Steampunk Voyages

by Irene Radford

  “We have our group of geniuses. You have yours. Only I’m beginning to think maybe the Rebs only have one genius. If anything happens to you they fall way behind in weapons development,” Tad returned. A theory niggled in the back of his mind. One that made sense and yet erased all hope that his brother truly did live.

  The colonel tilted his head and raised his eyebrows in a gesture very reminiscent of Nate. Nate had never asked a lot of questions, mostly because he knew he wouldn’t understand the answers and that frustrated him to the point of rage.

  “That still doesn’t answer my question. If you are indeed my brother, why aren’t you dead? If you aren’t truly my brother transformed, who are you?”

  Tad blew the steam, contemplating how it swirled and drifted toward the tent flaps. Hot seeking cold. A balance.

  Something was very out of balance here. He took a sip of coffee to help him find the missing pieces.

  This second cup of coffee felt just as good as the first. He could sip it more slowly, working his thoughts around the brew as it infused his system with warmth and life and small relief of his headache. He could think around the pain now.

  “Do you know if General Grant has hired someone called The German?” the colonel asked.

  “I am not privy to that information.” Tad had heard about The German at The Point during a class on weapons deployment. The elusive military designer had written a very good treatise on matching the weapon to the terrain and troop placements.

  He’d also heard about The Frenchman from New Orleans who made guns and cannons impossibly more powerful and more accurate than logic allowed. Rumor through the army’s upper echelons said The Frenchman had turned down many offers from President Lincoln because he was dying of consumption.

  Another puzzle piece dropped into place.

  “Ah, well, you can at least tell me what you learned of my weapon.” The colonel nursed his own cup of coffee, not bothering to blow the steam across the cup so it wouldn’t burn his mouth. Another clue. An unsettling one.

  “You aren’t Nate,” Tad said flatly.

  “That is neither here nor there. I need to know how much information you gathered with your ghost goggles and your balloon that can tack against the wind. I have already drawn diagrams of both and sent instructions to Richmond for developing our own versions.”

  “Nate could draw exquisite pictures of birds and bugs and trees and flowers, almost lifelike, with only bits of charcoal on a piece of bark. But he couldn’t diagram anything mechanical. He understood how birds move their wings to fly. He couldn’t translate that to balloon aelerons. He saw ghosts all the time, but did not understand the chemistry of putrefying flesh.”

  The colonel stared above Tad’s head, an unreadable blank, like an empty page in a book.

  “Nate spoke basic English with a limited vocabulary. He had no need or interest in developing another language or accent. His ability to learn was very limited. The average machine with an automatic language codex inserted could learn more than Nate.”

  “What is your point, Captain Thaddeus Hyatt-Forsythe? This tells me nothing about what you observed.” Was that a crack in the colonel’s composure? His hand clenched and unclenched, but not in the smooth motion of muscles and bones working together. This was more like precise measured shifts with a tiny pause between.

  “I remember once when we were children. I came down with whooping cough. Nate didn’t. He tried imitating my cough in order to take it away from me.”

  The colonel—or was he The Frenchman from New Orleans? The accent was right—blanched at the mention of a cough. His chest drew sharply inward, like the instinctive suppression of lungs trying to expel the miasma of illness.

  Tad gathered his legs beneath him and slowly inched his way upward. At the last moment the colonel offered him a hand of assistance. Nate would have done so much earlier in the process.

  Tad rested his weight heavily on the proffered hand. He used the moment to feel the texture and temperature of the skin. No calluses. Perfectly smooth like the finest tanned leather. But it felt almost feverish, as if the Confederate officer had just stepped out of a Turkish bath.

  A sniff told him even more. He had no smell. No dried sweat, no body oil in the hair, and no rank breath from the last meal he’d eaten. Tad did not think the colonel breathed properly either.

  Tad said, “I am a reasonably intelligent and well-educated man. Graduated in the middle of my class of ’59 at West Point. I am competent in many areas but expert in few.” Observation being his one true talent and the reason he’d been selected as a spy for this mission, but he wasn’t going to let that slip right now. “If I can discern that you are not my brother, then others will as well. Anyone who served with Nate will denounce you for what you are, Monsieur Jules de Chingé.”

  The colonel drew back in shock. “That . . . that will not happen. General Pemberton promised.” He took a step toward the tent flap but Tad still held his hand in a fierce grip.

  “Remember that Pemberton betrayed his loyalties once. He will do it again. Discovery is inevitable. Any officer who attended the Point or VMI will have heard of your developments; your contributions to the death toll of every battle. Tell me, how do your comrades feel about automatic machines imitating people? You can’t be killed by your own inventions. From what I’ve heard you don’t even stick around long enough to count the bodies. Neither does the German. But your fellow officers, they can and will be killed in battle by your inventions.”

  No response except for several quick blinks.

  That clinched it. Tad new for certain now what this colonel was. He only blinked when he needed to change focus or think more quickly than usual.

  “Last January, President Lincoln issued a proclamation to free the slaves in the states that are currently in rebellion against the Union.” Tad had read the statement and found it limited. Slaves in the states loyal to the Union had no guarantee of freedom. But he needed every flimsy weapon he had at his disposal. “Ensouled automata were included in that proclamation. If the South wins this horrible war, how will they treat automata? Will you be honored for your contribution to the victory and given citizenship? Or will you, too, be classed as a slave? Property. A machine, purchased and utilized. Exploited at every turn while others take the credit for your genius. And when your metal joints and leather tendons wear thin, will they be replaced? Or will you be cast aside on the junk heap?”

  The colonel jerked his arm free of Tad’s grip with superior strength, turned on his heel, and left without a word.

  Tad sank back onto his bedroll and pulled the blankets around his shoulders to ward off the chill in his heart as well as his body.

  <<>>

  Jules walked awkwardly through the camp toward the haven of his weapons barge. His well-oiled knee joints stiffened in the damp. Rust creeping in?

  The camp awakened around him. Some soldiers began to emerge from their tents.

  Was that a sneer on a lieutenant’s face as he grudgingly offered a salute? How about the corporal who turned his back so he wouldn’t “see” a superior officer and then farted loudly.

  The little bit of coffee he’d drunk in order to put the prisoner at ease felt as if it ate through the metal and leather of his internal workings, disrupting the flow of life-giving steam and lubricant.

  Property. A machine purchased and used, then thrown away.

  You don’t even stick around to count the bodies.

  No. General Pemberton had promised him life and freedom from the consumption that slowly killed his flesh-and-blood body.

  Had he promised him citizenship and rights? Had he promised him the freedom to invent and write academic papers and perhaps teach at a University?

  His mind whirled without answers. He’d dismissed politics, investments, philosophy, manners, and relationships as useless interruptions of his work. The lovely Mathilde had seen to his physical needs and entertained him. But she had had other clients who could not care for h
er the way he had. His future lay only in his work. He invented. Others deployed. He had no responsibility for the number of dead caused by . . . that he caused.

  He honestly did not know how the Confederate government of the future would deal with him.

  “Private, send for Lieutenant Markham. I have questions for him,” Jules ordered the man on guard at the landside of the barge’s gangplank. Not his barge. It belonged to the army. As did the weapon awaiting his final touches.

  He owned nothing. Not even the body they had given him. He owned only his soul, which did not truly belong on this Earth anymore.

  He’d accepted inevitable death once. He’d never planned on enslavement.

  He’d never worried about the deaths of others at the end of his projects.

  A long time later, probably too long to be considered respectful of the rank of colonel, rank the army had given him, Lieutenant Markham appeared at his side, posture not truly erect, his salute more than a little sloppy. As if saluting were a formality he begrudged.

  “Lieutenant, tell me your thoughts on this Emancipation Proclamation issued by Mr. Lincoln.” Jules bent over the codex array in the weapon’s guts.

  “I have not heard of it, sir.”

  Jules could tell by the way the man shifted his feet and his eyes that he lied.

  “What is your opinion, Lieutenant, of a law that will free the slaves and ensouled automata?”

  “It is not my place to express my opinions, sir.”

  “I ask you man-to-man, not colonel to lieutenant. Do you own slaves? Have you ever dealt with a freed slave?”

  “I own five slaves personally, sir. They assist me in the family shipping business and the running of my home in Charleston. My father owns more slaves on the plantation I hope to inherit one day, far in the future, when he eventually passes from this world.” Clear, crisp words. Statements of fact. No opinions.

  “Then an emancipation of slaves will hurt your finances.”

  “Yes.”

  “You are familiar with machines that act quite human?”

  “Only by reputation. Some gentlemen consider them superior to slaves. They require less maintenance and work harder and longer.”

  “Would you consider working with one that has gained a soul, either deliberately or by accident?”

  “I have not considered it, sir. Now if you will excuse me, I have other duties.”

  “Yes I imagine you do. Dismissed.” Jules watched a long time as his assistant tended to his duty. He had not doubt that duty included reports to General Pemberton anytime Jules varied from expected protocols.

  Jules removed six specific gold cards from his weapon and retreated to his work tent. Within the privacy of canvas walls he took a hammer and chisel to the key cards that would perfect the cannon’s aim. Three minutes later he emerged, leaving the six thin pieces of gold in three dozen pieces.

  He performed three more acts of sabotage. Then he hastened to where the observation balloon was being loaded onto a wagon for transport to Richmond.

  <<>>

  A scratching on the back wall of Tad’s prison tent startled him upright. He groaned. Gripping his gut with one arm, he crawled the two steps from his bedroll toward the noise.

  Night had fallen hours ago and he had no light other than what filtered beneath the flap from the campfire. Fortunately, he had nothing to trip over.

  “Yes?” he whispered.

  “Captain Thaddeus, if I create a diversion at the front of your tent, can you slip out beneath? I have loosened the pegs,” The Frenchman whispered back.

  Tad inspected the canvas with his fingertips. It felt slack. “I believe I can,” he returned in the same hushed tone.

  “Once you have escaped, keep low and away from small fires. You are in the center of camp. You will have only other tents to cover your retreat.”

  “Where should I go?”

  “Do you remember the place where your balloon crashed?”

  “Um—not really.” He tried to envision the map he’d called up on the goggles.

  “You will find the balloon in the meadow half a mile due east of here. The wind is from that direction. Keep it in your face. There is no moon to guide you. I need you to light the burner and fill the envelope while I am occupied elsewhere. Wait for me. I beg of you.”

  Tad heard a shuffle of footsteps retreating to the north, then silence except for the usual sounds of men settling down to sleep.

  Diversion?

  What should he expect?

  He worked at loosening the back wall even more, lifting the bottom where it snugged tight against the ground, pushing and pulling in tiny increments until he could raise the canvas a good eight inches. Was it enough to wiggle beneath? He hoped so. The actual process of pushing his body through should loosen the pegs and lines even more.

  A thundering boom shook the ground and knocked him flat on his butt. His ears rang and clogged. Wind whooshed through the tent behind the noise. He barely heard it above the shouts of surprise and pounding of running feet outside.

  He counted to ten and raised the tent canvas. His saw no one moving there, only heard them all racing toward the river.

  His ribs protested the sideways movement and the pressure from the ground as he pushed and slid free of his prison. He had to breathe deep for too many long moments before he dared rise to a crouch and inspect his surroundings. A towering wildfire backlit the camp.

  “Now that’s a diversion. I hope you blew up your own gun, de Chingé.”

  The diversion wouldn’t last all night. He had to get to that meadow half a mile away. Slowly at first, he duck-walked past ten tents scattered across the floodplain. When the last of them was behind him, he turned his face to the wind and ran as fast as his weakened legs and broken ribs allowed.

  <<>>

  De Chingé allowed himself three moments of regret while he watched the broken and twisted hulk of his weapon crash backward beyond weakened rail stops. The weapon tipped backward off the barge—too short by sixty yards, but all that he had been allowed to build with the reduced Confederate resources. The cannon barrel pointed toward the stars and dropped heavily into the water. A loud, roaring splash signaled its contact with the river.

  Waves shot outward in ever widening circles, crashing into the banks and flooding the first circle of troop tents, well above the normal river level.

  That was his signal to retreat. He’d mussed his uniform with dirt and creases, removed his rank insignia and tugged at his hair and beard until they stood out in odd spikes. His disarray allowed him to pass unnoticed among the troops, except that he fled the scene of destruction while they headed toward it.

  His recently oiled knee joints worked splendidly, carrying him through camp toward the open meadow faster than any normal man. His hearing sensors detected the hiss of a balloon burner before he saw the flare. No one should be looking this way to notice another fire. From the river it should look like any other campfire, periodically blocked from view by the movement of men back and forth in front of it.

  Humans had such limited eyesight and sense of perspective. His mechanical eyes found the balloon’s exact location without failure. He noted that the envelope was near fully inflated. He’d repaired it and set it up with a partial load of hot air. The private who was supposed to “test” the repairs surely had run at first sign of explosion on the river.

  “Hop in,” Hyatt-Forsythe commanded from the basket. He loosed all but the last two tethers as he spoke. The balloon and basket strained against the ropes, hovering nearly a foot off the ground, eager to dance with the wind at upper levels. “Good thing the wind is from the east. It will carry us west to headquarters without the delay of long tacks.”

  “Yes.” De Chingé climbed in, bringing the last tethers with him.

  They slid upward into the chill mist.

  “What did you do?” Hyatt-Forsythe demanded. “Not that I’m ungrateful. But I need to report accurately and be certain of your change of loya
lty.” He worked the burner as he spoke, keeping a close eye on their elevation as well as the activity below.

  Flames from eight burning gunboats in the middle of the river gave the chaos a garish light. De Chingé could still pick out in mid-river, at the deepest spot, the cannon barrel pointing upward, a tombstone marking the grave of his weapon. Not the graves of ten thousand men at the point of impact five miles away.

  “I have made sure that the river is clear enough for your General to send his boats drifting downriver on the dark of the moon, so that they can rendezvous with the army at the end of a forced march and ferry them across the river to assault Vicksburg from its vulnerable south.”

  Hyatt-Forsythe raised his eyebrows. “How did you know?”

  “I deduced the tactic as the only reason worth risking an experimental balloon and a trained observer.”

  “If you can figure it out, then Pemberton can too.”

  “I do not think so. He planned to take my weapon upriver and use it to destroy General Grant’s headquarters from the safety of the river.”

  “Whew,” Hyatt-Forsythe whistled through his teeth. “You had that kind of accuracy?”

  “I did.”

  “And you destroyed it?”

  “I could build it again if I choose to.”

  “And what do you choose?”

  “I don’t know. That is the true weapon of mass destruction, the truth and responsibility for that truth. I have the choice to take responsibility for my inventions, or invent something else entirely that I am morally comfortable accepting responsibility for. I think I’d like to work more with the potentials of ectomorphic gel.”

  “That sounds wise. The mines out west could sure use lights that don’t eat air.”

  “I could save lives rather than take them.”

  “Truth and responsibility.”

  “Yes. But if you ever hear of The German working for either side, I’d like to have this same conversation with him.”

  Introduction: The White Swan