Stealth

Corvo retraced his steps, and moved from the wheeled drum to a stack of wooden pallets to a low wall formed by a moveable tool rack. The rack still held harpoons and hooks and blades strapped on the end of ten-foot poles. Every tool needed for slicing into the still-living flesh of a whale as it hung, helpless, in the air.

There was a Whaler near the cabinet and just enough shadow behind him for Corvo to sneak up, cut off the man’s supply of oxygen and dump the unconscious body behind the tool rack.

Two down.

Corvo glanced up. There were no Whalers that he could see up on the galleries or the ironwork platforms, unless they were skulking in the shadows, but there didn’t seem to be any reason why they would be. Just to be sure, he picked a spot on the gallery opposite his hiding place, blinked, then rolled into the shadows high in the factory.

His limbs grew heavy as he expended his energy, but there was no time to wait for himself to recover naturally. He reached into his tunic and drank the second vial of restorative. That left only one.

Down below, Zhukov was saying something, talking to Emily, but Corvo couldn’t make out the words over the steady rumble of the vat. He glanced to his left, and—

There.

A Whaler by the factory office platform. Corvo slunk along the gallery as far as he could, blinked up to the platform above the Whaler, then dropped down on top of the man, felling him without a sound.

This gave him a good view of the factory. He looked around. Still no sign of Galia. That was problematic, but Corvo put that thought to one side. There were no other Whalers that he could see, save for the two directly ahead of him, one flight down at the bottom of the stairs.

More luck. The two sentries were facing Zhukov, who was standing by the vat. Emily was on the other side of the factory floor, kneeling in front of the disused vat. As Corvo watched, Zhukov walked over to her. In a few seconds, his back was to the Whalers, who watched their master from behind their leather and rubber masks.

Corvo blinked.

He smashed the Whalers’ heads together, then grabbed them under the arms and pulled backward, letting them drop down onto the bottom of the staircase. The attack had been awkward, and far from ideal. Not silent, either—but as it happened, the noise had been a useful distraction.

Zhukov turned his head in his direction, but in an instant, Corvo blinked, reappearing behind Emily, severing her bonds without a moment’s delay.

“I’m here,” he whispered in her ear.

Dishonored: The Corroded Man, Chapter 28