening to distinct chemical profiles in his newly wired nose. The spliced DNA could be the first to degrade, but it wouldn’t be for a week or so. A subtle, cold urge to hunt and consume something smaller than himself pulsed through his hindbrain. The strange brass syringe was a marvel from a previous age. It had undoubtedly been crafted long before splicing was possible with modern technology. Even with bleeding-edge tech, splicing still typically required a series of pieces of equipment that would populate an entire operating room. And yet, this small device, which looked to have come from an age when mental problems were ‘solved’ by drilling holes into someone’s skull, could smoothly perform the entire process in a matter of seconds.
Architallis stowed his splicing syringe and moved to rejoin the group of oddballs. The Vex woman had mentioned something about running down leads on their last lance-mate. She’d left in a hurry, and Architallis suspected that she wanted away from her team. The half-elf seemed like a hothead who would jump into trouble at the first sign. Architallis was more than a little nervous about her being the lance lead. He could just imagine her throwing him into the thick of a fight he’d rather have nothing to do with. Despite his hulking size, Architallis wasn’t a brawler or really a fighter of any kind. His people were naturally skittish, and he was no different, even if he was three times the size of his own kind.
Architallis rounded a corner and walked right into a nightmare scene. The immortal, Architallis, remembered his name was Sin, and he had his arm trapped up to the elbow in the churning gears of a magnetic car engine. Gears and mechanical internals were drenched in gore. The vehicle operator, an elderly human man, was desperately working to pull Sin free with a panicked look. The Soulforged, Alex, was also panicking, looking for somewhere he could reach into the engine and rip the idiot immortal free. For Sin’s part, he looked more irritated than anything, even as the gears pulled him deeper into the meat grinder.
Architallis strolled up, with his hands in his pockets, perfectly calm. “What, by all that is pure, happened here?”
“Don’t just stand there!” Alex demanded, his eyes flickering back and forth across their screens. “I don’t want to find out if he can regrow from sausage stuffing! That Witch lady is gonna grind us up next if he doesn’t come back!”
“Good sir,” Architallis addressed Alex. “Just rip his arm off.” He spoke in an even, though a bit irritated, tone.
“What!?” Alex exclaimed. “I can’t do that!”
“You have more than sufficient strength via your mechanical state of being to remove the man from his appendage.”
Alex stared at Architallis for a few long seconds as he processed what was just said. “I’m not about to just rip a dude’s arm off! I don’t go ripping off people’s arms!”
Sin looked at the Soul Forged. “Just do it, if you would kindly.”
“How do I kindly rip off someone’s arm?!”
Architallis rolled his eyes. “Fine. Leave me to do the menial work.” Without another word, the Vhenari calmly wrapped his fingers around Sin’s neck. Sin, for his part, had enough time to say, “This is not going to be pleasant.”
The hulking rat-man wrenched the immortal up and away from the engine. The remainder of the limb from the shoulder down was separated from Sin and ground up by the vehicle in short order. Architallis dropped Sin onto the pavement like a sack of flour. “When is limb amputation ever pleasant?”
“Oh gods, oh gods!” the old man said in a panic. “I promise I’ll buy you a cybernetic replacement. Just please don’t sue me.”
Sin propped himself up on his remaining arm. “Fret not, sir.” Sin waved aside the man’s worries with the regenerating stump, bone, and flesh regrowing at a rapid pace. “This sinister severing is nothing more than a momentary nuisance.”
Without another word, the driver leaped back into his vehicle and sped away before anyone could change their minds. Vex was closing in on the group as the car sped past her. She watched the car go before turning back to glare at Sin. “I can’t leave you alone for more than ten minutes, can I?” Her tone was irritated.
Alex pulled Sin to his feet as Vex closed the last few paces. “What happened?” Her tone was frosty.
Sin wobbled on his feet for a moment before regaining his balance. “The gentleman was having motor problems and asked for my assistance.”
“Do you know anything about magnetic engine engineering or mechanics?” Architallis asked.
“No,” Sin answered plainly.
“Then why?!” Vex demanded.
“I felt I should at least attempt to aid the gentleman.”
“Yeah. And get chewed up in the process.” Vex mocked. She turned to Architallis. “New scales?”
“Yes,” was all he said.
Vex eyed him for a long moment before moving on. “I’ve got a trail on our tag. Tro is working a rescue mission in some ruins just outside of town. Apparently, some scientists or arcanists were delving into some old ruins and got trapped in an ambush of some kind of monsters.”
“So we’re jumping straight into a brawl right out of prison?” Alex asked. “We don’t even know any of each other’s abilities and tricks.”
“I’m also a non-combatant,” Architallis said. “In addition, I possess not a field lab. What am I supposed to do without my Alchemyst equipment?”
Vex shrugged. “You’re big. Just punch them really hard.”
“Thanks,” Architallis said with thick sarcasm.
“And don’t think you’re out of explaining to us your…situation,” Vex waved her hand in a broad gesture to the entirety of Architallis’s body.
Architallis grunted a reluctant affirmative. The Vhenari knew he couldn’t hide his condition. The effects of regular splicing couldn’t go unnoticed. Since he had been forced to take up splicing, Architallis had faced discrimination and social isolation, given his freakish stature and abnormal features. There was a time when these issues were more tolerable, but that time had long passed.
“Alright, freak-show, let’s roll out. We’ve got a brother to find,” Vex said in a falsely positive tone tinged with worry. “Now, let’s hit the west gate and snag us a field ride.”
“Wait. Brother?” Alex asked.
“Yeah. Tro is my bro.”
With that, the lance moved toward the gate in a confused gaggle.
Architallis felt sick, and this time it had nothing to do with his genetics. Vex was driving an armored all-terrain van, like some kind of speed demon Ceangar, down the dirt road like some inter-realm horror was chasing her. Architallis’s stomach burbled and sloshed with every jarring bump in the road.
They drove through an ancient and dense forest. Shadows occupied the space between the trees twice as often as those same spaces glowed with sunlight. The undergrowth was thick, even beneath the shadows of the looming trees. And things moved in those shadows, flitting, searching, and stalking.
The rear seats of the van ran parallel along the sides. Architallis sat across from Alex, who looked mournful if his eyes were any indication. Sin had sat beside Architallis for the first three miles of the trip until a jarring pothole in the road caused the Immortal to be thrown against the rear doors and catch his hand on the latch. Vex had gone another half mile before she stopped the van and put it in reverse. She backed up enough to drive the rear doors into Sin’s chest before he disappeared beneath the van.
After that, Sin was forced to sit shotgun, and Architallis could tell that Vex was hating every second. He wondered how much of her anger was being channeled into the vehicle’s present velocity.
Architallis watched the van's GPS display, waiting and praying that this would come to an end. Before he knew it, Vex was slowing to take a turn into a nearby clearing. The clearing was already occupied.
Vex parked adjacent to a corporate Field Lab Vehicle, near the center of the open space. The lab resembled a slate-gray armored bus with no windows beyond those required for the driver. Along the side of the van was plastered the name and logo of Evea-Life, the corporate world leader in medical technology and services.
Architallis looked at the lab for a long few moments before getting out with the rest of the team. Something smelled fishy, and it was not Architallis. He stepped from the vehicle, passed Alex, who eyed his small shovel with a sad and uncertain look before regarding the strange coffin device strapped to the roof of their ride with the same expression.
Vex was examining the field lab almost as intently as Architallis. The Vhenari stepped up to the rear doors of the label and tested the latch. As expected, the vehicle was locked tight. “Miss Vex, would you happen to have a bobby hairpin and a small flathead screwdriver?”
“Uh. Yeah.” Vex said warily. “Why?”
Architallis gave the lab a knowing smile. “I intend to arm myself with the tools I know best.”
Vex reached into one pocket at her hip, then another near her back. She handed over the asked-for items. “I don’t even know why I’m still carrying these hair clips. My locks are far too wild for the flimsy things.”
Architallis inspected the two items before slipping the hairpin and screwdriver into the lock with a delicate touch. “I think you will find that the hairpins work more reasonably with a different kind of lock.” Architallis carefully slid the hairpin back and forth, feeling for the lock pins, counting them, and testing the tension of each.
“Wait,” Vex said. “You can pick locks? What Alchemyst knows that kinda thing?”
Architallis spoke as he raked the pins. “Before my incarceration, I found myself in need of some decidedly unethical skills. After I lost my licence, I needed to procure my materials and components by other means than simple purchases.”
“So a thief on top of being some mad Alchemyst. Great.” Vex said the last word with sarcastic venom.
“Ma’am,” Architallis started, “you will find that I am most certainly sane. I simply made a series of tragic mistakes when I was desperate. I regret those choices deeply and have every intention of spending the rest of my life atoning for those sins.”
“Yes?” asked Sin from the edge of the clearing.
“Not you.” Architallis and Vex said as one.
“Aaanndd… Success,” the Vhenari said with reaffirmed self-confidence. He was pleased to discover that his skills had not atrophied during his time away from the world.
That was when the ambush came. Shadowy canine forms exploded from the dark of the forest. Five forms lunged at Sin, tackling him to the ground, where they began ripping and tearing at him. “Damn it!” Vex cursed as she drew her hex revolver. “Umbra Wolves!”
Architallis threw the door to the lab wide and hurried to take in the contents of the space. He snatched the first lab coat that looked to fit him, checking to ensure that its inner lining had pockets for test tubes. After he confirmed that, he rushed to the other end of the lab, snatching up a hand-sized metal device. The item appeared to be a revolver firearm cylinder mounted to an extruder tip, with a trigger running along its length. Architallis flipped open the device, finding eight slots for components. He flung himself toward a series of shelves holding alchemical components in tubes and beakers. A shot rang out from outside, driving him to rush.
Architallis picked up four components and poured them into the device as quickly as he could while remaining careful not to spill or overfill. Once the measurements were correct, Architallis flicked the container shut and twisted a dial on top to the correct setting. On his way out of the lab, he snatched an empty beaker.
He stepped outside just in time for Vex to shout, “Watch your shadow!” The words had barely left her mouth before she spun on her heel and drove her gauntleted fist into the head of a midnight-furred wolf, caught mid-lunge. The beast was pushed back into the shadow and flung out of Sin’s shadow, to lie whimpering on the ground.
Architallis spotted Alex just in time to see a wolf already emerging from his shadow and lunging for his face. The Soulforged threw up his shovel in an effort to block, only for the motion to strike the wolf in the skull with the flat of the tool’s head with a sickening crunch. The beast was launched ten feet into a nearby tree with another wet crunch. It did not rise again. Alex looked at his shovel with wonder for a moment before coming back to reality.
Vex and Alex moved to close the distance between them and the remaining Umbra Wolves savaging Sin. Architallis acted first. With experienced motions, he pulled the trigger on the device in his hand and filled the empty beaker with a gray-green fluid that sizzled and popped. He lobbed the glass container in a roughly calculated arc. The glass shattered against the back of one wolf; the others were sprayed with the fluid. Devorrick chewed through fur and flesh alike, burning the beasts hideously. The creatures yiped in pain and panic before rushing off into the woods.
Architallis made his way toward Sin, Vex already offering him a hand up. Alex stepped up beside the Vhenari. “Good throw, man,” Alex said.
As Architallis got a clear look at Sin, he said, “Clearly, it was not good enough.”
Sin was missing chunks of flesh, some from bites, others from acid. His face was a mask of gore, bone, and shredded tissue. The Immortal shook a fist at the dark woods where the wolves had fled. “Hateful hellion hounds! Be gone, foul fetid fiends, and show thy face to me nevermore!”
“Geez!” Alex cursed. “What did you hit him with?” The question was directed at Architallis even as Alex’s eyes stayed glued to the immortal.
“Two parts dried Ember Weed to one part Mermaid’s Hair. The first is infused with Fire Myst, the second with Water Myst. Combine the two Core Elements the result is the Compound Core Element: Devorrick Acid. A simple concoction, but an effective deterrent.”
“Yeah… Effective’s one way to say it,” Alex said with a note of caution. He eyed the device that was so small in Architallis’s hand. “What is that thingamajig? Some alchemy gadget?”
Architallis smiled sadly as he closed his grip around the device with a gentle squeeze. “It’s a standard field tool for Alchemysts, known as a Distillex Xerron Device. However, we lab rats simply refer to it as a Pocket Lab.”
“And by lab rat, you mean… Rat Vhenari, who work in alchemy?” Alex asked.
Architallis gave the Soulforged an irritated look. “Don’t be such a close-minded xenist. Lab rats is a term used among Scholar archetypes for those among us who spend our days in a laboratory.”
Alex’s only response was an embarrassed and muted “Ah.”
Without another word, Architallis walked closer to Vex as the group eyed the Umbra Wolf corpses. “You suspect these were the creatures that incited the extraction mission?”
“Not even close.” Vex said, “If these were the problem, Tro would’ve put them down in moments and would’ve been outta here by now. I sent him a text message, but he hasn’t responded, meaning he’s still working.” Vex pointed past the pool of Sin’s blood toward a trailhead at the edge of the clearing. The path appeared to be newly carved through the undergrowth. Two Orcs could stride abreast through the trail, still littered with freshly cut foliage.
Vex made for the path, waving for the others to follow. “Let’s roll. I don’t know what Tro’s up against, but I’m not about to leave him to handle it alone.”
Vex led the way, Alex close behind, followed by Architallis, and trailed by Sin. The path was mostly a straight shot, with only a few deviations to navigate around boulders or similar obstructions. It didn’t take them long to come face to face with the yawning maw of a tomb—a barrow, with a stone passage leading deep into the earth. The scent of stale air, damp stone, and mildew seeped from the passage. Etched along the perimeter of the gateway was script written in a language none of the team could identify. Beside the passageway was a portable hoist holding a massive slab of carved stone that must’ve weighed over a half-ton.
Sin stepped up beside Vex, wheezing and coughing, before he said, “The way was shut. It was shut for a reason. Why does no one these days understand that these acts are done for a reason?”
“You mean like to protect treasure?” Alex said as he examined the hoist, poking the raised stone just enough to make the half-ton slab sway back and forth gently.
“Mayhap it was to keep something in. Something deeply unpleasant and quite likely dangerous,” Sin said.
“You’re just being paranoid,” Vex said with a smirk, her eyes glittering with excitement.
“Mark my words,” Sin warned, “nothing good is held within that tomb.”
“Quit your bitching,” Vex said.
Before any reply could be made, a scream echoed out through the shadows, and Vex broke into an all-out run. She vanished into the darkness, and the remaining three were left to trade looks before following, each uttering their own curse at the careless charge forward.
The tunnel was much tighter than the path that led to it, broken occasionally by branching passageways. Architallis struggled to keep pace with Vex and Alex, as his bulk forced him to hunch and run with his shoulders off-center so that he didn’t scrape them against the walls. His arms still rubbed against the stones more than a few times.
A light sheered through the shadows ahead. Vex must’ve lit a flashlight. The team must’ve descended some fifty feet beneath the surface before they breached into a cavernous room. A domed stone ceiling reached overhead. Passageways branched off from the room every twenty paces. Near the rear of the space was a sarcophagus with an ajar lid. But those were not the only things in the space.
Inside the space, the first thing Vex noticed was the bodies. Corpses of five security forces members lay strewn across the stone floor, rendered down into dismembered and gnawed pieces. The metallic scent of fresh blood was thick in the air.
However, they were not the first bodies. Lining the walls were older, skeletal remains, piled deep near the entrance as if they had tried to claw their way out. Most had been clearly chewed on.
“Charming,” Vex muttered, on hand pressed against the side of her head as if a headache had set in, or she was trying to tune out something unheard.
“The builders,” Sin said, wheezing as he hobbled to a stop beside her. “Poor, damnable devils. It appears they were sealed in alive. Likely where these... ghouls... originated.”
Moving his gaze past the corpses, Architallis found a mobile barricade of extended sheets of reinforced metal partly protecting a huddled group of scientists and arcanists. Two remaining guards stood defense between the noncombatants and… ghouls. Lots of ghouls. Each was a naked, humanoid figure with gray skin, no hair, claws, and a deformed jaw that had grown into a canine-like muzzles of exposed bones and fangs.
Architallis did not like the appearance of the situation they had stormed into. The feral, restless dead beasts were utilizing pack tactics: one or two would harass the defenders to create an opening for another. The remaining security forces had a foothold; however, it seemed to be a tenuous grip that was slipping inch by inch.
Then Architallis noticed the anomalous figure. First, Architallis noticed the figure’s acrobatics. They jumped from the back of one ghoul, driving it to the floor with astonishing force, to jump high into the air for a moment before landing on another ghoul with a fist driven into the back of its head, killing the beast.
Next, Architallis noticed the figure’s appearance, clad in a white and black armored jacket with too many pockets, sleeve cuffs that were too large, and a collar that hid the lower half of their face. Black tactical pants with too many pockets over worn combat boots.
The figure leaped again, crippling another ghoul. Then, while high in the air, they aimed a sleeve at another target. The sleeve twitched, and another ghoul dropped. Architallis had never seen an Adroit at work before, but this was a spectacle.
“Hey, Tro!” Vex called with a cupped hand. Architallis noted Vex’s posture immediately relax, her shoulders dropping, the lines of stress around her eyes smoothing out, replaced by a fierce, proprietary pride.
Tro leaped into the air again, his eyes finding Vex instantly. “Vex?!” Tro called in an androgynous voice, “Behind!!”
Vex spun on her heel in an instant, ready to fight. A shadow lunged from the shadows, tackling Sin to the ground and dragging him away. Vex simply watched the ghoul drag away the Immortal with an irritated expression.
While Vex had turned away, Architallis noticed several of the ghouls turn to the newcomers. He swallowed the knot in his throat even as he hurried to pull material components from his coat to develop a countermeasure. The materials were in the pocket lab and brewing in seconds.
Several of the ghouls stalked closer to the lance as Architallis extruded the fluid into a large beaker; the substance thickened as it came into contact with air. The beasts were growing increasingly confident, and Architallis was trying to remain calm, but was mostly failing. With a hurried throw, he lobbed the container of opaque yellow-white goo toward the ghouls.
Even as the bottle flew, Alex rushed forward with a battle cry and shovel, swinging like a madman with a hand axe. The adhesive within the bottle exploded across the back of Alex’s head and expanded. Architallis cursed his lance mate even as the Soulforged and several ghouls became trapped in the goo. Trapp Tar was a miracle substance; a Core Compound Element like Devorrick Acid or electrical current. Like any of the Core Compound Elements, it could be tailored to specific needs based on several factors during its conjuring. What Architallis had made was a thick and elastic glue with a short lifespan. It would only last for a few minutes, but those few minutes were enough to get the team killed, with their front-line defense trapped.
The ghouls trapped with Alex struggled and thrashed but could not break free. Alex was attempting to free himself, but with little effect beyond working the glue deeper into his joints, which further hindered his movements.
“Damn it!” Vex cursed as she fired a shot from her hexgun into the chest of a ghoul who appeared to be readying for a lunge. The bullet punched through the first ghoul and into the shoulder of a second. Both struck developed violet vein-like growths beneath the skin before they both rapidly rotted away into a pile of necrotic sludge and bones.
Tro lept from one ghoul to another like he was hoping stones to cross a river before coming to a stop beside Vex. “Why here?” he asked.
Vex flicked him in the ear. “For you, twit.”
Architallis took careful note of Tro’s bat ears on a humanoid head. The thought that Vex’s brother was a splicer too gave Architallis pause before he focused on the battlefield again.
The ghouls were growing impatient, snapping and growling at any other ghoul that got too close. “I suspect we may be in some serious trouble,” Architallis said nervously.
“Yes?” asked Tro.
Vex waved off the question. “Don’t mind the rat-man, bro. We’ve got bigger things to handle first.”
“Agreed,” said Tro as he raised an arm into the mass of ghouls who were still harassing the security team and their charges. The sleeve twitched, and two ghouls dropped with holes in their heads.
Four ghouls rushed the three still standing near the entry. Two went for Vex, while the other two went for Architallis. The Vhenari backpedaled, screaming in panic. Tro stepped between Architallis with a fluid motion to drive a knee into one ghouls neck, breaking bone, then he whirled on a heel and kicked the first corpse into the side of the second, throwing both into the wall.
Vex shot one ghoul in the chest with another one of those Death Myst-infused bullets before simply punching the second in the forehead with enough force to send it staggering back. On its forehead was a sigil, burning with red-orange energy. Vex took a casual stance as she snapped her fingers. Glowing-hot chains erupted from the floor to grapple the beast to the ground. The creature shrieked and thrashed against the bindings, but to no avail.
Tro pointed past Vex and Architallis. The two followed his finger to find that Sin was being devoured in an even more gruesome fashion than by the wolves, but he still struggled, even without one arm, most of his entrails, or any of his face.
“Should help?” Tro asked.
Vex shot another ghoul before answering. “When we get a chance. He’s in no danger. We’ve got higher priorities right now.”
“You sure?”
“YES!” Vex insisted. “Now, go back to playin’ hopscotch and putting holes in heads.”
“Aye, Captain,” Vex said with a playful salute before diving back into the thick of the ghouls.
Vex turned back to Architallis. “You got anything that’ll unfuck our Shield?”
Architallis leaned against the wall for a moment, his breath coming in ragged, shallow gasps, his new scales clammy with sweat. “I…uh…yes,” Architallis said breathlessly. He was sure that he was about to be a munch meal for some corpse-eating fiends. He shook himself out of his shock and riffled through his materials to find the materials for Devorrick Acid again. Still, this time, the potency would be reduced to, in theory, just enough to dissolve the Trapp Tar, but not harm Alex’s body.
Architallis brewed up the concoction but felt reluctant to go anywhere near the ghouls trapped with Alex. “I…uh…Vex.”
“What?!” she snapped.
Architallis pointed a shaking finger toward the ghouls. “I do not think I can get close enough.”
Vex gave an irritated sigh. “Our Support member is a baby. FINE!” she snapped. “I really didn’t want to use this.”
Vex pulled a small, etched disk of stone and metal from a pocket. She flung the disk into the Trapp Tar and touched something on her gauntlet. The Disk burst into six even segments that flew out to form a hovering circle. Each segment drove into the stone. Within the circle, the ground turned to thick, fluid-like shadow. Architallis noticed Vex’s teeth were gritted, and sweat beaded on her forehead as she held out her gauntlet, her entire body tensing with the effort of precise control. Tentacles rose from the shadows, tearing through the Trapp Tar to grapple the ghouls and drag them into some unseen abyss. Alex remained unharmed, but still trapped.
Vex gestured for Architallis to hurry. “I can keep it from attacking friends, but only for a short window. So, unless you want Skull-face swallowed, GET YOUR FURRY ASS MOVING!”
