by Alan Gratz
“He might indeed, Master Archie. But how to reach him? We would have to land the Hesperus to send a letter by pneumatic post. Your parents have been docile until now, but I worry what their insect masters might make them do to you should we try to stop them.”
Archie couldn’t believe he hadn’t remembered him earlier, back in New Rome. “This is so clinker, Mr. Rivets! We can’t just sit here and do nothing!”
But nothing was all they could do now. Archie climbed into his hammock, which hung at eye level in an alcove off the Hesperus’ round cabin, and watched his parents from underneath his blanket. They never moved, never spoke, never ate or slept. They just stood there, staring straight ahead and smiling, while the Hesperus’ propellers drove them all south at full steam.
As day turned to night, Archie realized it had been breakfast since he’d last had something to eat. As scared as he was to come out from under his blanket again, he forced himself to cross the cabin and search the compartments in the airship’s small galley.
“I’m afraid you won’t find much, Master Archie,” Mr. Rivets told him. They were over Cherokee territory now, and the machine man was paying close attention to Mrs. Dent at the controls. “Your parents thought we would be back in Philadelphia by now.”
So had Archie. He remembered the sub landing, where he’d wished he could go off on a trip around the United Nations. He’d gotten his wish, he realized. Just not the way he had imagined it.
Archie found an old saltine tin in one of the cabinets in the galley and popped it open, but it didn’t have crackers inside.
It held an aether pistol.
It was old, from the look of it, like something from the pictures of the Pawnee Wars in Archie’s history book. It was squat and round, with a pointy fin on top like antique rayguns had. Archie had no idea if it still worked, but it seemed like the real thing. He looked up at his father. Mr. Dent was still staring straight ahead and smiling. Wherever his parents were taking them, he was sure he’d be safer with the raygun than without. As innocently as he could, Archie walked to his hammock with the raygun tucked into his jacket. He was so nervous he almost tripped over his own feet, but at last he was to his hammock, where he hastily stuffed the raygun under his blanket.
“I think I’ll just go to sleep now,” he announced. He was still hungry, but he had to pretend it was food he’d found in the cabinet, not something else.
“Very good, Master Archie. We should be in Florida by midday tomorrow. You’ll want all of your energy then,” Mr. Rivets said. All of his energy for what he didn’t say, because neither of them knew. But Mr. Rivets was right. Archie needed to be ready for whatever was coming.
He climbed into his hammock and pulled the blanket over his head, holding the raygun close so he could see it in the half-light. He’d never used one before, but Professor Torque used one a lot in The Adventures of Professor Torque and His Amazing Steamboy, his favorite dime novel. Somewhere there was supposed to be a switch that activated the aggregator. There. The raygun vibrated and hummed. Archie hugged it to him, hoping his parents didn’t hear. A big round gauge on the side of the raygun showed when the pistol had collected enough aether to fire. It was slow, but it worked. Archie quickly shut it down, worried he might accidentally set the thing off. He didn’t know exactly what he would do with it, but it made him feel better to have it.
Archie stayed under the blanket hugging the aether pistol close like a stuffed animal. He knew he needed to rest, but he was too anxious and too scared. How could he sleep with those things here in the airship with him? What if one of them crawled off his parents and came after him? He would have to stay awake all night, just to be sure.
Fifteen minutes later, he was fast asleep.
As he slept, he dreamed. He wasn’t in the airship anymore. He was in a dark, man-made cavern with rock walls and a stone ceiling supported with tall iron buttresses like the Septemberist Society headquarters, only bigger. Much bigger. But maybe built by the same people. At the center of the room, low to the ground, was a circular stone wall like the top of a well, but much larger—almost the size of the center circle on a lacrosse field.
Ksshoom. White-blue lightning flashed down from a metal rod sticking out of the ceiling and arced into the well, lighting up the chamber. In the flash from the lightning, Archie saw a vast clockwork machine set into the far wall of the cavern. But that wasn’t what drew his attention.
The floor was alive.
The ground was covered with bugs, a six-inch layer of them, all climbing and crawling on top of each other. Centipedes and beetles and mantises and roaches and a thousand more creepy crawly things. A million more. It was a jungle full of bugs, right here in this room. All around him.
Archie jumped back in horror, but the bugs weren’t crawling on him, and they didn’t crunch when he stepped on them. He was there, but not there, like a ghost. The insects scrabbled and chittered and buzzed through him, marching along with the rest of their creepy-crawly friends toward the low wall of the stone circle, where they climbed up and over.
Archie wanted to see what was down in that hole. He needed to. He could feel the pull of it, just like the insects. He couldn’t resist it. He slid a foot forward, still afraid of the bugs, but they passed right through him.
Archie crept closer and closer to where the insects poured over the wall, then peeked over.
The abyss was covered with an enormous stone, like a lid. No, two stones: half circles that met in the middle, each with a huge letter X on it. XX. It was a door. A seal. An old one, with cracks in the stone. That’s where the bugs were going. They wiggled and pushed and scrunched down through the cracks to whatever was below.
THOOM. The ground trembled. Was it an earthquake?
THOOM. Dust and rubble shook loose from the ceiling.
THOOM. The stone seal on the well shuddered, knocking insects onto their backs.
There was something inside the well. Underneath the stone seals.
Something trying to get out.
Ksshoom. Lightning flashed again, and Archie woke up with a start on the Hesperus, the antique raygun poking him in the stomach.
“The Mangleborn wakes,” his father said, making Archie jump. His mother and father were both staring at him.
“I’m glad you were able to sleep,” said Mr. Rivets.
Archie felt like he’d been asleep for hours, but it was still dark outside. Mr. Rivets had said they wouldn’t get to Florida until midday. Thunder boomed outside, and the Hesperus shook and rattled. Rain splattered the windshield, and Archie understood. It was morning. The Hesperus was just in the middle of a thunderstorm. So much for staying awake all night. Archie put a hand to the back of his neck, just to check, but there was nothing there.
He slid out of the hammock, the aether pistol stuck in the belt of his trousers under his shirttail. Through the windshield, he saw the center of the storm dead ahead. Dark clouds swirled and lightning flashed—blue-white lightning—and suddenly Archie remembered his dream, saw the cavern and the clockworks and the stone seal and the bugs. Ahead of them, deep in the storm, the lightning flashed again and again, all striking the same place: the tip of a metal tower poking up through the clouds.
“I do believe,” said Mr. Rivets, “we have arrived at our final destination.”
4
Mrs. Dent dropped the Hesperus’ anchor just beyond where the lightning was striking.
“Stay with the airship,” Mr. Dent told Archie and Mr. Rivets.
“Mom. Dad. Don’t go,” Archie said. They had to be able to hear him. But Mr. and Mrs. Dent said nothing more. They were still in there somewhere; he knew it. But they were buried too deep. Without another word they climbed into the elevator basket, pulled a lever, and descended into the dark, stormy sky.
“Mr. Rivets, we can’t just let them go!” Archie said.
“I am loath to be separated from them, Master Archie, particularly in their current state. But they did command us to stay with the airsh
ip.”
“That’s clinker, Mr. Rivets. They didn’t tell us that, those bug things did!”
Mr. Rivets clicked and whirred as he processed that. Archie knew it was difficult for him. He was programmed to take orders from humans, but nothing in his programming allowed for humans controlled by evil bugs. Archie, on the other hand, had never been good at doing what he was told, no matter who was doing the telling. He ran to the coat closet and pulled out his leather duster, a pair of brass goggles, and leather gloves.
“Master Archie, I believe our safest course of action is to fly back to New Rome with all due speed. Technically, that would also not violate our orders.”
Archie put his arms through the sleeves of the duster. “And do what?”
“Seek help. Your Uncle John—Mr. Douglas. Other members of the Society.”
“We don’t know any other members of the Society. And it’ll take more than a day to get back to New Rome, and at least another day and a half to get back.” Archie put the goggles on, then slid them up into his messy brown hair. “My parents may be long gone by then. We’d never find them again.”
“We don’t know that, sir.”
“We won’t know anything unless we follow them,” Archie said.
The empty elevator basket came back up and locked into place. All Archie had to do was step inside and throw the lever and down he would go after his parents. He hesitated, not sure Mr. Rivets wasn’t right. He was a twelve-year-old with an antique raygun stuck in his belt. What good was he, really? He had always wanted to be a hero. Always imagined that he was Theseus, the leader of the Ancient League of Seven. In his daydreams he fought Mangleborn the size of mountains and won. But he wasn’t a superhero. Not really. And now that he had to be brave for real, he was scared.
But he had to go. He couldn’t leave his parents behind and fly back to New Rome. If he did, he would never see them again. He knew it.
Archie stepped into the basket. “I’m going, Mr. Rivets, with you or without you.”
Mr. Rivets ticked again as he considered the ultimatum.
“I would be more use to you if you exchanged my Airship Pilot card for my Protector card,” he said finally.
Archie hadn’t realized how much he needed Mr. Rivets until the machine man had decided to come. Relief washed over him as he disengaged Mr. Rivets’ Airship Pilot card from the slot on his back and put it in the trunk of talent cards they kept on the Hesperus. There was a lot more to Mr. Rivets’ decision than just wanting to protect Archie though, and he knew it. Mr. Rivets had decided not to take orders from Archie’s parents anymore, which meant that he thought Mr. and Mrs. Dent were really and truly lost.
Archie would just have to find them again.
Talent cards were big, heavy brass slates with holes punched in them for Tik Tok clockworks to read. Archie had to stand on his toes to tip the card into the slot, but it slid in with a click.
Mr. Rivets straightened and stood tall. “Protector card engaged. I am ready, Master Archie.”
For the first time in his life, Archie was glad Mr. Rivets had his Babysitter card in.
Archie pulled his goggles down to keep the rain out of his eyes as they rode the elevator basket down into the swirling gray sky. Below them was a marshy green swamp overgrown with ferns and vines, and shrouded by trees with broad, sloping roots. Tall grasses swayed in the wind as the basket settled on a soft, muddy patch of land. Something nearby sloshed into the water.
Archie pulled the aether pistol out from under his shirt and activated the aggregator.
“Where in Emartha’s name did you get that?” Mr. Rivets asked.
“It was in a saltine tin in the galley.”
“It looks like your grandfather’s. I always wondered where that had got to. Have you any idea how to use it?”
“Well … you just point it and shoot it, right?” Archie said.
“Essentially, yes. The gauge on the side tells you how much aether has aggregated. At partial strength, the ray it generates will only stun your target. At full strength, it can kill.”
“How do you tell when it goes from stun to kill?” Archie asked. He wiped rain off the round glass window on the gauge so he could read it, but there didn’t seem to be any marks for that kind of thing.
“I’m afraid it was something of an art with aether pistols from that era, sir.”
Oh, that’s just brass, thought Archie. “Which way do you think they went?” he asked over the howling wind. If there had been any footprints to follow, they were washed away by the driving rain.
Lightning flashed in the near distance, bringing daylight to the nightmare around them.
“That way,” Mr. Rivets said.
It was slow going. Having a thousand-pound machine man next to you in a fight was a good thing; getting him through a mucky marsh was another. Mr. Rivets sank in past the tops of his riveted spats, and had to use all his clockwork strength just to pull each foot free and take another step. Archie kept winding Mr. Rivets as they went with the key on his back so he would stay at full strength.
The marsh gave way to firmer ground, and the soft earth began to rise away from the water. Not very high, but they were definitely climbing what amounted to a hill in the Everglades.
“It is unusual for any place in this region not to lie at sea level, Master Archie,” Mr. Rivets said, noticing the same thing. There could be any number of reasons there was a hill here, but Archie knew Mr. Rivets was thinking the same thing he was—that this was where a Mangleborn had fallen millennia ago, and was buried alive.
Lightning crackled and boomed close enough for Archie to taste the metallic tang of it in the air, and he and Mr. Rivets pushed their way through a last thicket of mangrove trees toward where it had struck. They emerged into a bright, mossy clearing filled with activity. The light came from glowing glass bulbs atop tall metal stands. Archie had never seen anything like them. They blinded him if he looked directly at them, even with his goggles on. Beneath the lights, perhaps a dozen people worked—some Iroquois, some Powhatan, and some Yankees like him, from what Archie could see through the rain. They wore long leather jackets and goggles like his own, doing what they could to stay dry in the driving rain while they ran a big steam-powered engine and worked at metal consoles filled with dials and switches. Thick black rubber hoses ran from the steam engine to the lights, and from the consoles to the giant dripping metal tower that stood high above them—the one Archie had seen peeking up through the clouds from the Hesperus.
Lightning struck the top of the tower again, kazaaking down a central shaft into the ground. The blast made Archie’s hair stand on end. It wasn’t just the lektro-static discharge that gave him goose bumps. He suddenly understood where that lightning was going. He had seen it in his dream. He didn’t know how, but he knew this was what he had seen from underground. From inside the prison the Ancient League had built.
“They’re feeding it, Mr. Rivets. That lightning. They’re funneling it down into the hole where the Swarm Queen is trapped. They’re making her stronger so she can get out.”
Mr. Rivets pointed. “Master Archie—there.”
Archie’s parents were the only ones without jackets, goggles, or hats, their good city clothes already drenched through to the skin. They looked like the bookworms they were—two skinny scholars totally out of place outside their observatory. They didn’t belong here. Archie hurried after them, Mr. Rivets calling to him to wait. But nobody was paying Archie any attention. They were all more worried about their work. Archie hid behind a console near his parents and peeked around.
“Thomas Alva Edison,” they said together. “Thomas Alva Edison. Thomas Alva Edison.”
“What is it?” said a man flipping switches and turning dials at one of the consoles. He wore a long black cloak, rubber boots, and rubber gloves.
“Thomas Alva Edison. Thomas Alva Edison,” Mr. and Mrs. Dent said.
The man Archie figured was Edison pushed his goggles up into his thin
black hair. “What what what? I’m busy here! Who are you?” He turned to one of his workers. “Take over here.”
Mr. Rivets clicked up behind Archie. Archie motioned for the machine man to be quiet and peeked out again. Edison was short and pudgy, with a distracted look in his eyes. Behind him stood a tall black machine man unlike anything Archie had ever seen before. It wasn’t made to look human like Mr. Rivets was. Where Mr. Rivets had broad shoulders that tapered down to a thinner waist, all of which was molded to look like he was wearing a servant’s vest and tie, the black machine man had a long, thin, unadorned body like a test tube, with abnormally long arms and legs. Its face had no human resemblance either. Mr. Rivets’ head was shaped like an upside-down bucket with a bowler hat on top, and his wide round glass eyes and brass handlebar mustache gave him a friendly working-class look. The black machine man, on the other hand, had a head like an upside-down bowl, and a blank face whose only features were two glowing red eyes. The thing scared the steam out of Archie.
“We are the Motasalat Hamad,” Mrs. Dent said.
“The Overbearing Mother-in-Law?” Edison said. He turned her to see the bug on her neck and frowned. “Why have you come here?”
“Malacar Ahasherat calls,” said Mr. Dent.
“We will go through the puzzle traps to her,” said Mrs. Dent, still smiling.
Lightning crackled and boomed down the tower, making everyone jump except Edison and Archie’s parents.
“We’ve tried that,” Edison said. “Nobody we send in there ever comes out. I’ll get the Swarm Queen out my own way. The Archimedes Engine is working. By the full moon she’ll be powerful enough to break free.”
“We will go through the puzzle traps to her,” Mr. Dent said.
“These bloodfoods have the knowledge,” said Mrs. Dent.