Age of the Orc - 04

Now
25 Mar 2019, Fourth Age
05:37:04

"Winning lottery ticket was sold last night in Dûr-on-Doom, the jackpot was twenty million credits..."

"Wish it was me," the driver grunted as he took the private road up the side of the broken mountain. Zoch and Eevin watched the small screen set in the seatbacks of the car. This was the only time they had to catch the news. Once inside, it would be badging through layers of security, straight for the lab. A total black site. No communication with the outside world.

Zoch glanced up, once out of the vehicle. As the Orc held the door open for Eevin, they saw the stark, brutal geometric concrete facade of the facility loomed against the sky, blackest night already turning to the blue of pre-dawn, all the stars gone now. Dûr-on-Doom was the company town that surrounded the facility, but Mordor Cybernetics' geothermal power station was a separate corporate compound. Indentured employees like Zoch lived in the on-site arcology, a little further down the mountain, but the facility itself was as secure as the company could afford it to be.

Eevin stayed three steps behind Zoch. It was all Orcs inside, and she was only barely tolerated because of Zoch's own position. It was an informal level of security, behind the encrypted smart badges, the biometric locks. If the guards saw anyone that wasn't an Orc, they knew that was an intruder. Eevin couldn't even walk around unattended. Zoch had to escort her everywhere.

For her own safety.

They followed a familiar path through the facility. The grey concrete walls gave way to something more primal. Bare, skeletal steel walkways over a natural crevice. Hot air rose up from the old, half-collapsed lava tube. They crossed the bridge and the chasm through a gateway of ancient stone, carved out of the mountainside itself.

The lab itself occupied a white geodesic dome constructed inside the lava dome that had been carved out of the space that had once been Sauron's forge. The final guards at this point were dressed in full body armor, despite the heat, **** rifles and combat shotguns drawn. Double normal security. They let Zoch and Eevin badge through, and they both breathed a little easier in the cool, air-conditioned air.

"Courage," Eevin whispered, as the door behind them closed. She leaned in for a quick kiss, not on Zoch's mouth that was out of reach, but mouthing Zoch's cock through the front of the Orc's pants. Her hot breath sent a shudder through the Orc's flesh, an immediate wave of arousal and shock that she did that here and now, of all places and times. The Hobbit straightened as the door into the lab in front of them opened. No lipstick today. No marks. Just a sudden, uncomfortable erection that was oddly more calming than anything else she could have done. It gave Zoch something to be embarrassed about.

Zoch strode forward, trying to project calm confidence. Inside the dome, the lab space was built like an ampitheatre: three levels ringing the central machine, with stairs connecting them. The actual base of the massive device that hung from the ceiling disappeared into the floor. That was by design. A crew of Orcs in labcoats were busy on every level, checking readouts. When activated, the power draw would be immense, strain the system to its utmost.

The technicians nodded to Zoch as the pair descended. They were Orcs, men and women, who had worked under Zoch, some for years. Educated, intelligent, thoroughly vetted, all indentured employees. No one else was trusted here. Not for this project. Mordor Cybernetics' secret of secrets.

That sight wouldn't have been possible a generation ago. There were damn few Orcs that went to any kind of higher education a hundred years ago. Technicians, engineers were almost unheard of. This whole space had only been excavated less than ten years ago. They had only broken ground on the facility two years ago, in accordance with Zoch's own plans and design.

A tall, smiling figure in a custom-tailored suit stood at the lowest level. He turned and smiled at Zoch. Silver hair brushed back from a sallow face, criss-crossed with deep lines, dark splotches at his temples. Broad shoulders subtle emphasized by the suit jacket's padded shoulders caused him to loom over Zoch. A deep scar across the forehead and the gold caps on his lower tusks gave him the look of some ancient Orc warrior dressed up as a corporate raider.

Which was closer to the truth than most guessed.

"Mr. Boldog," Zoch acknowledged with a slight bow. An old custom, largely ignored among modern Orcs, but Boldog was old-fashioned. Or just old. Something stared out from behind those strange yellow eyes. Something that had seen far shores, and stood at the left-hand side of dark lords. Zoch's palms were suddenly clammy.

The oldest records of Orcs mentioned Boldog. Most assumed that it was a name, or possibly a title, taken up by many different leaders over the centuries. There was a Boldog under Morgoth, and another under Sauron, and others...but once, in the bookstore, Eevin had showed him an old commentary on the Silmarillion, which had claimed there had been only one Boldog, a minor maiar that cloaked itself in flesh, again and again, always moving forward the same dark agenda.

"The Age of the Orc is at hand," Boldog said. The yellow eyes slid off of Zoch and settled on the Hobbit behind him. Not that Eevin was trying to hide. Boldog's tone shifted. "Did you have to bring that here, today of all days? At our moment of triumph?"

Zoch met those eyes. "I'm going to be monitoring the Temporal Chamber personally. I need a second set of eyes on the sensor feeds. Eevin reviewed and tested all of the safety subroutines and diagnostics. If there's a power or temperature spike in any of the secondary systems, having someone who knows what they're doing could be the difference between success and failure—or life and ****."

Boldog's face was impassive. Then he broke into a nasty smile. "Well, I don't suppose it will matter. We're changing history today, after all."

It was a nasty joke. Zoch looked up at the massive inverted-pyramid shape of the machine, and thought about how they were going to use it.