Story continued from:

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A large mechanical hand reached out and grabbed Sirinni around the ankle and yanked her off the edge of the elevator as it shot toward the ceiling.

She hit the floor with a clang and felt her gears jar in her torso. One of her gyros was knocked offline, and her left knee was registering a lubrication error report. However, this was not the time to be concerned about such things as already damaging her new body!

Sirinni looked up to see a familiar face. It was Grishel, who had been down in the grand hall to witness the ceremony with a probable higher degree of contempt than normal. He looked downright calm now, and this struck Sirinni as impossibly comforting in the chaos of the death and fear surrounding them. The emptiness in her chest seemed less noticeable for the moment.

Grishel was using his size to block the end of the tunnel as best he could, and he was looking through his satchel with a determined look on his brow.

"Grishel!" Sirrini cried out in relief and gratitude.

"Hold on I- wh- wait is... is that you, Sirinni?" he looked up bewildered at her. "Sorry, I didn't even recognize you... Miss Skyfarer." he paused a moment and added, "Your new body becomes you young lady... where is The Family?"

Sirinni fidgeted, "Well, I came down alone. I don't know where they are!"

"We can deal with that later, right now-" Grishel pulled a small copper tube-like device out of his satchel, "Here we go! This'll do'er."

Sirinni drew in closer to his legs, as sounds of the returning elevator came from above. A hand on the end of a bend and crushed arm reached out to her from the bodies in the elevator well. She tried to pull, but everything in the well was mashed together, and she couldn't possibly lift all of them out. Nonetheless she strained with all her might until the arm burst forward from the writhing mass. She held it before her in horror like a dead rat and stared at it over the flickering floor lights.

Grishel turned the rocket slightly against itself and it lit up with a bluish white light. He tapped Sirinni on the shoulder and she snapped out of her morbid reverie.

"This is going to hurt like a smack to the brain, but this should reset the whole system! He bellowed over the yells and metal clashing from down the other end of the hall."

"What *is* it?" Sirinni asked in bewilderment.

"This is an electromagnetic grenade! The city is older technology than what we are based on, so while it won't damage us permanently, this thing should break the sentient tapestry and let the city reset!"

He smiled a hopeful look at Sirinni and threw the grenade at the back wall of the elevator shaft.