"I jump into my rocket 'cause I'm ready to blast!
I don't know where I'm goin', but I'm goin' there fast!
Don't know if there ain't a future, but there isn't a past!
Make it like the first time, so it won't be the last!
All I wanna' do is everything that you ask!
Don't ya' know I'm really getting' in the mood!
Got the jitter fingers and their ready to POP!
Baby, when we get there then the JOINT'S GONNA HOP!
Got the right feelin', baby, straight to the top!
Girl, you make my heart start beatin', flippity-flopp!
Baby, can't you tell I'm getting' in the mood!
>In the mood!
The joint is jumpin'!
>In the groove!
We're on to somethin'!
>In the mood!
The band is pumpin!
SWINGIN' AND A-SWAYIN', AND ROCK N' ROLLIN'!
>Come on, now!
We're gonna party!
>I know how!
Yeeeeah, to get it started!
>In the mood!
I'm good to boogey!
PLAY THAT JIVIN' MUSIC, NOW!"
"Shadow, shadow"
Installment two
Milyn gazed quizzically at the indigo schematic that lay before her.
Upon it, in scribbled white ink, was a landstrider, each individual part that conspired to complete it marked and outlined.
Grabbing it from the table it rested upon, Milyn held it out, studied a moment more, then lowered as to see the actual project that stood before her. Devlin, dirtied in oil and various sorts of lubricants, stood beside the goofy looking machine, a hand rested on its base.
"Mmmkay, so we've put spacers in the legs to help it hold up the extra weight, right, Devvie?"
She asked suddenly, returning her gaze back to the blueprints.
In response, Devlin knelt down toward its legs and gave them a once over.
"Yup." She answered, prodding the said part with a screwdriver.
"And we've added extra hydraulics to give it a lil' more giddyup?"
"Sure did."
"And the body? There was a lot of modification that needed to be done there..."
"Well, the engine's been compressed and relocated to a space between the legs, rather than directly underneath the driver's area. The base as whole has been extended outward to four feet, rather than three and a half, AND, a back has been added to the seat, behind which we put the exhaust pipes...looks pretty good to me."
"What about the eyes? The bulbs that were in there before were pretty dull..." In response to Milyn's next question, a spectacle of vividly bright light hit her directly in the face, causing her to nearly topple over backward.
"...okay..." She picked up after regaining her composure.
"That made the grade, once you count out my burnt retinal cells."
"So...you think it's safe to get on?"
Milyn laughed at her servant's question.
"Safe to get on? Devvie, I'll have you know that before I picked you up in Shadowglen, I made a profession out of taming the 'wildest' steeds!"
Devlin's face exhibited intrigue. "Really?"
"Nope." Milyn hopped on the seat and crossed her legs. "Not really, I lied. You know, you worry me sometimes, Devvie. For all I've read and experienced, Night elves are supposed to be the wise, mysterious species of the Alliance...an enigma to humans..." She trailed to focus a more intent stare into the Altmer's pupiless eyes.
"I wonder…" The two words came with much more labor, "…if all of the time you've spent around me may have made you a little bit…special."
and she finished on a light-hearted, if not stupid, note.
Rather than come to her defense, Devlin giggled. She had been around Milyn for some number of years, and never once in that time could recall seeing her act in any manner other than this.
Primarily because of that, she had little trouble admitting her own personality was bent quite a bit from that of the common Night elf.
And in the long run, she was content with exchanging a life sustained off battle that so many others were having to lead, for being the servant of a syndicate operative. None too savory from an unspecified standpoint, but her time with Milyn's prodigious mind granted her a unique character of her own, and allowed the time and dedication necessary to become a master of many different professions; engineering, alchemy, herbalism, and crafting just to name a few.
Yes, that, Devlin concluded, was far better than being a luckless Night elf warrior, one of many, caught in a detestable, meaningless struggle with the Horde.
"Well..." Milyn's voice caused her to lift her head.
"Think we should get Cocoa to give her a little test-run? Just to make sure it's safe..."
Devlin relented--poor Cocoa.
The Deadmines was, in essence, a pure subculture of Westfall, and sure as that was, there were numerous people living within whom were charged with nothing more than the duty of keeping the chambers tidy.
Cocoa was the housemaid for Milyn's chamber—
"He's gay as a pigeon bath." Devlin recalled Milyn declaring, "But he's an okay petunia, I like him."
The rogue was not inaccurate in her statement--from the moment the two met, she took a prompt liking to Cocoa, which subsequently qualified him for a vast array of test runs, crack-pot experiments and other bizarre trials, most of which he reluctantly agreed to, and almost ALWAYS endured a bad result.
Devlin recalled the last favor Milyn had asked Cocoa to partake in--sampling a potion the two of them created that, in theory, was capable of putting its applicant into a deep trance of sleep for days.
Instead, he got a strange, severe case of the trots, and didn't emerge from his room for full weeks.
"...Are you sure he'd do it?" Came a doubtful reply.
"Why wouldn't he?"
Milyn quickly cued into the look she was given, and picked back up, "Oh, I'm sure he's forgotten all about that little mis-trial. Besides, he's practically like a brother to us..." Her words trailed at that thought.
"...Our very, very gay brother."
"Maybe you should say sister?"
"Yes, sister, thank you. He has a moral obligation to us, just as we have with him. But I need a vote, here, Devvie, so c'mon, out with it!"
Devlin responded with a light shrug of her shoulders.
"If it's what you want to do, sure."
"Alright!" Milyn spun on her heel, and started toward the door.
"Then let's fetch our guinea pi--assistant, and get this show on the road!"
"Absolutely not."
Cocoa stood before a thick black cauldron, with one hand on his hip, and the other loosely grasped to a wooden spoon, which he stirred about in the cauldron's contents in a less than vigorous manner.
Wearing a silk night robe and a golden anklet, he hit the bull's-eye on that which Milyn described him as.
The rogue's shoulders slumped forward after his response.
"This is because of that potion thing, isn't it?" She guessed.
The dark skinned maid stopped stirring altogether and let the spoon dip into the cauldron.
"You know it's more than just that, stretch." His fingers raised as he begun to count off all of the less than desirable things Milyn had put him through, "First, there was that 'Accelerating the human thought process through assimilating magnetic polarities' thing you insisted on dragging my Pappy into..."
"Oh, come ON, I needed more than one person to correctly conduct that experiment, and your dad was more than happy to oblige! Besides, I got all of the bad things that encurred from it fixed."
"Tell that to my Pappy." Cocoa grated without missing a beat.
"He's still looking for a surgeon that can get his wedding band out of his forehead. THEN, there was the 'mind-reading with sound-waves passing through a dense gas' crack that singed my hair right down to the roots! I looked like Buckwheat for the a month!"
"Hey, now you can't blame me for that flop, it was more than logical. Trepanning was considered a pseudo-science because people 'insisted' on trying to do it with a chisel while the subject was asleep. Sound-waves need a medium to travel through, and they're received by vibrations in the ear. How was 'I' to know that when I used the megaphone to produce a wave that the nitrogen serving as a medium would...combust..."
Milyn protested once more, prompting an exasperated sigh from Cocoa.
"My point is every time I let you drag me into one of these goofy experiments, 'I' get the short-end of the stick when they go belly-up, and end up getting mauled, or caught on fire, or just 'blown up'. I'm sorry, sweetie, but I just can't do it anymore."
Finally, the rogue hung her head in defeat, allowing Cocoa to resume his stirring, though the exchange was carried further by Devlin's off-topic query, "What're you cooking, Cocoa?"
"Oh, the sauce for an old recipe that the girls in my family have passed down from generation to generation."
He answered without averting from his work.
The altmer leaned forward and wafted the scent to her nostrils.
"It smells delectable."
"Are you kidding? It's to die for. The sauce alone takes two hours to properly simmer, but you know how hungry the boys get after a day of pillaging and raping."
"Hey, Cocoa, tell y'what…" Milyn shoved herself into the conversation, "You help me just this one last time, and I'll introduce you to some of the guys that work the industrial quarter."
A promising wink followed, "They sweat like pigs and never wear shirts!"
Cocoa raised a hand to his chest and donned a vaguely insulted look.
"Girl, you think I couldn't get a man all by myself down in this dump?"
He turned around and continued stirring.
"With all of that 'Jolly Roger' stuff going on in the chief's ship-docks, this place's like a Pride Parade marching through the tunnels everyday."
Milyn balled a fist then ran it into her other hand.
"DRAT it!" and proceeded to retreat to her chamber, but was sure to remark in a more than audible voice, "I officially disown you as my brother, Cocoa!"
Cocoa held little reaction, but Devlin called after her, "You mean sister?"
"Sister…whatever!"
Now, the maid decided to make his move.
"You're still coming to my Pappy's dinner party, Sunday, right?"
Milyn froze in her spot. After a long pause, there came a frail, "…Yes." Followed by the slam of a door.
"Woow…" Devlin said sheepishly after things settled down to some degree.
"That might be the closest I've ever seen her come to upset."
"Ah." Cocoa waved her remark away.
"You know Milyn, she couldn't take a heart attack seriously. She'll get over it in about twenty minutes, guaranteed."
"Yeah, you're probably right…" She nodded. "But I should get back to her side…if she's going to try riding that strider, she'll probably need some first aid on standby."
"Good idea, sweetheart. That girl'd be a mess without you."
Rather than verbally thank the maid for his compliment, Devlin leaned forward, pecked him on the cheek, and retreated to Milyn's chamber door.
Less than three feet from her destination, she was greeted by a series of noises. The acute hearing she was blessed with dubbed them as the sounds of a running machine.
The occasional release of exhaust, a dull, whirring hum, and over everything else, a constant thump, as though something were hitting the ground in precise five second intervals…
Devlin stepped away from the door, having an unusual boding feeling about the next events, and sure as she predicted them, they fell into place.
The heavy door bulged outward quite suddenly, then burst off the hinges. It would gain an impressive gauge of velocity before smashing into the wall directly across from the chamber entranceway.
Devlin stumbled backward and fell onto her butt when the landstrider shortly followed along the same path, Milyn straddled upon the base.
A pair of built-in straps on the sides of the neck were the only things keeping her even remotely attached.
"CLEAR A PATH, DEVVIE!" Her voice prevailed amongst the explosion of distracting racket as the strider threw both legs forward and rebounded off the wall.
Devlin's natural reflexes didn't fail her as she scrambled out of the way sheer seconds before the machine landed on the space she once occupied with a booming THUD!
Rather than recoil or slow in the slightest bit, the strider mindlessly whirled around and tore off, further into the cavernous corridor.
"Uh…oh…" The words hardly surpassed a whisper as Devlin climbed to her feet. One quick gaze over her shoulder was all it took to see the crowd that had gathered behind her.
Ignoring their jumbled mass of awed remarks and queries, she begun pursuit with as much speed as she could muster.
The corridor ended in a sloppy three-way fork, not including the way from which she had come.
Devlin ventured into the center of the room and looked quizzically down the middle passage. She saw nothing that indicated the strider's presence; no prints on the ground or traces of exhaust.
Just as she was preparing to look into her other two options, the faulty mount's symphony of operation hit her ears anew.
She looked up to see her quarry headed straight for her.
A yelp of surprise escaped her as she spun on her heel and dove back into the center of the fork.
A moment later, a pair of big, clawed, iron feet thudded by, then proceeded past her.
Knowing this was her best opportunity, Devlin recovered to her feet and took off in a dead sprint for the steam-driven terror.
Two feet shy of its rear, she decided to attempt contact.
"MILYN, SHUT IT OFF! THE CHIEF'S GONNA' KILL US IF HE CATCHES WIND OF THIS!"
"I DUNNO' HOW!" Came a prompt reply.
"WHAT?" Devlin felt her voice go shrill. "YOU MEAN WE SPENT ALL THAT TIME MODIFYING THIS STUPID THING AND FORGOT TO CHECK THE BRAKES?"
Milyn smirked behind her mask; her servant wasn't even in any sort of danger, and she sounded more panicked at the moment.
This wasn't to say that she, herself wasn't scared crapless, but for all of her bluster of nonchalance and only accepting protocol when the goings got rough, she wasn't about to let it show.
And that subsequently caused her logical, no nonsense style of frame of mind that she rarely implemented to try its hand at the predicament.
This was a bi-ped machine, nothing like a tank.
Tanks have pads that primarily serve as the brakes, because they're on treads. Therefore it was logical to assume that there would be some other sort of simple machine on a landstrider that would kill the hydraulics, or stop some cog from turning, or something!
"Gah!" Milyn spat as she struggled to stay put on the base.
"DEVVIE, WHERE ARE WE GOING?"
The answer, as misfortune would continue to behold, wasn't on the list of things she wanted to hear- -"THE KITCHEN!"
Beads of sweat begun to break out on the sides of her head.
This plan was going rotten, and fast.
Meanwhile in a corridor not too far from Milyn's locale, someone else's plans for the evening had already gone pretty damned bitter, and were rapidly getting worse.
A door that led into a section of the industrial quarter swung outward.
Behind it, Chief Edwin VanCleef rose his foot to proceed past the threshold, but stopped abruptly.
"I beg your pardon, my Liege." He bowed his head politely and stepped back, allowing a middle-aged woman that donned an orange bandanna upon her face to step through the doorway first.
"I would appreciate it, Edwin…" The woman begun as she traipsed into the hallway, "If you didn't call me 'Liege'. We, The Syndicate have not officially touched base on whether or not we will welcome your little…gang into our arms and I have to be honest, after having this tour of your headquarters, I harbor some doubts…"
Edwin winced inwardly at the last half of this remark, feeling his best efforts unravel.
For the past few years he had been doing everything within his power to convince The Syndicate, another primarily human-based Cartel, to collaborate their numbers with that of the Brotherhood.
Most every letter he sent outlining his pleas were either never replied to, or sent back with "RETURN TO SENDER" scrawled across the front (One such subject had a hand with a risen middle finger doodled underneath).
BUT finally two weeks ago, the Chief's prayers had been answered when the Courier whom operated for the Brotherhood delivered a letter marked for him.
In it the President of The Syndicate announced that he was planning to expand into Westfall, and now may have been a beneficial time to join forces.
Whatever joy Edwin felt at reading that paragraph was quickly dashed when his eyes met with the next sentence. Much smaller in size, it read that before anything could be finalized, one of their officers would be dispatched to conduct an inspection of the Deadmines, and its residents, as to ensure that this venture wouldn't wind up being a flop.
Now, here it was. Two weeks later, and the 'Officer', an over-the-hill Battle axe that had been born and raised in Dun Morgouh, was proving to be more than he could stand.
The tour that he and three of his most trusted 'right-hand men' prepared had completely failed to bring even one compliment or positive remark to light from the old woman's lips, and she carried with her the most unimpressionable look Edwin could ever remember seeing.
Indeed, his hopes were unraveling, like a cheap, unraveling…thing.
"Well, I'm sure you will be glad to know, Madame…" He tried once more while leading her down the corridor, "that we've just recently cut our ties with those brutish River-Hide Gnolls, and I have my central intelligence agent working tenaciously to…finish the matter, for good."
"I would be." She replied coldly. "But after seeing your industrial quarter, I'm afraid it doesn't move me."
Edwin stopped dead in his tracks.
"Ex…Excuse me?"
The shock of this particular barb proved too much for his 'content' disguise. The massive Industrial Quarter of the Deadmines was, as far as he could figure, his best bet of impressing this old biddy.
She stopped to face him, and arched an eyebrow.
"Goblins, Edwin?" Her tone carried a hint of disdain.
"Honestly, do you insist on welcoming every backwater, freeloading snake of a species into your number? Don't you have any standards at all?"
"I…I…"
She shook her head at Edwin's response.
"No, after seeing this dump, I suppose I shouldn't expect too much from you. The Defias Brotherhood is little more than a joke from what I've seen here, today. I will, however, tell you of this place's one redeeming quality…"
The Chief's heart skipped a beat as the word came out, "Please..."
"The Kitchen."
And it just as quickly sunk like a brick.
"Would you mind leading me back there? I find your little cook quite humorous."
A deep sigh dispersed as he replied, "As you wish, Madame…"
"Back so soon, Devlin?" Cocoa turned from his kettle to greet the winded Altmer, whom had just arrived at the foot of the yawning entranceway.
"No…" She huffed, "No time for small talk, Cocoa, we've got to clear the kitchen!"
The maid let his spoon fall into the cauldron and rushed to Devlin's side as she collapsed to her knees.
"Sweetie, you looked exhausted, what happened?"
"Milyn…strider…coming this way!"
Before Cocoa could ask what the Hell she was talking about, the very subject of his question made its appearance, halfway down the hall.
"What…the blazes?"
…It was at this inevitable moment that Edwin VanCleef and his special 'guest' made their entrance into the kitchen, through another frameway at the other end of the room.
When Devlin caught sight of them, she realized the hopelessness of the situation.
Rather than attempt any sort of warning, the words "Oh, shit!" emerged as she grabbed Cocoa and dove to the ground for cover.
Edwin, for his part, was completely oblivious to the disaster that was on the verge of striking the kitchen, till the familiar voice of his central intelligence agent projected out, "GAIN WAY, CHIEF!"
The sight that greeted him when he looked up held the distinction of the most horrifying shock of his life.
What he could only have described as a big, mechanical ostrich shot into the kitchen, and bounded over a counter, subsequently setting it on a direct collision course for him.
This was simply too much for the Chief, and was proven when he threw his arms over his head, dropped into a crouch and let loose a scream that mirrored that of a small girl. (He would later come to pin it on Cocoa whom, for his own safety, never disclosed the truth)
"AAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!" Edwin's shriek pierced every ear present, even after Milyn located the brake lever and hastily jerked back on it.
He would not return to an upright position till the machine's operation was completely killed.
Even so, he was shot for a remark, or a demand to know what was going on, or even an attempt to look like he wasn't phased.
All the Chief could do was stare in awe at that which had very nearly claimed his life.
…And this bearing was wholesomely shared around the kitchen, save one person in particular.
"Uh…Hey, Chief!" Milyn greeted in a cheerful, yet unsteady voice.
"You'll never guess what I've accomplished on this fine evening!"
"What…is the MEANING OF THIS?" The Syndicate officer cut in with a bellow loud enough to wake the dead.
"YOU!" Her finger pointed toward Milyn. "Who the Hell are you?"
"Wa?" The rogue asked innocently while putting a hand to her chest.
She failed to see Edwin's hectic gesturing to say nothing before replying, "My name's Milyn, and I'm the central intelligence agent for the Defias Brotherhood, but who are you, and why does my boss look so afraid of you?"
Rather than answer, the Officer repeated, "Central intelligence agent…"
Then rounded on Edwin.
"THIS is the person you assigned to deal with the River-Hide Gnolls?"
"OH, well you know what they say, Madame…" Edwin quickly straightened himself up, "variety is the spice of life, and those who seem rather, uh…impulsive tend to get the job done rather effectively. I'm sure when it comes to something as detestably unsophisticated as Gnolls, standard operating procedure isn't all that…"
"Uhm, Milyn?" Devlin whispered while approaching the strider's side.
"I think we might've gotten caught up in something big, here…"
"I agree."
"Perhaps we should leave?"
Milyn gulped as the Officer begun to cut Edwin down, mid-sentence.
"You're readin' me like a book, Devvie. Let's get Cocoa and jet."
Edwin nor the Officer managed to avert their attention from each other for even a second.
Had they done so, they would have caught Devlin, Milyn and Cocoa silently fleeing the scene.
I GOT ALL MY BEST THREADS AND MY FAVORITE SHOES!
NOW IT'S MY TIME TO PLAY, GOT NO LOVE FOR THE BLUES!
UNDERSTAND WHAT I'M SAYIN', OH YA' BETTER GET BACK! GOT NO TIME TO WASTE, 'CAUSE I'M ONE HIP CAT!
AND WHEN I START WORKIN', I CRUISE LIKE DYNAFLOW!
AND WHEN I'M IN THE MOOD I SPREAD IT ALL AROUND!
I MIGHT BE THE MAN ONE HIP PARTY ON THE RUN!
AND WHEN YA' SEE ME COMIN', JUST CALL ME BIG KING FUN!
"And when the party's over, I just know where to go!
Where the after-hours people boogey, you know!
I wanna hang awhile, where the light's really low!
I whisper to my baby, and we're takin' it slow!
And baby if you're ready, then I'm ready to BLOW!
Baby, know I'm really getting' in the mood!
>In the mood!
The joint is jumpin'!
>In the groove!
We're on to somethin'!
>In the mood!
The band is pumpin'!
SWINGING, AND A-SWAYING AND ROCK N' ROLLIN'!
>Come on, now!
We're gonna party!
>I know how!
Yeeeeah, to get it started!
>In the mood!
I'm good to boogey!
PLAY THAT JIVIN' MUSIC, NOW!"