>>6134809With a slow, fluid motion, the puppet's head rolls away from Elle's touch before straightening up, the hollow eyes gazing blindly over her shoulder. The short, unfinished arms waver slightly before falling still, as if the puppet thought, for one brief moment, that they were a complete being. Seeing something so obviously artificial moving like a living thing is repulsive, and you find yourself automatically reaching for your gun.
“Wait!” Elle hisses, grabbing your arm, “Wait, please!”
“I was dreaming,” the puppet says, each word slow and measured, “What would you ask of me?”
It has a soft, melodic voice, although it is laced with the same metallic static that your host has. You could never mistake it for a true human voice, but it's close.
“What... have you dreamed?” Elle asks tentatively, “Can you tell us your dreams?”
“I dream of the eclipse. It is always there, no matter what I dream,” the puppet answers, “I hear the cries of night owls, and the thunder of artillery. I see great trenches cut through the mud, and men who live in them like rats. This will be how our world dies.”
“Oh God...” your own oracle whispers, clasping her hands over her mouth.
“Who... what are you?” you ask, stepping forwards even as Elle staggers away, “What happened to this place?”
The mechanical oracle is silent for a moment. Just as you're about to get Elle to ask your question for you, it speaks. “I am an oracle,” it states simply, “This is Miss Phalaris' Demesne. She created it.”
“Why?”
Another silence. You can actually see intricate mechanisms whirr within the puppet as it “thinks” about an answer. “Miss Phalaris required a place outside of the natural order so that she could conduct her experiments in peace,” it says at last.
“And those experiments were... what, exactly?”
“I am sorry, I cannot answer that question,” the oracle states, an eerie, almost cheerful note entering its voice, “I would like to dream now, please.”
“Isambard, can we... leave it be?” Elle whispers, tugging at your arm, “I think Mihail was right, I don't think we should've intruded.”
You nod slowly. Somehow, you don't think you'll get much more out of the mechanical oracle. As you're turning away, though, it speaks once more. “My...” it says, the voice flickering as if uncertain, “My shawl...”
You look around in confusion before your eyes fall on a scrap of white lace peeking out from beneath a stack of faded papers. Glancing at the inscrutable designs penned on the worn papers, you move the stack aside to examine the shawl beneath. You can sense a dormant power within the ancient lace, Lessons imbued into it by the former owner. Was the oracle offering you the shawl, or asking you for it?
>Leave the shawl alone. You don't even want to touch it>Take the shawl for yourself. You can use its power>Place the shawl around the oracle's shoulders. It's the least you can do>Other 