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Steampunk Cthulhu: Mythos Terror in the Age of Steam

Page 17

by Jeffrey Thomas


  From the galley came laughter and jovial conversation, the clink of crockery as dishes passed hand to hand. They’d put in a fine day’s fishing, pulling in one full net after another, and were in good cheer.

  The captain would join them soon enough, but it was his custom to enjoy his before-supper pipe at the privacy of the rail, weather permitting. Lars Gunderson puffed contentedly on the carved meerschaum, exhaling streams of sweet-smelling smoke.

  A pipe was a simple pleasure and a timeless one, if all but unfathomable to the younger members of his crew. In this day and age, with factory-made cigarettes pennies by the carton, Lars wondered if his was but one more dying fancy.

  They did want it quicker and cheaper than anything, didn’t they? Quicker, cheaper, bigger, faster, mechanized, automated, all these modern advances and newfangled gadgets…available next-to-immediately, manufactured, ordered from a catalog, delivered…it’d be the end of hard-learned skills, craftsmanship, experience, wisdom…

  Would his ancestors have felt the same? Theirs had been a glorious age of exploration and plunder, bold warriors turning dragon-headed prows toward unknown horizons, nothing but oar and sail. To those bygone seafarers of old, even this humble fishing vessel would have been an amazement beyond their ken. Yet, compared to the immense steam-liners or the submersibles that churned the oceans with their turbines, the Duck was a relic, a laughable little tub.

  A tub, she might be, and even laughable…round and fat-bottomed, pitch-sealed wooden planks, creaky, leaky…but she was his own, paid for free and clear, and she regularly turned him a profit while other captains stood neck-deep in debt.

  He patted the rail, smiling around the pipestem gripped in his strong teeth. Yes, his Duck was a stout enough old dowager, faithful and true. The crewmen could – and did, Lord knew it – go on about how much more profit they’d see if she was given an overhaul, but it was their greed and their laziness talking.

  A glow and a rumble from above caught his attention. He turned his gaze skyward, scowling. The steam-liners were bad enough but these air-ships, bloated whales of the heavens, beaming their spotlights down without so much as a by-your-leave…

  But he had never seen lights such as this, and the noise was like no engine-screws he’d ever heard. Almost as soon as he realized this, the glow turned fearful-bright, and the rumble became a roar. Crewmen came rushing from the galley, some with mouths still full, even as Lars shouted for all-hands.

  Something tore through the clouds, ripping them apart like threadbare cloth. It streaked down and across at an angle, plunging from the sky. The fierce light – it was yellow-blue, not green, in no way green, but yellow-blue – flared with terrible, dazzling flashpowder brilliance.

  The men cried out, averting their faces, shielding their eyes.

  Only Lars, still staring up, saw how through this long tattered rent in the cloud-cover it appeared the very night sky itself roiled. He glimpsed stars, stars he knew as well as any sailor, stars that should, even in so fleeting a glimpse, have been familiar in their patterns…but weren’t. They hung distorted, discolored, as if viewed through a thick sheet of tint-glass.

  Flaring, blinding, yellow-blue! That relentless head-splitting roar! Men screamed and scrambled and fell. Lars clung to the frame of the wheelhouse door, aware in an instant of absurdity that he’d lost his pipe.

  The sheeting flame and arcing electricity was reminiscent of St. Elmo’s Fire but at the same time uncannily not St. Elmo’s Fire. Its reflection tracked a blurred smear on the water. The two, the source and its reflection, made a narrowing convergence…

  Lars shouted again, unheard, and too late anyway. Even had there been anything they could do, there was no time.

  It hit.

  The source met its reflection, and both vanished in the sudden swallowing gulp of the sea, which went from slate-smooth and calm to a pond into which someone had hurled a boulder. A violent upheaval marked the point of impact, a bulge of dark water surging out in an expanding ring. A tremendous spout shot up from the center, a towering spire to rival any skyscraper, spraying salt foam.

  The Duck dipped and tossed at the mercy of the ruthless forces. Lanterns swung in mad arcs. Charts and instruments flew about. Lars held fast, still shouting useless orders.

  Drawn inexorably into the tidal pull, the tubby ship swept up the swell’s steep curve. She tilted until her snub-nosed prow pointed at the ragged clouds and roiling stars. The catch in the holds shifted backward, a huge, wet, slapping weight.

  Lars felt his feet lift from their purchase, a sickening sensation of floating that made his stomach roll. He saw a froth of whitecaps edging the curling top of the monstrous wave, looming high above the poor little Duck.

  Then, down it came, the wall of water, a crashing tumult of doomsday.

  ***

  Dockside was a city in its own right, a city of wharves and warehouses, shipyards and shipping offices, markets and canneries. A thick stink comprised of tar, oil, brine, and fish predominated. A dozen languages could be heard in as many strides…sailors, merchants, travelers and immigrants going about the business of daily life.

  Constable Arthur Pearce attracted no small notice as he made his way toward Pier 23, some of it speculative as if to size him up for robbery despite a bearing that proclaimed him as a man of the law. His clothes were understated in their fine tailoring but by no means cheap or shabby, and the trunk he wheeled behind him was of good quality.

  He was not of imposing height or brawn, and the slight stiffness of gait given to him by a clockwork-prosthetic leg disguised a natural litheness and speed. His blond hair, fair skin and keen gray eyes further added to the impression of him as an intelligent man, a learned one, but perhaps not the most formidable of opponents.

  The truth of this, of course, often came as a most unwelcome surprise to anyone who meant him mischief.

  However, this day, no one chose to take the chance, and he reached the end of the pier unchallenged. A glance at the magnificent gleaming bulk of the Thetis committed countless details to memory – the forward sweep of its prow, the brass hull-plates held by bolts big as a child’s fist – but what most held his gaze was the shapely figure of a young woman in traveling frock and hat, watching other passengers jockeying for position to embark.

  “Miss Noir,” he said, stepping up behind her.

  She turned, ebony-black ringlets framing an alabaster complexion. “Why, Constable Pearce! What ever are you doing here?”

  “Looking for you, as it happens.”

  “I thought you were out of the country.”

  “I only just got back.”

  “And you’ve found me already.”

  “To be fair, I had help. Your brother told me what you were up to.”

  “Ah. Dear Felix. You had to see for yourself to believe it?”

  “Not at all. I know you too well.”

  “I hope you haven’t come to talk me out of it,” she said.

  “As I said, I know you too well.”

  “So does Mother, and that never stops her from trying.”

  “I suppose she would be more at ease if you had a steady, stay-at-home trade.”

  Her ruby lips quirked into a smile. “Like hers?”

  “Touché,” he said, clearing his throat.

  “Besides, my trade treats me rather well. Look, I’ve even had cards done.” She presented one to him.

  “Things Man Was Not Meant To Know? Send a Woman! Chantal Noir: Paranormalist – Troubleshooter – Adventuress.” He raised his eyebrows. “Indeed?”

  “Oh, hush!” Laughing, she made to reclaim the card, but he deftly held it out of her reach. “Arthur!”

  “This one’s for my records,” he said, tucking it into his pocket. “If I should need to contact you.”

  “If you should need to contact me,” she said, “you’ll just ask Felix again.”

  “He might not be in.”

  “He never goes out.” She nodded in the direction of the ga
ngway, where porters from the Thetis struggled with a luggage while a well-dressed banker tapped his foot and made an ostentatious show of checking his gold-plated timepiece. “So, you heard about the incident?”

  “Mysterious object lights up the sky for hundreds of miles around, slams into the North Atlantic? Expedition team dispatched to investigate? Absolutely. Wouldn’t miss it.”

  She tipped her head. “It isn’t a ferry crossing; you can’t just purchase a ticket.”

  “No, but I can use my credentials and connections.” He touched his hatbrim to her, then moved to hail a man in a peacoat who’d just stepped onto the Thetis’ over-deck. “Captain Burnham? Arthur Pearce. I wired you this morning—”

  “The constable, yes!” The captain, a barrel on bowed legs, bald and bare-headed with a badger’s brush of beard to make up for it, had a gruff but jovial booming voice. “And a Pearce, right enough, the very image of old Gussy or I’ll be dunked in it!”

  “Old Gussy?” Chantal Noir inquired, amused.

  “My grandfather,” Arthur said. “Augustus Pearce. He was a mariner, and—”

  “And I sailed with him, I did, when I was no more than a pip of a lad!” boomed Burnham. “Started me off as a powder monkey, taught me everything I know. Now here I am, captain of my own nautilus! Come aboard! Come right aboard!”

  Right aboard, as it happened, wasn’t feasible, but the porters went to work with a will and soon enough had the various passengers and their bags sorted. Arthur went to his stateroom to unpack, change clothes, and perform minor matters of maintenance on his clockwork leg.

  The Thetis was no trans-oceanic luxury cruise vessel the likes of the Star of Cairo or the Gibraltar Empress; her quarters were by necessity much smaller, less grand than those seagoing pleasure palaces. They lacked balconies, and had brass-ringed unopenable portholes instead of panoramic sliding windows.

  A series of megaphonic speaking tubes served each deck and the public areas of the Thetis. Announcements from the bridge, gramophone-recordings in dulcet female tones, broadcast from it. The messages welcomed the passengers aboard, instructed them on the uses of various amenities such as the light fixtures and en suite washcabinets, informed them where to locate the dining room and at what ship’s-hours meals would be served, and so on.

  From deep within the craft, a steady thrumming began as the propulsion turbines powered up. It intensified until Arthur’s toiletries jittered and chittered together upon the vanity shelf beside the mirror.

  “Ladies and gentlemen,” came another announcement, “it would be our honor and privilege to invite you to the forward observatorium lounge, to best experience our departure.”

  Arthur tucked a clutch-shockgun into a holster at the small of his back. Not that he expected to need the weapon, but, better than being caught unprepared. Armed as well with a fresh ledger and a fountain pen, he let himself out into the narrow hall and saw Chantal Noir emerging from her own cabin.

  She had changed from the traveling frock into more casual attire… too casual for some, perhaps, with knee-buckle knickerbockers in lieu of a skirt. Her ankle-boots and bodice were black with brass stays and fastenings. Around her slim throat was a cameo on a silk ribbon, and her ringlets were piled atop her head, affixed with a gearwheel comb in a way artfully designed to appear artless.

  “You look more like a clerk than a constable,” she said, not without approval.

  He patted the leather-bound ledger. “As I’m here in no official capacity, I thought I might keep some notes.”

  “Are you ever anywhere in no official capacity?”

  “Officially?”

  She laughed and held out her arm. “If you’d be so kind as to escort me to the observatorium, Mr. Pearce?”

  “Delighted.”

  The forward observatorium lounge was, by far, the most impressive feature of the Thetis. Its ceiling was a geodesic dome of metal lattice-frames and triangular glass windows treated with an exterior opacity sheen. Seen from outside, this dome resembled a multifaceted, semi-translucent gemstone above the brass prow. Seen from within, it soared up and overhead in an enclosing insectile-eye crystalline bubble, offering a panoramic view.

  Currently, sunlight streamed in, and the air had a pleasant greenhouse warmth. Once the Thetis began to dive…

  Chantal glanced at Arthur. He read the familiar mixture of anticipation, trepidation, and devil-may-care excitement in her dark eyes.

  A single decorative pillar rose from the center of the floor to the topmost point of the dome, all ornate metalwork and tiny bulbs that were currently unlit but promised a spiraling spray of twinkling illumination later. Around the base of this pillar were curved tables, linen-draped, set with a champagne bruncheon buffet. Two white-jacketed stewards stood attentively nearby.

  “I say!” said a youthful voice. “This is rather a something, isn’t it?”

  They turned. The new arrival, goggling upward, was a tall and lanky young man in crisp shirtfront, pressed trousers and brocade waistcoat. His face had an open, affable character. His brownish hair was combed sleek with pomade. An attempt to convey maturity by cultivation of a moustache was unconvincing at best.

  “Is it safe, do you think?” he went on, with his neck craned. “The glass and all, that is, once we’re under? Hate to be going along and ckkkk –” He etched a jagged cracking line in midair. “—before you know it we’re knee-deep in sharks or the like. Or jellyfish. Ruddy awful blighters, jellyfish. They sting, don’t you know.”

  “For one thing,” someone else said from the doorway, “if the glass does give way while we’re at any sort of a depth, sharks and jellyfish would be the least of your worries.”

  This arrival proved to be a woman, though her choice of attire – corduroy trousers, a chambray work shirt, and a loose over-vest bulging with pockets – was even more casual than Chantal’s. Her age could have been anywhere from hard-worn forty to hale and hearty seventy. She had masses of wiry gray hair, a creased and sun-browned face, and the blunt-nailed, scar-fingered hands of a laborer.

  “Oh, the chill, you mean?” asked the pomaded young man. “The what-do-you-call-it, hypothermia? Or are you talking about drowning?”

  “Won’t matter.” The woman was short, stocky, not soft enough to be rotund, and walked with heavy, clomping strides. “You wouldn’t live long enough to drown.”

  “Here, now, no call for that! Because I can swim. I may not be good at a whole lot else, but, I can swim.”

  She picked up a custard-filled puff pastry from a serving tray, and held it out. “The weight of the water, laddy-buck. Squish you in an instant, it would, just like…that!” And she clenched her fist around the pastry, custard squirting through her fingers.

  “Would it?” he cried.

  The woman ate the flattened pastry, licked custard from her hand, and wiped her palm on her trouser leg. “But it won’t, not if I’m any judge. Take a closer look at those windows. Double-paned, and the space between them filled with…pressurized etheric gases, I’ll warrant.”

  “You’d be right,” Captain Burnham said, coming in. “Sound as a dollar-pound to three thousand fathoms, is my sweet Thetis!”

  “Three thousand!” the young man exclaimed, agog all over again. “That must be quite a lot!”

  Chantal, meanwhile, addressed the stocky woman. “Professor Edison? Edwina Edison? Of the university scientifics department?”

  “No relation,” the woman said, giving her a sticky handshake. “Are you a student?”

  “I sat in on one of your Egyptology seminars last year. Chantal Noir—”

  “Paranormalist. Well, we’ll put your lot out of work soon enough, no offense.”

  “Out of work?” asked Arthur, suppressing a smile at Chantal’s astonishment.

  “Pff. The paranormal, the supernatural, myths, legends…only means we haven’t figured the science, yet. And you are?”

  “Arthur Pearce. Constable Pearce.”

  “Constable, is it? Going to arre
st a meteorite, are you, constable?”

  “Meteorite?” The young man, who had been listening to Burnham wax eloquent about the Thetis’ engines, rejoined them now. “Is it? Well, that’ll be a letdown to the aunties, I must say. They’re half convinced it’s Star Wormwood or some such, a sign, a herald of the apocalypse. Why I’m here, isn’t it?”

  “I don’t believe we’ve met,” said Arthur.

  “Haven’t we? So sorry. Wilmott. Reggie Wilmott. Sent by my aunties, don’t you know. Devoted believers in the unfathomable, they are. Séances, little green men, all that rot.”

  “And they sent you?” Chantal asked. Arthur nudged her with an elbow.

  Reggie waved a hand. “They don’t travel so much these days, getting on in years as they are, long in the tooth and whatnot.”

  Professor Edison snorted and quaffed a glass of champagne.

  “Always after me to make something of myself,” he continued, rolling his eyes. “As if card games and racing yachts aren’t enough to keep a chappie happy? But, if a body’s got to have an adventure, might as well go in style, right-oh? Far better this than trudging through some god-forsaken jungle where there’s mosquitoes big as barn owls.” He leaned toward Arthur in a chummy man-to-man way. “Besides, gets me away from those dreadful dinner parties, you know the sort, where they sit you by some girl with a ‘wonderful personality’?”

  Other passengers had come in as the Thetis glided out to sea, waves lapping at the lowest edge of the observatorium glass. They left Dockside and the cityscape with its smokestacks and high bridges behind. The usual bruncheon rounds of mingling and introductions went on over tea and coffee, juices and champagnes, pastries, fruit salads and cold cuts.

  Most were experts in various disciplines. One, Lord Smedley, was an energy baron, investing in everything from coal and steam to oil and electrics. His secretary was of the humorless and severe high-collared sort, her squint either due to suspicion or the extraordinary tightness of her hair bun. General Thomsfield was ex-military, square of shoulder, square of jaw. The dark-suited pair who kept to the fringes might as well have sported governmental insignia for lapel pins.

 

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