Mancer Ch. 1

Mancer Ch. 1

The day began normally for any October day: the sky was blue, the grass was brown from the first frost, and people were inside while the blistering cold hung outside of windows and doors, like a dog left in the rain. This continued until about Noon, when storm clouds rolled in, slowly blotting out the sun, blackening the sky and releasing an endless torrent of rain. Rain that tried to reach into every home by sneaking through leaky roofs, by creeping down open chimney floos, by hammering the window panes; rain that was relentless in its onslaught, battering cars and streets, trains and power-lines—trying it’s hardest to disrupt and intrude on the semblance of the ordinary.
Then the cold took over, it began to cool the storm clouds, causing the water to crystallize before it fell toward the earth, each fluttering and falling different ways, each droplet unique, held together by strange bonds. The flakes began to fall faster, clumping together, giving gravity something more to drag down. Soon the ground began to whiten, like the last hairs of an elder; the grass was covered by a blanket of white, snuffing out any resemblance of summer green. Theil opened the door and held out his small hand to catch some of the whiteness; but each time one would touch his skin, it would melt, leaving the original droplet of water to roll down the side of his head and fall the final distance to the ground, freezing again.
“Theil, come inside!” a voice chided from the innards of the house, “You’ll catch a cold out there!”
“How can I, if the snow keeps melting?” Theil asked his mother, as he was picked up and carried inside.
“Because a cold is different from the cold outside, a cold is caused by wet, which you have on you,” Theil’s mother said this lovingly as she placed him down in the living room, “now, take off your jacket, and we’ll have dinner.”
Theil muttered an ok, and struggled out of his fur jacket as fast as he could. He still wore the same clothes he had since age three, a short sleeve shirt, with some khaki pants. He hurried up to the table and clambered into his seat just as a bowl of steaming soup was placed in front of him.
“Now, you should eat up, because this is your dinner for tonight.” His mother said. Theil barely heard her, as he was already blowing some of the heat off of the soup. He shoved a spoonful into his mouth, swallowed, and had a smile brim on his face.
“It’s Potato!?” he said, “Is something special happening?” He asked.
“Yes, of course silly, it’s your seventh birthday.” His mother said. “We always have something of your favorite on your birthday.”
“But dad’s not home yet.” He said, his face falling. “Why isn’t he back yet?”
“Well, he called; he said that something’s keeping him at work, so he shouldn’t be too much longer.”
“But he’s always been here when it’s my birthday.” Theil said, beginning to worry about his dad.
“He’ll be fine, he’s always fine.” His mother said; and with conviction in her eyes repeated quietly: “he’s always fine.”
Theil was about to enjoy a second spoonful of soup when his bowl bounced slightly. He stared at the ripples moving through the liquid, bouncing back and forth, they looked like something familiar, but he couldn’t name it. His mother looked in the direction of the foundry, her eyes boring holes through the walls of the house, seeing what was beyond them. The bowl bounced again, this time there was a faint boom heard, but it seemed to hit his mother like a rocket; she took a step back, faint lines of horror dawning on her face.
“Mom,” Theil asked, “what’s wrong?”
“I don’t know, but something’s happened.” She said, looking back toward the foundry.
Theil looked back into his soup, and watched the last ripples fade away, and look like his dad.


The Foundry
“Watch that pressure valve!” The shout was heard for only thirteen feet due to the noise level, “We can’t have that falling off or rising to high!” Draeon walked along the catwalk about two-hundred feet from the bottom floor. Steam and smoke rose from the heating vents, causing the steel to attract the dirty water, causing the need for high traction boots. The filters on the mask took out any of the oxidations from the smoke, allowing workers to breathe, but they had to be careful with them, they could slip at any moment.
“This one’s fine, check the two on the lower levels!” Draeon Shouted, “They might be the cause of the shutdown.” When the man from team 9 had left he muttered: “thirty years working here, and there’s never been this massive a shutdown.”
“These ones are fine too!” The man shouted shouted up after a few second; “Maybe the central control valves are off!?”
“I’ll check” He said, moving cautiously toward the center of the foundry.
“Wait!” The man shouted up again, “This one’s just started flying off the chart! We’re going to have a pressure breach in five seconds!” Draeon heard this, and immediately smashed the Emergency Com button on the shoulder of his suit and grabbed onto the support railing. “Four Seconds! Impact in sector three!”
The warning had barely a second before a rumbling started, and then the explosion occurred. Chunks of metal, pieces of piping both large and small, all flung from Pressurized Tank zero-zero-three; they smashed through everything they came into contact with: equipment, catwalks, people-especially people-, even those chunks that flew into vats spewed the hot liquid out toward workers. Draeon was thrown rapidly up, the catwalks shaking horrendously, each oscillation appearing to tear the steel grates from each other. The lower catwalks fell away, the man barely grabbing onto the ladder, hoping for it to become stable. The Foundry was filled with the screams of those falling through the air, then those were silenced and replaced by soft thuds or splashes as they hit the heating equipment or fell into the ore vats. Alarms blared, lights flashed, and several more seconds of quaking passed.
“Is my team alright?” Draeon shouted into his com-link. He heard radio silence for about five seconds before the static broke off and was replaced by a voice.
“Connor, calling in, I’m fine, a little shaken up, but fine.”
“Marshall calling, I’m good, though it’ll take some time to get back, the catwalks are out near me.”
“I’m fine, thanks for asking,” said the man while pulling himself up the last chains in the ladder.
“You should call in, you’re team will be wondering where you are,” Draeon said, “In the mean-time I’m waiting for three more responses.”
The com-link crackled to life, with spurts of static Draeon heard a faint voice: “This is Tanner, I’m hurt, near vat three-nine-zero, there’re about five others here too.”
“Tanner, stay put, I’ll get down there with the rest of the team.” Draeon turned to the man from team 9. “I have work to do, as I believe you do.” He then ran toward the abridgment between sectors three and four.
Draeon could feel the air filters working to keep up with his breathing, while his feet were pounding the grating beneath him. His breath fogged the faceplate, making it harder to see through the smoky light. He came across three sections that he couldn’t pass because of debris, but this only caused him to run faster to find other ways to the vat his team was by. Several times he passed bodies, hung on railings, falling slowly from the catwalks; all with various limbs torn off, several were missing legs or arms, while a few were missing heads. The ones whose heads were missing were the lucky ones. Many were groaning, or crying. Draeon wished he could help them but he had to keep moving, the lines from the tanks could become critical at any moment, and he had to get his team out.
He’d alerted the remainder of his team two minutes earlier, how he hated that idea: “remainder,” he thought, “it’s as though they never existed, they were just names on a sheet of paper, pretending to be real; and now Tanner’s one of them.” He pushed these thoughts out with others. “No, he’s alive, he can make it, he was working in a subsector, he was close to the ground when it happened.” Other thoughts filled his head, most rebuttals, but he pushed through the grim and focused on making it to the vat area.
Dreaon approached the abridgment near the outer rim of the foundry, there was less debris here, and he could move more freely, this path being reserved normally for lead blocks to shift past. However, the lead blocks lay still, the shutdown had affected a large portion of the heating apparatus, while many other sectors were starting to black out from power loss. He moved along this way for about fifteen more feet, then came face to face with one of the slabs, shaken from its hang-rig, and lay blocking the porthole, except for the last five feet near the top where the rig still hung. Dreaon looked around him quickly, making sure that nobody was near him. After confirming he was alone, he formed his hand into a cup, faced it towards the solid grating, and relaxed his mind.
At first nothing happened, and the odd passerby would have wondered what he was doing, just standing there, looking like he was reaching for something in midair; but there was no such passerby, this area had been evacuated long before the incident. Soon water started to run down his arm. He closed his eyes, then opened them again; they changed from dark brown to sky blue, more water started to roll down his arm, wetting his workers oversuit, dripping from his fingertips, falling to the floor. He released his stored energy in a quick, successive blast; the force of the water pushing him up and over the leaden impass. He released another burst when he was on the other side, slowing him down, keeping him from hitting the ground too fast; he still landed with a tuck-roll, then popped back up and surveyed the damage there.
The spaces between sectors are generally filled with vats, drones, and various noises from workers and machines; but sector four had blacked out in the early stages of the shutdown process, all the drones had flown off, following their emergency protocols. All that was left was the vats, all stopped in place, barely kept molten by the heating equipment. Nearly all the catwalks on sector three’s side had been destroyed by the blast, leaving a large mass of rubble at the bottom floor; there were about three stairwells, and a full catwalk from the upper level left. The vats nearest the explosion had tipped over, spilling their precious ore, leaving trails of metallic residue and chaff as they cooled. The emergency fans had kicked in at this point, so there were no harmful gasses leaked, or floating, in the air; the wind pulse from these five meter wide fans was intense, so intense that it made walking on the free hanging catwalks a near impossibility.
Dreaon scanned the carnage of the lower floor, looking for where vat 390 was supposed to be. He saw vat 458, hanging halfway in it’s cradle, some metallic mass still dripping from it’s sides; vat 328 was completely out of it’s cradle, upside down, nearly sealed from the cooled metal; vat 380 was normal, but 390 wasn’t there. Dreaon checked again: “385, 386, 387,” he muttered, keeping track carefully, “388, 389, 391.” He stopped, dumstruck—where could a single vat have gone, and been replaced by the ones in succession to it. He opened the comlink again.
“Tanner, are you sure you’re by 391?” He released the button to hear static. He waited nearly a full minute: “Tanner, are you there?” He asked again, “Tanner, are…you…there?” He became frantic, he double checked his double check, and re-checked that even; but the numbers stayed the same, 390 was still missing. He was going to press the com button again, but someone grabbed his hand.
“He’s gone, Dreaon; he’s gone.” Dreaon looked up to see the Connor standing in front of him, keeping him from pressing the button again.
“Where’s Marshall?” Dreaon asked, dreading the worst.
“He said he’s fine, though he got caught in a bit of a bind with the catwalks being out. He said he’d be here, but I don’t see him.” Connor said, looking around.
“Wait, he wasn’t working sector three was he?” Dreaon asked.
“Actually, no, he wasn’t; he was performing cleanup in sector four.” Connor said, “What?” he asked, when Dreaons face turned pale; but he ignored Connor, and looked down again toward the vats organized on the floor.
“Didn’t he say something about wanting to quit, that this job wasn’t worth the effort?” Dreaon asked, his voice fading off into the distance.
“yeah…” Connor added, this comment bringing up older memories; “yeah…” he repeated, the impossibility of it striking him oddly.
Dreaon scanned the floor, more vigorously this time, and he saw it. By vats 389 and 391 there were drag marks from where it had been pulled off the assembly line and hauled into the darkened sector four.
“There,” Dreaon said, pointing this out to Connor, “He’s dragged the vat somewhere, but why?”
Connor shook his head, “I don’t know.” He looked at Dreaon, “I’ll go tell the head advisors, you’re going after him, aren’t you.”
“Why shouldn’t I, he’s part of our team, kidnapping other team members. I’m obliged to on multiple levels.” Dreaon said, still staring at the drag marks.
Connor reached into his emergency bag and pulled out the extra flares; “take these, if you’re going in there, you’ll need them.” Dreaon took them from him and muttered his thanks. Then, prepping his mind, jumped from the catwalk. Connor gasped as he watched him fall the near two-hundred feet, then land slowly, propelled by water. The last thing Connor heard from Dreaon was him shouting up to him to get the heck to the head advisors.