Steampunk Omnibus: A Galvanic Century Collection (21 page)

"Then why do you supply nations with these horrible weapons?"

"Because the more devastated Europe is, the stronger America will be. Galvanic rifles. Resurrected troops. Ironclad airships. Clockwork steam-tanks." Each syllable came out of Edison's mouth a staccato burst. "After the horrors of war, all of Europe will clamour for sane American dominion, and inventors and engineers will lead the way."

"I was wrong," Aldora said bitterly. "You're not a bore. You're a monster."

Edison sat back, blinking, and seemed to recover his composure. "You'll have to forgive me, Miss Fiske. I had no intention to upset you so. For your own good I'm afraid I must cut this interview short."

"Please," Aldora said, leaning forward. "Tell me the name of the man you dealt with. Tell me what he looked like!"

The door to Edison's office opened behind her. A pair of his assistants, large and broad-shouldered men with cruel smiles and scarred hands, stepped inside.

"Good day, Miss Fiske."

***

Back in her West Orange hotel room Aldora sat and unwrapped the package that Captain Fowler had sent to her from London. Letter after letter, written in the same elegant hand, on the same Parisian stationary, all telling her the same thing. Screaming it so loudly that she couldn't ignore the signs. Her hands trembled as she carefully slid each missive back into its envelope, and she felt faint as she carefully placed them atop her room's desk.

"Grayson," she said in a small, almost childlike voice. "Oh, why, Grayson?"

Her hand drifted almost instinctively to the locket around her neck.

***

Dark figures moved through the West Orange Farragut Hotel corridors, men with hats pulled low and coat pockets bulging with nefarious intent. If any of the guests or staff saw their silent passage they kept quiet, knowing the man they worked for, and knowing that discretion was the better part of valour. Neither man tarried in their dark task, proceeding swiftly and full of menace up to the hotel's second floor, down to the end of the corridor to the spacious suite occupied by the lone travelling Englishwoman, their shadows contrasting with the yellow patterns of the hall's wallpaper.

Gloved hands used delicate tools to spring the hotel's lock, and the well-maintained door's hinges remained silent as the pair crept inside. Dangerous tools both blunt and sharp were pulled from jacket pockets, and the murderous men descended on the still form beneath silk sheets.

A ripping blade found not soft yielding flesh to part, but rather goose-down-stuffed pillows, and a length of pipe cracked not skull but flexible mattress.

"The hotel management shall be quite displeased," Aldora spoke from the darkness, turning on a lamp to reveal herself in a chair across from the bed, pistol levelled at her would-be murders. "You've made a dreadful mess of their sheets."

The man with the knife growled and took a half-step towards the woman, only to be halted by his partner.

"A dead-shot, this one," he warned.

"She's just a girl," his partner said. "I doubt she could hit either of us."

"Care to wager your life, sir?" Aldora asked.

"I don't," the man with the pipe said. "Look at the way she holds the piece."

"So?"

"Thumb on the hammer, ready to slip. She'd drop us both before we even heard the report."

His partner was silent.

"Go." Aldora gestured towards the door with her free hand, the pistol level on her intruders. "Tell Mr. Edison that I've gotten what I've come for, but that our business is not yet settled. Understand?"

"Damn right we're not done." The knife-wielder growled, but allowed his partner to pull him back through the doorway.

***

"You're looking well, Nikola."

They both knew that it was a lie, but the inventor smiled anyway. "And you remain as radiant as ever we meet, Aldora. If I'd known you were coming by, I'd have cleaned up for you."

Aldora glanced around the brick interior of the Wardenclyffe Tower's facility building. The entire building was constructed in the style of the Italian Renaissance, and the laboratory area contained all manner of electromechanical devices, few of which she could identify. To Aldora's untrained eye, everything was bulbs and tubes, wires and cables. Through a great window in the back she could see the wood-framed tower itself, almost two-hundred feet tall, with a steel hemisphere cupola at the top.

Nikola Tesla followed her gaze. "Do you like it? Overly phallic, I know, but in a way it could not be anything else. The shaft sinks another hundred meters into the earth."

"Good heavens, why?"

A strange sort of mania flashed briefly though the inventor's face. "To give it such a grip on this earth that the whole of the globe might quiver."

"Nikola," Aldora said softly. She had told him of her visit, both by telegram before leaving France, and again before leaving New Jersey, but he'd been honestly surprised to see her appear at the entrance to his machine shop.

"If I get the funding I need," he continued, turning back to his mass of wires and tubes, "it will be the core of my World Wireless System. Imagine. A world linked through free and abundant energy. There would be no more struggle. No more conflict. No more need for war."

"Edison says that the world will fall into a great war within the next decade."

"Edison!" Nikola spat and raised his fists. "What does he know? He is a reprehensible man. An uneducated man with contempt for book-learning and no interests other than business. Science is just another investment, patents just a revenue stream. What I could have done with his resources..."

Aldora placed a hand on the man's shoulder. "It's been too long, Nikola."

He turned, clutching at her hand like a drowning man. Hers was one of the few touches he had learnt to abide. "It has been how long?"

"A decade, almost."

"A decade?" He turned back to his workbench. "I hear that you're engaged now. Is he a good man?"

"Good enough," Aldora said. "One who will give me the freedoms I require to live the life that I desire."

"Good," Tesla said. "A decade. I suppose I am an old man to you now?"

"You have the energy of a man half your age."

"Energy. Yes. Hm."

He seemed to drift off again, thinking thoughts that Aldora could not begin to fathom. She waited patiently for his attention to return.

"Edison, you said. You have spoken to him?"

"Yes. Of necessity."

A hurt look crossed Nikola's face. "And you did not come to me?"

"Oh Nikola," Aldora said. "No. Edison sold some sort of galvanic cannons to some criminals that are using them to terrorise London, but he wouldn't tell me anything about them."

"London?" Nikola said. "That won't do. London will be important."

"Important?"

Nikola turned and erased a chalkboard alongside his instrument panel. "How long can you stay?"

The question seemed to surprise Aldora. "A few days, I suppose?"

"Three days. I will need three."

"I can stay three."

"Prvoklasan!" he exclaimed.

***

Over the next three days Nikola Tesla built a strange looking generator for Aldora Fiske. It looked like all the rest of his electromechanical apparatus did -- wires and tubes -- but this device seemed even more slap-dash jury-rigged than the rest of it.

"What does it... erm..." she asked, examining the breadbox-sized device.

"I call it an Ionic Shield," Tesla said. "It will protect you from Edison's galvanic weapons. Or any other electricity-based armament, I suppose."

"Marvellous!"

"It will de-ionise the emissions of the Galvanic Cannons and render their issue inert. This is only a prototype, though. I am afraid it will burn out rather quickly, but it should be enough to get an airship close enough to board the pirate vessel."

"How does it work?" Aldora asked.

"Simply mount it to one of your airship's hard-points. It will function reactively. It's functioning now, in fact, aligning the ions of the surrounding air. Don't worry; normal static electricity will not burn the device out, nor will normal operation of an airship."

"Nikola," Aldora said. "Do you mean to tell me you've developed an anti-lighting field?"

"Oh," he said. "I suppose I have. Perhaps I will patent it, and get rich like that
kopile
Edison."

She leaned forward and gave the inventor a peck on the cheek. "Thank you, Nikola."

He turned and grabbed her hands again. "Be careful, Aldora."

"I will."

"And do not wait another decade to come see me again!"

"I won't! Perhaps I'll invite you to the wedding."

"Pfah," Nikola grinned.

***

"Why am I doing this again?" Fowler asked, glancing back over his shoulder as he worked to attach the Ionic Shield to
Persephone's
bow. The old barn that the American pilot stored his airship in was littered with spare machine parts and tools largely kept in bins and buckets.

"Money," Aldora said.

"Lots of money," Fowler clarified.

"And the gratitude of London and the United Kingdom," Aldora added.

"Will that gratitude also be monetary?"

"I cannot speak for the Home Office," Aldora said, "but I cannot imagine that being the man who saved London would not result in excellent business contacts."

"Business contacts." Fowler mulled. "I like that. Sounds respectable."

"Oh, it is," Aldora assured.

"Fine. Let's get on with it, then." Fowler stepped down from his stepladder and carelessly tossed his wrench into one of the buckets.

"Is that the American 'Can-Do' attitude I've heard so much about?"

"No," Fowler said, wiping his greasy hands off on a kerchief. "But if you're curious about it and we can push our departure back a bit I can give you a demonstration."

He stepped in close to Aldora, wry grin on his face, his earthy graphite scent filling her nostrils. His proximity was a physical thing, registering on her skin despite the inches between them. Aldora's bemused expression didn't falter. "Alas, Mr. Fowler, I'm spoken for, and we cannot afford even a few minutes' delay."

He turned back towards his airship with a barked laugh. "Well enough, Miss Fiske. Let's get on with this suicide mission of yours."

***

Luck held with the
Persephone
, and the sleek form of the
Stirner
was swiftly discovered in the fogs above London. The larger airship ignored the smaller vessel until it became clear that the
Persephone
had plotted an intercept course. The fog was lit with an incandescent glow as the pirate's Galvanic Cannon charged, small auras flickering around its generators, a high-pitched whine audible even aboard the smaller vessel.

"Let's hope that your mad scientist's shields work," Fowler said, jaw set.

"I have the utmost faith in Mr. Tesla's work," Aldora said.

Fully charged, the Galvanic Cannons crackled and fired bright white arcs of electric death towards the smaller vessel. It seemed to split as it reached the sphere of invisible ionised air around the
Persephone
, fracturing and cascading to form a jagged net over the border of the shield's protection. It glowed bright white for an instant, almost blinding those within, and the cabin rocked with a slight concussive force, but when it faded Fowler's vessel appeared unharmed.

"It worked!" Fowler said. "Bully for your Tesla."

"We're not aboard yet."

There was a pause aboard the
Persephone
, and the
Stirner
began charging its Cannons again.

"Brace for impact," Fowler warned.

The lightning cannons fired again. This time the arcs came closer to the
Persephone
before they split, and the jagged electric net they dissipated to was markedly smaller, almost touching the
Persephone's
hull. The concussive force that struck the ship was more powerful, sending Fowler sprawling, and slamming Aldora against the hull. The ozone smell of the Ionic Shield had grown more noticeable, and small wisps of smoke began to issue from its innards.

"It'll not protect us from a third hit," Aldora warned.

"All ahead." Fowler pushed the
Persephone's
throttle to full, and the ship lunged forward.

"Captain Fowler?"

"No time to look for a bay and come in for a soft landing." The Captain stared directly at the
Stirner
, his jaw clenched, eyes narrowed. "Brace for impact!"

Aldora wrapped her arm around a length of hanging chain and set her hip against the railing. The
Stirner's
Cannons began to charge a third time, and through the cabin's forward windows small arcs of electricity could be seen playing over the surface of the ship.