Steampunk Cthulhu: Mythos Terror in the Age of Steam

by Jeffrey Thomas

  “How many books are on this floor?”

  “32 thousand, four hundred and thirteen,” he stated without hesitation. She calculated quickly in her head.

  “Assuming an average weight and size, we might be able to bring out a hundred of those. Perhaps more, if they’re small.”

  He gasped, eyes spinning. “An impossible number!”

  “You can put aside more, certainly, and try to protect them, but how many can you each carry if we must run?”

  “It won’t come to that.”

  “I am certain it will.”

  Ashurbanipal looked around the room. He set a hand on the top of a tall pile of ancient tomes. She could see that the leather of their bindings was worn but couldn’t estimate their age. Before, of course.

  “Ashurbanipal, do any of your people write?” she asked, suddenly curious.

  “We can all write, of course, as well as understand the organizational system codes.” He paused, then continued. “We can read too. We each know different languages, with some overlap. It’s necessary for cataloging.”

  “Could you rewrite the books? What I’m wondering is, can we record their information and then take that with us? Photo plates or something similar?”

  He strode past her then, opening the door with more force than she’d expected from this elderly construct.

  “Dewey!” he yelled, startling them all. The younger librarian hurried over, his face turned up, questioning.

  “Dewey, how quickly can you photo-scan?” Ashurbanipal asked.

  “I can complete one page per minute, if I have someone to hold the book open,” Dewey replied. “I can store 3500 such images on each internal tape spool.”

  “How many spools do you currently have?” S37 asked.

  Dewey paused before answering. “On hand, I have two.”

  Ashurbanipal nodded. “I know there is a box on the third floor with half a dozen or so. Perhaps ten books to a spool—if we had time for Dewey to scan all of our selections, we could save the information from another hundred books.”

  “We won’t be saving the actual books then?” asked Dewey.

  “We’ll gather up the most important specimens, but the officer feels we need to plan an evacuation. Our ability to bring books with us back out of this building is limited by our small numbers. An armful, for each of us, is all we can carry.” Ashurbanipal sighed out his remaining air intake.

  “What about the other soldiers?” Dewey asked, looking at S37. “Your reinforcements will arrive before the ghouls do, won’t they?” The Head Archivist turned to look at her as well.

  “There is no backup,” she replied. “Our numbers are few, and other buildings must be protected as well. I am assigned here to protect you more than the books themselves.”

  Alexandria and Pergamum, who had gathered near during the conversation, looked to each other for comfort. Deci, standing between Dewey and Ashurbanipal, reached out for Dewey, who did not seem to notice. His eyes were fixed on the officer’s face.

  “Then you have to be the one to save us,” he said, as if it were settled.

  She nodded but didn’t like his calculation of their odds.

  Night edged toward them on the second day, and the remaining photo spools—scavenged from the building—had been brought in. While Dewey began scanning the contents of the A New English Dictionary on Historical Principles; Founded Mainly on the Materials Collected by The Philological Society, most of the others sorted through the stacks to find their favorites. S37, who didn’t understand half of the gilded words pressed into the cover, asked about its importance.

  “It was never completed,” Pergamum explained as she held the heavy book open to Dewey’s requested page. “However, it contains the complete known word usage of the English language, letters A through O.”

  “Why is that important? We who have the workings to understand words can’t forget the ones we use.” She tapped her skull, marveling briefly at the sensation of vibrations running along her gears. “Made to last, or we wouldn’t still be here.”

  Pergamum nodded. “Certainly, but these books weren’t written for us in the first place. We, and I mean we the Librarians, not you obviously, we were made to shelve and sort and find books.” She shifted the tome slightly without disrupting Dewey’s hands, which had, unexpectedly, the ability to open. S37 had been surprised that so delicate of a construct could also hold inside himself a camera capable of imaging the words in books, but his left palm irised open to reveal the tiny lens. She found herself watching his process without meaning to, and kept trying to engage the other librarians as a distraction for herself. These thoughts passed in a moment while Pergamum spoke, uninterrupted. “We cannot help but love them.”

  She handed S37 a small book, bound in burnt orange leather. “Open it.”

  Inside the words were written by a human, instead of printed by machine. The words were irregular, unsteady, difficult to interpret, but the letters were familiar. The writer had put down dates and times, followed by words about his daily activities.

  “I don’t understand it,” she admitted as she passed it back.

  Pergamum set it with the others for a moment. “It’s a diary. A collection of the thoughts and experiences of one man. He had thoughts and he wrote them down. Only the people, the real people, would do that. Without them here, we cannot protect who they were unless we protect their books.” She opened a latch on the side of her chest, allowing the front of her to swing open. Inside her gears ticked on perfect time. She gently placed the book inside her body cavity and sealed herself back up again.

  “This man was a Librarian, here in the city, when the hole in the sky opened and the monsters came through. He wrote about the end of his city, even the end of his own life. I’ve read it, and saved its memory to my permanent file. I don’t really need the book anymore,” she said, her voice growing softer. The book was pushing against her interior air vessel, S37 realized, cutting off the amount of air she could breathe in to speak. Pergamum rested her free hand on her chest for a moment. “This one book, I will carry with me until I, too, die.”

  The room was silent again.

  After an hour or so, Dewey finished the volume, another 352 pages of human words now permanently archived. They each knew they couldn’t save enough books to start a new library somewhere else, but when the group agreed that one book was worthy, no one argued against it. S37, who hadn’t moved since she handed back the little diary, began to shake slightly under the effort of holding herself upright.

  “You’re running down,” Dewey pointed out.

  “Yes, you’re right. I apologize. My brain slowed and I didn’t think.” She put her remaining energy into holding her legs still, and looked around for an out-of-the-way spot. “Alexandria and Ashurbanipal are sorting the books in that office,” she gestured off to her right, “so I am not sure—”

  “Come with me,” Dewey interrupted. “I will help you.”

  Pergamum raised her head. “Deci?” she asked, or reminded, him.

  “Has wound Ashurbanipal when he needed it, as have you, and Alexandria. This officer needs to wind, it’s obvious,” he said without emotion.

  “I don’t need help,” S37 tried to interject. “I can do it.”

  “Of course you can’t,” Dewey exclaimed, taking her arm. “None of us can wind ourselves, or we wouldn’t need to be in pairs.” He looked at Pergamum. “Isn’t that true?” She nodded, and lowered her head.

  Dewey led the stumbling security officer toward the reference desk, and the room just beyond it.

  “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “You know that I can do this myself. I just waited too long, I should never have been careless.”

  “We’ve all worked hard,” he replied, gently moving her into the room, and shutting the door behind them.

  Inside, there were no books. The room was empty except for a small shelf on the far wall, where half-melted but unlit candles sat grouped together. Her vision adjusted, somewha
t, to the dark, helped a little by the light which snuck in under the office door. “I don’t know how to access your key,” he said, moving to stand in front of her. “You’ll have to help me get into your chest.”

  He didn’t know.

  “Have you ever seen a security construct without their armor?” she asked. He shook his head, the tiny gemstone fragments in his eyes, and the edges of his cheekbones, glinting in the meager light. She said nothing in response but began to unbuckle her jacket, fastening by fastening. Hands moving, falteringly, down the front of her, she reached the last one, nearly two-thirds of the way down her body.

  The heavy jacket fell to the ground with a loud thud, releasing her.

  Dewey stared as she stepped out of it, revealing a compactly-built frame. There was no decorative plating on her legs and arms, no flourish covering her shocks and joints. On her steel chest, a single moving part could be seen—her cog key, winding down.

  “May I touch your arm?” he asked, his hand tilted toward hers. She nodded. He lifted her right arm, examining it. “It doesn’t match.”

  “A replacement,” she said. “Along with my backplate and the knee joint on my left leg.” He glanced down to her knee, then back up at her face.

  “You’re well designed,” he said, his hand still holding hers.

  Dust fell, slowly, all around them.

  Suddenly, her legs gave out, and S37 dropped to her knees. Dewey mimicked her movement, falling with her.

  “I need to wind you,” he said, moving his hand to her key.

  “What about you?” she asked.

  “I can…” he paused. “Do you want to?” She nodded. “When I have helped you, I can turn around and then—my key is under the panel below my neck.” He reached back with one hand and unlatched the compartment, tilting slightly to show her. “You first, though.” His hand was on her cog now, trembling.

  “Wait,” she said, wrapping her arms around his neck. She pulled him closer to her with one hand, grasping his key with the other. “Together.” He leaned his head against hers, and as one, they began to wind.

  Later, standing up again but still holding each other, they heard Deci yell, “Dewey!” He moved a few inches away but didn’t quite let go.

  “I’ve never, not that way,” he started to whisper.

  The door opened suddenly and Deci stopped, the force of her momentum propelling her into the room anyway. “What are you doing?” she squeaked.

  Releasing Dewey, S37 scrambled to get back into her armored coat. She was still doing back up the clasps when Alexandria arrived. Deci stomped her foot, and said again, “Dewey, what are you doing? In here, with her?”

  “What we all do in here, Deci. What must be done.” He crossed his arms across his chest and waited. Alexandria broke the silence, saying, “Ashurbanipal has found something amazing. Please come.” Deci turned, pushed past the older woman, and disappeared from sight.

  Feeling strangely unsettled, S37 followed the others back across the Great Room and into the office on the other side. As she drew close, it was plain to see that a green light was spilling out of the room, and voices, raised, could be heard.

  “No, they’re all gone here,” Ashurbanipal was saying. “Only we constructs remain.”

  Entering the room, her world changed.

  There, blocking the view of the far wall, was what first appeared to be a wall hanging, but could not have actually been hanging from anything. A place of wrong space, like a window open on a landscape that couldn’t possibly exist. She could see, through a green-rimmed hole in the air, a man on the other side.

  A real man. A human. Alive.

  “How many are you?” the man asked. “Can you come through?”

  “In this building, eight, though more in the City proper. Is it safe to cross?”

  The man wavered slightly, then popped back into focus. “I don’t know. I haven’t seen a gate like this in a long time. It’s not magic we usually teach these days. Where did you find the spell?”

  “What is that?” the Head Archivist asked.

  “Words, or music, or some kind of somatic component that you would have uttered to bring the gate into existence.” On the other side of the gate, a door opened, and three more humans rushed in, awe on their faces. “It is real!” one of them exclaimed.

  “I think that’s a woman,” S37 said, stunned. “Those are real people.”

  Ashurbanipal turned to look at her for the first time, nodding excitedly. “We found a book, and Alexandria was reading snippets of poetry aloud. It was curious stuff but it passed the time while we sorted. One book, all in Arabic, contained this —” he waved at the gate, “this power.”

  “It’s like the old days. We can escape,” Deci said. “We can take the books and leave this horrible place and go back to where real people need us.” She stepped toward the opening, her shiny silver skin turned green by the glow. Dewey’s hand shot out, grabbing her before she could step through.

  “You don’t know if it’s safe,” he cautioned her.

  She grabbed a book from the nearest stack and tossed it through. The man on the other jumped out of the way, but the woman behind him caught the book squarely in both hands.

  “It’s safe,” Deci declared.

  “Can we move into your world?” Ashurbanipal asked. “We have only hours before this building is attacked. We need a safe place to bring the books.”

  The humans looked at each other. “Yes, of course,” the woman replied. The others spoke to her in hushed tones, turning away from the gateway. “I don’t care,” she said to them. “You go get clearance, but they need a way out, now. You told me as much when you summoned us here to see it.” The first man nodded.

  The first man, S37 thought. The first one I’ve seen in fifteen decades.

  The decision to move the books was made by the others almost immediately. As a final test, Alexandria stepped through to the other side, Pergamum holding her hand tightly until the last minute, in case she needed to be pulled back. Once there, she looked around, and gasped. Startling the humans, she bolted out of sight.

  “Alexandria!” Pergamum yelled.

  She reappeared. “A window!” she yelled back. “It’s green outside!”

  There was nothing else to say.

  It took hours to move the books, passing them one or two at a time, through the gateway to Alexandria on the other side. The others set up in a line, each passing a book from left to right, to the next automaton in the line, and on through. More humans had arrived, some carting the books out of the too-small room, and others just to talk. It became clear that they had no clockwork robots of their own.

  “You’re marvels,” they kept saying. “Beautiful.”

  S37 understood the words.

  She had contacted K, relaying the situation. He refused to come.

  “I defend the city. You defend the city. If it mattered whether or not real humans still lived here, we would have stopped long ago. Know your job. Let the Librarians worry about theirs.”

  The third night fell. Most of the great room had been cleared so the others scrambled to pull books from the shelves which radiated out from that space. She helped where she could but as the hours crept on, spent more and more of her time moving between exits, listening. The first floor sentries called to report movement outside, but with no clear view, in the dark, they couldn’t tell where the creatures were.

  “Soon,” she told Ashurbanipal. “You’re nearly out of time.”

  “How long?” he asked, visibly run down.

  “Perhaps an hour,” she guessed.

  It was closer to twenty minutes.

  A dull pounding began on the barricaded door to the north staircase. S37, who’d paused her patrol to help shovel more books through the gateway, heard it first. “Go,” she said, “Go now.” Pergamum looked up, exhausted and slow-witted, but Ashurbanipal understood. He grabbed her with both hands and threw her into the gateway. Alexandria caught her on the other side.
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  “Ashurbanipal!” Pergamum cried out. She rushed back toward the gateway but Alexandria held her back.

  “I’m coming,” he called. “Let me get the others.”

  “No,” S37. “I’ll do it. You go.” He paused, eyes widening, then nodded. He looked around once more. Picking up the huge leather-bound tome, he handed it to S37. “The page is marked, if you need to open it again.”

  “What if the creatures get to it? Will they come after you?” she asked.

  “Haven’t you noticed? They don’t speak. The book won’t do them any good.” Releasing his grip on it, he stepped through the gate.

  S37 held it to her chest and backed out of the room.

  “Dewey!” she yelled. The banging sound began on the other staircase door. Deci rushed out of the stacks, her arms full of brightly-covered books.

  “Children’s stories,” Deci explained. “What is it?”

  “The creatures are here. It’s time to go. Where’s Dewey?”

  “Here I am,” he said, appearing from behind another piece of shelving.

  “Go,” S37 said. They ran back toward their escape route, entered the room, and saw—

  Nothing.

  The shimmering gate was gone.

  “What happened?” Deci shrieked. “Where did they go?”

  “It must have happened when the book left the room,” S37 said. She handed it to Dewey, who’d just set his armful of books on the floor. “Ashurbanipal said the page was marked. Make it open again.”

  “I don’t think I can,” Dewey said. “I don’t know how to pronounce Arabic.”

  “Oh, I do!” Deci exclaimed. “I can read it!”

  A loud crash from the other room made them all jump. Calculating their odds, S37 stripped off her coat.

  “It buckles from the inside too, and clamps to the floor here,” she pointed, “and here. Get under it and get that gate back open.”

  “You’ll be defenseless,” Dewey said.