>>5877571Riv, that's . . . That's wrong.
Those are military standard pattern, they're meant to fit in the new model 74 Mordenkani the Defense Council in Vanadia introduced last year. But no marks or markers stamps, so we won't know the factory or the merchant-magnate that shipped them there to here.
Who would need this? Given the standard dimension of the reinforced crate you've torn open, one could fit a company's worth of bayonets in it. And Rinik has quite a bevvy of rats in his employ but he doesn't need to outfit <span class="mu-i">an army</span>, because he simply doesn't have that many slicerats. Let alone the trouble they'd find themselves in if they marched through the streets with those things. Fine knives they make perhaps, but they're too awkward for their sort of work, and one would need them attached to the end of contraption they're intended. There's some sort of socketing system.
But military doctrine aside, this is preposterous.
Rinik provably cannot use multiple crates of bayonets, he'd have ten bayonets for each slicerat under his command, and even if Spider-Rat-Man's earlier findings of blackened powder and the tools for repairing muskets indicate that perhaps Rinik is trying to smuggle in a weapon or two, that explains nothing. Suppose he has muskets and bayonets then. Suppose he has instructors for his rats!
This City has <span class="mu-s">rules</span>.
If the Slicerats started disturbing the peace with weapons of war, the Watchers would respond in kind. And it's a fact as plain as the shining sun that the Watcher's would in a war.
Rinik would find himself in a scrap he can't win. The Red Market would turn on him, people would turn on him. He might be the kingpin ratlord of the wards for now, but even Rinik can't stand against everyone. The Shimmergrass Cartels would eat him alive! The Kalcmiri Roofrunners! He'd get in deep trouble with Uthani Family Bands! Not to mention the Rebus and the Senate Intelligence and that's if Legion High Command's Civic Protection doesn't gut him like a rat first.
What ace could he possibly have up his sleeve?
This defies logic, because you can't field an army of common criminals to take the city street by street. And more besides, no one's heard whisper or rumour of half-made plans to sieze granaries or take gates or bar roads. Is Rinik's entire organisaton the single most loyal and well organised conspiracy in existence? Preposterous again. The Slicerats are as bribable as anyone, because they're not all Mothdreamers.
We're missing something.
