Ulysses leapt from the control platform, sprinting past the bewildered Dashwood, covering the cellar with long strides, as the sphere activated one last time. There was a sound like a thunderclap, deafening within the cellar. Blinding white light flooded the lab, burning Ulysses' eyes even though they were closed. It was as if they had been caught at the very heart of a violent electrical storm, where the turbulent skies birthed their lightning progeny.
His ears hurt, his eyes hurt, his skin felt like it was on fire.
And then the light was gone, leaving glaring after-images on his abused eyeballs, and the acrid stink of obliterated ozone in its wake.
Ulysses fought to open his eyes despite the pain. He could see nothing. The exposed skin of his hands and face stung.
He cast his gaze around the cellar, blinking all the time, and then he saw Nimrod through the gloom. His faithful retainer's eyes were watering and his exposed skin looked like he was suffering from a bad case of sunburn.
And then Ulysses realised something; he could see Nimrod, he could see the workbenches of the lab behind him, he could see the cloud of smoke left by the lightning explosion. He looked around the cellar space again, hardly able to believe the what he was seeing, or rather, what he wasn't seeing. The reason he had seen nothing when he first opened his eyes, beyond the shadows sliding over his tortured corneas was because there had been nothing to see.
Caught within the matter transmitter's zone of influence, Dashwood, Smythe and Wentworth were gone. And so was the sphere. All of them had disappeared - villains, sphere, logic engine, all - teleported to God alone knew where.
Considering how Oddfellow's machine had failed before, Ulysses wondered darkly whether their final destination had been anywhere within the physical realm at all.
"Won't you stay, just for a little while?" Emilia beseeched him, practically on the verge of begging. "We have so much to catch up on." She found herself absent-mindedly stroking the material of his waistcoat.
Ulysses noticed that she was wearing her hair down, loose about her shoulders. He put a hand to her chin and raised her head, gazing into her darkly-lidded eyes. The day had dawned bright and clear, the storm having blown itself out in the night. The cold crystal blue sky of the first day of November was now reflected in those dark eyes of hers.
He could have lost himself in those limpid pools at that moment, he thought, but he had to be strong. The way fate and personal preference had dictated how he live his life was no life for a delicate flower like Emilia Oddfellow.
"I'm afraid there are matters awaiting my attention back in London," he said in all honesty, without actually giving away any pertinent details.
"I mourned you once," she said, "when The Times reported you lost over the Himalayas. Just as I mourned my father. But now I have you both back. I do not want to mourn you again."
"Which is why I must go," Ulysses stated flatly. "Go to your father now. Be with him. He needs you."
"Don't you need me, Ulysses?" she asked. He looked away to where a sunburnt Nimrod was loading his luggage back into the boot of the Silver Phantom.
Ulysses turned back to her and, a forced smile on his face, said: "It's been a pleasure, as always."
"Oh, I see. It's like that." Now it was Emilia's turn to look away. "So are we to live parallel lives now," she challenged, "never to meet again?"
Ulysses said nothing, but gazed out at the mist rising from the croquet lawn.
"Well, thank you for all you've done," Emilia said, suddenly prim. "Good day to you, Mr Quicksilver. I hope you have a safe journey back to London."
"Good day, Miss Oddfellow."
Feeling lonelier at that moment than he had in a long time, turning his back on Emilia and Hardewick Hall, Ulysses Quicksilver descended the steps to the gravel drive.
Two other vehicles were waiting in the cold crisp morning. A team of horses and adapted carriage sent by the local constabulary were taking Madam Garside's body to the morgue and the broken Renfield for further questioning. The second vehicle was a private ambulance. A pair of medical orderlies was lifting a stretcher-bound Sigmund Faustus into the back, his young aide looking on anxiously. The German still looked pale, unsurprisingly, but at least he was still alive.
"I meant to thank you, and apologise," Ulysses said holding up a hand to the stretcher-bearers to wait as he humbly approached the prone philanthropist. "I was wrong to accuse you. What you did was incredibly brave."
The German smiled weakly. "I was foolish and incredibly lucky, Herr Quicksilver. You, on the other hand, saved the day."
"I couldn't have done it without you," Ulysses admitted.
"Very well then, if you insist, I will - how do you say it? - take my share of the blame." He held Ulysses' gaze for a moment, suddenly serious. "Your father, Hercules, would have been proud of you."
An unsettling chill began to gnaw away within his gut at Faustus' mention of his father, as the injured man was loaded into the ambulance. Ulysses had not realised that Oddfellow's mysterious benefactor had known his father. What else didn't he know, he wondered.
There was a tug on his arm and before he really knew what was going on, Emilia was there in front of him her scent heady in his nostrils, her lips crushed against his. And at that moment their parallel lives seemed to converge and all his doubts and conflicting emotions vanished.
THE END
Ulysees Quicksilver returns in Human Nature (Abaddon Books).
Table of Contents
Extract
Indicia
Title Page
Prologue - Voyage to the Bottom of the Sea
Act 1 - 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea
Chapter 1 - Around the World in Eighty Days
Chapter 2 - Fourteen at Dinner
Chapter 3 - Waterworld
Chapter 4 - City Beneath the Sea
Chapter 5 - Our Man in Shanghai
Chapter 6 - Casino Royale
Chapter 7 - Artificial Intelligence
Chapter 8 - Worse Things Happen at Sea
Act 2 - The Kraken Wakes
Chapter 9 - Between the Devil and the Deep Blue Sea
Chapter 10 - Full Fathom Five
Chapter 11 - The Deep
Chapter 12 - The Nature of the Beast
Chapter 13 - Sea Dog's Tales
Chapter 14 - Finding Nemo
Chapter 15 - The Abyss
Chapter 16 - The Relict
Act 3 - Leviathan Rising
Chapter 17 - Marianas
Chapter 18 - The Accused
Chapter 19 - Enter the Dragon
Chapter 20 - Project Leviathan
Chapter 21 - Lamprey's Legacy
Chapter 22 - Ghost Ship
Chapter 23 - The Belly of the Beast
Chapter 24 - Sins of the Father
Chapter 25 - Sea Change
Epilogue - Britannia Rules the Waves
Bio - Jonathan Green
Novella - Vanishing Point
I - The Haunting of Hardewick Hall
II - Parlour Tricks
III - The Late Gladys Garside
IV - White Noise
V - Fear the Sphere
VI - The Ghost in the Machine
VII - Phase Shift
VIII - Deal With the Devil
IX - Vanishing Point
Leviathan Rising Page 32
