“Rustport,” Rommond said ominously. “Either our haven, or our end.”
The city of Rustport rose from the sandy haze before them, a city of towers and chimneys, of scrap metal turned into housing. It sat on the edge of the ocean, the Last Sea, and over time it stretched out over the sea itself, with a mixture of wooden and metal walkways, some fixed deep into the earth, others floating, and others still sinking and rising as the need came for them.
It was a vibrant city, a mariner's home, with many ships docked, and others docking. There was the smell of salt sea air, mixed with the stink of fish and the musk of industry. It was a city of labourers and tradesmen, with no room for pretence, and so there was zero presence from the Treasury there, whose members would not have been able to bear the stench.
The tracks of the Iron Wall fed into the city, and it was the protection of the Landquaker that stopped it from falling to the Regime for so long. It was that same protection that kept the Resistance from retaking the port when the demons gained control of the railway gun. It meant that Rustport had very little in other defences, which the Regime felt were needed more at Landlock up north. Yet it was likely only a matter of time before reinforcements were drafted in from further east.
The trucks halted at the outskirts of the city, where workers passed them by without batting an eyelid. It did not matter if the Resistance or the Regime was in the city. They had work to do.
“So then,” Jacob said. “Do we trade in our uniforms for fisherman's overalls?”
Rommond rolled his eyes at him.
“Seriously though,” the smuggler added. “What's our plan here?”
“We'll simply propose a truce,” the general said.
“Maybe I've spent too long in their uniform, but I can't see them going for it.”
“We'll have to bluff our way.”
“Now you're talking my language,” Jacob said, “but then you did know that I'm a gambling man. So, what's the bluff?”
“That if they don't agree, we'll take the city by force.”
“Ah,” Jacob said, less confident now. “You know, it's a bit easier to fake it when you're not showing your cards.” He gestured to the handful of people they had.
“The Regime knows that I never play all my cards up front,” Rommond reminded him.
“Yeah, but this time you are.”
“And that's the bluff. That's the card I never played before.”
Jacob sucked air through his teeth. “All right then. But … what if they call your bluff?”
Rommond gave the slightest of smiles. “Then we take the city by force.”
* * *
A truck pulled up, flanked by two of the Regime's box-shaped landships. Out stepped a short and rotund commander, crudely attired, and a tall woman in a long, flowing purple dress, hanging out of his arm, and looking remarkably out of place.
“Well, well, well,” the commander said, clapping his hands together and rubbing them briskly, as if he had just won a prize. He had the thick, common accent of Rustport, but a glance from Whistler revealed that he was most definitely maran. “If it isn't Edward Rommond himself.”
Rommond gave a slight nod. “If it isn't … sorry, I don't know who you are.”
The commander could not hide his irritation. “Ovunan Trokus,” he said. “Commander, that is.”
“I can see your rank well enough. Where's your General?”
“I'm in command here.”
“Good,” Rommond said. “You look like an easy kill.”
Trokus gritted his teeth. “You know, you shouldn't provoke when there are so few of you.”
Armax folded his arms and puffed his chest.
“As you well know, Mr. Trokus,” Rommond replied, “the Resistance has never needed numbers.”
“There's a first time for everything, Mr. Rommond. Maybe this is it.”
Rommond raised the index finger of his left hand. “But you're not thinking this through. You didn't think we'd come here in so few numbers if we didn't have a plan, did you?”
Trokus' grin faded into the flabs on his face.
“The Landquaker is on the way,” Rommond said.
“But it was derailed.”
“That it was,” the general acknowledged. “But, as you know ... Brooklyn's back.”
The mention of Brooklyn crushed whatever sliver of a smile remained on Trokus' face.
“Darlin',” the lady crooned. “Perhaps I should go back inside.”
“Hang on a minute,” Trokus said through his clenched teeth.
“If you think I won't shoot you in front of your wife,” Rommond said, “you're very much mistaken.”
The guards pointed their guns at the general, but he did not flinch. In fact, he showed an element of boredom at the display, as if he had seen it all a thousand times before. He had.
Rommond gestured dismissively to the guards. “None of this matters. Right now, all that matters is you … and the bullet meant for you. You see, I'm not a religious man, but I do believe in fate. Your fate. I believe it's in my hands.”
This is some bluff, Jacob thought, and yet he was not entirely sure it was. In many ways, everything Rommond said was true. But there was a lot of cold iron truth in the guns pointed at them as well.
“You're talking a lot,” Trokus said, “for a man who likes to shoot first.”
Trokus' wife gripped his hand tightly. Rommond saw it, and Jacob saw it too.
“Well,” the general said, “words are our weapons tonight, and we need them, because there is a bigger threat out there than either of us. You've probably heard of the Armageddon Brigade and Project Ironending.”
“Can't say that I have.”
Rommond cocked his head. “Let's pretend that you haven't then. I cancelled the project, but the Brigade continued it. And now it's done.”
Trokus' worry was evident.
“They're already in the air,” Rommond continued, “so you can pretend that doesn't mean the clock is ticking, but even now we might already be too late. Ironhold looks like the target, but the beauty of the bomb is that it changes everything, even for those who survive—if any survive. We call each other monsters, but there's one real monster up there in the sky.”
“You don't need to convince me any more.”
Maybe this might work after all, Jacob thought.
“But we'll need approval,” Trokus added.
And ... there it goes tumbling down.
“Then get approval,” Rommond said. “But don't take long in getting it. A new age is approaching, and its advent might make us pray to go back to the days of the trenches. Once the Worldwaker goes off, we will never be able to sleep again.”
9 – CABARET
While the Regime forces contacted headquarters, and awaited approval for a temporary truce by the Iron Emperor himself, the Resistance team were “welcomed” into Rustport, ushered along at gunpoint, and led into a murky bar with flashing lights that read: Club Crimson.
“We'll need your weapons,” Trokus said.
Rommond stood firm. “Not a chance.”
“We'll give you the bullets,” Armax taunted. “A whole belly full.”
“Now, that I'm fine with,” the general said, “if you are, Mr. Trokus.”
Trokus grumbled and let them inside, guns and all.
The light was low, which made the shadows long. Had Jacob and company not been painfully aware that they were surrounded by Regime forces, those menacing shadows would have reminded them. There was something about a maran shadow that seemed different to a human one.
Maybe I'm just imagining it, Jacob thought, but hell, they do look a little demonic.
“Do you always bring your good lady with you to dangerous situations?” Rommond asked.
Trokus grunted. “Do you always bring yours?” he retorte
d, nodding towards Jacob.
The smuggler snorted. “Who said I was the wife?”
They sat at a table in the centre of the club, within eyeshot and gunshot of everyone else. It was not the location Rommond or Jacob would have picked, but they were forced to indulge in Trokus' demonstration of Regime hospitality. Jacob stared uneasily at the drink he was given. He was very thirsty, but very suspicious too. Armax seemed to have no such suspicions. He downed his glass without qualm.
The background music stopped sharp, as if the pianist's fingers had been chopped off. The curtains pulled open, and the spotlight turned on. Jacob shifted uneasily. Spotlights were not his thing. Too many people died in them. He felt like even in the darkness of the audience, there was another spotlight on them.
Trokus' wife, Arlesei, stepped onto the stage and grabbed the microphone. As melodic as the piano was, her voice outmatched it in every way, both in beauty and volume. She gave a spell-binding performance of an old seafarer's song, a local tune, slow as the endless erosion of the sea, and the sound chipped away at even the hardest of hearts. Then she ended with a quick ditty, which was not local at all, and was clearly a soldier's song devised by the Regime. The crowd chanted and banged their mugs and glasses on the tables, and the only ones who did not join in stood out awkwardly at Trokus' table.
“She's quite a women, eh?” Trokus said.
“Quite,” Rommond replied.
“'Course, you don't go in for that kind o' thing, do you?” Trokus said with a grin.
Rommond did not so much as twitch.
The crowd cheered and whistled, and there might have been a shout of “encore,” but it was made in the maran tongue. Rommond gave a polite clap, which Jacob and Whistler matched, albeit a little more enthusiastically.
You cheer the performance or you become the performance, Jacob thought.
They watched as Arlesei stepped off the stage and strolled straight past the salivating soldiers with their outstretched hands, to where a teenage boy and young girl sat. She embraced them both fondly, kissing each on the cheek, before sitting down with them.
“What?” Trokus said. “You thought she was just a trophy wife? Shame on you. She's a wonderful mother. Couldn't ask for more. I already got more than I deserve in life.” He rapped his fingers off his chest. “I got family.”
“So I see,” Rommond replied.
“And you didn't a minute ago. Well, General, maybe you shouldn't be so quick to judge.”
Rommond stifled a sigh and said nothing.
“This one,” Trokus said, gesturing towards Whistler. “I know he's not yours, Rommond.” He looked intently at Jacob. “He your kid?”
Jacob glanced at Whistler and smiled.
Trokus held his hands out. “What's that supposed to be? You going to be rude or answer my question?”
“Not by blood,” Jacob said.
“So no then,” Trokus said, and Whistler frowned. “You got any family, soldier?” Trokus asked Jacob.
“Not really.” And not really a soldier, he thought.
“Not really? You either do or you don't.”
Jacob tried to control the part of him that might make a sarcastic response. “Then no,” he said.
“You Resistance lot, always going on about us stopping you all from having kids, and you don't even care about family. I don't get it.”
“Perhaps we can debate that at another time,” Rommond said, “but if you really do care about your family, and the other families of people close to you, then you'll help us fight this common threat. For now, let's put our war on hold. Let's fight for a greater good.”
“Fair enough, General,” Trokus said, extending his hand. “I do this for my family.”
* * *
Trokus was called away to receive a transmission from headquarters, straight from the mouth of the Iron Emperor himself. The Resistance forces were left alone at their table, where they tried not to exchange awkward looks with the Regime patrons.
“So,” Jacob said, turning to Cantro. “What's your story?”
“My story?”
“Everyone's got a story. Some are better than others, but we've all got one.”
“Mine isn't that exciting.”
“Really? Sky pilot and all? Why'd you join the Resistance?”
Cantro sighed. “I joined this war because I lost everything that mattered. My wife. My daughter. My grandson. You know, I don't even know if he was human. I like to think my daughter was one of the Pure. She was pure to me, and she died before she could be tainted by this world.”
“Ouch,” Jacob said. “Maybe I shouldn't have asked.”
“Maybe you shouldn't have, but you did.” He swamped down another whiskey. “And now that I'm talking, maybe I signed up because I wanted vengeance. Maybe I wanted this to never happen to another family ... even though I know it happened to many. And maybe I'm just pushing myself closer to death so that I can finally see them again.”
“Heavy stuff.”
“Yes. The weight of the world.”
Jacob said no more. He glanced at Whistler and raised his eyebrows, and the boy returned the gesture. With all the booze and scantily-clad women, whom Whistler tried to appear like he wasn't staring at, this did not exactly seem like the family-friendly place that Trokus made out.
* * *
As Trokus took his time with that fateful phone call, Rommond pulled close to Jacob and spoke beneath his breath, keeping his mostly full drink to his mouth to disguise his words, and his eyes fixed on the dancers on the stage. He refused to sit, which made Jacob cautious to do so either.
“This could all go horribly wrong,” the general reminded Jacob, as if he needed the reminder. The possibilities played out over and over in Jacob's mind, with one in particular that kept coming into view: that if the Iron Emperor refused to grant the truce, then the club was about to get a lot more crimson.
“Yeah, I kind of thought about that,” Jacob said.
“I hope you're ready for a fight.”
“Not really.”
“Well, get ready,” Rommond said, glancing around the room at all the people there—or, as he probably saw it, all the targets.
Armax shuffled up, placing a tray of drinks down on the table, and patting the general gruffly on the back. “Don't worry, Roms, we've got it covered. Bang boom, in and out, and back home for supper!”
“I'm not sure you really know what we're doing here, do you?” Jacob asked.
“Hey, it's all the same,” Armax said. “Except here we can down a few before the bullets start flying. Or we start flying. Or whatever order it goes in.”
“Probably safer not to drink before you fly,” Rommond recommended.
Armax held out his hand, palm downwards, and made it tremble. “Gets rid of the shakes,” he said. “Old Croc's got 'em. Surprised you don't too.” He nudged Rommond. “Half me mates have shell-shock from the trenches.”
“And the other half?” Jacob asked.
“They're dead.”
“Ah, yes.”
Rommond kept his eyes on the door to the back room that Trokus had disappeared into. “He's taking his time.”
“Maybe he's got the shakes too,” Jacob said.
The general watched the room like a hawk, spotting every movement, judging every gesture. When two guards strolled through and led Trokus' wife and children out, it was not a very encouraging sign. The music kept playing, and the dancers kept dancing, but the atmosphere had changed.
“Do you notice who's left?” Rommond asked his comrades.
Jacob looked around.
“Soldiers and hookers,” the general continued. “In other words, the kind of people no one bats an eyelid at if they find dead.”
“Oh.”
“Looks like something's going down all right,” Armax said, downing the last o
f his pint in preparation.
“So much for dialogue,” Nissi said.
Whistler looked up at Jacob from his seat, sensing something.
They heard the door lock, and the lights went out.
Jacob sighed. “I guess he said no then.”
10 – GUNFIGHT AT CLUB CRIMSON
Jacob ducked low as he heard the sound of soldiers running into the club from the back rooms. It was pitch black inside, and he had barely gotten his bearings. He regretted not making a mental map of the room like Rommond undoubtedly had.
“Listen up,” one of the soldiers roared. “Surrender now and this doesn't have to get ugly.”
Rommond was silent. Jacob was not even sure if he was where he last saw him. There was not the crinkle of a coat or the cocking of a gun. Yet Jacob could not imagine the general just stood there.
Whistler! Jacob thought. Last he had seen him, he was sitting at the table, bang smack in the centre of the room, between all the potential gunfire. Jacob crawled slowly across the room towards where he thought the table was, trying to be as silent as the Desert Hawk.
“I don't hear any surrenders,” the soldier said. “Slide over your guns.”
Jacob slid his gun a little ahead of him to help mask the sound of his movement.
“Are you crazy?” Armax shouted. “These lads I'm with are right killers! They'll have you all for breakfast, and I'll have a bite myself, if you don't mind!”
Jacob could imagine Rommond rolling his eyes. They don't need to see you with that mouth. He kind of wondered how many people had said that about him too.
“This is your last warn—” The soldier grunted as a sudden gunshot cut him short.
Well, that's where Rommond is then.
The lights came on suddenly, and the glare was blinding. As Jacob squinted, he noticed the knees of a soldier just inches from his face. Jacob looked up, and the soldier looked down, and though they were enemies, they shared the same look of shock. Both had guns, a rifle versus a pistol. In the battle of seconds, the pistol always won.
Worldwaker: A Steampunk Dystopian Action Adventure (The Great Iron War, Book 5) Page 5