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Midday in Northrend was not much different than midnight, despite the sun - the northern lights were as bright as usual here.

Professor Rakeri Sputterspark did not seem to feel the icy wind as he stood on the battlements of Valiance Keep, on the western coast; he had woken nearly an hour before, having enjoyed a proper meal and slept in a real bed for the first time in a month. Now, he was lost in thought - remembering when he had first come to this land six years earlier, just after the Scourge attacks against the capital cities in the lower continents, as a member of Fizzcrank Fullthrottle's engineering corps. The team had accompanied the Valiance Expedition at the behest of King Varian to build the airstrip and oil pipelines in the northern part of the tundra.

It had been there that the engineers had made a discovery that shook the gnomish people to its foundations, for - like the dwarves in Uldaman - they had discovered their origins...and it had been there that Rakeri's current destiny had begun, when Gearmaster Mechazod had "decursed" him and most of Fizzcrank's engineers. Even all these years later, he remembered inwardly screaming against his programming while he had mindlessly obeyed the call of the Watchers; remembered the pain as he had been broken and left to rust in the snow; remembered the hate and shame he had felt when he had been unable to break free of Saavedro's directives when the human had rebuilt him.

He remembered the agony that had coursed through his being when the demon blood had taken effect in the recursive formula that Linavil Shadowsun had given him, and when the blood elf had tried to recruit him to work for her master, the orc known as the Corruptor. He remembered the failure of Operation: Gnomeregan, and his horror at Mekkatorque's foolish optimism at the result. He remembered the Cataclysm, how he had fought against Twilight's Hammer forces. He remembered Pandaria, a war that had never needed to be fought but for the egotistical bullies who ruled Stormwind and Orgrimmar...and he remembered the battle in the latter, chasing down a persistent dark shaman in the wartorn canyons of the city.

Above all, he heard only the mockery and disrespect of those around him, because he was a gnome - more so, because he was a gnome warlock. His last words to Orwyn had made clear that he would have his revenge, and the human, typically, had been dismissive.

That will be your fatal flaw, you idealistic fool, he thought.

A chattering from next to him indicated that his loyal mutant imp companion, Twitch, had returned from Stormwind, where he had remained during the professor's incarceration. He listened to the creature's description of Vendross' crazed ranting against Orwyn and the broken system of laws in Stormwind, and how Orwyn had suspended him for it. He chuckled. "Glad to see I've made an impression," he mused aloud. He had spoken with the Highborne mage several times since that first visit, usually inbetween visits from the draenei medic Alaanu, who had treated his lung ailment. The first thing he had done with the package of herbs she had given him, once the boat had left Stormwind Harbor, was to incinerate it. I have no need for Orwyn's witch doctors any further, he thought.

But soon, he will...

He stood at the top of the watchtower at Fizzcrank Airstrip, looking out over the Scalding Pools and the Geyser Fields, and the pipelines and pumping station in the midst of the natural vista. He had left Valiance Keep that morning, and rode out across the tundra on his felfire-charged dreadsteed. He had made this journey at the start of the Northrend war wearing an engineer's worksuit, riding a mechanostrider; now he was making it in his ornately-appointed robes, riding a demonic horse.

Fate is whimsical, he mused.

Coming from the high mountains of Dun Morogh, much like the dwarves did, he did not mind the cold as much as most other species. But he felt a shiver go down his spine, as he had when he had first arrived. Then, it had been the slight scintilla of anxiety; he had heard of the Scourge and what it had done in Lordaeron, and the idea of taking the fight to the Lich King himself was both exciting and terrifying at the same time. Now, the shiver was from looking out at the pumping station - and remembering what he and the other engineers had found...

----

Six Years Earlier...

"Hellish place."

Riding down from the airstrip to the pumping station, Rakeri Sputterspark turned to his colleague with an amused look. "Let's not write it off with just a glance, Wil," he chided. "You see a wilderness of geysers and boiling water. I see something else entirely."

"Yeah?" Wilbert Blunderwitz snorted. Thirty years younger than Rakeri, he had also been a combat engineer, working on siege tanks in Dun Morogh and for the Stormpikes in Alterac Valley after the fall of Gnomeregan. Their mechanostriders strode across the uneven ground around the Scalding Pools as they approached the station. He gestured to the land around them. "What do you see here?"

"Opportunity," the elder gnome replied. "The humans have a saying: 'Never judge a book by its cover.' Yes, it looks inhospitable now, maybe even inimical to life - imagine how a lobster feels in a pot. But it's not what we see that makes this an opportunity. It's what we don't - what's beneath it all. It's called 'black gold' for a reason, Wil, and General Arlos has entrusted the job of getting it to Fizzcrank, who has in turn entrusted it to us, the guys who'll have to work on the damn thing - because we are the best at what we do."

"Yeah, but if Arlos was gonna put us to proper use, he'd have made us tank engineers, like we were in Ironforge." Wilbert had just arrived on the boat as part of the next wave of gnomish workers for the airstrip and its surrounding support structures.

"And what do you think the tanks run on, magic elf dust?" Rakeri retorted, grinning. He clapped his friend on the shoulder. "We have our parts to play for the Grand Alliance, Wilbert my boy. Moaning and groaning about 'drudge work' isn't going to make it go faster so that we can be combat engineers again."

Dismounting from their mechanostriders, Rakeri and Wilbert went up to the chief engineer. "Sputterspark and Blunderwitz, reporting, sir."

"Morning, boys. Another typical day at the station...oil galore, and sand with magical properties. The possibilities are --"

"We've got a clog!" shouted one of the engineers overseeing the main suction line. Indeed, the pipeline began to bulge.

"Ratchet up the suction! Now!" the chief engineer shouted. "Get whatever it is out of there!"

Out of the pipe came a great deal of blocked oil...and something metal. Some things, they could see. It was fairly large, easily large enough to have blocked the entire pipeline on its own. Wilbert was the first one to step forward, picking up one of the pieces, a rounded-looking thing, and swiping away excess oil from it with one hand. When he saw what was beneath, he gasped and dropped the thing on the ground. "That...that...." He stammered incoherently.

Even the chief engineer was dumbfounded. "It looks just like..."

"One of us," Rakeri finished, staring with wide eyes. He looked over the parts. Yes, he could see - a torso, parts of a hand, a leg...beneath all the oil, it still seemed to be there.

"Let's see what we have here. Some of you folks help me put this sucker back together. Sputterspark, keep an eye on the suction line, in case we get any more of these...things. Let's not get so tunnel-visioned that we get a clog and the pipeline blows up."

"Yes, sir," Rakeri agreed, though he kept only one eye on his task. The other was on the engineers working on the mechanical construct that had come out of the pipe...

Mechpriest Wilbert Blunderwitz had lived in New Tinkertown since it had been settled, finally glad to at least be somewhere relatively close to home. Like Rakeri, he had been "decursed" by Gearmaster Mechazod, but he had been saved early on by heroes sent by Fizzcrank with "Recursive Transmatter Injectors", whereas Rakeri had undergone his own personal hell leading to the Storm Peaks. He had joined the Argent Crusade after being recursed, and gone to Icecrown Citadel. The horrors he witnessed during his experiences in Northrend led him to the priesthood, training in Stormwind and later in Hearthglen, working with the Crusade in its work to reclaim the Plaguelands from what remained of the Scourge.

A nightmare, or perhaps a vision, had brought him back to Northrend, where he had worked as an engineer what seemed like an eternity ago. His opinion of the landscape near the airstrip and pumping station had not changed a whit, still appearing as dark and inhospitable as it had been years before. And having served across Northrend after being recursed, he knew exactly why. The true darkness had not been the Lich King, but a being far more powerful and far more ancient that had resided deep in the halls of Ulduar.

He froze right in the middle of the road as he approached the airstrip and looked up into the tower, his eyes wide. Sure enough, it was Rakeri Sputterspark, his former friend - a gnome who had gone mad after his traumatic experiences. He had read Orwyn's public notice about what had happened to him, and heard the rumors of his works, good and ill.

Like his old colleague, Blunderwitz thought back to those days when they found the construct in the pipe - where Rakeri's madness had truly begun...

----

After working day and night for close to a week, the thing was finished. The engineers at the pumping station had all stopped working and gathered around to see it. "A clockwork gnome," the chief engineer said in wonder. "Could this be...?"

The machine's gears began to turn, and power surged through its body. Its glowing eyes flickered to life, and the mechagnome began to turn its head to look upon the engineers. A mechanical voice, with all the pitch and inflection of flesh and blood gnomes, spoke. "Greetings! I thank you for restoring me to functionality."

"Who or what are you?" the chief engineer asked.

"I am called Gearmaster Mechazod. I am a servant of the Grand Architect, one of the first created in his image." The mechanical head examined them all again. "Fascinating. You also appear to have been made in his image, but you have been afflicted with the Curse of the Flesh. Unfortunate. Most unfortunate. But worry not, dear children. I will remove the curse from you all, as a token of my appreciation for your efforts in repairing me."

Rakeri's eyes went wide as he looked over at his friend Blunderwitz, who was similarly dumbstruck. He had heard of what the dwarven archaeologists had discovered in Uldaman, having discovered a tie between the earthen - ancient Titan constructs - and modern dwarves. If what this Mechazod was saying was true, then...

The chief engineer screamed as Mechazod raised its hands and projected energy into his body. Before the horrified eyes of the onlooking engineers, his flesh began to harden, as did his waxed mustache. His hair fell in one piece, and his pale flesh began to turn...brass. Soon, they could see vestiges of bolts in his skin, until finally, what stood in the engineer's place was a near-mirror of Mechazod - a construct, a machine, not a living being at all.

Blunderwitz's stomach heaved, and he fell to his knees retching his guts out. Rakeri stared at his boss' new mechanical form, frozen in stupefied terror. Soon, Mechazod had turned his energies onto the others as well, and he could hear the horrible screams and pleas for mercy as their flesh betrayed them, and they too became mechanical constructs. Blunderwitz, still on his knees in a puddle of his own vomit, couldn't react fast enough as the Gearmaster came for him too.

Rakeri finally snapped, his fear overwhelming him. He turned and ran. But it was too late; Mechazod spotted him, and blasted him with his energies as well. Rakeri now began his own screaming, the agony lancing through him as the Titanic power began turning his internal organs and his skin into metal. Even as his body now stood as a complex mechanism of gears and cogs, the screaming continued - in his own mind, trapped in a mechanical body that was subservient to the will of the Titans. Even as Mechazod directed him to the Storm Peaks, to the libraries of the Titans - a place he wanted to see for himself - the scream continued.

A scream that he feared would never end...

----

Blunderwitz watched as Rakeri summoned a phoenix-like creature of shadowflame to take him away, flying east into the Dragonblight. Was he the reason that brought the priest here...?

So, you've heard, and now you've come for me, Rakeri thought, having seen his old colleague Blunderwitz approach the airstrip. He had been one of the first gnome priests, a calling that he (Rakeri) considered "human corruption" of the gnomish people, imposing their philosophies in order to remove any individuality - to ensure that the races of the Alliance followed Stormwind's lead now and forever.

Some would say that warlock magics were an orcish corruption, and that Rakeri was a traitor to his people, too. But Rakeri saw it differently; his people took up warlock magics more out of their inherent curiosity rather than outside influence. That curiosity was what had led him to fully take up his new powers when Linavil Shadowsun had used her "Feltouch Recursive" on him years before, rather than have the demonic corruption removed from his body.

Now instead of being just another cog in the great Alliance machine, he was a figure to be feared, respected. Even Orwyn, grudgingly, had given him that much - even though his statement (of which Twitch, who regularly commuted back to Stormwind on the ship, had obtained a copy) essentially praised him and lamented his unfair treatment on one hand, and slandered him and said he got what was coming to him on the other.

The human predilection for "do as I say, not as I do" continues to confuse me.

Flying now across the Dragonblight, Rakeri looked northward, towards the bloodsoaked ice fields of Wintergrasp and the Storm Peaks beyond, as well as the looming monolithic spire of Icecrown Citadel. He remembered the entire trip into the mountains as if it had happened yesterday...

----

The screaming continued without pause, but no one could hear it.

The mechagnome that had been Rakeri Sputterspark continued his way through the secret halls of the Titans to their great libraries and machines high in the Storm Peaks. The shred of the living being he had once been fought with all the strength that could be mustered against the preprogrammed directives of the Titan construct - and failed. Finally, he arrived at the Inventor's Library, where he joined other mechagnomes - perhaps "refugees" like him from the Borean Tundra, or perhaps original clockwork constructs - in ensuring the working order of the Makers' engines.

That had changed when a particularly loot-crazed gnome warrior had tromped through the place and smashed every mechagnome he could find, taking what spare parts could be found. Rakeri was lucky, in a way - his damaged body was buried by a snowdrift. By the time he managed to crawl back into the light of the sky, the ravager was gone. Agony lanced through his soul, but he could do nothing. He wondered if this is what death would feel like.

Then someone else arrived. A human, adorned in white and gold robed armor and an Argent Crusade tabard; he had white hair worn in braids on his shoulders, and a neatly trimmed goatee beard. He saw the destruction around him, and Rakeri could hear him lamenting about the lack of viable spare parts. The human might be an engineer, he realized, a flicker of hope in his breast. Could that mean...?

The human saw him and knelt, his plate-armored hands gently examining the damaged body. He opened a pouch at his belt, and Rakeri could see that he was indeed an engineer, as he could see a familiar tool - a gnomish army knife, with the arclight spanner tool extended. The agony returned as the human went to work, first with the spanner, then with the gryomatic micro-adjustor. He realized that something was being added - rocket boosts in the feet. Odd thing to have on hand...

"Saavedro!" The human looked up at the voice of a draenei in chain-mail robes, carrying a hammer imbued with flame. "Come on now, they're waiting for us in Ulduar."

"Just a moment, Farseer," the human - Saavedro - replied, as he made the final adjustments...inside the mechagnome's head. Specifically, a reprogramming to have it act as a repair bot and menial servant.

Rakeri's hope turned to horror. He was still trapped...

----

Saavedro never realized what he had come across, he thought, not until I told him - after Linavil took me out of his "care". Typical human with no regard for things lower than he, in his view. He laughed to himself as he continued eastward...then shifted north towards Crystalsong Forest, following the broken Titan road. Well, Saavedro, who's dead and who's not, eh?