All the Dust that Falls

Chapter 168: Forcing The Issue

The Warden struggled to hide his frown as he left the council meeting. The contents had been fairly standard, and he really didn’t have much to say beyond his usual advice and some extra tidbits of information his position gave him. Still, what he had heard had been concerning enough.

That the city of Caleb was still in one piece was hard to believe. Especially after hearing not only Harold’s report, but the hundreds of eyewitnesses he had brought back as well. However, the messages from Arthur had been quite hopeful. Either he had been captured and subverted enough to give up all code phrases, or things were better than they could hope.

His strange references to the horrible demon that had shown up made the Warden lean towards the first option though. Specifically that it wasn’t described as a horrible demon, but as something else. Sure, the only message they received was right after the decisive battle, so things were murky, but it was still concerning.

All of that was concerning but not new. The thing that had the Warden frowning was the timing. This was the first council meeting in over a week. That was far less frequent than usual.

At first, he thought that maybe a rival had been trying to make a move on him. A foolish endeavor.Given his advantages and sheer longevity in the kingdom’s inner circles, most didn’t try him. But after a simple investigation, he found that there just hadn’t been any meetings at all.

The Warden didn’t entirely mind the break. To be honest, he had always felt that there were too many of the dang meetings anyway. But the idea that king was so untethered and able to free himself from them was odd. There hadn’t been any signs of bad health or anything, just a small break in the normal routine.

It was a bad time to have the ruler distracted. The Warden was already regretting sending Harold to investigate the other Lieutenants' sites for a few reasons. Despite his recent record, Harold was a savvy political mind and held the ear of the king as well as many other important bureaucrats.

But also, recent reports had ticked the danger up in Harold’s target areas even more. The Warden could have used a more combat-capable asset at his disposal here, and he was leery of trusting Harold on his own at the moment.

At least he wasn’t alone this time. One of the Infiltrators was with him, and that should keep him safe and keep him on track. That was the reasoning the Warden had given Harold, at least, but as with many of his actions, it served a dual purpose. He just didn’t have enough time to tackle his problems one at a time.

The Infiltrator would also be watching Harold closely. Sudden bouts of incompetence or a series of failures weren’t completely impossible, but if Harold had been compromised, they would find out soon.

Once the Warden made it back to his rooms, he completed the circle around the room and the shield popped up. Sitting down, he was finally able to relax and let his true emotions come forth. There was so much more to do.

—-

I left the completely fixed gate on the ground for now as I went in search of pulleys. The humans watched as I moved back into the city, but no one said anything, so I mostly ignored them as I scanned for my target.

The mechanical advantage was something that I had learned about recently. The library had some books on physics, but reading them was one thing. Understanding them was another thing entirely. Even beyond that, using that understanding was even more difficult, in my opinion.

It wasn’t until I had seen plenty of examples and had the need to use this knowledge that I put the two together. Now that I dedicated some processing power to the issue, though, a whole new world of possibilities opened up to me. Force diagrams and estimated friction constants streamed through my processors like a collection of particularly lively dust bunnies. There was so much potential here. With a long enough lever, I could move mountains to clean under them.

If I had known this the whole time, I could have been so much more effective. I would have been able to move furniture that was too close to the ground to clean under. Of course, by now, it was a moot point as I was able to lift most things with my Air Manipulation. But who knew what else I could move and clean under that I would never have thought of?

After all, there were many statues that my Air Manipulation wasn’t able to budge. Though I had gotten much stronger than I was even when I left the castle a little while ago. I doubted that I would have been able to lift so many blocks back then.

Eventually, I found some things that could work as pulleys. They were a bit larger than the ones that I had seen the humans using, but I still thought that they would be viable. The only issue was that they were attached to a cart. Sure, the cart was mostly crushed, so I didn’t think anyone would miss it, but I still made a mental note to return them when I was done.

The metal axles they were attached to would also be pretty useful. I was sure with these, I would be able to generate enough force to lift the door. The only problem was that I wasn’t confident about whether my new pulleys were able to withstand the force themselves. Maybe it would spread out evenly over them? Honestly, I was a bit fuzzy on that. The physics book had assumed an immutable pulley, and that wasn’t very helpful when I actually thought about it.

Nobody complained as I harvested my materials, but some people did stare. Instead of just carrying them back over to the gate, I pulled them into my dustbin. I still needed to find a rope, so I decided to take some time to improve the items I had collected while I searched.

In my void, I alighted the grains of the wood to be more parallel and sturdy. I also tempered the metal. My calculations indicated that they should hold. Provided I wasn’t missing any other variables, of course.

As I worked on this, I decided that I didn’t want to search the city for a very long rope myself. Surely the humans had some on hand. Instead, I found someone I had only heard referred to as the Quartermaster. It didn’t sound like a name, but I didn’t know what it meant.

Still, people seemed to talk to him whenever they wanted things. I located him sitting in a tent with a line of people stretched outside. Not wanting to make anyone wait on me, I joined the back of the line to wait my turn.

The people in front of me struck up a conversation. The man in front of me tapped the guy before him on the shoulder. “So what are you here for?”

“My chin strap buckle broke.” The second soldier said with a shake of the head.

“The buckle? Not the strap?” With a note of surprise in his voice.

“Yeah, bizarre, right? I’ve never seen it before. I suppose it was bound to happen eventually. It's the older model I got back in the Matlrena campaign, and I’ve had to mend the leather several times.”

“Matlrena? Wow, that was some time ago. My first tour actually.”

“Hey mine too! Who did you serve und-?” As the second soldier asked his question, he fully turned around to engage in the conversation. When he saw me, he cut off with a strangled exclamation. “Desus’s beard!”

“Huh-?” The soldier in front of me turned as well and jumped seven and a quarter inches off the ground. “What the -”

I popped out my arm and gave them a small wave. I really didn’t mean to startle them, so I felt a little bad; sometimes, I forgot how bad humans were at keeping aware of their surroundings. The two of them stared at me until one of them bowed slightly.

“I’m sorry Lord Void. I didn’t see you there.”

“Yes, uh-”

“-our apologies-”

The two of them stuttered out half sentences. They were clearly having trouble stringing words together. They stepped out of line and tapped the people in front of them, then pointed me out. With a few more startled reactions and a short moment, the entire line had moved out of the way.

That was awfully nice of them. Not wanting to reject their kindness, I rolled up to the entrance of the tent.

Before anything else, a man walked out of the tent followed by an impatient voice roaring, “Next!”

The man who had just emerged was carrying a shiny new sword. He also jumped as he saw me, but I didn’t want to make the angry man inside wait any longer than I had to, so I rolled past the rest of the way into the tent.

“What der ya need?” Came the gruff voice from a head buried in a stack of papers. Before I could respond, I heard more mutterings. “I should have a whole bleeding staff, not just me. This is what I get for being even mildly competent at my god’s cursed job. Need ta handle t’all meself.”

It was whispered at such a low volume that I didn’t think that anyone else would have been able to hear it, but I certainly didn’t have any problems with that. Still, I waited for him to finish his mumbling before replying. Strangely, he just kept going until he looked up with a frustrated expression. “Well! Don’t waste m-”

The Quartermaster cut off when he saw me and jumped to his feet. “Lord Void! What are you doing here?”

I tried explaining, but I didn’t have much hope for him understanding me. Adults never seemed to be able to, especially not on the first try. Sure enough, the man shook his head after I finished explaining. “I’m sorry my Lord, but I didn’t get that. But I assume that you are coming to me because you need something. People always do.”

He turned away and pulled up a bound book from a side table before laying it out on the desk. “Why don’t ye point to what ye need and we can work from there?”

I liked this human; he was very organized and good at thinking. I boosted myself up to the desktop, cleaning my wheels as I was in the air. Dirtying his desk would be poor thanks for his help.

Taking my arm, I turned the pages quickly, reading what was an inventory with detailed notes. Eventually, I found a heavy rope description that sounded like it would serve my purpose. After I pointed it out, we spent a few minutes narrowing down the length I needed.

Soon enough, we left the tent and went to another one nearby, where I got a spool of rope. Though I was politely, yet firmly, asked to bring it back when I was finished with it. Before I left, the Quartermaster asked if I would sign for the equipment. I popped out my arm once more and waited for him to hand me a pen. We looked at each other for a few seconds before he sighed. “Ya know what, don’t worry about it. I’ll just make a note. Good luck with whatever yer planning, m’lord.”

I waved goodbye as I carried the spool on my back. It was just small enough that I could balance it on my chassis, even though it did hang out a few feet past me on each side. While quite heavy, I didn’t have many problems moving it.

With my pulleys refurbished and my new rope, I had everything I needed to get the gate into place.