Proscenium: Oenologist

Maister S’vren was a rigid grey apparition in his immaculate lab coat as he stalked between the long wooden benches of Bunsen burners and bubbling beakers. Burets dripped their concoctions into Erlenmeyer flasks, earnestly tended by his students and chemists. Conversations were brief and hushed.

Satisfied with his workers’ industry the Maister took the long flight of stairs down to the Cellar. He typed his personal code into the access keypad and submitted to the retina scan. The heavy metal doors rolled apart, allowing him entrance into the high-ceilinged cave that housed the Guild’s Fermentation Vats.

Walking the length of the darkened subterranean factory took a full thirty minutes. As he strode along the slightly raised metal gangway, the age of the installation settled heavily on his shoulders. These machines had been in service for the last three thousand years, producing the Multiverse’s most acclaimed and sought after wines.

Finally, he reached a small, shadowed door. Again the keypad, and retina scan, but this time he felt the distinctive tingle of a full body scanner. After a fraction of a second delay, the door popped open, released by the gigantic computer brain that monitored the entire forty floor facility.

Unsurprised or undeterred by the jumble of ancient, discarded cleaning equipment and materials, he walked to the back of the small room and opened a rusted metal cupboard door and squeezed through.

He was embraced by pitch darkness, and the smell of rich earth and oaken barrels. A single spot of mellow light painted a circle on the naked soil beneath his feet. It was just enough to allow a hint at the extent of the modest row of barrels. Taking a glow stick from the depths of his lab coat, he found his way to an ancient dusty wine rack. Twelve unlabeled bottles nestled on the wooden frame. He scanned the micro-coding embedded in their corks with the small tablet he took from his pocket. At the third bottle, the scanner shone golden yellow. This was the one.

Being careful not to jostle the precious contents, he wiped the bottle clean with a special cloth from his pocket and gently wrapped it to protect it during its transport. A special order from the Emperor herself.

He paused, briefly pondering the delicacies of politics and power. His place was not to question. He sighed, wondering who was going to die tonight.