by KW Jeter
“I doubt any amicable intentions on your part.” Having a little more time to study the other, I saw that he had been similarly roughed up by the impact of the aerial cemetery into the earth; the miracle that I had survived was compounded by his having done so as well. That he had taken some hard blows was apparent; one side of his neck and face was so bruised as to appear almost black; a sleeve of his jacket was tattered to shreds all the way up to his elbow, revealing crusted blood beneath; and he visibly favoured one leg even as he stood, suggesting that some sinew or bone in the other was sprained or broken. “Even if,” I continued, “you had been able to satisfyingly answer all the questions I posed to you while we were still airborne, you would not have earned my trust, or convinced me to throw my lot in with yours.”
“Shame, that – you’ve no hope, save me.” Spivvem stepped closer, pressing a broken-nailed fingertip against my chest. “Hear me out, Dower; can still achieve not just survival, but deal of profit besides. And more – there’s child involved, isn’t there?”
“What do you know about that?” I still held the rock aloft as a weapon, but his unexpected words stayed my hand. “And what business of yours would it be?”
“Lot palaver you wish – never tire of talking, d’ye?” He advanced his familiarity, actually wrapping an arm about my shoulders and pressing me closer to him, as though we were long-lost friends, newly reunited. “But time presses – should be on way, ‘fore those mean us no good can stop. Can talk later – are you ready?”
“Ready?” I stared at him in puzzlement. “Of what are you speaking?”
“No more’n this–”
With sudden force, Spivvem pushed himself against me; balance lost, I stumbled backward to the edge of the grave. Attempting to save myself from any further jostling on his part, I struck at him with the rock, swinging it down toward his brow – but he easily parried my forearm aside, knocking the stone out of his grasp. Thus disarmed, I could not prevent another shove from him–
And I fell, toppling into the hole, my arms flailing wildly. Desperate, I reached for the rungs of the ladder propped nearby, but my fingertips only futilely grazed them. Above me, I saw the clouded sky, framed by the grave’s rough edges, and Spivvem receding as he looked down at me. To my astonishment, he bent his legs, then sprang forward, his own arms outstretched. For a moment, he seemed to hang spreadeagled in open space, then plummeted as I was already engaged in doing. Likely he was smiling in that crazed manner of his, though I could not be certain of this, as we both tumbled toward some point far below.
* * *
How long I fell, and how far, I am not certain; these are difficult things to calculate when one is in the midst of them. With previous descents, I had the comfort of being battered unconscious before undergoing the final stages of them, and thus been spared the dizzy anxiety that I suffered upon this occasion.
The passage of time distorts when one descends so headlong into the earth, with no support but the rush of air past one’s cartwheeling limbs – particularly so in darkness, when there is no reference as to how quickly it is happening, or how much distance has been vaulted through. One part of my mind judged – certainly incorrectly – that I had been falling for hours; to another part it seemed but a few seconds.
Mercifully, the vertical process terminated; water splashed about me. If not for that, I would have been broken lifeless by the impact of some sterner substance. Fortunately, it was not of great depth; sufficient to break my fall, but not enough in which to drown, as long as I quickly regained some footing. I did so, the water coming to my waist, and looked about myself. The place was familiar to me; I had been here before, with the Americans Blightley and Haze. This was the subterranean chamber that contained their mock Venice, in which I had glided along in a gondola with them. At that time, the waters had been deeper; something must have occurred, so that the entire area had been drained to a great degree; the artificial shore against which the waters lapped now stood yards higher above its dark surface. That was not the only transformation; the pasteboard palazzos and other structures were in ruins, their flimsy silhouettes toppled over and broken, giving the false city the appearance of children’s toys that had been trodden upon.
“There be–” My survey was interrupted by a voice from some distance where I had fallen. Turning about, I saw Nick Spivvem similarly enmired as I was, his clothes soaked and dark hair plastered to his brow. “Well found you.”
He made his way toward me, the water parting around him as he approached. I made no attempt at evasion or escape, considering it pointless under the circumstances.
“Come along then.” Once at my side, Spivvem tilted his head to indicate the direction in which he apparently meant us to go. “Much to see.”
“What happened here?” I remained where I was; my inquiry was prompted by having been able to perceive more of our surroundings. A lurid glow dimly illuminated the prospect, as though from smouldering fires just out of sight. “When last I saw this, it appeared to be at least functional, if not all that impressive; now everything seems to be in shambles.”
“Could say.” He took a quick look about us. “Confess myself bit guilty, though not my intent. ‘Fraid that when tinkered with rigging of that little boat, in which you and Blightley were having chat, disarranged more than was needed to shoot you away from premises. Indicates, it does, how jury-rigged whole construction was – cheapskate Americans slapped together with no regard for durableness. Good sneeze, whole bluidy place falls apart.”
“Is that what you wanted to show me? I already had little regard for the pair you mention – you needn’t have so precipitously forced me here, just to provide confirming evidence for my low opinion.”
“Give rat’s hindquarters, what think of them. Scurried off home, they have – and good riddance. Got more important things take care of, than dealing with those fools. Keep up–” He started off, toward the distant point to which he had previously drawn my attention. “We’ve business to attend.”
With my own jacket damply clinging to my frame, I followed after the other man – if for no other reason than that he seemed to know his way about, and I was otherwise without guide in the subterranean chamber to which I had been compelled.
As we advanced through the waist-deep water, the light increased, the flickering tints of red and orange growing brighter and more threatening; it hardly seemed to be the wisest course to be heading toward them, but Spivvem ahead of me displayed no trepidation. At the same time, the mournful quiet of the artificial Venetian city, broken and tattered, was replaced in our ears by a growing din, the hissing and clanking sounds of machinery in operation.
That such would be the case at whatever destination my companion led toward was confirmed by the fiery glow rising to an eye-searing intensity, and the tumulting din mounting to an almost deafening volume. Some dismaying prospect lay before me, though yet unglimpsed; the distant fires, if such they were, cast their heat with sufficient force to draw sweat from my skin, even as I was still mired in the waters through which we advanced; above us, the rocky ceiling of this vast subterranean chamber reflected downward the intimidating radiance and noise.
“Hey up,” spoke Spivvem, glancing over his shoulder at me. “Best stop moment, chat a bit here – difficult make clear, much farther on.”
Though unable, given the circumstances, to summon up any emotion bright enough to be termed gladdened, I was at least relieved by this momentary lull in our sodden march. A stony ledge close by afforded a perch out of the water, and large enough for two men; I joined Spivvem there, scrambling up beside him.
“Much to tell – hear me well enow?”
“If you raise your voice,” I replied, cupping one hand to my ear. “I will do my best to listen.”
“Brilliant.” Spivvem’s shoulder rubbed against mine, as he pointed in the direction toward which we had been proceeding. “Wager like to know, all that is?”
“I have learned to forestall such inquiries,
for fear of finding out the answers.”
“No avoiding this’n.”He prodded me forward with a hand at my back. “Go look, see yourself – I’ll wait.”
With some reluctance – the distant heat had been lessening the wet state of my clothing, increasing my comfort to a small degree – I allowed myself to slip from the perch, and back into the shallows. As I waded on, the force of the water rushing past me also increased; through the roaring mechanical din, I could make out another sound, that of a rushing cataract ahead.
The subterranean chamber’s dimensions were augmented, I now saw, by those of the chasm into which the water fell; this close to its edge, I braced myself to keep from being swept over. Some rusting iron, perhaps of a ladder, had been fastened to the rock wall nearby; I grasped one of the heavy bars, but it came away in my hand, nearly toppling me. But I was able to regain my balance; at the slight distance I maintained from the opening, I was able to view that which Spivvem had wished me to see–
Below lay the source of the churning fiery glare, and the unrelenting noise. I had expected – or perhaps merely hoped – to find a volcanic phenomenon there before me, of greater dimensions than some Ætna or even Krakatau, but of the same lava-spewing nature. Instead, the grinding iron clatter had been more truly predictive – for what stretched out as far as my eye could perceive through the rising smoke and steam was nothing of geological process, but rather entirely industrial. If one had been given djinn-like powers to fly above such appalling factories as disfigure our English cities, and peel back a bolted ceiling, something similar might be revealed, though not at the scale which I now witnessed. It was as though all the earth’s depths beneath those surfaces upon which the sun shone and the rain fell, and here excluded, had been transformed into one great interlinked factory, every inch a locus of incessantly pounding activity, with no horizon limiting its extent. The fires were those of the furnaces and crucibles that vomited forth streams of molten iron, crusted with black patches of slag; the gouts of steam and smoke were emitted by the boilers quaking from the pressures bottled within. The waters tumbling over the edge of the cataract above were instantly boiled away, or ran beneath the grated substructure in bubbling rivers. Pistons the size of cottages thrust back and forth with frightening velocity, shivering the girdered frames that caged them.
How much time, whether minutes or hours, crawled by as I stood transfixed, staring at the infernal scene rolled out before me – I have no idea. The terrifying images of industry, unremitting in its mechanical fury, were virtually seared upon my eyes, as my face withered in the heat from the ovens of production. And yet there was something even grimmer and more appalling that I perceived at last, when I was all but blinded…
“Rather stunned, you seem.” In a relaxed attitude, Spivvem retained his seat upon the ledge above the flowing waters. “Sight afflict so bad?”
I slowly crawled up beside him. My eyes had been soothed by the darkness through which I had plodded, wading back toward this spot; I could discern the other in silhouette at first, then his features became dimly visible.
“Yes…” I nodded slowly. “It was… horrible.”
“If used to green fields and pastures, imagine so.” He shrugged. “More an urban upbringing, myself – so didn’t find quite so shocking, first I saw it.”
“What is it, for God’s sake?”
“Rather, what isn’t?” Spivvem’s voice remained calm and unruffled. “Soon everything, everywhere, be like. No more than seen Future, you have.”
“That? That is the World to Come?”
“Plenty as would wish it so.” He nodded with exaggerated sagacity. “Might get their way.”
“Nothing more,” I muttered, appalled, “than a giant grinding factory – and for what purpose? What is all that supposed to manufacture?”
“Why… misery, ‘course! What other purpose needed? Oh, to be sure, high-minded industrial types and apologists will ‘scuse themselves, pointing to mountains of shoddy goods that come out the loading docks – but really b’lieve that’s what thrills their innards? Or would be sight of common folk crushed beneath one great bluidy machine, and the boss’s manicured finger on lever drives it? There’s true reason for what’s called Progress, very like.”
“No more,” I said. “Please – whatever your purpose in bringing me here, and showing me this, I cannot fathom. But if by doing so, you have trapped me in this place – if there is no escape from what lies so close at hand – than I would rather drown myself now, than be faced with the prospect of enduring it any further.”
“Suit yourself, Dower. No business mine, what you do – but not yet. As said before, business to take care of. Both have – that’s why here.”
“What possible business could I have in such a place, but attempting to flee from it, as best I can?”
“Told above, before made our great jump. The child – your son, that is.”
“How would you have any knowledge regarding him?”
“Scape told me. Told me quite lot, indeed.”
“I find that difficult to credit, unless you are implying that you once had him under some type of duress, and forced him to tell you.”
“Hardly necessary,” said Spivvem. “He and I were partners – at least for while.”
“As I said to you before – he expressed to me an opinion of considerable hostility toward you.”
“Not surprised – had fallings out, we did. Recently, too – volatile character, his. Pity he’s dead, otherwise might’ve made amends. But both engaged in finding this sprat of yours. Fact, Scape and I in league when you first laid eyes on me, down in fookin’ Cornwall – oy, dismal place that is. If you hadn’t so rudely chased me away, might’ve saved us all a fair bit trouble. And mystification on your part – would’ve known about your boy, and why all this chasing about, earlier rather than later.”
“If the two of you had been concerned over the whereabouts of my son – and you had managed to locate him, as Scape had informed me – then why are we here in this dismal hole? Why not take me to where he is, so that I might assist you in whatever efforts are required to extricate the child from whatever situation in which he resides? Scape had made his promise to Miss McThane to effect that rescue; if for whatever reason you wish to fulfil that pledge, why not commence immediately upon it, rather than wasting more time?”
“Daft, you are–” Spivvem rolled his eyes as he shook his head, then looked full upon me again. “I have brought you to where boy is. He’s here, or rather–” A hand rose, to point toward the appalling scene from which I had just returned. “There.”
I could make no reply; the other’s words oppressed my soul to a point near extinction.
“Bad off, eh?” Spivvem tilted his head, attempting to peer into my averted face. “Weren’t expecting such?”
“No…” My voice dwindled to a whisper. “I knew it.”
For that was what had so afflicted me, as I had stood at that precipitous edge, the water streaming past me, transformed to hissing steam below. It had not been the ghastly engines that I had espied through the mists and smoke, churning ceaselessly, their enormous cogged gears grinding away, the pistons slamming back and forth with such relentless fury. If that had been all that I had witnessed from above, it would have been a vision terrifying enough. But there had been more, which had required a sharper peering to glimpse, and which sent me scurrying away, horrified–
Human figures among the demonic machines; that was what I had seen at last. So distant had been the elevated point from which I had viewed this sunken landscape, they seemed ant-like, dwarfed to insignificance by the iron constructions maintained by their labours. Whenever some boiler hatch was opened, the glaring light from the flames within glistened on the sweating torsos of the men, stripped to their waists, or on the faces of the women tending the only slightly less demanding wheels and spindles. Elsewhere, in whatever shadows could be found, a few took shelter for a hastily seized respite, or lay prostrate and
motionless, their lives’ last energies having been finally pressed from them.
And still worse, if such could be imagined! The smaller forms of children, their faces blackened with soot, their fragile limbs withered and bent, spines hunched nearly circular as they scooped cinders and ash from beneath the constructions pounding only inches above their heads, or squeezed themselves through those constrictive spaces that only they were able to, intent on all those interminable errands that the factory demanded of them.
That had been the vision – the sight of those tiny workers – which had so weighed upon me, I could not speak of it until prodded by Spivvem’s words.
“He is there?” What I said was no more than what I had already realized. “My son is among the machines?”
“One time, would’ve been.” Spivvem nodded. “But things’ve changed somewhat; as much valued he’d been by late mother – and perhaps yourself – he’s also for certain others. Scape and I found out that much. And why boy’s so – very interesting matter, that is. But also reason for your importance in all these dealings and scrabbling about.”
“Which is?”
“Others can explain better’n I – and they’ll have chance, if I have anything to do with. For I’ve proposition to make you.”
“Proceed.” My surroundings, and what I had witnessed a little distance away, so darkened my thoughts, that I was ready to consider any prospect. “I am listening.”
“Here’s deal.” In an expectedly conspiratorial manner, Spivvem brought his face close to mine. “Brought you here, can get you out – but have do something for me.”
“Very well,” I said. “What would that be?”
“Come with, to where this boy is – I’ll take there. Don’t fool me, Dower; can see well that black rock of your heart. Very perceptive I am, concerning people’s natures – why I’m so good at my line of work. If cared enow your son’s plight, much as late wife did, there’d be no need to force you go to him; do it of own free will. But – We are as are, as folk my particular tribe like to say, and we do as can. Accompany willingly, and no mucking about on your part, and I’ll make sure see daylight again.”
