A Good Son
It was not theirs to take. Father will be most displeased...
Clink skittered across the loose dunes of sand, his eye filled with purpose and determination. His legs had been fashioned with city streets, building walls, and the soft, vulnerable flesh of the deserving in mind, not these loose particles. Nevertheless, the spider-like golem had been the only witness to a most heinous crime, and he would sooner die than allow the perpetrators to get away with it.
A small hunter’s camp lay in the distance, its firelight muted by a clay stove resting over the top of it. Shadowy forms surrounded the thing, laughing and drinking, no doubt discussing the heist from earlier that day. Beyond that a few trees and shrubs marked the presence of a minor oasis. Were the sun not already lost behind the Blade Wall, this place would stick out like an Order priest in the border towns. As it was, the darkness swallowed up the greens and blues of the oasis just as easily as the yellows and browns of the surrounding desert, rendering it a serviceable place to hide for the time being.
They hide their tracks poorly, Clink thought. Not true hunters, then. Not wanderers, either. Smart wanderers know how to disappear. Fools. Fools in any case, to steal from Father.
It would have been easier, perhaps, for Clink to have alerted his father of the theft. To point out the missing blade and set out on the trail like a loyal sailhound. Indeed, the pair had done just that to many other would-be burglars who had thought they could get one over on the greatest hunter in Sur’Dhanza. But Clink’s father was the showboating type. He preferred to drag out his kills, toying with his prey to make jokes at their expense before ending their miserable lives. Clink had been scolded more than enough times for ‘ruining the moment’ that he’d learned not to get too involved.
Not this time. Father will see how good I am, even without his help! With the ripping and the tearing and the shooting - Perhaps he’ll leave more of them to me!
It’s not that Clink couldn’t appreciate the fun of building tension; soaking in the panic of a terrified quarry before striking. It’s just that he enjoyed the final act much more than his father seemed to. In any case, Clink had never been built with speaking in mind. It’s not as if he could join his father in the wisecracking. Killing was what he’d been made to do, and he enjoyed it immensely.
Tucking in his legs, Clink rolled and slid down the final dune between him and his foes. He could see them clearly now: Kiarren, almost certainly. Likely outcasts, like most of their kind this far from the Holy City. The Mimarren were rarely so quick to turn to petty larceny, but the figures were most definitely lizard-folk rather than demons. As his metal body finally slid to a stop at the base of the hill, he began creeping closer to the camp, eye all but closed to mask the ominous red glow it gave off. It wouldn’t do for the thieves to be prepared when he finally fell upon them!
Closer and closer the golem crept, his bladed legs slicing through the sand nearly their full length before gaining purchase, further slowing an already agonizing approach. The raucous voices of the figures ahead reached him, but they were ignored. He simply stalked and watched. At last, as Clink came to a stop at the very edge of the campfire’s light, one of the thieves pulled out their prize: An elaborate, hooked blade, custom-made for the self-titled Sheriff of Sur’Dhanza. Clink’s father loved those blades nearly as much as he loved Clink himself. Seeing them in the hands of these petulant strangers would have made Clink’s blood boil, had he actually contained any.
Suddenly, one of the figures’ heads swung his way. Clink froze.
“Hey, Nguvu, you see that shadow over there?”
The other figure looked. “You think Tukufu’s wound drew in a scavenger?”
“Doesn’t seem big enough for that.” The former replied, leaning forward to get a better look.
The second shadow reached back, hand blindly grasping for the edge of the stove, aiming to lift it away from the fire. If it succeeded, the entire area would be bathed in light. Clink couldn’t allow that.
A panel on the golem’s upper half flipped open, and a tube of hand-bored steel emerged from the inky depths of his hollow frame. There was a dull thud, followed by a blinding flash, and a slug of solid iron erupted from the gun barrel, tearing through the shoulder of the stove-bound figure and throwing them to the ground. To the other thief’s credit, their shock only paused them momentarily before they let out a cry of fear and rage, drawing their sword and dashing forward.
Two of Clink’s legs lanced up to meet the thief’s blade as another swept through the sand at their feet, hurling a thin trail of grit into their eyes. They stumbled forward, parried blade slashing at the empty air where Clink had been. As they continued to advance, Clink slipped between their legs and around their thrashing tail. His bladed feet found purchase in the tough hide and solid bones of the thief’s back, and from there he managed to push off into a leap for the center of the camp, plopping neatly into the first bandit's downed body.
Gun lists right. Father should fix that, Clink thought to himself, pulling his legs out of the motionless corpse at the base of the camp stove. The landing had been excellent. One of his more stylish ones, in fact. It was a shame no one had been around to witness it! Thankfully, the sounds of shouting and scrambling for weapons emanating from the surrounding tents suggested that he would soon have many more chances to exhibit his skills.
Panels popped open across his form, further barrels and blades emerging from a space that could not possibly have contained them were his innards not an affront to the laws of physics. His eye scanned the tents for the first lucky thief who would get to be taught a very important lesson this night: No one stole from the house of Walowik and lived.
Father will be so proud!
-----
Joka crawled towards the safety of the oasis, where the bushes and water would surely conceal her from the unholy terror in her wake. Even now, she could hear the gunfire and screams as the strange being tore through her compatriots like some sort of rabid beast.
Blood streamed from the wounds left in her back when the contraption had vaulted off of her and into the camp, leaving her in terrible pain, but alive. While she could still feel her lower body, it hurt far too much for her to stand, and in any case she had no intention of making herself a target of that contraption once again. She clawed her way further still. The sands of the desert had begun to give way to the loose soil and clay of the earth directly around the oasis. She was close!
Suddenly, her hand fell onto a taloned foot. Looking up, her eyes met those of a stranger. The being was cloaked in shadow, but the otherworldly glow of his eyes marked him as a demon. There had been no demons in Joka’s band, and the nearest demon settlement was a day’s ride to the south. Confusion and doubt were quickly swept aside by panic.
“Demon! Whoever you are, help me!” She cried as loudly as she dared, lest the unholy abomination still slaughtering the rest of the thieves overhear. “We must flee this place. That thing is a monster!”
“A monster?” The demon replied, cocking his head to the side. A muzzle flash from the camp briefly illuminated his face, revealing a twisted grin.
Joka recognized that face; that grin. Her heart went cold.
“It does my heart good to see a child follow in his father’s footsteps.” He continued, the orange orbs of his eyes briefly drifting towards the mayhem in the distance. “I couldn’t be more proud!”
“Oh gods above. Oh Vossos, please…” She was crying now, eyes squeezed shut and body curled as tightly as the pain in her back would allow. “Just let me go. It wasn’t my idea!”
The demon watched her for a time, unmoving. “Were it up to me,” he said at last, “I might actually consider that. Tales of horror and woe do wonders for my image.” The sound of metal being drawn from a sheathe reached the thief’s ears. “Unfortunately for you, this isn’t my show…”
Pain ripped through her shoulder as a hooked blade, the twin of the one she and her band had made off with mere hours ago, looped through the flesh and bones of her shoulder. No amount of screaming for mercy had any impact on the demon as he began to drag her back to the light of the campfire.
“…and I don’t think my boy was finished with you, yet.”
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