https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/774724975835349012/785662822720995328/fizzleface.png
Somewhere in Boralus.
It was dark… and quiet. So quiet that he could hear himself breathing… there was just a hint of an echo as he inhaled and exhaled, but still - all he saw was darkness. The echo and the darkness must mean he is in some kind of chamber, he thought to himself.
A cave perhaps?
Agent Fizzlevolt could feel his eyes were open. He consciously opened and closed his eyes tightly, blinking in quick succession, making sure his eyes were actually open.
And the pain… the excruciating pain in all his joints. He tried to move his arms and legs… but nothing happened. Was he chained down? He wanted to look at his arms and legs, and see what injuries he had sustained, but there was nothing but darkness and pain.
As his head began to clear a bit, he remembered the mission. He could only vaguely remember following the Apothecary Mortignis and his bodyguards. The Captain had ordered that their movements be tracked… and track them he did. The other Marines were ransacking his house - looking for his notebook… but they would need more time, he thought. Boralus Intelligence had spent months tracking down his lab, and they only had one shot at this… but he estimated the Marines would need more time to find what they needed. He had to create a diversion… something to slow them down.
But they had caught him as he tried to slow their march. The diversion failed, and the gnome’s body had been torn apart by the vile Forsaken known as the Shadows of Lordaeron just before the disastrous battle at Olsen’s Farthing that followed. Once the Undead knew they were being tracked, they made haste to the lab and laid waste to the small team of Marines there. In their haste to reach Mortignis’ laboratory, the Undead had assumed the gnome agent to be dead. It’d been a few months since that day, but to Fizzlevolt it just seeemed like he was waking up the next day.
“Sa… Salu…tations? Is… any… one… there…?” he asked in a faint, squeaky voice. He was very weak, struggling to gather the strength to breathe with each word.
Fizzlevolt could hear a muffled voice.
“Sir! I heard something!”
The muffled sounds of commotion could be heard closely… finally some thuds just inches from his face, and then it happpened.
Fizzlevolt then saw bright light as a hatch opened, revealing that he was in Chief Engineer Fizzleplugg’s workshop. A couple of assistant Engineers from the Marine Corps of Engineers were frantically running around checking an assortment of instrumentation and sensors as the agent looked around in confusion.
“How did I get here?” he thought to himself, still unable to gather the strength to speak.
“At ease, Corporal! Don’t try to move… it’ll just make the pain worse!” spoke the familiar voice of Chief Engineer Fizzleplugg.
"Now, I know what you’re thinking! What happened?! Well, Agent Fizzlesocket found you and brought you here… or what was left of you, anyway! She’d been worried sick! Boy, she sure will be glad to see you’re still kickin…er… awake!”
“Sir…? What’s… happening…?” squeaked out Fizzlevolt.
“We’re still attempting to heal your body, but those damned deaders ate your arms and legs! Not to worry though, we’ve got a plan!”
Fizzlevolt seized in horror. He had been trying to get up, but couldn’t reach up to pull himself into an upright position. As he looked to his shoulders and legs, he realized why he was in so much pain. They were all missing - apparently. No arms… no legs.
As he looked to the left, he saw another one of the same exact incubator-type contraptions which he was currently tied into. The other one didn’t have a gnome in it though - it had a goblin, and he was in quite the panic!
“We’ll have you all patched up and good as ne… well, no, not good as new, but better than now at least! Hahaha!”
“Sir…? Wh… What are… you… going… to do?”, wondered Agent Fizzlevolt as he trembled in fear.
“As soon as your vitals stabilize and we can discern a regular breathing pattern, nominal blood pressure and a lapse in your current state of shock, we’re putting this beaut to work, Corporal!”
Fizzlevolt looked over to the machine, Engineers still making adjustments as they bolted and unbolted various instruments and gizmos from what appeared to be an incubator housing… and they were doing this on both his and the goblilns’ machine.
The label plate identifying the machine read “Facial Arrangement Characteristics Exchanger / Oscillating Feature Fractals”
“This is the experimental F.A.C.E./O.F.F. machine! The Marine Corps of Engineers have been working on it for a while with none other but Trivoltza leading the design efforts! It should buy you the time we need until we can build you some bio-mechanical limbs that won’t introduce unacceptable levels of metal toxicity and rapid blood loss, Corporal!”
Fizzlevolt had no idea what that meant, but as he looked back over to the other incubator to see that terrified goblin chained to an identical F.A.C.E./O.F.F. machine. The goblin’s green face was turning pale white with fear… and it began to dawn on Fizzlevolt what was about to happen.