It doesn’t matter what people say about you..it will all work out for your good, if you let it. Try a bowl of ice cream and a fun show to find a new perspective.

“Really?”

Dax sighed, followed by a genuine smile. “Really.”

Chuck grabbed the elf and hugged him. “Thank you, thank you, thank you!”

Prying himself from the iron grasp, Dax straightened his shirt and held the wizard at bay, “Alright! That’s enough.”

Chuck giggled.

“You’re positive that this will work? The charm will hold?”

The wizard shook his head, “Not in the least.”

Lili closed her book, “You sure you want to risk it? What if you come back and you’re no longer a gnome? I don’t think they’re going to allow a…” she paused, not sure what to say, “green person into the games.”

Shrugging, “Maybe not, but the rules say all team members have to engage in the initial rounds. I already did that—so even if I have ta drop out, it won’t affect Wendell competing.” He stared up at the wizard, who looked like the world had just been removed from his shoulders. “Besides,” Dax smirked, “we’re doing this for you two anyway. We need Höbin’s help to find that seal—that’s what we’re here for, right? So this takes priority.” He looked away long enough for Chuck to snatch the elf up and hug him again.

“Thank you, thank you, thank you!!” he giggled.

Dax’s face turned a bright off-shade of green. “Can’t…breathe…”

****

The entire warehouse had been locked down under Shamas’ recommendation. Trench fans had figured out where the warehouse was and started showing up on the doorstep the moment Dax’s press event went live. People asked for autographs, tried to peer in windows and even attempted to pilfer parts of the warehouse not nailed down. Luckily, Morty had experience dealing with vandals and had developed his own customized security system.

“It won’t even send them to the hospital. It just gives them…” he had to smile to himself in satisfaction, “painful encouragement not to touch.” He glanced over at the bodyguard innocently, “That’s all. I promise.”

“Alright,” said Shamas. He looked around at everyone else in the kitchen, “Consider this a weekend off, folks.” Even the TNT crew had been encouraged to live at the warehouse until the blitz of the media had passed, which infuriated Tumbler.

“Is this really necessary?” he complained, smoke rolling up from the end of his cigar and around his bulbous nose. “I can’t be here too long, boy,…no one’s home to feed me plants!”

Shamas nodded, “Yes, old timer, it’s necessary. If you wander off alone, you could get hurt.”

“Bah.” Putting the cigar out in his cheese sandwich, he scowled at the bodyguard. “Who’s gonna bother an old, retired welder that lives on the docks? No one I tell ya!” With a grease-smudged finger he pointed at Nat, “I’m only doin’ this gig for extra credits and to stick it to the younger crowd!”

Shamas patted the welder on the shoulder sympathetically. “I apologize Tumbler, but that press meeting went south. Our words are being twisted and there’s a growing division between the normals and the factory workers. So, right now you’re all at risk. My job is to keep you safe and I can’t do that if you’re spread out around the city. Until some of the attention dies down, and I can do a little recon, I want you in one place.” He nodded to Alhannah, “The hangar is locked down. Don’t open it for anyone and don’t even bother kicking on the S.L.A.G.s until I get back.” He turned back to point directly at Freak. The fluffy gnome gulped. “That means no working either. You stay in the main quarters of warehouse. Got it? I don’t want anyone looking in windows and taking candid pictures of any of you. Spend the time planning for now.” Looking around, “Where’s Dax, Lili and Chuck?”

Deloris pulled out a gallon of cookie crumble ice cream from the freezer. “They’re talking about their research project.” She gave Alhannah a wary look, then added, “Don’t worry, I’ll let them know and make sure they stick to your directions. Didn’t sound like they had any intention of leaving the library anyway.”

Shamas nodded, “Thanks. Ok then, I’m off. Time to find out how bad this is going to get.”

Alhannah walked him to the door, leaving the group to argue over who got the first bowl of the ice cream. She shifted her weight from foot to foot, the tension openly displayed in her face.

Shamas reached out and lightly touched her forearm. “You ok, Red?”

“Do you think this is as bad as you’re leading on?” Her body kept shifting, but her stare was cold, firm and calculating. “You haven’t shared any intel with me and I think you forget I have the same job you do in the big wide world. The only difference is I’m allowed to put my enemies six feet under.”

He stopped his hand on the front door. “I’m…not sure what’s going on yet.” He thought for a moment, biting his bottom lip. “The moment big corporations get involved, you know they’ll do anything they can to stack the odds in their favor. With the factions joining the list, you never know.” He glanced over her shoulder, watching the shadows being projected in the hallway—movement from the kitchen. “Once government gets involved, you know the next stop is the crapper. And that’s if we’re lucky.”

Yanking the door open, Shamas almost stumbled over a crate sitting on the doorstep. “What the…?”

It was about two feet squared, a small cream colored envelope nestled under a bright red bow stapled to the corner of the wood.

Alhannah leaned over and snatched up the card.

“Careful,” Shamas whispered, looking down the street and across at the other abandoned buildings. There wasn’t a single soul in sight. “It could be a trap.”

Alhannah chuckled, “I hardly think we’ve risen to the retaliation level of bombs, RH.”

The envelope was addressed to Dax. Without hesitating, she tore it open and pulled the paper from its confinement. She laughed out loud.

“What does it say? Who is it from?”

She shook her head, grinning wide, “To Mr. Dax, Keep Up The Good Work. Signed, Bellows.”

The bodyguard frowned, “I don’t get it. What’s in the crate?”

Alhannah hefted the wooden container onto her shoulder.

“Cigars.”

****

Every station repeated the same stories—labeling Steel and Stone as racist, bigots and suggesting the team not be allowed to continue in the Trench Wars competition. The phone rang that morning…and never stopped. All day, people shouting profanities at whomever dared to pick up the receiver. Deloris eventually had to disconnect the phone from the wall altogether. The Steel and Stone website was also bogged down, overloaded with millions of emails until the system froze. Reporters wanted to confirm the coarse allegations made by the stations—while hecklers and religious leaders spit out threats from the church districts. Hour after hour, overreaching opinions saturated the airwaves about the poison of Steel and Stone.

It wasn’t long before Wendell started to wonder if entering the games was such a good idea after all. The whole warehouse had become quiet and solemn, eventually everyone gathering to the kitchen area. No one felt like strategizing so much as trying to figure out how to ride this wave of public scorn.

“If we were tryin’ to reclaim our reputations, we’re off to a crap of a start,” grumbled Tumbler. “And that ain’t the worse of it neither.”

Telly stretched his legs out under the table and yawned, “What you complaining about now?”

The old welder jabbed his thumb in Wendell’s direction. “The pressure’s on him now! All this lying and shifty work o’ the media ain’t gonna bode well for any of us if he don’t win, I can tell you that!”

Wendell had sat nearly comatose all evening, plopped down in the center of the sofa. Station after station, report after report, he sat there gripping the remote control and staring at the distressed faces of reporters. Pictures and short video clips flashed across the screen, spliced and out of context, showing Dax and Alhannah defying the corporate elite, concentrating on words and phrases they could turn and misused to their own design.

“…we intended to…”

“…out to make money, to get famous…Right ‘Hannah?”

“Exactly right.”

“…we aim ta remind Clockworks…”

“…this city has lost…”

“…the workers…”

“…the factories…”

“…its government,…”

“…its religion…”

The lies continued into the night. One by one the team got up from the table, sick of the media bombardment and wandered back to their rooms, depressed and distraught. In the end, only Wendell, Morty and Deloris sat on the couch.

“Not a single station,” Wendell muttered to himself.

“What’s that dear?” Deloris asked, rising to collect the ice cream bowls left about. She shuffled about, humming a soft, pleasant tune as she did so.

“Not a single station told the truth,” he repeated. “We spoke out in behalf of the people and not one station reported what we actually said.” He corrected himself, “Well, not accurately I mean. Don’t they realize that if the people were empowered, things could change?”

“But that’s just it,” remarked Morty, getting up to help Deloris, “They might not want things to change. Did you think of that?

It didn’t make any sense to Wendell. “Why wouldn’t you want things to change when the conditions for the people are so bad?” The words of Motherboard kept flashing through his mind—stories of oppression and how the Government faction lulled people into a false sense of security, so the leaders could have their way. It had made sense to Wendell and he’d believed it. Was it all wrong? No, I can see the oppression around me. The government isn’t the good guy. It’s never the…but he also had to wonder. Even back home, on Earth, citizens didn’t care about what happened around them. Not truly. Oh, people would complain when things didn’t go their way or a bill or law was passed that they didn’t like, but truly—no one cared. So long as the small daily conveniences of life were not disturbed, no one looked at the bigger picture or noticed how the small changes made by their leaders were adding up to foul play to that citizens could be ruled and controlled.

Wendell remembered many night sitting across from his father at the kitchen table, listening to his parents political views. They never really made much sense…until now. There’s always an alternative goal of those in charge. The gnomes are no different.

Deloris set the bowls on the table and walked over to the couch. She leaned over and smiled at Wendell in a motherly fashion. “I think we could do with a lot more young men with your views of life. My opinion, of course. But what Morty is getting at dear, is that the people in charge—the ones with control of the resources, the funding, the power over the masses here in Clockworks are the ones who probably don’t want anything to change.”

It’s just like Earth, Wendell sighed, people hungry for power and control over others instead of helping one another. Without thinking, he clicked the remote. The TV clicked on…to a station he didn’t recognize from his evening of surfing. A young male gnome, dressed in a ruffled blue shirt, sat behind a desk, with a banner tacked to the wall behind him. It said KNOW THE NEWS.

“…and I was appalled at what my colleagues in the industry have been relaying. Ladies and gentlegnomes, it…is…a…lie. This reporter was there and our crew filmed the entire event. We would like to play it now, for you, unedited—straight from the Steel and Stone press room.”

The scene instantly changed and Wendell watched himself through the lens at the back of the room. The camera man was standing in the far corner, a head or so above the rest of the media crowd. He’d recorded the entire meeting and the event played out on the TV…with each word in its proper place. What was even better, was the camera man zoomed in to capture the face, voice and the station logo of each person who asked a question. They’d all been caught in a bold-faced lie.

Deloris and Morty set the dishes down and walked back to the couch.

“Well I’ll be,” Morty muttered, “they all just got nailed…by the under dog station!” He laughed, “Oh there are a lot of people who are going to have to eat crow tomorrow.”

Deloris just grinned. “It will always work out,” she smirked. “There are still good hearted citizens out there—even in the media. If given the time, someone will say what needs to be said.”

“We got any ice?” Dax sighed, barging into the kitchen, startling both Deloris and Morty. He was holding the right side of his face with one hand and grabbing his behind with the other. His face was bright red.

“You’re back!” Wendell beamed, “and you’re still a gnome…” but he cocked his head to the side as his friend limped across the floor, gripping butt and face.

Dax glowered, “Yeah, lucky me.” He let go of his face and yanked the freezer door open. A gigantic black and purple bruise circled his swollen eye and upper cheekbone. Digging through the contents, the elf growled and finally snatched a frozen bag of veggies. He gingerly put it upon his cheek and sighed.

“What happened?” Deloris asked, stifling a giggle. She bit her lip. “You look like you stopped a transport with your face.”

“Hah, hah,” he sneered, carefully sitting down into a chair at the kitchen table. He held his breath as his rear made contact with the wood. “I was attacked by a psycho cyborg gnome, that’s what.”

Wendell exchanged glances with Morty, who was also fighting the poetic humor. “So Höbin’s here?”

“Yup.”

“And he…hit you?”

Dax sighed, “And TASERED me!”

Morty snorted, then coughed. “And he did this, why?”

Looking between them, “Because I didn’t look my amazing, masculine self, of course!” He stared at each of them, hurt. But when Wendell smirked, he sighed heavily, “Oh alright! I was trying to stay out of sight. Didn’t want to have to explain myself to the Sentry or anyone else for that matter—so I ported directly into Höbin’s room at the Roadkill Tavern. He…” but he couldn’t help but smiling himself, “thought I was laying in ambush, in his room, to mug him.”

Wendell laughed, “So he…”

Dax nodded, now laughing, “Popped his fingers down and shot me.”

Deloris walked over and took a good look at the black eye. “So when did you get this?”

Dax moaned, adjusting the cold pack on his face. “When I didn’t lose consciousness from the electricity, he cold-cocked me.”

****

The library still had the heavy scent of incense in the air, but it was quickly being challenged by the repeated visits to the espresso machine in the corner. Wendell held his small cup to the spout and watched the machine sputter out the flavorful elixir of soberness. Pulling the lever back, he walked over and handed the cup to the historian. Höbin looked up at him sheepishly.

“Well how was I supposed to know it was him?” he argued, “Not like he had green skin, or four digits on his hands and feet…” he gave Dax a glare, “or even identified himself! Heh, that would have been nice.”

“Would you have believed me?” Dax countered.

The gnome paused, cocking one eyebrow up and staring at the ceiling as he pondered. “Uhhhhh,….nope.”

“Then what was the point?”

“The point, Dax,” he said with disdain, “is that you shouldn’t have ported into my private quarters in the first place.” He flicked his eyebrows up and down rapidly. “P.R.I.V.A.T.E.”

“Got it,” he rolled his eyes, “GOT it.”

“Did Dax explain to you why he was there to pick you up?” asked Chuck, watching the verbal tennis match with great amusement.

Höbin shook his head, “Other than you being in trouble, no. I was too busy electrocuting his behind.”

Lili giggled from her desk.

The wizard took a sip of his own coffee, then set the cup onto the table. “Well I am in trouble and I need your help desperately, my friend.”

“Anything, Chuck, you know that.”

“It’s about the Demoni Vankil.”

Espresso sprayed from the gnomes mouth…and all over the wizard. Hobin coughed and began hitting himself in the chest, trying to get a breath. “Are you…nuts? Why…?” He looked between them all and finally rested his gaze on Wendell. “I know you have a tough job ahead of you, but if you want my historical advice…leave those things alone. If they stay hidden, the Dark one can’t come—simple as that!”

The smiley face on Wendell’s shirt carried a sad and sober expression, its eyes drooping, mouth aquiver. “There’s only one left.”

No one commented. All eyes watched the famous fishis swallow and digest the news. His eyes grew wide with panic. His mustache quivered and he quickly pulled his handkerchief from a vest pocket to dab his forehead. Before long, he was up on his feet and pacing the room.

“This…this can’t be right,” he muttered to himself, his voice shaky and weak. “If two of the seals were…” he glanced at Chuck, who silently nodded. Höbin’s tiny body flinched again and he resumed his pacing. “Then Mahan already has influence again. It…doesn’t matter which two seals it is. If he’s trapped on Unrest—he still has powers that can transcend the distance between planets. It would be weaker, but not impossible. If he’s not trapped, but stranded because he doesn’t have a way home, he can either speak magic or perform rituals with motion.”

“What does that mean? Motion?” Wendell asked.

Höbin’s gulped, “It means we’re screwed.”

“That’s why the darkness has been growing over time,” Chuck said softly. He reached out as the gnome passed and grabbed Höbin’s arm, “That’s why I need your help. The third seal is here, in Clockworks.”

For a moment, it looked as if the last tidbit of information had been lost on him. He kept nodding, but didn’t say anything. Then all of a sudden, his head snapped up, the blood draining from his face. “Here?” he choked, “As in, right here, in the City? Clockworks City…filled with over a billion gnomes?!?”

“That’s what I said,” frowned Morty, folding his arms and quite content that someone finally agreed with him.

Höbin smiled, “Oh, well that’s good then, isn’t it.”

“Good?” Morty scoffed.

“Of course. It’s a great idea,” the historian gave a sigh of relief and sat down. “A little seal, hidden in a sea of intelligent, hive-like people? It would be virtually impossible to find! It’s like…a needle in a billion haystacks. Perfect hiding place…so long as our people don’t know that it’s here.” He glanced over at Chuck. “Do they? Know that it’s here, I mean?”

“Mahan’s pink panties, no,” the wizard gasped. But he scratched his head and thought about it a moment. “Well,…not that I know of, anyway.”

Höbin’s head drooped forward.

“Oh don’t be like that. As I said to everyone else, I wasn’t the one in charge—I was the messenger! So stop blaming and start helping, alright?”

The gnome nodded, “What do you need from me?”

Lili came over and sat down next to Höbin and showed him a piece of parchment with names on it. “We have a puzzle to solve,” she said politely, “and Morphiophelius tells me you’re the best at what you do.” She stared at him, hopeful, as the gnome scanned the paper.

“Is this your work?”

She nodded, “My father is very adamant about keeping records. I’ve had practice.” She watched the metal fingers go down the list she’d helped compile, then asked nervously, “Do you think we might be able to find it? The seal?”

Höbin adjusted his artificial eye. “My dear child, I’m the one who discovered the damnable things existed in the first place. This should be a cake walk.”

Dax grumbled, “I hate cake.”