42
Milo studied the new muzzle.
It was the thickest muzzle in Fed’s stores.
But it still didn’t look thick enough.
“I don’t think it will do what you want it to,” Tania said. She tapped the heavy cylinder. “It’s a suppressor. It’s not designed to protect against you overcharging the rifle.”
“I won’t overcharge it again anyway,” he said. “Probably.”
“Meaning you will.”
“If I have to,” he admitted. ‘But let’s hope I don’t have to.”
“And if it explodes in your face again?”
“Maybe I should get a helmet?”
“You oughtta think about us, Milo,” she said. “If something happens to you, what’ll we do?”
“Anything you like?”
“But we like doing things with you. If you died, how could we do things with you?”
He shrugged. “You’re a golem, Tania. I’m a human. My lifespan isn’t as long as you think. In a couple of years, I’ll be old. I can’t do this sort of thing forever.”
“Old?” Her eyes widened. “You mean, like Master Garmstooth old?”
“That’s right.”
“Wow.” She pursed her lips, thinking. “We gotta do something about that, Milo. We can’t let you get old.”
“I’m not a golem,” he pointed out. “You can’t just replace my parts.”
“Why not?”
“Bodies don’t work that way.”
“How do you know? Have you tried?”
“No.” He shuddered. “And please don’t try.”
“But we can’t just sit back and let you get old, Milo.” She put her hand on his. “Surely there’s something that you can do?”
He chuckled.
A warm feeling slid through his heart as he looked up into her green eyes.
He couldn’t help but wonder if her care was something she felt or something that was mechanical. Something calculated somewhere inside her Intelligence Matrix. Was she actually like this, or was she like this because her Matrix told her to act that way?
Sometimes he thought of her as a real girl.
Other times as a construct like Click. Just a bit more complex.
And, late at night, he was troubled by the thought of which was true.
“Even the dwarves died,” he reminded her. “With all of these miracles they created, even they couldn’t hold back time.”
“Sure they could,” she said. “It wasn’t time that killed them.”
“What was it, then?”
She opened her mouth.
Then she shut it with a click of her teeth and sighed through them.
He raised an eyebrow. “The Prime?”
“Yes.” She nodded. “It’s so annoying.”
“I won’t argue against that.”
She watched him as he turned back to the rifle. He refused to feel frustrated by her inability to explain anything beyond his surface understanding of the dwarves and their history and culture.
Instead, he recognized that the limitation wasn’t her choice, and moved on.
Letting his mind sink again as he deftly slid parts together. Soldered.
Twisted screws.
And tested bolts.
Eventually, he held up the finished model and eyed it critically. It was chunkier than the rifles distributed by the Academy. But similar enough to some sold by a gunsmith Milo had visited in the city.
That had been an experience.
He’d first had to prove he was a mage, which required not just his ID, but also getting his mana capacity checked again. The gunsmith had been less than impressed by his meagre capacity.
“That’s why I need a rifle,” Milo had explained.
“Makes sense,” was the dry response.
In the end, he hadn’t bought anything. He’d just come to look. To make sure the creation he was putting together wasn’t too visually different to anything he might buy.
He could argue he modified it himself.
He’d already started reminding the teachers he’d been a clocker. Every now and then he threw it into conversation with other students.
When Tania was selling some tips for the next dungeon, she also praised his skills with modifying guns, saying he could’ve been a gunsmith himself if he’d not been recruited.
No one would think it too strange for him to show up with a strange new rifle.
Except for Fergus, who was still trying to convince as many people as he could that Milo was cheating.
The tips Tania sold were creative. Different.
But hardly cheating.
Some began to think Milo was just simply a gifted strategist. Even Master Garmstooth had purchased his observations of the next dungeon.
The dungeon, called the Stagnant Swamp, was due to open in about a month. It also needed four team members. Tania and Selma were already being approached by other students eager to join their team.
They took their information.
But promised nothing.
Walking to the testing range, Milo hefted the rifle. It was a bit heavier. But he’d get used to it.
Tania skipped along behind him.
“You’re not gonna try one of them boosted cartridges, are ya?”
He shook his head. “No. There’s no need. I know what they do.”
“Yeah.” Her voice was dry. “They explode.”
In the testing range, he opened the scope and lay on the ground. Resting the rifle on a small tripod, he aimed at a target. The target was a sheet of metal about an inch thick. Shaped like a humanoid with bright red circles in the middle of the head and torso.
Staring through the glass of the scope, he aimed.
Didn’t need to adjust for wind down here.
He was able to set up a nice clean shot.
He took a breath. Slow. Then exhaled. As he did, he squeezed the trigger.
The rifle bucked lightly as mana raced from sphere to sphere in an instant, compressing to a volatile bolt that blew from the muzzle with a muffled thump.
Bright and hot, the bolt speared towards the target.
Hit it.
And fragments of molten metal exploded as it hit.
“Blast,” he gulped. It was a lot more powerful than he’d expected it would be.
“Hey, that ain’t bad.” Tania crouched down next to him. “Can I have a go?”
He nodded dumbly and moved aside so she could get into position.
“Is my skirt rising?” she asked as she peered down the scope.
“No.”
“Are you sure?”
“I’m sure.”
“I knew you were looking.”
“Only when you asked me to check.”
Her hand reached down and pulled her skirt up a little. “How about now?”
“Stop it and just shoot.”
She blew a hole through another target and giggled. “Wow, Milo! This is kinda fun.”
They spent a few more minutes trading shots.
Blowing up targets one by one.
Until Selma, drawn by the giggles, stepped into the testing range. “Hey,” she called. “What’s up?”
“You gotta try this,” Tania squealed, waving the other golem close.
“A rifle?” Selma’s face screwed up.
“Yeah! But try it. Trust me.”
Selma took her place. Then she awkwardly aimed the rifle. “Like this?”
Tania reached down and set the rifle against her shoulder properly. “Tuck it in here or it’ll rattle some gears, sister.”
“Alright.”
“See the red dot?”
Selma squinted through the scope. “Yeah.”
“Just put it where the heart is.”
“Got it.”
“And lift your skirt a little so Milo can see.”
Selma reached down automatically and swept the back of her robe aside. She was wearing her chain mail bikini underneath. She pushed everything aside.
“Like that?”
Tania glanced at him. “What do ya think, Milo?”
“I think you’re both cracked in the head and I’m thinking of switching out your cores.”
“Milo!” Tania looked horrified. “Don’t even joke about that, buster! You try touching my core again and I’ll… I’ll. I don’t know what I’ll do, but I’ll do it.”
Selma looked up from the scope. “He touched your core?”
“While I was assembling her,” Milo said, rolling his eyes and wondering if he rolled them much more if they’d just roll out of his skull one day.
Tania’s cheeks flushed. “With his bare hands!”
Selma shivered. “What about mine?”
“No way, sister,” Tania said. “I made him wear gloves. And close his eyes, too!”
“Oh.” Selma craned her neck to look at him. “Are you sure you don’t wanna touch my core, Milo? I’ll let you if you want…”
Tania slapped her head. “Perv!”
“I just meant… If it’d make him happy…”
“Will you two just stop it?” He stood over them, wiping his hands on his robe. “You’re being silly. Just take the shot so I can tweak it.”
“It don’t need no tweaking,” Tania said.
Selma put her eye back to the scope.
And pulled the trigger.
As the target exploded, she stared at it. Her mouth dropped open slowly.
“Wow.”
“Right?” Tania giggled. “It’s incredible, right?”
“Makes my coochie itch,” Selma agreed.
“Perv!”
“Alright alright,” Milo reached down and took the rifle. “That’s enough excitement for one day. Why don’t you both go check on things.”
Tania squinted at him. “You’re not gonna try one of them exploding cartridges, are you?”
“No. I told you I wasn’t.”
“Swear it, Milo.”
“I swear it,” he said.
“Because if you blow yourself up while we’re gone, we’ll be mad. Won’t we?”
“Yep.” Selma nodded, hauling herself to her feet and glaring down at him. “You’re our only engineer, Milo. You oughtta treat us nice.”
“I do treat you nice.”
“Nicer, then,” Tania put in.
He sighed. “You know where the gold is. Go get it yourself.”
“But it’s not as nice as when you get it for us.”
When they were gone, he was a couple of gold poorer and a lot more confused. Did he treat them nice? Or did he treat them like tools?
He couldn’t remember thanking them after the last dungeon.
Beside his arm, a ham and cheese sandwich rested on a plate. Beside that, an ale. He was getting used to the taste of ale.
Somehow in the time it’d taken him to retrieve some gold, they’d made him a sandwich and poured an ale.
He didn’t even know where they’d been keeping the food.
But Selma wasn’t around when he was finishing up the rifle. Had she gone to get the food for him?
What had prompted that?
Why were they doing these things?
He picked up the sandwich and looked at it. Took a bite. And told himself to thank them for it when they got back.
His eyes were caught by the ceramic cartridge on his bench.
Squeeze it and it would absorb mana. Too much, and it’d become volatile. He shuddered as he remembered the pain of it exploding in his face.
That’d really hurt.
There was no way he was going to use it again unless he had to.
It was way too explosive.
The thought hung in his head for a moment. Then his eyes widened.
And a wide grin slowly spread across his lips as a single word was rasped through his teeth.
“Boom.”