Esmeralda: Fontaine 2

A/N: I specifically made the combat stats vague as I have no way of knowing how balanced it will be. The important part is the abilities themselves, not the numbers.

In her workshop at the Fontaine Research Institute, Esmeralda threw down the book that she was reading and groaned. It was, like the others, useless to her. When she had asked for information about the Clockwork Meka a few days ago, she had been pleased to be given quite a stack of books and papers. She was significantly less pleased to see that many of them were simply posters and propaganda, and outright annoyed that even the books only spoke of their physical design, not their internal mechanisms. Useless.

Ideally, she needed to take one of the Meks apart and examine how it works - that was the way she learned best and the method that she used to understand the technology of Khaenri'ah. However, the Research Institute did not have any spares with which they were willing to part. Another option was to attack and capture a malfunctioning one in the wild, but that would likely cause catastrophic damage, rendering it unusable.

So if she could neither get one from the Institute nor the outskirts of Fontaine, then she would have to go to the source. The Clockwork Meka had to be produced somewhere, and a quick check revealed that they all came from a single factory - the Fortress of Meropide, Fontaine's biggest prison.

Information about that place, too, was scarce. That made sense to Esmeralda - it was a high-security prison, after all. There were no books about its inner workings, but perhaps an officer might know more. She had been in her workshop for too long, anyway. It was time to take a walk.

Esmeralda easily found a guard on duty outside the local coffee shop - a Melusine. A little apprehensively, she approached the creature - it was short, with horn-like head protrusions, mitten-like hands, and stubby feet. It was, Esmeralda decided, really cute.

"Hello," Esmeralda greeted.

"Good morning," the Melusine, whose name, Menthe, was on her nametag, responded. "How can I help you?"

"I'm Esmeralda. Can I ask you a few questions?"

Menthe nodded. "Sure! I'll do my best to answer."

Things were going well so far. Feeling a little more optimistic, Esmeralda began questioning. "Well, I've heard that the main supplier of the Clockwork Meks is the Fortress of Meropide. Is it true?"

"Yes, the Fortress builds the Meks that you see around the nation."

"Great. Can you tell me more about the Fortress?"

"The Fortress of Meropide? It is Fontaine's prison, although that may not be the most accurate term. Criminals are sent there to serve their sentences."

"And they help build the Meks?"

Menthe paused. "I'm afraid I'm not familiar with the workings of the Fortress."

"Ah, that's fine. So... What kind of crimes would get someone sent there?"

"Well, any crime severe enough to warrant imprisonment would probably land the person who convicted it there for a while."

Esmeralda nodded. "Alright, thanks, Menthe."

"Happy to help," the officer responded, waving as Esmeralda went to the coffee shop and ordered a drink. She took her juice to a table in the corner and activated her Akasha Terminal. Although the Akasha System was deactivated, it could still be used for ranged communication with a particular friend.

"Daisy, you there?"

"I hear you," came the response immediately.

Esmeralda smiled. "I've found some clues. I'm going to have to pay a visit to the Fortress of Meropide."

"The prison? They do not accept visitors."

"I know."

There was a long pause. "Esmeralda, I know what you are thinking. Do not do it."

"It'll be fine. Shouldn't be more than a few weeks."

"This is unnecessary," Daisy insisted. "Why not just ask Aether? I am sure that he has the connections to get you a tour."

"There's no need to bother him."

Daisy could not make any facial expressions, but Esmeralda nonetheless felt her glare despite the distance currently between them. "You would rather be arrested than meet up with Aether?"

"That... you know, you're right. Alright, that's the plan then. Let's go find Aether."

As expected, Aether was willing to help Esmeralda get a visit to the Fortress of Meropide. It was also only a little surprising that he personally knew the Head Administrator of the prison, Duke Wirothesley and would bring Esmeralda to meet him directly.

Esmeralda met Aether behind the Opera Epiclese, where the main entrance to the Fortress of Meropide lay. When she got there, he was already waiting for her.

"Hey, Aether! Sorry to keep you waiting," Esmeralda greeted.

"It's alright. Follow me, I'll show you into the Fortress."

With that, Aether stepped onto the lift waiting for them. Esmeralda followed him onto it, and it began to descend. As the sky shrank into a small circle overhead, Esmeralda wondered if what she was doing was a bad idea. It'll be fine, she decided. With Aether's help, there was nothing to be worried about.

"Esmeralda, why are you interested in the Fortress, anyway? Is it the Meks?" Aether asked.

Esmeralda nodded. "Yup. The Meks are constructed in there, right? I want to take a closer look."

"Well, I can arrange that. I know the Duke - I'm sure that he won't mind you looking around a bit, especially if you can give him some feedback on it."

"Well, I can't promise that I will be able to improve their designs, but I'm pretty sure that I can upgrade their intelligence - right now, the Meks that I saw in the wilderness seem quite mindless. I can definitely change that," Esmeralda confidently declared.

"Great. Given your experience, it shouldn't be too hard to convince him."

"Great. Is there anything else I should know?"

"Well, the Fortress is a prison. You should be careful in there, but as you're working directly for the Duke, you should be fine. Good thing that you decided to look for me instead of getting yourself arrested. That wouldn't have turned out well," Aether commented.

Esmeralda laughed nervously. "Yeah... Daisy managed to convince me about that."

Aether gave her the 'seriously?' side-eye. "Well, that's good. The Fortress of Meropide is not a safe place, Esmeralda. The Duke had made things better, but it is still full of criminals. Don't try anything foolish in there."

"Weren't you a prisoner in there for a while?"

"Yes. And that's why I can warn you about this. You should be fine under Wirothesley's protection, but make sure to keep your eyes out. Not all the prisoners are bad people... but there are still murderers and slavers in there."

Esmeralda gulped. Now that she was about to walk into a den of criminals without Daisy's help, she was having doubts. Those doubts were quickly dispelled by the promise of unlimited access to Fontaine's unique Meks.

Soon enough, the lift reached the bottom, and, judging by it speed and duration of the ride, it was quite deep underground. Aether walked confidently into the room ahead and Esmeralda followed more cautiously until they came to the reception desk. For the biggest prison in the nation, it was a surprisingly normal place.

"Hello, Madeline. Can we go in? I need to talk to Wirothesley," Aether casually said, as though he was asking to enter a common office instead of the Fortress of Meropide.

Madeleine, the receptionist, looked up at him. "Do you have an appointment with him?"

"Well... No. It's not urgent. Can you inform him that I'm here?"

Madeline sighed. "Fine. Go in and try not to cause any trouble."

As Aether and Esmeralda walked into the prison, she could not help but examine the area. An underwater prison. No wonder it was so effective. Anyone who tried to escape would either have to leave through the front door where rows of Guardmeks were stationed, or break through and attempt to swim to the surface. Without proper gear, that would be a short-lived plan. Overall, an impressive design.

Then she entered the main administrative area of the Fortress and gasped. Above her, hanging from clamps attached to conveyor belts, there were a large number of Meks. Even a cursory glance showed that they were incomplete, but Esmeralda's experience and her visor's ability to magnify her sight meant that she could notice more details. Intact circuitry and power systems - in theory, the Meks were functional, albeit at low efficiency.

Esmeralda realized that she was staring when Aether nudged her. With a knowing grin, he said, "You can explore later. Come on, let's go see Wirothesley."

Aether led her to the center of the Fortress and the two of them entered the Duke's office. Wirothesley was there, waiting for them, with cups of freshly brewed tea. He was quite an intimidating man, and Esmeralda was happy to sit aside and allow Aether to do the bulk of the talking while she occasionally answered some questions.

Soon enough, Wirothesley came to a decision. He would allow her to stay in the Fortress for a few weeks as a guest, keeping her away from the majority of the prisoners. She would work on improving the efficiency of the factory as well as the Meks' intelligence alongside their current overseer.

He introduced himself as Thibert and seemed intelligent enough, so Esmeralda was excited to start.

She took that back. Whoever had first done the brains for the Meks, Thibert or otherwise, was an absolute fool. No wonder the Meks felt so slow and sluggish. Half their processing power was wasted on useless checks that bogged down their speed and made their simple logic consume more energy than complex networks.

Esmeralda did not even bother trying to fix the various issues. Instead, she spent the first day rewriting their minds from scratch. Once she was done with that, she uploaded it into a spare Mek. With her improvements, it would be far more capable than any Mek in production.

Of course, Thibert took offense at that claim.

"Seriously? After just one day?"

Esmeralda nodded, grinning wildly. "Well, I haven't tested it properly, but it's definitely an improvement over the current AI. Did you make those, by the way?"

"Nah, I'm in charge of production. I don't think anyone's touched the Meks' brains in years."

"I see. That's why it's so bad," Esmeralda commented.

"Confident, are we? How about we run a test? The Mek running your AI versus the old one. See how it does," Thibert suggested.

Esmeralda had agreed, of course, and that was how they found themselves at the Pankration Ring. Somehow, the prisoners had gotten word of the match, despite its spontaneity, and were crowded into the stands, cheering and hollering.

She had definitely not been expecting an audience. Still, it was too late to back out now. Everything was almost set; she was doing one final look through her code to fix any issues she could find, while Thibert was working on his own. Both Meks were almost physically identical - standard, unmodified Assault Specialist Meks wielding a baton and shield, with the only visible difference being the color of the hastily applied coat of paint on them.

"Fighters! Step into the ring!" the announcer called out.

Time was up. Esmeralda stepped away from the Mek and told it to enter the ring. On the other side, Thibert did the same. The two Meks, indistinguishable from each other apart from the paint job, stood silently, facing one another.

"We've got a show for you today, folks! Two Meks with different brains - the one in red, the original, a seasoned fighter, against the one in green, a new, intelligent, and cunning model!"

Esmeralda cocked her head. The announcer must have been playing things up to agitate the crowd, because what he had said was not entirely accurate. Well, it was no matter. She was here to analyze the performance of her program, not to put on a show.

"And unlike the usual matches, there will be no surrender today! The match shall continue until one is left standing, and the other turned to scrap!"

That was also interesting. Esmeralda had already agreed to the conditions beforehand - she had copies of the new AI anyway; it would not matter if the Mek was destroyed.

"Fighters! On my mark!"

Esmeralda focused. The match was about to begin and she was eager to watch the performance.

"Three! Two! One!"

The Meks, previously still, stirred to life.

"Begin!"

The Meks moved, and Esmeralda unconsciously leaned forward.. It was time to see what her Mek could do.

The red one, using the original AI, attacked first, swinging it's baton in a large arc. Her own Mek, painted in green, blocked it with its shield. It countered in a similar fashion and the attack was also blocked.

Nothing extraordinary so far. The announcer was speaking, but Esmeralda ignored him. Although her Mek was performing merely fine, she was actually quite satisfied. With the amount of time she had to prepare, it was impressive that it could even walk.

Slash. Block. Counterattack. Block.

Then the green Mek shifted. When its opponent went for another strike, it dodged aside, to the left - on the opposite side of the red Mel's shield. Caught out of position, it was helpless as Esmeralda's Mek struck out with its baton and shield consecutively, sending the other Mek stumbling away, sparking.

The crowd cheered, but Esmeralda gave them no heed. Her Mek had learned its enemy's patterns and moved to counter it. Now it had the advantage, which meant that -

Yes, her Mek pressed the attack. It moved in and struck with its baton, sweeping the legs of the other Mek and sending it tumbling. Then, it waited, weapons ready.

"Oh, looks like green has pressed the advantage! Red is vulnerable and exposed! Will this be the end of the match?"

Unfortunately not, Esmeralda realized. She had been told that the Meks were security models and created her AI accordingly, meaning that they would attempt to suppress, not kill. Why was this match even to the death, again?

While her Mek waited, the red one recovered and got back onto its feet. It was damaged, definitely, but still functional. Again, it attacked, but as it only had a few potential movesets, Esmeralda's Mek easily countered it and sent it crashing back down.

"Once more, green shows it superiority, but allows red to live! Looks like it lacks the killing instinct!"

Esmeralda frowned. It was obvious that her modifications were successful, but it would attempt to avoid lethal blows, meaning that the match simply would not end. Well, as her tests were done, Esmeralda activated her visor. With it, she quickly created an update and sent it to the Mek.

The green Mek froze for a second before moving again. Now it struck with purpose. With just a few moves, it broke past its opponent's defenses and smashed its face with the baton, ending the match in a single blow.

"Victory!"

After that, Thibert congratulated her, suitably impressed, and Esmeralda smiled.

The next few days passed quietly, with Esmeralda focused on improving the Meks and their production line.

Esmeralda was woken abruptly when something crashed to the ground, the sound of shattering metal and wood echoing throughout the Fortress of Meropide. She jerked up, rubbing her eyes. There was shouting in the distance and loud thumping.

The latter turned out to be someone smashing down the door to her room. It fell back and exploded into splinters, allowing a group of prisoners to rush in.

"There she is! Take her!" one of them shouted. Still groggy, Esmeralda was taken by surprise when one of he men pulled her arms behind her back and held a knife to her throat. She froze.

"Just do what we say, and nobody gets hurt. Let's go," he warned. He pulled her to her feet and pushed her out of the room. Esmeralda obeyed, shuffling along. She had no desire to try anything with a blade at her neck - that, and she still had absolutely no idea what was going on.

Esmeralda winced as they left the room and entered the relatively bright main area of the Fortress. Almost instinctively, she summoned her Visor, which appeared around her eyes. That turned out to possibly be a mistake as the man holding her tightened his grip, the knife grazing her throat. "Hey! No funny business, you hear?"

Esmeralda froze again, partially to appease the man, and partially to focus on using her now-enhanced sight to scan her surroundings.

Twelve guards. Twenty-three prisoners, including the ones who had broken into her room. The former were armed with their standard equipment, including a baton. The latter had various improvised weapons. The prisoners had a significant numerical advantage, but the guards had them surrounded, and access to better equipment. Around them, the crates usually scattered around the area lie in disarray, with a few small spots on fire. A riot, then. They were in an uneasy standoff, neither side confident of overpowering the other.

That must be why they had grabbed her. A hostage to gain an advantage.

"Hey! Guards! Stay back or I slit her throat!" the man grabbing her - the leader of the rioters, most likely - yelled.

The guards definitely noticed, their hesitation apparent. The leader laughed. "Yeah, that's right. She's the guest of your boss, ain't she? Nothing's going to happen to her if you just do what I say."

There was more conversation and threats after that, but Esmeralda tuned it out. She had realized two things at once. One, that the knife was digging into her skin, causing a sharp sting. If she was not bleeding yet, she would be soon. Or worse. She did not quite fancy that. The second thing that she noticed was the various under-construction Meks that were hanging off the ceiling conveyors. One of these issues could solve the other.

Looks like the work that she had previously done on the Mek systems was going to come in useful. With a thought, she sent out an activation signal. The conveyor belts that were usually in constant, slow motion halted. The Meks that they carried twitched.

Esmeralda grinned. Time to go.

The rioters and the guards were still shouting at each other. Concentrating, Esmeralda drew upon her Vision to create a protective Geo barrier around her neck. Now protected, she raised a leg and brought it crashing down onto the foot of the man grappling her. At the exact time of impact, she activated the boosters on her legs at max power. The force was thus multiplied from 'young girl stomp' to 'ruin guard punch' levels.

The man screamed as his foot and the ground around it were shattered, and the room burst into chaos.

As expected, the knife slashed across her throat but was deflected by her Geo armor. The force of her stomp also sent her into the air, breaking out of the man's grip. She even did a little flip, allowing her to examine the situation from the air. With the aid of her visor, Esmeralda could process information quite quickly - not on par with specialized devices, but fast enough that during the few seconds that she was airborne, she could notice many things.

At the same time that she had acted, so too had the Meks, now under her command. The clamps holding them up all released at once, and the machines dropped into the fray. Most of them were yet to be fully complete, but they lacked mostly their outer casings. Function-wise, they were practically ready and charged past the stunned guards and into combat. They struck hard, but non-lethally. While Esmeralda did not want to kill anyone, she was tired of getting picked on. Besides, they deserved it, and none of them would get permanently crippled. Probably.

It was also at this time that Esmeralda realized that she was going to land face-first, which was not ideal. Fortunately for her, she had always been quite agile and managed to rotate and land on her feet.

Someone reached for her - probably a prisoner attempting to regain control of their hostage. He was immediately struck hard by a metal fist and collapsed, writhing in pain. Taking the chance, Esmeralda hurried away, back into her room, and a pair of Guardmeks followed her, blocking off the entrance.

Esmeralda sat down on her bed, taking deep breaths to calm herself. She dispelled the Geo armor around her neck and waited for things to blow over. Still, waiting was not her strong suit, and soon, her curiosity got the better of her. She peeked out to keep an eye on things.

It did not take very long for things to come to an end. Wirothesley himself soon showed up, accompanied by even more guards. Now truly outnumbered, the rioters surrendered and were taken to... Esmeralda did not know where. They were already in prison. Some were definitely sent to the infirmary.

At that point, she ordered the Meks to stand down. The guards were obviously still wary of them and Esmeralda did not want to cause any more issues.

Leaving his subordinates to clear things up, Wirothesley entered her room and, ignoring the pair of motionless Meks, looked at her. His expression and voice were carefully neutral as he asked, "Esmeralda, are you injured?" When she shook her head, he continued, "Follow me to my office." With that, he turned and left with the stride of a man used to being obeyed. Esmeralda hurried after him, fully releasing her control over the Meks, suddenly reminded of her time in the Academia.

"Welcome to my office, Esmeralda. Take a seat," Wirothesley said as he walked to the other side of the desk and sat in the ornate chair there. Esmeralda followed his instructions, taking the chair opposite the table and trying not to meet his eyes. She focused on the table. It was a nice table.

"Tea?" Wirothesley offered, sliding a cup over to her. A wisp of steam floated above it - freshly brewed, it seems. When did he have the time to brew tea?

Esmeralda shook her head.

Wirothesley shrugged, picking up his own cup to take a sip. "Your loss. It's good tea." In silence, he drank his tea while Esmeralda examined his desk. With a sigh, he out down his cup. "Aright. Tell me what happened out there. From the beginning, and leave nothing out."

Esmeralda did so. From the moment she got woken up, to being taken hostage, to controlling the Meks, to ending the riot. She explained her actions and motivations in detail. All the while, Wirothesley listened attentively, occasionally sipping his tea.

"So you claim to be a victim, and did your best not to cause excessive injury?" Wirothesley asked.

Esmeralda nodded, but it seemed that he had not been expecting a reply.

"Good, good. We wouldn't want you to become a more permanent resident here, now would we?"

Esmeralda froze.

"I jest, Esmeralda. Don't worry about it."

Wirothesley's assurance did little to assuage her fears, and she decided to stare at her untouched cup of tea.

"Alright. I'll stop joking around. To the point, then. Esmeralda, answer this question completely and truthfully. How did you take control of my Meks?" Wriothesley asked, all trace of humor gone from his voice.

Esmeralda swallowed nervously. "Um, right. But it was self-defense, alright? They took me hostage."

"I know what happened. The rioters will be disciplined appropriately. But that is not what I asked."

"Yes. That. While I was upgrading the factory, I just added in a hidden override that would cause them to obey me, that's all," Esmeralda explained nervously, gripping her cup of tea.

"And this override, you installed it in the Meks that you calibrated?" Wriothesley asked.

Esmeralda shook her head. "No, it's in the construction system. Each Mek has instructions and information uploaded into it, you know? I just added the override to the source code, which is then copied to every Mek created."

Esmeralda could not tell if Wriothesley was concerned, impressed, or about to execute her. She hoped that it was not the latter. After a while of silence, he took a long gulp of tea and spoke again. "Are you telling me that you hacked my machine and now every Mek that it makes listens to you?"

"Every Mek made by the Fortress, actually," Esmeralda corrected.

"What? How? You never got close to the other machines."

Esmeralda shied back as far as she could in her chair. "Well, I, er, disguised my changes as an administrator-approved system update. It will automatically propagate into every machine here."

Wriothesley set down his tea. Abruptly, he changed the subject. "Did you know what the traveler told me about you?"

"Huh? Aether? I was there."

"Yes, but before the two of you came into my office asking for a job, he had already contacted me. He mentioned that you were something of a prodigy, and it would take no more than a week for you to understand these systems and use them for yourself."

Esmeralda quietly smiled. It was good that Aether had confidence in her abilities.

Wriothesley continued, "Do you want to know what else he said? He said that despite the hacking, you are a good person and I shouldn't punish you too much. I can see that he was not wrong. Your Meks protected the guards and caused no casualties. Although there were quite a few injuries, that was acceptable, given the chaos."

Esmeralda remained silent for a while. Softly, she asked, "Will I be punished?"

Wirothesley leaned back. "Punished? What for? You had the right to defend yourself, and while those injured tried to argue about excessive force, they were the ones with a knife at your throat."

"And the hacking?"

"That is a little more complicated. Your skill is impressive, but I cannot simply allow you to modify my things as you like. Here is my proposal: I will allow you to continue your work, but before you do any kind of major changes, you must submit a report for my approval. You must also submit a report after you make your changes, detailing what you've done. I will also send someone to check on you. Deal?"

Esmeralda thought about it. Wirothesley would probably shoot down some of her suggestions, but the alternative was to be kicked out of the Fortress, and that simply was not acceptable. There were enough things that she wanted to try that even having some banned would be fine. "Deal," Esmeralda said. Maybe she could make an automatic printer for the reports...

A/N: In the original draft, Esmeralda would get herself arrested. Without Wirothesley's protection, she would get all kinds of assaulted and unlock various levels of trauma. In the end, I decided that that wasn't necessary - for one, she already has trauma, and for two, I was planning to keep this story more lighthearted, not full of depression. Instead, she learns a whole different set of lessons and her personality changes just a bit.

Next chapter will be a short one.