The Music of the Machine (The Book of Terwilliger 2)

by Michael Stiles

  Nathaniel offered no explanation of who Mike Ludd might be, but that question was answered when a lanky man with longish, greasy hair came running up to them. He looked extremely upset. When he spoke, Ed could see that his teeth were a deep, rich brown. “He broke it, Nathaniel. My machine!”

  Nathaniel spat on the floor. “He’s always ruining things. I hate him.”

  “Who’s this?” said Ludd, putting his face uncomfortably close to Ed’s. “New guy?”

  “Terwilliger,” said Nathaniel.

  “Oh.” Ludd turned sullen, casting unpleasant glances at Ed out of the corner of his eye.

  “Show me the machine,” said Nathaniel. “I want to see what he did.”

  “What if he’s still down there? That sword was―”

  “He’s not still down there.” When Ludd hesitated, Nathaniel grabbed him by the shirt collar. “You need to fix it, Ludd. I need the music to play.” He turned and went down the tunnel that Ludd had just come out of. Mike Ludd looked at Ed, who shrugged and went after Nathaniel.

  “What is this machine you keep talking about?” said Ed as they walked. He wasn’t all that eager to learn about it, but the tight, half-lit tunnels were making him anxious.

  “Electromagnetic radiation,” said Ludd. He sounded very excited to talk about it. “Rotating magnetic fields. Adolf Beck, the scientist, figured out that you can induce all kinds of electrical activity in the brain using electricity. I figured out how to do the same thing using low-frequency radio waves. We can create emotions, or make someone emotionless. Make someone paranoid or make him fall in love. Get the frequency just right, and you can make a man do anything you want. Get it wrong and you liquefy his brain.” He ducked under a low-hanging part of the ceiling. Ed was able to walk under it without ducking.

  “The world has changed since the last time Urizen lived,” said Nathaniel. “In the old days, he could take over a town or a country. The last time he was around, he tried to take over Europe. Almost did, too. But today his plans are bigger. His weapons are bigger.”

  “Nukes,” said Ed.

  Nathaniel shrugged. “I guess nukes are big. But you can’t nuke your own country, can you? You can only nuke other countries.”

  “At some point,” Ludd said, “you have to get past killing people and figure out how to control them. That’s what Novus is all about.”

  They came to an ancient wooden elevator, controlled by ropes. “Shortcut,” said Nathaniel. “Get in.” Ed examined the ropes before he got on; they looked fairly new. It was totally dark inside except for the soft red glow from Nathaniel’s right eye. The temperature dropped noticeably as Nathaniel manipulated the ropes to lower the elevator. By the time they reached the bottom, Ed realized he had been holding his breath almost the whole way. He hated the dark.

  “So Nosgrove was running experiments down here?” said Ed.

  “No!” Nathaniel looked at him like he was an utter fool. “Novus wasn’t here. Nosgrove kept it near his home. There’s a place in Maryland where the President goes camping.”

  Ed laughed. “Camp David. I don’t think they go camping there.”

  Nathaniel did not enjoy being laughed at. “Yes, that place. Nosgrove had a building there to do his experiments.”

  “But then it got shut down,” said Ed.

  “It was supposed to be.” Nathaniel’s eye flashed a brighter shade of red. “But I came and rescued it. I rescued Mike Ludd too.”

  “And Dalton Whitehead,” said Ludd. “Don’t forget Dalton.”

  Nathaniel nodded. “The prisoners became my friends. They were like me, and I took care of them. I gave them blue clothes, because it’s a nice color, don’t you think? The blue men became my own little army. My starting army.” He beckoned Ed to follow him onward, to a place where the narrow passage opened up into a larger chamber up ahead. “The guards came with me too. They didn’t want to go. They were afraid. But I took them anyway. It was a long trip to Colorado. I brought the men here, and Mike Ludd brought the machines.”

  “How did you get them all here?”

  “Bus.”

  Ed waited for him to say more, but Nathaniel didn’t elaborate. “How did you find this place?”

  Nathaniel pointed to his own head. “Agent Tom knew. This was where he sent people who needed to disappear. He almost sent you here, you know. Did you know?”

  Ed shook his head.

  “Tom was not a nice man.” Nathaniel pinched his own arm, as though punishing the body that had once belonged to Kajdas. “After we got here, that was when I took the Society,” he continued. “Took it right away from Arthur. The hum of the machine kept them in line, made them behave themselves.”

  Ed wondered if Big John was among those captured, but it seemed like a dangerous question to ask. “What happens when the hum stops? Do they get their minds back right away?”

  “Hell, I don’t know.”

  They entered the big room. Ed stopped to take it all in: the rocky platform in the middle; the two huge chairs, only one of which was occupied; the mural on the ceiling.

  “They needed an icon,” said Nathaniel. “So I made them one. Straight out of Croaker’s head. It’s pretty.”

  Ed looked up at the horse’s red eye. “It’s very… lifelike.”

  Nathaniel was not listening. He stopped and stared in horror at the empty chair in the middle of the room. With a roar of anger he ran to the platform and stood there a moment to gape at that empty chair. He got down on the floor to inspect several dark stains and one large puddle at the foot of the platform. He dipped his finger in the puddle and tasted it. They were alone in the room except for the man in the second chair, whose face was turned away from them. Nathaniel hopped onto the platform and rattled his chains. “Where did he go?”

  The prisoner slowly turned his head to look at Nathaniel. Without his wig and glasses, he looked vaguely like a turtle with its shell removed. His head jutted forward on a curved neck and his upper lip stuck out like a beak. He stared down his nose at Nathaniel but did not answer.

  “Cruller!” Ed exclaimed. “I guess you’ve met your match!” He was hardly in a position to gloat, since he was just as much a prisoner as Cruller was, but gloating was all he had at the moment.

  “Cruller doesn’t like talking,” said Nathaniel. “That’s all right. We can still have good conversations. Right?” He put his hand on Cruller’s shoulder and moved in close, as though he was coming in for a kiss, stopping when his nose was only an inch from Cruller’s. “We’ll be good friends,” he whispered. “We’re going to have some good, long talks, as soon as the machine is fixed.”

  Cruller’s mouth began moving, as though he was trying to talk but no sound was coming out. He worked his lips to the side and bit down on something. A sharp cracking noise came from his mouth, like he had bitten into a piece of glass.

  “What are you doing?” Nathaniel cried, suddenly enraged. He shook Cruller by the shoulder. “Stop! Spit it out!”

  Cruller smiled. Then his eyes rolled back and he began convulsing.

  “Spit!” Nathaniel grabbed his other shoulder and shook him hard.

  “Too late to spit,” said Ed. “It’s potassium cyanide.” He had never seen it first-hand, but he was familiar with the effects. “He’ll be dead in another minute or two.”

  Nathaniel released Cruller and let him slump sideways in his chair, shaking violently. In just a few seconds his convulsions weakened and he became still. Nathaniel stood up and turned his gaze to Ed, his right eye glowing brightly. “Somebody let Orc out of his chair,” he said, sounding like he was talking more to himself than to Ed. “That means he has at least one friend. Is Orc alive or dead? Assume alive. Is he still in the caves? If so, have to catch him. No hum; can’t send a message. Chase him? Or…” He nodded, as though he’d just come to a decision. “Fix the machine. That’s the best way.” His eyes came suddenly back into focus. “You can help me.”

  Ed forced himself not to look away. “I’m not going
to help you.”

  “Help me,” said Nathaniel, “or I keep your Sarah once I find her. I’ll keep both of you here forever.”

  “I don’t know anything about machines.”

  “But I do,” said Mike Ludd.

  Nathaniel was about to say something else when the lightbulbs overhead suddenly became exceedingly bright. Ed put up his hand to shade his eyes. Every contour of every rock stood out in sharp contrast. Then the lights went out. Ed blinked rapidly, disoriented by the greenish afterimage that filled his sight. It faded quickly, until all he could see was the red glow of Nathaniel’s eye.

  “Come,” Nathaniel said, taking Ed by the arm.

  Ed bumped against the edge of the stone platform and held back, afraid to go any farther. “Do you have a flashlight or… or something?”

  Nathaniel pulled him onward into the darkness. “I can see just fine,” he said.

  * * *

  An eternity passed while Perla waited in the dark, sitting on the floor with her eyes tightly shut. If she kept her eyes closed, she could pretend she wasn’t trapped in a black cell underground. The cool air had stopped flowing out of the vent when the power had gone, and the cell was becoming uncomfortably humid.

  There was a clanging noise out in the hall. Perla jerked awake and was surprised to discover that she had been sleeping. Rubbing her stiff neck, she stood up and went to the door. She had to back away immediately as it swung inward. A bright square of light was aimed directly at her face. “Can you point that somewhere else?” she said, shading her eyes.

  “Sorry.” It was Seymour’s voice. He aimed the light at the floor. “Ready to go?”

  “I was ready to go hours ago,” she groused.

  “I’ve only been gone twenty minutes.” He sounded irritable. “Stay in there if you want. Somebody will find you eventually.”

  “No!” She hurried out of the cell and shut the door. Only then did she notice that they were not alone. There were several other people in the narrow hallway, visible in the outer edge of the flashlight’s wide beam. Every one of them wore a metal collar like Flem’s, each with a little red light flashing in the darkness. “Who’s with you?”

  “The women from the Society,” said Flem. “All six. They were okay, just a little scared. Plus two who were here already, so that makes… eight. This is Mary and Sonya and Louisa and…”

  Perla cut him off. “Nice to meet you all. We can do introductions later. I can’t see them anyway.”

  “Oh. Sure.” Flem sounded embarrassed. “Ladies, this is Perla. She’s cool.”

  Perla thought that might be the first time she’d ever been called cool. She was glad no one could see her blushing. “What happened to Larson and those other guys?”

  “Well,” said Flem, “I’m no match for Larson usually. But it turns out I am a match for him with the lights out. The other two… I don’t know where they went. Ran off.”

  Perla had to admit that she was impressed. Flem was full of surprises. “Good work, Flem. Do you remember the way out?”

  He did remember. They set out slowly, with Flem in the lead and Perla at the back to make sure none of the women got left behind. Flem only had the one flashlight, so they had to follow the beam and stick together. This was made a little easier by the flashing collar-lights. The girls were disoriented and terrified. Perla was afraid to think of what Nathaniel’s men had done to them, and that was after Arthur had already had his way with them. She wished she could say something to set them at ease, but she didn’t know what to say. “How long have you all been down here?” she asked the girl at the back of the crowd. “What was your name again?”

  “Mary,” the girl said. She was young, maybe in her late teens. “I was, like, counting days for a while after they brought us here. Then I… I sort of forgot to keep counting, you know? It’s hard to explain, but there was this humming noise…”

  “No need to explain. How many days did you get up to before you stopped?”

  “Seventeen. But that was a long time ago.”

  “Hush,” Flem said from up in front. “People ahead.” He turned off his flashlight. There was another light up ahead, faint but distinct. The girls bunched up into a tight group as they shuffled forward slowly. The more Flem kept shushing them, the more frightened they became. Perla heard one of them crying quietly.

  “Ladies,” Perla said, trying to stay quiet while still making herself heard. “We’re going to be all right. But you have to be quieter. Pick up your feet and stop crying. We’re almost out.”

  Her words seemed to have some small effect. The crying girl held back her sobs, and they all made less noise when they walked.

  The light was coming from a side-passage. Flem made them all wait while he went on ahead to see what it was. When he came back, he went straight to Perla and leaned in close to whisper into her ear. His breath in her hear gave her goosebumps. “It’s the doctor. I don’t see any other Horsemen around—maybe they all split—but Whitehead’s still working on something.”

  “Should we find another way?”

  “There’s only one way to go from here. We can get past him, though. He’s distracted.” He turned to the rest of the group and whispered a little louder. “We’re going to walk right past the doorway, nice and quiet. Nobody stops, nobody looks inside. Understand?”

  No one replied. Maybe they were nodding their heads. Flem took their silence as consent. The girls squeezed against the wall to let him go back to the head of the line. He led them slowly to the light and walked right on past it into the dark passage beyond. The girls hesitated, but they were more afraid of being left behind than they were of whatever was inside that lighted passage. The first four followed their instructions nicely. The fifth girl looked to her right, into the passage, and gasped in shock. The next girl in line nudged her forward, but then she saw what the other one was looking at. They both stood, staring in horror, until Flem took each of them by the hand and pulled them onward. The other two girls in front of Perla did as they were told; they kept their eyes forward and kept moving. Perla, bringing up the rear, couldn’t resist taking a quick look as she passed.

  The light came from a lantern that had been placed on a pile of books in the corner of the small room. The doctor, Whitehead, was standing with his back to the open doorway. He was muttering to himself as he worked on a patient who was laid out on a metal table. The patient was Arthur. His eyes were open, staring at the ceiling with a grimace of pain on his face.

  “No anesthetic,” Whitehead was muttering. “And now, no power. We’re back to the Stone Age.” His arms moved rapidly as he worked on Arthur’s abdomen. A spray of blood squirted out, arcing upward almost to the ceiling. Whitehead quickly stopped it. “If you survive this, pal, you owe me one giant bottle of tequila.”

  “Rrrrrrrgh,” Arthur growled through clenched teeth.

  “You said it,” said the doctor. “I don’t know what keeps you going. Most guys would’ve died a long time ago. Are you sure you’re human?”

  “Rrrrr,” grunted Arthur. His head turned slightly toward the doorway, and Perla hurried on her way before she was seen.

  They continued walking as softly as they could, using Flem’s flashlight and the collar-lights to guide them, until they came to a straight tunnel that sloped gently upward for a long way. Perla shivered in the chilly breeze that was blowing against her face. It was quite cold, actually. A breeze… It had been a long time since she had smelled fresh air, and it smelled wonderful. She wanted to run, and wondered why none of the others were running toward the source of the breeze. In fact, they were slowing down rather than going faster.

  “Flem! Why are you stopping?”

  Flem stood at the front of the group, shining his flashlight into the passage up ahead. There was a door at the end of the tunnel, and Perla was quite certain that this was what they had been looking for: the way out.

  “This is where they made me clean up the pieces of Al Spence,” said Flem.

 
“I have no idea what that means,” said Perla.

  “The collars,” said the girl named Mary. “The guy with the red eye said the collars wouldn’t let us leave the caves.”

  Flem approached the door and shone his flashlight at the walls and ceiling. “There’s a little bomb in each of the collars,” he said. “If you go through the door, something triggers it.”

  “But the power’s out now,” Perla said. “Shouldn’t that turn them off?”

  “Then why are we still flashing?” said Mary.

  “There must be a battery in the collar,” said Flem. “But there still has to be something else that triggers it.” He stood there a moment longer, looking for whatever it was in the doorway that would make their collars blow up. “Perla,” he said.

  Perla went up next to him. “They didn’t put a collar on me. I can go out first and―”

  “Hold the light,” said Flem. He handed her the flashlight, opened the door, and walked through to the outside. Perla clenched her teeth, waiting for him to explode, but he didn’t explode. After a moment, he started laughing.

  One by one, the women from Arthur’s Society stepped outside onto the cold hillside. There were stars overhead, lots of them, and a hint of a glow on the eastern horizon that suggested dawn was approaching. Perla looked around for Horsemen, but she saw no one.

  Flem took a dozen steps and then sat down on the ground. “We’ll have to figure out how to get these off,” he said, pulling gently at his collar. The women stood in a cluster behind him. Now that she could see them, Perla was shocked at how skinny they all were. Nathaniel’s men ate so well, but these girls were skin and bones.

  “Thank you,” said a petite girl with light-brown hair. Her clothes would have been two sizes too big for her even if she hadn’t been half-starved.

  “You’re welcome, Cindy,” said Flem.

  “How do we get home?” another of the girls asked. “Does anybody have money for a taxi?”

  “Where’s home?” said Perla.

  “Arthur’s house.”

  “This is Colorado, kiddo,” Perla said. “You’re about a thousand miles from Arthur’s house. And why the hell would you want to go back there?”