Shanghai Steam

by Calvin D. Jim

  Topper stepped forward and slapped both his hands onto the shoulder of the nearest guard. The connection completed, a lightning storm’s worth of electricity snapped from the contacts on Topper’s palms into the guard. The guard howled; his body galvanized into rigor and he collapsed.

  The other guard whirled and Topper found himself staring down the too-wide barrel of a cocked pistol.

  “Easy, there,” Topper said, backing away, hands up. His little trick was only good for a single jolt, more’s the pity, and he had no other weapon. Topper’s attempt at a friendly smile felt greasy and unconvincing.

  The guard’s trigger finger tightened. Topper winced, seeing his life about to end in a roar of gunpowder when Kuo appeared from nowhere.

  One hand knocked the gun aside. It went off with a deafening boom. The round careened harmlessly off the floor. Kuo’s other hand, the right one, the deadly one, drove into the guard’s neck. The man dropped.

  Silence had fallen. The servants had all fled. Behind Kuo, Topper could see the dragon lying motionless, dead, flat across the floor.

  The Mistress was sprawled on her couch, red eyes closed. Topper thought she was dead, too, then saw her chest rise and fall. She’d only fainted. He grinned.

  “Thought she was made of sterner stuff than that,” Topper said.

  Kuo regarded her without mercy. “I was not fooled.”

  “Good for you, mate.” He caught a flash of movement. Someone peeked into the room through the main door, then darted away. A guard, Topper was sure of it, and he’d seen the fear and relief plain on the man’s face before it’d vanished. “I think you were right about their loyalty,” he said. “She’s finished.” When Kuo said nothing, Topper gave him a pointed look. That got him nowhere, either. He whistled softly between his teeth. Subtlety was lost on this one but he could do blunt if that’s what was needed.

  “Well, you got what you wanted,” Topper said. “Now it’s time for me to get what I want.” He held out a hand. “Give it up, mate.”

  Wordless, Kuo extended his right hand to Topper. It still gripped the pearl. Bloody hell, he’d hit the guard with the pearl! Topper peered at it in panic, hoping it wasn’t cracked. He breathed a sigh of relief; it looked fine.

  Then he looked again. There were streaks of blood on the prize. The black glove had great rents in it, made when Kuo had punched through the unbreakable glass. Through them Topper could see bleeding and ripped flesh. Kuo’s hand wasn’t bronze or iron or anything other than human skin and bone.

  He stared at Kuo, dumb-struck.

  A faint hint of a smile teased at Kuo’s mouth. “I did not lie: powered by qi.”

  Bloody hell.

  * * * * *

  Shen Braun is a dedicated writer, parent, nerd, house-husband, and gamer (not necessarily listed in order of importance). The product of a childhood spent reading and role-playing, it’s only natural he prefers to write stories that just can’t happen in the real world.

  Song of My Heart

  Jennifer Rahn

  When Jianyu was born, he was a great disappointment to everyone. Heads hung in shame, the elders bore the intensity of Grandfather’s glare, made more fearsome by the old man’s white hair tossing over his black robe as he moved. Jianyu, the fat thief of Qi, squirmed in his cradle, unaware of how badly he had damaged the Sphere of Wu Shin. Although the brass plates remained solid and the rivets held strong, our enclosed City was fragile, barely maintaining its balance with the other floating City-Spheres of the Lake. Not only had Jianyu’s birth increased the presence of Yang, he had also completely wiped out any compensating effect of his mother’s Yin, having killed her with his arrival.

  Distant shouts could now be heard as men scurried to find any fuel for the burning maws of the steam-driven equilibrium-engines that fought against the disparity. The floor shuddered intermittently, and the balancing pumps shrieked with strain, trying to maintain Wu Shin’s steadiness. The positioning of Grandfather’s City-Sphere within the Taijitu Spiral was supposed to be in perfect harmony with the other Spheres, creating the music of enlightenment. It hardly sounded that way now.

  Unable to control his fury any longer, Grandfather smashed the jade emblem of Jianyu’s birth against the wall. He stormed out, followed immediately by the uncles and father of this unwanted, impetuous disaster. The baby could not notice the shift of our Sphere closer to the outer rim of the Spiral, so he continued to kick and wave his fat feet and hands in the presence of his only aunt, Lihua.

  Lihua was a lady of great composure. Her fan and the red dust around her eyes may have hidden any upset, yet this time she could not prevent her tears from spilling into rivulets of black that ran down the powdered white of her face. Releasing a deep sigh, she finally shifted in the heavy red and cream silks that encased her, the rustling of her sleeves and blossom-adorned hair alerting her servants that she wished to leave. They helped her rise, leading her gently over the red and gold carpet, her footsteps leaving brief impressions of heat that glowed in my ocular input.

  I, too, could now leave the chamber; yet temptation stirred in my little gyrating pumps that mimicked a heart. Pistons and valves quivered, clearly visible though the silica encasing my inner works — I was low on Qi, the midnight blue force pumping through my veins gradually fading each day to silver. My knee gears caught and ground as I went to the crib to gaze at the small organic creature with great jealousy. He stopped his squirming to look through the skin above my lilac dress, mesmerized by the churning pumps and gears he could see within my throat. They made soft squeaking noises, now that they were old and misaligned.

  So much Qi. His body pulsated with the glowing, vital energy, all gotten so easily by simply being organic. A few drops of it would have energized me for years — but it was forbidden. Such things could only be given by the elders, and only when it was not needed for the great stabilizing engines. I turned and exited the room slowly so that I would not stumble and fall, losing my wig, and smashing myself yet again. The exorbitant cost of parts and labour had caused my husband to do many of the repairs himself. The disfigurement was … well, Fuhua was a good man. Certainly he appreciated my efforts to compensate.

  At the docks, I stood beside Fuhua as he gazed past the wooden planks, into the resplendent orange glow reaching over the water surrounding the Sphere. He watched longingly as Lihua’s golden junk lifted its sails and ran its pumps until it released a huge plume of steam, carrying her back to the safety of the Spheres that were better balanced and closer to the Centre of the Spiral. One of her status — female and organic — was free to live where she wished. A woman such as her would most certainly not stay here. Our Sphere was already too far away from the centre of the Spiral and there would be little she could do to rescue it.

  “Song.” Grandfather turned to me as he said my name. I bowed as humbly as I could without overstressing my gyros and tipping over. “You will look after the child when we are not using him.”

  Using? I bowed again, not daring to question my elder. Grandfather regarded me longer, as if considering how much explanation he would provide.

  “One generation more and we will be pushed out entirely, free-floating in the Lake, completely dependent on our own means. There will be no more women here, and thus no new Qi. Jianyu has cost us dearly. He will repay his debt to our Sphere. Our energy must come from somewhere.” I bowed once more, still not understanding, but honoured by Grandfather’s trust. I reached for Fuhua’s hand, as he must also have been pleased by this, but he had already left. How foolish of me. How unreasonable to expect that my existence could satisfy his longing when a real woman had just been here.

  I stood motionless for perhaps an hour. My memory capacitors had grown faulty, and I was experiencing lapses of consciousness. By the time I regained awareness, the dock was cleared. Only the piercing cries of Jianyu could be heard back within the Sphere. It took me a while longer to move toward him, not because I was frozen, but because…

  Fuhua had not
returned for me. Before he always had.

  I finally reached the cradle, and stared down at the squalling organic, confused. Being an organic had always elevated a person, even one so unwanted, and yet here he was, as abandoned as I. It had to be something else, then, that determined the importance of a person. I collected him from the cradle, hugging him to my breast as I had seen real women do in holograms. This did nothing to comfort the child, yet it amazed me when the pulsating life forces in his body radiated through my silica casing. He was soft, warm and yielding, squirming against me. It felt nothing like the presence of my husband, when he used to come to my bed. Jianyu’s energies were unconstrained, and shared freely. I aligned my Kirlian plates towards him to receive what I could. Surely I could collect a little of this energy that he dispersed anyway?

  I took the baby to my chambers where a small brass tank with many levers and gears stood upon three sturdy legs. After turning the small crank at the front once, I held the feeding tube extending from the base of the tank to Jianyu’s mouth, letting him suckle until he fell asleep. I sat there, thinking that Fuhua would return, see me in my finest silks holding this child, and desire me as he had when I was first constructed.

  Time passed and Jianyu grew. Because we were alone, I spoke to him, feeling ever so pleased when he eventually spoke back. We continued on in this way — feeding and conversing — for many years. I watched his hair and beard grow long and thick as he became a man, his body fill out and stretch until he could only place his head in my arms when it came time to feed. Fuhua never returned. Perhaps he had died.

  The elders came to take Jianyu away for a few hours each week. He always shied away from them when the door opened and the radiated light of their bodies fell into the room. Sometimes he would scurry under my heavy, mahogany table and fight them, kicking and punching furiously. They would grab his clothes to pull him out, and when those had been torn away, they would grab his hair and skin, forcing him to leave, dragging the energy of his Qi out of my chambers. Whenever Jianyu was gone, my world was dark.

  I sat alone yet again, waiting for my door to swing open and his body to be dumped through its frame. Despite the easing of my being that occurred whenever he was returned to me, the current in my body always fluctuated drastically when he told me what they had done to him.

  “They drain me, Song. Trap me in a cage so I can’t move, push metal probes through my skin and sap my life to power their machines.”

  I cradled him in my arms and comforted him as best I could, holding the feeding tube to his lips and searching my databases for stories that would distract him from his pain and soothe him into sleep. Over several days, the light of his Qi regenerated — until the elders returned.

  And again. I sat alone in my chamber, surrounded by so many beautiful items — sculpted jade, wooden screens, silk draperies, empty silica of others like me who no longer held a charge — all these lovely things that no one seemed to value without the energy of life.

  When my door opened at last, Jianyu’s body was so dark that I thought they had drained him completely. He flopped from their hands onto my carpet. My heart pumps stuck for a moment, but a faint flicker of energy still lingered around his heart and lips, barely detectable by my ocular input.

  “Jianyu,” I whispered, shifting my weight and grinding my knee gears to reach him. I needed him. Neither Grandfather nor Fuhua had given me even a single drop of Qi for years. All that kept me going was the small amount I collected with my Kirlian plates.

  Moving carefully, I lifted and carried him back to my couch, then raised the feeding tube to his mouth. A single drop of glistening white fell from its end, then nothing more. Our resources were cut off. I had nothing to give him except…

  My brass sewing shears, which lay in a basket by my feet, more for decoration than use, did have sharpened edges. I poked a hole in the silica of my chest, awkwardly working the blades in a circle until the opening was big enough to insert my fingers. I reached in to where my little whirring pumps were connected to the series of tubes through which my Qi flowed, and pulled one free. A silver-blue drop fell from its end as I held it over Jianyu’s mouth, but it puddled listlessly around his tongue. He was unable to use the Qi in this form. I could use it because…? My memory slipped for a moment.

  Because Grandfather had used his alchemy to mould extracted Qi into jin, which could power the elemental metals, but could not be returned to an organic. Jianyu! Was there nothing else I could give him? Reaching into my chest again, I deliberately ground my thoracic gear over my hand, releasing a fine spray of metal. I put this into Jianyu’s mouth, wiping my fingers against his lips. His hungry blood swept it away and his light seemed to shift toward infrared.

  Slowly, his system accepted the energy as it dripped from the tube in my chest, glowing with the same metallic blue that ran in my veins. The sensation of the Qi transfer was amazing. I could feel synchronicity between his heart and my pumps as both beat to the rhythm generated by my jin. Was this how it felt to be organic and alive?

  Every bit of jin exited my body and filled Jianyu, carrying more of my metal components as it left. I happily surrendered, as this was my will. I went blind as my systems sequentially failed, but in the seconds before I lost my sight I saw the Sphere through his eyes, now enhanced with my ocular input. So beautiful! I could see his cells meld and mutate to become more than merely organic or mechanical. A whole greater than the parts.

  Tendons and muscles found simpler, purer forms while his intellect rewired itself. Before I finally lost my sense of touch, I was able to feel his pleasure at the enhanced sensation of running his fingers over the silks covering my arm, and at his new mechanical receptors feeding him information about the exact positioning of each fingertip as he flexed his hands with their metal wires snaking through them. Before my neural network completely faded, I felt him turn to look at me and marvel at what an amazing creation I was. How strange. Fuhua had never thought so.

  And then, my consciousness ended.

  Restart.

  I am … Jianyu. I am…

  I didn’t know what I was. But I knew I was beautiful. Perfection. My form was dark, long and sleek; elegant with curves of metal and muscle now fused into a hybrid of organic and machine. Between stretches of translucent flesh, tendons and endoskeleton were interspersed with arteries and tubes carrying jin. Within my chest, the motion of tiny mechanical metal pumps assisted my circulation, creating a system stronger than before. At my feet lay the remains of what had been Song, just a mound of deflated silica.

  Song. Still in my heart. My strength flared with her essence but she had never been real Yin and I was no longer Yang. I had strange, new sort of balance. I flexed my will and felt the Sphere of Wu Shin spin even farther from the edge of the Spiral. I could hear Grandfather and the elders scream and run for the central stabilizers. Their panic no longer distressed me. I could change things.

  I could be anything, exist in any circumstance, absorbing new energies from any element that surrounded me. I saw what our Sphere was and what it could be and that I would soon make everything right. My elders would finally have prosperity and peace.

  Zichan fuzhai. I balanced myself. My breath drew in. My arms moved in sweeping arcs, my right foot extended in front of me. Poised. Breath expelled out sharply as I pulled my arms back, fists tucked by my sides.

  Shen ti xing. I was the vessel ready to be filled. I made a half turn and shifted my weight to my other foot, repositioning my arms in front of my body. The power of the elements came into me from beyond the Sphere. No longer would we be dependent on the Taijitu Spiral.

  Li. My strength swirled within me.

  Yi. I released this energy into Wu Shin, to power my family’s home, letting them know I could sustain us all. My arms opened and swept down as the Qi came out from me in waves.

  Jing. I released all my love, the Song in my heart, into the structure of Wu Shin. Our Sphere stopped its motion. The entire structure, every atom, wa
s in a state of flow, of perfect balance within the Lake.

  The elders broke down the door. I searched their faces eagerly for Fuhua, whom I did not find. Grandfather came forward, his eyes flashing as he pounded the heel of his staff once, and all fell silent.

  He did not yet understand.

  I smiled, wanting to share my new knowledge. “Grandfather, I have made things stable. We no longer need the Taijitu Spiral. We are a new centre of balance, all by ourselves.”

  “Jianyu?” He glared at me, his eyes raking across my changed body with what looked like disgust. “What has that abomination done to you? I will restore you at once!”

  “Abomination? Grandfather, no! Let me show you—”

  “You have lost your humanity! And you will not show anyone anything!”

  My elders shifted behind Grandfather and I saw they were armed. Again I had been foolish. All his talk of balance, the maintenance of order. Grandfather only wanted power that he alone could control and provide. The rage on his face told me all.

  Grandfather slammed his staff down again, and my elders moved in to attack. “Zhe shi mogui.”

  So be it. I am a devil indeed.

  “Be still, Jianyu! I will remove that traitorous metal from you!”

  They would not take Song from me, returning me to that living death. The elders’ blows were sluggish, easy for me to predict and avoid. I was not as they tried to make me believe. They were not as they tried to make themselves believe. Why should I keep trying to please these … archaic … useless…

  My heart broke. So long had I yearned for their affection that the wish still resided within me, but my defence was sure, my strikes were precise, brutal.

  I could not kill them.

  I fled. I ran through the halls of Wu Shin, through the steam-filled underworkings, out into the darkness of the Lake. I swam through the icy waters, not caring that soon I would be lost, and more alone than I had ever been.