Boom Time

by Michelle E Lowe

  “Keep your goddamn mask on, soldier,” his commander ordered. “Medic!”

  The armored vehicle took aim at the automatons. The blast was louder than a meteorite hitting the earth. There was a brief whistle as the shell soared toward its targets, followed by the impact. Debris and smoke plumed up in a mass behind the Machine Men. The gunner had missed. George peered around the wall. As the Living Automatons came closer, firing relentlessly, he got his first real look at them. They wore no helmets, for their heads were made of metal, as were their bodies, which had not a stitch of clothing on them, probably to keep them from being identified by other countries. No country would dare claim them, but that didn’t mean someone hadn’t been producing them to win the war. Their torsos were long and oval-shaped, similar to a pill capsule, and their arms and legs were a network of rods and movable pipes. Wires and bolts allowed for mobile joints. They approached without fear, but they were clearly on a mission to destroy. For some reason, they were all wearing gas masks with air tanks strapped to their backs. Why did they need them? Were they breathing?

  The bullets of the mini-guns bounced off the tank as it rolled to a stop. One of the Machine Men pressed the button of a detonator and more deafening explosions erupted from other hidden bombs nearby. The tank aimed despite the wall of flames in its path. Another blast from the tank gun fired and pieces of the Machine Men flew in all directions. Afterward, the medic arrived and plunged a morphine needle into George’s leg. The world dimmed soon after.

  George gasped awake, sweat drenching him. He got up quickly.

  He was used to the recurring dream, but it still left him shaken every time. He needed to distract himself.

  After getting the fire going downstairs and getting the coffee brewing, he did a little maintenance on his artificial limb. Basic stuff, such as lubing the joints and tightening any loose gears. His mechanical arm may have caused the people who he believed loved him to turn him away, but he was thankful to have it.

  After the Battle of Ypres, he was taken to a makeshift hospital that smelled as rank as shit and vomit. His commanding officer had requested the United States Army to put George on a special list, and he was soon accepted. George was given an honorable discharge and was then sent to New York City to have the procedure. It took months of surgeries and recovery, not to mention learning how to acclimate to the new arm.

  He wrote to his kin back home but never mentioned what happened in full detail, only that he had been wounded. He wished he had now. It might have given them time to process it before he arrived. His family was mortified, calling the mechanics the work of the devil. The same community that promised him praise when he came home now saw him as nothing more than a freak. So, George left and returned to New York City, where he landed employment in Mr. Quinn’s brewery company. People in the big city didn’t seem to mind his arm much. In fact, they found it fascinating. Mr. Quinn never cared so long as he could perform his duties. When Prohibition took effect, Mr. Quinn offered him a job as a bartender in his soon-to-be-opened speakeasy.

  George had once had other ideas for his life—things other than becoming a one-armed, illegal bartender—but life had a way of changing a person’s fate.

  The kettle whistled. His real hand shook as he poured his coffee. He missed the sound of cars honking outside his apartment window. The quiet scared him. Without the sounds and busyness of the city, there was nothing to distract him from his past. George had done his best to keep himself occupied, doing repair work around the cabin, hunting, and of course, brewing batches of alcohol.

  If only his family hadn’t shunned him. The betrayal stung him deeply. It hurt him more than losing his arm. He almost thought about having the thing removed, but then decided that he didn’t want to live life as a cripple. Perhaps if he could find a woman and settle down. Then he wondered what woman would want him as a husband or the father of her children? A man with a robotic arm, George could already see his kids coming home from school, crying over being teased about having a freak for a father. Anyway, how could he provide for a family? Working for Kelly Quinn got him paid decently, but it wasn’t honest work and there was always the threat that it would all come crashing down on Quinn and everyone else he employed. George was reminded of that on the night The Attic was raided, and Brody was murdered.

  George had to admit that he was alone in this world and had to face his own nightmares. The Machine Men in Ypres had taken away more than his arm that day.

  The winds howled. A blizzard was sweeping in just as the weather forecast had predicted. George turned the knob on his radio but only got the hiss of static. Interference from the storm. Because he had won two packs of cigarettes from Frank and Isaac the other night, he didn’t bother going to the general store. Chain-smoking was his only comfort. Being stuck in the middle of the damn woods all by himself, he never let a cigarette be far from his lips for too long.

  With the oncoming storm and nothing else to do but to stay warm and check on the product down in the cellar, George decided to chance it and go to the store, anyway. If the telephone worked, maybe he’d call up Isaac. A talk would do him a world of good, and Isaac was good at talking.

  George bundled himself up and went to the car. Having it in the shelter of the shed kept the frost off the windshield. After the engine warmed up, George drove off, taking it slow over the lane until he reached the main road. The snow was coming down hard by the time he reached the general store, which was closed. George had predicted this and so broke in and helped himself to smokes, supplies, and anything else he thought he might need. He tried the phone, but the storm had disrupted the power lines.

  At least he’d gotten what he came for. The journey to the cabin, however, proved more difficult. The blizzard had erased not only his tire tracks but also hid any trace of a road.

  “Dammit!” he cursed, leaning close to the wheel. “Where’s the fucking turnoff?”

  His body shook with rage and frustration. The heavy snowfall had completely whitewashed everything. The windshield wiper did little to help with visibility. Then he spied the road leading to the cabin and he yanked the wheel over, anxious to get back. The automobile veered off and then George’s body rose a bit off his seat when the car dipped sharply down.

  The turnoff wasn’t a turnoff, after all, but a steep embankment leading down into the snowy forest. He was bumped violently off the seat as the car rolled rapidly over the rocky hillside. Low tree branches, small trees, bushes, and whatever else was in the way whacked the automobile hard, cracking the windshield. As the vehicle rolled over the unlevel ground and flipped onto its side, George was flung sideways. The vehicle slid toward a tree and George braced himself. The impact knocked all the air out of him, nearly causing him to black out. He had guarded his head with his real arm, which kept it from smashing into the windshield when the front of the car crashed into the tree.

  That didn’t stop the world from spinning. He tried moving off the door he was pressed against, but his chest hurt from hitting the steering wheel. Shattered glass tumbled off him. The door window he lay upon cracked as he moved. Everything he’d taken from the store was scattered all over. Warm blood slid down from a cut on his forehead. He wiped it away before it fell into his eye. The hood of the car was completely crumpled against the tree trunk and white smoke billowed from the radiator. Pains at various levels of seriousness hit him all at once. He felt that his legs were broken in many places. He tried moving his mechanical arm, but it was stuck between the steering wheel and the car door where the steering column had bent. George yanked it free. The loud squeaking and groaning of metal scratched his ears. When he looked at it, he saw that the forearm cylinders were bent and the fingers twisted and disfigured. Some fingers could no longer move.

  “Ain’t that something else,” he said quietly.

  He kept trying to move them. The middle digit and thumb only twitched, the gears sputtering and locking up. The palm of the hand had locked upwards in an unnatural way when t
he ball joint broke away from its connector. The forearm was as gnarled as the metal of his car.

  This was the lowest moment of George’s life. The moment when he realized he had lost everything. The war had hollowed him out and refilled him with unmanageable nightmares and mental torture. His family didn’t want him around, he had no future to speak of that wouldn’t land him in Sing Sing Prison or in the grave, and now he had lost his arm for the second time.

  George Baxter was truly alone, and he didn’t do well alone. He pulled his pistol from under his coat and put it in his mouth. He didn’t think, only pulled the trigger.

  Thirty

  Too Many Close Calls

  Pierce woke up all out of sorts. After Lucy left, he had sat on the stair for a long time, trying to keep the room from spinning. He hated that he’d gotten so wrecked that it had prevented him from going after her. When he collected himself, he went into the speakeasy and did his best to save face. He drank coffee for the rest of the night until the nightery closed up. Pierce hurried everyone out before he keeled over from exhaustion. The moment all the customers and staff were out the door, he locked up and fell asleep on a rear booth.

  He had no clue what the hour was when he woke up. When he finally got to his feet, he cringed at the wretched state of the place. Because he’d let the staff go home without cleaning the speakeasy, the entire bar was a mess.

  “Bloody hell. I’ll deal with it later,” he mumbled, working at stretching his stiff limbs.

  The whole speakeasy was cozy and warm thanks to the heaters he had left running all night. Hell, he hadn’t even shut off the lights. The warmth kept him from having to wear his suit jacket. He did put on his coat when he went upstairs to use the toilet.

  It was dramatically different up there. The winds whistled sharply through every nook and cranny. A massive snowstorm had hit the city. The brunt of it seemed to be over now, leaving a thick blanket of snow in its wake. Already, the snowplows had pushed powder from the roads. Pierce watched through the tavern window as a snow vehicle traveled on, shoving mounds away. In his day, a snowstorm such as this would have forced a city to a standstill. Not this city, though. Not New York.

  He went back down, closing the door to prevent the speakeasy from losing heat, and put on a second pot of coffee at the bar. While it brewed, he tried calling Lucy from the telephone installed on the wall nearby. The operator connected the call but Lucy never picked up.

  “Dammit,” he cursed, slamming the phone down.

  She must be at work or simply not answering. It was times like these that he wished he didn’t have such a generous memory. Even in his drunken haze, he clearly remembered her coming to the speakeasy and their discussion up in the basement.

  He stood at the bar and planted his face in his hands.

  “I’ve bloody well embarrassed myself.”

  He stayed that way for a long time. Then he heard a loud bang when something was slammed down directly in front of him. Pierce jumped and looked.

  There, before him, was his own flintlock pistol.

  “I thought I should return this to you,” said Leon Clark, standing beside him, sliding his hand off the handle of the weapon.

  With him was around a dozen or so of his goons. One of them stood behind Leon, aiming his gun at Pierce.

  Pierce reckoned they had broken in from upstairs. Pierce hadn’t locked the speakeasy door, and its well-oiled hinges had prevented him from even hearing it open.

  “I wasn’t expecting anyone to be here,” Leon admitted.

  Leon reached under Pierce’s coat and pulled his gun from its holster. Once he was disarmed, another goon grabbed Pierce, yanked him away from the bar, and began searching him.

  Leon breathed through that mask of his. Mist whisked out as he pulled it away. The goon quit searching him after finding nothing else, allowing Pierce to lower his arms. He wished he were behind the bar where a rifle was hidden under the counter.

  “I was informed late this morning about Quinn’s new digs,” Leon explained. “We stopped by to see it for ourselves.” An eerie grin split his dark face when he added, “Thought we’d wait to see who showed up first. Maybe it would be you, Brit.”

  “Brit?” Pierce repeated in his best American accent. “Never been to England, friend.”

  Leon’s grin dropped. “Don’t play me for a fool, boy. I know it was you who held me up and broke into my office.”

  Pierce reckoned he was buggered. Everyone had warned him about how dangerous Leon Clark was—or used to be before he was shot. For the cocker who’d robbed him and lost him his precious bug collection, though, Pierce was sure the man wouldn’t mind letting his bloodlust take him over just for him.

  Leon socked Pierce right in the gut. The hit was the hardest he’d ever taken to the stomach. It certainly brought him to his knees in a hurry. Burning acid rose up in his throat, forcing him to cough and gag.

  “I was a boxer in my prime,” Leon explained while Pierce worked to keep the contents of his stomach from spilling up through his mouth. “And that’s only a taste of what’s coming to you.”

  Leon eyed someone behind Pierce. “Carl.”

  “Yeah, boss?”

  “Get this cat on his feet. Hold him.”

  Carl hoisted Pierce up and held his arms, locking him into a very vulnerable position. A pain that could only be described as catastrophic for his balls erupted between Pierce’s legs when Leon grabbed his testicles and squeezed. Pierce would have lost his dinner if he’d had any.

  “Let me do a little math for you, boy. One forceps to pull teeth, plus one hammer for bone breaking, plus one hacksaw for cutting, and one hedge clipper.” Leon’s grip tightened, sending a wave of hot nausea up into Pierce’s already tender gut. “That equals several long and very painful hours for you.”

  Thankfully, before he retched, Leon let him go.

  “We’re takin’ him for a ride to his final destination,” Leon announced to his goons. “I want to take care of him someplace else so we don’t have blood and innards all over my future speakeasy.”

  They headed up the stairs toward the unfinished antique shop. Why the bloody hell had Pierce stuck around? He should have taken the cash he’d saved and skipped town ages ago. Taken Lucy with him and left this crazy world behind.

  Now it was too late.

  Pierce held a shimmer of hope that someone, perhaps Kelly and Frank, would be upstairs. Maybe the Trickster would appear. Instead, something else entirely different waited for them.

  “Hello, Clark,” a woman dressed in a long fur coat greeted him.

  She was a plump lass with black hair and perfect makeup that enhanced every beautiful quality of her face.

  Leon stopped and cocked his head sideways. “Romano? What are you doing here?”

  Romano? Pierce thought. The Violetta Romano I’ve heard so much about?

  Pierce stood behind Leon and a few of his goons, with a handful of thugs behind Pierce. From where he stood, Pierce spied eight other men with the woman. They were all dressed in coats except for four of them. Those men’s heads were bowed, their faces hidden by the brim of their hats. Pierce wondered why.

  “I followed you,” she confessed. “Well, not exactly. More like eavesdropped on your call.”

  “You had my phone tapped?”

  “I have connections of my own, Clark,” she stated matter-of-factly. “When my people overheard Dixon call you about Quinn’s new speakeasy, I decided to come see it for myself.”

  “You got the call last night and you show up now?”

  She shrugged. “I waited for you.”

  Ol’ Leon’s breathing increased to the point that he wheezed painfully and needed to use his mask. Leon’s people stiffened, their expressions alert. Things were about to go to pot for somebody.

  Leon lowered the mask and surmised, “You’ve spied on me and now you’ve followed me here, huh? I can only assume the worst.”

  “You’ve guessed correctly,” she confirmed, a sa
distic sparkle in her eye. “I’m going to rub both you and Quinn out and take over everything you boys own.”

  Her bloody bold claim brought on an immediate reaction. The gents with their heads bowed like some sort of dramatic choir ready to sing a hymn raised their heads. They didn’t seem real. Their faces appeared to be made of patches of metal, yet their eyes were human, set deep inside eye sockets and guarded by goggles. Each of them shared similar features such as blocky noses and thin mouths. Their throats consisted of a single clear tube surrounded by a series of wires, thin pipes, and gears that turned whenever their heads moved. These blokes seemed manufactured. Each had a faint fog coming out of their mouths.

  Christ, were they . . . ?

  “Machine Men!” Leon hollered.

  The gangsters pulled their weapons and gunfire erupted on both sides as bright and dangerous as an indoor fireworks show. The bangs knocked loudly against Pierce’s eardrums. Blood from Leon’s people sprayed everywhere. The Machine Men had opened fire with handguns, as had everyone else. Pierce found that fortunate, for it would’ve proven mighty difficult to escape from an auto rifle.

  The second the firefight started, Pierce ducked low and headed for the kitchen area that was still under heavy renovation by the McCarthy Construction Company. He was amazed that he was able to make it out without being shot. When he neared the kitchen exit, however, it burst open and in came another metal man. It seemed to sense his approach. Pierce stopped short and stood there, petrified. Those perfectly round eyes, showing through the goggle’s lenses, targeted him. It prompted Pierce to move his arse.

  Everyone, except the automatons, had taken cover behind whatever they could find, firing pot shots. Bullets smacked all around Pierce as he rushed for the basement. He thundered down the stairs, nearly tripping over his own feet and tumbling.

  The thing came after him.

  Just as he entered the basement, someone grabbed him and flung him back against the stairs. His back knocked hard against a step.