A thin stream of sweat forged a path down Piper's cheek, which she wiped away absentmindedly with the back of her hand. It had become swelteringly hot the past few days. Despite it being the middle of Yanāyaka and quickly approaching the first moons of Frostfall, the Clarimo Sea appeared resistant to such changes in weather. Even on the main deck, the heat shimmers rose around her as the sun beat down merciless rays upon the ship and crew. If she thought that the outside was bad, the heat wave turned Azariah's office into a furnace.
Her attention, however, along with Winnifred's, was set on the small metal cage that Winnifred had retrieved that morning from where it had been set on the fourth deck. Many of the traps had come back each day containing the imprisoned vermin that commonly infested ships accustomed to long voyages. Especially those that had been set in the hold, kitchens, and mess, where such creatures sought out provisions. What had captivated their attention about this trap in particular was that it held no occupant. Now, this was not unusual due to the location - the boilers were hardly the most suitable residence for the average pest given the level of soot and noise.
Rather, it struck them as odd considering the rather obvious fact that the cage had, in fact, been occupied, before the metal rungs that made up its frame had been torn apart from the inside.
"I'm not sure what could have done something like that," Winnifred said, more to herself than anything, "I've seen all manner of creature, but none so small that could do such damage."
Piper bit her lip but did not respond. She too was busy trying to make out what could do such a thing herself, though nothing short of a miniature explosion seemed to suffice for an answer. Azariah was bent over at an awkward angle behind his desk, where only the hunch in his back was visible as he rummaged through unseen drawers. He made a number of strained noises in his search before he finally straightened himself, dropping a wide, dust-laden tome on the desktop with a heavy thud.
"I've got an inklin' of an idea." Azariah replied at last, blowing a thick cloud of filth off of the cover.
Piper and Winnifred stepped forward curiously to examine the book. Not much could be made out from the worn leather, where a faint title could be seen but no longer discerned aside from a few letters of the presumed author. Flipping quickly through a couple of pages until he found the one he was looking for, Azariah stopped suddenly and thrust the book forward again. He tapped a crooked finger on a faded image, displayed beneath a bold description that read:
"Lesser Automata - Vermin"
Piper was beginning to fit the pieces of the puzzle together as she examined a smaller diagram of what appeared to be a mechanical gopher. Azariah went on with his theory as she did so.
"What I believe we've got 'ere is a springtail infestation," he gave his head a slow shake, "always a risk when ya dock in the cities. Why I prefer headin' further south into Drumwald, but ain't really have much of a choice this time 'round."
"We had to deal with them at Brackendow a couple of times. They would get into the armory if we weren't careful." Piper replied, burying her nose deeper in the book.
"What's a springtail?"
Piper and Azariah shared a look before turning to Winnifred, who gazed back with innocent sincerity. After the trio blinked at each other for an uncomfortable moment, Azariah cleared his throat.
"Well they're uh, small little buggers. Mouselike critters but-"
"Have you really never heard of them before?" Piper interjected incredulously. Winnifred simply shook her head to the negative.
"I've seen plenty of dangerous creatures back home. Crocotta, nandi-bear, wolpertinger, amphisbaena … cockatrice and wyvern weren't even that uncommon to be seen flying overhead from time to time."
"But not automata?" Piper queried. Even she hadn't heard of some of the beasts her friend had listed, making her ignorance to some of the most common inhabitants of urban Animaeris all the stranger. Winnifred put on a wounded expression.
"I'm not so far lost as to have no notion of them. Higher Automata won an entire war after all, though there was hardly reason for them to be as far removed as the frontier. Never have I known them to be so small in size."
Azariah scratched the back of his head. "Well they weren't, not till the last forty roats or so, little wonder ya haven't heard of 'em way out in the sticks. A few innovators took up the helm after the Great Recall and began experimentin' with smaller models, meant for ah, household use an' such in the cities."
Winnifred nodded once as she stepped closer to peek at the book herself, though Piper could see that her dark brows were still furrowed in confusion.
"Birds, rabbits, gerbils, mice … cats and dogs, too, though they are a lot pricier if I recall," Piper shrugged, "I never had any pets myself."
"But what was the point of it all?"
Piper shrugged once more, and found that she genuinely didn't fully understand the point herself the more she thought about it. "Companionship, I suppose. Some of the lesser automata are made in forms that are difficult to find in Animaeris. That, and most of the tenements in New Albion don't allow pets."
"Automata were a bit of a loophole," Azariah chuckled, "though I can't say they were much better."
"What do you mean?" Winnifred asked.
"Y'know how a lonely mutt might chew up the leg of a table? Or a kitty tear up the curtains?"
Winnifred nodded.
"Well, imagine they're 'bout eighty pounds heavier, made of metal, an' harder than stone."
Now, Winnifred winced. "I can see how that could become problematic."
Azariah nodded much like a schoolteacher praising a student over a correctly solved equation.
"As they grew in popularity, many were affixed with other uses. Most were given specializations. Chirrlets and correvans were kept to record and deliver messages, boltboxers made good guardians, and iron-pointers could track as well as any flesh-and-blood hunting dog. Funny enough, I think scamperlocks were made mostly to catch the overflow of springtails." He scratched his chin thoughtfully, "Made some goldfish models too - tinfins - but they had a habit of short-circuiting if I recall correctly."
It was clear that Winnifred was soaking in this information with an eagerness that verged on hunger. How she could have had such an immeasurable repository of personal knowledge but left unaware of one of the most common aspects of Animaerisian life seemed like almost an impossibility to Piper.
"If each of these creatures were given functional designs, what about the springtails? What were they made for?"
"S'far as I know they were sold as novelties. Children's toys. They were among some of the first designs by Zomorov Innovations meant to prove how popular Lesser Automata could be among the masses. Our little problem here just shows how right they were."
Winnifred looked on the verge of asking another question, but Piper interjected with a passage from the tome.
"'Burrowjacks, sparkmartens, springtails, and other Lesser Automata modeled after rodents and small mammilians showed both a marked increase in intellect when compared to their organic counterparts, and an astounding similarity to the natural behaviors typically exhibited by them …' So in essence, they're still mice."
"Mass produced just to be lost by any child they couldn't escape from on their own an' left as a nuisance for the rest of us." Azariah confirmed.
"I feel sort of sorry for them in a way," said Winnifred, "it wasn't their fault that they were created and abandoned."
Azariah sighed. "Yet they're mice all the same, and mice burrow - these'uns specifically can do so through iron if they've got a mind for it."
"So how do we stop them?"
He gave the pair of swabs one of his famous, toothy grins. "Same as you stop our regular pests, we jus' need a better trap."
By the end of the day, Piper had nearly sweated clean through her shirt. Azariah had figured the springtails had navigated the ship through the piping and ventilation, and so she and Winnifred had been sent to lay a new sort of trap Azariah had concocted. He had instructed her on how to do it to his liking, but neglected to elucidate how exactly it would work. In addition to having to be manually constructed at each location, the components to do so were immensely heavier than the traditional traps they had been employing to date. Fortunately, it did not take long after the first were activated in order to capture the first of the miniature constructs.