“You might want to shield your eyes,” Josephina warned just before the darkness disappeared in the wake of a terrible explosion, light and heat washing over them as their own airship listed dangerously.
It was several minutes before they could see or hear again, and by that time, Dragomir’s pirate ship was just so much ash in the air.
Despite the pirate attack, Lady White had insisted that the conference continue. The ladies were energised from driving off the attack. Doctor Blackwell, however, had remained silent for the remainder of the voyage. A trait Wellington knew was not normal.
In their final day, Wellington served Josephina tea, poured another setting, took a seat opposite of her, and made his confession. “I’m going to have to include this in my report to Doctor Sound. It not like we can keep an attack by pirates a secret. Especially since so many others serve as witnesses.”
“But Agent Books! If it’s known that my brother—”
“Now then,” Wellington interrupted, enjoying his tea, something he desperately needed after this experience. “I don’t think it necessary that your relationship with the Baron be mentioned.”
Josephina’s pallid complexion appeared to regain colour. “Truly, Agent Books?”
“Indeed. And this time, we saw him die.”
“But Agent Books, that is hardly an assurance, he has faked his death many times and—”
Wellington knew taking her hands in his was not only most forward but hazardous in the case of Josephina. He did so anyway, assuring her softly, “Agent Blackwell, someday, you may have to face him. But that is not something the Ministry can make you do. It is something you must seek out on your own.”
She looked out the window “You’re right, of course.”
“Yes, well, of course I am,” he said with a shrug. “It’s only proper.”
“We wouldn’t want to be improper, would we?” she quipped.
“Indeed.” he stated, finishing his cup, dabbing his mouth with his napkin, then straightening his cuff. “Now, Baroness, you are due for a seminar. Ready?”
With a nod from her, they walked together to the dining room as the airship glided above the deep waters of the Atlantic.
The Clockwork Samurai
Jack Mangan
Otisburgh, Vancouver
British Columbia, Canada
1891
The Samurai knelt on the Canadian hilltop, blade pressed against his stomach. His breathing was relaxed and measured, even as the nearby ironwood tree shuddered in the pre-dawn breeze. Kuro stood over him, ready to fulfil his duties as second, fitting his katana into the grip of his brass right hand. The Pacific spoke softly in the distance.
“Lead with your left,” the kneeling man said, the cold vapour of his breath billowing with each word. “I want you to feel this as much as possible.”
“Hideo—”
“I am enamoured of the beauty of the stars, filling the sky like grains of sand on a black beach. Yet even now, the tide of dawn washes them away into the coming light. I shall step into those waves and allow the sea to carry me with honour into eternity.” Hideo’s voice was calm and resolute. “Were you not so enamoured of that light-haired American woman, you would sit beside me, Kuro, to perform the last noble act of your life.” He inclined his head toward the scaffold tower of their keep, visible over the ridge to the south.
“Miss Beverly is a fine swordsman. Swordswoman. Nothing more to me.” Kuro felt his face redden. He tried to match Hideo’s stillness, but his voice wavered in the cold breeze. “We obeyed Master Ueda’s final order, before he committed seppuku. We have remained Samurai in this foreign land, continuing our ancient ways without persecution, serving under Master Toranaga for the noble House of Usher. There is no dishonour in the paths we have chosen, Hideo-san. Would you have preferred to become one of Emperor Meiji’s bureaucrats?”
“Toranaga was a good man,” Hideo agreed. “Since his death, we have taken orders from the barbarian, Scharnusser. There is no honour in kidnapping children.”
Kuro made no reply, only recalled the fear in the seven-year-old boy’s face as the Usher Samurai had stolen upon him on his father’s island beach. Kuro still saw the terrified question in his eyes as he’d been bound and boarded into the shadow zeppelin.
Hideo sucked his breath in sharply, dimpling his exposed belly with his blade. The first golden crest of light appeared above the eastern hills. Far from his home, Hideo gazed a final time upon the rising sun.
Kuro raised his brass right forearm, adjusted the sword hilt in his left hand.
Twenty-four hours later
Her cooled steamsword clattered against his wooden katana, glimmering in the courtyard gaslight. Sweat ran freely from his hair in spite of the cold. She chewed her lower lip, as was her custom when concentrating. Tufts of long blonde hair stuck out at random points from beneath the rim of her knit cap. The duellists were both alive with purpose and determination, continuing to trade hits and parries, even as the steam whistle summoned the morning shift to their posts. Sunrise had only just begun to peek over the half-completed stone wall.
The work of converting the old Monastery to moated, modern fortress had fallen behind schedule, and a week earlier, Roderick Scharnusser had made grisly examples of three stonemasons to show his displeasure. Eight men in parkas went now to the exo-goliaths parked in the wall’s uneven shadow. They watched the swordplay, laughing and talking softly amongst themselves. One by one, the men dispersed to climb into their giant cockpits, and began the tasks of firing the boilers.
Wood struck steel, their weapons locking near their hilts, drawing the combatants in tight. He felt the softness of her hair whip across his chin. The gears in his forearm chattered busily as he tightened his grip on the wooden pommel.
“This won’t bring him back, you know,” she said, her breaths coming hard.
“I pray nothing does,” Kuro replied. “Hideo died a warrior’s death. It was my honour to act as his second.” With a light shove, the two separated. The wooden practice sword felt almost the same weight as his steel blade in his clockwork hand. He’d kept that katana sheathed, since cleaning it yesterday of Hideo’s blood. Around them, the 10-foot-tall biped machines lurched into motion, the night’s accumulations of dewy ice sliding from their frames. They walked awkwardly, deliberately across the yard to their tasks. With a drawn-out whine of pistons, the machine closest to them bent down to lift a heavy stone.
Its worker leered at them through his cockpit scaffolds, emboldened by his mechanical height and strength. “Hey, I thought there were no Chinamen left?” he shouted.
The goliath-driver nearest him responded with a laugh.
Beverly dropped her fighting stance to stand upright, visibly overcome with rage. “How dare you? A thousand of you in your machines are not worth one of these Samurai!” Her fury was as frightful and sudden as a thunderbolt. Kuro counted himself lucky that he’d never been the target of her anger. She turned away from him to focus on the labourer. “Attend to your duties, grunts. Speak again and you’ll answer to my cousin.”
The workers blanched. The nearest one said, “I’m sorry, Miss—”
She pointed her sword and he silenced, pulling his exo-goliath’s levers to stand upright with the stone.
Kuro sighed. “He’d have died for such disrespect in my homeland. I am destined for a common death here in shame, many years down the road as an old man, surrounded by these savages.” he said, then saw her dark expression turn to amusement. He bowed his head. “Pardon me, Miss Beverly. Present company excepted, of course.”
“You can always go seek your noble death back in Japan,” she said.
He shook his head. “I was barely a man the last time I saw her shores, and there are grays in my top-knot now. When Hideo and the rest of us left, the Emperor had turned the Samurai into Shizoku, bureaucrats wielding quills while the ink rusted their swords. I am the last now of the Samurai in America, maybe the last of my kind in the world.”
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“Well, my cousin’s move with little Percy Amboy is bound to tick off his father. You may see some glorious battle soon,” she said, lunging suddenly with her steamsword. His parry was more reflex than conscious action. The sword kiss brought her mischievous grin in close again to his startled face. “If you can survive practices with me.” Their blades drew a circle in mid-air, danced for another five steps, until his smile matched hers.
Kuro had watched the late afternoon commotion from a frosted second story window, had seen the Ministry agent stride through the gates under the eyes of the Usher guardsmen’s rifles. The tall man was a figure of masculine bravado in dust, goggles hung loosely about his neck, smirking at the confused henchmen as he surrendered to them. His appearance at the compound had apparently been a surprise to everyone.
Kuro blinked with surprise when the porter arrived and summoned him to stand watch for the prisoner interrogation.
Roderick Scharnusser was a strikingly large man. He’d parked his bulk outside his study doors, flanked by nervous lackeys. He said nothing as the Samurai approached, but frowned and gestured to the door handle. Kuro led Scharnusser in, who nodded to his men inside to exit, leaving them alone with the Ministry agent.
“You still haven’t shaved off that neckbeard, Rod? I hope it keeps you warm up here in the snow.” The man remained seated, staring Scharnusser down, his hands bound before him. His own facial hair looked more sculpted than neglected; and even with his wrists bound, he adjusted his cuffs, showing off a pair of elegant gold cufflinks. “This meeting is supposed to be just you and me, mate, one on one. Lose the Chinaman.”
“Mr Campbell, I can hardly be alone with a man as dangerous as yourself, can I? My guardian here is a relic, freshly imported from Japan. He doesn’t understand American English, and could never decipher your walkabout dialect.” Kuro blinked at the lie. “You can speak freely.”
“Call me Bruce. I’m pretty unhappy to have been airshipped across the Pacific, mate, just because you’ve gone and stolen O.S.M. Amboy’s son. My superiors believe you’re settling old scores, so I’m here instead of our North American field agent. Let’s have it out, so you can return Percy to his father and I can go home.”
Scharnusser’s smile was thin. “A few clarifications, Bruce. Zachary Amboy is no longer with the Office of Supernatural and Metaphysical. He now runs a small colony with his wives, a few miles offshore from here.”
“Yes, I stopped there on my way to your place. Half-finished inventions everywhere you look, people of all sizes and colours tinkering with his crazy machines.” Campbell reached inside his jacket. Kuro stepped forward, and the man froze. In this opponent’s eyes smouldered courage, bravery, duty. For a moment, he saw the spirit of Hideo. With a quick arch of a single eyebrow, he pulled out a crumpled fold of paper. “Got a note from him right here, in fact. It’s long, but I’ll read some of the highlights.” Campbell pulled the goggles up from beneath his chin, framing and magnifying his eyes dramatically. “Cor, these things are blurry. The vision’s the first thing to go, you know. Let’s see…it says:
‘Return my son unharmed immediately… face my wrath…This is your only warning… I’m a bloody lunatic.’
“OK, I added that last bit meself, but you get the point. I think you’d prefer to deal with me than him, sensible and level-headed man of action that I am. Here are your choices: accept a trade of the boy for me, or refuse, and be shocked and angry when I leave with Amboy’s junior, and you have nothing.”
Scharnusser frowned, paced slowly along a wall of books, bringing his bulky frame to rest at an unfamiliar marble bust mounted on a pillar. Bruce Campbell looked around blindly for a few seconds, then pulled the goggles back to hang at his neck.
“Mr Campbell, while you did play a role in the events of my father’s murder, I recognise that you were blameless in the act. There’s nothing to settle between us. I likewise don’t hold your Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences responsible for my twin brothers’ deaths. The guilt lies solely with Zachary Amboy. Each night, a raven flies in here and lands upon this bust, speaking my father’s name, taunting me with his death. Amboy will answer for it. His son will not be released; he will die before his own father’s eyes, when Amboy shows that he’s man enough to come here himself.”
Campbell looked directly at Kuro. “Seriously, mate. Everyone in the Americas is buggering mad, aren’t they?” The Samurai made no reply. “So Roddy, this kidnapping isn’t actually Usher business, is it? You’ve gone rogue with some personal revenge scheme? How are your superiors going to like that?”
Roderick struck the marble bust with his fist. “Enough! You have wasted my time, Mr Campbell. I shall send a courier to your ex-O.S.M. friend informing him that his son will be executed at twilight tomorrow. He can come and watch with you if he likes. In the meantime, you can rot in a cell. Samurai,” and with a wave of his hand, motioned for Kuro to take Campbell away.
Kuro bowed. The Australian locked eyes with him, but stood and allowed himself to be escorted.
Beverly was waiting outside, tendrils of blonde hair escaping from tight braids to cascade along the pale white of her neck. Campbell’s height and muscular girth loomed large over them both. His eyes immediately fell to the expanse of flesh from her collarbone to her corset. “Well, hell—”
“Can it, Agent Outback,” she said, her voice taut.
Puzzlement mingled with his charm. “Have we met?”
“Yes, two years ago in Arizona, on my uncle’s train. The day he was killed. Walk.” The three of them began down the staircase nearest the study.
“No, miss, begging your pardon, I’d have noticed you.”
“You did. You shook my hand.”
Campbell’s mouth hung agape now. “Cor, I do recall now. Blimey! From gentlewoman to hired muscle, how did that happen?” He looked at them both a moment, and his mouth dropped again. “And wait, you’re with the little guy here? My lord, really?”
Kuro blushed, but otherwise betrayed no reaction.
“Keep walking, Outback,” Beverly said. To his surprise, she looked equally flustered. “If you give us information on Amboy, you might just survive this.”
“What’s to tell that you don’t know? Retired from service a few years ago for unknown reasons, left Arizona for a little island off of Vancouver. He’s madder than a croc dentist. The O.S.M. must miss his inventions, though; I’ll give him that. As clever a clankerton as the Ministry’s wanker of an archivist. Zachary’s wagon ornithopter was a pretty amazing piece of work, before your ninja boy here and his mate blew it up on their kidnapping mission. But you should see what he’s done to his little gunboat. Hell of a ship.”
“Which would be a problem if we fought him at sea, or on his island,” Beverly said. “You’ll notice that our fortress here is five miles inland.”
“Be that as it may, you’re fools to provoke that lunatic. Especially with no government agency to leash him.”
Bruce then looked around. “Speaking of your rice-powered help here, where’s the other one?”
Kuro glanced at Beverly. After holding her gaze for a moment, he looked forward. “Enough chatter, Outback,” she said. He raised his hands in mock surrender.
They continued in silence across the compound, into a gas lit hallway lined with closed doors beneath another monastery building. The samurai’s thoughts went to Hideo’s burial mound, on the nearby hilltop where he’d taken his own life.
“All right, I can’t hold it back any longer,” Campbell said, staring at Kuro’s brass right forearm. “What happened here? Did your hand go bad?”
Kuro replied in English, without hesitation, “There was an incident in my homeland. Your Ministry colleague, Kitty O’Toole, was there when it happened. You should ask her about it.”
Bruce moved quickly, grabbed the metal hand, held it up to his face. Kuro’s left hand went to his sword grip, Beverly drew her pistol; but Campbell only gave the glove an inquisitive look.
“I wil
l, mate,” Bruce replied. “I’ll also ask her about the English teachers in the Land of the Rising Sun. You got a real command of the language there.”
Now it was Kuro’s turn to arch a brow. This one was far more clever than he led others to believe.
“The rubber grooves on the fingers give me a secure grip,” Kuro said, snatching his hand back from Campbell. He unlocked the third cell door and held it for him, thankful that Amboy’s son in the next room made no noise.
“That arm chugs louder than a locomotive, mate.” Bruce snorted as he stepped into his cell. “I guess you Japanese will never be known for your technological devices.”
“Our koala guest is quite impressed with himself,” Beverly said. “Is he a worthy opponent?”
Kuro looked Campbell from head to toe. “Agent Campbell carries himself like a true warrior. But I don’t think there’d be any honour in dying by his hand. He’s too—”
“Foul? Uncouth?” she suggested.
“Crude.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment,” Bruce said, beaming.
Miss Beverly’s smile was colder. “We’ll meet again, Mr Campbell.”
The agent stepped into the cell. “Planning to keep me company tonight?” He winked at Beverly as the door shut in his face.
They nodded to the guard on watch and ascended the basement steps. Kuro walked in silence, his thoughts returning to the bombastic adventurer locked away in the depths of the Fortress. The man cast a shadow across his duty that unsettled him.
“What do you think about his warning?” she asked, snapping him out of his reflection.
Kuro paused, squinted in the grey twilight. “I fear that we have woken a sleeping giant.”
Thrilling Tales of the Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences Page 25