by A. W. Exley
Jared was silent for a moment. “I’m sorry.”
Allie opened her eyes and glanced up at him. “It happened and can’t be changed. It’s easy to condemn someone as a thief when you have a warm bed to sleep in and three meals a day.”
“Your grandfather obviously cares for you, how did you end up on the streets?”
“At the time, I thought it was the better option.” She let the cryptic comment hang. Feeling she had the right spot, she dug her nails under the small panel at a point closest to the door and flexed her fingers. It yielded with a soft pop as the top flicked down. Allie stared at the wires running through the wall to the door.
“Now that is interesting,” she whispered.
Jared pushed off the wall and leaned in over her shoulder. His warmth pressing behind her and his breath brushed her ear. “What is it?”
“I have no idea,” Allie admitted, trying to resist the urge to lean back against him. The butterflies in her stomach started to go on a rampage at the prolonged close contact, flinging their tiny bodies against the inside of her gut, trying to make her topple into Jared.
“I believe it’s electrical in nature. That makes me rather cautious about sticking anything metal in it.” She studied the flow of wires. “Some of the copper is exposed. He probably didn’t plan on anyone finding the panel. I think we just need to short circuit it by squashing them all together.” She looked down at Jared’s riding boots. “What have you got on your soles?”
With both of them in place, Allie gave a nod to Jared before she aligned the barrels and unlocked the door. At the same instant, Jared smashed his boot heel into the wires, slamming them together. There was a flash of yellow light as the device short-circuited and a loud click before the huge door swung open.
Allie got up off her knees and they entered Zeb’s laboratory, an Aladdin’s Cave dominated by ores instead of precious gems. A soft whirr and hum emitted from numerous devices hanging from the ceiling and littering the floor. Small metal bodies twitched on worktables in various stages of evisceration, the life force still circulating within them despite their mutilation. The air smelt of oil and something vaguely reminiscent of burnt eyebrows.
On hearing the latch give, Zeb looked up from the far workbench. He paused with a small part in his hands, brows knitted behind his magnifying goggles. “How did you get in?”
Allie shook her head as they picked their way through the mechanical minefield. “You must be the only student who doesn’t listen to school gossip.”
Zeb swung his head to Jared.
“She picked the lock,” he said navigating his course and avoiding swaying shards of metal. “And found the electrical panel at the side.”
Zeb’s frown deepened as he pushed the goggles up onto his head revealing his smaller glasses underneath. “Oh well done, very clever of you. Now get out.”
“That’s hardly polite when we’re worried about you,” Allie said.
She stopped in her tracks, her gaze fixated on the enormous creation lurking in the corner. A dull sheen covered its hide, absorbing light, cloaking it in shadow. The head appeared tucked into its neck, its massive shoulders pressed against the ceiling. The body larger than a horse with a thick tail curled underneath, pressing alongside its stomach. Powerful hind legs with hip joints the size of barrels each ended in a reptilian foot, sporting long, sharp claws. She wanted to move closer and investigate, but dragged her attention back to the conversation.
“I’m fine and I’m busy.” Zeb turned back to his workbench, dismissing his friends.
“And we’re not leaving until you tell us what is going on,” Jared said. Having made his way to the workbench, he picked up a set of schematics and began studying them.
“And I’m up to the challenge if you want to waste your time designing better door locks. I suspect Jared will have me busting him in every day until you answer.” She turned in a circle, unsure about having her back to the monster in the corner and suspicious of what hid in the dark, wondering if Weasel had evil litter mates. If anything darts out and bites my ankle I’m going to scream like a girl.
Zeb gave a long sigh and took the diagrams out of Jared’s hands, laying them back down on the bench top. “It’s highly classified you know.”
“You’re working in the school basement,” Allie said.
Jared leaned on the bench, crossed his arms and stared at his friend. Classes were over for the day, and they didn’t have to be anywhere else.
“I only work on a small portion here. Parts and components mainly, and I run the calculations. My father is building the actual prototype at the KRAC base in Edinburgh.” His hands continued to fuss with the small part he held. Allie and Jared exchanged looks but remained silent. They waited for Zeb to fill the vacuum.
“It’s a new type of propulsion system,” he blurted out. “It will substantially increase the maximum speeds of the airships.”
“Doesn’t sound particularly exciting.” Allie directed her remark at Jared. She felt like she was missing something obvious and needed his military mind to fill in the blanks.
“What’s its other military application?” Jared asked Zeb.
Zeb shifted from foot to foot, his eyes darting around his lab. “It’s only theoretical, we haven’t tested anything yet,” he mumbled.
“Then give us the theoretical application,” Jared pursued the issue.
Allie watched the exchange. Given Zeb’s sudden caginess, she assumed they were on the right path.
Zeb put the part down, so he could gesture instead. “Well, if you gave it directionality, and an explosive payload, and fired it from an airship… you do appreciate this is just conjecture?”
“Conjecture away so long as you get to the point,” Allie said, trying not to get distracted by the numerous shiny things that whirred and buzzed and kept calling her name. She spotted an automaton’s arm on a workbench. Bones made of steel, while brass tendons and nerves ran from fingertips to elbow. It looked so real and yet so surreal, she found it unnerving to gaze upon. She kept expecting it to crook a finger and beckon her closer.
Zeb gave another sigh. “You could blow up a target fifty, possibly one hundred miles away. We’re still doing the final calculations on how far it could travel independently of an airship.” He crossed his arms and then uncrossed them as his hands crept back to the workbench for something to hold.
Jared let out a low whistle. “You could annihilate your enemy and never see their faces. What’s the accuracy?”
“We don’t know for sure yet. But my calculations show the resulting explosion would be… devastating.” Zeb chewed his bottom lip.
“And imagine the civilian casualties of something that indiscriminate,” Jared said, brushing a black lock out of his eyes and back behind his ears. Allie and Jared exchanged looks. Allie could see other implications for Zeb’s invention and it involved dancing dollar signs.
“Is this the problem that keeps exploding?” Allie glanced around, hoping none of the cylinders littering the worktops were building up internal pressure.
“Yes, now will you excuse me so I can get back to solving that issue?” Zeb asked, gesturing at the array of parts littering his workbench.
“All right.” Jared picked his way back through the lab and put a hand on the small of Allie’s back, ushering her out in front of him.
“One more question.” She halted by the door. “I have to know what that is.” She pointed to the black nightmare lurking in the corner.
Zeb’s gaze followed her outstretched arm. “Thumper.”
Allie arched an eyebrow. “Is Thumper anything like Weasel?”
Zeb scratched his head. “I don’t know, technically it shouldn’t be but I haven’t activated it yet.”
“Why not?” As hard as she stared, she still couldn’t discern what creature Thumper was modelled after.
He stared at his feet and mumbled something.
“Pardon?”
“I said I can’t get it out
the door.”
Allie glanced at the giant wind-up toy. In size it was bigger than a horse but smaller than an elephant and it definitely would not fit out the door and up the narrow hallway. She bit her lip to supress the laughter. Genius didn’t always go hand in hand with common sense. “Can you pull it apart and reassemble it?”
“Oh yes, but I don’t have another laboratory.”
“It’s summer, why don’t you move it in pieces to one of the stalls in the stable? It will give you plenty of undercover space to work and the barn is designed for larger animals to come and go.”
A broad smile broke over his face. “By gods, that’s a brilliant idea.” He abandoned the piece of machinery in his hands and picked up a screwdriver. With a gleam in his eyes, he advanced on his largest creation.
“And Jared broke your lock,” Allie called out as they left, which earned her a scowl from Jared, Zeb too intent on Thumper to notice.
“Well now we know why KRAC is twitchy,” Allie said after the door closed and they started up the stairs. “Imagine if this got loose.”
Jared put his hand on Allie’s arm, spinning her to face him in the confined space. “You have to tell me what you’re thinking. Is this why you’re here, to steal the plans for the propulsion unit?”
Looking up at him, she guessed why he wanted her input. She just didn’t want to provide an answer. She tried to throw him off from further questions. “What on earth makes you think I know anything? This is way out of my league—I spent time with the Runners, not the Reapers.”
“That’s why.” He gave her a wry smile. “You know about the guilds and how they operate.”
Neatly trapped by her guild life she answered on instinct, without thinking. She sighed. Molly-coddled aristocrats with no idea of how the world really works.
“Can I cross the Grim Reapers off the list of guilds you might belong to then?”
She blew out a deep sigh. “This isn’t a game anymore.”
“No, it’s not. Whatever it is, it revolves around my friend.” His tone changed.
She looked up into his eyes and saw concern.
“There’s no one else I can talk to about this and I believe you know far more than anyone else. To Zeb all this is an absorbing experiment with only hypothetical applications. He has no real appreciation of the dangerous line he treads.” Jared held her gaze until she looked down and away.
The stone in Allie’s gut grew in size and she brushed her hands over her arms to dispel a sudden chill. She thought Zeb wasn’t the only one caught in something without a real appreciation of the larger picture.
“I can only speculate and I think we need to talk to Marshall. But you don’t mess with the Reapers, and this most definitely falls into their realm. If the device came onto the black market it would generate a bidding frenzy. What country wouldn’t want this in their arsenal?” She pitched her voice low, so no one above in the corridor would hear their hushed conversation. Something else bothered her. “And Zeb’s a soft target.”
Jared nodded in agreement. “That’s what I feared.”
Sunday, 31st July.
eb attacked his enormous creation with a screwdriver and loose nuts and bolts flew in all directions. Allie and Eloise chased after them and placed all the small pieces in tin boxes. Jared and Duncan were enlisted to carry the largest parts and they laboured all day long, carrying each piece to an empty and secluded stall in the barn. By evening, they had a giant Thumper jigsaw puzzle waiting for Zeb to reassemble.
The next morning, an unexpected rain kept everyone inside and by unspoken consent the friends piled into the library nook―except for Eloise, who sat in their bedroom, praying the storm brought a lightning strike to power her electrodes. Allie battled Duncan for sofa space and ended up with her legs thrown over his lap. Zeb read next to Jared, who kept glaring in her direction, leaving her to ponder what could possibly have annoyed him this time. Duncan rested an enormous illustrated guide to weapons on her shins.
“Does that even qualify as a book? It’s only pictures.” Allie ribbed.
“I have to read the captions under the pictures.” He stuck his tongue out at her.
“Can you read those without moving your lips?” A casual camaraderie had sprung up between Allie and Duncan rooted in the sort of insulting banter thrown by siblings.
Duncan dug his book into her shins, causing her to stifle a yelp. She tossed her book on to the low table, determined to tackle at least one of the topics gnawing at the back of her brain.
“Can you explain how Weasel works to me?” she asked Zeb.
His eyes lit up and he shoved his glasses up his nose with an oil-stained finger. He closed his book and clasped it in his hands.
Allie held up a hand. “Use small words. I’m not a science girl.”
His smile deflated a little and he screwed up his eyes in concentration.
“Start by explaining your original intention when you set out to make Weasel.” She threw him an easy start point, before his brain exploded.
“Ah, well, I wanted to create a device to control the rodent problem in the barn.” He dropped his book to the table. “Weasel wouldn’t stay out there.”
Allie cast a glance at the deformed feline, resting but alert at the foot of the sofa. The ears rotated in slow circles, ensuring Zeb didn’t try anything sneaky. “Don’t tell me you’re afraid of mice?”
The creature dropped its head lower on to its paws and fixed its eyes to the floor.
“See that, is what I don’t understand.” Allie pointed to Weasel. “Weasel understands me but that’s just not possible for a wind-up toy.”
The head rose and it fixed Allie with a rotating red and black stare.
“Sorry, no offence intended.” Satisfied with her apology, the head sank back onto its paws.
“He’s a boy by the way.” She looked from Weasel to Zeb.
“No, it has no gender, it’s an it.”
Weasel gave a soft hiss and Allie laughed. “Well I refuse to call him it any longer. So back to why he prefers me to you?”
Zeb frowned but let the point go, to continue his lesson. “Do you know of the Stone of Coulags?”
Allie racked her brain. “Yes, fell out of the sky ages ago in some little dark corner of Scotland.”
Jared placed a marker in his book, coughed and then sat up. “That dark little corner happens to be in my family’s territory.”
Duncan snorted at her faux pas and then yelped when Allie got him in the ribs with the toe of her boot.
Zeb nodded. “A hundred and fifty years ago to be precise. A young lord and a small group of friends were out hunting. That night a fire blazed across the sky and the meteor struck the ground near Coulags. Warmed by a large quantity of whisky, the lord and his friends decided to set off in the dark to find the object that had fallen from the heavens. A glow drew them to a remote area where they found a large stone lying in a crater, smoke still rising from the surface.”
“Sounds rather poetic when you put it like that,” Allie said.
“Some time later, the men who handled the stone in those first few days noticed a strange phenomenon. They didn’t have to wind their pocket watches. Ever.”
Allie flicked a glance to Weasel as she figured out the implication. “So the stone somehow makes wind up devices run indefinitely?”
“Yes,” Zeb’s tone crept higher as he became excited about the monumental discovery. His hand gestures became more effusive as he spoke. “But we recently discovered the effect of the stone is far greater than just that.”
“For over a century it was a fabulous garden ornament at our family estate,” Jared added to laughter all around. “Then thirty years ago my family had the meteor taken to KRAC headquarters in Edinburgh where Lord Lithgow, Zeb’s father, began his experiments.”
Zeb carried on with his history lesson. “Through his experiments, my father found that devices left by the stone acted in a manner beyond their intended scope.”
&nbs
p; Allie sat up, swinging her feet off Duncan’s lap and down to the ground. Weasel moved closer, to lean against her skirt. “What do you mean beyond their intended scope?”
Zeb scratched his head, trying to find the right words. “Well, most of it is highly classified. But as an example, a musical automaton supposed to play a set list began composing. The devices took their basic programming and then exceeded their predefined limits.”
She glanced down at her little friend. “Like a rodent controller who decides it doesn’t like mice?”
“Exactly! Through trial and error my father found he didn’t have to leave the entire device touching the stone, just the core componentry.”
Allie tried to translate Zeb’s words into something she could understand. “You mean the brain?”
Zeb screwed up his face at her crude description. “Of sorts, yes.”
Her eyes ran over the disobedient creature at her feet, in size only slightly larger than a kitten. “Which for a creature like Weasel, would be rather small. I imagine just the sort of piece that might be easily overlooked and slipped into a pocket.”
Zeb shifted on the sofa and began staring at the fire surround.
Duncan dropped his large hand onto Allie’s shoulder. “Leave Zeb alone, you’re making him all squirrely. Yes, he sneaks stuff into the main lab but we would never tell on him, he’s our friend.”
Allie let out a sigh. Everyone thought she would steal the school silver while Zeb walked away from a military base with his pockets stuffed of top secret components. It seems breeding is the difference between a thief and an experimenting genius.
Jared pinned her with his gaze. “The Scottish government and KRAC allow other governments, military and businesses to leave components near the stone, so that all nations can share in the sentient technology.”
“And your family take a cut of that business?” Allie asked.
Jared met her gaze. “Yes.”
Allie ran through the implications and they were staggering. She let out a low whistle. No wonder Eloise said he was one of the highest ranking nobles here and probably the wealthiest as well.