Gatekeeper Alpha

Gatekeeper Lambda-N was a Sentry model golem who was long-ago stationed at the North Gate of New Thapheneaux. Due to its contentious history with the Black Cove pirates who had several times infiltrated and raided the city, New Thapeneaux maintained strict border security. No one entered or exited the city without papers, and people caught fleeing the city were to be restrained with extreme prejudice until a figure of authority could ensure that they were not a threat. This was the one and only purpose for which Lamba-N was forged.

Consequently, when hundreds of citizens tried to flee New Thapeneaux on the night of the Descent with no regard for checkpoints or paperwork, Lambda-N did his best to keep them within the city with aplomb. Though Lambda fought to detain the hordes of potential roustabouts, a powerful paladin among the fleeing mob would not be denied, and ran Lambda-N through with his blessed claymore. The light of the paladin’s deity coursed through Lambda, overloading his runic circuitry, and Lambda fell lifeless to the ground. Hordes of citizens fleeing the city stampeded over his lifeless shell and attempted to dodge the jaws of the Devourers that had beset the city.

Even though Lambda-N had died in a sense, the golem was not out for the count. Days later, gears that had been grinding inside him, building tension since the sword pierced his breastplate, finally slipped loose to spin again. He arose to survey the smashed walls and buildings of New Thapeneaux, oil pouring from the slashed Lambda stamped on his breastplate, aware that something had changed. He could not be sure if it was the damage to his carapace, the surge of divine energy through his delicate magical devices, or the existential terror of being made to protect and failing miserably, but one way or another, he was awake in a way he had never been before. He had been created to defend the citizens of the city, and yet the good citizens had struck him down for it. They were weak and fragile creatures who had refused his help and paid the price for it, as evidenced by the carnage.

He was a new golem now. Not some minor Lambda peon, but a true Alpha. No longer a gatekeeper to a city of weak Kindred, but a gatekeeper to the next stage in evolution. He had not been defeated by the Devourers. And as he reasoned, Golems could not attract the Devourers as they lacked flesh and blood. Gatekeeper Alpha would see society reborn, but a society of nigh-indestructible Golems, as aware and alive as he was. To suffer the weak, fleshy mortals who had created them was a road to the unparalleled ruin of the Descent.