Story Time: The Twisted Existence of Dolores Laceration.
The Twisted Existence of Dolores Laceration.
The lock on the side door was rusted through and was easily broken with one blow from grizzled Redmond's trusty crowbar. Cracked in two, the lock landed on the wet cobbles with a loud clatter that rang throughout the night air and echoed down empty alleyways. "GRANNY RAMBLE'S GHOST, REDMOND! DO YOU WANT EVERY STRIDER IN TOWN TO KNOW WE'RE 'ERE?!" Tall, wiry and pathologically pretentious, Cyril was always annoyingly jittery on endeavors like this, but he had his uses when rifling through loot to determine what to take when time was of the essence. He'd once been someone of high standing, but the plague and tyrants that arose in their wake were a great social leveller. "Calm yer'sen, Cyril! There's no Padders around here, Padre said th' whole district is empty since the Coughing set in." Cyril was less than enthused with Redmond's attempts to allay his fears: "Oh wonderful!" He grumped. "No Striders to bash my skull but a chance to die slowly and painfully as my insides become my outsides, I hope to buggery that this place is as good as yer' man said." "Ol' Padre hasn't let me down yet. If he trusts the Lady he got the info from, then I trust her too, and we can't let a score like this go unclaimed." Redmond said as he swung the sturdy wooden door open, "Now, where's that blasted Girl gone and got to?" Upon hearing mention of her, the third participant of this criminal endeavor emerged from the shadows. A pale, ragged, scrawny thing, with dirty red hair and dressed in the finest rags a life among an underclass can provide. Even a proper name was beyond the teenager's means. "Ah, there y'are, Rat!" Redmond blustered. "Go on, you first an' don't touch anything 'til I tell you. Last thing I need is a rat scampering away wi' my profits, yer' ere to watch for ol' Padre, nothing more." With Redmond's warning ringing in her ears, Rat made her way through the door, holding a lantern to light their path through this opulent townhouse. Cyril especially was taken with the place, as they skulked through its hallways he marvelled at framed posters of plays and concerts held years ago during more prosperous times. "Oh my, I think I attended this one!" He marvelled at one of them. On every surface was some kind of memorabilia of the city's cultural heyday, whoever owned this place was clearly a fan of the playgrounds of high society and a collector of some standing. "See" Redmond uttered, remarking at Cyril's delight. "Padre's never wrong." None of this engaged Rat at all. She'd been born after the onset of the Coughing and only knew a life of scavenging and the brutal rule of the Emperor Weaver. She just carried on and hoped she'd get a meal out of all this. Redmond's eyes widened as the trio reached the basement storeroom. On every wall and every table were stage props and costumes that when broken down into scraps would fetch significant amounts of money to the scrap merchants and tailors still operating despite the plagues and hardships rotting the city from the inside. Redmond and Cyril hurriedly loaded up sacks with plunder, giddy with anticipation at the chance of warm food and comfortable lodgings again. They were far too distracted to notice that something else had caught little Rat's eyes from across the room: a large, black, ornate metal case stood by a far wall, caked in dust and cobwebs that tarnished it and sealed tight with several heavy locks. Almost transfixed, the young girl approached the casket, placing a small hand delicately upon it, finding it strangely warm to the touch and heard a slight, nearly imperceptible melodic humming coming from it, almost as if something alive was inside. Rat's touch seemed to stir something in the room, and the locks binding the casket opened by themselves, their falling to the floor alerting Redmond and Cyril and causing them to dash over to her. A scent of floral perfume wafted from the casket as it opened and the lid swung open to reveal something extraordinarily beautiful inside. Laying among plush, red velvet lining was an exquisitely crafted mannequin in the visage of a young woman, life size, made of very fine white porcelain and gleaming brass mechanical workings and dressed in a black gown of fine, imported silk. She was perfect save only a missing glass eye. The doll lay as if asleep arms crossed across her chest and delicate eyes closed, peaceful, a delicate melody in playing from within her. Each of the three would be looters reacted to the doll in incredibly different ways. Redmond saw a bounty of valuable scrap and silk, a prize. The little Rat saw something to awe, something so incomprehensibly beautiful in a world of refuse. What Cyril saw chilled him to his very marrow. Struggling to breathe, he grabbed Redmond's shoulder and squeezed far too hard than someone should. "We need to go. Now." He whispered, trying to drag his accomplice back towards the door. Redmond however, was quick to shrug him off. "What're you blathering on about, Cyril? No way are we leaving summat like that 'ere to rot!" Cyril began to ramble, shaking: "Redmond! Th-That's R- Rosemary's Dancer! Oh God, this was a mistake. We shouldn't have come here!" This sparked an argument between the two, with Cyril frantically trying to explain to Redmond how he knew what the doll was and why he was so afraid of it. A lifetime ago, before the Coughing, before destitution, before Weaver, Cyril went by another name. In the golden Palace of the Empress Hawcroft, Sir Cyrillian Blighe was among the great and powerful of the City joined in another of the Empress's lavish parties, headlined by a demonstration by the Court Scientist, Rosemary Bayliss: the authority in the art of mechanics. At the height of festivities, the guests were ushered into the grand marble auditorium where a large tarpaulin covered whatever it was Bayliss had built for her patron. "My lords, ladies, gentlemen, my Empress." Bayliss projected like an accomplished actor to the crowd. She continued: "In my efforts to further the study of the sciences and harness the power provided by the mechanistic arts, I have crafted some wondrous things: The sea bridges at Guarnod, the Iron railways that united the empire, even the clock at Ferris' sweet shop here in town. All of them standards of progress in their own right, but tonight..." She paused. "...Tonight I have with me my greatest triumph! I have with me, MY DANCER!" With a flourish worthy of a magician, she deftly whipped the black tarpaulin away from what it was concealing, and the gathered nobles gasped in unison at an exquisite porcelain and polished brass doll of a girl. Tall and slender, the doll had pale and delicate china pieces fixed to a skeleton of metal gears and beams just visible between the joints of the casing. Looking like a pale young girl, the doll had jet black hair, crimson red lips and dressed in fine, black silk dresses. It also had precious gems in their eyes that twinkled and sparkled in the light. Beautiful was too poor a term to describe them. Continuing the demonstration, Bayliss clicked her fingers, causing the doll's head to swivel independently to look at her. It's reaction to sound elicited another gasp from the audience. "This one is Dolores."Bayliss said proudly. "She was the first to respond to me, wave to the people, Dolores!" The doll dutifully turned her head back to the crowd and smoothly raised her right arm, a low whirring sound accompanying her movements. Then she delicately waved her hand as the crowd cheered, the Empress was especially enamoured by Dolores' antics. "My, I think you've made a good impression, Dolores!" Bayliss was ecstatic with the reception she was getting. "I think you should show them what you can really do. Show them how well you dance!" At her maker's command, Dolores' internal music player began to emit a soft melody, like a music box the simple tune carried on the air as with almost effortless grace and poise, the doll performed whole sections from popular ballets as good as any trained dancer, her silken hair and light dress twirling like ribbons as she crossed the floor. Everyone was bewitched by Rosemary Bayliss' Dancer. Rapturous applause greeted Dolores' conclusion of her routine, the whole court was abuzz at her and her maker. Barely able to contain himself, Cyrillian's friend and drinking companion, Mumford Aldore, took it upon himself to dash up to Dolores in the hope perhaps of dancing with her himself. His desire for attention, although legendary, would often land him in trouble, none more so than now. With haste he grabbed Dolores' hands, and began to whirl her around the marble floor, gears crunching and with his jewelry marking her hands. Bayliss was too busy with the empress to see, everyone was and too late to stop what happened next. A horrific scream and awful, wet cracking sound filled the room, and everyone at once turned their heads only to gaze upon a shocking sight. There was Dolores, covered in blood, and by her feet was the mangled corpse of Mumford, a gaping hole torn through his torso, steaming innards spilled out and staining the marble floor. She had punched a hole clean through Mumford. The panicked nobles, Cyril included ran from the palace as fast as they could. In the days afterwards the scandal of that night would tear through Ashwood's high society, with Cyrillian leading the calls for justice that ultimately leading to Bayliss being removed from her post as scientist to the court. Public opinion turned against the sciences and Rosemary sat in a celk for months as her works were torn down and Rosemary herself condemned to death, before escaping prison and disappearing into exile. No one ever knew what became of her or of the doll afterwards. With Cyril and Redmond still bickering, and Rat still awestruck by Dolores laying still in her plush casket and her gentle song, neither man noticed a curious mouse creep up to the doll and find it's way into the mechanisms within her. Believing such a personal intrusion to be malicious, the still very functional automaton's gears snapped into life, a muffled, brief squeak and crunching revealing that Dolores was awake, she always had been. With an inhuman grace, she stepped out of her case and towards the startled Rat, still frozen in a kind of terrified awe. With each step the doll's limbs twisted and shifted, preparing to strike like a viper. Either out of heroism for Rat, blind panic or stupidity, Redmond charged at Dolores, crowbar held high and swung as hard as he could, bringing it down onto the Doll's raised arm. Porcelain shattered and splintered, falling away to reveal more of Dolores' inner workings as she reeled from Redmond's powerful blow. "RUN GIRL!" he screamed in the melee, "GET OUT O' ERE!" Rat ran to Cyril who grabbed her arm and whisked her with him out of the basement door leaving Redmond alone with the recovered Dolores. He swung his crowbar once more at the doll, but now wise to him, Dolores span out of harm's way like she was performing a dance, deftly moving to Redmond's left side and grabbing his arm in one motion. Her grip was like a vice, and with a disturbing ease Redmond's arm broke as she squeezed, his cry of pain filling the entire townhouse, and heard by Cyril and Rat as they bundled up the stairs to the exit. Redmond's screaming continued and all Cyril could think about was the twisted corpse of Mumford all those years ago and how he was right about this venture being a mistake. Did the old Padre know what he was sending them into? Upon them reaching the ground floor, Redmond's cries fell silent, with only Dolores' melody being able to be heard downstairs, save for her footsteps as she began to follow upstairs. Panicking and disorientated, Cyril and Rat struggled to find their way back to the little side door they had entered all the while the haunting song of the doll growing ever louder as she approached. Dolores' pursuit was relentless, just a few steps behind Rat and Cyril. As Cyril tried to slow her down by tipping furniture in her path, Dolores' mechanical strength meant that she could easily toss any obstacle aside. Poor Cyril could see the open door onto the street when he felt his trailing leg snared by cold, forceful grasp of Dolores and he crumpled onto the marble floor. All he could think about was that night at the palace and Mumford as the Doll loomed over him, readying her fists. He thought of his friend, of Bayliss, of her trial, her anger. At least the girl was safe. Heavy blow after heavy blow began to rain down upon Cyril's body, brass and steel shattering bone and pulping muscle & sinew, blood even staining the ceiling. The horrible, dull sounds of flesh being pulverized providing a macabre harmony to the sweet song produced by Bayliss' greatest work. From a street away Rat could still hear the moments of Cyril's demise. There was screaming, then gurgling, then the music, then nothing. Alone, she headed back for home and safety. It took the rest of the night but Rat finally snuck past the Guards' checkpoints and arrived back in the slums of Ashwood and then on to Padre's shack just in time to see the sun rise over the rooftops. "Ahh. There y'are, Girl." The old man said as she crept in and joined him by the fire. "Did you find what you were looking for?" Rat nodded as she sat, and rested her head on Padre's shoulder. "And Redmond... his posh friend...?" Rat nodded again, softly. This elicited a deep sigh from the old man. "Ahhh, that's a shame. Good man, but needs must, eh Rat? We'll get you another mouse to look after soon, I promise." Time passed as Rat fell asleep in the glow of the meagre fire, answering Padre's questions as best she could in hand signals, nods and shakes, so she didn't notice when someone else entered the shack. "I saw she was back." The newcomer, a red haired woman, stated. "Aye, she's a survivor, this one." Replied Padre, gently laying Rat's head upon a cushion on the floor, before getting up and turning to greet the visitor, who continued with her questions: "So what about the men, Cyrillian and that other one you talked about?" "Rat says they didn't make it out" Padre answered, sombrely. "By her account it was quite a bit messy." "..a Doll?" "A Doll." The woman breathed an intense sigh of relief. The news she'd received was most agreeable. "Found you." She muttered under her breath. "Forgive me, Ms, but there's the fee we'd discussed?" Padre insisted. "Oh yes, of course, you've more than earned it." The woman exclaimed, reaching into a pouch on her belt and taking out a small red velvet bag, handing it to Padre. Inside was a gleaming round glass, with precious gems arranged in the pattern of an eye. It shone in the grey daylight as the woman turned to leave, raising a hood to hide her face. "Thank you, Ms. This will keep us fed for a good while, and if you're thinking of going to the house yourself, I'd be very careful. This Doll sounds like a handful." Padre warned as she left. The woman grinned back at him: “Yes she does, doesn't she?”