Agent, Ebonheart's finest Options

[jack cloudy]

Yesterday was my birthday so here's my belated gift to all of you. The start of a new fanfic! (Wings of Light will be continued as well.) You may notice a shift of focus compared to my earlier fanfics.




Agent.
Chapter 1: In training.

My knees were shivering. For a good reason, I might say as the Duke towering over me looked very intimidating in his heavy suit of Ebony armour. Just to compare the two of us, the helmet would have been enough to crush me. Also, being dressed in cheap rags has never been a good source of courage. As it was, I had more than enough reasons to be afraid of him.

Who am I? I no longer use the name I was born with. I changed it upon my arrival here on Vvardenfell. Now I finally I have a name I can spell. Anyway, my name is Ro-El Frost. Sounds Khajiit? Maybe, but I am really closer related to the Nords, though without the muscles, the alcohol tolerance, the noise and without the size. Go figure.

The Duke turned to a man wearing some sort of golden armour. Probably the boss of the guard who was blocking the only way out of the room.
,,Is this the kid you were talking about?” The Duke asked with a stern voice. This did not sound well.
,,Yes, that’s the one.” Was the equally stern reply. This was one of those moments that your life would start to fly past your eyes.

How did I get here? Well, I don’t really know to be honest. People claim I must have been on the Skooma to have forgotten how I ever found myself in that mine. I didn’t like it there. The slavers forced me to do hard labour every day. I could feel my life slowly seep away with every single egg I harvested. I had to get out.

My plan took time but it worked in the end, except for one small detail. I harvested some poison one of the Kwama warriors had been spitting at the wall and mixed it with my food for the day. The day after that, I dumped it into the lake that was somehow inside the mine. The food had been swallowed by the Slaughterfish before I’d stepped away. The next part of my plan was the hardest. I’d been warned that the smell of their queen’s blood puts the Kwama into a killing frenzie. This information was meant so that the slaves were careful not to kill themselves, but it could also be used to my advantage.

So as you might guess, tapping blood from the queen is a potentially lethal act. Fortunately, I knew that by tapping just a little through a tiny wound made with my fingernail, the Kwama would not even notice. I carefully kept the blood sealed away inside a bottle till after four days, I’d finally collected enough. That night came the last part of my masterplan.

I managed to convince the slaves to go swimming in the lake, after showing them that the Slaughterfish had died through my act of poisoning. Next, I sprinkled the collected blood on the clothes of the slavers. I managed to get out to the lake before the killing started. I’d never been so glad that Kwama can’t swim. Those things were completely out of control. Which leads me to where I am now.

,,You have caused the death of three Dunmer and would have escaped if my Legionaires weren’t performing a raid at the same time.” The Duke spoke directly to me. Remember the little detail that went wrong? Well two dozen heavily armed soldiers who found a whole angry bunch of Kwama in their face, that’s what went wrong.
,,I thought they would run when the Kwama went mad. I didn’t expect them to die.” Was the weak defense I managed to whisper.

My arm was brusquely grabbed by the guard. The slave bracers I’d been forced to wear clattered on the floor.
,,Ro-El Frost, you have closed down an illegal egg mine and punished those who were responsible. You have further freed their prisoners who are being returned to their families as we speak. All that without harming the Kwama themselves, my men are responsible for that. As such, it is my pleasure as a servant of the great Emperor, Uriel Septim, to grant you your freedom and to take you into my service as an agent in the order of Ebonheart. Serius will escort you to your room.” The Duke now said with a smile and pointed at the guard who had released me from the symbol of slavery.

In a flash of inspiration, I snatched the bracers from the floor before I was dragged out of the room by Serius. We ascended many stairs before he finally threw open a wooden door and pushed me inside. ,,Consider everything in this room to be yours. You’ll be summoned tomorrow at 6 am. Wait inside your room till we come for you.” Serius ordered me before slamming the door shut. Not the nicest guy in the world.

I sat down on the bed and looked around, still unable to believe what had just happened. Instead of being branded as the bad guy and possibly executed, I had been turned into some sort of hero. Not exactly something that happened to me every day.

After I finally admitted to myself that things had turned out alright, I took a look around the room they’d given me. Apart from the bed, there was a closet, a mirror, a desk with several books on it and a sturdy wooden chest. It wasn’t big, but not small either. I opened the closet with the intention of swapping my dirty old rags with something more comfortable. It was cold this time of the year. The closet did not disappoint me. It was filled with all kinds of clothes ranging from simple but sturdy to downright extravagant and fit for a noble. There were shirts, pants, robes, shoes and even a few skirts, though I did not know what I was supposed to do with those. Men don’t wear skirts where I come from. Finally there were a few gloves on a separate rack.

I choose for a simple blue shirt with matching pants and a pair of shoes fit for indoor use. As the last action of the day, I picked up the book lying on top of the pile. ‘History of the Empire, part 1’ it said on the cover. If my idea of an agent was somewhat correct, these books had been placed here for a reason. I had some reading to do.

[jack cloudy]

Another short one. I bet you didn't see this one coming.



We glared at each other, trying to find our weaknesses. To an outsider, it didn’t look too good. He was a hulking mass of a Dunmer wearing battleworn Bonemold with a large Dwemer axe in his hands. Me, I was the smallest Nord ever seen, wearing nothing but my simple travelling clothes and with the rapier hanging from my belt. Unless I happened to be a powerful mage, which I definitely wasn’t, any battle would have me cut to pieces.

My eyes caught some more details, both of the man and of my surroundings. Starting with the surroundings, it was obvious that Arkngthand was even less than a shadow of its former glory. The pillars were rusted, the lights dim and part of the roof had come down. The doors looked like they were about to fall apart and even the two suits of Dwemer armour guarding said door looked as if they’d seen better days.

My Dwemer memories had been flowing back withing my mind almost constantly, ever since I entered the fort. Those were not suits of armour, the Dwemer never had any need for them. Why should they, when their Centurions were better warriors than any being of flesh and blood? They were Centurions themselves, fully humanoid ones and simply known as the type 1, albeit deactivated. Conceived to have the full flexibility of an organic warrior but with far greater strength. In the end, they offered neither. Slower and more bulky than a Spere centurion and less powerful than the gigantic Steam Centurion, they were about to be replaced by the newer type 2 when Red Mountain came.

The glaring contest had ended. The Dunmer pointed at one of his henchmen.
,,Take that little Scrib’s sword.” He barked. I did nothing and allowed the rapier to be taken. It was all part of my plan. Phase one of the plan unfolded as planned with the bandits all being rather surprised at seeing a silver blade being drawn rather than some crummy iron.
,,Give me that!” Their leader snatched the rapier out of his underling’s hands and tore off the leather I’d wrapped around the hilt. Phase two was completed as he stared in shock and fear at Ebonheart’s dragon engraved into the pommel.

,,Legion rule 04: Never let yourself be caught off guard!” With that bit of advise, I launched myself up and cracked his unprotected nose with a knee. His fingers loosened their grip and I retrieved my sword, giving him a quick stab in the wrist as a farewell gift. My kick knocked the Dunmer to the ground and allowed me to escape the encirclement. I headed straight for the two Centurions with their warhammers. I passed between them and then waited in front of the door. As I’d already expected, the bandits were in hot pursuit. I grinned and said a single word that hadn’t been heard for centuries. A word in a language that had been lost.

With a swift motion, the two Centurions swung their hammers, sending the two lead bandits flying and cracking a couple of ribs. The following bandits were knocked to the ground by their unfortunate companions, allowing the two Centurions to step in and end the whole battle with several swift motions. Outdated or not, the machines proved to be devastating when no one expected them to be active.

I gave them some more orders in the Dwemeric language and they took up position next to the leader. Being unable to give chase had saved his life. I walked up to the Dunmer and watched him hold his nose as he stared up at the two Centurions who simply stared back, as if they were silently challenging him to get up and fight.
,,Who are you?” He asked frightened. I leaned in close with a grin and gave him the answer.
,,Dumac Dwarfking. Now you and your friends were looting my property. May I remind you that both Imperial as Dunmeric laws are excessively strict regarding the theft of Dwemer artefacts?” With him immobilized, I could give his armour the examination it required and confirm my previous thoughts. What had first looked like battledamage was in fact the subtle removal of identifying marks. Unfortunately for him, Bonemold marks were not only unique in their shape but also in their placement.

,,Since you work for Orvas Dren, I believe it might be a wise idea if you gave him a message. Stay off of my lawn or you’ll be sorry. Signed, Dumac Dwarfking. Now get out of here.” I snapped and watched him go. Maybe it was a mistake, but minor servants like him rarely knew anything I could use. Besides, asking him more about Arkngthand was useless as well. If he couldn’t even recognize two fully functional Centurions, anything he could tell me was probably nonsense. After he’d vanished through the upper door, I turned back tot my new friends.
,,Go guard the door, but bring in the Guar first. I have a type 2 Centurion to fix. After that, I have an evil twin to hunt.” It was a bit annoying that they only took orders in Dwemeric. On the other hand, this flaw was also the only reason no one had managed to abuse them. So it was probably the best.





Notes: I plan on underlining the text whenever Ro-El speaks in Dwemeric/Dwemer/whatever it should be called. Also, why make the Morrowind Dwemer armour into Centurions? Well, there is the reason I already gave. Why would the Dwemer fight? They had a whole army of robots to do it. Besides, it does fit in with their obsession over machinery. It also makes the 'Trojan Horse' trick of the 'Chimervadimium(?)' more plausible. If no one knows that Dwemer are willing to fight themselves, then it is more likely that they never even think of the possibility of a Dwemer sitting in that thing.

The other reason is that the Dwemer armour in Oblivion differs too much from the Morrowind version. I heard that Morrowind's version is a pile of scrapmetal glued together by robbers, archeologists and other people who poke their nose in Dwemer ruins but that doesn't explain the appearance of Dwemer armour in untouched ruins. I figure that while turning them into Centurions would require internal mechanisms, any finder would probably rip out those mechanisms because no one knows how it works. So the armour we see in use by Bolvyn Venim's guards among others are simply the empty shells of stripped Centurions.

And for those who are wondering, I called Zarador's Centurion a type 2. So guess what, the type 2 looks like Oblivion's armour which I simply love from the screenshots. That helmet alone is wicked. The type 2 is also a bit better in performance than the type 1.

This post has been edited by jack cloudy: Jan 10 2007, 06:36 PM