Stygian Prophecies - Prologue 2: Rising Tensions

Titus was feeling that obsolete urge to sit while he pondered the events of the previous night. Of course to sit would be a purely aesthetic choice as his clockwork body never tired from standing, or any other physical activity, and the urge was purely an artifact of his former state of flesh and blood. First the Circle Orboros was here and now this triangle of clockwork angels, acting as scouts due to the speed of their true flight, say that there are Everblight forces in the area. This triangle of angels were lead by Galatea, all women as per the direction of their de facto leader Aurora. Where Aurora was, nobody had been quite sure for some time now. The machinations of the higher command were obscured from Titus, secret knowledge that he had yet to earn. He had to wonder if these two enemies were both here by coincidence or by some intention. The angels knew their current positions and it seemed likely that they would remain in their camp for the night, not wanting to venture farther in the continued unnerving darkness. The clouds had yet to subside, and the moon was still fully obscured, lending them a potential advantage to set up an ambush.

But Titus was not so sure. By what the angels reported, these were Warmongers, blighted ogrun known for their ferocity in battle. And they seemed to be lead by the infamous Gorag Rotteneye. He was thankful that his doubts were hidden by the mask of his mechanical body, for he knew that confidence may be the only tool that could help them. The Ogrun had unfortunately made their camp between Titus' small scouting band and the entrance to the larger Convergence forces underground, and he did not see any reasonable chance to sneak around them. There was a servitor on its way to that entrance now with Titus' message of ill fortunes, but he was skeptical that they could wait for long. No, they must attack while the advantage is theirs.

Titus and Lavinia approached, Lavinia's eradicators now repaired and combat ready, around ten meters apart with the angels flying above, unconcerned that their silhouettes could be picked out of the dark sky. Gorag's camp was just shy of two kilometers from their own, and their attempted silence slowed them down. They made no sounds except the soft murmuring of whirls and clicks from the movement of their bodies. Titus came across the sight of an old brick wall, standing in isolation, covered in vines and ivy with two lit braziers on top. Gorag and his blighted ogrun were near it eating some stew their gobber chef made. Titus and Lavinia each took their place a good distance from them as the angels advanced, landing on the other side of the wall so that the ogrun could not see them. There was a fog creeping in from the west, it seemed to be somehow condensed, not spread thinly across the forest as a morning fog would. The sight of it filled Titus with dread. Lavinia was closest to it, and though her mask was as static as ever, Titus was sure she felt similarly.

Galatea used a signal to order one of her angels to fire the first shot from her binomial beam. She carefully edged to the end of the old wall, the fire light flickering on her mask, fired, making that characteristic thwop sound. With bad luck, the ogrun she was aiming for had hunched over in laughter and the shot just grazed him. There was a split second of silence before Gorag's battle cry reverberated in Titus' auditory receiver and the Warmongers switched immediately to their battle craze. As one coordinated unit they charged directly toward Titus, his position revealed. Lavinia moved her unit of eradicators to enforce their defenses and Titus' reciprocators braced for the oncoming charge.
Their assault was brutal, beyond anything Titus encountered before. When within a single pace, the Warmongers as one leapt at both units, their cleavers high. The eradicators were each slain in single blow, outnumbered and outmuscled. The reciprocators barely did any better, but for every blow that was parried, another came from the flank.

It was over in mere seconds. The last optical image that Titus captured before his body performed an emergency power down was those last three angels, with Galatea in front, charging the rear flank of the Warmongers. Now he's simply in darkness, completely insensate, waiting. Waiting to be powered on again. He hopes the angels were able to avenge him and Lavinia and the rest, but he doubts it. It feels like it's been a long time, but of course he has no way to tell. Titus hopes the servitor made it to the base, so that the greater force knows of these two threats and will come and find him for more details. Surely someone will find them and wake them up soon. Right?

Stygian Prophecies - Prologue 1: Doomed Patrol

The sky was dark, clouds concealed the multitudes of stars above and the moon was fully in its dark phase. Titus was leading a heavy patrol out into the black forest above ground with his other two most trusted Reciprocators, Cleora and Horace. They were joined by Lavinia's Eradicators Theophilus and Octavia. The six heavy clockwork bodies moved quietly through the light brush, near the Great Tree when Titus' optics caught movement. The patrol had been routine, ordered because the Iron Mother suspected they would not be the only ones interested in the node atop which the Great Tree grew. Titus raised his halberd in the air to signal a halt so that his accoustic relay could pick up the air vibrations of whatever caused the movement.

Whatever it was, it was on the other side of the Great Tree. Titus nodded to Lavinia, who knew the protocol at least as well as Titus himself did. The two groups split apart and began to creep forward. Their engines ran silently, powered entirely by their soul vessel, so while they gave off no smoke or the glow of a coal fire, they could only dim the faint magenta glow of their optics so much. It was Cleora who saw the two figures in the night, no more than fifteen meters ahead. Sure that they were already seen, Titus slammed his halberd against his shield making a loud clang which reverberated through the thin forest. The signal received, both Titus and Lavinia willed the gears in their legs to drive them forward toward the enemy. Whoever these figures were, they could not be allowed to escape and reveal the sight of Convergence presence.

They detoured around a pool of water, not knowing its depth, and saw the two figures running to meet them. Surely they must be mad to take on six battle ready heavy infantry as only two? But a quick glance to Titus' left showed their enemies' true plan, an ambush! Theophilus was completely surrounded by savages with some kind of glaive. Theophilus tried to fight them off but their coordination allowed one to score a strike against one of Theophilus' hydraulics in his right leg, releasing its steam and momentarily crippling him. Some bird cawed unnervingly right above Octavia and looked like it shifted into a man who struck her from behind. One of the first two figures came close enough for Titus to see that it was made of stone, confirming his suspicions of who his enemies were: Circle Orboros. The stone figure summoned thousands of tiny stones and sent them toward Theophilus, who could not get out of the way in time. The rain of rocks damaged him so much that the glow from his soul vessel started to fade. The other Orboros man used the same incantation to buckle Octavia down to a knee as she held off the mysterious man behind her.

Seeing this man as the leader of the band, Titus charged at him with his protean polearm charged from his vessel, and struck him down in one fatal strike. The two halves of his body hadn't even hit the ground before Cleora and Horace were at his side. Titus ordered them to assist their brothers and sisters, but he needn't have worried. Octavia openned her protean buckler revealing and furiously tore into the strange man who appeared behind her until he vanished from sight again using presummably the same magic that teleported him there. Lavinia charged into the ambushers with her bucklers in attack mode and avenged Theophilus, slaying a third of the unit within a second. Titus swung at the stone man as he monitored the skirmish, but that slight distraction allowed it to escape long enough to pelt Octavia with stones in her moment of furious triumph, bringing her down.

Horace came around Titus' flank and cornered the stoneshaper enough that they were both able to bring it down, collapsing into a pile of rubble. Lavinia, now with two of her Eradicators in the dirt, slaughtered each of the ambushers even before Cleora could assist her. There was a moment of silence as Titus and Lavinia tuned their accoustic receivers to hear if another ambush was approaching. The forest was silent except for the rustling of the great trees. Titus knew he needed to report this as soon as possible and considered briefly if he had the time to bring Octavia and Theophilus' bodies or just their vessels. The bodies did not look beyond repair and he knew an Enigma Foundry should be near by. Now the only question remained, what to do with the bodies...