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Monster of the Month

Modron

What’s a mortal to make of the modrons—those strange creatures of absolute order that whir and click along in the Clockwork Nirvana of Mechanus? To an outsider, they seem to have no existence other than as a whole. Indeed, there is a saying: “To look at one modron is to look at all of them.” It is only logical that these creatures are native to Mechanus. Rumor has it that they are the keepers of their mechanical plane, the maintainers of the gears and the polishers of the cogs. Modrons keep the whole place running smoothly and cleanly—without them, Mechanus would surely break down. Though the majority of modrons live in Regulus (their own city in Mechanus), they can be encountered anywhere within the planes. No modron is ever without a task to carry out, though these tasks may be no more comprehensible to other creatures than the modrons themselves are. Just what are the goals of these creatures of ultimate order? Do they want to impose total law over the rest of the cosmos? Are they simply keepers of the machinery that drives the multiverse—the repair unit of infinity? Or are they devious players on the cosmic gameboard, trying to eliminate their competition? These questions may never be answered, and a host more may never be asked. No one but a modron truly understands a modron.

Modron Society

Because of their method of reproduction, modrons have no families, tribes, or clans. They live in rigid numerical units called, for lack of a better word, battalions. This term makes modrons sound more warlike than they really are, although they do maintain standing armies that are not to be trifled with. Modrons spend their lives performing the duties that Primus assigns, either directly or indirectly. Each modron accepts orders from members of the next higher caste and can, in turn, give instructions to members of the next-lower caste. In this way, orders filter down from Primus through all the modron ranks until they reach the caste capable of carrying them out. Although some less-informed scholars state that no modron acts except by the orders of a superior, this is not perfectly accurate. In general, a modron can act and react on its own, provided that the situation at hand falls within the range of its purpose. Thus, monodrones are rightly seen as incapable of reacting because each can perform only a single task at any given time. Modrons of higher ranks have correspondingly greater ranges of function, so they can react to more and more complex situations. Even so, modrons are notorious for their predictable and rigid reactions to events.

The Modron Mentality

Modrons are the ultimate creatures of law. Their very bodies conform to the unflinching regularity of geometry, and the flawless logic of their alien minds can lead them to conclusions that others might not even consider. Modrons have pitted themselves against—and beaten—all challengers at games of logic, so their supremacy in that area is undisputed. Modrons care only about order and law; they have no concept of good and evil. They can decide what is best and what is worst, but they cannot distinguish between right and wrong. This limited viewpoint makes dealing with these creatures a challenge. Attempts to explain good and evil to a modron can only result in it equating good with order and evil with chaos, for those are the best and worst possibilities it can imagine. It should be no surprise that the goal of every modron is to organize Mechanus in the most orderly fashion possible. Given the opportunity, of course, modrons would spread their rigid pattern of organization over the entire multiverse. Fortunately for the rest of the planes, order is constantly challenged by chaos, even in the clockwork vastness of Mechanus. Since even the slightest imperfection is enough to disturb the ultimate harmony that modrons seek, they seldom find the time or resources to carry their crusade to other realms or planes.

Interactions With Other Races

Modrons are not completely without their uses to the residents of other planes. In fact, their single-minded pursuit of order is particularly beneficial in some areas. Wizards, for example, find that modrons make amazingly effective librarians, and some merchants appreciate having them as bookkeepers. On rare occasions, nonmodrons can hire modrons for particular tasks. The process is never simple, since the potential employee can never make that decision itself—all requests are subject to approval by superiors. Usually the request has to pass through several castes before an answer is forthcoming. Those who employ modrons must be constantly on guard against the creatures’ overzealousness. Sometimes a modron’s understanding of order, which is far deeper than that of most other beings, defies human comprehension. For example, a modron might decide to arrange all the books in one library by subject, in another by the first letter of the first word, and in yet a third by the page where the last diagram appears. All three of these approaches might somehow be vital to maintaining the overall order, as defined by the modrons. Order, after all, does not necessarily need to be understandable. Modrons’ attitudes toward their employers and coworkers can vary for no apparent reason. Sometimes these creatures are helpful, and sometimes they’re cruel—but they’re never entirely predictable in their dealings with other races. No one except other modrons can read a modron’s expression or guess at its true agenda. Thus, nobody with any sense really trusts one, even if it has been instructed to help. After all, it might have additional or competing orders from above, and it’s certainly not going to think twice about obeying those.

Rogue Modrons

Of course, every rule has its exception, and rogue modrons are the exceptions to the rule of orderly modron society. Rogues are modrons who, for one reason or another, suddenly find that they cannot accept the orders of their superiors, or that they have lost the concept of the orderly modron society. Modrons who spend long periods alone, or have many superiors, or who advance in experience (thus becoming different than others of their rank) are the ones most likely to “go rogue.” Naturally, the modrons have tried to cut down on the factors that lead to this outcome, but there’s an indefinable factor in operation that they can’t isolate or identify. The most dangerous aspect of rogue modrons is the fact that they retain the power of command over lesser modrons. Though most rogues simply go off alone to explore the individuality they’ve discovered, it’s not unheard of for one to gather lesser modrons about it and establish its own power base. This makeshift army then goes forth to conquer, though for what purpose only the rogue itself could explain. Because of the possibility that such a creature could subvert others and wreak havoc on the order of Regulus (and even Mechanus as a whole), rogues are considered menaces to modron society. The hierarchs pour almost every resource they have into hunting them down, bringing them to trial, and destroying them. This is a difficult process because it’s often hard to tell when a modron goes rogue. A modron who told others of lower ranks to disobey their superiors would surely earn the designation of rogue, for this is tantamount to blasphemy in Regulus. But it is rare for even rogue modrons to do this because of their innate respect for order.

The Great March

Once every Grand Cycle (seventeen cycles, each of which is about seventeen years—the time it takes for the largest gear on Mechanus to turn once), a horde of modrons spills out of Mechanus and marches through the planes. Why? Nobody knows for sure, although it seems as if they’re gathering information as they march. The modrons cause all kinds of havoc in the planes through which they march. They don’t stop for anyone or anything, trampling right through towns and over any inhabitants who are too slow to get out of the way. It is ironic that these lawful automatons can be the cause of so much chaos. When they reach the Lower Planes, the conflict begins in earnest, with the inhabitants attacking the invaders from Regulus every step of the way. When the much-reduced force returns to Mechanus, the few remaining troops march straight to their superiors to report. What they say in this meeting is the subject of much speculation: Some claim that they report on the progress of the modron invasion; others insist that they merely describe the state of the planes. Granted, this seems a difficult way to gather knowledge, but perhaps the modron mind sees some particular logic about it. Whatever the case, the report is inexplicable to everyone except modrons. Over the centuries, the inhabitants of the other planes have grown accustomed to the March. Previous Marches are well documented, and an adventurous few have roughed out some of the probable routes for upcoming ones.

 

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