Power Under Pressure (The Society of Steam)

by Andrew P. Mayer

  “You saw Viola,” Jenny said matter-of-factly.

  “I’m sorry,” Sarah said, and she meant it. It seemed that Viola had an uncanny knack for twisting moments of closeness into uncomfortable encounters. “She’s lost her mind, I think.”

  “Maybe more than that.” Jenny turned to look in the direction where she had run off and frowned. “It’s a shame. You and she are more alike than either of you would ever be able to admit.” Her words trailed off at the end, almost as if she was simply reciting an old saying.

  Sarah furrowed her brow. “Do you think I’m mad, as well?”

  “What?” The maid replied almost dreamily. Then, in an instant, she snapped back to reality. Jenny looked at Sarah sternly and waved a dismissive hand at her. “Don’t be so sensitive, girl. One minute you’re perfectly happy to consider yourself free of your responsibilities to anyone else in the world, and the next you’re complaining that I might compare you to someone who has managed to build a life where she doesn’t have any responsibility for anything.”

  Sarah could feel herself being put back on the defensive. Jenny’s crushing descriptions were legendary amongst the staff of the Stanton mansion, and only Mr. O’Rourke seemed to always have a ready retort for her sly barbs. Having grown up around intelligent women for most of her life had given her a few tricks of her own. “All right, Mrs. Farrows. So maybe you don’t think I’m a madwoman, but I think it’s safe to say that Viola and I have parted ways at this point.”

  “Oh, you’re both definitely mad,” Jenny replied with a devilish smile. “You’re also both stubborn, willful, and so cocksure and full of pride that neither of you can recognize that the moment when you feel the most alone is also the moment that you most need to rely on others.”

  Sarah tried to reply, but instead found herself looking sheepishly down at her shoes. Perhaps the maid had a point.

  Sarah looked up at her and smiled. “Thank you, Jenny. Because if I’m going to fight this madman, I’ll need my good friends by my side.” She’d closed the trap. “I’m glad to know you’ll be there with me.”

  Jenny frowned. “All right, Sarah. You know I’m not going to abandon you. But I’d like us all to come out of this alive.”

  Sarah nodded, and then felt a sudden pressure of a different kind. “Thanks, Jenny.”

  “Now,” Jenny said, rising up, “I need to go out to the privy.” After a few steps away she stopped and turned back to face Sarah. “But I still haven’t promised to join you on your crusade.” Just before she reached the curtains in front of the exit, she stopped again. “And if you’re going to try recruiting people for your mad schemes, you may need to consider wearing something more than a housecoat.”

  After a few more steps she stopped and turned around for a third time, cutting off Sarah just before she started to reply. “And while you’re considering what you’re going to do, there are plenty of chores around this house. That’ll keep you busy while your Italian friend tries to put Humpty Dumpty back together again.”

  Sarah opened her mouth to tell Jenny off, but then simply let out an exasperated sigh as the maid danced out the door. She wondered why it was that her father had wanted so badly to become the leader of the Paragons if this was how everyone acted when you asked for their help? “Maybe he didn’t bother trying to lead maids and madmen,” she muttered as she flopped back onto the couch. But it was a question Sarah would need to answer properly if she was going to face Lord Eschaton.

  What was it that allowed some people to lead while others followed? And worse still, what if that particular instinct, whatever it was, was something she didn’t have?

  Sarah sighed again, a bit more theatrically this time, stood up, and then grabbed a wrinkled dress that she had pulled out of a closet and then thrown over the back of one of the nearby chairs. It was cut from heavy black cloth, and she was convinced that the previous owner of the shapeless and dusty thing had once been a nun. Still, it was clothing. Sarah heard the sound of feet running back toward the room.

  Sarah had managed to wriggle herself far enough through the dress that she could poke her head out through the top of it by the time Jenny returned.

  Something had given the maid quite a fright. Sarah had only ever seen her so flustered once before, and that had been over a precious vase that Nathaniel had managed to knock down when roughhousing with another boy. “What is it Jenny?”

  “Please. You need to come see this,” Jenny said in a discomfortingly serious tone. Jenny snatched up her hand and began to drag her outdoors. “There’s something very bad happening in Manhattan.”

  As she parsed the words, Sarah let her resistance give way and allowed Jenny to pull her out into the daylight. Even before Sarah’s eyes could finish adjusting it was obvious what had frightened her friend: a heavy black cloud hung menacingly above the empty blue city sky. Even from this distance she could see that it was roiling in a most unnatural way.

  “You see? It looks almost like one of those horrible sea beasties that your father liked to eat.” Years ago Alexander Stanton had once consumed octopus for dinner. The unfortunate monster had been a gift from an Asian dignitary who had visited their home. It was the only time that Sarah could remember her father eating any kind of seafood that didn’t have a tail. It had also, apparently, scarred Jenny for life. “What do you think it could be?”

  Sarah studied the roiling black cloud for a moment longer. Although she had never seen such a thing before, it still seemed somehow familiar. She was unsure whether or not she should say her conclusions out loud. “I think,” Sarah said with a degree of certainty in her voice that was shocking even to her, “that Lord Eschaton has just shown us the next step in his plan.” And as she said the words the cloud seemed to collapse, almost as if it could hear her and was trying to escape. It dropped out of the sky, falling onto the city as a sudden black rain.

  “What should we do?”

  For a moment Sarah wondered whether it wasn’t already too late. If this was the first step in Eschaton’s plan then their best action might be to run away from the city as fast and as far as they could. “Emilio should be in his lab. Go tell him what’s going on.”

  “What are you going to do?” Jenny asked her.

  Stantons didn’t run, especially from villains. Sarah would face down her fate with her fists swinging. And, if she could help it, she wouldn’t do it alone. “I need to get something first.” Sarah followed the maid back into the house, taking a right turn when Jenny turned left toward the workshop.

  Although she mostly slept on the parlor couch, there was still another room in the house that was considered hers. It was the same one in which she woke after she and Emilio had fallen out of the sky from le Voyageur’s balloon.

  For the first few weeks she had thoroughly enjoyed having such a spacious, open room in this ridiculous ramshackle house. It was a far cry from the cramped urban spaces of the family mansion, and she had been ecstatic to live someplace where she could leave a few things around without them immediately being pounced on by an endless parade of overeager, disapproving servants. But once it began to settle in that this house was now her new home, the excitement had quickly soured. Sarah would wake up in the morning finding herself feeling lost and lonely. And in the dark the broken statues and hanging curtains had seemed to take on a life of their own.

  The main room was larger, but less cluttered. It also seemed more friendly and open. She trusted Emilio, if not Viola. It hadn’t been her intention to make the sofa her new bed; the first few times she had fallen asleep on the overstuffed settee, she had woken up after a few hours and dragged herself back to her room, chastising herself for dozing off in such a vulnerable position. But after a time she realized that no one really cared where she slept, nor did they have any desire to disturb her slumber in the parlor. It wasn’t long before Sarah let herself spend the entire night there. Other than Jenny’s disapproval this morning, there had been no consequences.

  Still, even afte
r she had stopped using “her room” as a bedroom, Sarah found that there were some advantages to having one’s own private space, no matter where she actually slept. Crossing over to the large bed, Sarah dropped to the floor and reached down to retrieve her battered leather suitcase from underneath the mattress. She pulled it out and landed it on the bed in a single smooth motion, then flipped open the cover to reveal what was inside.

  Unlike when she’d lived in her small apartment in Manhattan, Tom’s metal heart was no longer wrapped in paper. Instead she had been able to find a long bolt of dark purple velvet that she had fashioned into swaddling to protect the device.

  Emilio asked her for use of the heart from time to time as he attempted to reanimate the mechanical man. Sarah was always happy to let him take it for experimentation as long as she was present. But after nearly losing the heart permanently after the incident at the theater, she was no longer comfortable letting anyone take it completely out of her hands. Instead she would stand there with him while Emilio tried to bring it—and Tom—back to life. She needed to be sure that this time there would be no disasters or mistakes.

  But, far from another disaster, so far none of Emilio’s experiments had managed to show any signs that he could conjure the mechanical man back to life. She flipped the lid closed and said a silent prayer. Sarah wasn’t sure that God would be interested in the fate of a mechanical man, but if Sarah had a single powerful belief when it came to spiritual matters, it was that it could never hurt to ask for divine inspiration in moments of need. Eschaton was on the move, and their time was running out. If God wasn’t on her side, there were much bigger problems with the universe than she thought.

  Sarah wedged the case awkwardly under one arm. Looking around the floor, she spotted a pair of sturdy, well-worn red slippers. She slipped her feet into them and headed for the workshop on the other side of the house. When she walked through the door into the ramshackle space, the light inside was blindingly bright. As her eyes adjusted to the glare, she could see that Emilio had thrown open the door of the old train car to let in the sun. He was staring out the door through a large spyglass that he had focused squarely on the city. “Are you sure of what you saw, Mrs. Farrows?” Emilio said. “A black cloud?”

  “She’s quite sure,” Sarah said, and walked up to an empty space on one of the workbenches. She placed the suitcase on it with a heavy thump.

  “Hello . . .” Emilio said cautiously. Sarah frowned. In the weeks since the incident, her once-dashing Italian suitor had seemed to retreat inside of himself. Between what had happened to Viola and his obvious lack of interest, Sarah felt unsure what her current feelings were toward the man. Where once he seemed unstoppable and exotic, now he was quiet and staid, like a nervous boy at a ball. He almost entirely refused to make eye contact with her.

  As first she thought that perhaps he had simply grown shy, but remembering his performance with the vermouth, Sarah harbored a suspicion that when it came to matters of the heart, Emilio’s true nature was far more that of a libertine than a retiring gentlemen. And since the theater he had managed to keep any inappropriate urges so deeply under wraps that another woman might have doubted he had ever had them to begin with. Truth be told, if it hadn’t been for the evidence of the kisses they had shared, she would have never known just how much he was attracted to her. She had begun to suspect that Emilio blamed her for the damage that had been done to his sister. And who was to say that it wasn’t her fault?

  As Sarah flipped open the lid, she turned to her right and saw what looked like a half-completed manikin on the stand next to her. “Is this Tom’s new body?”

  Jenny turned to look at it as well, and scrunched up her face. “It looks more like a harp with delusions of grandeur.” If there was one thing that Sarah could rely on from her friend, it was a dismissive attitude when it came to anything mechanical or technological. Jenny didn’t mind machines, but she had a habit of seeing them as a one might a feral cat or untrained dog—always ready to strike when least expected.

  From the darkness there was a hiss, and Viola melted out of the shadows. The girl dragged closed the squealing train car door, shutting out much of the daylight with a painful crash. She turned around with a menacing look in her eyes, and somehow seemed to be glaring at both Sarah and Jenny simultaneously. “Don’t make fun of him. I think he’s beautiful.” Viola marched over, wrapped her hands around the inanimate thing’s neck, and gave it an almost-lustful hug. “He’s my favorite man.”

  Sarah tried to ignore Viola’s disturbing display and took a closer look at Tom’s body. As her eyes traced out its form, Sarah realized that this time the mad girl was right: what Emilio had created was beautiful. There was also something strangely familiar about it, although it took her a moment to place it. “Why does this make me think of the Frenchman’s balloon?”

  Emilio smiled and nodded as he came up to her, his eyes finally meeting hers, if only for a fraction of an instant. “Ah, yes!” he said with a tone of slight embarrassment. “You noticed!” His last few words even seemed to have a hint of the old Emilio’s intensity. “I borrowed some of his techniques. At first I thought they were ridiculous, but then . . .”

  “I’m not a complete fool,” Sarah said, cutting him off. “But le Voyageur was a dangerous madman. Is it safe to give Tom a body designed after him, especially given what happened last time?”

  Viola lifted up her head and smiled a grim smile. The scars pulled tight; a vivid reminder of the consequences of awakening Tom in the wrong body. “Poor little rich girl . . . I think that maybe all the men in your world have been mad for a very long time and now you’re just starting to notice.” The Italian girl plucked one of the wires in the manikin’s shoulder, and it let out a clear musical tone.

  Sarah felt her face flush. Once again the Italian girl had managed to wind her up, but she was not about to get into another argument about men, mad or otherwise, with Viola Armando. Their fights had been troubling enough before the girl had lost her mind. There seemed to be no possible benefit in trying to convince her of anything now. “And it isn’t over yet,” Sarah said.

  Emilio shook his head. “No, not yet—but very close. Another few days.”

  “You didn’t see what was up in the sky, but I did,” Sarah pulled the mechanical heart closer to her chest. “We’re out of time, Emilio. If Eschaton feels that he can attack in broad daylight, then he must be very close to completing his plan.”

  “Maybe it was an accident. . . . Maybe it was not him.” Emilio paused and stared straight at the heart in her hands. “Is New York. Things happen all the time.”

  Sarah brushed her hand along the manikin’s metal frame. It was almost shockingly smooth and cool under her fingertips. Perhaps waiting for Emilio to finish was the right thing to do. “It was him. I know it,” she said. The words were as much for her own benefit as they were for anyone else’s.

  But the body didn’t even have a new face yet. . . . Could they bring him back without one? It wasn’t like Tom had ever actually needed eyes to see, or even a mouth to speak. . . . But time didn’t seem to be a luxury they had anymore. “I’ve spent my entire life around adventurers and villains. I can tell when they’re doing their work.”

  Emilio rubbed his hands together. “We tried before, Sarah. It was no good. What do I do differently now?”

  Sarah thought of Darby’s failed experiments with the Alpha Element, and held the heart out toward Emilio. “Try it now.”

  Jenny looked shocked. “Sarah, he’s already told you that he needs more time.”

  “I heard him, Jenny, but we’re running out of options and time. He just needs to try.”

  Emilio looked up at her, but made no movement in her direction. She tried to look into his eyes, but all she saw in the small glimpse she could get was the same dark cloud of retreat that had been smothering him ever since that night his sister had been hurt. If they were going to change their luck, she would have to be the one to do it. “Emilio . .
. you have to.”

  “I don’t have to do anything.”

  Sarah was shocked. Was she the only one here with any spirit left? But before she could reply, Emilio spoke again. “All right. We try,” he said with a weary nod. “So everyone move out of the way!”

  The women stepped away from the manikin. Emilio popped open a latch on the metal frame, then grabbed the top of the machine’s rib cage and pulled. The front of the metal chest swung open as a single piece, revealing the mechanical workings within. The steel had all been polished to a silvery gleam, the light reflecting off of every edge. What Emilio did next almost made Sarah gasp out loud: reaching into the cavity, he pulled on the ring that he had designed to hold the heart in place. Where Tom’s heart had previously been locked deep into the cavity of his body, for his new incarnation Emilio had created an ingenious swinging armature that slid smoothly out from the center of the mechanical man’s chest and locked into place with a satisfying click once it was fully extended.

  “All right, now his heart.” Sarah held it out, and Emilio took it delicately from her hands and placed it into the platform. Whereas in Darby’s version, Tom’s heart had been locked into position with numerous screws, this new device was more of a harness with a series of spring-loaded clamps that held the metal sphere in place gently but firmly. Once Emilio had finished placing it into position, the metal sphere seemed to be almost floating in the air. Sarah felt a warm tingle of emotion that ran through her from head to toe.

  Looking at Emilio she recognized that it was a feeling of attraction for the man that she hadn’t had in a long time. There was, she had to admit, something about him that she found undeniably compelling—so similar to Darby in his skills, and yet so different in his approach. Less skilled, but more wild and alluring.