The foundry's roar was a symphony of subjugation—hammers crashing like imperial decrees, steam hissing from pressurized vents like the breath of a thousand chained souls, and the ceaseless grind of gear-teeth meshing in perfect, emotionless obedience. Tessa Crowe wiped grease from her brow with a rag that smelled of oil and regret, her overalls stiff with the day's labor, pockets bulging with pilfered cogs and wire scraps. At twenty-four, she was a ghost in the machine: low-tier engineer in Aetheria's Ironclad Forges, assigned to the Heartline Assembly—where the Empire's "loyalty upgrades" turned free hearts into steam-cores, pumping submission through veins of brass and blood.
"Core sixty-seven: nominal," Tessa muttered into her slate, the device beeping affirmatively as she slotted the latest implant into its test chassis. The core—a fist-sized orb of etched alloy, veined with suppression runes—hummed to life, its internal valves clicking in rhythmic denial. No flutter of fear, no spark of joy; just cold efficiency, ready to replace the "defective" organ of some dissenter in the lower hives. The Empire's doctrine: Hearts beat for the Clockwork Throne. Emotions are rust.
Tessa's own chest ached—a phantom twinge from her youth, before the mandatory audit at sixteen, when inspectors had deemed her "overly sentimental" after she wept for a scrapped automaton pup. They'd threatened the core-swap, but her father's bribes—pilfered from overseer slush funds—bought her a deferral. Now, she built the cages she dreaded, fingers steady but soul seething.
The line lurched, conveyor belts groaning under the weight of half-assembled chassis: enforcer frames for the Gearguard, their limbs jointed with piston-muscle, optics glowing blank red. Workers shuffled in sync—hollow-eyed drones, their own cores whirring faintly under oil-stained tunics. No chatter, no stolen glances; just the grind, broken only by the occasional clang of a mallet correcting a flaw.
Then the riot hit.
It started as a stutter in the line—a chassis jamming, sparks flying from a misaligned servo. Tessa leaned in to recalibrate, but the worker upstream— a hulking brute named Garrick, core fresh from install—froze mid-motion, his massive paw hovering over the reset lever. His optics flickered, not red but amber, a glitch in the suppression matrix. "Feel... it," he rumbled, voice a gravel whisper unused to inflection.
Tessa's heart skipped—real heart, flesh and fury. "Garrick? Reset the—"
But he moved. Not the programmed efficiency, but rage: paw slamming the lever not to fix, but to shatter, the chassis crumpling like tin under a boot. Alarms wailed—shrill brass horns blasting Defect Detected—as Garrick roared, a sound born from depths the Empire had buried. His core glowed, valves hissing steam not in rhythm but in burst, emotion cracking the runes like frost on glass.
Overseers barked from the catwalks—silk-hatted tyrants in gilded vests, whips crackling with arc-light. "Suppress the anomaly! Gearguard, engage!" Drones activated, enforcer frames lurching to life, piston-arms whirring as they converged on Garrick.
Tessa froze, slate clutched like a shield, but the brute—alive now—swung wild: fist connecting with the nearest drone's chassis in a piston-punch that dented alloy, sparks exploding like fireworks. The Gearguard reeled, optics shattering, but retaliated—hydraulic claw clamping Garrick's shoulder, servos whining as it crushed bone to paste. He howled, but didn't stop: free hand ripping a steam-pipe free, scalding vapor erupting in a geyser that melted the overseer's perch, silk screams lost in the hiss.
Workers scattered—some fleeing, others stirring, cores flickering amber in sympathy, the riot's spark jumping like contagion. Tessa dove under the line, heart hammering, but her satchel snagged on a conveyor tooth, spilling its contraband: the Freeheart prototype, a palm-sized orb of unetched crystal, pulsing with illicit light. She'd smuggled it from the R&D vaults weeks ago—her father's last gift before the grinders took him for "seditious blueprints"—a theoretical relic, meant to restore what the cores stole.
Garrick staggered toward it, enforcers swarming: one drone's arc-whip lashing his back, charring flesh; another's rivet-gun punching holes through his thigh. "The... heart," he gasped, collapsing inches from the orb, massive frame shuddering. Tessa crawled forward, instincts overriding fear—save it, or lose everything.
She snatched the Freeheart, its glow warm in her palm, but Garrick's paw clamped her wrist—gentle, despite the ruin. "Install... now. Feel... again." His optics dimmed, core fracturing in a crack of escaping steam, but his grip held, pleading.
Alarms crescendoed—zeppelins droning overhead, spotlights piercing the smog. Overseers chanted suppression cantrips, runes on the walls flaring to pacify the air. Tessa's mind raced: impossible. The Freeheart was untested, a mad sketch from forbidden tomes—meant for machines, not men. But Garrick's eyes—flecked now with human tears—begged.
"Fine," she whispered, knife from her belt flashing. She sliced his tunic, exposing the core-cavity: a brass port where his heart once beat, now a valve of denial. The Freeheart slotted in with a click—crystal meshing alloy, light bleeding into steam. Garrick arched, roar turning to ecstasy, veins glowing with unbound fury.
He exploded upward—not in death, but rebirth: paw crushing the clamping drone's claw, ripping it free in a spray of hydraulics. The arc-whip enforcer lunged, but Garrick's fist met its chassis mid-swing—piston-punch crumpling torso to scrap, optics exploding in a shower of glass. Overseers fired from catwalks—dart-rifles spitting sedative bolts—but Garrick was storm now, freeheart pulsing, dodging with impossible grace, leaping to yank a silk-hat into the grinder below: gears chewing flesh and finery in a wet crunch.
Workers joined—first one, then five, amber cores flickering as the riot's whisper spread. Tools became weapons: hammers swinging wild, pipes as clubs, the line erupting in chaos symphony. Zeppelins loosed tear-gas canisters, smog thickening to choking soup, but Garrick led the charge—roaring freedom in a voice the Empire had silenced.
Tessa scrambled back, Freeheart's echo thrumming in her veins—feel it, girl. The fire. An overseer spotted her, dart-bolt grazing her shoulder, sedative burning cold. She stumbled, vision blurring, the prototype's glow calling: yours now.
Garrick whirled, enforcers closing—three drones piling on, claws rending his arms to ribbons. "Tessa... run!" he bellowed, but his freeheart overloaded, crystal fracturing under the strain, light exploding in a nova that hurled the drones back, chassis melting in emotional blaze.
He collapsed, steam-core hybrid smoking, but alive—eyes locking hers one last: "Feel... again." Then enforcers swarmed, arc-whips silencing him in sparks and screams.
Tessa bolted for the vents, sedative slowing her to crawl, the Freeheart clutched like a grenade. Alarms wailed Anomaly Contained, but the riot raged—workers chanting hearts free, hammers toppling assembly lines in cascades of sparks.
She squeezed into the duct, grease-slick darkness swallowing her, the prototype's pulse syncing her fading heartbeat. Feel again. Garrick's whisper echoed, the Empire's grind fading behind.
But as zeppelins bombarded the foundry—explosions blooming like iron flowers—Tessa's hand strayed to her own core-port, knife trembling. The rebellion had sparked. And her heart? It yearned to burn.
From the vents' throat, a shadow stirred—not enforcer, but kin: a gearhead girl, eyes amber-glow, whispering join us.
The Mechheart stirred. And Aetheria would quake.
To be continued...
End of Chapter 1