Chapter 16. The Lost City
The
rest of that "day" dragged horribly.
Perhaps it was the fact that the invigorating glow of the solar engine
was spent, but it was also possible that the remaining lizardmen were weighed
down by the loss of their comrade and brother.
Joe
managed to give voice to his regret.
"There was so much I could have said to Bob, but I never did. We just spent our time bickering about
unimportant things. I....I wish that I
had just said to him, "You're wrong, Bob.
About everything."
Mahtis
gave Joe's shoulder a comforting squeeze.
"It's okay, Joe. I'm sure he
knew that was how you felt."
Rychek
scanned the horizon with a dangerous look in his eyes. "The next zombie I see, I will take
apart. With my teeth if I have to!"
As the
weak light faded at dusk, he spied his desired victim. A solitary zombie stood, blocking their path
east, with a single arm lifted, palm outwards.
Rychek leapt to the ground brandishing Gork-on-a-Stick and charged the
zombie with a wordless shout. The shout
quickly changed to a cry of confusion, and then anguish.
As
he came close enough to strike he saw that the walking corpse before him was of
reptilian form, with blue scales on its slack hide. A rotting wound on the creature's neck buzzed
with flies. Its milky eyes gazed
unseeingly at him from beneath a gleaming white egg shell.
It
was Bob.
Joe
and Mahtis rushed to Rychek's side.
"Bob, thank the Old Ones!"
Joe blurted, "You're
alive!"
"No
he isn't. I don't know how he is
standing here, but he is not breathing.
He is dead."
"No,
he came back so I could tell him..." Joe turned back to his spawnkin, "Bob, I need you to know.... that you
are wrong!"
There
was no response.
"About
everything!"
Still
no response.
"Okay
smarty-scales. He's dead."
"Not
exactly dead," a harsh voice called from the darkness. The Night-Mare drawn cart clopped into
view. From the running board stepped a
figure. "He is undead. I have made him so."
The
speaker was an elderly and not very impressive human. His eyes were covered with disks of glass
held by a wire frame which was hooked to his ears and balanced on the bridge of
his long, pointed nose. His dome-like
scalp was devoid of hair, and combined with the dark circles of glass gave him
the appearance of a leering skull. There
was something cold and clinical about his precise appearance and movements,
which was contradicted by the ornate appearance of the black filigreed staff he
bore.
"Why
have you done this?" Joe attempted
to step forward to confront the figure but was restrained by the claw of the
zombie saurus between them.
"At
least Zis one has held your attention long enough to avoid being burnt. Or hacked.
Or crushed. It is tiresome to me
when I have to reanimate so many of my friends whenever zey extend an
invitation to guests, such as yourselves."
"Zombies
are no one's friends," Rychek snorted.
"They are mindless slaves."
The
glassy disks regarded him for a long moment.
"Indeed. Und zat is why you
have been invited as guests. I think you
would prefer zis to... the
alternative. But, I am being a poor
host. My name is Victor. Please to follow. What is it you call zis one? Bob?
Come Bob."
Victor
and the undead Bob climbed onto the corpse cart, and it turned towards the
menacing dark to the north. Rychek
briefly considered fleeing to the east, but changed his mind when he saw that
the zombie army had formed a semicircle around them. North was definitely the way to go.
The
trio of lizards dutifully followed on Bessie and whispered about this turn of
events, all the while shadowed by the ring of undead.
"Rychek,
why has he done that to Bob? Why are we
following him?"
"We
have no choice, Mahtis. We are
outnumbered one hundred to one, and he can raise troops as quickly as we can
cut them down. He is clearly a powerful
necromancer."
In
the silence of the Dark Lands, attempting to have a quiet conversation was
futile. The sharp eared old man drew his
cart back level with Bessie and engaged them in companiable conversation as they
travelled deeper into the darkness.
"Zis
is correct. I am, or was, a
necromancer. I was one of ze best. But now I am a humble scientist." He bowed his pointy head.
Mahtis
raised his eye-crests at the unfamiliar word.
Victor
explained, "I observe ze world
around me and I deduce how it works. I
conduct experiments and I apply ze knowledge I have gained."
"Isn't
necromancy easier?"
The
scientist laughed. A short savage
bark. "It is easy enough for zose
dumm-kopfs in Sylvania. Zey are blinded
by their desire to live forever. But I
desire more zan an army of "mindless slaves" as your spawn kin puts
it."
The
cart and the bastiladon rumbled onwards in silence for a time.
"I
have spent centuries in study, but when I presented my findings to ze Sylvanian
Geographic Society zey banished me from ze land. No matter.
I will show ze fools. Very soon,
I will show zem! But now, excuse my
bitter words. We have arrived!"
The
bastiladon, cart and zombie army passed under a shadow which dwarfed them. An enormous arch pierced an equally
impressive wall which extended in both directions to be swallowed by the
gloom. The travellers followed broad avenues
through a city which had long been abandoned.
The buildings seemed eerily familiar.
"This
is a Temple City!" gasped Rychek.
Victor
confirmed Rychek's assertion.
"Indeed. Zis city was
established by your "Old Ones" millennia ago. The pool at its heart ceased to produce
spawnings, and ze city died. But what is
dead need not remain so."
The
layout was familiar to the adventurers.
Every temple city was a construction of the Old Ones. For all that kroxigor labourers might
maintain it, and skink artisans embellish it, a temple city has at its core the
durable architecture of the Old Ones.
The basic structure would endure until the end of the earth.
By
the time the odd travelling companions reached the central plaza there was an
unnatural storm beginning to brew further to the north. Flashes of purple and green lightning were followed
several seconds later by ominous rumbles.
The
great temple at the centre of the city should have been surmounted by the star
chamber of an attendant Slann Mage Priest, but in this forgotten city, a crude
bird's nest of metal rods perched at the zenith. Thick metal cables snaked down the Eternity
Stair to disappear underground through a low arch.
Rychek
boggled at the desecration of the most sacred of sites.
"That
thing..." he pointed at the spiky mess on the temple. "....connects to the Spawning Chamber?"
"Ya! You are observant. Ze first attribute of ze scientist. Come with me....Rychek. We shall test your application of
logic!"
Victor
beckoned Rychek and the pair disappeared into the spawning chamber with a
sizeable escort of zombies. Joe and
Mahtis fretted outside. Bessie ate a
tumble weed.
***
The
spawning chamber was the almost the twin of the one in Los'tmabo'tl. The murky water in the further half of the
vault had a vague glow which lit the chamber from beneath. On the far wall, water dripped into the pool
from the grooves of an ornate frieze which depicted the inscrutable Old
Ones. These aspects were as they should
be. However, two differences were
apparent.
The
dry portion of the chamber was cluttered with a tangle of wire and gleaming
metal apparatus. Multihued liquids
bubbled in retorts and noxious vapours clouded the air. The other difference was an empty square
niche in the centre of the dripping frieze.
Rychek wracked his brain to recall what exactly was missing.
Victor
paused to inspect some of the shabby citizens of his empire. They were from all corners of the globe. There was an impressive greenskin warboss, a
random selection of elves, a clump of dwarves and men of the Empire, Bretonnia
and beyond. There was even a lone
lizardmen skink whose body was ravaged by burns and large wounds.
"Zese
animated corpses will obey, but without life they have no volition. Zey cannot choose and zey cannot feel. They retain only the barest rudiments of
their pre-mortem personality.
"I
don't want to raise ze dead anymore. I
wish to create life. I want my creations
to serve me, but not as zese do. I want
zem to serve me of zere own free will, and out of gratitude. And love."
Rychek
snorted, "Creating life! How is that going for you?"
Victor
remained pensive. "I have travelled
and observed as a scientist should. I
even went to your homeland, Lustria. I observed carnivorous plants which move of
zeir own volition. Zis inspired my first
attempt to create autonomous life.
Rick!" He beckoned a
malformed creature.
It
was vaguely man shaped, but its head was replaced with some form of large root
vegetable. As he did not have a face,
his features were simulated with crude caricatures which were pinned in place.
"Zis
is Rick O'Mortis. He was a potato farmer
from Eireland, but was killed in a tragic mishap involving three quarts of
butter, a large marrow, and an angry sheep.
I was too late to prevent ze... incident, but I was able to combine his
essence, so to speak, with zat of a living plant. Is he not appealing?"
Rick
O'Mortis shuddered at the horror of his situation, and one of his ears popped
off.
"So
your experiment was successful?"
"No. Unfortunately, he is a vegetable."
Rick
O'Mortis shuddered once more and scuttled away.
"It
does not matter. He is obsolete. An early prototype. Now observe.
Arnold!"
A
muscular part human warrior strode forward.
Where his flesh had rotted, or been stripped away, a gleaming metal
skeleton was exposed. One half of his face was missing and a there was a red glow
emanating from the metal eye socket.
"Arnold. Bring the
gurney."
Arnold
surveyed the scientist and the space which the gurney was meant to occupy. "I'll be back." He said slowly.
"My
work with Arnold was inspired by my dealings with the biomechanical
monstrosities of Skaven Clan Moulder. I
took his dead flesh and merged it with a machine.
Rychrk
studied the muscle bound human's back as he disappeared into a side
chamber. "He was a mighty
warrior. What killed him?"
"Quietly
now. He is sensitive about the manner of
his death. He was originally from
Oesterreich. By strength of arms he rose
to become State Governor. He could not
be defeated in battle, but yet he succumbed to a cancer of the brain."
"It's
not a tumor!" Arnold protested.
The
gigantic warrior had quietly returned and stood now stood behind Victor.
"Of
course not," said Victor soothingly.
"Put the gurney there."
Arnold
complied and stepped back muttering.
"It's not tumour. At
all...."
"Rick
and Arnold are closer to true life than the zombies. They have greater self will and
autonomy. Rick moves towards light of
his own volition, and Arnold steals people's clothes, boots and
sunglasses. No-one knows why." He shrugged.
"Zey obey me, but it is out of obligation not love. Only the living can love."
Victor
stepped behind the trolley which Arnold had delivered. It had a sheet covering what appeared to be a
large dead body.
"Zis
will be my final experiment. I will
create life! I will be as a god! Behold my beautiful creation!" Victor flung back the cover to reveal a
hideous creature. It was too large to be
a man, yet not big enough to be an ogre.
The body appeared to be assembled from the parts of several different
creatures stitched together. On either
side of its neck protruded two large silver bolts.
"You
have made a monster?" cried Rychek in shock. "....although the tail is a nice
aesthetic touch."
"He
is beautiful!" sniffed Victor defensively.
"I used reptile parts where I could. Ze cold blooded physiology is more suitable
for reanimation."
Victor
inspected the horror briefly then called,
"Scalenex! We must
prepare. The storm is almost upon
us."
Rychek
realized that rumbles of thunder had been building in volume and frequency
since he had entered the spawning chamber.
The
undead skink pattered to his master's side.
"Scalenex,
do not neglect to attach the electrodes to the silver bolts zis time. We all remember what happened on ze previous
occasion."
The
dead skink paused as if recalling an unpleasant experience. He attached the wires carefully and scurried
out of the chamber.
image
"What
is my part in all of this?" Rychek
demanded.
The
scientist was bustling around his equipment, checking connections and adjusting
dials. "Ah yes," he gestured towards the empty niche above the
spawning pool. "A cube fell from
its place millennia ago. It remains at
ze bottom of the spawning pool. You will
retrieve it."
"I
have seen a similar cube above the spawning pool of Los'tmabo'tl. What does it do?"
"Your
Old Ones were not gods. Zey were
scientists such as myself. Zeir planet
forming and universe bending power came from one invention. Cubes of some unknown material. Within each, ze essence of one or more forms
of energy could be captured. Zey can be
filled with incredible volumes of energy, even otherwise incompatible energies,
such as light and dark. Ze combined
powers from ze cubes can perform otherwise impossible works.
No
practitioners of ze mystic arts now alive, not even ze greatest of the Slann
Mage Priests, can combine such antipathetic energies without triggering
cataclysmic consequences. You have an
example of one of zese cubes on the back of your pet."
Rychek
remembered the cube at the heart of the solar engine. "Could you use that one?"
"Bah!
I cannot use it. Who here has any use
for concentrated sunlight?"
Rick
O'Mortis raised his hand hopefully, but was ignored.
"Ze
cube in ze pool combines earth and life power.
Zis pairing is normally incompatible.
Ze earth digests and decays. Life
grows and flourishes. Ze two energies
combined in ze cube empower ze nutrient rich crucible of ze pool to produce
living beings, by some means I do not fully understand.
I
will use ze power of a lightning bolt channeled through the cube to give life
and vigour to zis flesh." He
thumped the torso of the collage of inert meat that lay on the metal trolley in
front of him. "My creation will
live!"
Rychek
folded his arms sullenly. "Get the
cube yourself."
"I
don't swim."
"Make
one of your zombies get it."
"I
have tried many times. Ze zombies
drown."
"What? They don't need to breathe."
"Zey
revive in ze water. Zen zey drown."
Rychek
scoffed. "We inter our dead in
those waters. They don't magically come
back to life. Their bodies mingle with
the waters to nourish the next spawning."
"You
are correct. Dead are not restored to
life by ze waters. But ze
undead.... Perhaps it is easier if I
demonstrate." He beckoned to a
rotting dwarf. "Retrieve ze
cube."
The
dwarf plunged beneath the surface.
Seconds later he surfaced with a gasp, "Ai'm...alive!" He grinned.
His arms and legs began to flail impotently. "And Ai cannae swim!" he spluttered as he submerged again. When he finally floated to the surface, he
was in a face down position.
Victor
dragged the dwarf's body over to the edge with a long hooked stick, which he
seemed to have been available for just this eventuality. "It is always ze same. Now I will need to reanimate him again. It is tiresome."
"You
have a zombie skink. He is aquatic. Send him after the cube. He won't drown."
The
scientist paused in his futile rescue mission.
The glass disks covering his eyes glinted. "Zat has proven to
be....unsatisfactory. He revives,
remembers his last living urge, and zen tries to kill me. Zen I have to kill him, and zen reanimate him
and so on and so on." he waved his
hands.
"I
need one living, aquatic being to willingly retrieve the cube. I leave you to decide whether you will assist
me, or choose to condemn your other companions to...unpleasantness. I must attend to my zombies outside. I feel zat zey are strangely unsettled.
***
High
up on Bessie's back, Joe and Mahtis were witnesses to a horrifying
spectacle. The throng of zombies had
organized themselves into two roughly equal factions. Those with hand weapons squared off against
those with spears. What had started with
some hissing and the occasional shove quickly escalated into a pitched battle.
"Halt!" Victor appeared at the mouth of the spawning
chamber with his necromantic staff held aloft.
The undead adversaries immediately froze and turned their milky eyes
towards him.
"Who
are ze instigators of zis... disharmony?"
The
mass of zombies disengaged and shambled backwards leaving two of their number
locked in a kind of embrace. One was an
undead skink. In one hand he held the
butt end of a spear. The pointy end was
standing proud of a zombie saurus warrior's back. The saurus, in his turn had demonstrated the
efficiency of the humble hand weapon by hacking off the skink's other arm at
the shoulder with a rusty sword.
"Come
here!" Victor barked in
annoyance. The pair approached their
master.
"All
of you!"
The
skink went back and retrieved his arm from the ground.
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