Turnkey (The Gaslight Volumes of Will Pocket Book 1)

by Lori Williams

  I sprung up and began breathing in a panic. The diary said that I had spent days upon days sleeping in the Watchmaker’s basement. That was up until the point that the Doll had stopped writing. Could further hours, days, weeks have gone by? The vile morning my girl was awaiting, had it already passed?

  Had the Watchmaker’s Doll fallen from the sky?

  Was she, at the moment of my awakening, already…

  “No!” I yelled, not a plea or a lament, but a demand of Creation. I began furiously pawing at the vacant walls for some sign of the date or even just the present hour. Of course, the place had been practically licked clean by the King’s men, picked and looted and emptied. There was no reason for me to believe that I would just happen to find a working clock sitting around.

  But logic didn’t seem like an optimistic path to be taking, so I tossed it aside. I panted like a dog and babbled like a madman, constantly telling myself that I wasn’t too late, that there was no way that I could be too late.

  I rushed through the emptied basement once again, feeling along the barren walls just as I had upon waking. I don’t know what I expected to be there that hadn’t been less than an hour before, but I kept searching. And of course, I found nothing, and ended back at the unfinished ship that was built into the room. The only trace of the Watchmaker not seized by the Crown. In the dimness, I pressed my palms to the planks and read those words again.

  THE LADY VIOLETTA:

  TO WORLDS UNKNOWN

  They were as deeply carved into my mind as they were into the wood. I dropped my head and slid slowly down to the floor, still pressing onto the ship that never was.

  Worlds unknown, eh?

  Maybe I’ve already reached them. Maybe that ship wasn’t unfinished at all. Maybe it just sailed so calmly that its passengers didn’t even realize their voyage had begun. I curled my head inward to my knees. Maybe that was it. Everything I had witnessed, everything I’d encountered since I first stepped onto this ship had been completely foreign and unknown to me. A world of shadows. A world unfit for the terribly ordinary man. In my head, all I could see was the Lady Violetta rising from its basement tomb on that first night, carrying Kitt and Dolly and myself upward through the fabric of real and unreal, through known and unknown, time and timelessness. I saw the Violetta bouncing waves through a million reflections of London, eventually tossing me ashore of one fraught with mystic teas and oil seas.

  So where was I docked now? Some dreary stain of the London I’d left behind?

  I had nothing left but questions. More even than when I started.

  And what way is that to end a story? Pathetic. Both literally and figuratively in the dark, huddling in the distance of a melting candle.

  “A…melting…candle…” I whispered aloud, the hairs on my neck standing stiff. “Wait!”

  I snapped my head up and glared at the dripping wax.

  “My God! Of course!”

  I crawled back to the flame and nearly singed my nose in it.

  “Of course!” I repeated, my breath making the fire dance. “Of course! How could I be so stupid?!?”

  A candle was burning. I know I’m repeating that observation an obnoxious amount of times, but it’s important.

  Because I wasn’t the one who lit it.

  If days, weeks, months, years, or lifetimes had passed, all I would’ve awakened to was a burnt lump of ashes.

  But this fire danced onward.

  Which meant, I told myself, no more than a few hours could’ve passed…right?

  I began excitedly pacing, wishing I held a greater knowledge of the properties of burning candle wax in relation to time.

  But it could be possible, I told myself. Possible that dawn hadn’t risen yet! Possible that the Doll hadn’t yet thrown herself to...to…well, thrown herself down!

  She could still be alive. Or intact, I mean, or constructed.

  No.

  Alive.

  As long as it was still night.

  I grabbed the diary, concealed it in my overcoat, and jogged to the staircase that led up from the basement floor to the world above. I looked at the closed, square hatch in the ceiling. I knew that if I put my eyes above the ceiling and night still hung over the earth, the Doll would still be alive.

  And I would still have a chance to find her.

  I brought my weight down on the first step and promptly, heroically…

  Stood there.

  What? No…

  I shook my head, took a deep breath, and…

  Just stood there.

  My stomach twisted as I realized that I was afraid. Not just of leaving. Not just of failing. Not just of death. I was in that moment completely paralyzed by everything that existed outside of me and everything within.

  I closed my lids and saw Tekcop, that bastard incarnation of myself born out of my tea dream. In my mind’s eye, he clucked his tongue and chewed on it.

  “And this is your concept of heroism?” he sneered. “Of motivation? Hmph. What a complete and utter bore.”

  I opened my eyes solely for the satisfaction of erasing his image. An utter bore? No. Slowly, I climbed the stairs. Being afraid is one thing, but I won’t stand for being boring.

  There’s nothing worse than that.

  I approached the ceiling hatch and peered upon those thin boards that awaited my touch.

  They did not have to wait long.

  Pushing all of my weight against the door, I moved upward. As I did, an unexpected counterweight smacked against me.

  “Damn,” I whispered. A considerable amount of debris must’ve toppled upon this hatch after Dolly had cleared it for her exit. But I was sick of looking for excuses to be deterred.

  “You wanna see determination, Tekcop?” I spoke in the dark. “Feast your eyes on this!”

  I shouted a primal growl and burrowed my shoulder into the wood. As it stubbornly succumbed to my advances, a slit of fresh air split open, and I raised my arm to it.

  It was time at last for me to ascend.

  With a resounding crack, my hand broke through the layers of death that stacked upon the mausoleum I had slept away in. As I gradually pulled myself up, inch by miserable inch, my heart squeezed itself into a clenched stone. I knew that the first thing I would see would irreversibly affect the rest of my life as I knew it. If the sun shone down from the heavens, then all would be lost. Dirt and soot rained down my shoulders. I gritted my teeth and felt my veins tighten like thick bands beneath my skin. I raised my eyes to the sky an impatient moment too soon, and was blinded by the airborne soot. My right eye was watering over, and I could only stare through the green-tinted lens that protected my left. The green sky above me framed a large glowing orb that hung menacingly overhead.

  “Sun or moon?!?” I screamed across my broken mind as I quickly clawed away at the eyeglass to reveal…

  Night.

  It was still night.

  My cracked lips made the weakest, widest smile.

  That green ball in the sky was still the moon.

  The dust of the urban graveyard settled silently into place. Amongst the wreckage I found the gun I had shot Kitt with, blanketed by scuffled dirt but otherwise unaffected since I dropped it out of my hand like an offering of flowers before a weather-worn tombstone.

  It seemed an omen, no, a reminder. Of what still remained before me.

  I still had a weapon.

  It was still night.

  And I still had time.

  Pistol in palm, I stepped out of the land of the dead and started running.

  You know what’s stupider than the boy who fell in love with the end of the world?

  When that boy tried to stop it.

  I hurried along, a piercing sting of fear in my chest. I kept pushing it away, refusing to acknowledge unwanted possibilities. A cathedral. That’s where she would be. A tall cathedral. But which? And where? The tallest ones I could remember were closer to the center of the city. Maybe I’d find some trace of Dolly if I began in
that direction.

  I hurried.

  I had only half of a fading memory of the gravedigger’s path to the watch shop, and tracing it backwards felt like trusting a dying firefly to light your way home, but it was all I had.

  I got only a few blocks away from the dirty rubble I had slept under before getting noticed.

  A night patrolman, a mustachioed servant of the city police, called me aside, presumably because an unshaven maniac running around in the dark with an openly-brandished firearm seems the sort of fellow that a well-meaning night patrolman ought to give a second look.

  “Something I can do for you?” I uttered, making no attempt to hide my irritation.

  “The road ahead is blocked off,” the man said, tugging impatiently at his collar. “Best turn back the way you came.” He was dressed in the dull, faded blues of the police force, and bore the unique strips of lead that New London officers wore sewn across their uniformed chests.

  “Turn back, you say?” I responded with absolutely no interest. To greaten the insult, I turned my glassy eyes away and continued walking in the same direction. My boots clanked a sound of metallic, mocking laughter at the patrolman.

  “Hold on, you!” the man soon said.

  I obeyed in the simplest manner. I stopped walking and kept my back to him.

  “Yes?” I replied.

  “Exactly what business do you have on these streets at such an hour?”

  I made a sad and tattered smile where I stood. Sure, I could’ve quickly hidden my weapon and made up another outlandish alibi, but that Will Pocket, as I’ve already said, was dying, and his successor hadn’t a tenth of the patience.

  “Those strips you’re wearing,” I seethed, “they’re for stopping gunshot, right?”

  “That’s correct.”

  “Good.” I pulled my gun, twisted around, and fired. The shot sparked against the metal and the man fell backward. I’d only wanted the momentarily distraction to take off, but when the patrolman hit the ground, his head met brick, and it knocked him straight out.

  I think.

  Without word, I carried forward.

  I’d like to be able to tell you that I met with no further interruptions on my way, but after the story I’ve spun, hell, you probably wouldn’t believe me if I did.

  For a moment I thought I’d gotten lucky. There seemed to be no witnesses to my little standoff with the patrolman, and I was now moving unfollowed.

  But of course, whatever fortune or luck I’d quickly gained was just as quickly lost.

  A pair of black coats stood like gargoyles against the stone of a building as I came galloping into their roost. They were quick with their claws and aimed shiny rifles at me. I looked at them and silently raised my pistol back at them.

  They had a good laugh at this.

  “Oh, what’s this?” smiled one of the Magnates, a stout but thick bruiser with a chin like a knobby tree trunk. “I think the unwashed little rat’s wants to shoot us dead.”

  “That’s cocky thinking,” his partner said, a taller man who stood bristling beneath a thick grey beard. “Especially considering it’s a good two-on-one fight.”

  “Yeah,” the knobby chin added, “two men against one rat.”

  I didn’t have anything to say them. No reason. No point. I just stood around, catching my breath and holding out my gun. I didn’t honestly believe I could take down both of these gargoyles and get out alive, but I wasn’t afraid either. I know that seems contradictory to the mental state I’ve been painting thus far, but in that moment I really couldn’t feel the presence of fear. Me, the man too afraid, mere minutes ago, to walk up a simple set of stairs. And the only explanation I can offer is that perhaps the constant strain of misadventure on my sanity had resulted in a somewhat haywired working of my emotions. I just prayed the wrong ones wouldn’t start to misfire.

  I frowned at the bearded Magnate, more impatient than forlorn. I think he could smell the fermentation of that outlook on me, because he puffed his nostrils and shifted his jaw to the side.

  “Will Pocket!” the chin spoke, reciting the words as if to conjure a spell against me.

  I sighed and put my hands up in submission.

  “You can drop that pistol as well!”

  I glanced and saw that I was in fact holding my weapon skyward, looking like I was about to conduct the start of a footrace. Emotionally drained, I could only smirk at the gun and ask what it was doing way up there.

  “You hear me, Pocket?!?” the chin snarled. “You drop it now or we start shooting.”

  “He’s not bluffing!” the beard reassured.

  I sighed in delirium. “No, I suppose he wouldn’t be. Bluffing requires subtlety.”

  “What’s that, now?” the beard barked.

  “The two of you aren’t terribly complex characters. In fact, all you’re really doing is slowing down the narrative.”

  “Shut up!” the chin cut in. “This is your last chance!”

  “Fine.”

  I tossed the pistol to them. It slid and landed a few steps before the beard’s feet. Damn, I thought, berating the gun. The least you could’ve done was spit a shot when you hit the ground, maybe take out an ankle. I must’ve closed my eyes momentarily after because I don’t remember seeing the two men rush me.

  Thwack! The sound bellowed between my ears as my body hit the brick road. Grunting like a gorilla, the chin had slammed his weight into me, and once I was down, he squeezed his boot against my throat. I coughed and winced, trying to breathe as best as I could under the crushing weight of his heel. My head pounding and vision blurry, I stared up at the Magnate and saw him aim his weapon at my forehead.

  “Hey, hey!” the beard said. “Orders say to capture alive if at all possible. For questioning.”

  “I can’t think of any questions,” the chin chuckled, making a sickening grin. “Can you?”

  “Still—“

  He was interrupted by the cocking click of his partner’s gun. “You’ve got one chance, boy,” the chin said to me. “Start talking.”

  I said nothing.

  “Come on. You know what we’re after.”

  Nothing.

  The beard sighed and crossed his arms. “All right,” he said to the other. “Do what you want. But I didn’t see any of this.”

  The chin jammed a malevolent spark into the crusty corner of his eye and tapped the gun barrel against my temple. I closed my eyes and waited for fate to unfold.

  Damndest thing, though. Fate had a couple of hecklers in the front row.

  “Oi!” a voice in the distance shouted. “Are you killing a man there?”

  I slowly opened my right eye and saw two oddly-dressed figures approach from the shadows. They seemed to have a variety of household objects tied onto their respective persons.

  Oh, no.

  “Evening!” Doctor P said. “God bless the King and all that! So are you taking a life here?”

  The chin jerked his head to the interlopers and exhaled pure, unadulterated annoyance. The beard bristled but held up a hand to his partner. Gravely, he addressed the onlooking Marin brothers with what I can only assume was just-barely-suppressed disdain.

  “Gentlemen,” he said to the peddlers, “I’m afraid you are encroaching on very official, very royal, and very private business, so if you’ll kindly refrain from interrupting—”

  “Oh, we aren’t interrupting!” Doctor P laughed. “Wouldn’t dream of it! Would we, Brother?”

  “Never!” Doctor D smiled.

  “We’re just curious onlookers, is all. Aren’t we, Brother?”

  “Quite curious!”

  “Well, be that as it may,” rumbled the beard, “this is not the sort of business that allows an audience. Might I suggest you boys go find a circus to entertain your want of—“

  “A circus!” Doctor P laughed. “At this time of night! This one’s hilarious, Brother!”

  “Very hilarious!” Doctor D chortled.

  “Look—”
the beard began.

  “It’s just that we’ve never witnessed any form of execution,” Doctor P explained. “Sure, back in the days of our youths, a gent and his lady could frequent the town square any day of the week and witness a fresh hanging, but you must admit, in these more civilized times, such an opportunity is rare!”

  “See, we are students of the human experience!” Doctor D added.

  “Exactly, Brother! Human experience! And you can’t very well study that without the all-important element of death! I mean, take this gent here. The one under your friend’s heel. What’s his name, then?”

  The chin snorted, shaking the pistol in his grip. “That’s hardly any of your—“

  “Oh, it’s you, Mister Pocket!” Doctor D gleefully exclaimed, clapping his hands and strolling right past the burly Magnates to where I lay. “I nearly didn’t recognize you! What are you doing down there!”

  “Well…” I uttered, “it appears I am about to die.”

  “Ah, aren’t we all, Pocket? Aren’t we all?”

  “Not really at this moment, no.”

  “Look!” the beard bellowed, losing what was left of his poise. “If you two vagrants don’t start walking away this moment, I’ll have you shot where you stand for interfering with—“

  “No need for all of that!” Doctor P grinned. “We were just on our way, anyhow. Shame though, would’ve loved to witness the snuffing of the human spirit. No offense, Mister Pocket.”

  “Yeah, none taken,” I grumbled.

  “Get them out of here!” the chin hissed.

  The beard nodded, grabbed Doctor D, and violently tossed him into his brother. The Marin boys scrambled, but kept their footing.

  “Easy now!” Doctor P yelped. “You’ll irritate my temperament!”

  The Magnate snorted and cracked his knuckles. Doctor P made a silly grimace and lifted his palms to his face. As the beard closed in, the wild-eyed peddler erupted with a loud sneeze. A puff of grey smoke shot forward from his hands and into the other’s face. The bearded Magnate swore, wafted the fumes away, and suddenly collapsed.

  “He did warn you, sir,” Doctor D sheepishly shrugged to the now unconscious man. The chin, naturally, was enraged and swung his weapon away from my forehead and over to the two clowns. I took the opportunity and elbowed the remaining Magnate in the back of his knee, toppling him over. He yelled and fired randomly as he tumbled down. The Marvelous Marins danced quickly out of the way of the sudden bullet fire.