moonshadows

((This time, the child being referenced is something spawned by an artifact that Claudia carelessly touched without gloves: a newborn that will fade out of reality after five months, the same as the ferrets. Artie is a giant squishy, but if you push him hard enough....))

As big as the Warehouse seemed to the agents that worked there, it was bigger. The warrens of shelves only made up about a third of the space, mostly the area near the office and the central, easily-expanded areas. The edges and far ends were a labyrinth of box canyons made up of crates and shipping pods, manifests tacked to their sides or simply painted on. No neat and tidy aisles here, no; not even dust with which to mark your trail and find your way out. That would require living things to shed the dead cells from which dust was composed. Wander into one of these unmarked sections, and you could very well need chalk, or string, or a pocket full of white pebbles with which to find your way out again.

Unless, of course, you were the Caretaker.

The only surprise, therefore, when she was suddenly sitting in a camp chair across the frozen Prometheus fire from Artie, was that it had taken her three and a half days to come calling. Without blinking - her sudden appearances had ceased startling him once he, too, shared that particular relationship with time and the Warehouse - he offered her the long fork on which he was roasting his dinner. "Sausage?"

"No, thank you," she said calmly. Her dark eyes took in the remarkably cozy interior of the shipping pod: the hammock strung up in the corner, the lei draped over its pillow, the antique wardrobe, the vast and tempting oil painting of a feast, the pile of books, the Farnsworth on top of them, and the non-burning fire with two comfortable camp chairs on either side. Two comfortable camp chairs. Her lips narrowed in disapproval. "What are you doing here?"

Unconcerned, he tested the temperature of the sausage link and hissed slightly, shaking his fingers. "Camping."

"I can see that. What I can't see is why."

"No," he agreed, still uncannily calm. "You can't, because you don't work with her day in and day out."

"Arthur..."

"Tell me, was the baby crying?" Artie took a bite of his sausage and chewed to hide his smirk.

Mrs. Frederic frowned. "It was. Claudia seems woefully inexperienced for her two months as a mother."

Artie swallowed. "That would be because she is. She ignored that child nearly constantly. Usually, she put it next to me and left the room." He looked her steadily in the eyes. "You know what happened with Schrödinger's box. You know I can't let that baby suffer, even if it's not real."

"No," she said slowly. "That's not in your nature. That doesn't explain why you left a note saying you were off on urgent business without informing anyone of your plans."

Thoughtfully, he inspected his sausage and took another bite. "It doesn't concern you, Claudia shirking responsibility like that?"

"She's still young."

"She's twenty-two and she's been in the Warehouse longer than at least a dozen agents you and I can both name." While she considered this point, Artie finished the link. "Look," he said, setting the fork aside and dusting his hands off on his pants. "Here's the deal. Either Claudia learns to suck it up and take her responsibilities seriously, or I won't suffer through her reign as Caretaker when you're gone. I'll squeeze the bond as it transfers and hobble her, and then I'll go out and find someone who will treat the Warehouse with the respect it deserves and the position with the maturity it requires." He gave her a few moments to let that sink in. "You know I'll do it, Irene. I love the Warehouse too much to let it suffer the way that artifact-child has suffered under Claudia's care, and the Warehouse loves me enough to overrule the Caretaker in my favor, precedence or no precedence. Until that child fades out, I will not return to my duties, nor will I answer any form of contact. Claudia has three months to shape up, or once she's in your shoes, I'm shipping her out."

The Caretaker remained impassive. "Now who's shirking responsibility?" she asked archly.

"Please." Artie seemed amused rather than offended, and with good reason - he had her in a corner, and they both knew it. "Finding pings, sending agents out to retrieve artifacts? That's not my responsibility." One hand gestured widely, conveying the entire Warehouse. "She is. Has been for years and years, even before I ate the apple, and you know I'll do whatever it takes to protect the Warehouse. If that means artifacts don't get retrieved for three months, paperwork piles up, and the Regents want my head, then so be it but I take my responsibilities to her very seriously and I won't let her be hurt by a Caretaker who's irresponsible."

"The Regents aren't happy with what you've done."

He snorted. "They'll live. What are they going to do, fire me? They'd only have to find someone to take my place permanently instead of for three months. Let's be honest - if they could do without me, they would have fired me back when James made his move. None of them have been serving the Warehouse as long as I have except maybe Jane, and I dare you to tell her what's going on. You know she'll side with me. And even if they did fire me..." Artie laughed darkly. "They'd never be able to actually kick me out of the Warehouse. They'd have to find me first. All they'd be doing is making me go rogue, and trust me, I have plans in place for that."

Her eyebrows drew together in concern. "Arthur, what..."

The sentence dried up in her mouth. From behind the stack of books, he'd pulled out the Setting Maul.

"Where's the Mason Square?" she asked with more urgency than she wanted to display, eyes slightly wild.

"Wouldn't you like to know," he answered loftily. "Yes, it's in place, and no, there's no point in tracing my recent movements to find it. Twice now I've come too damn close to losing the Warehouse to the whims of a Regent, and I decided to take that decision away from them after Valda showed his true colors. Trying to stop me will only lead to a direct confrontation between you and me. How secure are you in your connection to the Warehouse? Are you certain she'll obey you if it means turning on me?" He put the maul back and smiled with cold contentment. "I've been playing by your rules for over thirty years, and I'm trying to keep playing by those rules. I've kept my head mostly down and not rebelled like some others, and all it got me was taken for granted, threatened, and nearly fired. I don't think it's too much to ask to be sure the future Caretaker is worthy of the post, but if you push me on this, I will huff and puff and blow the whole house of cards down. The Warehouse needs a keeper. She doesn't need Regents, and they're the only ones who don't see that."

Mrs. Frederic's lips pressed into an unhappy line, but if she wanted to say anything, she didn't act on the desire.

Artie picked up the fork and poked the oil painting; when he pulled it back, half a loaf of bread was impaled on it. He ripped a piece off the loaf and stuck it on the prongs of the fork, then held it over Prometheus's Fire to toast. "The Regents used to be field agents," he said idly. "Somewhere along that line - Warehouse Seven or so, I think - they stopped getting their own hands dirty and became administrators. Nobility, enjoying the power and prestige without working for it, passing judgment on those who served them. How many of the current Regents have ever retrieved an artifact?"

"That's not a fair question," Mrs. Frederic answered while he nibbled his toast. "Walter Sykes..."

"...killed half of them. Yes, I know. But think back to that meeting in the diner. There were how many Regents there, ten? A majority, certainly. But I didn't know any of them. Jane wasn't there. How long had those Regents served? The ones who were there when James turned, when did they retire? Who selected their replacements, Valda?" Artie snorted. "We know now that he was plotting even then to take my position. He wanted to steal the Warehouse and install himself in my position. Why? Because I have power the Regents don't. And I'll use it if I have to, but it's not in my nature to overthrow the established order of things any more than it is to let innocents suffer, you know that."

"I do," she agreed solemnly. "You've thought this through very carefully. You know exactly what you're doing and why, and you won't be swayed from your course. I will present your arguments to Adwin Kosan; I trust he will understand your reasons given your unwavering dedication and particularly given he owes his life to you and the flaws in Regent protocol." She stood up. "Enjoy your vacation. We'll see you in three months."

He saluted her with the toasting fork, and then she was no longer there.