by Jeff Provine
Nate Kemp stood silently.
“Marshal Ticks here brought your testimony to me about the happenstance of the fire aboard your train.”
“He tried to kill me,” Kemp said coldly. “Ticks forced the quartermaster to give me faulty catalyst. It killed Jones, the engineer. After he’d tortured my story out of me, he tried to finish me off by throwing me out of a Rail Agency airship. They’ve destroyed three trains at least! It’s a conspiracy!”
Ticks snorted with contempt.
Burr, meanwhile, shifted in his throne to lean forward, far enough that Husk could see behind him. Instead of a back, his uniform coat dangled loosely like a cape. There was no flesh beneath it, just brassy rings that served as connectors to a series of hoses. All the fluids that were pumping through the machines in the wall flowed in and out of the decrepit old man to keep him alive.
Husk’s stomach lurched. If he hadn’t already lost everything he’d eaten that day, he would have then.
Burr pressed the lever in his hand, and Husk watched his chest inflate as the machine pushed air into him to speak. “It was I who gave him that catalyst.”
“You?” Kemp asked. “Why? Why are destroying trains in your own state?”
Burr leaned back. He raised his free hand and scratched his chin lightly. Then he set it down and flipped a different lever.
A panel of the wall opened, revealing men in long, red coats. Light-reflecting mirrors rested on their brows, and sets of lenses with different magnifications circled their faces like the eyes of an insect. They marched toward Burr and saluted.
“I’ve decided on a walk,” Burr told them.
“Aye, sir,” one said in a thick Scottish brogue.
They swarmed around Burr’s back. Levers clicked, and machines stopped. Fluid bubbled up into some of the glass chambers. After a moment, the men set onto the hoses, disconnecting them and reattaching a few into metal cylinders on the back of the throne.
When the tubes were out of the way, a man on each side pulled a long lever. Husk had thought these were decorative bars, but they seemed to drive hidden gears that folded the seat up into a standing posture. Burr’s ancient body leaned back against it. His armrests crossed in front of him to hold his invalid body in place. Yet, the way he laid his arms on the rests was practically regal.
“Your walker is ready, sir,” the Scotsman told him.
Burr gave a nod and pressed forward a lever that had sat near his free hand. The entire throne, now something like a platform, rolled forward on newly revealed wheels. It gave off no steam or smoke, only a high-pitched whine like a lathe.
Husk stared at it. Any engine he knew of would give off some exhaust, unless it was…
“An electric motor,” he whispered. It was one thing to think of electricity carrying a simple message across the telegraph wire, but to see a whole man driven by its invisible power was something else entirely.
Husk’s eyes began to sting, and he realized he hadn’t been blinking. When he opened them again, Burr had turned his platform toward the open panel in the wall. “Follow me, if you will.”
They left the throne room and came into a long laboratory. The walls were lined with cabinets and shelves filled with glass bottles and machines like those that had rested behind Burr’s throne. More men in red coats stopped working at tables, where each of them was busy mixing chemicals or tinkering on machines with watchmaker’s tools.
“Have the pleasure of meeting my staff,” Burr called. “In my old age, I’m afraid my continued existence takes diligent work from these fine men. Ah, for the time when I required but a valet, a chef, and a maid!”
Husk’s muscles grew tense. The fluids in the jars held yellow bile, red blood, and a half-dozen more with labels of Latin terms that he couldn’t recognize. One set of shelves held unborn pigs floating in brine. The whole room smelled of chemicals and a vague taint of rot.
“This is wrong,” Husk heard Blake mumble. Ticks hit him in the back between the shoulder blades.
Husk agreed with Blake, but he didn’t want to say anything.
A pair of men in red coats hurried in front of Burr and pulled back a bar on an iron door at the far end of the room. They opened it without a word, and, without a word, Burr rolled through. Blake had fallen back several steps, shrugging his shoulders against the pain lingering from what would probably be a deep bruise. Nate and Ozzie walked close together, the young fireman holding the nurse’s hand. Husk hustled ahead of them.
When he crossed the threshold, his boot scraped over loose grains. He paused and toed the white powder. “Salt?”
Burr interrupted him. The ancient man’s platform spun around in place like a lazy susan. He raised one hand for effect and used the other to push his speaking lever. “Behold!”
Husk looked up, but even before he could see he was struck by a hot wave filled with odor. It was foul yet sweet, the kind of smell garbage took on as it cooled after a day sitting in the sun. Acrid smoke joined in with a hint of almonds.
He peered through tears in his eyes. The room flickered from the light of six ovens along the walls that cast a brooding red glow amid the blackness. The center of the room held a wide wooden table that was covered in glass tubes and beakers, jars of powders, mysterious ground herbs, and papers with strange signs. More men had red coats, but their faces were covered with sheets of dark glass affixed to helmets. Long, leather aprons and thick gloves covered most of their bodies. They all looked up and then turned back to their work, most grinding powders. One reached inside an oven with a pair of iron tongs to bring out a charred wooden bowl.
“What is this place?” Ozzie asked.
“This,” Burr began, pausing to cough, “is my catalyst factory.”
Husk coughed, too. “I thought all the catalyst in the world came from a single factory in London.”
“All of a certain type,” Burr replied. “I’m creating my own.”
He turned back around and rolled through the stifling room. Husk didn’t know how the men in the glass hoods and aprons could stand being here more than a few minutes.
“The legends say that Sir Isaac Newton discovered the crystal-making process in his alchemical studies,” Burr said, “between his time philosophizing on theology and inventing new forms of mathematics. It is a mystical substance that defies scientists to this day: simply adding it to a hot fire makes it burn hotter.”
Husk wondered how often Burr practiced this speech.
“For over a century, people thought of the catalyst as a novelty or at most something to use when pinching pennies on fuel,” Burr continued. “It was the French, just before their revolution, who determined to use it in their hot air balloons, giving us an age of airships that allowed Napoleon to lead his ill-advised invasion of Britain. The Scots, then, applied it to making the steam engine more efficient.
“When I returned from my speech in Congress that defied Jefferson and proved my national loyalty, I determined to import catalyst for the good of my colony. As Gloriana grew, so did the need for catalyst. First, we built factories using the brown coal, lignite, dredged from beneath the bayous, then anthracite from Fort Smith. We grew rich, but we needed more and more catalyst. Often it may be reclaimed, but only after the fire has gone out.” He turned to Kemp. “As you are well aware, I’m sure.”
The fireman’s lips were pressed tight, and his eyes glared.
“I have spent years trying to break our dependence on London. While we have yet to recreate the exact formula for catalyst suitable for our factories and trains, we have come across a few promising discoveries. Several years ago, we learned how to bring our new friends into the world.”
He lowered his hand in a broad swoop directed behind them. Husk peeked back to see the hunchbacks shift as if from nerves in the laboratory. They didn’t seem to even want to approach the salt-covered threshold.
Ozzie shrieked. “You made them?”
Burr’s thin lips pulled back into a grin that showed silver teeth. �
��They may call me a braggart, but what man doesn’t love to show his works? Come and see.”
He led them into yet another room, this one even darker than the last. There were ovens lining one wall, much deeper ones that were separate entities with wide pipes leading from them. It was not nearly as hot in this room as the last, though the smell was much worse. It smelled of the grave.
Only two men worked here, standing under a single lamp that hung from a rod. Their gloved hands worked on something covered in a sheet.
Burr rolled toward them and then stopped in front of one of the ovens. A smoke-stained glass door stood in front of it. “Our hunchbacked friends, as they’ve been colloquially known, are actually assembled from previously living organic matter. A body is packed with this version of the catalyst and then tucked inside to bake until they arise new.”
He waved a hand. “Go ahead and see. The catalyst is infamous for giving off no extra light, but you might catch a view.”
Curiosity drove Husk toward the glass. He brought his hands around his eyes to block out any reflection from the hanging lamp. The iron shackles clanked in front of his face.
Inside the oven, a man’s body lay. At first, Husk took it to be half-rotten, bloating in parts with others shriveling, but as his eyes grew accustomed to the dark light, he saw that those parts weren’t human at all. They were closer to the hinged legs of an insect, enormous and covered in thorns. He pulled back from the glass and made a horrified gasp.
Burr convulsed. Husk looked up at his twisted ancient face and determined he was laughing. Without human lungs to blow the air, it was seizures like a sleeper having a nightmare.
Husk had to take several breaths to calm himself. The thing was as bad as the monster in the bayou. He looked back at the hunchbacks, who stood far beyond the salt threshold. If that was what stood beneath their hats, masks, and coats, he was glad they wore them.
He finished and rolled backward to the men at the table. “They are a strange kin, but we have found a good use for them policing our rails. Inhuman strength and near invulnerability! And now we have a new stage for our explorations.”
The body on the table that would lead to the last oven was tall and slim with blond hair that was streaked black with soot. His piercing blue eyes gave a vacant stare. The men had drawn strange signs on his body and were sprinkling him with a greenish sort of crystal powder.
Kemp let out a horrified scream. “Jones!”
He seemed to lose his footing, but Ozzie held him up.
“Ah, yes, your engineer,” Burr said. “While the soul is gone, do not worry, we will make something of the body.”
Kemp’s scream turned into an angry cry. “You’re a monster!”
He dove toward Burr with his chained fists raised. Just before he hit him, Marshal Davies made a flying leap to intercept him. The two men fell to the ground and fought. Ozzie screamed and grabbed Davies around the neck with her shackles.
“That’s why you didn’t search for him,” Blake cried at Ticks. “You already had the body!”
Before Ticks could reply, the sheriff jumped him, too.
Husk froze. Even though they were shackled, they had numbers. He could help Blake disarm Ticks; once they had the guns the day was theirs. Then what? Hold Burr hostage? We’re three layers into a secret vault inside the capitol.
Husk took a step backward and turned his head away. He couldn’t bear to watch. Shouts flowed through the rooms, and the soldiers in the odd uniforms burst inside. Burr wheezed out an order to take them away. The fight lasted only a minute more, and then Kemp, Blake, and Ozzie were dragged out. Their shouting continued for a few more minutes until all that was left was the dull roar of ovens and the whirring of Burr’s machines.
“Some people don’t understand,” Burr said. He coughed. “You, Master Husk, you do, don’t you?”
Husk tried to take in a deep breath to calm himself, but the air was too putrid. He took in as little as he could to carry on. “I do my best, sir.”
“Good, good,” Burr replied. “Master Kemp was correct; it is the engineer from the train. We want to see what the effects of being intertwined with the thing from beyond the flames might be upon our catalyzing process for brutes.”
Husk nodded, even though he did not begin to understand. His head swam. He hoped it was just the combination of the foul air and his injuries. Otherwise, he might be losing his grip on reality.
“Now, then, Master Husk,” Burr called. “Shall we have an interview? The festivities for the Jubilee begin tomorrow with our grand display that night. I am certain the populace will be hungry for details the next morning. I have a few questions about your adventure in Shreve’s Port as well, but we can get to those after.”
Husk blinked. Burr was still alive. Everyone would want to know why. He wanted the truth. “Yes. Whenever you are ready.”
Burr led him out of the laboratories, and Husk was glad to be back in the enormous room with the windows showing the nighttime in Lake Providence. It was as if he’d just crawled out of a cavern leading to hell. He took a few minutes to breathe the stale, odorless air, and then a man appeared at his side with a pencil and a folder of paper.
Husk looked up to see Burr back sitting in his throne. His hands were shaking, but he forced them to work enough to pull out a sheet of paper for notes.
Burr began without a prompt. “It has been fifty years since I first signed the deed for Baron de Bastrop’s tract of land.” His bony free hand pointed out the webbed window. “Look out there.”
Husk turned toward the view. Lake Providence stood with its towers and factories shining under a sickly orange canopy of clouds. In the distance, Burr Bridge sparkled as it spanned the mightiest river in the nation. Even at night, it swarmed with activity.
“When I arrived, that was nothing but swampland,” Burr said. “Look what I’ve created.”
Husk hummed and nodded. “It’s unprecedented in history.”
“And there are those who would have taken it all away. Wilkinson, Jefferson, backstabbers the lot of them. But I showed them, didn’t I? At Washington?”
Husk nodded again.
“I did.” Burr chortled. “I humiliated them all. We New Yorkers retook the party, and that lackey Madison was ousted in ‘08. That gave me enough clout to win Gloriana a territory of its own, breaking from Orleans. After statehood, Presidents Jackson and Clay were proud to have my advice on the development of our nation’s rails.”
Husk perked up his ears. Something rang in the one the monster had roared in, and he quickly rubbed a finger in it. “The Rail Agency. You’ve been in charge since the beginning, using it as a way to expand your power outside of the state. That’s why the hunchbacks ended up there!” He hurriedly scrawled notes on his paper.
“A good use of my many resources,” Burr replied.
“And that’s why the catalyst was in the trains. You put it there!”
Burr sat quietly for a moment. “You are a very astute man. We needed a testing ground for our newest catalyst experiments, and trains are the perfect disguise. People would be aghast if the capitol exploded with the early attempts that were seen in Faber’s Bluff and Shreveport, but no one would bat an eye at a train wreck. Those early ones were far too explosive for their good. When the report came from Master Kemp, it was clear that we had accomplished our goal. If the locomotive hadn’t fallen into that bayou, the gate might have stayed open as long as we fed it fuel.”
Husk stopped writing notes. “Kemp said that the fire caused monsters to come out. First small, and then a huge one.”
Burr did not reply.
“Is that what you want? More monsters?”
The ancient man’s eyes narrowed. “What I shall be receiving is an army.”
Husk dropped his pencil. “An army?”
“An army unlike the world has seen since the Nephilim before Noah,” Burr said firmly. “Hunchbacks are few and costly, but they make useful enforcers. Tomorrow night at Midsummer, we sh
all open a doorway that will grant me a force to make my power unquestionable.” His thin face pulled back into a sinister smile. “There is an election this fall. I don’t see how I could lose as I march toward Washington… then a true American empire can begin as my army storms Mexico, Canada, Granada, Brazil, anywhere I choose.”
Husk’s hands shook. As he tried to stop them, he noticed his shoulders were quaking as well.
“Master Husk? Have I shocked you?”
“You can’t,” Husk began. He swallowed against a lump in his throat and had to begin again. “You can’t do this, Governor Burr. The things that come from that catalyst are evil. I faced one today. It killed men out of the joy of it.”
Burr rolled his dull eyes. “The first hunchbacks were a troublesome lot, but we’ve managed to train them up. Besides, you’ve proven they can be killed if problematic enough. Thank you for that! I must learn more if I am to assure my control.”
“I’ve seen what comes out of that fire, and I killed it only by the grace of God. It’s uncontrollable evil.” Husk raised his hands and clasped them together. “I’m begging you, sir. Reconsider. Don’t let this happen. You cannot make any kind of deal with the things on the other side of the fire!”
Burr stared at Husk a long moment. When Husk lowered his hands, Burr said, “I’ve bargained with them for five decades.”
Husk’s mouth fell open. He drew up his chained hands close to his chest. “No.”
“Yes,” Burr said quickly. His mechanical voice hissed. “Everyone knows the stories that voices whisper from the flames. Few know that you can whisper back.
“It was 1807 when I first heard the voices. I was desperate, called a traitor to my country for seeing a future in the West. The voices soothed me, assured me, told me to march directly on Washington and call for support from the floor of Congress rather than meekly going into the courts. They counseled me on how to speak, whom to attack, whose greed to appeal to. They liberated me, and I fulfilled my end of our deals by opening the flow of catalyst into Gloriana, stamping out resistance, encouraging a land of mammon and lust.