Dungeon Hunters

Getting a Little Sidetracked

"Matt, shouldn't we go and see Grim?" Michael asked.
"What, without, touring the old HQ for a bit? Where's your sense of adventure?" Matt responded.
The four looked at one another. "Hang on a sec," Eden said. The group stopped in the middle of the hallway and huddled together.
"What do you think?" Daemeon asked.
"I think it could help," Eden said. "It could help us gather some useful information, I'd say we just go along with it for now."
"Fine. It's not like we're in a rush or anything," Riley said.
"Good enough for me," Michael said.
They turned back to Matt. "Okay then," Michael said," we will gladly accept a tour."
"Wonderful," Matt said, "follow me then." He proceeded to lead them down the hallway on the right. "Now, if you remember from my earlier introduction of this place, we are currently heading towards barracks, office space, and I suppose I should have mentioned, this is also where a few miscellaneous spaces are."
"So where are we going?" Riley asked.
"To one of those miscellaneous spaces," Matt said. "More specifically, the lab of our resident technician, tactician, engineer, and occasional cook, eighth captain Hayley Mason. She's pretty brilliant and a very skilled fighter."
"Oh yeah, didn't you just beat her and take her rank?" Michael asked. "And her boyfriend was going to kick your ass?"
"Raph is not going to...shut up."
They walked down the hallway until it teed off. Matt lead them down the right hallway, which didn't go very far before turning left. Down this hallway were 14 doors, seven on each side of the hallway, which itself was rather wide and well lit. At the end of the hallway was a long set of stairs going down.
"These are the barracks," Matt said. "Each member is given their own room, with a few spare rooms in the event of guests, and two restrooms. An officer does not have to live here, and many of us don't. In fact, almost all of us have homes either in the city or in close proximity, so many of these are vacant."
"Do you have your own home?" Eden asked.
"What, on my salary? Are you nuts? Besides, these rooms ain't so bad, pretty nice actually. Better then a decent number of hotels. Come on, it's just down these stairs." Matt continued to walk towards the end of the hall. He descend the stairs with the four close behind him. They stairs ended in a dim hallway, lit by a few lamps that hung loosely from the ceiling. On the sides where four doors, two on the right, two on the left. The ones on the left were heavily chained.
"So, what is this place used for?" Eden asked.
"Storage, mostly," Matt said. "We keep some confiscated magical artifacts down here. This isn't the real horde though. That's...something you didn't hear about from me. Well here we are." He stopped in front of the door the farthest down on the right. Matt knocked three times. A voice called from the other side.
"Who?" It called.
"It's Matt. I've got a little surprise for you."
"Enter."
Matt opened the door and stepped inside. Inside, there were numerous tables, each of them completely filled with different mechanical parts and pieces, some of them looking half completed projects, others just looking like scraps of junk. Along the walls were different markings, most of them resembling alchemic circles, others looking like pure nonsense. The room was very well lit by a single light hanging in the center of the ceiling. At the far end of the room was a woman, shorter then Riley, with long, light brown hair, which was tied neatly in ponytail, standing on a stool back turned to them, working on something on the table.
"What surprise have you brought me this time?" She asked not turning from her work. "It had better not be another wand of combustion, I do not want to deal with one of those again." She turned around. She was wearing a pair of dirty jeans and a gray, long-sleeved shirt. She had a thick pair of glasses over her light brown eyes. When she saw the four of them standing next to Matt, she looked rather surprised. "Oh, you have brought people. Why have you brought people?"
"I figured you could use some socializing for today," Matt said. "Plus, I've got something you might be interested in. Let me introduce you to Riley, Michael, Daemeon, and Eden."
She stepped off of her stool. "Very nice to meet you all. I am eighth captain Hayley Mason. So what is it you wanted to show me? It's not another-"
"No, it's not another hydra eye either," Matt said. "Are you ever going to let that go?"
"Not while you're still breathing. So what is it then?"
"What do you know about this mark?" Michael asked, holding out his right arm.
Hayley got a wide-eyed look. "Dear God, I've never seen anything like this," she exclaimed. "Do you mind?" She asked Michael.
"Um, I guess not?" Michael said hesitantly. "Wait, mind what?"
"Oh I'm just going to look over it," Hayley said, wiping her hands off on a rag she had grabbed off of a table. She grabbed Michael's arm and began looking at it up and down, turning it over, and even prodding it in a few places. "And how does one such as yourself acquire such a strange and ominous mark?"
"No idea," Michael said.
"Ooooo, mystery mark, even better," she said excitedly. She let go of Michaels arm and ran over to a desk in the back corner. She reached inside and pulled out a large sheet of paper and began to draw something on it. She then snatched a piece of metal off of a table as she ran back. She placed the piece of paper on the ground. On it was a basic alchemic circle. She placed the piece of metal in the center of it.
"Here, touch that piece of metal," she said to Michael. Michael shrugged and bent down, hand extended towards the scrap. As soon as his hand came close to the metal, both his mark and the alchemic circle began to glow red with lightning shooting off of his mark. Suddenly, there was a brilliant flash of light. When it cleared, the metal had been reduced to a smoldering pile and the paper was completely charred.
Matt was rubbing his eyes, much like the rest of them were. "What the hell was that?" Matt said.
"Exactly what I thought would happen," Hayley said.
"Care to explain just what happened?" Daemeon asked.
"I'm so glad you asked," she replied cheerily. "That mark is only half of the equation." There was nothing but confused looks. "Allow me to explain. Alchemy is made up of several basic steps. First, the breakdown of the desired substance. Second, the rearranging of the molecules, which is a lot of complicated crap. Lastly, the assembling of the new molecules into a desired shape. I haven't seen much, but from what I've seen, your mark seems to only begin the process, the breaking down phase that is. It also has a very negative reaction to other alchemic circles. It's only hunch, but I believe there might be an opposite to your mark somewhere out there. What it is, I haven't the foggiest idea."
"So, you think there's another part of this mark, one that will complete it?" Michael asked.
"If what I've seen is true, then yes. So, will there be anything else or can I get back to my work?"
"Right, right," Matt said, "we'll let you get back to whatever it is you're working on."
Hayley turned, got back on her stool and continued to work on the device from before. Matt lead the four out of the room, shutting the door behind them.