Chapter 11 - New year old memories

Hello humans it's Weegee1 again with another chapter of my Winnie the Pooh story. I seem to have lost one of the people who favorited my story though now I have over 3000 views so win some fail some I guess. Well time to continue the story, now to take an excerpt from the fanfiction bible page 7 paragraph 3 I don't own anything other than my OCs everything else is owned by their companies. Also feel free to leave reviews they fuel my plot bunnies the food they need to hop around in my old and addled brain.

It was a rainy day where I lived, dreary like every other day. People walked from one place to another with thick robes hiding their figures except for the silver buckles of their black shoes and the black gloves covering their hands. Further obscuring their features from view was a thick hood and a black scarf leaving only their eyes visible. It was thought to be a sin to show our bodies in public in any way shape or form unless it was during the yearly baptism to wash away the sins of our failures and transgressions. Any person who was late to the baptism would be stripped down and publicly flogged, thinking about that made my shoulder itch at the memory. Education was a simple affair of reading, writing, mathematics, the history of our "holy" nation, and then it was off to work for anyone over the age of seven. I liked the reading as long as someone read with me, and mathematics were as easy for me as breathing. Writing was problematic due to my poor spelling which the teacher would say was brought on by "the wickedness that a boys hands and eyes are used for." I later learned it was brought on by dyslexia. History was repetitive and easily summed up as monsters evil, outside world bad, our dreary island good, Archbishop perfect, and everyone else imperfect. Work was the one thing I loved most it as sorting things or other such mindless labor allowed me to ignore the dullness of the day to day life.

One day one of the artificer was entering his twilight years and was looking for an apprentice to pass on his craft to. Out of two hundred boys I was chosen, me the failure, me the orphan of two people that were deemed heretics by the clergy, me the worst student in the school. When I asked my new master why he would take me as an apprentice he looked at me with his milky black eyes, tilted his head, and rasped out "Why not?". The journey to the master artificer's quarters was long and arduous with him clacking loudly with every other step. Each store we passed would have him looking in through the windows or going into the store where he would spend a few coins for a bauble or two that he would stick in his deceptively deep pockets. By the time we reached the rusted doorway of the builder's guild six hours had passed and the lamplighter was out lighting the street lights. Reaching out he took off his right glove and pulled out a knife. Cutting a quick nick into the tip of his exposed pale pointer finger he touched it to the door. With a click and a puff of air the door slid into the ground rather than opening like a normal door.

On the other side of the door electricity arced around before several spheres lit up, I would later learn these spheres were called light bulbs. The only thing that was revealed was a round topped iron stick fused into the ground. Clicking forward the weathered old man grabbed the top of the stick, pulled his face scarf down, and looked at me "don't just stand there we have great things to do, and time waits for no." before he could finish he doubled over and started coughing uncontrollably. With shaking glove covered hands he reached into a pocket at his hip before pulling out a long tube with a button at the top. Sticking one end into his concealed mouth he compressed the button causing the tube to to fill with a glittering silver mist which he inhaled before coughing out a black vapor. After a few minutes to catch his breath the old man hobbled the rest of the way to the iron stick with me trailing closely behind.

The old man gave a grunt and shoved forward on the iron stick causing glass to come up from the floor trapping us in a cage. After a few seconds the floor we were on started to rise with the sound of creaking gears and hissing of steam. We passed by several tunnels some were illuminated others weren't, on and on we went raising higher and higher until we finally stopped at a tunnel filled with flickering lights. Following the old man down the tunnel he turned into an alcove in the wall of the tunnel. In the alcove was a wooden chest next to a metal frame bed with thin black sheets, a hook was attached to a chain hanging from the ceiling. With a creaking of bone on bone from severe over use and old age the Artificer sat himself on a metal chair that formed from the ground. With a groan the old man raised a gloved hand pushing back the hood on his head and removing his facial scarf revealing milky eyes and a balding head covered with a near countless number of scars ranging from small pinprick sized spots to a series of three claw like scars taking off his right ear, all the flesh of his bottom lip was gone revealing black metal teeth, and revealing a green splotched neck riddled with infection. Sticking out of his neck where his Adams apple would be was a small sponge like plug. Taking off his gloves revealed a metal right hand covered with rust and missing the pinky while the left hand was wrinkled and covered with liver spots. Reaching into a pocket in his cloak he pulled out a tube filled with clear liquid which he poured on the plug in his neck which resulted in the green splotches on his neck to shrink slowly until there was only three spots the size of a pea on the left side of the sponge. Removing the cloak revealed a long black shirt, black hole riddled pants, a black leather shoe on his right foot and a metal left foot shaped to look like a shoe.

With a twitch of his metal fingers a series of cables emerged from within his sleeve and wrapped around the ceiling hook. With a quick tug the chain lowered until it was at eye level for him. Reaching forward he hung his cloak on the hook before detaching the cables from the hook with a twist of his wrist allowing the chain to retract back into the ceiling. "I don't speak much so when I talk it is best to listen until I stop talking. Do you understand?" he spoke in a stronger voice than before. I simply replied with a yes master. With a roll of his eyes he said "None of that master nonsense. I may be your instructor and you may be my apprentice but I am master of no living being. Call me Sir if you must or Johan if you wish. Do you understand?" Yes sir I replied. "I will ask you a series of questions and I expect you to answer as well as you can, I don't know is a possible answer though I prefer you to try your best to answer the question. Do you understand?" Yes sir I replied again.

Some of the questions were simple like what my name was (Charlemagne Orion Browne), to how old I was (14 years old). Some question were weird to say the least are you gifted (I had no clue how to answer that one which resulted in a minute narrowing of his eyes). The questions went on and on until with a yawn Johan said that it would be best to get to sleep as it would be a hard day tomorrow. He got up and led me further down to another alcove revealing a room similar to his except for the fact that the bed and sheets were nicer, and walls were smooth. Before I could turn around to thank him Johan was clicking his way down the hallway. I climbed into bed and promptly fell asleep.

Waking up was an odd affair, no angry orphanage matron shrieking at me, none of the other orphans throwing things at me to wake me up, instead it was a constant whirr ca-clack coming from beneath my bed. My peaceful state of mind was interrupted by a slow hissing and then an ear splitting "Cookoo, Cookoo, Cookoo." as something leapt onto my chest. Looking down I saw it was an extremely obese brown bird like creature with four little legs, comically small wings, beady red eyes, and a drill beak. "This is your eight o'clock wake up call breakfast will be served in half an hour in the mess hall. Follow the piper to get their." rasped my master's voice from inside the bird. With a hop it turned around revealing a speaker in the back. Sitting up I noticed a stack of clothes on the top of my wooden storage chest consisting of the same clothing that my master wore except for the scarf. Putting the clothing on I followed the piper to the moving floor. Once I got in with the creature it hopped onto the top of the metal stick and flapped its tiny wings until the stick moved and we started to go down.

Once we went down far enough it hopped off before leading me to the mess hall.
The mess hall was filled with similarly dressed men of all ages as well as women dressed in black dresses and thick black shirts with long sleeves. Many of the people here were tinkering with some small gadget in their hands ranging from little figures that clicked and puffed steam as they moved to sharp implements of varying shapes and sizes. Serving the meals were a menagerie of creatures some more human in appearance than others. Looking around I saw that a great many of these creatures were talked about in class as unholy creatures that would steal your soul or eat you but none of these supposed monsters were doing either of those things. A loud snap and a clattering of dishes drew my attention to a man a little older than me. He had greasy black hair, black rings around his eyes, and a face covered with boils and warts, wearing a snear he was yelling loud enough that I could hear him from across the sprawling mess hall. "Filthy beast how dare you bring me the wrong order! Is there no brain in that hollow head of yours?".

Looking closer I saw the knocked down being he was yelling at, it was about the height of a young girl barely over four feet in height with unnaturally black skin to the point that I thought it would absorb light crisscrossed with white veins. It wore a tattered short sleeved black dress that went to her bare feet exposing thin arms and hands, surrounding her were broken dishes, spilled food, and cutlery from when she was knocked down. Looking closer I saw the being had no facial features or hair of any kind. Apparently yelling and knocking the being down wasn't enough of a punishment for him. With a flick of his wrist a foot long black metal spike slid from his sleeve and into his hand before he brought it down of the creature, or rather tried to. Visions flashed before my eyes of similar events happening to me, the other orphans beating me with sticks, the matron using objects of the same material. A lesson that was taught in school was of how to fight and kill monsters a popular sure fire way was the use of Able's Iron a black metal like material that disrupted Mana circulation in monsters causing extreme irreversible harm or death. What wasn't commonly taught was that humans that were considered "gifted" would also be similarly injured or out right killed by the material if it punctured the skin.

I don't know what happened other than the fact that my head exploded in pain causing me to close my eyes, hold my head, and grit my teeth. Opening a single eye revealed that the greasy man was separated from the downed being by a red slab of metal crisscrossed with blue archaic symbols that were slowly changing to different symbols. I don't know how or why but I could tell the symbols read things like DEFENSE PROTOCOL 1 INITIATED, DEFENSE INTEGRITY 99.9998%, and COUNTER ATTACK POSSIBLE EXECUTE COUNTER 1 Y/N?. Before I could comprehend what that meant the dropped cutlery turned black before forming a boot. The boot promptly kicked him in the balls hard enough to make him clutch his damaged jewels, turn red in the face, and tip over. The symbols dimmed and the red slab broke down into sand sized grains before entering my body by burrowing through my palms. Despite the bizarre event of the red metal sand burrowing into me I felt no pain or discomfort. Once the last grain went in I looked at my hands and saw no mark or evidence of the odd event. Standing up I expected many things, yelling, glaring, or being attacked for my actions instead I was takled in an unfamiliar way. My first hug was odd to say the least I hadn't received one since my parents died, I almost forgot what it was like. Once I gathered my wits enough I embraced the being during that moment I heard a single word in my head "Seraphina". In that moment I made my first friend as well as my first enemy.

I must apologize for the short chapter as well as the wait. The next chapter will be much longer and hopefully on time. The Corona virus as well as health issues are taking a fair bit of my time as well as the weather we are having in my area. Take care everyone and stay safe
