The soldiers stood at the entrance of the Clocktower. Massive brass doors stood before them, fighting dragons carved into the metal. The building was far more imposing from this perspective than it was from afar, like they were used to seeing it. The mechanisms of the massive clock above them could be heard clearly from the bottom of the tower, and must have been deafening up close.
A small orb with an embedded camera floated next to the soldiers, filming their every move. It spoke with a voice they’d gotten annoyingly familiar with over the last few weeks: Professor McCray.
“Now, my dear soldiers,” he said, “I hope you all know your place. You are here to judge immediate threats to our science teams. Do not touch anything. Do not damage anything. Do not shoot unless in self defence. Abandon the mission at the first sign of trouble. We are here to investigate, not kill.”
“Yeah, we know, doc,” replied Private Lindsey North, the longest serving member of the Special Forces unit outside of the Captain. “We’re soldiers, not murderers.”
“I do not believe there is a distinction.”
“Quiet,” the Captain replied sternly. “We can’t do this if everyone is bickering. This mission is dependent on our mutual cooperation. For the good of humanity.”
“For the good of humanity,” all of the soldiers repeated. McCray added his begrudging voice a moment later.
Two of the privates walked forward and grabbed onto the doors.
“By the Clocktower, this thing is massive,” the one on the left whispered.
“Saying ‘By the Clocktower’ when you’re about to desecrate the Clocktower is an interesting choice,” the one on the right replied.
The other soldier sighed. “Mick, if you really think this is a bad idea, you could have ducked out for religious reasons.”
“Unfortunately, I believe the scientists on this one. Gotta be something in here to help fix this universe.”
“Did we just come here to talk?!” The Captain growled.
“Sorry sir,” the two said, before they finally yanked the door of the Clocktower open. Bronze floor extended into total darkness before them.
“Floodlights!” The captain shouted. The soldiers wheeled forward the massive lights behind them and turned them on. The interior of the Clocktower turned out to be very different from the outside. The inside walls were dark mahogany, the floors a kind of marble with clock decals. Bronze pipes occasionally protruded from the walls, often being attached to clocks or having pocket watches hanging from them.
The soldiers walked forward, guns raised, the floodlights automatically following on behind them. They soon entered a massive room with a high, domed ceiling. Above them was a tapestry of a group of dragons circling two knights and a princess. Hallways extended off into the dark all around them, each passageway marked by a ticking clock directly above them.
“I don’t know what I expected,” Private North admitted, “but it wasn’t this.”
“All of the clocks are different times,” the Captain realised. “Any idea why that is, prof?”
“I’m as in the dark as you are,” the floating camera orb admitted.
“Hard to believe,” another one of the privates chimed in. “It’s really damn dark in here.”
A few of the other soldiers chuckled.
“You must get a better hold of your men, captain,” Professor McCray responded, exasperated.
“Which way?” Another of the soldiers asked. “Do we split up?”
“That’s the number one way to die in a place like this,” Private North replied.
“We stick together,” the Captain agreed, pointing down the leftmost tunnel. “Let’s go this way. I hope you’re mapping this place out, prof.”
“Quite,” the orb responded as the platoon began to walk down the tunnel. It was the same as the one they entered through, except for the chaotic arrangement of pipes that broke up the consistent wood panelling. They walked for far longer than they should have, to the point where they should have been walking out of the Clocktower. None of them said a word about this, even though they should have. None of them knew what the Clocktower was. Extremely long corridors was one of the least weird things they expected. Eventually, they arrived at a set of stairs that climbed left.
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The Captain examined the spiral staircase, which came out of the right wall and spiraled up into darkness to the left of them. He grabbed onto the handrail and pulled himself up, only for his centre of gravity to suddenly change and position him firmly on the stairwell. The other soldiers, though confused and a little scared, swiftly followed him. The orb just floated after the soldiers, the footage not changing to match the tilt of the platoon.
It finally changed when the soldiers walked out into another corridor, leading to a massive ballroom. Massive double doors and windows flanked every wall, marble pillars holding up an enormous diamond encrusted ceiling that looked like the night sky. The floor was practically a mirror with how well polished it was. The Captain opened one of the double doors to find just a wall of bronze metal. He opened the curtains of the windows to see no view there either.
“What does the holy Wyrm need with a ballroom?” Private North asked.
“We don’t need to question why He does the things he does,” Mick replied. “This place clearly wasn’t made for humans anyway.”
“It must have been, though. Why have a place like this if there’s no humans about?”
“Maybe it’s for the dead,” another private suggested. “We know that the souls of the dead go to the Clocktower-”
“Religious conjecture is not fact, Private Green,” the orb angrily interjected.
“-so there’s probably some kind of entertainment for them. Maybe we can only truly understand this place when we’re dead?”
“Hey, prof,” the Captain shouted. “Can your orb thing do structure analysis?”
“Unfortunately not,” the professor replied. “I will need to be on sight to begin analysis of the Clocktower.”
Private North went over to one of the doors and opened them. A cog was spinning directly in front of them, seemingly detached from everything else.
“What if we bring back samples for you to study?” She shouted, turning around to face the orb.
“I do not recommend that, Private North,” the professor replied again. “Not until we have a clearer understanding of what this place is.”
“Spoilsport,” she said, turning back to look at the bronze to see a bright blue eye staring at her through the metal.
She yelped and immediately drew her rifle. The other soldiers responded in kind, aiming as a long tendril of metal with a bright blue eye extended into the ballroom. The eye flitted between all of the soldiers, examining them.
“Do not open fire!” Professor McCray shouted.
The Captain began to walk forward slowly, hands raised. In response, the other soldiers lowered their weapons slightly.
“We are not here to fight,” he said, calmly. “We are investigating this place for the good of humanity. This place is strange to us, and it is natural for humans to be scared of something like this. We are sorry.”
The tendril growled and hissed in a strange, harsh language.
“I cannot translate,” Professor McCray said. “The language does not exist on any database.”
“Do you know how to speak English?” The Captain asked.
The tendril let out some strange scratching noises, before responding with, “yes. I will repeat what I just said. I kindly ask you to leave this place. We do not wish to wake Dominion.”
The group looked between each other, confused by the name.
“We have no intention of doing that,” the Captain replied. “We simply wish to understand the technology of this place, and its possible applications for the good of humanity.”
The eye narrowed, the tendril snaking towards the Captain. “I understand your noble intentions. However, we do not wish to wake Dominion.”
“Who is Dominion? Is it the one we would know as the Worldwyrm?”
“The name is unknown to me.”
“Maybe you can be our guide?” Mick suggested.
“Is he allowed to speak?” The tendril asked the Captain.
“Of course,” the Captain replied. “He makes a good point after all.”
“He does not. I am bound in servitude with a specific function. I cannot travel far in this place, and many of my coworkers would approve of you even less.”
“Terrific,” Private North muttered. “There’s more of them.”
The Captain nodded, thinking for a second before speaking. “Perhaps we could take something small? We have devices that can break down the material composition of objects. If we could take a small cog, we could use it to fully understand how this place is made.”
“It would be far worse than having full access to this place,” Professor McCray objected.
“But it would be far better than disturbing whatever is happening in this place,” the Captain snapped back. McCray grumbled something, but over the orb’s speakers it just came out as static.
“Do we have a deal?” The Captain asked the tendril.
The eye continued to glare at the captain. “Very well. You may take a single cog from this holy place. Then, you must leave.”
“Thank you,” the Captain said, reaching out and taking the cog Private North was looking at earlier. He began to walk away, and the soldiers holstered their weapons. The more religious among them bowed in approval as they left towards the staircase.
“What a grand waste of time,” McCray snarled.
“I am not a religious man, Professor,” the Captain admitted, examining the cog, “but I am scared of this place. We will take what we can get, and make the most of it. Soldiers, we’re getting the hell out of here!”
“Sir, yes sir!”
The group walked away, not realising that this gift of a single gear had just doomed the human race.
