Engineer's Empire 2.0

Chapter 7

Chapter 7

The wagon rolled into White Pine. The boys hopped off and made their way back to the orphanage. As the other haggard, weary children lumbered past them to catch some small bit of sleep before school, Tyler turned toward the old saw mill. The other two exchanged looks and followed him. Once they were out of sight of the others, Jeffrey ventured a whisper.

"Where are you going?" Jeffrey asked.

"Let's go do something exciting tonight," Tyler said.

"Slade not getting hurt by those creeps and not getting pulverized by Russell was pretty exciting to me," Jeffrey said with a smirk. Tyler stared.

"What did you want to do?" Slade asked after a moment.

"Go see the haunted pillar," Tyler said. Jeffrey froze.

"At night?" Jeffrey asked, fear changing the tone in his voice.

"Of course at night. When else are you supposed to go look at haunted stuff?" Tyler said and continued walking.

"But tonight? Of all nights? With those creeps looking for us?" Jeffrey whimpered.

"If they're looking for us, they'll be back at the orphanage, not where I'm wanting to go. 'sides, might give us a moment to miss them if they swing on through," Tyler added. Jeffrey looked to Slade for some sort of help. Slade shrugged.

"It's a good idea honestly. And could be fun. Let's go for it," Slade replied.

Jeffrey watched his friends continue on towards the woods and sighed. He followed, forcing one foot in front of the other. Past the old saw mill was another ten-minute walk through the woods. Slade used his flick-switch for light until they came to the clearing with the old pillar. It stood taller than any of the boys and appeared to be made of black stone fused with warped metal of the same color. The air had a thickness to it here. The feeling of static around the pillar left the boys' arm hair standing on end. It had a faint gleam to it in the moonlight. Slade had always wondered if this was some relic from an ancient world of advanced societies and shadowy mysteries. Nearby, Jeffrey rubbed his arms, feeling a sudden chill.

"Okay. We've seen it. Can we go now?" he said.

"We just got here you big chicken," Tyler chuckled. Tyler looked up at Slade.

"What do you think it is?" he asked. Slade knelt down next to it, holding his flick-switch up to see better.

"I dunno. I bet it was beautiful back when it was built though. I wonder what it's made out of," Slade said, staring at the intricate metal work of circles and lines that covered the old relic.

"They say creatures from some far away world left it here," Jeffrey said.

"What?" Tyler asked in sheer annoyance and confusion.

"Just what I heard..." Jeffrey muttered, rubbing some dirt with his foot.

"It's really old," Slade replied.

"Ya. What I heard was that the Ossifers built it a long time ago," Tyler said.

"The who?" Slade asked.

"Ossifers. They built magic machines a long time ago," Tyler answered, not at all sounding certain of this.

"You mean the Artificers?" Slade asked.

"Shh..." Jeffrey hissed. "You're not supposed to say that word."

Slade looked from Jeffrey to Tyler.