Wintergewitter
This too shall pass.
Silvertown watched Mornington snap open one of the new standard-issue collapsible aluminium wands. He held it against the ulnar vein in Newkirk's wrist and closed his eyes; she felt him send an exploratory pulse of magic into the dying magician's bloodstream.
He frowned. Rotated his wrist and tilted his head without opening his eyes. Tried another, more significant burst of magic.
"I'm having trouble getting traction. Magic's... sliding off. What hit him?"
Beckton was about to answer when he was interrupted by Osterley. She stood at the open door to Director Ackerson's office, folding a thin sheaf of papers into her apron.
"Late-model .455 Magekiller. You need to stop the bleeding before he goes into cardiac arrest."
Mornington whistled appreciatively.
"Didn't think any of those were still around. We need to get him somewhere with some facilities and support. Too risky to do anything without."
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Comments (2 so far!)
HSAR
Mornington's remark indicates that production of Magekillers was ended at some point and not resumed, leading to the depletion of stockpiles to the point where they're no longer regularly seen - see the comments of "Adder" (#42072). How and why Osterley had one, let alone Bleecker, is not stated.
Operation Wintergewitter ("Winter Storm") was a military operation conducted by German forces in December of 1942. Armoured German units attempted to rescue comrades who were trapped inside Stalingrad by Soviet forces, but were forced to retreat when their flank was threatened by a successful Soviet counterattack.
- #4147 Posted 5 years ago
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Beckton applied pressure to the wound through Newkirk's wadded-up coat, leaning in and using both ha…
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HSAR
Incidentally, earlier versions of Dungeons and Dragons treated necromancy and healing magic as two aspects of the same field, which is to say they are attempting to manipulate the very essence of life. Each field reviles the other has having taken the easy path, of course. This has no relevance except to say that Mornington can't be blamed for not wanting to attempt a complex operation without backup.
On that topic, it seems that Magekiller rounds have additional capabilities beyond merely piercing magical defenses. Mornington's initial attempt to discover the nature of Newkirk's wound do not appear to meet with the result typically expected, and this is related to the nature of the later production examples of Magekillers - presumably when the system was perfected.