His children had learned fast, that was certain.
Scalpel had paused in his extensive workload in the creation of simpler forms to overlook his first creations in their cursory activities, and he had been amazed at the rapidity in which they regained their basic knowledge of the world. Already he saw the two of them tear their way through an amassed number of accumulated text books on varied subjects such as occultism, science, history and religion which he had gathered here many years ago. The improved process seemed to have ensured that they learned voraciously, each conversation becoming ever more developed and complex, more advanced and beautiful. However, despite their mental aptitude, they showed a singular loyalty which overrode their ever action, every pattern of thought, every burst of magical energy which now coursed through their living, breathing, warm flesh.
Loyalty to the Father.
Scalpel had never considered himself an apt choice of parent, he was not prime material for it, regardless of his long history of care for Honey Puzzle, he remained her ever protective uncle not a father to her. But now he had his “sons”, his children not borne of biology and the flesh, but of science, brass, and steel, to care for… and he felt familial loyalty to them which none of his real family had ever truly inspired, asides from his neice. It was the duty of the Father to protect and assist his children, and so he would fill that duty, despite them not being children of his flesh and blood.
They are not my flesh and blood… but something more, something perfect
And so he felt something he rarely felt before… Pride.
Turning back to the masses of bodies sitting on the various tables in front of him he considered the passage of these last few days more clearly, wondering at the tremendous progress he had made. Thanks to the quick and able nature of Nocturne, he had been able to make the adaption’s to deceased flesh with increasing speed and propensity. They had acquired more bodies by means of scourging the local areas of bandits and highway ponies, which coursed across the landscape like so many plague infested rats. With the assistance of the goliath enraged body mass of Grunge, the bandits had fallen like wheat before a scythe and his experiments had continued. Meanwhile the two entities which he had taken to call “The Risen” had grown massively in maturity and knowledge and seemed to share his interest in the augmentation of flesh. He had however, been unwilling to entirely reveal the details of the process unless it slipped out of his hooves, but in time he might entrust such activities to the chosen few in time.
The entities he was currently in the motions of making right now where a much simpler and duller form of his prime creations, they would merely be required for basic duties, including defence, manual labour, and industry. Before him lay their forms, macabre in design, but mostly flesh asides from select parts of metal and copper, stitched together with wire and thread. Their lower jaws had been removed and replaced with a series of knifes, pinchers, and welding devices, and their heads caved in, eyeless and filled with a almost arachnid series of glass lenses and tubes to replace them. But their most noticeable attribute was their singular hairlessness, genderless bodies, their huge mechanical claws and a long heavy, flexible cable which extended to the central device of control.
The device in question was a long cylindrical tube like construction, distinguished by two pillar like tops which connected the mass of wires to it. It looked relative nondescript on the outside, but was coursing with the same occult workings he had attributed to his finer subjects. This was the generator, a crude device that ensured a constant supply of magic to keep the creatures active, as well as mood control magic which would alter their state based on the orders given to the device by its creator. It was fitted with two levitation spells in order that it would follow the connected host effortlessly wherever they were directed, even the wire was enchanted not to trail or catch, ensuring relative mobility for the creatures. Each generator could support ten of these things, and with the luck they had gained recently in laying waste to numerous bandit camps, they now had the better part of forty of these easily designable workers.
Of course this was just for the basic model for industry and labour… the true fighting design was a little differently. Clad in leather trench coats, with a large Black Sun sigils in white attached to their backs, and heads mostly covered in Sallet design helmets, only broken by a series of wiring blades and spikes extending from the mangled jaw that was terrible to behold, the fighting units were fearsome entities. Both front hooves had been replaced with metal blades, and their back hooves reinforced with mechanical supports which would allow them to walk on two hooves as well as four with ease, as well as springs which allowed them a deadly jumping attack of flailing blades and screeching knives. Like their labouring brothers, they had attached to them an immense cable and a generator, but unlike the basic drone they could separate themselves for a an hour from the main generator and use what was effectively a portable battery to power themselves for a time, when the power grew low, the creature would redirect itself back to the device using a minor locator spell, and recharge. A bonus feature of the production of these war machines when they had tested them had been the psychological effect on their enemies. The inequine screams of absolute rage as they changed to an aggressive setting, made guttural by machines and magic had utterly terrified the bandits they had fought, and Scalpel had noted with keen precision as the bandits had fled, only to be cut down by and slaughtered by his forces as they sped forward with unnatural speed and agility, and ripped them apart with extreme prejudice.
It had been like watching a pack of manticores.
They had lost the upper levels of thinking, the personality, their memories and emotions, but the basic instinct remained, and the capacity, both to understand commands and learn predatory tactics remained to a degree. Already he had observed changes in the way they dealt with their prey, not only on the field were they grew to learn the best spots to test their blades, but also in their return through the secret passages to the forest with more bodies for his experiments, where he had noted a lessening of the mangling, not by request, but by their seeming understanding of his difficulties with such corpses. Still, at best they remained highly intelligent predators, with basic understanding, true, logical, intelligent life remained only in the Risen.
Whilst he had continued work in making this strange force, he had not abandoned his studies into that of achieving divinity, but he knew he was far from able to create the conditions of apotheosis in his current situation and with his immediate resources. Each year he got closer to the truth, each year he got closer to achieving his dreams… but each year he felt further and further away.
The destruction of his labs, the scarcity of knowledge and the occult books he required, the missing tools from which he would tear open the veins of true magic all lead to an ever distant horizon for the completion of his work. Without some immediate change in his situation he would never truly breach the gateway to true unadulterated divinity. Still, something did lead him to consider it a continued possibility…
The Dreams.
They had become stronger and stronger as time had passed, and every now and then it seemed as if he was hit like lightening by jolts of almost unfathomable information even in his waking hours. He barely understood most of it, but what he did comprehend seemed almost revolutionary to his studies. He did not understand where it came from however… had some entity connected with him and was now flooding his mind with information? Or was it something else entirely? His smile of appreciation faded slowly as he watched his Risen, replaced by one of intense thought…
What awaited him in the service of the machine god?
