Gunz & Madge

Prologue

The year of 1819 was marked by the unconditional victory of the joined forces of the British Regular Army and Her Majesty’s secret service over mages, witches and warlocks.  And although the fighting was still in place, the United Kingdom was officially recognized as a territory cleared of all things supernatural, of people who so stoutly resisted the industrial revolution, progress, future.

For decades, the hounds of Holy Inquisition and the agents of Her Majesty’s secret service systematically cleansed city by city, village by village, until there was no even a trace of mages within our country.

A new era was emerging. You could see steam cars on the streets, steamships sailing the rivers, and the first aircraft in the sky. Throughout the country, factories and manufactories were launched. People became more pragmatic, rational, but at the same time, they preferred to stay more reserved and less friendly. Any hints that could tie you to the supernatural, otherworldly, even those of the religious nature, were banished. 

When the victory was officially announced, parades and fairs of the widest variety were arranged throughout London – from Westminster to Whitechapel, and from Holloway to Brixton. For a short time the agents of Her Majesty’s secret service – the service which shortly before the described events had been transferred to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Anomalous Phenomena – received a breather. Many of them were drawn to London’s hot spots: brothels, pubs, scatters and booze parlors.  Among them was a young man, whose name years later would be remembered with the greatest love and pride.

On a clear spring evening this gentleman, Captain Charles Winston McGregor, crossed Regent Street, heading towards Piccadilly. Out of mere curiosity and because he was a bit tipsy, Captain decided to pay a visit to a newly opened shooting club. There were not so many people there at that hour, and Captain was immediately offered the most comfortable place and a single-shot rifle of the latest model.

McGregor carefully studied the weapon and was about to shoot, when he suddenly noticed a lady dressed in an emerald velvet dress a la mode. She stood a couple of yards away from him and shot flint pistols, kindly provided by a humble servant. The presence of a woman in a shooting club was already a big surprise, but even more impressive and sudden was the fact that she was shooting superbly: nine hits out of ten shots.

Madam, I offer you a bet! Captain McGregor told her during a short pause. The lady glanced in his direction, and the captain’s heart missed a blow. To all her merits, the young woman was incredibly good-looking: a snub nose, freckles, red hair – everything Captain secretly adored.

A bet? She repeated.

Yes, ma’am. We shoot in turn. The one who misses first buys drinks at Old Jackson’s.

What makes you think I’m drinking?

Everyone drinks today

Well then. Shall we begin? She gestured to the servant to change the target, and the boy immediately rushed to carry out the order.

That’s how they met – Rita Douglas and Charles McGregor. Those who believe in miracles would say that it was the love at first sight. Those who inclined to think more rationally would argue that both of them were young, beautiful, and their worldviews coincided. Their social background was similar, so no one objected to their friendship, and – eventually – to their marriage.

They were like the very essence of our world. Rita Douglas was an excellent shooter, and a prominent scientist who devoted her life to everything connected with mechanisms. She was the author of many inventions that were meant to make life easier for her and her friends, including, among others, an improved pocket watch, which continued to work, even if the owner forgot to wind it up.

In no way Captain McGregor was inferior to his future wife, and in many ways he complemented her. Even though he was young, he had already reached certain heights in his career. He was known as a man who possessed an excellent knowledge of everything that had a direct relationship to the supernatural. More than anyone in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Anomalous Phenomena, he was aware of the nature, abilities and talents of wizards, enchanters and sorceresses.

The love of progress became the connecting link between these two, and therefore, after a short courtship, Captain McGregor proposed to Miss Douglas, who could not refuse. The wedding was more than modest, and immediately after it, the young couple settled in a spacious mansion in the Paddington area (where, incidentally, the parents of your humble servant and other prominent people of that time lived).

Nine months later, the McGregor family welcomed a son. It took them quite much time to choose a proper name for the baby, for it was the first-born, the boy, the heir to the family. Aunties, grandmothers and all sorts of cousins wanted to give him a simple name – like Tristan or Percival. Luckily for the wee child (and thus not able to express his opinion), the mother was set categorically and did whatever she could to resist public’s opinion and to choose the name herself. She announced at the family meeting:

Gunz is the perfect name for our son! Both children and weapon are of great benefit in able hands!

And although many members of their family were shocked by such a choice, nobody could make Rita change her mind, not even her husband. She insisted on her decision and named her child the way she wanted.

With the birth of their son, the McGregor family achieved what someone would call a happily-eve- after, because the couple had everything their contemporaries could not even dream about: love, peace, and understanding.

For the next five years, they lived in perfect harmony: they enjoyed life, raised their son, arranged parties and balls to which they invited famous scientists and inventors from all over Europe. And although their life in marriage was only beginning, they did not let the ordinary to take over them. They simply did not have time for that. Captain McGregor was still the agent of Her Majesty’s Secret Service, and Rita dedicated all of the free time to what she loved with all her heart: inventions, newest mechanisms, installations, steam engines. 

As for Gunz, he was a calm and relatively quiet child. Of course, like all other children, he was extremely curious and sometimes even restless, but he could be easily carried away by his mother’s newest project or his father’s weapons accidentally brought into the house.

Months and years passed, and it seemed than nothing would disturb this idyll. Unfortunately, all good things come to an end sooner or later. That’s what happened to the McGregor family too soon.

The year when Gunz celebrated his fifth birthday, a wave of riots swept across the country. Some people blamed the Luddites – the ones who so stubbornly resisted progress, who regularly committed horrific deeds, aimed at destroying steam engines, mechanisms and other benefits of civilization. Other citizens were inclined to attribute the ongoing atrocities to the newly revived Order of Magi. And although chatterboxes were immediately put in jail for such blather, people did not stop gossiping, and panic grew like an avalanche.

By summer, the riots reached the streets of London. For no apparent reason, the conspirators decided to entrench in Whitechapel, and it appeared impossible to smoke them out of there. Redcoats scurried around the area, but all was in vain.

When all measures were tested and called ineffective, the agents of Her Majesty’s Secret Service were summoned.

On Wednesday, June 15, 1825, at the very dawn, a bellboy knocked at the door of the McGregor estate. He came from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Anomalous Phenomena. According to the message that he brought, the Captain was obliged to report immediately to Whitechapel.

Agent McGregor was ready to leave when his wife caught him at the door.

I’m coming with you, Charles!

The captain’s heart sank. He did not have a slightest desire to start a quarrel with his wife, because up to that moment they had never really quarreled. Therefore, he only protested:

No. You are not.

That’s not up to you to decide, she was already standing next to him, looking straight in his eyes. He blinked, but did not turn his gaze away.

We don’t know what we are to face there!

Whatever it might be, she put a hand on his chest, where the heart was.  This is my city, too. I will not stand aside!

Rita! Women shouldn’t be on the streets, weapon in their hands! Besides, someone should take care of Gunz...

She gestured for him to stop.

I have made my mind. I shoot better than any of your colleagues. I’m faster, quicker. In addition, I’m not that suspicious and precisely for the reason that you have mentioned.

It was impossible to talk her round. Neither the voice of reason, nor the appeal to her maternal duty could give the desired effect. Reluctantly, Charles resigned himself to the fact of her going with him.

They walked out together, leaving Gunz to the care of aunts. Only a week later Captain McGregor did return home – alone.

For most of the time, Gunz sat by the window waiting for dad and mom to return.  For days, he did not talk to anyone, did not ask about where his parents were. He was so quiet as if he knew from the very beginning what had already happened and what would occur after that.

From history books, we all know what happened on that day: the rebellion was successfully suppressed. The conspirators, Luddites and mages alike, were completely smashed: most of them were killed on sight, all who remained were sent to the gallows.

After those events, any suspicious activity within the city was scrutinized with trebled vigilance, and the main reason – a horrendous explosion that occurred at noon in the very heart of Whitechapel, and caused terrific destruction and many deaths.

It is difficult to say now who committed this act of terror – the rebels or the redcoats who needed to smoke the rioters out of their lair. Some would say that the explosion was a result of some spell cast by mages. However, only very narrow-minded people could believe in this, because there were traces of gunpowder at the scene, and quite a lot.

McGregors came to Whitechapel a few hours prior to the explosion. Like all other agents of Her Majesty’s Secret Service, Captain was summoned because it had become obvious: an armed clash could not be avoided. The rioters did not want to enter into negotiations, and therefore the redcoat officers decided to storm the rioters’ base.

The beginning of operation was a success. The soldiers squeezed the rebels inch by inch. However, at some point the rioters did something our forces did not expect. They let out a crowd of women, old men and teenagers dressed in black robes to the square. The very appearance of the mob caused great confusion. The soldiers hesitated and the mages who were among the crowd instantly took advantage of the situation.

The effect was immediate. The mages casted spells: they choked, paralyzed the soldiers, and threw them back and against the walls. It was very easy for them to defeat a poorly prepared opponent. Fortunately for the redcoats, the secret agents came to the aid. Instead of coming from the flank, they came from the rear, using nearby streets for this purpose. There was no time for talking. Some agents were firing, others were reloading and giving back the guns. Having realized that luck was no longer on their side, mages fled in disorder. Secret agents, Charles and Rita among them, followed. The pursuit continued for a while, and the number of victims grew.

Suddenly Charles stumbled and nearly fell. To restore the balance, he had to slow down his pace. At that moment, he noticed a child, a small blond girl, who appeared out of nowhere on the street where there was no one but agents, soldiers and dead mages. Captain ran up to the child, and then looked at his wife.

Rita! He shouted. The woman turned around. Her gaze shifted from her husband to the girl, her eyes widened. She shouted:

Save her! And those were the last words of Rita McGregor, addressed to her husband. The moment Captain picked up the child, the explosion thundered.

Charles was thrown back and hit hard against the wall. He lost his consciousness, and when he regained it, only dust and destruction could be found around him. Neither his wife, nor the girl was there.

Captain spent a whole week looking for his wife, and even after that, he did not lose hope of finding her.  Not once or twice did he return to Whitechapel, expecting to find at least something. But no matter how much he tried to find Rita, the child or someone who could provide any information about what happened, it seemed no one knew anything. Witnesses were either too frightened or non-existent.

A month later, Captain McGregor had to come to terms with the loss and to bury in absentia the one he loved more than his own life.

After the funeral, he hurled himself into work. He spent all his free time studying new and improved ways to fight conspirators, rebels, magicians.  He raised his son accordingly – nurtured an ideal weapon against everything that he hated: against all things magical, supernatural, anomalous.

We are confident that all people should have an equal chance to express their opinion. Everyone should be able to and have an opportunity to realize their potential. Human rights should not be limited simply because a man or a woman is somewhat different from people who are considered normal. For it is unknown what can truly be considered a norm.

From the Manifest of Magi. August 1841.

Part I

Chapter 1: McGregor’s amazing flying cat

It was early in the morning when my fellow students gathered in a spacious lecture hall. There were still ten minutes or so before the beginning, but almost everyone was already there. Only our professor, master-gunslinger Rustyx, who was supposed to give a lecture, and my old friend Gunz McGregor were missing.

It was not very much like Gunz, because in most cases he was the first to come to classes. But on that day, it was rumored that his father, the senior agent Charles Winston McGregor, had returned from some very important assignment and decided to visit our university to see his son before going to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. I don’t think those rumors were true, because the main rule and unofficial motto of both the Ministry and our alma-mater was discipline and subordination. Therefore, the situation where a secret agent would violate all orders and instead of reporting to the Presidium would engage in some completely extraneous things, be it a meeting with his only son, a wedding of his future wife or even his own funeral, was out of the question.

It was difficult not to notice Gunz’s absence, because not only was he the most outstanding student of our faculty, but also the most sociable and the most, so to speak, outlandish of all my friends.

On that day, he rushed into the lecture hall as always: disheveled, in a slightly rumpled frock coat, with pinkish spots of incomprehensible origin on his cuffs. Absolutely everyone present immediately turned their heads in his direction. Having felt such focused attention, he became slightly confused, but found what to say almost at once. As usual, the thing he said struck the entire audience:

Ladies and gentlemen, let me introduce the amazing flying cat of McGregors!

There were many eccentric people in our university, but Gunz was a cut above the rest. Still, for all his strangeness and unusualness, he inspired unconditional respect, even in those people who openly disliked him. One of such people was Trenton Clark, who never failed to snatch an opportunity to mock my friend:

Geez, McGregor, you’d better go practice shooting.

Trent’s remark was completely out of place, because everyone knew that Gunz spent most of his time practicing and, to tell the truth, was one of the finest, or maybe even the best shooters in our university, which was especially striking considering his modest physique.

McGregor was far from tall: only five feet and seven inches, provided that he was wearing inch heel shoes. He was clubfoot, thin and not very cute.

But, of course, Gunz became famous not because of his appearance, physique or ability to handle weapons. Of all his eccentricities, the greatest interest and perplexity were caused by his dream of creating a working model of an aircraft. He produced such models constantly, on a regular basis. He tested all of them on his pet – the amazing cat named Fluffert, whose presence in our university was already a miracle in itself. It was difficult to imagine that one of our professors would voluntarily allow to keep unaccounted animals inside the university or its dorms. It is most likely that Colonel McGregor insisted on permission to let Fluffert stay with Gunz. Children of senior secret agents could do much more than other students, but even they knew: no matter who you or your parents were, everyone was obliged to stick to all thinkable and unthinkable orders, rules and protocols.

Most of my fellow students came from families of active secret agents. We were young men and women from noble, but not very wealthy families. Kids from the lower and the uppermost levels of society rarely entered our university. And only provided that one of the parents was the senior secret agent, the child would be offered at least some indulgence. There were twelve senior secret agents in total, and therefore there were not too many of their offspring among us.

As for indulgence, during the penultimate year of training, our professors did not let too many pranks go unpunished. We spent our days studying – exact sciences, history, languages. Before and after lectures we practiced in shooting, riding and fencing. Some girls took additional courses in first aid, and some boys learnt how to handle different mechanisms. The first were sometimes called healers, and the latter – mechanics. It sometimes happened that the ladies showed certain interest in mechanisms, and young men in potions and poultices, but for the most part this was an exception rather than the rule.

Given all this, the situation with McGregor was even more peculiar. Despite all his love for mechanisms, he was not a mechanic. His father insisted that the son chose the swift pistols as his main specialization, and so my friend was engaged in all sorts of inventions in spite of rather than thanks to the wishes of his only parent.

That’s how it turned out that on the morning of April 4, 1843, he came to the lecture hall not alone, but with his cat, who for the time being was sitting in an iron carrier covered with a purple velvet cloth. Yes, Gunz was prepared much more thoroughly than usual (and this, of course, was not the first case of public demonstration of potentially working models of the mechanisms invented by him). Aside from the carrier, he had another thing in hands: a box with the newest model of an aircraft in it. I knew this because I lived in the same room as McGregor and I had seen this exact box more than once.

In a pocket of his favorite leather waistcoat there was some kind of spanner. Obviously, Gunz was ready to make some adjustments in the course of his experiment.

The whole audience watched him very closely. Nervous laughter was heard from the back rows.

McGregor, geez, will you already show us the trick? Trenton Clark asked.

Gunz preferred not to respond to this joke. Instead, he considered it sensible to go straight to the point. He threw away the cloth, opened the carrier and took out mister Fluffert in full gear: a leather cap with goggles, gloves with sockets on cat’s front paws and boots on its back paws. After a moment of hesitation, McGregor began to fix the prototype of an aircraft with folded rag wings, to the cat’s back.

When the preparations were finally over, Gunz pressed a button and the mechanism immediately was set in motion. The wings straightened and vibrated. The cat snorted. Gunz pulled up some bolts and pressed the button again. The gears slammed, the mechanism hissed and let out a small trickle of steam. Both the cat and the owner broke into a sweat. The audience leaned forward. We were to see a miracle...

But the miracle did not happen. After a couple of seconds of hissing, snorting and clinking, Gunz threw his pet in the air. The cat produced a loud meow and landed on the front desk. The laughs rang out here and there. The cat began to roll back and forth in an attempt to get rid of the backpack. The students who were sitting in the close proximity of the landing site drew back.

At that very moment the master-gunslinger Rustyx entered the lecture hall. Since Gunz was still standing in the middle of it, the professor asked him immediately:

What’s going on here, McGregor?

Gunz blushed profusely, shrugged and muttered something like excuse me, professor. Then he moved to his desk, grabbing the cat on the way to it. As he passed by me, I whispered:

Either your cat or your bad luck will go down in history, mate. One way or another you will become a legend.

Having produced an obscene sound, Gunz sat down at the desk behind me. Best friends ever – we constantly rejoice in each other’s success and support one another in every possible way.

Chapter 2: What it takes to be a secret agent

Master-gunslinger was quite a shorty – a head shorter than Gunz – but nonetheless, my fellow students never ridiculed him. He was treated with due respect and subordination.

Perhaps, this was due to the fact that when laying out the theory, master-gunslinger did not maunder, but tried to share practical knowledge that could be useful in our profession – the profession of the agents of Her Majesty’s secret service. Besides, master Rustyx knew everything about mechanisms, weapons and steam engines. He often shared his knowledge of the latest models of pistols and rifles, rapiers and daggers, crossbows, arquebus and other deadly weapons. It seemed that he could tell a dozen stories about any mechanism known to us, and how this very mechanism could be used for defensive or offensive purposes.

Of course, like any other teacher he sometimes began to talk about some high matters, which was not always clear and comprehensible to us. On that day he decided to share some, not directly related to the subject of his discipline, philosophical considerations with us:

All of you here – young men and women – dream of fame, ranks and riches. But the truth is that our service is secret. We are secret agents.

He stressed the last sentence and looked at us. For a moment, he stopped his gaze on Gunz – my friend was unsuccessfully trying to put his cat inside the carrier. Mister Fluffert desperately resisted and did not want to climb back to his small prison. McGregor did his best to shove the cat inside, but no matter which side of the pet was directed at the carrier, most of the animal stubbornly stayed outside. Having noticed this mess, Master-gunslinger shook his head and continued the monologue:

And that’s the whole point! It's a contradiction to everything you dream about. A secret agent could not be famous or popular. Our task is to act secretly and covertly. Unfortunately, not all of you are able to act quietly and imperceptibly...

He came up to Gunz’s desk helped to put the cat inside the carrier, having first released the beast from the failed prototype of the aircraft. Gunz smiled nervously. Master-gunslinger patted him on the shoulder.

...others stand out a mile...

Taking into account the fact that the agents were mostly selected by the social status rather than their physique, all sorts of students were studying at our university: high and low, full and thin, men and women. There were very ordinary people among us, but there were also extremely prominent figures.

One of such figures was Michael Brownie Tanks - the most outstanding student in the whole university. His nickname – Brownie – was invented by Gunz during our first year of training when Tanks began to show interest in rifles and other heavy weaponry. In most cases, students who chose the path of snipers took additional lessons of stealth and disguise. They were trained to hide in a variety of places, and even in plain sight. Gunz somehow linked this fact with Scottish fairy tales, in which the little creatures, brownies, among other things, were famous for spending most of their time hiding in chimneys.

Ironically, Michael Tanks was the largest student of our faculty: he weighed more than others, and was the tallest among us. In a word, he had nothing in common with the real brownie. And although everyone understood that over time he would become a high-class specialist, most of us agreed that he would never be a secret agent.

Of course, you can learn a lot in our university... Professor Rustyx continued his lecture. "You've already learnt a lot. But you must understand that the theory alone is not enough. Therefore, from this day on, all classes on anti-propaganda, the theory of mechanisms and the history of weapons are replaced by practical exercises