Clockworks & Mechanicals Unlimited - Tumblr Posts
She wanted to beat something. Throw things. Make a mess, a horrible, wretched mess. Show the world what she felt like on the inside. What her heart looked like.
One of the little clockwork owls was in her hand. She didn't remember picking it up. But already she was squeezing it, fingers tightening around the delicate metal and bending it. If she smashed it in her palm, she'd throw it at the wall. If she threw it at the wall, others would join it. And if she threw them all, smashed the glass, wrecked the shelves, broke her shop...
Then what happened?
She'd lose everything. Everything.
Slowly, her fingers loosened around the owl. Breathing heavily through her nose, she set it on the worktable. There was blood there. Blood on the floor. There might even be blood on the chair in the corner where Ordran had set that useless corpse. She had to take fucking care of things. If she didn't, no one would.
She set out the 'closed for the day' sign beside the door, found a bucket and some rags -- rags she'd gotten to help with Cia NO don't think like that -- filled the bucket with rainwater from outside, and started cleaning.
Milli spent the morning on her knees, scrubbing blood from wood, emptying the bucket when it got too bloody. Not thinking. Not feeling. Desperately wishing she was being held tight by strong arms that could make this all better.
And when it was done, she made her way home and collapsed on the bed in a sort of half-sleep, staring at the door. Hoping it would open. Not knowing who she hoped would be on the other side.
I called you 'doll' because you remind me of one - perfect, fragile, and something I have no business being anywhere near. The best thing I can do for you is stay away. You may think no one loves you; everyone does. You're the best of all of us. The best I ever hoped to find. ~C *the package contained a delicate golden clockwork bracelet that rotates a faceted smoky topaz and a handful of apple candies*
Milli looked at the package in her hands, left on her doorstep like a present. Opening the door, she stepped into her shop, still staring at the note. She read it a second time. A third. It made no sense.
She set the bag on the counter, noting the clink of metal, the shuffle of candy wrappers. The note was set aside, the bag opened. Milli held the bracelet delicately, shifting it about to catch the light, to see its startling beauty. Absently, she reached in and pulled out one of the candies, started to open it.
Stopped.
If she took this, if she accepted it, it meant that Cia had never hurt her. It meant that Cia would keep on hurting her. Because she could. Because Milli was giving her that power. Just because she'd never laid a hand on Milli, didn't mean she couldn't make her hurt.
Angrily Milli crumpled the note. It went in the waste basket. Along with the candies, making a sad thunking sound as they struck the bottom. At the bracelet, she paused.
It was lovely. Good workmanship. Something she would like to wear if she was pretty, stylish. Something she could never wear, because Cia would see it and know.
It didn't mean it had to be broken, though. She didn't have to be broken, either.
So with a heavy heart, Milli placed the bracelet under the counter, far in the back behind several boxes. Where she alone would know. She alone.
There's something for everyone at Clockworks & Mechanicals Unlimited! Come by and see our line of custom altered weapons. Anything you can dream up, we can make it happen!
The birds seemed popular. Different species interested different people. They seemed to each carry their own meanings. So Milli went about the process of making different birds, learning to tint the metal blue and black and deepest red.
Milli examines the design carefully. It's good work. And she might have a use for this soon...
Steampunk Claw Hand by Diarment
A design left behind in the workshop, the notes on it in Tia’s handwriting.
The engineers and smiths at Clockworks & Mechanicals Unlimited have been hard at work creating the most spectacular and inventive devices you'll find anywhere! Looking for a custom gun? Look no further. Need security for your valuables, home, or place of business? This is the place. In need of tools and machines from the simple to the radically complex? Come on down! While the shop is open daily, special evening hours are planned for this coming Tuesday, December 3 from 7-9pm server. Appointments are also available. Bulk shipments and nautical mountings are available, please inquire!
OOC: This is an opportunity for mercantile RP, customers and potential trade allies alike are invited to come look around, browse the merchandise, and speak to the shop owner, Millicent Bowyen. The shop is located in the Priory office just north of the Priory Digsite Waypoint in Lion's Arch.
If you have any questions or comments, please feel free to contact me in game on Raevyn.9102!
Reblogging cause it's tonight!
The engineers and smiths at Clockworks & Mechanicals Unlimited have been hard at work creating the most spectacular and inventive devices you’ll find anywhere! Looking for a custom gun? Look no further. Need security for your valuables, home, or place of business? This is the place. In need of tools and machines from the simple to the radically complex? Come on down! While the shop is open daily, special evening hours are planned for this coming Tuesday, December 3 from 7-9pm server. Appointments are also available. Bulk shipments and nautical mountings are available, please inquire!
OOC: This is an opportunity for mercantile RP, customers and potential trade allies alike are invited to come look around, browse the merchandise, and speak to the shop owner, Millicent Bowyen. The shop is located in the Priory office just north of the Priory Digsite Waypoint in Lion’s Arch.
If you have any questions or comments, please feel free to contact me in game on Raevyn.9102!
She stumbled in in the morning, Throane in tow, and found the sleeping Syrean. Despite the look her guardian gave her, Milli just smiled and went to wake her. But then she saw the page.
Milli slid it out from under Syrean's arm and carefully looked over the neatly scripted lines, considering. This would be for her shop, after all. It would be a representation of her business. After staring thoughtfully at the paper for a rather long time, she picked up the pen and circled the fifth logo from the bottom. She scribbled, I love it! in the margins.
Then she went back over and grabbed Throane's hand. "We should get her breakfast," she said softly. "And let her sleep a bit longer."
By the end of the night, Syrean had fallen asleep at Milli’s desk and used up all of the purple ink. She hoped Milli would like at least one of the designs.
Syrean smiled as she saw the notes and wrote it out on a new piece of paper, this time changing the ampersand a bit. She left it there as she rushed back to the Reach before the two could return.
Syrean painted banners, carved into wood and fretted over whether it looked good enough. It had to be just right…
Milli laughed delightedly as she accepted the poster from Syrean. "It's marvelous! Simply marvelous! You made it so beautiful, Syrean. I just hope nobody expects such delicate penmanship from me," she joked, motioning to the wooden sign and the banner that were also displayed on the table. "I promise, I'll be putting them up all over Lion's Arch and the 'Reach. And if anyone I know needs posters, I'll send them to you."
Laying aside the poster, Milli embraced the other woman tightly. "This is such a sweet gift. Thank you so much, Syrean!"
It took her most of the morning, but it was finally done! She hoped Milli would like her new advertisement, and that this would be a sufficient Wintersday gift.
The signs and posters had been up all week, but Milli hadn't remembered to post one on her door. So she carefully tacked up one more, with a carefully lettered message at the bottom:
OPEN TONIGHT
7PM
It took her most of the morning, but it was finally done! She hoped Milli would like her new advertisement, and that this would be a sufficient Wintersday gift.
It had taken some doing, finding the right tarnish for the metal to stain it different colors in different areas. The coating was one she used on her clockwork toys, something to keep them from losing their shine. Milli hoped it would hold up against fingerprints and sea water. But it was flashy. The Admiral had asked for flashy.
To the Captains' Council of Lion's Arch:
While I appreciate the festivities of the holiday, which no doubt provide extensive funds via tourism and trade to the City coffers, I'm afraid I am at my wits' end as a merchant.
Pictured above is my shop and two of the three snow makers which surround it. I was neither asked nor consulted about the placement of these machines before the holiday and my complaints about how they turned my shop into a veritable ice box went largely unheard.
On that note, I would like to lodge a complaint about one of your employees. She suggested I "just light a fire in the corner," which is a gross violation of fire codes and could prove dangerous as my shop sells weapons and ammunition. One Violetta Fennick, according to the plaque on her desk, proved quite rude and unhelpful to me.
Back to the topic at hand. It is past Wintersday. Well past. If you could please convince the asura Tixx to remove his snow spraying devices, at least from the immediate vicinity of my shop, I would much appreciate it.
And next year, please convene with the local merchants before allowing the placement of these devices. We help keep Lion's Arch running smoothly and it would be a kindness if the council would give them a voice in matters that will directly affect them.
Thank you for your time,
Millicent Bowyen
Proprietor, Clockworks & Mechanicals Unlimited
Her feet were freezing.
She'd been tucked in under a blanket all morning, huddled down over an explosive device that required a great deal of concentration and focus to keep her pieces in all the right places, and when she finally came up for air, Milli realized she could barely feel her feet.
The engineer stood up and stomped around the shop trying to get the blood flowing, her fingers shoved under her armpits. Her letter to the Captains' Council hadn't worked. She'd been back almost daily to check to see if they'd read and understood it. They didn't seem to care. Wintersday was for snow, damn the merchants!
"Well damn the snow," Milli muttered angrily to herself. "It's just a stupid mechanical...oh." The idea, so simple, dawned on her like a brand new day.
Sitting back at the table, Milli pulled out her notebook and began to scribble a design. Absently, she pulled the blankets up over her legs.
They were only mechanical devices. Removing their functionality would be easy. And if asked, well, she'd just say she heard gunshots one night and then didn't bother to report them. Because the Council obviously didn't care about the merchants.
Milli grinned.
The avalanche has already started. It is too late for the pebbles to vote.
Things were fine until they weren’t, but in retrospect she should have suspected something was wrong. People she knew and trusted grew quickly and uncharacteristically tense and withdrawn. Those who were of a more jumpy nature disappeared entirely. And Jack became strained, one with too much on his shoulders, desperately looking for someone to unload it on. She tried to share the burden, but he protected her even from this. He always protected her.
And then even Jack was gone.
She heard from one of the locals that the Stone Mason’s Guild Hall had been ransacked. And when she checked his room at the Lion’s Shadow, she found it equally ruined. His personal belongings were gone. Whether that meant he’d left before whoever did this got there or they had taken everything when they took him, she didn’t know.
Like the lamps in the windows of a house, her sources of information went dark. Something happened with the Hangmen, she gathered, though what she didn’t know. But people were scattering to the winds.
From then on, it was delicate. She provided what money and supplies she could to those leaving. She didn’t go to Divinity’s Reach. She kept her store open and if a Seraph stopped in once or twice, she showed them only the face of a shopkeeper, though she was left trembling and sweating after.
She specifically avoided news. She didn’t want to know if friends were being tried and hanged. She wanted to space out her heartbreaks.
In a few weeks, she was calmer. Things were back to relative normal. If the shop wasn’t as prosperous, that was because she’d spent the extra on her friends. On buying them safety. It wasn’t something she could regret.
Milli was left in the rubble of what had once been. So she did what she always did. She picked up the pieces and moved on.
