The Osiris Curse

by Paul Crilley

  “We need to find Tesla's soul, yes?” said Tweed. “I think that's the only thing that will stop them at this point.”

  “What if it's already up on the airship?” asked Octavia.

  “That's a very strong possibility,” said Molock. “They would keep it close to them, wouldn't they?”

  Tweed frowned. “I don't know. Keep it safe, or keep it close?”

  “We have to find a way up to the airship anyway,” said Elizabeth. “We just keep our eyes open for his soul at the same time.”

  There were four doors leading off from the foyer. Tweed looked at them. “One each?”

  Octavia shook her head. “No way. You'd end up sneaking aboard the Albion by yourself and sailing off without us. We should pair up. I'll keep an eye on you.”

  “Fine.” He pointed at the two doors to the right. “We'll take these. We should meet up back here in an hour?”

  The others nodded.

  “Good. Now remember, if we fail here, then thousands of people will die. So…let's not fail, eh?”

  Octavia and her mother moved aside to hold a low conversation, leaving Tweed and Molock standing awkwardly nearby.

  Tweed watched them, his thoughts going back to his talk with Octavia. “Just so you know,” he said, “I still think you're wrong. Hiding away while you hope to come up with a solution is not in your best interests.”

  “We have thought long about this, Sebastian. Revealing ourselves will only lead to trouble for my people. Keeping ourselves hidden is the path we must follow.”

  Tweed shook his head, exasperated. “Listen to yourself! Doing nothing is why we're in this mess! Doing nothing is what finally drove Sekhem and Nehi to rise up against you! If you had gone to the Queen, or even the Prime Minister, none of this would have happened.”

  “You are correct. None of this would have happened. Because my people would all be dead.” Molock sighed and shook his head. “I do not mean to sound patronizing, but you have the optimism of youth. You think the best of people—”

  “I assure you I don't,” interrupted Tweed. “People are crap. Really, they are. But when it comes to bigger things we can really surprise you.” He shook his head angrily. “I had this exact same conversation with Sekhem back on the airship! You're both the same, you know that?”

  For the first time ever, Molock allowed anger to show through his usually calm demeanor. “We are not the same! How dare you! Those two are going to doom us to a war that will kill us all!”

  “Whereas you're going to hide in the shadows in a move that will kill you all. Same result.”

  Octavia joined them, surreptitiously wiping her eyes. “Ready?” she asked.

  Tweed nodded. “I'm finished here.”

  “As am I,” said Molock. He turned abruptly and walked toward Elizabeth. Tweed hesitated, wondering if he should call him back, but decided against it. He hadn't said anything he didn't believe. What did he have to apologize for?

  Octavia and Tweed had been moving through the complex for about ten minutes and still hadn't come across another living person. The corridors they moved through were chiseled directly out of the rock. The floors were nothing more than metal grills laid over dusty stone. There had been no attempt at prettying anything up.

  “Tesla's soul,” Octavia said slowly.

  “What about it?”

  “If they're using it to somehow build this weapon, shouldn't we destroy it?”

  “No,” said Tweed immediately. “If we do that, we're no better than Chase. We're no better than Sekhem and Nehi. We don't have the right to kill him.”

  “Even if it saves others?”

  Tweed looked at her, serious. “Octavia, who are we to judge who lives and who dies?”

  “Tweed, someone has to. I know you don't like it, but hiding away from the decision—”

  “It's not hiding away,” Tweed snapped. “It's accepting that we have no right to sentence anyone to death.”

  “Some would say it's survival.”

  Tweed shook his head. “No. If there is a choice, if we can discuss it like we're doing now, then it is not survival. It's playing God. Don't you see? That's what caused all this mess in the first place. The Ministry playing God over the Hyperboreans. Then Sekhem and Nehi playing God to get revenge, proclaiming judgment on innocents. We're not like that. That's not who we are.”

  Octavia thought about this. She wasn't sure she agreed with that. If one life could save thousands, surely it was that person's responsibility—that person's duty—to sacrifice him or herself for the greater good? She would expect no less from herself.

  She said as much to Tweed, adding, “I think you're oversimplifying the whole issue.”

  “No. I'm not. That's the trick, you see? They try to make it sound complicated, but it's not. But you are right. Up to a point. It might be a person's duty to sacrifice himself to save others, but it has to be his choice. No one has the right to make that choice for someone else. It has to be done freely.”

  Octavia could see she wasn't going to change his mind. She wasn't sure she wanted to. What he was saying was part of who he was. It was what she liked about him, what drew her to him. He had formulated his own views of right and wrong. And he had to figure out for himself if those views were correct or if they were simply naive. Who was she to try to influence that one way or the other?

  They turned into a corridor, checking any doors they passed. They were all locked. Another corridor, more doors. All of them locked.

  Finally, they found a door that opened. Octavia peered inside. It looked like a workshop of some kind, but it held nothing of interest.

  “This is hopeless. What are we meant to do? Just wander around aimlessly until we stumble on something?”

  “Any other suggestions?”

  Octavia thought about it. “Make our way up top and set fire to the Albion?”

  Tweed brightened at this. “Not bad.” Then he frowned. “Actually, no, I thought we'd use it to escape. I don't fancy being stuck here forever. It's a bit cold, you know?”

  Octavia hadn't thought about that. They did need some form of escape. So destroying the Albion perhaps wasn't the best idea.

  They walked on and reached an intersection between corridors. To the left was a set of stairs. To their right—more doors.

  “Flip a coin?” asked Tweed.

  Octavia was about to answer when she heard footsteps coming down the stairs. They ducked back into the corridor and peered around the corner.

  Two elderly men walked into view. Behind them came Nehi. She was pointing a gun at their backs. The trio didn't pause, but kept descending the stairs. Tweed and Octavia waited, and a few minutes later Nehi reappeared, climbing back up to the floors above.

  “So who were they?” said Tweed.

  “Someone held against their will. Which means they might be willing to help us find Tesla's soul.”

  They headed over to the stairs and peered over the banister. No sign of any guards. They hurried down to the bottom level and found themselves in an empty room with a single, glass-paneled door leading out. There was a small table in the room, and a set of keys hanging on a hook in the wall.

  Octavia peered through the glass. Beyond was a single corridor with prison cells to either side. There didn't seem to be any guards here either, so Octavia opened the door and they approached the first of the cells.

  Inside was one of the men they had just seen being led down the stairs. He looked to be in his sixties, thin grey hair hanging down to his shoulders. He was pacing back and forth, but froze when he saw them.

  “Who…who on earth are you?” he asked, shocked. He took a tentative step forward, gripping the bars. “You are real, aren't you? I've not finally gone mad?”

  “We're real,” said Octavia.

  “Why are you locked up in here?” asked Tweed.

  “To do their bidding,” spat the man. “Why else? You have to get us out of here.”

  “What do you mean do their bidding? Who
are you?” asked Tweed.

  “Dr. Johan Strauss.”

  “You're a doctor?”

  “A scientist. We're all scientists.”

  Octavia stepped back to get a better look at the line of cells. There were another five of them, each holding a single person. Three men and two women. All of them looking haggard and worried.

  “They needed people to help them build their weapon,” said one of the men. He had a thick, German accent. “We were all taken from our homes. Kidnapped. I am Dr. Faber, from Berlin.”

  “Mary Campbell. Edinburgh,” said another. She looked to be younger. Early fifties, perhaps. Her Scottish accent was soft, easy to understand.

  A tiny man whose face was a mass of wrinkles nodded and smiled at them. “Dr. Vladimir Kolotcha, Russia.”

  “Dr. Jake Ampney. Oxford man, myself,” said the youngest of the group. Which wasn't saying much.

  Realization dawned. Octavia remembered the article she had been proofing at The Times the afternoon Tweed returned to Stackpole's house. “The missing scientists.” She turned to Tweed. “Scientists have been disappearing over the past few years, all of them experts in their fields. Another one went missing just last week.”

  Dr. Ampney raised his hand. “That would be me.”

  “And you helped them build that weapon?” asked Tweed angrily.

  “They threatened our families,” snapped Strauss. “What choice did we have?”

  Octavia put a calming hand on Tweed's arm. “What does the weapon do?” she asked.

  “It is a combination of two of Tesla's weapons,” said Dr. Campbell. “His death ray and another that was called the ‘Destroyer of Worlds.’”

  “That sounds fairly ominous,” said Tweed.

  “It is. It is an electromechanical oscillator.”

  Octavia and Tweed looked at her blankly.

  “He never perfected it, but Tesla claimed he could use it to set up vibrations in the crust of the earth that would split the planet in two.”

  Octavia's eyes widened in alarm. “Is that what Sekhem and Nehi are going to do? Use it to…create an earthquake or something?”

  “Not quite”, said Dr. Strauss. “As my colleague said, the weapon attached to the airship is a combination of both. A sort of death ray earthquake machine. Basically, it disintegrates matter. It will eat away at whatever it is pointed at, and the longer it is activated, the quicker its effects will spread. In a matter of minutes it will disintegrate a space a hundred feet wide. Ten minutes, it will devour five miles of the earth. An hour, an entire city will be destroyed.”

  “Ja,” said Kolotcha. “And remember, we're talking five miles wide and five miles deep. It just…eats everything away.”

  “But they could never complete it,” said Campbell. “You see, Tesla put in a safeguard. The machines as he designed them could only be activated by him.”

  “We thought it was safe to build them,” said Ampney. “After all, Tesla would never activate them. We all knew that. We were playing for time, hoping that someone would come and rescue us.” He shook his head. “We didn't realize that Sekhem and Nehi had made other plans.”

  “His soul,” said Octavia. “They can use his soul to activate it?”

  Dr. Campbell nodded. “It is his essence. The key. And now that they have it, they are getting ready to launch. It was the last thing they needed.”

  Octavia and Tweed glanced at each other. So now they knew exactly what Sekhem and Nehi were going to do. They were going to point this ray at London and just…dissolve it to nothing. And with the kind of time frame the scientists were talking about, very few people would be able to escape. Millions would die.

  “Do you know where they keep Tesla's soul?” asked Octavia.

  “You're too late,” said Dr. Campbell. “All the modifications are complete. They're setting sail within the hour. The only thing to do now is stop them before they launch.”

  Octavia tapped her foot thoughtfully. “Is there an armory around here?” she finally asked.

  “One floor up,” said Kolotcha.

  Tweed realized what she was thinking. He grinned at the scientists. “How much do you want to make reparations for what you've all done—what you were forced to do?” he corrected.

  It was Dr. Campbell who answered first. She gripped the bars so hard her knuckles turned white. “Those bastards took me away from my family. My grandchildren think I'm dead. You want help, sonny, you put a gun in my hand and I'll take them on myself.”

  Kolotcha grinned. “I like you, Dr. Campbell. You have the spirit of a Russian bear! Only prettier.”

  Tweed turned his attention to the others. “You all feel that way? Because we have a chance to stop this before it's too late.”

  The scientists all nodded. Tweed ran back to the first room, grabbed the keys, then came back and unlocked the cell doors.

  “Which way?” asked Octavia, as the elderly scientists stepped into the corridor.

  Kolotcha took the lead, heading up the stairs to the next level. He led them around a few twists and turns, passing glass-walled laboratories filled with half-completed hybrids. Another room had condensation running down the glass. It was filled with stainless steel instruments and tables, and a tiled floor that sloped slightly toward a drain. One wall was simply a bank of closed metal drawers. It took her a moment to realize the drawers were large enough to contain bodies, or at least, body parts. She shuddered and averted her eyes.

  “Are those hybrids part of their cult?” asked Tweed.

  “No,” said Dr. Faber. “They are curious things. They obey like automata but still have enough human brain left to adapt and make choices. Very dangerous creatures.”

  The armory was a narrow room lined floor to ceiling with shelves, and crowding these shelves was an arsenal of odd-looking Hyperborean weapons. Octavia didn't bother taking any. She already had her Tesla gun, and she was comfortable with it, but the scientists all crowded around and picked the biggest guns they could find. Tweed grabbed a second pistol, identical to the one he had taken from Temple.

  Vladimir Kolotcha had chosen some kind of rifle that was taller than he was. He had it resting against his shoulders, but it was so heavy it was slowly pushing him backward. As Octavia watched, he finally overbalanced and slowly toppled into the wall, where he rested at an angle.

  “Ja, this one, it might be a bit big,” he said.

  He dropped it and picked up a smaller one, this one the length of his forearm.

  Octavia surveyed their improvised squad. Two seventeen-year-olds and five scientists, none of them below fifty years of age. She sighed and locked eyes with Tweed. But if she thought he was going to share her concerns, she was sadly mistaken. His eyes blazed with excitement.

  “Are you all ready to kick some evil cultist bottom?” he shouted.

  “Damn right!”

  “Da!”

  “Aboot time!”

  “Ja!”

  “Yes!”

  Tweed gave her a thumbs up.

  Octavia groaned. They were all going to die here. She just knew it.

  They left the armory and moved quickly along the corridors, moving up the stairwell to level three. Apparently, there were five levels and then the rooftop where the Albion was moored. Octavia glanced at the others, but none of them seemed to be feeling anything but giddy excitement. Weren't they afraid? She was terrified.

  But then, if she had been kept prisoner for six years, she supposed she'd jump at the chance to get revenge. Fear would be buried beneath a desire for payback.

  But Tweed…She couldn't help staring at him. He was sliding along the walls, peering around the corners, with his guns held out before him for all the world as if he really was Atticus Pope. She hoped he hadn't finally snapped.

  “Tweed,” she whispered fiercely. He didn't acknowledge her. “Hoy. Tweed!” He glanced over his shoulder.

  “What?”

  “You all right?”

  “I'm fine. Why wouldn't I be?”r />
  She checked to make sure none of the others were listening. “You're acting a bit…” She searched for the word.

  “Heroic?”

  “No…”

  “Manly?”

  “Definitely not.”

  “Brave?”

  “No.”

  And then she remembered something. This was sort of how he had been acting that time in the Zeppelin factory, just after they'd been attacked by the Laughing Man and his lightning gun. This was Tweed. This was who he was, this was him being normal.

  “Mental,” she said. “You're acting a bit mental.”

  “Oh.” Tweed shrugged as if this was perfectly ordinary. “You've got to be a bit mental to survive, I reckon.”

  So saying he winked at her and disappeared into the next corridor. The others followed, and after a few minutes they were crouching outside a set of double doors.

  “It opens into a large room,” said Ampney, “but it's been used to dump all the stuff that's been offloaded from the Albion. Lots of boxes and crates.”

  Tweed pushed the doors open a crack with the tip of his gun. Octavia joined him and peered through. Light filtered in from somewhere, but not much. As Ampney had said, there were crates piled everywhere. The floor was strewn with books, ornaments, bottles of wine, clothes, old suitcases.

  “We were struggling with weight,” whispered Dr. Faber from behind her. “We had to offload everything we could.”

  “Ja,” said Strauss. “You should see the other side of the mountain. A pile as high as your Big Ben.”

  Tweed pushed the doors open and entered the room in a crouch, pausing behind a large crate. The others followed and the doors squeaked as they swung closed again.

  Octavia winced, then peered into the room.

  Orange electricity soared past her head and burst the doors from their hinges.

  A second later the room was a brightly lit confusion of exchanging gunfire. Tweed was lying on the floor firing around one side of the create. Kolotcha crouched above him, firing blindly in every single direction, while Ampney, Campbell, and Faber shot from the other side of the crate. Octavia winced at the sudden heat, the smell of burning tin. She grabbed hold of the top of the crate and pulled herself up so she could peer into the room.