The Circus of Machinations

by Chris Ward

  Sensing Robert would soon wake, Victor gave Isabella’s hand a last squeeze. The flesh beneath the cold skin felt hard, almost metallic.

  ‘Wait for me,’ he said. ‘I’ll come again soon.’

  As he crept out of the room, past Isabella’s snoring father and the guard sleeping in the chair outside, Victor prayed that he could keep his word.

  As Kurou moved through the deserted streets, the cane he had found to go with his gloves and top hat swishing through the fresh snow, he tried to ignore the blistering air temperature, chilling even for him as it dropped to the region of minus thirty centigrade. He had considered discarding his costume or replacing it with a thick Russian jacket, but it helped him stay in character, and right now his character was the only thing that might get him answers.

  While his own army’s preparations for war were going better than he had could have hoped, considering the age of the resources available and the limited fuel sources, not to mention the technical infallibility of his workforce, he had failed to make further progress in his attempts to stop the Grey Man’s approaching horde.

  With the right resources, Kurou felt capable of controlling anything. His were skills learned through myriad hours of intricate practice, his knowledge of electronics, computer systems and genetic manipulation technology advancing until they were without peer, but this was something different.

  Controlling the drones had been like stealing a kid’s toy and taking over the controller. Once you knew where the controller was, it was a case of plucking it out of whatever hand—real or digital—was holding it.

  But taking control of the War Horses—the very same machines that he had helped to design—was different.

  He could feel their systems. He could tap into their memory banks and read through their data, count the kills, the remaining fuel, even view the emotive charts which displayed the current status of the human-machine link, but he couldn’t take control of them in the way that he, Kurou, had designed them so that he should be able to.

  Something else was blocking them, a form of technology of which he had no knowledge, and the implications of that were terrifying.

  He couldn’t beat an enemy he couldn’t see.

  The Lenin District was deserted and almost pitch dark, the electricity having been diverted to add power to the underground base. A handful of emergency street lights were too dim to even cast him a shadow, an irony that did not go unnoticed. Even in the gloom his keen eye picked out the tracks of his volunteers, and he was careful to keep away from the streets he had allocated for booby traps and other little welcome parties for the Grey Man’s troops.

  He had to take a scenic route through several dark, deserted streets to get to his old haunts in the far south of the Lenin District, where most houses were abandoned shells, haunted only by the ghosts of former mining workers and the wraiths that kept them alive.

  With a memory better than any photograph, it was easy to find the house where he had spoken to the girl. It was likely she was dead or gone; while he hadn’t seen her among the volunteers, the last time he had seen her, in the days before Victor had found him, she had been a hair’s breadth from a welcome death.

  The house was as he remembered it, putrid smelling, freezing, veiled with the aura of the dead or nearly so. The downstairs rooms were empty, but he quickly found the place where he had left the remains of his last human meal, the floorboards creaking underfoot. In a back room he found a small television, its screen dirty, its power chord frayed. Several wooden stools surrounded it, the remains of some kind of animal—most likely a household pet—shared among several plastic bowls in front of them. Some of these men were now saddled into War Horses and preparing to ride into battle; he remembered the same foul stench on their unwashed bodies.

  The stone staircase was cold underfoot, in places sticky from the residue of a carpet long ago taken away. On the second floor landing, three doors stood open to reveal empty rooms littered with trash and drug paraphernalia.

  One door at the end was closed.

  Kurou opened it silently and peered into the darkened room. The girl lay on the bed, beneath a pile of filthy blankets that smelled like rotting cattle hide. A fire in one corner flickered weakly beneath the charred remains of a stool similar to those encircling the television.

  Her eyes were closed, her breathing shallow. Kurou tapped his cane lightly on the floor until she opened her eyes and squinted up at him.

  ‘Do you remember me?’ he said. ‘I have come back for you.’

  The girl gave a weak smile. ‘The worst thing in the world. Self-styled. Like a character from a comic book. You know nothing, Mr. Caricature.’

  Feeling a surge of anger, Kurou knelt down and gripped the girl’s chin in his fingers, squeezing her mouth open. He gave her tongue a kiss before she could shrink away.

  ‘Tell me what I ought to know.’

  ‘He’s coming.’

  ‘The Grey Man?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘How do you know?’

  She gave a weak smile. ‘I hear him. He doesn’t know I can hear, but I can. I remember him.’

  ‘Who is he? What is he?’

  The girl started to laugh. ‘He’s the end of all things. Isn’t that who you wanted to be? He’s looking for you, you know. He doesn’t appreciate being made a fool of. Not by a man, not … by a Crow.’

  ‘Tell me how he controls them. How does he speak to you?’

  The girl smiled again. ‘He is with me all the time. In here.’ She lifted a hand and pointed to the side of her head. ‘Sometimes I hear him talking, other times it’s only his thoughts.’

  ‘Talk to me in the same way. Do it now.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘I don’t want to see inside of you. I’ll go to hell soon enough as it is.’

  Kurou slapped the girl across the face. ‘Who are you?’

  ‘Don’t you mean, what am I? Isn’t that it? One of the rejected, I guess you’d say.’

  Kurou stared into her eyes, and as the firelight flickered there he saw she was older than her face suggested, older than he was, older than he might ever be.

  ‘What’s your name?’ Kurou asked.

  The girl chuckled. ‘I don’t remember what it was, but it was pretty. I remember that.’

  ‘You knew him, you were close to him.’

  ‘Once. We come from the same place. The same level of darkness.’

  Kurou slipped one hand under the mass of blankets. The girl didn’t react as his fingers traced lines across her cold skin.

  ‘Why can’t I hear him?’

  ‘Because he only speaks to humans.’

  Kurou smiled. Whether she was humouring him or not, he didn’t know, but he took it as a compliment. He pushed the blankets back further and lifted himself up into the bed, pulling the covers back over them both.

  ‘Call him,’ he said. ‘If he can hear you, call him. I want him to hear your sighs, your moans, your cries. Call him, lost princess.’

  The girl closed her eyes. She sighed and lowered her head back on to the pillows.

  ‘Call him,’ Kurou said, beginning to move back and forth. ‘Tell him Kurou looks forward to meeting him. Tell him to come with all might and prepare for darkness, even in the depths of light. Tell him I’ll be waiting.’

  The girl had begun to groan. Kurou scowled as he pushed himself forwards, enjoying a pleasure he hadn’t felt in years. Then, as the wind rattled the shutters of the bedroom window, he lifted his cane and lowered it across the girl’s throat. She made no motion to stop him, but her eyes jerked open, staring straight ahead.

  ‘Tell him Kurou waits in the passages beneath ground,’ he said. ‘Tell him to come to me if ever he wishes to avenge his lost princess.’

  He leaned forward on the cane as he rose inside her. For the briefest of moments her arms reached up to grip his shoulders, then her mouth widened, a low moan escaping her lips. Kurou gasped, pushed down on the cane one mo
re time, then relaxed, pulled himself free of her embrace and climbed out of the blankets, lowering them back down over her empty, dead eyes.

  ‘Goodnight, flown angel,’ he said, breathing hard. ‘I’ll tell your old friend you wished him well.’

  40

  Isabella’s situation worsens

  The Grey Man opened his eyes and sat up with a start. A tear trickled down his face and he wiped it away with a flourish of his big hand. Had he been dreaming?

  Lost princess.

  The words reverberated inside his skull. Who was she? Where was she?

  He closed his eyes, reaching out. There was nothing, the link was dead. All he had was the residue of her thoughts.

  The passages beneath ground. Kurou waits. Prepare for darkness.

  He climbed up from the chair and looked around, feeling suddenly disorientated. The girl … she had spoken to him. All these years she had listened in silence, waiting for him, but now she had spoken.

  ‘You know me. You know what I am….’

  He reached out again, but the link was truly gone, as if it had never been.

  ‘No—’

  She had spoken to him under duress, he saw that now. This Kurou, he had found her, made her open a link to him, made her issue a challenge.

  And then … he had killed her.

  The might of his army was waning. Soon he would have to go to ground or begin a new form of offensive against the many who had wronged him. But for now … there was enough.

  ‘I will scorch you from the world,’ he muttered, his voice as deep as a rumble of thunder. ‘I will wipe you away.’

  He closed his eyes, reaching this time to his soldiers, those still answering his commands.

  Faster, he bade them. As fast as the howling wind.

  ‘What are you doing?’

  Kurou turned to see Lena standing behind him. She pointed at the trucks. ‘Can we spare the fuel for these?’

  ‘None of this equipment works,’ he said. ‘It is useless, so we will make it useful. A magic trick.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘For barricades and obstacles, among which our own soldiers will hide.’

  ‘Will it work?’

  ‘We will engage our enemy on our terms,’ Kurou said. ‘There are no guarantees. We only need to slow them.’

  ‘Have you discovered a way to block their communications systems yet?’

  Kurou started to shake his head, then thought better of it. Lena was ready to assume control as soon as he was of no further use, he could tell from the look in her eyes. If she knew he had failed, then he could find himself back behind bars, or even worse—his dead eyes might watch the battle from the top of a flag pole outside City Hall.

  ‘It has proved my greatest challenge,’ he said. ‘Yet one that will be conquered.’

  ‘Good. We’re counting on you. We won’t be able to hold them for long. They’ll overrun us in hours. I’ve seen what these things can do.’

  You’re talking to the man who designed them, you arrogant whore. Out loud, he said, ‘I’m sure it was a horror like no other.’

  Kurou turned back to watch the volunteers loading the junked machinery on to the trucks with forklifts and a digger they had brought down from the mining fields. He gave a small shake of the head. Far too many of the machines in the hangars had proven worthless, the years of stagnancy fraying their wires and rusting up their joints. More than half of the War Horses had to be abandoned, and it was unlikely that many of the rest would last long before breaking down.

  Heaped in the roadways they might still have a use. Among the broken robots Kurou would hide others, ready to ambush the Grey Man’s invaders. The battle—while far from won—wasn’t quite over yet.

  An angry shout came from behind him and he turned, groaning at the sight of Robert Mortin hobbling among the workers towards them.

  ‘Here comes Nuncle,’ Kurou muttered with a sideways grin, wondering if there was some way he could slip away, but it was too late, Mortin had seen him.

  ‘You!’

  ‘To what delight do we owe this pleasure, grand king?’ Kurou said. ‘Hast thou split thy kingdom amongst thy undeserving daughters?’

  With a growl Mortin swung a crutch at Kurou’s head. The speed caught Kurou off guard, and while he avoided a direct blow he caught a stinging glance on the shoulder. He clenched a fist, feeling his knife-like nails cutting into his palm.

  ‘You ignorant bastard,’ Mortin spat. ‘When this is done I’ll use your skin for a doormat. My daughter is getting worse. I need you to see to her immediately or I swear I’ll cut your throat.’

  Kurou sighed. He threw a glance at Lena, who was taking an unnatural interest in the loading of a broken War Horse into the back of the nearest truck.

  ‘I’ve told you, I’m doing everything I can to find a way to fix her.’

  ‘She’s not one of your damn machines!’

  ‘If she were, she would be significantly easier to fix, sire.’

  Mortin swung the crutch again, but this time Kurou was ready for it. He stepped back out of range as Mortin stumbled, his good knee landing in the snow. Lena ran to help him up, then glared at Kurou as if it had been his fault Mortin was a blathering idiot, rather than a combination of inbreeding and growing up in the shithole to end all shitholes.

  ‘If it will ease your troubled mind, sire, I will waste a few of my precious superhero moments to visit her,’ Kurou said. ‘Just remember that I am a scientist, not a doctor, and that removing her from the machine was a mistake made by your dear misguided self.’

  Mortin turned to Lena. ‘How can you stand him? I’d cut his throat after five minutes of listening to this crap.’

  She shrugged. ‘You learn to filter him out after a while,’ she said, offering Kurou a smile that was almost friendly.

  With witty retorts flying off his misshapen tongue like sparks of electricity, Kurou let Robert lead them back up to the tunnel entrance where he had commandeered a jeep for his own private use. Within a few minutes they were standing around Isabella’s bed while a couple of doctors from the town hospital stood in the corner, looking sheepish and helpless.

  Kurou had seen corpses in better condition. Isabella’s face was gaunt and colourless, the veins on her neck poking up, the hair that fanned out around her left in clumps on the pillows. The sound of shallow breathing came from the ventilator hooked up beside her, and the soft bleep of the heart rate monitor was like a ticking clock.

  ‘She’s worsening,’ Robert said, reaching down to pat one of her hands. Kurou stared at the way it took a few moments for her skin to even out again, the elasticity almost gone.

  ‘Double her food doses,’ Kurou said. ‘She’s wasting away.’

  ‘I can see that, you fool. How can you make her better?’

  ‘I’m working on it.’

  Mortin’s face was like a sky heavy with the threat of rain. ‘You said that yesterday. You’ve done nothing that I’ve seen. I’m giving you one more day. If she dies, you die.’

  Kurou sighed. The fool would not be put off. When the inevitable happened it would be best to keep out of the old man’s way, lest a swinging crutch take a chunk out of the back of his head.

  While he would not admit it to Mortin, he’d done nothing at all to investigate Isabella’s condition. Her life meant nothing to him and he had far bigger concerns to focus on, namely ensuring that he came out on top in the forthcoming class of armies. Soon enough there would be all the emergencies that the doctors could deal with, and the girl would be forgotten in the rush of mutilated bodies and severed limbs. He didn’t like to admit it, but unless he could find a way to stop the Grey Man’s army, they would be annihilated. He had designed the War Horses to be fast, efficient, and savage. They would do him proud, and he hoped he could get far enough away that he could appreciate their handiwork without risk to himself. Surely they wouldn’t turn on their own creator?

  ‘Kurou, you bastard, are you listening to me?’

&nb
sp; ‘Of course, Nuncle,’ he said, giving Mortin a wide grin. ‘It’s just that I have a war to prepare for. Now, if you don’t mind….’

  ‘Heal her, Kurou,’ Mortin said, his voice menacing.

  ‘Yes, yes, I’ll do one’s best,’ he said, retreating from the room with Lena following behind.

  ‘Will she die?’ Lena asked, when they were alone.

  ‘Certainly,’ Kurou said. ‘Twenty-four hours at most.’

  Lena gave a slow nod. ‘Then there’s nothing we can do.’

  Kurou sighed. ‘Within a few hours, we’ll have a lot more death on our hands than just that one girl,’ he said. ‘Are you ready for a little bloodletting, princess?’

  Patricia leaned back against the side of the truck, her cheeks burning. Robert hadn’t even noticed her standing just a short distance away. Had he forgotten her so soon? That useless bitch Isabella had got herself into trouble and all her father could think about was her.

  She shook her head, punching the side of the truck. Since when had his attention meant so much to her? She didn’t need it; she never had before. Yet she couldn’t shed the feeling of resentment towards Isabella that had been brewing ever since the old dimwit had been taken on the train while she had been left to rot in Kurou’s dungeon. It didn’t matter what her father said, that he had sent people to find her, if he loved her he would have stayed behind and let Isabella go alone. What kind of parent would trust that their child was dead without seeing the body? He didn’t love her, he couldn’t have. He had loved Esel, and he loved Isabella, but Patricia?

  She punched the side of the truck again. What did it matter? She didn’t need him. She didn’t need anyone.

  With anger filling her heart she stalked off, wanting to be alone for a while. A knife bounced around inside her jacket and she wondered if it wouldn’t be better to head out into the forest and pull it across her wrists. It wasn’t like anyone would care.