The Clockill and the Thief

by Gareth Ward

  After a short delay, a muffled response echoed from a trumpet fixed next to the speaking tube. “Bridge. Roger that. The Captain’s taking a look and will advise. Over.”

  The clouds darkened before Sin’s eyes, and when the bridge responded several minutes later the first drops of rain were already spattering the ironglass dome. “Bridge to crow’s nest. We’re maintaining course. Inform all crew topside to make haste below decks. Over.”

  “Crow’s nest, roger that,” said Sin into the tube. “Take us down, Nobby. I’ll go warn them.” In the distance lightning flashed, followed by the rumble of thunder.

  Stanley spun a sizeable brassanium wheel and the crow’s nest descended until it was level with the airship envelope. Sin strapped on his flight helmet and exited through a curved door in the dome. The wind whipped around him. He locked his rigair boots onto the ratlines and set off towards the forward stabilisers.

  Fat raindrops the size of marbles battered the envelope, making the ratlines greasy. Finally Sin understood why Stoneheart had been such a tyrant, drilling them back and forth across the practice envelope. He leaned into the wind, his thighs burning with the effort. Ignoring the discomfort, he strode onwards, knowing that his crewmates’ safety depended on him.

  He drew alongside Jimmy and Trixie. “Storm coming. Captain says to get below decks.”

  Trixie chucked a handful of weed in the air. The wind whipped it away in an instant. “Careful near the stabiliser, this stuff is jolly slippy.”

  “You don’t want to try to clamp onto it,” added Jimmy. “I made that mistake. Trixie saved my bacon.”

  “Got it. Keep off the weed.” Sin continued towards the stabiliser, leaving Trixie and Jimmy to head safely inside.

  The airship hit a pocket of turbulence and with an almighty shudder it listed to port. Sin’s weight shifted sideways. His calves pulled taut, the muscles aching as he pressed down firmly onto his toe switches. The claws on his rigair boots groaned, straining to keep a grip on the ratlines.

  “Jasper, help me!” Velvet’s panicked shout cut over the whine of the airship’s motors. She lay spread-eagled on the smooth metal stabiliser, which now tilted severely in an attempt to balance the airship. She was slowly sliding backwards towards nothingness. “Grab my line!” she yelled and hurled the safety rope attached to her suit’s harness.

  Crouched on all fours, seemingly frozen with fear, Jasper ignored the safety line trailing past him.

  Sin picked up his pace, striding towards the stabiliser as fast as he dared. With every step Velvet inched closer to oblivion. Her scrabbling fingers found no purchase against the smooth litanium wing.

  “Hook her line!” shouted Sin.

  Jasper hunched, motionless, a look of terror on his face.

  Ten yards separated Sin from Velvet. Her legs slipped over the curved wing’s edge and dangled into space. He wasn’t going to make it in time, not unless he ran. Hawk’s warning played through his mind: Never run in rigair boots. If you do, you’ll fall and die. But if he didn’t, Velvet would fall and die. Cursing, Sin broke into a sprint.

  Toe switch down, clamp the cable, tow switch up, release. Toe switch down, clamp the cable, tow switch up, release. He’d managed less than five steps when he clamped onto a section of weed-covered cable and his boot’s jaws slipped free. Instinctively, Sin released his back foot to regain his balance. Both feet now devoid of purchase, he bent his legs and made an impromptu leap through the air. He was a thousand yards above the ground. If he missed the cables on landing, he’d be done for, and so would Velvet. Time slowed. The crisscrossed cables drifted below him. With pinpoint precision, Sin slammed his feet onto the ratlines. Operating his toe switches, he clamped onto the cables and charged towards Velvet.

  Hitting the ratlines and managing the boots’ mekaniks was a simple task in his time-altered world. Sin sprinted faster, reaching the stabiliser as gravity sucked Velvet from view. Her anguished, time-slowed scream played long and loud in his ears.

  Sin released both toes and dived forwards. He slammed into the smooth litanium wing, stretching for Velvet’s disappearing safety line. His fingers wrapped around the thin rope, the hemp rough against his skin. Time snapped back. Arms outstretched, he lay sprawled on the stabiliser, the thin cord biting into his hands. He kicked his feet down and hooked a ratline with the toes of one boot. “Help me!” he shouted at Jasper. His petrified crewmate offered no response.

  Gears inside the airship mashed and the stabiliser returned to level. The movement jolted Velvet’s suspended body and the line slipped an inch through Sin’s fingers. He screamed away the rope burn’s pain and gripped the cord tighter, his blue blood-enhanced muscles straining.

  “Hold on, brother, I’m coming.” Stanley’s voice sounded woefully distant.

  Pins and needles pained Sin’s forearms. Not now. He couldn’t lose strength or Velvet would fall. He clenched his teeth, fighting back the agony coursing through his arms.

  The clank of boots drew nearer. “We’ve got this, brother.” Stanley dropped to his stomach beside Sin, his own safety cable hooked onto a ratline.

  “Two, six, lift,” shouted Sin, and hand over hand they pulled in the rope. Velvet’s fingers appeared over the lip of the stabiliser and their job became easier as she took her own weight. They gave one final heave and, with a kick of her legs, she scrambled onto the metal wing.

  Letting go of the lifeline, Sin sat up and examined the bloody, blistered grooves scarring his palms. Velvet crawled closer and wrapped her arms around him in a hug. “Thanks,” she whispered.

  Unsure of how to respond, Sin gently patted her arm.

  Velvet leaned back, a watery sheen glossing her eyes. “Sorry about the coal.”

  Pins and needles tingled Sin’s arms. “It’s not the coal you should be sorry about, it’s the bl –”

  Thankfully he cut himself short. He’d nearly let slip the secret of his blue blood.

  Velvet pointed at Jasper’s disappearing form, clambering through the hatch to below decks. “I’m going to jolly well kill him.”

  The ship creaked eerily, lashed by the wind and rain, rocking and shuddering in the grip of the storm. The chemlamps in the galley swung in erratic circles, weaving a swirl of shadows over the deserted rows of litanium tables. Sin sat with Stanley and Mercy on the only occupied bench. Each had a fire helmet, an extinguisher and an axe. They were the rapid response crew, and were waiting to be deployed in case of a lightning strike or other emergency.

  Sin ran a gloved thumb across the blade of his axe. Beneath the thick leather glove, bandages wrapped his hands. Madame Mékanique had dressed the wounds, applying a soothing salve and then, to Sin’s surprise, had cleared him fit for duty. He supposed that was the difference between training and being on a mission: things were no longer pretend; every crew member was needed and sacrifices had to be made.

  “What did Hawk say to you?” asked Stanley.

  “She wanted to know what happened topside. I told her Jasper froze and Velvet nearly went overboard because of it.”

  The debrief with Hawk had been more relaxed than the last time he’d been in the Captain’s cabin; he’d even been allowed to take a seat. She’d made him recount the events several times over, drawing out more detail with every telling, and questioning him on specific points. As a thief, Sin had got used to not being believed, however it irked him that Hawk seemed to doubt his story, especially when this time he was telling the truth.

  “What did she ask you?” Sin let the axe clatter onto the litanium tabletop.

  “Same same. She was mighty interested in the bit where you sprinted in your rigair boots. Reckon she thought I was telling porky-pies. I told her if you hadn’t done it, Velvet would be dead.”

  Mercy adjusted the wrist strap on her glove. “Do you think Jasper will get in trouble?”

  “Oh, he’s definitely in trouble,” said Sin. “If not with Hawk, then with Velvet. I wouldn’t want to be in his shoes the next time she sees him.
”

  “He should be thrown out of COG,” said Stanley.

  “It’ll never happen.” Mercy leaned in closer to the boys. “Lottie says Jasper’s mother is a special friend of Major C and he promised to watch out for Jasper. She heard that the Major talked Jasper out of quitting, said he should make his father proud.”

  Sin recalled what Lottie had told him about Jasper when they’d been sparring. How must that feel, to have an expectation placed on you by a dead parent? Sin had spent years carrying a photo of his mother, trying to find out why she’d abandoned him as a baby. What would he have done if there’d been a note with the photograph, some form of request from beyond the grave?

  A bright light flickered through the portholes, bleaching everything momentarily white, and a thunderous rumble shook the airship.

  Zonda stormed into the galley, her forehead cragged in the mother of all scowls. “You just couldn’t leave it alone, could you?”

  Stanley and Mercy stared at the table, which had apparently become especially interesting. Sin met Zonda’s gaze and held it. “Couldn’t leave what alone?”

  “You jolly well know what. It wasn’t enough that Jasper was terrified by his ordeal, you had to stick the knife in and give it a twist. He’s on restricted duties pending a hearing.”

  Sin shot to his feet and slapped the table, sending a crack reverberating through the galley and pain through his injured palms. “Jasper let Velvet fall. He could have reached out and grabbed her line at any point. He could have saved her. Instead he watched her slide off, into nothing.”

  Hands on her hips, Zonda’s scowl deepened. “That’s not how Jasper tells it. He said she was gone before he had a chance to help. Then you came barging in, all desperate to be the hero again.”

  Sin shook his head in disbelief. “Me and Velvet are lying, are we?”

  “Wouldn’t be the first time you and Velvet kept a secret, would it?” Zonda spat.

  “Is that what this is really about? Me and Velvet?” asked Sin. “You think I should have let her fall?”

  “Don’t be an ignoramus. Of course not. You just didn’t have to be a tattletale. I thought you thieves had a code of honour about squealing.”

  “I ain’t a thief no more and it weren’t squealing. I had to tell Hawk the truth, that’s all.”

  Zonda held a hand to her face. “Oh yes, because you’re always so truthful about everything else, right?”

  Sin stared at her. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “You know damn well what it means. I’m sure you don’t want to inject the truth into this conversation.”

  Sin sank back onto the bench. Blinding white light seared through the portholes and the galley shook violently. A tumultuous boom reverberated throughout the ship, then a whistle sounded from the overhead vocifertrump. The Captain spoke. “All firefighters to the starboard engine bay.”

  Sin leaped to his feet. “I’d love to continue this conversation, but I’ve got to go and be a hero again.” He grabbed his axe from the table. “Unless of course it’s going to upset you or Jasper and you’d rather we all burned?” He jammed his fire-extinguisher under one arm and dashed out of the galley, Stanley and Mercy following.

  Thick, greasy clouds billowed from the engine bay. Sin lifted the bubble helmet over his head and secured it in place. Thanks to his blue blood, he’d easily outpaced Stanley and Mercy. There was no time to lose; he couldn’t afford to wait. Holding the fire-extinguisher protectively in front of him, he advanced into the smoke. The sound of his breathing echoed loudly in his ears. This was no drill where he’d be rescued if things went wrong. Fire was a ship-killer. He had to stop it spreading or they’d all perish.

  The heat of the flames penetrated the smoke, long tongues of destruction leaping along the passageway. Sin’s pulse quickened as the familiarity of his surroundings hit home. His father’s cabin was ahead. Sin adjusted the setting on his extinguisher’s nozzle and depressed the handle, sending a mist of spray before him as a shield. Braving the heat, he battled closer. Acrid white smoke spilled through the open door. Sin stepped inside, his chest tight. The bedding and furnishings blazed beyond redemption. Shattered glass covered the desk, spilled chemicals forming colourful pools of combustion.

  With a hiss, the valve in Sin’s helmet operated and he sucked in a breath of oxygen-enriched air. Relief flooded his body. Nimrod wasn’t there.

  Using the hooked end of his axe, he pulled the door closed and latched it shut with the iron handles, or “dogs”, as they were referred to aboard. Once the door was securely “dogged down”, preventing it from swinging open with the movement of the airship, he chalked “Keep Closed” on the blistered paint. Deprived of oxygen, the fire inside would burn itself out.

  Stanley and Mercy drew alongside. Talking through the helmets was nearly impossible, so Sin gestured that he was going towards the engine pod, from where more smoke swirled. Stanley gave him the thumbs up and indicated that he and Mercy would check the workshop.

  Fire raged along the passageway’s ceiling, the insulation on the steam pipes fuelling the inferno and dripping molten blobs onto the deck. Sin abandoned his extinguisher; it would be no use here. He backtracked to a hose reel on the bulkhead and grabbed the brass nozzle. With the double rubber hoses clamped beneath one arm, he took on the blaze. Tugging the operating handle, he doused the nearest flames then redirected his aim further along the passageway’s ceiling. Immediately the fire rekindled on the section of pipe he’d extinguished. If he advanced, he was in danger of becoming a victim of flashover.

  Rotating the nozzle to allow retarding agent from the second pipe into the mix, Sin pulled the handle again. Greenish foam splurged upwards in a conical spray, coating the pipe, depriving the flames of oxygen. Edging along the passageway, his breath fogging his ironglass helmet, he foamed the ceiling, snuffing out the flames.

  The smoke thinned, blown hither and thither by a gust of icy wind that swirled over the gears, pipes and mekaniks. At the very end of the gondola, a jagged rip of molten metal cut through the hull and deck plates where a lightning bolt had struck. Rain sleeted in from outside, vaporising on the charred litanium. Beside the rip, Sergeant Stoneheart lay motionless. Her hair was singed, and her face rested in a pool of congealed blood that oozed from a gash at her temple.

  His pulse racing, Sin dropped the hose then ran to her. It seemed unreal that the giant physical training instructor could be laid low. She’d always exuded an aura of invincibility. Remembering the whack Madam Mékanique had delivered to Claude in the infirmary, Sin checked his surrounds for danger. There was the massive gash in the deck plate and the remnants of the fire, but other than that he was cushdie. He pulled off his helmet and thick leather gloves.

  “Staff, can you hear me?”

  No response. Stoneheart’s chest rose and fell. Pressing his fingers against her neck, Sin detected the faintest of pulses. A shiver ran up his spine: her goosebumped skin was cold and clammy. From the first-aid kit on his belt he took a crepe bandage and wrapped it around her head, stemming the bleeding.

  The Sergeant was a good two feet taller than Sin and built with the muscled body of a Zulu warrior; there was no way he could carry her by himself. He eased her limbs into a more stable position and adjusted her head, extending her windpipe to help her breathe. Satisfied that he had done all he could, he set off to find a stretcher and some help.

  Sin, Stanley and Mercy stretchered Stoneheart into the sick bay. Madam Mékanique had prepared a bed, at the end of which Nimrod fiddled with the pristine dials of an NB27 Mekanikal Nurse.

  The unconscious tension tightening Sin’s body dissipated, and his hunched shoulders relaxed. Common sense had told him that his father was safe, given that they’d found no trace of the professor after extinguishing the fires, but that wasn’t the same as knowing for sure. Sin quashed the urge to give the scientist a hug; nobody was to know that Nimrod was his father. Instead, he said, “I’m afraid the fire’s destroyed your cabin an
d everything in it.”

  “Botheration.” Nimrod fixed his gaze on Sin. “My most important equipment is irreplaceable, until we return to the palace.”

  Madam Mékanique bustled towards the stretcher bearers, her normally flamboyant ringlets tied behind a white nurse’s cap. She straightened her pinafore and directed the candidates to place Stoneheart on the bed. “COG Sin, COG Nobbs, you may leave. COG Goose, you will stay and help us.”

  Sin and Stanley vacated the sick bay and headed back towards their cabin. A painful spasm shot through Sin’s arm and he flinched, stumbling against the passageway wall. He massaged his bicep, hoping it was just a touch of cramp. The excruciating tingle spread and his muscles locked solid, racked in torturous agony. He panted, paralysed by the pain.

  “You all right?” asked Stanley, concerned.

  Sin wasn’t all right, and wouldn’t be until he’d had his injection. He’d never experienced the pins and needles this bad before, and it was more than a day until his next fix was due. The exertion of rescuing Velvet and carrying Stoneheart had taken its toll, draining him, accelerating his body’s need. He was going to have to be careful. With Nimrod unable to manufacture any more until they got back to the palace, he’d have to ration out the few vials he had left. Fighting the pain, he flexed his fingers, then balled them into a fist. The cramps lessened, and his breathing eased. “Think I just strained a muscle carrying Stoneheart.”

  Stanley nodded. “Yeah, she’s a big old unit.”

  “That she is.” Sin shook his arm, loosening the muscles. He pushed their cabin door open and froze.

  “What is it, brother?” asked Stanley from behind him.

  Sin couldn’t answer, his brain derailed by what he saw.

  Sin’s portmanteau stood open on his bed, the contents scattered about the cabin. His wooden injection box lay discarded on the floor. Broken gears protruded from the medicament-chronograph, the brass back ripped from the clock face. Worst of all, the compartments that held the syringes and vials of his medicine were empty.