Alcatraz

by Brandon Sanderson

  ‘I really need to get going,’ Grandpa Smedry said. ‘I’m late – I don’t suppose we could call it a day?’

  Blackburn screamed in frustration, taking off his Torturer’s Lens and looking at it with an annoyed eye. ‘You!’ he snapped to a guard that I couldn’t see.

  ‘Uh . . . yes, my lord?’ a voice asked.

  ‘Stand right there,’ Blackburn said, putting on the monocle. I sensed another wave of power.

  The guard screamed. I couldn’t see him crumple, but I could hear it – and I could hear the pain, the utter agony, in the poor man’s voice. I cringed, closing my eyes and gritting my teeth against the awful sound as I remembered that brief moment when I had felt Blackburn’s fury.

  I had to work hard to keep myself from fleeing right then. But I stayed. I’ll point out that now, looking back, I don’t consider this bravery – just stupidity.

  The guard stopped screaming, then began to whimper.

  ‘Hmm,’ Blackburn said. ‘The Lens works perfectly. Your Talent is stronger than I had anticipated, old man. But it can’t protect you forever! Soon you’ll know the pain!’

  Bastille suddenly grabbed my arm – she was still watching through the crack beside me. ‘He’s arriving late for the pain!’ she said in an excited whisper. ‘Such power . . . to put off an abstract sensation. It’s amazing.’

  I noted the look of relief in Bastille’s face. She does care, I realized. Despite all the grumbling, despite all the complaints. She really was worried about him.

  ‘What’s going on?’ Sing whispered. He was too big to fit beside the door with the two of us.

  ‘Old Smedry is handling the torture with poise,’ Bastille said. ‘But Quentin looks like he’s had a hard time.’

  ‘Is he babbling?’ Sing asked.

  Bastille nodded.

  ‘Then he’s gone into anti-information mode,’ Sing said. ‘He can engage his Talent so that it translates everything he says into gibberish. He can’t turn it off, even if he wants to – not until it wears off a day later.’

  ‘That’s why he makes such a good spy,’ I realized. ‘He can’t betray secrets – they can’t force him to talk, no matter how hard they try!’

  Sing nodded.

  Inside the room, Blackburn stomped around the table. He grabbed a knife from a rack of torturing implements, then rammed it toward Grandpa Smedry’s leg.

  It missed, sliding just to the side, and Blackburn swore in frustration. He held the knife up, steadied his hand, then carefully plunged it down again.

  This time, it hit Grandpa’s leg and jabbed directly into the flesh.

  ‘Shattered Glass,’ Bastille cursed. ‘The knife is too advanced a weapon – it can get past old Smedry’s Talent.’

  I stared in shock at the cut in my grandfather’s leg. No blood came out, however.

  ‘It’s a good thing I don’t need to go to the bathroom,’ Grandpa Smedry said in a cheerful voice. ‘That would be embarrassing, wouldn’t it?’

  ‘We have to do something,’ Bastille said urgently. ‘He’s powerful, but he can’t hold back the pain – or the wounds – forever.’

  ‘But we can’t fight a Dark Oculator,’ Sing said. ‘Especially not without your sword, Bastille.’

  I stood. ‘Then we’ll have to get him to leave Grandpa alone. Come on!’ With that, I rushed down the hallway. Bastille and Sing followed in a dash.

  ‘Alcatraz!’ Bastille said as soon as we were a safe distance from the torture room. ‘What are you planning?’

  ‘We need a distraction,’ I said. ‘Something that will draw Blackburn away long enough for us to get in and rescue Grandpa Smedry. And I think I know of one.’

  Bastille was about to object, but at that moment Sing tripped. Bastille and I ducked to the side just as a pair of bow-tied, sword-carrying Librarian soldiers came up out of the stairwell ahead. Bastille cursed, dashing toward them with a sudden burst of Crystin speed.

  The stairs they had come up were the very same stairs that we ourselves had come up a few hours before. That meant the door I wanted was—

  I threw my weight against it, pushing open the door and stepping into a room filled with caged dinosaurs.

  ‘Good day!’ said Charles. ‘I see that you have not ended up dead. What a pleasant surprise!’

  ‘Did you bring us something to eat?’ the Tyrannosaurus asked hopefully.

  ‘Better,’ I said, then rushed into the room, touching the cage locks as I moved. Each one my fingers brushed against snapped open, the complicated gears inside breaking easily before my Talent.

  ‘Why, what a good chap you are!’ Charles said. The group of twenty dinosaurs agreed with eager, loud voices.

  ‘I’ve freed you,’ I said. ‘But I need something in return. Can you cause a disturbance downstairs for me?’

  ‘Of course, my good fellow!’ Charles said. ‘We’re excellent at creating disturbances, aren’t we, George?’

  ‘Indeed, indeed!’ said the Stegosaurus.

  With that, I stepped aside, waving eagerly, trying to begin a stampede of undersized dinosaurs. They, of course, filed out of the room in a very gentlemanly manner – for, as everyone knows, all British are refined, calm, and well-mannered. Even if they are a bunch of dinosaurs.

  I followed the group out of the room, trying to whip them into a frenzy – or at least a mild agitation.

  ‘That’s your plan?’ Bastille asked flatly, standing above two unconscious Librarians.

  ‘They’ll make a disturbance,’ I said. ‘I mean, they’re dinosaurs.’

  Bastille and Sing shared a look.

  ‘What?’ I said. ‘Don’t you think it’ll work?’

  ‘You know very little about dinosaurs, Alcatraz,’ Bastille said as the dinosaurs went down the stairs to the first floor.

  We waited. We waited for painful minutes, hiding in the Forgotten Language room. We heard no cried of panic. No yells for help. No sounds of people being chewed up by rampaging bloodthirsty reptiles.

  ‘Oh, for goodness’ sake!’ I said, rushing from the room and running over to the hallway with the broken floor. I got on my hands and knees and peered through the opening, hoping to catch a glimpse of chaos below.

  Instead, I saw the dinosaurs sitting in a group, several stacks of books settled around them. One of them – the Stegosaurus – appeared to be reading to the others.

  ‘Dinosaurs,’ Bastille said. ‘Useless.’

  ‘They are easily distracted by books, Alcatraz,’ Sing said. ‘I don’t think they’re going to help much.’

  ‘Hey!’ I called with an annoyed voice. ‘Charles.’

  The little Pterodactyl looked up. ‘Ah, my good friend!’

  ‘What about the chaos?’ I demanded.

  ‘Done!’ Charles said.

  ‘We each moved six books out of their proper places,’ called George the Stegosaurus. ‘It will take them days to find them all and put them back.’

  ‘Though we did put them into place backward,’ Charles said. ‘You know, so they could be seen more easily. We wouldn’t want it to be too hard.’

  ‘Too hard?’ I asked, stupefied. ‘Charles, these are the people who were going to kill you and bury your bones in an archaeological dig!’

  ‘Well, that’s no reason to be uncivilized!’ Charles said.

  ‘Indeed!’ called a duck-billed dinosaur.

  I knelt, blinking.

  ‘Dinosaurs,’ Bastille said again. ‘Useless.’

  ‘Don’t worry, my Oculator friend!’ Charles called. ‘We gave them a little extra kick! We had Douglas eat the entire science fiction section!’

  ‘Well,’ admitted Douglas the T. Rex, ‘I only ate the “C” section. Honestly – claiming that Velociraptors were the smartest dinosaurs? I knew a Velociraptor in college, and he failed chemistry. Plus, resurrecting a character just because he didn’t die in the movie? Poppycock, I say!’

  I sat back. Bastille had the dignity not to say, ‘I told you so.’ Or, at least, she had the digni
ty not to say it a third time.

  We need another plan. Another plan. Can’t stop to think about the failure. We need to draw the Dark Oculator away. Need to . . .

  I stood, steeling my nerves.

  ‘Another idea?’ Sing asked, clearly a little apprehensive.

  I took off again. Sing and Bastille followed reluctantly. But they hadn’t come up with anything better. My failure with the dinosaurs had come from relying on misinformation. In most books, two dozen rampaging dinosaurs would have been a distraction worthy of even a Dark Oculator’s attention.

  That’s why most books aren’t true. Sorry, kids.

  I dashed back toward the torturing room. The guards still lay unconscious in the hallway where Bastille had left them. I checked the knothole – Blackburn was still there inside, and he had apparently decided to rough up Grandpa Smedry with slaps to the face.

  ‘I think I’ll go for a walk . . .’ Grandpa Smedry said cheerfully.

  ‘Wasing not of wasing is,’ Quentin added.

  I gritted my teeth. Then I pulled the velvet pouch out of my pocket and looked inside.

  ‘Alcatraz . . .’ Bastille said carefully. ‘You can’t defeat him. You might have a powerful Lens, but that’s not everything. Blackburn will be able to deflect that Firebringer’s Lens with his Oculator’s Lens.’

  ‘I know,’ I said. ‘Sing, take these two unconscious men and hide them – with yourself – in the Forgotten Language room.’

  My cousin opened his mouth as if to object, but then paused. Finally, he nodded. He easily lifted the two unconscious men, then left down the hallway.

  ‘Alcatraz,’ Bastille said. ‘I know you want to protect your grandfather. But this is suicide.’

  I waited a few moments for Sing to complete his task. Then I knelt down beside the door and looked through the knothole. Blackburn was raising a mallet, as if to break Grandpa Smedry’s arm.

  ‘You can’t resist forever, old man,’ Blackburn said.

  I activated the Firebringer’s Lens.

  17

  Immediately, the Dark Oculator looked up.

  I smiled, watching Blackburn turn with a confused expression on his face. At that moment, he was sensing a very powerful Oculatory Lens coming in from the hallway outside. He took a step toward the door.

  ‘Now,’ I hissed. ‘Run!’

  Bastille didn’t need further command. She took off down the hallway, as did I. However, she obviously held back so that she didn’t outstrip me.

  I held the Firebringer’s Lens before me, and it spewed forth it’s powerful line of light. I ran on, aiming it at the side of the corridor.

  ‘You’re leading him away!’ Bastille said. ‘You’re using us as bait.’

  ‘Hopefully bait that escapes,’ I said, ducking around a corner, then pausing to wait. The Firebringer’s Lens continued to blast.

  A door slammed in the distance. ‘Smedry!’ a voice bellowed. ‘You can’t run from me! Don’t you realize that I can sense your power?’

  ‘Go!’ I said, taking off at a dash. Within seconds, we were at the section of the corridor with the broken floor.

  ‘Charles!’ I yelled down through the hole. ‘Trouble is coming your way! I’d run if I were you!’

  And then I took the Firebringer’s Lens and tossed it through the hole. It bounced against a few books, then came to rest on the floor, still shooting a piercing-hot laser of heat up into the air, burning the ceiling, threatening to start several of the bookshelves on fire.

  I grabbed Bastille by the arm, tugging her around the corner and into the Forgotten Language room. Sing jumped as we entered. He had – for some reason that he never explained – propped both of the unconscious men in chairs at the desks.

  Anthropologists are funny that way.

  Now, I would like to take this opportunity to point out that I didn’t take the opportunity to point out anything at the beginning of this chapter. Never fear; my editorial comments were simply delayed for a few moments.

  You see, that last chapter ended with a terribly unfair hook. By now, it is probably very late at night, and you have stayed up to read this book when you should have gone to sleep. If this is the case, then I commend you for falling into my trap. It is a writer’s greatest pleasure to hear that someone was kept up until the unholy hours of the morning reading one of his books. It goes back to authors being terrible people who delight in the suffering of others. Plus, we get a kickback from the caffeine industry.

  Regardless, because of how exciting things were, I didn’t feel comfortable interjecting my normal comments at the beginning of this chapter. So, I shall put them here instead. Prepare yourself.

  Blah, blah, sacrifice, altars, daggers, sharks. Blah, blah, something pretentious. Blah, blah, rutabaga. Blah, blah, something that makes no sense whatsoever.

  Now back to the story.

  (And whoever put in that cliff-hanger at the end of the last chapter needs to be reprimanded. It’s growing quite late here, and I really should be getting to bed, rather than writing this book.)

  I crouched inside the Forgotten Language room with Bastille and Sing. I kept my Oculator’s Lenses off, hoping that without them I wouldn’t have as strong an aura. Sure enough, watching under the door, we saw a dark shadow pass by, and I felt a slight surge of power as an activated Oculatory Lens passed by. (Fortunately, Blackburn didn’t appear to have a Tracker’s Lens of his own.) His shadow didn’t stop to check the Forgotten Language room, but instead continued on toward the stairwell.

  ‘We have very little time,’ I said, looking back at the other two.

  We burst from the room and ran back toward the torture chamber. By the time we arrived, I was feeling a little out of breath. Having never had to rescue anyone from torture before, I wasn’t accustomed to so much running. Fortunately, Sing wasn’t exactly in shape either, and so I didn’t feel too bad lagging behind Bastille.

  Once I reached the guard chamber, I noticed Bastille standing beside the door with the peephole. She gave the handle a good rattle. ‘Locked,’ she said.

  ‘Move aside,’ I said, walking up to the door. I rested a hand on the lock, jolting it with a bit of Breaking Talent. Nothing happened.

  ‘Glass lock,’ I said. I moved my hand up to the door’s hinges, but they resisted too.

  Bastille cursed. ‘The whole door will be warded against your Talent. We’ll have to try to break it down manually.’

  I eyed the thick wooden door with a skeptical eye. Then, from behind me, there was a click. I turned to see Sing leveling one of the biggest, baddest handguns I’d ever seen. It was the kind of gun that took most men two hands to hold – the type of gun that used bullets so big that they could have doubled as paperweights.

  Sing pulled out another gun, identical to the first, in his other hand. Then he took aim at the door handle – which sat directly between Bastille and me.

  ‘Oh, put those antiques away,’ Bastille said testily. ‘This isn’t the time for – Gak!’

  This last part came as I grabbed her by the shoulder, yanking her with me as I took cover behind a table.

  Sing pulled the triggers.

  Wood chips sprayed across the room, mixing with shards of dark black glass. The booming sound of gunshots echoed in the small chamber – or, at least, the booming sound of three gunshots echoed in the small chamber. By the time Sing fired the fourth shot, I’d been deafened and couldn’t tell whether or not the rest of the shots made any noise.

  I couldn’t hear any trees fall either.

  When it was over, I peeked out from behind my table. Bastille remained stunned on the floor beside me. The door stood shattered and splintered, the remnants of its handle and lock hanging pitifully, surrounded by bullet holes. As I watched, the broken, bullet-shattered lock finally dropped to the floor, and the door quietly swung open – as if in surrender.

  Now, after all our discussions of ‘advanced’ weapons and the like, you probably weren’t expecting the guns to do much good. I cert
ainly wasn’t. One thing to remember is this: Primitive doesn’t always mean useless. An old flintlock pistol may not be as advanced as a handgun, but both could kill you. Sitting there, I realized why Sing was insistent upon bringing the guns along, and why Grandpa Smedry had let him do so.

  It seems to me that some people underestimate good, old-fashioned Hushlander technology a little too much. It was good to see something from my world prove so effective. Locks made from Oculator’s Glass might be resistant to physical damage, but they certainly aren’t completely indestructible.

  ‘Nice shooting,’ I said.

  Sing shrugged, then said something.

  ‘What?’ I asked, still feeling a bit deaf.

  ‘I said,’ Sing said, speaking louder, ‘even antiques have their uses every once in a while. Come on!’ He waddled over to the door, pushing it open the rest of the way.

  Bastille stumbled to her feet. ‘I feel like a thunderstorm went off inside my head. Your people really use those things on the battlefield?’

  ‘Only when they have to,’ I said.

  ‘How can you hear what your commanders are saying?’ she asked.

  ‘Uh . . . helmets?’ I said. The answer, of course, didn’t make any sense. But I didn’t care at the moment. I rose to my feet, rushing after Sing into the room. Inside, we found one guard on the ground, unconscious from Blackburn’s use of the Torturer’s Lens. Grandpa Smedry still lay tied to the table, Quentin in his chair.

  ‘Alcatraz, lad!’ Grandpa Smedry said. ‘You’re late!’

  I smiled, rushing to the table. Bastille saw to Quentin, cutting the ropes that tied him to the chair.

  ‘The manacles on my wrists are made of Enforcer’s Glass, lad,’ Grandpa Smedry said. ‘You’ll never break it. Quickly, you have to leave! The Dark Oculator sensed you using the Firebringer’s Lens!’

  ‘I know,’ I said. ‘That was intentional. We distracted him with the Lens, then came in to get you.’

  ‘You did?’ Grandpa Smedry said. ‘Whooping Williams, lad, that’s brilliant!’