Every Wind of Change

by Frank Tuttle

  But it is also true that no band of Tirls has yet made an attempt.

  I remain,

  Mugglesworth Ovis

  15

  Meralda woke to find the chamber empty, and the circular hatch open.

  She leaped to her feet. “Mug!” she called. “Donchen!”

  Mug sailed through the opening. “You’re awake.”

  “Where is everyone?” Meralda asked. She already regretted her haste in rising; the aches and pains brought on by her fall, coupled with her night sleeping on cold metal, left her stiff and sore.

  “Out performing hilariously awkward morning ablutions,” replied Mug. “Mrs. Primsbite is particularly vexed. It’s probably a good thing the creators of this place didn’t hear her comments regarding the lack of bathrooms.”

  “Is Donchen still limping?”

  “Hiding it well, but he’s hurt worse than he’s admitting.” Mug set his flying cage down at Meralda’s feet and turned most of his eyes toward her. “Mistress, what are we going to do?”

  “I don’t know, Mug.”

  “Skoof is out seeing if the generous tree he spotted his last time here has repaired itself. We won’t starve if it has. The crows and I flew out for miles in every direction, and there’s no sign of a bug army. But I’m afraid that’s the only good news I have, and neither item gets us any closer to home, does it?”

  Meralda walked to the open hatch. Beyond it was the perpetual twilight and dim lights scattered about the wreckage.

  She studied the piles and ranks of broken machinery. “Nothing here works?”

  Mug joined her at the portal. “Skoof claims most of the working parts were carried away right after the war. Fat lot of good it did the survivors. But I still see lots of lights, Mistress. Not all of them are the glowing jelly critters. What are you thinking?”

  Meralda shrugged. “I think I don’t care to remain here one moment longer than I must.” She paced. “One. We can see our home spoke. We need only follow the yellow path, across the Hub, to the entrance to our spoke.”

  “Right through the army of flesh-eating bugs, but yes, do go on.” Mug’s eyes swiveled to follow Meralda.

  “Two. The presence of the path marker means our spoke is still functional. Isn’t that what Skoof said?”

  “It is,” said Mug. “Well, he said probably functional.”

  “Three. We must therefore contrive a method to either avoid or defeat the Mag, reach our spoke, and then go home.”

  “Pray contrive. I would like to add, Mistress, that there may be another way home, albeit your plan is probably the better one.”

  “Another way?” asked Meralda, halting.

  “The Hang voidships. I mentioned them to Skoof. He says the Hub might still recognize approaching vessels and allow them entry. Of course, we have no idea if any of the Hang survived.”

  “Do you know where the Hang will enter if they do make it this far?”

  “That’s a bit of a problem, Mistress. Apparently, the main docking station was destroyed. Skoof isn’t sure which of the smaller docks might still work – so the Hang could pop up anywhere. But that’s not the worst of it, I’m afraid. You see, if any of the Hang ships do make it, the Mag could use them to fly back home. Where they’d eat everything in sight before we could stop them.”

  “How many of these Mag are there?”

  “Doesn’t matter,” Mug said. “Skoof says even one of them, if they land on a world with food and water, can turn into hundreds in just a few days. Millions in a few weeks.”

  “We can’t let that happen. I wish I’d never decoded that infernal song.”

  “Not your fault, Mistress. Anyway, I doubt any of the poor Hang make it. Or manage to signal the Hub if they do.”

  Meralda had no answer. Her bladder ached, though, and she knew that however distasteful, she’d be forced to begin her day without a bathroom, a washcloth, or a decent cup of coffee.

  “I’m going to need a workshop,” she said. “Tools. Equipment. A chair of some sort.”

  “Skoof said the Gow set up a lab, trying to cobble together a way home. Not sure if they used chairs, though. I gather they had six legs.”

  “Do you know where it is?”

  “Not far,” Mug said. “Haven’t been inside. The door was too heavy. You could manage it, though.”

  “Good. I will not simply sit here and waste away. But there’s something I need to do before we visit this place. Wait here.”

  “Where are you going, Mistress?”

  “To engage in hilariously awkward ablutions,” she replied. “Alone.”

  “That’s not a good idea, you know.”

  “It’s a good day for bad ideas,” replied Meralda, as she stepped outside.

  “Can’t argue with that.” Mug waited until Meralda was halfway down the ladder before he too sailed out into the dark.

  The door to the Gow workshop was merely a bent scrap of metal leaning against the curved hull of what Meralda imagined was a flying machine of some sort.

  Only half of the saucer-shaped craft was intact. One entire side was missing, neatly sliced away by forces Meralda could only imagine. The exposed sections along the cut drooped, and here and there melting metal had formed monstrous drips that froze in place, like wax from a neglected candle.

  Mug motioned to the red X marked in paint on the makeshift door. “I’m told that was the Gow sign for safety. We should be able to go anywhere we see that. The Gow were biologically similar to us. Except for all the legs, I suppose.”

  Meralda grasped the metal and pulled it aside.

  The interior of the craft was dark. Meralda stepped inside, holding her hands out before her.

  “Lights,” she said, out of habit. The space remained dark, and Mug chuckled. “Wish it were that easy, Mistress. Should be a switch of some sort low and to your left.”

  Meralda bent, running her hand along the hull. She found a protrusion, a round knob of sorts, and she worked it until it moved.

  One by one, a series of bright blue lights flared to life. They revealed a long, narrow hall flanked by low-set tables and bank after bank of strange machines.

  “Oh dear,” Mug said, darting ahead. “I suppose that’s the last Gow. Skoof mentioned him. Still at his workstation, poor devil.”

  At the last table, its long segmented body slumped and still, was a figure.

  “They did have six legs,” Mug said. “I wish we could at least bury the fellow. Seems a shame just to leave him here.”

  Meralda approached the dead Gow.

  It was covered in beautiful blue feathers. A crest ran along its beaked face, all the way to its stubby tail. The front set of limbs had hands, each with six long blue fingers. The other limbs ended in shoes, which were not that different from the supple black dress shoes Donchen favored.

  The Gow’s eyes were gone, long turned to dust. They had been huge, Meralda realized, gazing on the empty skull. Owlish, probably.

  “I am so sorry you never made it home,” she said. “I hope you will forgive our intrusion here.”

  “He’s a bit dead, you know. Well past caring about trespassing.”

  “Hush,” Meralda’s her gaze fell to the machines and objects scattered about the workstations. “Did Skoof happen to mention what they were trying to do?”

  “He did. Because I asked. None of it made much sense, Mistress. Gow magic – or Gow technology, I’m still not sure which was which – was very different from ours. All I’m sure about is that they were trying to get home.” Mug glanced at the hollow-eyed corpse.

  Meralda picked up the nearest object. It was a single shaft, terminated on both ends by a mirrored half sphere. There were no markings, no switches, no apparent means of activation, no clue as to the device’s function.

  Meralda’s heart sank. She looked up and down the rows of silent, dark machines, and she knew, deep in her heart, she might spend a lifetime trying to turn a single one of them on, and another lifetime determining just what the th
ing did.

  “This isn’t going to work,” she said, glancing at the silent, still figure beside her.

  “We’ve got to try.”

  Meralda turned away from the dead Gow. “That’s not what I meant. We don’t need to try and repair the Hub. We don’t need to repair a broken spaceship.”

  “We don’t?”

  “No. We just need a way to get from here to our spoke. Didn’t Skoof say all the spokes stopped working, after the battle?”

  “He did.”

  Meralda put down the alien device. “But we saw paths light up. Presumably, that means ours will function.”

  “And draw the entire Mag army right toward us, but yes, possibly.”

  “Then we need to find, somewhere in all this…junk. A vehicle. Something we can use to either fly over or push through the bugs. Just how large is this Hub, Mug?”

  “About eighty miles wide. We’re close to the center.”

  “We need only travel half that, and reach our spoke,” Meralda said. “We don’t need a voidship. We just need to go forty miles. Somehow.”

  “That is a bold concept,” Skoof said. He clambered through the opening and trotted toward Meralda and Mug. “However, what I assume was a weapon employed during the first moments of the conflict incapacitated every piece of high technology parked on the Hub.”

  “You survived,” Mug noted.

  “I am heavily shielded,” Skoof replied. “Even so, I was affected. I am unable to determine the duration of my incapacitation.”

  “You say all high technology was affected,” said Meralda. “What about simpler machines? Were they destroyed as well?”

  “Nothing useful functioned after the conflict,” Skoof replied. “The Gow inspected hundreds – thousands – of the craft. None were deemed suitable for restoration.”

  “What about the ones they ignored?” Mug asked. “The less advanced machines. Any of them around?”

  Skoof tilted his dome. “My conversations with the Gow do indicate a lack of interest in primitive craft. Although I doubt they fared any better than the rest.”

  “Where might I find these primitive machines?” asked Meralda. “Is there any organization here?”

  “None,” Skoof said. “I am unaware of how the derelict craft even came to be collected here. I assume it was some mechanism of the Hub. Cleaning up after a disaster, I suppose. I was non-functional when this took place.”

  Mug sighed. “So we search, not knowing which machines can kill just by touch, or by standing too close. Wonderful.”

  Skoof raised a dainty silver leg. “Not necessarily. There is a tool – ah, here it is.” Skoof trotted halfway down the tables. He halted and picked up a box. “This is what the Gow used to determine which craft still emitted dangerous radiation, and which were safe.” He walked to Meralda and handed her the device.

  “How does it work?” she asked, inspecting it.

  “It will warn you verbally if danger is present.”

  “We don’t speak Gow,” Mug said.

  “If it speaks at all, hasten away. As long as it is silent, you are safe.”

  Mug flew close to the box, turning his eyes upon it. “It still works?”

  “It does.”

  “Is there only one?” asked Meralda.

  Skoof scampered about the workplace. “If I recall, there are three,” he said. “Ah yes. Here are the other two.”

  He snatched up an identical pair of devices.

  “We can split into teams,” Mug said. “Search the things the Gow ignored. Maybe there’s something here we can use after all.”

  Outside, the voice in the flickering sky boomed.

  “Let’s gather the others,” Meralda said. “Time to get to work.”

  16

  Mister Mug’s Musings, Tuesday, January 18th, 1971

  Wonders and terrors, gentle readers.

  Wonders and terrors.

  Two weeks have passed since my last entry. We measure the passage of time now using Donchen’s pocket watch, and we mark the days with scratches upon a scrap of some flexible metal. Our little band has settled into a routine now, a routine that we hope will one day see us home.

  Donchen and I take one of the Gow speaking machines and set out each morning, searching for anything that might be of use to Mage Meralda. Mrs. Primsbite and Miss Bekin do the same. The crows patrol the unsettled sky. I dread the day the Mag finally dare the shadows of our anomaly.

  I fly where I am most needed. Mage Meralda remains in the old Gow workshop, trying to make sense of the artifacts we scavenge. Reardon emits unsavory odors and barks at what I presume are restless ghosts.

  A stunted generous tree supplies our food and drink. The lighting in the Gow workshop has kept me from wilting away. Our basic needs are met but were it not for the marvels we discover daily, I fear we would soon lose that most precious of commodities, hope.

  The craft and remains of what Skoof calls the ‘more advanced’ travelers are usually so alien as to be incomprehensible. Some still emit faint glows, or make odd noises, but they are simply the damaged relics of long-dead voyagers, useless to even the Mag.

  But what the Gow overlooked, we have made some use of. Already, Meralda has succeeded in creating crude but workable batteries. She has fashioned a thaumeter from the wreckage of a wooden spaceship – a spaceship that used flying coils to propel itself. She has constructed a compass, of sorts, that should allow us to navigate the Hub should we leave the anomaly.

  We have thus far identified a dozen wrecks that may yet reveal objects of value. There is the cylindrical wooden spacecraft I mentioned. There is another, this one fashioned from steel, which appears to have been driven entirely by a bizarre mechanical contrivance that somehow produced usable thrust. Meralda thinks that engine is our best hope now of raising a ship, but the physical damage to the vessel is considerable.

  The other craft of interest contains familiar electrical and even thaumaturgical systems. The engines are ruined, of course, but Meralda believes some of the parts may still be salvageable.

  Sadly, as our numbers are small, we have no means to dismantle the gargantuan devices strewn about us. But I have complete faith in my Mistress; if anyone can see us home, it is Meralda.

  Skoof holds nightly lectures on the history and use of tripping wheels. It is hard to believe that while we toiled and struggled on our fair green world, the skies were teeming with aliens of every description, wandering to and fro across time and space via these mysterious wheels. Meralda still claims to disbelieve that Skoof’s knowledge of our tongue proves we, as a people, once traveled the tripping wheels ourselves. But I’ve seen her look up into the perpetual night, and I know she is pondering that very question – what if?

  17

  Meralda and her mother walked in silence.

  The strange machines were laid out side-by-side and end to end, as though some giant child laid out his broken toys in orderly ranks, at least at first. Here and there were regions of jumble and chaos, which led Meralda to wonder if ancient scavengers moved the derelict relics, or if the Hub itself grew bored and simply dumped the wreckage in heaps.

  Jellies clung and dripped from girders and gaps. Some oozed sluggishly about, dripping ichor.

  The orderly sections were easy to navigate. The space left between the derelicts was easily as wide as any four-lane street in Tirlin, and the spark-lamps both women carried lit up the scene.

  Her mother held the silent Gow warning device. Meralda had rejected all the machines they had passed so far. Some were already marked with the Gow cross, some were mere heaps of melted scraps, and the rest were towering edifices with no visible means of entry and no clue as to their function.

  “Mr. Mug has been remarkably civil towards me,” her mother said. They paused before a squat hull with a shattered glass top. It rested on four enormous legs. “He has obviously mastered that sharp tongue of his.”

  Meralda put her hands on her hips and stared up at the craft. “Mug is
a gentleman, in his own way. Thank you for not baiting him.”

  “I see no way in.” Her mother walked closer to the nearest leg, and then stepped in the darkness beneath the craft. Her lamp bobbed and swung, revealing a rounded shaft that extended from the base of the craft to the deck of the Hub. “Wait. I see it now. There’s an opening, and a spiral stair.”

  Before Meralda could reply, Mug’s cage dropped down beside her. “There you are, Mistress,” Mug said. “Donchen found more wire, and a lot of fiddly little brass things. Asked me to tell you. So, where’s the old witch?”

  “I’m right here, Mr. Mug,” said Meralda’s mother, her tone cheerful. She emerged from beneath the machine, smoothing her skirts. “This craft appears to be intact. The stairwell is tight, but unobstructed. Shall we board it, daughter? It bears no Gow markings, and the warning device remained silent.”

  Meralda nodded, her excitement growing. The hull of the craft was not damaged at all. The glassy dome at the top was shattered, yes, but there might still be salvageable parts inside, unlike most of the wrecks she had visited. “I’ll go first. Mug. Why don’t you wait here, with mother? I’ll call down if I find it’s worth exploring.”

  “I’d rather be pruned,” Mug replied.

  “That can be arranged,” said Meralda’s mother.

  “Stop it. Both of you.” Meralda glared. She took the Gow speaking device from her mother, and stomped off toward the ship’s boarding shaft.

  Mug hug in the air, his coils buzzing. The light from Meralda’s lamp vanished as she entered the winding stair.

  “You’ve moved up in the world,” said Meralda’s mother, after the sound of Meralda’s boots on the metal stair died away. “I follow your columns in the Times, you know. Most informative.”

  “You may have beguiled Donchen,” Mug said. “You may have confused Meralda. But you will never pull me in, madam.”

  “Pull you in? Into what, pray tell?”