Bubbling concoctions corkscrewed through the spiralling glass tubes that were above a flat slab of runes blasting puffs of cold blue air beneath them.
Centrifuges with dark sand-like powder made the constant whirring sounds across the laboratory. Set in a single room with the height of two buildings within, the lab was separated by an upper and lower platform.
Clunky consoles and machinery buzzed and beeped with lights and sounds that could only be identified by those in this room. The dozens of what appeared to be scientists and researchers went about maintaining the space—taking notes, starting or stopping processes.
Too little magic for a Maleficos Ordinate, but too much magic for a military unit. This laboratory was what stood in place of an Ordinate for the country; although, this being only one section of presumably many.
Hanging back a step, Fuko scanned from concrete ceiling to tile floor while the three detectives headed in a direction familiar to them. "lcer darling~!" Rose cooed and gracefully rushed up to a man who was deeply indulged in his work before him to even take notice.
lcer, the man in his mid-40s and in a lab coat, stumbled to one side as he was tackled into an embrace. He mumbled in shock and finally turned to see his visitors. Rose kissed him on the cheek and let go of him.
He cleared his throat and adjusted his circular glasses, "Sorry, I was working on sothing. Hello, how are you all?" he straightened his posture.
His beard was a reddish-brown with bits of white sprouting through. The short hair atop his head however was much more white than brown. Wrinkles from a stressed life eased up under his eyes as his expression went more neutral.
The average figure, no taller than Rose herself, stood politely with his hands over his lap, having taken a step from his workbench.
Kazuo gave a nod, "Doing alright, all things considered."
"How’ve you been holding up?" Morgana folded her arms.
His voice squeaked a sigh as his brows jerked up, "Good; good. Could be worse, I an, with all the news and things, seems we’re on a better track for the rest of the year," his deanour shrunk as he spoke in his stilted low voice.
Many researchers and scientists rolled their eyes and scoffed under their breaths as they saw visitors enter their space and start making more noise than needed.
"How’re my little toys coming along?" Rose hovered her finger over a line of disassembled parts of gadgetry, so with dim purple glows.
"D-don’t touch anything," he warned and swiftly grabbed Rose’s wrist to shoo it away. "So of it’s done, not all. I didn’t expect for you to go through so many in a single go. I’m surprised you’re alive still."
"Oh, all thanks to your genius work~ And a lot more from the sirens," she leaned against an empty spot on his desk.
"It’s crazy," lcer said to Kazuo. "We might just see the end of the cult before we kick the bucket. And your daughter’s involved in- Oh," only then did he see the girl standing behind them all. "Sorry, didn’t see you there."
"Maybe you need better glasses," Fuko snarked while still looking up and around.
"Yeah," Kazuo said with no real agreent with anything while he stepped aside.
"Hey there," lcer put his hands on his knees and leaned down slightly, only to shake his head and stand upright when speaking to her, "Wow, I haven’t seen you since, well," he then raised his hand up and down, trying to recall her height when she was much younger.
"I haven’t seen a lot of people since last year so," she gave a half shrug. "Fuko Namora, adventuring detective."
"Oh I’m aware, I’ve read about you in recent papers, just not in the flesh—see in the flesh I an. I knew that all of you were coming to city hall, but any particular purpose why you’re here?
In the lab I an?" he then faced her father, "I wasn’t told about making any new designs or gadgetry Kazuo, I don’t have anything at the ready," he put his hands up.
"She’s just here to look around lcer, don’t worry about it," Kazuo unholstered his pistol and handed it over to the man. "Just maintenance."
lcer took the pistol and rotated it around his hands, examining it.
"And hellos, it’s been a while," Morgana added.
"Hello, hello," lcer still kept his eyes on the bronze-gold pistol and the transparent cartridge with purplish dust within. "I’ve been busy, what with all the, you know," he stumbled through the words while he placed the pistol on his workbench.
"You’re telling I could’ve asked for a special gun beforehand," Fuko walked past Rose and the ss of a workspace lcer was working with.
Screwdrivers and pliers of varying sizes, tal plates and discs in no particular assembled order, so leftover packet of potato crisps to the side, several screws strewn about alongside rounded bullets that were coated thinly in a purplish polish.
"Not exactly kid."
"Well, yes, it’d have to go through approval," lcer replied over Kazuo’s statent, to which Kazuo crossed his arms and stared.
Fuko’s head turned back with her eyes glazed over.
...
Stuck between two glares, lcer took a cautious step back, "It’d probably not get approved, but, considering h-her recent actions- I don’t know, I don’t know," he put his hands up and got between Fuko and his workbench.
"Who even are you?" Fuko squinted.
"Oh sorry," he rubbed his hands off on his lab coat. "Sir lcer Vogel, head of magi-technology for the Departnt of Arcana. Inventor of the mage-piercer ammunition and auto-loading pistol," he gave his hand out. "Also the one who..." he looked to Kazuo.
Fuko cautiously shook his hand.
"She already knows lcer," Kazuo stated.
"Right, the entire reason she ran away," lcer affird while he shook her hand. "I’m the one who helped your father get custody of you after the whole fire fiasco. Took a while, but."
Fuko retracted her hand, her expression barely changing. "I didn’t know that," she remarked.
"Oh- well-"
"And I don’t care," Fuko tagged on. "I don’t really care one way or the other, and I definitely don’t care about whatever relationship you have with Detective Chesire," she glanced over at the workstation.
"Careful darling, I don’t have anything like that going on," Rose chid in with a wag of her finger.
"T-that’s true, she knows she can get more out of people by being, well, her," lcer agreed.
The short brunette looked back, "Like I said, I don’t care." Fuko held a hand to her chin, "What I do care about is everything that’s going on here. You’re the one who made the mage-piercers, which were the bullets used in the Burntish Courthouse earlier this March.
Naly, used by the Deuctus Cult mbers to shoot up the place after a dragon crashed in and ate the chief justice. So you tell why and how your experintal technology was used by cultists.
And to add to that, how exactly do the guns Mrs Aetherton and my dad use work? Could be crucial; if one patented technology’s already stolen, then," Fuko turned.
lcer’s eyes narrowed through his glasses at her. "Under what authority," he muttered to himself and then glanced over at Kazuo Namora. Then his eyes darted to his daughter, and then back to Kazuo, "Just like you, this one.
You were worse still," he complained to Kazuo who gave an exhausted shrug. lcer then turned to Morgana, "Mrs? Doesn’t she?" he hushed a smidgen.
Morgana’s eyes waned and she simply raised a brow; the ssage was clear to him.
"I’m... not answering out of, interrogation? I’m answering out of courtesy here. Y-yes, I know about the information breach about the mage piercer ammunition," his arms moved around while he paced throughout his workspace with his eyes to the floor. "All of the departnt has been investigated, we haven’t found a source of the leak.
I suspect, that the leak may just be so deliberate that it can’t be traced. Or that there isn’t a leak at all," he bumped into a trolley rack to stop.
"You think soone could’ve magically spied on your work?" Fuko crossed her arms.
"Definitely not while in here, there’s enough defensive magics to prevent any sort of intrusion."
"What if the cult’s magic’s more powerful than the magic here? The cult’s already has that going for them," the brunette proposed.
"That’s," lcer grunted as his fingers curled in like claws. "Listen, what I do here is study magic, and more specifically the improvent of everyday technology via magical ans.
The challenge we face, is that magic is fundantally uncooperative with science—there’s largely a difference set of rules, but," he said popping his lips and pinching his fingers together, "It does have a base to work off of.
That’s why there’s different categories of magic. Even a weaker defensive spell can protect against a stronger offensive spell, because it specifically is for that purpose.
So stronger or weaker, still have to contend with whatever school of magic you’re dealing with, and even then you have to factor in a dozen other variables- Sorry, tangent," he held the bridge of his nose. "Even if they did intrude, we’d know, alright?
The reason I theorize that there isn’t a leak, is that, although I’m the proud creator of them, the principles of my idea aren’t revolutionarily new.
I just found a way to refine mana dust into a gel coating that’s added in during the casting of bullet rounds. Even then, highly inefficient—half of it evaporates into the air.
What I do know, is that in that refined neutral state, it’s easier to produce and supply in larger quantities for the use of the GAS. And when refined in a specific process, it can neutralize reactive mana—reactive mana being a spell or an enchantnt. Thus, making it a magic-piercing bullet.
Is it extrely powerful? No. Is it replicable? Absolutely. So of the GAS have already been using it before February, so if the true culprit needs to be found, we have to trace back weeks of recorded logs, so may not even be recorded, who knows?
Maybe soone higher up already knows, and I’m just in the dark? Maybe? Probably. But what does it solve now? Nothing. I’m not the first person to use refined mana dust, I won’t be the last," he sat down in his wheeled office chair and slid back.
"You couldn’t’ve led with that?" Fuko replied.
"He’s got a delicate process," Morgana mocked.
"You all co into my office, with this hostility," he waved his hands in front of him at them. "I’m going to get to the MID-s and you can all go about your business," he rolled forward to his work desk.
"Oh co on darling, you’re a genius~ What about all the fun stuff you make for , hm? Those aren’t brilliant inventions?" Rose leaned her hip onto the desk.
"Prototypes. Experintal," he was starting to disassemble Kazuo’s gun. "Hardly useful for most people, GAS included. I’m surprised they all function and you’re not dead," he put bluntly.
"That’s just how much I trust your brain," she tapped a finger onto the side of his head.
"I’m already finishing up the rest of your equipnt, you don’t need to lay it on so thick."
"Well darling, maybe more grease next ti, half of the ti this thing jams," her charm was dropped, just like the crossbow she dropped onto his workbench.
"Grease? D-do you think I use greas-" he swivelled in his chair and groaned. "You know you could’ve just had Peter send whatever you needed fixing and I can send over whatever you all need."
"We were already coming," Kazuo walked over and examined his disassembled firearm. "Besides, I worry about you; always cooped up in your lab. When’s the last ti you saw the Sun?" He placed one hand on the headrest of the chair and the other on lcer’s shoulder.
Distant thunder bellowed from outside.
lcer checked his own pale hands and checked his wristwatch. "Burnetrout? Sun? Who are you trying to trick."
Kazuo patted his shoulder twice and leaned away from him, "Nice to see you mate."
"...Is this why she’s here?" lcer said after a long exhale, pointing to Fuko.
"I’m here on a whim; I turned down food for this. But a case’s a case and it’s one that’s not over yet. Any piece I can get, the better," Fuko replied.
"I’m letting her have free rein, she deserves it," Kazuo hushed and backed away from the scientist.
"What’s an MID?" Fuko was two seconds away from swiping an interesting looking device on the trolley.
lcer sighed and gave a nod to himself.
"And then he said, your end will co! But he’s the one getting arrested into the back of a carriage," Ben’s voice ca echoing into the lab, while he was surrounded by amused, laughing GAS agents.
Reviews
All reviews (0)