Gentle Blade (Dresden Files/Warframe)

[Anzer'ke]

Gentle Blade​

Prologue: Even angels...


A whisper of steel, muffled by the night. That and a brief glimmer in the wind were the only signs to be seen. No matter how closely any observer might have looked. Whether mystical or mundane, they would have found no further sign.

Perhaps, had some hypothetical watcher seen those signs, things yet to come might have been averted.

Perhaps.

*****​

Some men were born to grow old.

Others wore their years like another man's suit, wrinkled and worn. While still others hardly seemed to wear them at all.

Much akin to these varied categories were the many ways a man might let himself fall into ruin. From the bitter scent and groaning knees of those who surrendered their health, to the ragged disarray of those who abandoned grooming, to the stumbles and lapses of drinking their despair. A man might find a thousand ways to wallow in pain, and a thousand more ways to wear it.

The man hunched over at the bar could have won every audition for the role he was playing. That of an ill-shaven drunk best left to their stoic staredown with the mirror behind the bar. Glass clenched in a fist half-raised, as if even he wasn't sure if he meant to drink or hurl the container at his own bleary eyed glare.

Certainly the muscle that hid beneath baggy clothes and poor posture suggested he'd have hit himself right between bloodshot eyes, despite the gentle swaying of his body. Indeed he was a man whose entire appearance suggested the capacity for violence and an urgent suggestion to be left alone, if only the one looking had the wit to see beneath his most superficial exterior.

The cluster of men and women that gathered around him, themselves fit to audition for the roles of generic bar thugs one through thirteen, either lacked the wit or thought themselves tough enough not to need it. The burly woman who swaggered out from among their number and loomed over him was unafraid, a predator's smile fixed on her face as she leant down and plucked the glass from his unresisting hand.

She sniffed the glass and tossed it away with a clatter and a laugh. "Tonic water? We've got ourselves a real hardass here boys and girls. What? The other cops thought it would be funny to send in the Mormon?"

Her words got a laugh from her 'friends' and a mixture of disinterest and averted eyes from the rest of the bar. All but the bartender himself, who had seen a few movies and owned a dive bar for over a decade and knew when to start putting the breakables out of harm's way.

The man himself merely waved for another drink and kept right on staring, muttering after a moment's thought, "Catholic."

"What was that you old fuck?"

Oblivious to the rising danger in her voice, the man only said, "I'm Catholic, not a cop, or a Mormon."

She turned and gave her buddies a knowing look, the face of someone moments from their favourite punchline. Then she leant down to rest an elbow on the bar and let her other hand hover before his face, palm up and open. Whispering, "Well altar boy, you wandered into the wrong place. This bar's for demons only." as her palm flickered with light and the scent of sulphur, before a perfect ball of fire bloomed into existence above it.

His eyes flicked across to stare at her conjuration, unbothered by the heat against his face, and she grinned in anticipation of his reaction. Then blinked at the hand that had caught her wrist in a grip like cold stone.

"I doubt you could summon a demon if you tried young lady." Was all he said before sweeping her arm to the side and catching the side of her head with his other hand. Her neck tattoo met the edge of the bar and her nose smashed against the surface a moment later, then she was gasping and choking and roaring her fury as her spun and tossed her into her own companions. Throwing the nearest bar stools to either side of her for good measure.

Like a statue unfolding from deep thought, the drinker rose to a height on the upper end of average and rolled his shoulders once before wading in to the disarray he had made of them. Before the cluster could recover and come at him together he had already laid out three of them with the quick workmanlike movements of an experienced brawler, meeting the first of them to recover by catching his spinning kick and punting the other leg out from under him.

He caught a punch and twisted until it's owner was close enough to headbutt repeatedly, then had the breath knocked out of him by a ripple of force that left the man who threw it gasping for breath. Enough of an opening for the half of the thugs not yet rendered unable to fight to come rush him, driving him back against the bar with fists, feet, and assorted weapons both improvised and pocket-borne.

Yet he did not drop, arms up and shoulders curled in tight as he weathered a steady stream of impacts. Eyes watching and alert behind the iron wall of his guard. Then one stepped back to toss aside a heavy bat a pull a blade and he surged through the opening. Catching his target in the instant between weapons and driving a merciless fist into his gut, so deep as to leave a splatter of half-digested food on the floor, not that he paid it any mind.

Instead he focused all his interest on the abandoned bat. Rolling it with the tip of a boot and flicking it up high enough for one bruised and scraped fist to snatch it from the air. Then he turned and took it in both hands, a swordsman's stance anchoring him amidst the bodies of his victims.

Two were brave or dumb enough to attack the bulwark before them. Both lost their weapons and consciousness in a single smooth motion, leaving a handful still capable of grabbing the nearest friend and heading for the door. Their erstwhile victim making no attempt to stop any of them.

He tossed the bat to the floor instead, letting go as if it had scalded him, and turned to squat before the prone form of their apparent leader. The woman spitting blood and fury and failing to hide the fear in her eyes as he took his turn to loom over her.

"You a warden?" She snarled, fingers curling around something tucked in the waist of her pants.

He shook his head, and carefully stepped on her hand as she tried to pull the gun, pressing down until she let go and then kicking it into the primordial shadows beneath a corner booth.

Then he bent down and looked her dead in the eye, his attention truly upon her for the first time, and he asked a question.

"Did you know Molly Carpenter?"

*****​

 

[Anzer'ke]

So, for reasons I won't get into, I have found the last of my interest in this fic has left me, and it is now well and firmly dead.

As such, I'm posting the following notes/outline/summary of the events of Gentle Blade so that anyone who was wondering can wonder no more. Fair warning that most of this was written years ago so the parts may feel disjointed due to me pulling it together into something that makes sense to people who aren't me.

Spoiler: Gentle Blade Notes

Michael as of Gentle Blade is pulled into events (Underlying setting is a combination of mostly White Night with some of Small Favour) by threats to his family, having renounced Amorchius and his role as a knight. His faith strained to breaking by the loss of his daughter and his best friend in close sequence, especially after his attempts to salve this met the horror of learning neither was in Heaven, a secret he has not shared with Charity even as she finds some kind of comfort in such faith.

Also involved are the local Warden. Luccio, and two junior wardens (one male one female) who are assigned to investigate....

And a mysterious Warrior who definitely isn't Molly having snuck into the world. Thinking herself safe as her Orbiter has not left the Void. Failing to grasp that she can still be snared and thus falling into Mab's trap. Only for her father to end up rescuing her. In the process he would finally find the will to take up the sword once more, having put it down for fear he would shatter it with his wavering heart, though this true motive would have been obscured for most of the story by a veil of more generic crisis of faith type feeling.

Spoiler: Start of Prologue Part 2 "...Fall"

Michael Carpenter emerged into the thin light of pre-dawn Chicago with the demeanour of an ancient subterranean beast left close to blind by the aeons underground. Precisely the sort of creature that would once have fled the mere sight -or alternative Morlockian sensory apparatus- of him, but would have had an entirely different reaction to his stumbling and flailing at the sunlight.

By the time he blinked the tears from his eyes and fumbled his way into his truck, Michael could see the first tints of sunrise in the sky. Sunday was dawning bright and beautiful and if he headed straight for home he knew he'd be just in time to help get the youngest of his children ready for church.

Which was his cue to recline his seat and close his eyes, quickly falling asleep.

When he woke up again the sunrise had been and gone. The bartender tapping on his truck windows in a manner that had him bolt upright and hefting a tire iron in the time most men took to blink.

Michael would have found his efforts at the bar failing to do much more than help a few young practitioners to stay on the right path, mostly out of fear but a little out of him still being kind to them even in the depths of grief and anger as he is.

He comes home and refuses to respond to Charity's attempts to start an argument, telling her that he won't help her punish herself. She closes things by asking him if that means he'll stop punishing himself.

Spoiler: End of Prologue

Again, wind whispered.

Again, steel sang.

Once more the night gave shelter to a wound upon the world.

Once more there was no observer to see the absence of signs.

So one more stepped through...and the walls rang with a steady rap rap rap…

A sound like laughter.

Next day he goes to work, only to find that one of his employees was murdered the night before. Cut in three pieces.

He refused the twinge of the call when he heard on the radio about the murder, only to come in to work and find it was one of his guys. First he doesn't show up, then he can't be reached, then Michael's secretary answers the phone and bursts into tears.

With the murder now personal, he decides to contact Murphy after sending everyone home for the day. Although they were only friends of a friend, they have gotten closer after Harry vanished, and thus Michael calls her. At least he does so after he initially phones the police only to flounder at no longer having guidance that would have previously ensured he got the cop he needed, instead resorting to asking for Karin Murphy.

On the phone with her and discussing it as he goes, he finds a number of weird details before his phone stops working and he thinks his abandoned workplace is under attack. Only for the Wardens to be the ones who show up, Michael almost takes a rookie's head off. The new local Warden for the region, plus Luccio, talk him down and try to ward him off. They're in the middle of reluctantly explaining to him that he has a price on his head when another attack comes, two bounty hunters attacking at once (one was tracking the Wardens to use them as supernatural cover, the other was taking a more traditional approach) only for a third to seem to show up in the form of a Warframe appearing on the scene. The Warframe being inhabited by Molly, who is here to protect her dad.

The rookie is the one who reacts to this, planting a hint that she is Indy, and Molly ends up fleeing as quickly as she arrived. No clear look at her throughout.

After this Michael is firmly refused participation and told to go home where he will be safe.

That night however, Molly sits in the treehouse and watches her family, only for one of the kids to see her, tell Charity, and lead to Daniel running out to try and fight her while Michael is left stunned by a supernatural foe managing to bypass the protections he thought were present. Whether Molly's nature let her sneak past the angels, or they allowed her by, remains unclear right to the very end.

Molly is chased off-

And there ends my detailed notes.

What follows is a much less detailed outline, my process for this kind of story being to create a pure outline, then turn that into actual scene level detail in my notes, then finally write that up. Outline turning into notes often involves a lot of 'Oh wait, this scene would work better like this' and just ideas coming to me. Notes becoming story often involves places where the flow of the writing resulting in differences from the notes or scenes not really working out. Hence there will be contradictions between what's above and what's below.

Given my lack of desire to engage with this any further, I'm not going back to create full notes for the story just to post this.

Spoiler: Gentle Blade Skeletal Outline

Mab instigated things with an offer of access to an ancient vault for whoever kills Michael.

Molly took the bait and came through the Void, unwittingly pulling a ship full of Grineer nightwatch in her wake.

She arrives in the city, they arrive in the lake, but the time they arrive at is midday despite this part taking place seemingly at night, to hint that it's not in it's proper place in time.

The gatekeeper detects this arrival and dispatches Luccio and her current apprentice to deal with it. The new Chicago area Warden obviously gets involved.

Meanwhile the stirrings of supernatural hitters have become action, and they start to come for Michael.

Lara suspects that one of her rivals for control of the White Court has put the bounty out after Michael tore a path of destruction through one of their fronts. Generally this kind of behaviour seems like the most likely reason for the hit at first, though Elaine finds this explanation too neat right from the start and suspects someone trying to take out a knight while he's grieving his daughter and hence weakened due to having put down the sword, advising him to go pick it back up for this reason.

First attempt is made at killing Michael, attacking him in his office via a stolen body and inadvertently reminding him of how Molly died. Which results in a weird zombie thing having its head beaten in with the remains of his desk.

Wardens show up after that, having been tracking the sudden influx of supernatural things that have come to Chicago, thinking one of them must be involved with the gatekeeper's mission. Luccio suspects that the hit is to give cover to this incursion, but does not share this theory and just tells Michael to stay home for a week or two, knowing about the supernatural protection he has due to his time as a knight. Basically telling him to stay out of their way.

Early hints at one of them being hinky come here.

He talks to Murphy when she ends up getting called to the scene (didn't get demoted like in Proven Guilty so she's actually on better footing then she was at this point in canon, plus she got a bunch of busts in the spate of anonymous tips the Lotus dropped a year past.) with his normal methods not an option, he tries to think what Harry would do and ends up calling Murphy to see if she knows of any hitmen coming to town, she points out how ridiculous this is and tells him that he is not qualified to be doing this kind of thing but since she can't talk him out of it she might as well introduce him to the other band of idiots, cue him finding out about Thomas being back in town. Also that Murphy does not get along with Harry's replacement and misses him desperately.

That night Molly deals with gangsters who were getting ready to move on the house to kill him in the night. Then Molly watches from across the street, creeping into the treehouse by morning.

She even disposes of the bodies.

End Day 1

He meets Thomas for brunch after helping get the kids up and ready, finding himself ashamed at how little time he's given them lately and realising he used his job as an excuse to keep himself from them, whether because he didn't want to worsen their pain or because he couldn't face them, Michael isn't sure.

Thomas managed to track down enough info to realise Harry was involved in something Seventh Law adjacent and that he was staring down a dead end. Harry's stuff was all either wrecked or gone by the time he got to it (Tenno nabbed Bob) so he came back to Chicago to try and hunt down leads on the Warlock that killed Harry's apprentice, figuring that was better than chasing the trail of his client and last job.

Meeting Thomas leads to sharing info and being confronted again by how bad he is at investigation, though Thomas commiserates on that front and introduces him to Elaine.

They reveal that the Warlock has proven a total dead end and he was unlikely to get anywhere chasing it further. However he points to the hit on his life and they agree this means he's probably spooked someone. Meaning their best bet is to follow it to the source.

Cue a visit to the Raith estate and Michael feeling the strong desire to start smiting things for the first time in a while. They find the Wardens there and learn that the new one has a semi-cordial relationship out of gratitude for her making Lara's life easier when she killed Madrigal (why are they getting along? "She killed my cousin." takes him a minute to realise that's being considered a positive). An attack while they are there dulls the suspicion that Lara was involved and the sight of Molly gets a red herring reaction from Apprentice girl after she intervenes from afar via a rifle.

Meanwhile, all through this day, Michael is getting twinges of the call that he ignores. This being the attempt to draw him off to fight the Grineer who are too close to Demonreach for any big players to deal with them. Given they are rapidly fixing their shit and getting troops ready to go, this means an army of about two hundred thousand supersoldiers itching to start taking slaves and murdering everyone else.

Lara rather bluntly reveals that she doesn't know who placed the hit, plus, after the way things went with the meeting she wants nothing to do with it. Which is in no small part so she has cover while she sets up House Malvora to take the fall for the contract (she doesn't think they placed it but is happy to take advantage of them looking guilty) since they're one of the suspects thanks to him fucking up their operation.

Michael heads for home. Seeing some of Marcone's men (trying to figure out where a bunch of out of town contract killers vanished) along the way without knowing anything but that they're suspicious. Plus a guy who was watching them in turn, with a really messed up face that stirs Michael's sympathy. That guy being a Grineer spy.

End Day 2

Middle of the night Michael is woken by screaming and runs upstairs to find a monster (Molly) was standing over his children (stroking their hair and saying things to them) as they slept.

Fight ensues, during which he dismisses Molly's claims that she is herself as a trick, especially since she's quickly blasted out of the house by angels after being discovered. Though the reasons for this remain unclear and they do no more than hinder her.

She is defeated and captured by him, mostly because the angels weakened her and she won't really fight him, but also because he's damn good and she's a baby Tenno.

Wardens show up, as does Thomas. Luccio knows enough to know that trying to kill the angel sealed Outsider will accomplish nothing and proposes handing her over to someone better suited for dealing with it in exchange for information on who put out the contract. Namely Mab.

They do this, hand Molly over, and Mab happily reveals she was behind the contract.

Since he finally tracked down the contract to Mab, Michael is furious that he has hit another dead end in his attempts to find his daughter's killer. Mab is prompt to tell him that one of the Wardens is the one who killed his daughter, though in an oblique way to hide that in fact it's Indy using one of their faces and all those physically present are innocent.

Maeve and Molly fight, which was Mab's entire goal ever since the Lotus's maiming made her realise she had a potential route to purging the corruption from Maeve.

Nemesis is killed, and in the process the Grineer being pulled across finally happens.

End Day 3

The Climax is all about Michael regaining his lost certainty and resolve. Starting by rescuing his daughter before Mab, who is still an arsehole, can show her gratitude by imprisoning her as the very valuable bargaining chip she is.

It also becomes clear that the White God's ilk were helping Molly from the start, mainly by way of them interferring far more directly against the Adept who followed her into Creation, thereby clearing the path for the protagonists of the story to deal with the Grineer.

Cue a story about trying to fight off a Grineer invasion force within the Faerie kingdom, making absolutely sure that no word of this new world gets back from them. They fail, but Leia the Tenno from Absent Faces, who has opened a line of communication tells them that the information is still limited to a single fleet that is stranded in the Void thanks to Molly's original mission of sabotage before she veered from that task in order to get to Earth and save her dad.

The story ends far more peacefully than the last, with an archangel who isn't Uriel revealing the full repercussions of Dresden's big sacrifice at the end of Absent Faces.

Molly is still unable to remain in Creation long term as she is, for fear of the impact of her presence for extended periods. Michael's emotional journey through the story brings him to a place where he can be okay with that. Okay with there not being a solution for this, despite the strength of his faith.

This established, the story can give him that chance anyway with the angel offering to carve Molly's soul free of the Void and let her remain in Creation as a spirit, if nothing else.

Whether this would have worked remains vague, throw in a hidden rap rap rap or something.

Stays vague as Molly chooses not to. Having found a new path and leaving Creation behind willing. Though the option is left open for her if she should choose it later. Maybe the rap rap rap goes here instead.

Michael ends the story bidding goodbye to his daughter and Charity managing a joke about feeling like she's going away to college. They gift her one of her mom's swords and slip her a totally secret note that she'd better come back for Thanksgiving.

Spoiler: The Gambit Pileup for Gentle Blade

Plans:

Mab – Put hit on Michael with collateral damage likely > Lure Molly back > Capture here under guise of duty > Use her to save Maeve under guise of Maeve executing her > Kill her

Indy - Know of hit on Michael and be aware he is looking for her > Seek to eliminate Michael after using him to find any other witnesses who might know something about what went down and therefore might have learned something that could reveal her > wallow in paranoia some more

Lara – Wants to get the measure of the new Chicago Warden and lure her focus out of the city, or if that fails set her up to die > Knows she won't respond like Dresden and therefore does not set up other houses to attack like in canon, instead trying to lure them into attacking Warden > To this end she manipulates them into taking the hit on Michael.

Grineer – Take slaves > Start fixing their ship to go home > Figure out where they are > ??? > Grofit

Anyway, that's it. The end of Gentle Blade.

Empty Stars didn't have enough of a complete outline for me to bother posting it here, as it would require me to do a lot more than just neaten it up as I did the above.

Basically it was going to be about Dresden, restored to sanity and health and boosted up to Origin System standards while still having all his magic, living his dream as a space pirate private operator making his living skirting the edges of the countless battlefields of the Origin System.

Bob and Lash would be sharing duties as his ship Cephalon. Possibly Bob was going to have integrated into a Helminth esque bit of biotech, becoming in truth the randy personality that he got from Dresden. Lash would be far more dignified and evoke space angel vibes as the living ship whose bones the Lotus gifted the saviour of her child.

The story proper would pick up with the Lotus' disappearance and revolve around Dresden looking for her, finding her, and bringing that whole plotline to a rather different and earlier end than it got in canon.