Gods of Chicago: Omnibus Edition

by Sikes, AJ

  All around him, Brand felt the web of citizens who had stood up to defend themselves or just protect themselves and one another. The people of Chicago City who had always been ready to do right by the city, to keep it from being awash in the waste and graft of corrupt politicians and gangsters. The people who believed Chicago City was more than just a mound of steel and concrete and brick, who knew it was a place where people lived and loved and worked and died. Those people who were the city, they were with Brand now as he crashed against the G-man and drove him up against the window, slamming his head against the glass.

  The electric gun fell to the floor at Brand’s feet and Crane shook violently. Brand let him go and stood back, watching as a greasy mass of spidery blackness poured from Crane’s eyes and mouth, forming a sphere in front of him. The mass swelled and moved as if to assault Brand, like it wanted to crash onto him, into him, taking away everything he was and leaving him an empty pitiable shell of a man.

  Brand flicked his gaze at Crane and saw that the G-man had become just that. The roiling inky mass slipped out of sight, vanishing into the world behind the curtain, leaving Brand alone with a weeping Jameson Crane.

  “God damn you, Brand,” the G-man said through his angry sobs. “This was the time. This was the decade we’d been waiting for,” he went on, talking into the air beside his face, not even looking at Brand anymore. “Ever since the war. It’s been aces up all over. Aces up for ten years straight.”

  Brand lifted the G-man’s weapon and stood back. His eyes had seen enough lives ruined by men like Crane not to care that the G-man had been reduced to a whimpering child angry about losing his favorite toy. But Brand didn’t find what he expected inside himself either. There was no joy at seeing Crane defeated. Only a sense of calm, a feeling that the world had lost something, but only something that it had not needed.

  “Even a roar has to stop for a breath sometime, Crane.” The G-man’s face fell and he dropped his chin to his chest, sobbing his failure down his shirt.

  Brand went to Conroy’s limp form, still trapped under the dead weight of Suttleby. He shoved the fat man off and felt the kid’s neck for a pulse. He had life in him still. It’d take a minute and fresh air would help. Going back to the switchboard, Brand went to finish unplugging the leads from the desk. He reached for the first cable and stopped. The screen now showed a rotation of images from around the city.

  People huddled together in the dark beside the smoking ruins of a home or storefront. People ran from soldiers who followed with guns blazing. People fell before the blasts of electric fire from the auto-men. Whatever system Crane had set up to filter the crabs’ pictures, it was broken now. Chicago City would see these images, and they would know Brand had been telling the truth. He was about to leave when an image from his nightmares filled the screen.

  Two people stood face to face next to a shed. Brand recognized it from a story he’d done on the World’s Fair project. The Mayor had broken ground a year ago while standing in front of the shed. Capone had been there, too. Now, the low wooden structure stood witness to a different kind of travesty. One of the people in the image was Emma Farnsworth, though it looked like she had someone take a keyhole saw to her hair. The other person was Detective Wynes, his mouth twisted into a snarl of rage.

  Chapter 55

  Brand hefted Conroy up, holding him around the waist, and then slipped behind the curtain, letting it fall on the scene of Jameson Crane crying into his lap. In a flash, Brand found his memories of the fair project story and moved behind the city to the yard by the lake. They emerged where he’d first set foot in the yard, only now they were surrounded by mounds of furniture and old automaton parts. A row of heavy canvas tents stood at their right, stretching from Michigan Avenue to the lakeshore. Two bodies were piled in a heap between the tents and the nearest scrap pile. Brand shuffled over to them with Conroy against his hip. Soldiers. One had been stabbed through the heart. The other had cuts under his collar. Little Red’s handiwork.

  “We’d have been in the way,” Brand said to himself as Conroy came around. As he waited for the kid to get his feet under him, Brand reached out with his inner vision, seeking the presence of Emma and the other people near the tree. He found them and made a beeline across the yard. Smoke hung heavy in the air and small fires still burned in places. Whatever had happened here, it was nothing like the neighborhood Brand had left earlier.

  Brand changed course and took them to the lakeshore. He and Conroy followed a path there around the mounds and stacks of scrap and raw materials. At their right, a row of concrete pylons ran the length of the shore. A line of airships hung above the pylons, tethered by chains. Brand kept his eyes peeled for the Vigilance and felt a stab in his chest when she came into view at the end of the line. Her bulk bobbed in the night air beside the empty branches of a wintered tree. A hushed sobbing came to Brand’s ears on the wind, and he thought it was his own voice, broken in sadness at the sight of his ship chained to the earth.

  “You son of a bitch,” Emma sobbed from up ahead, her voice shaking around the words.

  Brand motioned for Conroy to move slow and tucked against a stack of lumber. He crouched as he walked, moving closer to the Vigilance and the scene playing out in her shadow.

  Beneath the ship, Emma Farnsworth stood illuminated by the flames of a burning cross at the edge of a clearing around a tall tree. In the middle of the space an ironwork hound walked a beat back and forth, the gas jet in its snout flickering in the chill night air. Two soldiers and Wynes stood beneath a tree with a pair of negroes. One of the soldiers tied the negros’ hands and then lifted a Tommy gun from beside the tree. He moved to stand by the ironwork hound, which stopped its marching. The soldier faced Emma, holding the Tommy gun on her.

  By the tree, Wynes held a noose in his hand and passed it to a second soldier standing there with him. This man moved to stand in front of the first negro and slipped the rope around the man’s neck.

  A second passed and a gunshot sounded from behind Brand. He saw the ironwork hound explode and felt a wave of heat wash over him that knocked him backwards. Cries of pain and moans spread through the night air. Brand found his feet, looking for Conroy. The kid was up against the lumber pile, frightened but not hurt.

  “Stay here, Conroy,” Brand said and then raced forward to where Emma Farnsworth had been standing.

  She was still there, but sat with her weight on one hip, sobbing and clutching her right arm above the elbow. Blood ran through a tear in the thick coat she wore. Another couple Brand hadn’t seen held each other beside the shed. They kept their faces hidden as if to avoid looking at the scene.

  The soldier who’d had a gun on Emma was now face down in the mud. Flames licked across his scalp like a halo. His helmet and the chopper had ended up a few feet away.

  Back at the tree, the negroes slowly got to their feet. Brand recognized one of the men as Emma’s lover, Eddie Collins. He and the other man leaned on each other and stooped to the side as they rose. The soldier who’d put the noose on Eddie was also down. He rolled side to side, hands to his neck. Brand rushed to him and saw a shard of metal had sliced into his neck. The soldier shook out his final breath as Brand, Eddie, and the other negro looked on.

  Wynes had fared much better than the soldiers. At least, that’s what Brand thought when he saw the man getting to his feet and holding a hand to his face.

  “I think this is where we call it a draw, Wynes,” Brand said.

  Wynes didn’t reply at first. He stood, holding his face and shuddering, and then turned to Brand and dropped his hand. Half of his cheek was missing, along with the eye above it. A bloody empty socket gaped between two shredded eyelids. Wynes roared and charged. A burst from a Tommy gun ripped through the scene and Wynes staggered and fell back. Emma Farnsworth stood and held the Tommy gun on Wynes’ body. She squeezed the trigger a final time. T
he man jerked with each impact, but there was nothing left in him to kill.

  Chapter 56

  Brand watched the Tommy gun slip from Emma’s hands and land in the dirt. Eddie limped in her direction, reaching a hand to her shoulder and pulling her to him as she sobbed and wailed. Hurt though he was, Eddie still held Emma close and let her shake into his chest. Brand let them have their time and turned to the other negro.

  “What happened there? With the hound?”

  “Beats me. Ain’t had my eyes on nothing but that rope ‘round Eddie’s neck. Where’d you come from?”

  “Would you believe I’m a reporter that happened to be passing through?”

  “No, sir, I wouldn’t, but I seen plenty I didn’t want to believe tonight. Name’s Otis, by the way,” the man said, extending his good hand. Brand shook and told the man his name.

  “The radio man, hey? Ain’t that something,” Otis said before turning to pick up the fallen Tommy gun. Brand spun to see if Conroy had moved to join them. He had, and he wasn’t alone.

  A younger boy, maybe ten years old, stood next to Conroy. The second kid wore clothes like the gypsies had, thick gray wool and heavy shoes. He also held a revolver in his left hand.

  “Conroy? You okay there?”

  Behind him, Brand heard a rustling and then a woman’s voice raised in fright. Footsteps raced in his direction, but Brand kept his eyes on the gun in the boy’s grip. Conroy nodded and said he was fine. He was about to introduce the boy when a man and woman came tearing past Brand. The woman swept Conroy into her arms and covered him with a mother’s affection. The man wrapped his arms around them both and they wept together, shivering by the lakeshore. Brand turned to the gypsy boy.

  “Are you the reason we’re out of the soup?”

  The boy nodded and stared up at Brand with fearful eyes.

  “It’s okay, kid. You did. . .you did all right. How about the pea shooter?”

  The boy held it out and Brand accepted it. He opened the cylinder and dumped the pills. Nothing but empty brass hit his palm.

  “Lucky shot,” he said to the kid. “What are you doing out here anyway, with a gun with one bullet and the know-how to plug an ironwork hound in its soft spot?”

  “I was aiming for man. Soldier,” the boy said as his eyes grew wet.

  Brand pocketed the revolver and brought the kid close, letting him cry it out. Whatever got the young gypsy mixed up in this, Brand decided he would get the boy out okay. The Conroys stood at Brand’s left as if waiting. Finally the mother interrupted to thank him for protecting her son.

  “He did all right on his own, ma’am. Kid’s a natural born newshawk.”

  “Well, thank you just the same, Mr. Brand,” she said. The kid’s father shook his hand and they moved away, leaving Brand with the gypsy boy.

  “Where’d you get the gun?”

  “Is dark man’s. He dropped it. In yard.” The boy told Brand about the tents, how he’d been taken prisoner with people from his neighborhood and brought here to work in the yard. He told Brand about the fires, how Emma and Eddie had come to help everyone get away, and how Wynes had his soldiers force the kid to put out the fires. They’d hit him a few times and worked him hard putting out the flames with buckets of water drawn from a pump.

  “My father tells me. Man hits you, he should kill you. If he doesn’t, you stand up, you kill him.”

  “Sounds like war to me,” Brand said. “Maybe your old man has some good ideas, but I don’t think that’s one of them.”

  The boy sniffed at Brand’s objection and got a faraway look. “When woman with sword comes to tent, I think is a dream. She is warrior from stories my father tells me. Woman who fought the Turks when they come.”

  “Where’d she go?” Brand said, sending his eyes through the night for signs of Dana Reynolds.

  “She kills other soldiers, over there,” the kid said, pointing down the lakeshore to the other end of the yard. “Then she leaves.”

  “What about the people? Those tents are empty now.”

  “They go with her. To railroad. But I found gun, and stay here. I should go now,” the kid said and walked away into the yard. Brand watched him go and then raced to catch up, dropping the empty revolver as he went.

  “Hang on. Where’s this railroad? The one underground?”

  The boy nodded. “That one. Yes.”

  Brand put a hand on the kid’s shoulder and flicked the city aside. The boy’s eyes went wide, but he’d seen this trick before and held onto Brand’s hand, clamping it to his shoulder with both of his own. They traveled through Brand’s memories of the tunnels, the cellar in the curio shop, the cellar in the speak, and finally the underground system of rails and handcars that people had used to flee the burning city above.

  They emerged next to a chain of flatcars with a handcar at the end. Gypsies mounted the cars and shuffled around in the weak light cast by lanterns almost burned out. Nobody seemed to notice the newsman and young boy who stepped out of the darkness. If they did, nobody said anything.

  “You’ll be okay?” Brand asked, helping the kid onto a flatcar. The boy nodded and smiled.

  “Thank you,” he said.

  Brand reached back to grab the curtain for his return trip and paused when he heard his name.

  “Good man, Brand,” Dana said. “I knew we could count on you to help. Even if you did wait until the end.”

  “Better late than never, I guess,” he said, sending his sneer across the dim space to where Dana stood by the opposite wall. “Be seeing you around, Miss Reynolds.”

  “Not likely. But stay tuned, hey?”

  Brand had to smirk at that, and then laugh as he finished the line before stepping through the curtain and out of sight.

  #

  Back at the yard, Brand hustled to join the group of people around the burning cross, stepping around the dead soldier in his path. He stopped and picked the pistol off the man’s belt.

  “What happens now?” Brand asked when he’d taken his place beside Emma. Eddie held her against him. Next to him was Otis. The Conroys stayed to the other side and Brand could tell the parents didn’t have kind eyes for Emma’s choice of company, or for the source of warmth that stood between them. Aiden seemed happy enough to be with his folks again and stayed wrapped up in his coat beside his mother.

  Brand was about to break the silence when Emma spoke up.

  “We’re taking your ship, Brand. I’m going to fly us out of this city and to New Orleans.”

  “You?”

  “Yes, me. I learned to fly out at the plant. Dad sent me up with his repair teams. He said I’d be excited by the view, but I think it just got me out of his hair.”

  “So you watched the pilots and helped the repair men, huh?”

  She sniffed at his words. “They showed me how to work the ballast first. Then I asked if I could steer. By the end, they were playing cards and taking naps while I flew us around the plant in between jobs.”

  “Well that’s you and yours settled then. What about the others here?” Brand asked, nodding at the Conroys.

  “They can come with or they can stay here. I don’t care,” Emma said.

  Brand looked through the flickering firelight. “You three up for a ride in that pig?” he said, lifting a finger to indicate the Vigilance. Her nose cone bobbed in a steady rhythm as she fought the chains that held her tethered to the pylons below.

  Aiden’s father spoke up to drown out his wife’s protests. “We’ll come along. But I don’t want my wife to be sharing no quarters with your friends there.”

  “You want to go back into the shed?” Emma spat across the frosty air.

  Brand cut in to stop the pissing contest. “There’s room enough for you to have your own space. You can take my bunk. The
se three can share the other room. It’ll be cramped, but they don’t seem to have a problem with that.”

  “What about you, Mr. Brand?” the kid asked.

  “I’ll camp out in the engine compartment. There’s a mechanic’s cot up there.”

  #

  Emma got Eddie over to the airship with Brand and Otis’ help. The Conroy kid joined them while his parents waited a few steps behind. Brand worked the catch that let the airship ladder unfold to reach ground level. He told the kid to go up first and dig the first aid kit out of the washroom. A minute later, the kid’s face was at the cabin door and he dropped the kit down. Brand pulled out two lengths of bandages and worked up a quick and dirty sling for Eddie and another for Otis. Then he yelled up for the kid to throw down some bedding from one of the bunks.

  With sheets tied around their ribs, Eddie and Otis managed the climb into the cabin. Emma followed, then Brand and finally the Conroys. Eddie and Otis went into the bunk room to rest. The Conroys stayed together at the back of the cabin with their son.

  Emma took the pilot’s seat and fired the motors. They came to life with a coughing rhythm, finally settling into a steady churn that sent warm air through the heating vents and into the cabin.

  Someone had cleaned the cockpit since the last time Emma had been in the ship. The ugly hole in the cockpit glass remained, but Emma didn’t pay it any mind. Her hands moved fast on the dials and levers. She only paused to swivel her head and tell Brand, “Get the damn cables loose or we’re not going anywhere.”

  Brand nodded and palmed the pistol he’d nabbed from the dead soldier. He went to the door and dropped down the ladder. Emma watched through the cockpit glass as Brand pressed the muzzle up against the padlock on the first cable, turned his face aside, and squeezed off a shot. The lock split apart and the cable snapped away, narrowly missing Brand’s head. He went to the second padlock and stood a few feet back this time. It took two shots before he hit the lock, setting the ship free.