by Anthology
Contents
The Safest Passage
The Smiljan Breach
Pain
Steampunk Rat
Black Dragon Blues
The Incurable Weight of the Breathless
The Shadow of
Black Wings
The Case of the Night-walking Automaton
Orphans of the
Celestial Sea
Inspiration for “Up From the Depths”
About the Cover Artist
Contributors
eSteampunk’s
Story of the Month
Editor-in-Chief Doug Lance
Managing Editor Mandy Alyss Brown
Associate Editors S.A. Kyle, Lisa Finch,
Copy Editor Preston McConkie
Editorial Intern Brandon Todd Bachman
Readers Suzanne Conboy-Hill, Lori Lopez, Mandi Ontis, Taylor Longnecker
eSteampunk is a monthly fiction publication. The editors accept manuscripts online. To review our guidelines or submit a manuscript, please visit http://eFictionMag.com/Submissions. Correspondence may be sent to [email protected].
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ISBN: 978-1-4659-3279-2
ASIN: B004UD88K2
Copyright © 2012 eFiction Publishing
eSteampunk’s Story of the Month
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Contents
Short Stories
The Safest Passage Matt Betts
The Smiljan Breach D. L. Mackenzie
The Case of the Night-walking
Automaton George S. Walker
Serial Stories
Orphans of the Celestial Sea
Episode One Mark Fenger
Black Dragon Blues
Episode One
Underwater Assassination Brent Nichols
Poetry
Pain Rigel Ordinario
The Incurable Weight of
the Breathless Angel Zapata
Non-Fiction
Steampunk Rat
reviewed by Mandy Alyss Brown
The Shadow of Black Wings
reviewed by Brandon Bachman
Inspiration for “Up From the Depths”
Jonathan Hunt
The Safest Passage
Matt Betts
Nayad Spencer spied another insect on a pile of crumbs near the edge of the table and ground it beneath his palm. “Lester,” he mumbled. He braced himself against the bulkhead as the ship lurched with another giant step.
“Lester!” He enjoyed the way his voice echoed in the tight halls.
Lucinda stood in the center of the washroom as he walked past. Without a word she used a soapy hand to point further down the hall toward the outer hatch.
Nayad grunted and continued stomping down the rattling metal deck.
He shoved the rusty metal hatch open and stepped out into the bright sunshine of the observation deck. “Lester! What in hell did I say about eating in the goddam navigation room?” He shaded his eyes and scanned the deck, seeing Lester Lomak with his face pressed against the telescope. “Lester, I’ve half a—”
The ship lurched again, and he grabbed the rail.
Nayad looked down at the land far below them.
“I’ve half a mind to toss you over the side and let things happen as they will.” He was perturbed that the boy wouldn’t even look at him. “I’m talking—”
Lester interrupted. “There’s an airship.”
“What?” Nayad moved toward the kid.
“On the horizon. An airship.”
Nayad nudged Lester out of the way and looked through the telescope. “How long’s it been there?” Nayad turned to look at the boy. He’d finally gotten to the point where the teen’s face didn’t make him cringe. His cheek and jaw on the left side of his face were a dark scarred mess — the victim of an exploding boiler when he was younger. It hadn’t healed well.
“Noticed it a few minutes back,” Lester said.
“Any idea what it’s doing?”
The boy shrugged. “Sittin’ there. Far as I can tell.”
“That’s almost due north?”
Lester nodded. “That would probably mean they’re over Sacramento.”
“Mmm,” Nayad put his eye back to the scope. “They can have it. That town’s a hole anyway. It ain’t nothing but another zombie lounge now. If they think they can salvage something there, good luck to ‘em.” Nayad gave the dot on the horizon another hard look. He envied whomever was onboard for their freedom. An airship could go places that the five-story six-legged Turtle couldn’t. “Any markings?”
“Not that I can tell.”
The hatch opened, and Lucinda stepped out onto the deck. “Crew meeting I wasn’t informed of?”
Nayad hiked his thumb at the boy. “Our lookout actually saw something. Tell’er what you found, kid.” He started walking toward the hatch.
Lester put his hands on the telescope and looked down at his feet.
Nayad knew the boy had a crush on Lucinda. He did nothing to discourage it and completely understood the power she had over any number of men she encountered. He himself had let his mind drift to thoughts of her long legs and dark hair. She’d made it clear that none of the crew were on her agenda, but it never stopped them from considering it. “Found himself an airship.”
“Whose?” Lucinda asked.
“Don’t know,” he said. “Keep watching, Lester. Let me know if anything changes.” He opened the hatch and held it for Lucinda.
“Cantolione?” she asked.
“Maybe, hard to say.” He shrugged it off as best he could for Lucinda’s benefit, but Cantolione worried him to no end. They were in competition with the man for every single passenger who crossed the great wasteland. It was the airship versus the walking tank, and for the passengers, it generally came down to price. They could get from point A to point B in a month via the Turtle and its squalor or spend eight times as much to take an airship and get there comfortably in a week.
Cantolione had offered to buy Nayad’s business out once in order to effectively corner the market on transportation. The conversation hadn’t gone well, and Nayad had put his fist into the airman’s nose. The man still whistled when he exhaled.
“Gibson says the passengers in the cargo hold are bitching,” Lucinda said.
Nayad looked at his watch. “Six days already? Right on time. Let me guess; they’re hot and hungry and want fresh air? Did anyone mention to these people before they got aboard that they’d be traveling cross country in a giant, slow-moving metal box in the middle of summer?”
“With three hundred other people.”
He’d heard the same complaints on every trip he’d captained for the last two years. A three-week journey from one civilized and safe coast to the next, and less than a third of the way through, everyone wants to go home. “Is this meant to be your daily report?”
“No. Gibson was getting shit; I thought I’d pass it along.”
Nayad opened the hatch to his quarters. “I’ll make a special entry in my captain’s log.” He slammed the door behind him and cranked the lock. He stumbled
to his bunk and stared at the nearly empty water bottle taped to the wall next to it. The liquid represented what was left of his daily ration, to which he was having trouble sticking. When they hit the Sacramento River, they could take on more water for the ship, the crew, the passengers. It was a traditional stop that they used to placate the passengers; open the hatches, let some air in, and everyone’s happy.
His head settled on the pillow, and he let the rhythm of the ship’s strides put him to sleep.
* * *
Nayad was startled awake by Lester’s voice. “Sir?”
Nayad opened his eyes, looked at the boy and glanced at the still locked hatch, then back to the boy. “Mm?” He didn’t feel the need to be particularly articulate and wasn’t ready to inquire how the kid kept getting in.
“Problem.”
“Problem?”
“Maybe.”
“Maybe?”
The boy shuffled a little. “I think something’s coming. The airship released something, and it’s coming our way.”
Nayad wiped the sweat from his brow and stared at the boy. “Is that a cracker in your hand? Are you trailing crumbs around my ship?”
The boy shoved it in his pocket.
“Give me a minute.” Nayad rubbed his neck and got pulled himself together. Out on the deck, the daylight was fading as Nayad put his eye to the scope. “I don’t see it.”
“It’s a small, one-man thing. A little west of where you’re looking now. A bit more.” Lester reached out and nudged the scope.
“Hands off,” Nayad said. He focused until he found the small shape in the sky in the direction of the ship. “Looks like a goose, one of them damn flyin’ bicycles.” He could make out the outline of a pilot laying back and kicking. The pilot pedaled, the chain made the wings flap and kept the plane aloft. Nayad grabbed one of the long, flexible pipes on the railing and held it up to his mouth. “Lucinda? We’re about to have a visitor very soon. Can you ask Wilson to crawl up into the upper turret?” He held it close to his ear for a moment to hear her curt acknowledgement, and then stuck it back in place.
“Should be here in twenty minutes?”
Lester nodded. “Give or take.”
Nayad folded his arms and stood a moment, unsure whether to wait it out or wander back into the hot belly of the gargantuan machine. The realization that he’d just awoken from a nap made his decision for him. “I’m headed for the pisser, give us a shout if I’m not back in time.”
* * *
Most of the crew gathered in the hall to watch the approach. The goose swooped toward the Turtle in jerky motions as its wings flapped and tail section swayed. Nayad thought again about the wonderful freedom of flight but crossed the bicycle plane off his list — too much work. He could practically hear the pilot breathing heavily, could see the trail of sweat the poor man was leaving across the terrain below.
Nayad slid the spy notch open to stare out at the approaching flier. Lucinda looked over his shoulder. The thing was close enough that Nayad could see the thin flier reach beneath himself and pull something out.
“Might be a bomb of some type,” Lucinda whispered. “Hard to tell.”
Nayad had a hard time believing that the man would do so much work just to toss a firecracker and then fly back. Surely he knew he’d be shot down before he got far.
The Goose disappeared from view as it flew over the Turtle. After a moment there was a clang on the deck and a cylinder rolled into view. Nayad was sure it wasn’t a bomb, but imagined, from all the effort to get it here, it was something worse.
Nayad cranked the lock and headed onto the deck. “Screw it. If it was going to blow up, it would’ve,” he said. He was glad to out in the air without the woman breathing down his back. He bent slightly to pick the cylinder up and turned around in time to see Lucinda and Lester reach out their arms toward him in panic.
“Christ! That could’ve gone off in your hands,” Lucinda said.
Nayad held it up. “It’s just a message tube.” He pulled out a piece of paper rolled up inside and focused on it. With one hand he began patting his coveralls, put the paper under his arm, and rummaged through his pockets with both hands in search of his spectacles.
He felt the paper slide from his side and noticed Lucinda standing next to him. “It says ‘Passenger 213 infected. Turn back.’” She handed the page to Nayad. “That gets to the point, doesn’t it?”
“What’re we going to do?” Lester asked.
“We go have a talk with the group’s administrator down in the hold and have her introduce us to passenger 213, I suppose. Lucy? Call down and ask administrator Pickerd if she’ll join us at the gate.” Nayad looked around, suddenly aware they weren’t moving. “Tell Jansen to get us moving. Step it up, so we make up for lost time.”
“We’re not turning back?” Lester asked.
“Got no cause, boy. We can take care of this on our own.”
They turned to watch the Goose flap off toward the shadowy craft in the distance.
* * *
Nayad unbolted the steel door and pulled the flaking handle. The door stuck, and he gave it two great tugs before it creaked on its hinges and opened for him. Lucinda stood behind him with a hand on her sidearm and a rifle across her back. They were always leery that the passengers would try to mutiny and bust through the security checks to storm the command section of the Turtle.
The heat and stench hit him in a wave. It was hot on top of the Turtle, but down below it was absolutely sweltering. It was ventilated, but two levels with hundreds of perspiring Easterners made for close quarters.
Nayad’s footsteps on the metal echoed as he made his way down. Lucinda slammed the hatch and locked it, then made no sound as she descended.
The landing was surrounded by wire, forming it into a cage with a large reinforced door opposite the stairs. Through the wire, a second cage was visible on the other side of the door. A pale light hung from the ceiling and swayed with the Turtle’s strides. The traveler’s administrator, Genny Pickerd, stood in the small circle of the bulb’s glow with her arms down in front of her. She held a bulky bag in her hands that hung down to her knees. Nayad had found her attractive when they had talked at the boarding plank. Now, like everyone else, she’d stopped caring about her appearance, and Nayad was put off by her. Every passenger got an allotment of water each day, and few used it for regular bathing past the first week.
“Mrs. Pickerd, thank you for coming,” Nayad said.
She smiled weakly. “I’m actually enjoying the breeze that’s trailing in.”
Nayad didn’t notice; he only felt the heat rising from below. He walked back and forth, looking through the wire to inspect the cage that Pickerd was in just to make sure no one had come in with her. Seeing she was alone, he examined the door behind her to make sure it was locked and barred. “Sorry to drag you up here like this.” He pulled the bar up and opened the door. “Those are the records?”
“They’re all in there,” she said dryly. “Is there a problem?”
“Let us have a look at the records, and we’ll go from there,” Lucinda said. “Probably nothing.” She began to dig through the bag.
“I understand that you’re getting complaints from the passengers,” Nayad said offhandedly. “Absolutely normal. Happens every time.”
Her voice steady and low, nearly a whisper. “How should I handle it?
“First trip, ma’am? We’ll hit the river tomorrow. We stop there to take on fresh water, and we open the loading bay doors to let a little air in. That tends to cool things down and dampen any fires that might be popping up.” He winked at her and smiled. “After we reach the river they’ll all come around.”
“Miss Pickerd?” Lucinda asked. “Aren’t these the passenger’s identifications?” She held up a fistful of f
olded papers and held open the bag to show Nayad more like them.
He sighed as he felt the air flow out of him. “Did anyone discuss with you what these papers are for?”
“Of course, they’re the passenger boarding papers.”
Lucinda waved them. “Which each passenger must keep with them in case of emergency.”
“Or if the government needed to identify them,” Nayad added. “It cuts down on fraud and stowaways.”
Still in a quiet voice, Pickerd replied, “But I have many children onboard. They’d lose the papers . . . .”
“Then you give them to their parents, grandparents, neighbors, or nearest semi-responsible person you can find,” Nayad raised his voice and grabbed the bag from Lucinda. “If all the goddam papers are in your bag, how do you know who anyone is?” He shook the sack in her face. “Whatever possessed you to keep them?”
Pickerd seemed unflustered. “It was a madhouse down at the dock. They stretched around the building,” she looked down at her feet.
Nayad rolled his eyes. One more thing to go wrong.
* * *
Nayad looked at the rest of the crew assembled and nodded. “I think it’s all a bullshit being pulled by Cantolione. He’s not above this kind of thing to put us out of business. He’s just looking to cut more of his competition.”
“You said you didn’t even know for sure it’s him,” Navigator Brian Jansen took off his leather hat and put it on the galley table. “Could be the government for all we know. If it was Cantolione, why wouldn’t he just bomb us? Killing everyone or crippling the Turtle so that all the passengers fried in the heat would be more effective than lying to us and having us turn back, right?” He played with the straps on his hat as he spoke.
