As the Head Chancellor rushed forward, the Supreme Wizard's white robes flashed in the surrounding gloom as he rushed from the opposite direction. The moment they met in the center of the room, each turned on his heal and continued their hurried progression side by side to plunge into yet another corridor.
"Where are they, Archibald?" the necromancer demanded of his companion, "I'll flood them with death for this delay!"
"Don't worry so much, Aldrich. You know the Guild, always messing about. A few days delay hasn't hurt anyone." Despite his calm words, he set the pace as much as Archibald.
"It could have hurt someone! Imagine if the old hadn't lasted quite long enough! Just think what might have happened if one of our department attempted to use it then! You know how slippery the powers we wield are -"
"The fact of the matter is, it did last long enough because you anticipated the delay when you requested a new one. Still, I will be happy to see it in place."
As they followed their long path, windows appeared. At first, they allowed only slivers of reddened light. However, by the end of it, the two walked in full sunlight. The Adjustment Tunnel, as it was called, had dramatically reduced the cases of temporary blindness suffered by necromancers leaving the fortress in the daylight.
On the gravel road leading to the fortress stood a motley of Guild members dressed in what they would call "eworld" clothing. Surprisingly, they had managed to dress for the current decade, unlike when they paid a visit in the sixties dressed for the great depression. Behind them was a people-carrier hitched to a rather large thing on wheels completely covered by tarp. Aldrich wasted no time.
"Where have you been, you fools?! I have been waiting an entire week for it to arrive!"
Stanley Collins, whom Archibald had healed just the year before after a steam creation broke down catastrophically, stepped forward gallantly.
"You see Sir, we couldn't very well have delivered it in the state it was in last week, now could we? It had a dreadful lack of style, after all, no bells or whistles to speak of. Why, it would have shamed the Guild's good name to present such a tasteless lump of seriousness, not that many people have heard of the Guild to start with. That is to say, those who do know of us, like your Chancellorness, would have been disappointed in us that what little name we have would have taken quite the thrashing from people who -"
"didn't think much of the name to start with!" Aldrich finished. "At any rate, now that it's finally here, we had best install it as quickly as possible. Which one of you knows how to drive that blasted thing?" He gesticulated towards the people-carrier.
"That would be me, sir," offered a young blonde man with the beginnings of a mustache on his lip, "I'm Jeff - er- Geoffrey Fisher."
"Well, what are you waiting for? Get in it! I'll show you where to go. Supreme Wizard, please deal with the rest of them, and make sure that they do not touch any of the receptacles." As he spoke, he strode up to the vehicle and climbed into the passenger seat.
"Thank, you for your advice, Head Chancellor of Necromancy," Archibald replied dryly, "but I have entertained guests before in my one hundred and forty four years here."
Aldrich paid him no mind as he rolled off down the road with the twitchy Geoffrey. He gave him directions to the back entrance and allowed himself to cool off somewhat.
"Fisher, is it?" Aldrich asked somewhat more gruffly than he had intended.
"Yessir," he mumbled. After a brief pause, he spoke again. "Um, would you mind my asking what this thing is for, exactly?"
"Good Heavens!" Aldrich spat, "You mean you came all the way down here without any of them explaining why? Why on earth didn't you ask them?"
"To be fair, I was only brought on this trip because I know how to dress properly and can drive something besides a Steam Trolley. The hassle I had to go through to procure the clothes and the people-carrier and following their decade old maps to get here..." Geoffrey heaved an exhausted sigh.
"Do you mean to say that this isn't your vehicle?" Aldrich asked, eying his surroundings as though he suddenly found himself inside a bomb.
"We didn't steal it, if that's what you think. We rented it. You would not believe how difficult it is to rent something without being able to give your name or address. Anyway, with all of that muck, they only had time to tell me that this had to do with... the Wizardry and Necromancy Department," Geoffrey muttered, glancing towards Aldrich doubtfully.
"I take it you don't believe in magic." Awkward silence was enough of an answer. "No, I didn't think so. I'll answer your original question anyway. What you have hitched to the back of this vehicle is one of the most durable, complicated, useless contraptions ever constructed. Millions of parts could break on it, and almost all of them would have to fail before it stopped doing whatever purposeless task it performs."
"Why would you want something like that so badly?"
"To understand that, you would have to understand how magic works, but of course," Aldrich grinned, "you don't believe in magic." As much as he knew he shouldn't, taunting the doubters was far too entertaining.
"Hey! I'm not entirely closed minded. Go ahead; explain it to me. I don't have to believe it to listen to it, do I?"
"All right, all right, relax," Aldrich smirked, "but it will be a highly simplified version of the way magic really works. Essentially, death is not the absence of life like most people think. Death and life are two opposing forces or energies. They both exist to some degree in everything, but one tends to overpower the other. In me, heh, life is clearly the dominant force. It is the ability to mend and build. Death, on the other hand, is the ability to break down and degrade. Scientists call it entropy, though they hardly understand it."
"Wait, so when we die, do we have an excess of death breaking us down or a deficit of life needed to hold us together?"
"Why, Mr. Fisher, you sound almost as if you believed me. Turn right up ahead, and both ways of dieing are possible. However, there is a finite amount of death and life in the universe. All that lives must die, because all that lives insist on giving life to dead matter."
"You mean, we have to die because people reproduce!?" Geoffrey exclaimed, horrified.
"It isn't as horrible as you think. Even if humans gave up reproduction, insects and animals and life galaxies away from us would continue to cause deaths and lives. It isn't wrong. However, Wizards and Necromancers do...shift the balance once and a while."
"So, you what, make zombies?" As he spoke, Geoffrey backed into the drive, pushing the overly convoluted machine into the waiting garage, hardly in keeping with the Gothic motif.
"Please, that is an unfair generalization. Necromancers can manipulate death energy. We can take it from organic matter and direct it towards other objects. Wizards do the same with life energy, taking from the organic and shaping to make something new." The people-carrier had stopped, and Aldrich and Geoffrey set about unhitching the contraption.
"What do you mean, wizards take life energy? They don't kill when they cast spells, do they?" Geoffrey asked while helping Aldrich to push the trailer through the back door of the garage.
"It depends on the strength of the spell. If they want to heal a cut, they have to take that healing ability from a person or a plant or several million bacteria," Aldrich huffed, "If I want to heal a cut, I have to give the damage to something, but it doesn't have to be living. That is where this thing comes in. Necromancers all over the country draw death from people in need and pour it into this thing. It's useless, so it is not a waste to destroy it, and it can take quite a lot of damage."
By that point, the men had maneuvered the trailer into a large room occupied only by a wizened man in white robes and an even more decrepit device of indeterminate purpose.
"The old dump, I presume?" Geoffrey commented, nodding towards the hulk.
"Don't speak so rudely about Wizard Powell," Aldrich grinned, "He may be old, but he's in great health. He is here to help us switch the two devices. Stand clear."
Geoffrey took several steps back and watched the white robed man, Wizard Powell, intone ancient words while gesturing mystically. Before his eyes, the decrepit wreck heaved and whined, then collapsed with a final groan. As soon as it finished its death rattle, Wizard Powell ceased his chanting. His arms shot out, one towards the old dump and one towards the new. With the slightest lift of his arms, both raised into the air by an inch. When he circled his hands about one another, the dumps swept through the air and took each others places. The wreck sat on the trailer, and the fresh watch-a-ma-call-it occupied the center of the room. Geoffrey occupied the ground that he fell down upon as the second time in the same number of weeks, his crazy fuse blew violently.
On the gravel road leading to the fortress stood a motley of Guild members dressed in what they would call "eworld" clothing. Surprisingly, they had managed to dress for the current decade, unlike when they paid a visit in the sixties dressed for the great depression. Behind them was a people-carrier hitched to a rather large thing on wheels completely covered by tarp. Aldrich wasted no time.
"Where have you been, you fools?! I have been waiting an entire week for it to arrive!"
Stanley Collins, whom Archibald had healed just the year before after a steam creation broke down catastrophically, stepped forward gallantly.
"You see Sir, we couldn't very well have delivered it in the state it was in last week, now could we? It had a dreadful lack of style, after all, no bells or whistles to speak of. Why, it would have shamed the Guild's good name to present such a tasteless lump of seriousness, not that many people have heard of the Guild to start with. That is to say, those who do know of us, like your Chancellorness, would have been disappointed in us that what little name we have would have taken quite the thrashing from people who -"
"didn't think much of the name to start with!" Aldrich finished. "At any rate, now that it's finally here, we had best install it as quickly as possible. Which one of you knows how to drive that blasted thing?" He gesticulated towards the people-carrier.
"That would be me, sir," offered a young blonde man with the beginnings of a mustache on his lip, "I'm Jeff - er- Geoffrey Fisher."
"Well, what are you waiting for? Get in it! I'll show you where to go. Supreme Wizard, please deal with the rest of them, and make sure that they do not touch any of the receptacles." As he spoke, he strode up to the vehicle and climbed into the passenger seat.
"Thank, you for your advice, Head Chancellor of Necromancy," Archibald replied dryly, "but I have entertained guests before in my one hundred and forty four years here."
Aldrich paid him no mind as he rolled off down the road with the twitchy Geoffrey. He gave him directions to the back entrance and allowed himself to cool off somewhat.
"Fisher, is it?" Aldrich asked somewhat more gruffly than he had intended.
"Yessir," he mumbled. After a brief pause, he spoke again. "Um, would you mind my asking what this thing is for, exactly?"
"Good Heavens!" Aldrich spat, "You mean you came all the way down here without any of them explaining why? Why on earth didn't you ask them?"
"To be fair, I was only brought on this trip because I know how to dress properly and can drive something besides a Steam Trolley. The hassle I had to go through to procure the clothes and the people-carrier and following their decade old maps to get here..." Geoffrey heaved an exhausted sigh.
"Do you mean to say that this isn't your vehicle?" Aldrich asked, eying his surroundings as though he suddenly found himself inside a bomb.
"We didn't steal it, if that's what you think. We rented it. You would not believe how difficult it is to rent something without being able to give your name or address. Anyway, with all of that muck, they only had time to tell me that this had to do with... the Wizardry and Necromancy Department," Geoffrey muttered, glancing towards Aldrich doubtfully.
"I take it you don't believe in magic." Awkward silence was enough of an answer. "No, I didn't think so. I'll answer your original question anyway. What you have hitched to the back of this vehicle is one of the most durable, complicated, useless contraptions ever constructed. Millions of parts could break on it, and almost all of them would have to fail before it stopped doing whatever purposeless task it performs."
"Why would you want something like that so badly?"
"To understand that, you would have to understand how magic works, but of course," Aldrich grinned, "you don't believe in magic." As much as he knew he shouldn't, taunting the doubters was far too entertaining.
"Hey! I'm not entirely closed minded. Go ahead; explain it to me. I don't have to believe it to listen to it, do I?"
"All right, all right, relax," Aldrich smirked, "but it will be a highly simplified version of the way magic really works. Essentially, death is not the absence of life like most people think. Death and life are two opposing forces or energies. They both exist to some degree in everything, but one tends to overpower the other. In me, heh, life is clearly the dominant force. It is the ability to mend and build. Death, on the other hand, is the ability to break down and degrade. Scientists call it entropy, though they hardly understand it."
"Wait, so when we die, do we have an excess of death breaking us down or a deficit of life needed to hold us together?"
"Why, Mr. Fisher, you sound almost as if you believed me. Turn right up ahead, and both ways of dieing are possible. However, there is a finite amount of death and life in the universe. All that lives must die, because all that lives insist on giving life to dead matter."
"You mean, we have to die because people reproduce!?" Geoffrey exclaimed, horrified.
"It isn't as horrible as you think. Even if humans gave up reproduction, insects and animals and life galaxies away from us would continue to cause deaths and lives. It isn't wrong. However, Wizards and Necromancers do...shift the balance once and a while."
"So, you what, make zombies?" As he spoke, Geoffrey backed into the drive, pushing the overly convoluted machine into the waiting garage, hardly in keeping with the Gothic motif.
"Please, that is an unfair generalization. Necromancers can manipulate death energy. We can take it from organic matter and direct it towards other objects. Wizards do the same with life energy, taking from the organic and shaping to make something new." The people-carrier had stopped, and Aldrich and Geoffrey set about unhitching the contraption.
"What do you mean, wizards take life energy? They don't kill when they cast spells, do they?" Geoffrey asked while helping Aldrich to push the trailer through the back door of the garage.
"It depends on the strength of the spell. If they want to heal a cut, they have to take that healing ability from a person or a plant or several million bacteria," Aldrich huffed, "If I want to heal a cut, I have to give the damage to something, but it doesn't have to be living. That is where this thing comes in. Necromancers all over the country draw death from people in need and pour it into this thing. It's useless, so it is not a waste to destroy it, and it can take quite a lot of damage."
By that point, the men had maneuvered the trailer into a large room occupied only by a wizened man in white robes and an even more decrepit device of indeterminate purpose.
"The old dump, I presume?" Geoffrey commented, nodding towards the hulk.
"Don't speak so rudely about Wizard Powell," Aldrich grinned, "He may be old, but he's in great health. He is here to help us switch the two devices. Stand clear."
Geoffrey took several steps back and watched the white robed man, Wizard Powell, intone ancient words while gesturing mystically. Before his eyes, the decrepit wreck heaved and whined, then collapsed with a final groan. As soon as it finished its death rattle, Wizard Powell ceased his chanting. His arms shot out, one towards the old dump and one towards the new. With the slightest lift of his arms, both raised into the air by an inch. When he circled his hands about one another, the dumps swept through the air and took each others places. The wreck sat on the trailer, and the fresh watch-a-ma-call-it occupied the center of the room. Geoffrey occupied the ground that he fell down upon as the second time in the same number of weeks, his crazy fuse blew violently.
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