Chapter 1: Dreams
The Warehouse had had many titles over the years.
The World's Junk Drawer. America's Attic. Library of Crazy. A World of Endless Wonder.
Arthur Nielsen, Artie for friends, had been there for most of them, perhaps second only to Mrs Frederic. But since the woman had been the Warehouse's caretaker for probably well over a century and still didn't look a day over forty five, she wasn't part of the competition.
It was a competition the "Senior Warehouse Agent" had in the bag, at least since the death of his former partner and friend, James MacPherson.
The ex-agent had burned to ashes from the inside out in Artie's arms only three days ago. It had taken the team every waking second of those three days to go through the artifacts that MacPherson had accumulated for sale, cataloguing each and every one of them and shelving them with Leena's sage advice.
Artifacts, and keeping them safely locked up, was the sole purpose of the Warehouse. Objects imbued with the tangential energy of the right person and the right event at the right time developed powers. Powers too powerful to be out in the open. Not just because people were greedy bastards in general, but every artifact had a downside when you used it; it ranged from harmless to life threatening and potentially world ending.
He still hadn't gotten around to making Leena and Claudia, their hatchling, talk it out, with the latter still being mad at the former for stealing her identity to help MacPherson with the help of an artifact - although, to Leena's defense, she had been under the influence of a mind-controlling artifact herself. That in and of itself screamed forgiveness to him already. You were barely being considered part of the warehouse crew until you had been under the influence of (and/or nearly killed by) an artifact.
"Hey, Artie! No lollygagging, old man," the voice of the Warehouse's newest apprentice tore Artie out of his thoughts... and she sounded way too cheery for this hour of the day. "Come on, it's the last artifact. I'll treat you to cookies later in the B and B if you help me. Deal?"
Artie gave the young redhead a flat stare. "You'd do well to remember that I am still your boss, young lady." He raised his nose and sniffed mock-indignantly. "Also, I'll have you know that I am incorruptible, even in the face of cookies."
"Sure," she snorted and grinned at him, "whatever helps you sleep at night." With that, she turned and made her way to the shrunken pile of artifacts, which, true enough, contained only a single artifact, finally.
"Last item on the list, is… what, exactly? A medieval dollhouse?" she asked as she checked their inventory list. Indeed, before them stood a relatively large dollhouse. Unlike any other dollhouse she had ever seen (not that she had seen many), this house was a little like the Castle Grayskull playset, except way less spooky… and kind of inviting, now that she thought of it.
Artie, having made his way to her by now, smiled slightly. "Not just any dollhouse. This is the first completely finished prototype of Moritz Gottschalk's Fairy-Castle Dollhouse."
Claudia eyed him suspiciously. "I really don't want to, but I know you'll make me ask you about it, anyway; so... what the frak is this thing?"
"Oh, I am so glad you asked," he replied with a sly grin on his face. "Moritz Gottschalk was a German entrepreneur who started making dollhouses in eighteen hundred seventy three. He-"
"I knew it was a trap! Make it stop!" Claudia groaned as she picked up the dollhouse with her purple neutralizer gloves and marched to the aisle Leena had designated on its tag, just to get away from him.
Exploiting the fact that she couldn't outrun him with the added weight from the dollhouse, he decided to torture his apprentice a little longer. "This particular prototype was built in a time where the German people longed for an escape from reality. The social life more or less stagnated and a large part of their time was directed inward, into their family life - it's complicated, with wars and everything - and this nifty little castle was imbued with that longing. I would advise you against trying to catch forty winks anywhere near it, by the way; you'll wake up inside, and the castle gains a new tenant."
Claudia eyed the artifact warily, and she would've held the surprisingly heavy dollhouse further away from her body now; if she could have, that was. Instead, she was left cursing inwardly at the laws of physics in general and lever forces in particular.
She tried to tune out her boss rattling off all those boring facts about an artifact she wanted nothing to do with, and tried to quicken her step, to no avail. Right now he was on a tangent jumping between Napoleon and Bismarck.
She loved Artie dearly, but the tangents he went on so frequently were the bane of her existence. Especially since he knew exactly that it would rile her up. Relief flooded her body when she heaved the dollhouse onto its hopefully final resting place.
She felt the inviting warmth radiate off the fairy castle, but something felt… out of place. Following her own gut instinct, she started removing the latches that kept the two halves closed.
Artie stopped his rambling the instant he saw Claudia messing with the latches. "Relax, Grumps," she said without looking at him, "you said it is activated by falling asleep in its vicinity, so opening it up shouldn't do anything. I just got a bad feeling about this thing, that's all."
"It's an artifact. I'd be more worried if you didn't have a bad feeling about it," he shot back drily. "Now stop messing with it and come back to the B and B with me. I think Leena wanted to make oatmeal scotchies this afternoon."
With the final latch opened, she looked back and grinned at the senior agent. "Too late. Let's see what has gotten this puppy in such a funk..."
Artie narrowed his eyes at his apprentice, but couldn't help risking a look over her shoulder once she separated the two halves. "Now that you're done not listening to me, would you mind telling me what you've found, perhaps?"
"Err… a doll? Out of cloth, sewn." Claudia frowned at the dollhouse. This was far more normal than what she had expected to find. She also didn't expect Artie to push her to the side and close the dollhouse on his own.
"Sorry, Artie," she said perplexed, as he wordlessly made his way back to his office.
He held open the door for her and shut it quickly once she was through. Claudia started feeling antsy; Artie was almost always calm and collected. If he acted like this, something had to be really wrong.
"Claudia, I need you to do something for me," he said softly, to which she could only nod wordlessly. "Forget that you saw anything inside the dollhouse."
She came closer to Artie and eyed him suspiciously. "Why? What does it mean?"
He gave her a hard stare. "It means that someone has already used the dollhouse and is trapped inside."
Claudia could swear that she had just heard her jaw clatter to the ground. "Come again?"
"You heard me just fine," he replied with a flat chuckle. "Last time I checked, you had ears." With that he started rummaging through stacks of papers on his desk.
"Well, how do we get them out?" she half-yelled. Sometimes, Artie could be really infuriating.
The older agent stopped in his tracks and looked up at her. "We don't." And back to his stack of paper he went.
So goshdarn infuriating! "But-"
Artie's fists slammed into the desk, sending files flying. " There. Are. No. Buts. Do you understand?" he told her and glared at her, to which she could only answer with a silent nod. His glare softened a bit at her response. "We have no idea who, or what, is inside that dollhouse. Is it another Alice? Or the original Krampus? The chances of anything trapped in an artifact being benevolent are slim to none. We at the Warehouse do not- no, can not, take those chances."
"Okay," she meekly gave back and stared at her feet, probably waiting for him to finish whatever he was doing. Artie gave her a look that a parent would give their child after yelling too much.
He stopped rummaging through the stack of files, cleared part of the table and sat down on the newly freed spot. He adjusted his glasses, only to take them back off and cleaning them intently.
"Look," he started, "I know this isn't easy for you. The artifacts you know of that trap people have been surprisingly good to us. Rheticus' compass gave us your brother back, but we knew the artifact well; and when Myka was trapped in Lewis Carroll's Mirror, we could confirm her identity. But our streak won't hold forever." He let out a small sigh and stood up from the table. "Now there's only one thing left."
Claudia frowned in confusion. "What?"
She watched Artie sling his jacket over his arm and walk to the door leading out through the newly rebuilt umbilicus. As he stepped through, he looked back at her with a smirk on his face. "First one to Leena's gets twice as many cookies."
With that the door slammed shut, and Claudia heard his footsteps scurry off from behind the closed door. "Hey! So not fair!" she shouted after him before giving chase, a silent curse (and a smile) on her lips.