The Stood-Down Battery

Atop the sea cliff stand four empty gun emplacements and a single polished cannon tended by an old gnome gunner in a faded Guild coat. Beside him on a brass tripod sits a hatbox-sized clockwork targeting reckoner covered in dials. "The Guild decommissioned this battery six years ago and cut off my pension after two," he says. "I won't sell my targeting Reckoner for coin—but I'll wager it in a gunnery duel: three shots each at the white sea-stack a mile offshore!"

A full mile offshore, a cart-sized white rock juts out of the foaming surf. The old gnome spins two dials on his brass Reckoner to account for the gusting crosswind and steps back. "Your gun crew fires first, captain. Take your best aim."

At the Guild Court, the pension clerk looks up the old gnome's name and frowns. "Marked deceased four years ago. A dead man can't collect a pension—especially not in person." The keeper slams six years of signed daily battery logs onto the desk, but the stubborn clerk ignores the book and looks at you.

The old gnome carries the brass targeting Reckoner down to your boarding ramp himself, though he hesitates before letting go of the case. "Six years I kept that battery ready for a Guild that forgot I existed. You won it fair and square, captain—just make sure your gunners calibrate the wind-dials every morning."

An hour later, the old gnome walks out of the Guild Court carrying a heavy canvas sack holding four years of back pension. He blinks in the sunlight on the steps. "There's no gun left on that cliff that needs me now, captain. How would you like to settle your fee?"

He shares the bottle of rum you lost to him on the parapet. By the second glass, he admits why he stays on the cliff: "A Guild clerk stopped my pension four years ago without explanation. I won't sell my Reckoner, captain, but if you carry me to the Guild Court to claim my back pay, I'll make it worth your while."