Steampunk II: Steampunk Reloaded

by Jeff VanderMeer

  That is, men persisted in building machines following the inapplicable principle of balloons, in that they had not properly distinguished between ascent and the far more difficult art of moving independently through the aerial sea. It was actually one of our own countrymen who first led thinking along the correct path in the present century when he referred to birds as the best flying machines the earthly globe possessed. His inventions, however, could take off only from dedicated stations where their safe landings were facilitated by very expensive and time-consuming apparatus. All of the Aerial-Railway platforms, Air-Castle towers, and Flying-Ship slipways that have been built in such great numbers around the world are now unnecessary and in a few years will lie in ruins, for the American Professor Swallow must now be considered to have completely solved the problem.

  While we here in Europe have always had the bird principle in mind, basing on it our Falcon Brigs, Albatross Schooners, and Stork Frigates, this outstanding scientist on the other side of the Atlantic Ocean had his eye on an entirely different model. Unfortunately, it may be found in Europe only in the Mediterranean region, where the surrounding countries remain sunken in an even deeper lethargy than they were a hundred years ago. Professor Swallow’s inspiration lay in the flying fish, and he was the first, in the literal meaning of the word, to fish it up from the great sea of unconsciousness. He studied the flying fish in its two opposing elements, the sea and the air, and spent his youth’s first period of bloom alone in his yacht, rocked by the Atlantic Ocean’s waves and engrossed in drawings and designs that made all of America believe he was busying himself with advanced plans for establishing a cod-liver oil factory on the east coast of Newfoundland.

  But it was the flying fish that was the object of his restless yearnings and aspirations. In the bright moonlit nights he observed how this remarkable fish moved in the water, how it positioned its fins when it readied itself for flight, and how it flashed through the air faster than an arrow with the help of its powerful pectoral fins, with such strength that sailors on the heaviest frigates caught them in canvas traps that they placed on high mast platforms. When he finally understood how this marvelous animal behaves in plunging down into the sea without smashing itself on the surface and without breaking either its head or its wings, he saw what form his invention should take, and with the last remnants of his colossal fortune he built the “Flying Fish,” which now bears its name as a second Prometheus from place to place across the far reaches of the globe.

  The principle is, as I mentioned, entirely the same as that of the fish, except that he has borrowed something of the octopus’s means of locomotion as well. The ship floats on the water as lightly as a swan, sinks to a certain depth by taking in water and forcing out air, then shoots upwards at an angle by abruptly expelling the water, the last of which is discharged when it reaches the surface. The expelled masses of water give it such momentum that the ship is propelled 200 feet into the air. Here, the wing-fin system is set into motion, the propeller tail is retracted, the steering tail is extended, and it speeds through the air ocean at a rate of 150 English miles per hour until it comes upon a body of water deep enough that it will not be smashed to pieces on the bottom when it descends. The Flying Fish can thus take off from any harbor city where the water reaches at least the minimum depth. There is no need for any stations with their specialized equipment and personnel—in short, it rightfully bears its proud name “Flying Fish Prometheus.”

  I did not sleep very much that night, partly because the airbeds in Koge are so poorly filled, partly because I felt a little tension about what lay ahead of me. Mainly I couldn’t get Spring’s explosive out of my head. I soon calculated how much work we would have saved on my Scandinavian tunnel and how much the company could have given him per cubic inch, then I went through all latest formulae for explosive gases, and at length I fell into an uneasy slumber in which I dreamed I was manufacturing more than enough Keraunobolite to blow all of Germany asunder. Somewhat dizzy in the head, I awoke at five o’clock and had a proper Greenland snowbath in order to thoroughly tone up my nervous system and invigorate my muscles. Then, armed with my spyglass, I went up in the Nykirk’s tower to be the first to greet Captain Bird when he arrived.

  My eagerness had gotten me up all too early, however. The November fog lay cold and gray over the town like a monstrous spider’s web in which all thought and motion were still ensnared. Only the tower watchman, a funny old fellow, was awake. I had a plain-talk conversation with him, but when in my enthusiasm I began to explain the Flying Fish, he said:

  “Yes, I can understand that one can fly in the air, because I have seen it. I can also understand that one can sail on the water because I have seen that, too. But what the Professor here is telling me, why, bless me, that is sheer nonsense.”

  “But it is indeed the truth, I assure you,” I replied.

  “Well, then, if I’m getting it right, it’s neither fish nor fowl, this machine.”

  “Correct,” I answered. “It’s a combination of both.”

  “No, that could never be true,” he said, “although I did read something about it yesterday. But does the Professor know what it is?”

  “No, what is it?”

  “It is, may the Devil take me, a lie!” he replied with all the strength of conviction, and started to go.

  I held him back to give him a further explanation, but suddenly the telegraph-indicator pointed to Severe Northwest Storm, Station Sukkertoppen. The watchman went inside to telegraph Copenhagen and so our conversation was broken off. I am relating this little incident to you to show you the sluggish minds and the suspicion towards all new inventions that still stir within the lower levels of the people in our land. This man goes calmly in to report at lightning speed a storm that was only just now starting into motion from your dear old icebergs, and he still didn’t believe in the Flying Fish. Well, the good people of Koge have always been a little behind the times; they were burning witches there not too many centuries ago, after all.

  Towards seven, the fog lifted, the Sun was breaking through, and down on the street life and movement were beginning to stir, which showed that the Flying Fish had set the more enlightened portion of Koge Town’s population into motion. Prosperous merchants on bicycles, rich landowners on quite smart steam horses, and the town’s youth in California jumping boots moved with lively bustle through the streets and made their way towards the harbor. There, the submersible vessel Neptune already had its steam up in the event that the Flying Fish should meet with an accident.

  Jumping boots have hardly become a universal means of transportation. At least here they are still rather new, although they give quite extraordinary results and their popularity is constantly increasing. A little practice is required to use them, of course, but once one has mastered them, they become as good as indispensable. True, it cannot be denied that the movement is somewhat grasshopperlike and not entirely free of a certain comic touch, such as when people leap over each other’s heads. I have incidentally seen them used on the boulevards of Paris with all the grace and elegance that are so characteristic of Parisian ladies, especially in falling down. Here in Koge, however, I saw only a few ladies, and they were starting out more on their heads than on their legs. When I caught sight of two rather stout women who leaped out over the wharf in their eagerness to reach the harbor, and shortly thereafter hopped their way homewards dripping wet and followed by the boys’ cheers and laughter...well, of course I do not deny that I was annoyed on account of these female citizens of my country and began to doubt how well the devices were suited for cool and phlegmatic Scandinavians.

  At about that time, a shot was fired from the harbor fort’s turret, a definite sign that the Prometheus was in flight. I turned my spyglass to the north, but at first saw nothing other than the sea and some scarlet cloud masses shining on the horizon. From this suddenly burst a single, silver-gleaming point that rapidly grew in size although I was still unable to discern its form or outlin
e. It approached at a furious speed, sparkling and gleaming in the morning sun’s rays, and soon its wings became visible as a pair of thin black strips while some whitish vapor streamed behind it. In short, there was no doubt that it was the long-awaited Prometheus flying towards us.

  Now it had been observed from the town as well. All faces were turned upwards, hearty cries of “Hurrah!” were heard, all the cannons of the fort gave a salute, and at the same time the line of townspeople in front of the guardhouse broke out in the well-known hymn, “Hail to Thee, Thou Eagle of the Air” (which you may remember from your schooldays in its old version as “Hail to Thee, Thou High North”).

  Meanwhile, I had exchanged my spyglass for my watch. Just three minutes had passed since I had first spotted it as a point—now I heard the mighty roar of its beating wings, not unlike a storm-tossed sea breaking against a rocky coast, and at the same time I saw the Prometheus at an altitude of about eight hundred feet as a shining silver, sheer-polished object in the shape of a fish with coal-black, bat-like wings and a tail whose quickly turning movement prevented any closer examination. Suddenly it stopped in the air, seemingly directly over the town. The wings moved, violently trembling, not unlike the flies that we see in summer standing almost still over a fixed location. Then the tail bent upwards; the now motionless wings assumed a slanted position relative to the ship’s hull, and as the crowds on the street and by the harbor shrieked deafeningly, it shot downwards like an arrow with constantly increasing speed. It was a terrible moment! Even I, who knew with what skill Captain Bird guided his ship, truly believed that the Prometheus would smash into the ground, for from my vantage point it looked as though the Flying Fish was plummeting towards the city hall’s spire.

  But soon I became aware of that optical illusion. Like an enormous shooting star it plunged towards the outer harbor, and the wings closed up and slid into the cavities along the hull allotted for them. Then I heard a tremendous splash, a pillar of foam and water rose so forcefully into the air that even the ships in the harbor were flooded, and the boats needed all their power to keep from capsizing. Following that frightful moment, there was only the silence of the tomb. There was not a face, not a regard, that was not directed out over the sea—it was as though everyone was afraid even to draw a breath before the ship came into view. Then a new, mighty wave rose further out; it parted and from its interior, like a pearl from an oyster, the Prometheus emerged in all its shining, silvery glory. Like the spout from an enormous whale, a white column of steam rose vertically into the air from the Flying Fish’s head. A second later the steam horn’s sound reached my ears, and at that very instant a cheer broke out that seemed to go on forever. Cries of hurrah from the docks, new salutes from the fort, waving flags and scarves—the enthusiasm was, for Koge, quite extraordinary.

  During all this vociferous excitement, I saw a wide gap appear in the ship’s bow. It most nearly resembled a fish opening its gill slit. From it shot a long, black snake that then rested on the water, swelling until it finally proved to be the Flying Fish’s longboat being inflated by the steam engine. Shortly thereafter, a hatch opened near something that in position and shape resembled a fish’s dorsal fin, and resplendent in sky-blue velvet uniforms with star-studded scarves, Captain Bird and the ship’s other officers stepped out on the Flying Fish’s back, where they were the object of another round of the crowd’s enthusiastic applause. Soon the air-boat was ready, its propeller was set to spinning, and it sped towards the docks, bearing Captain Bird and his crew while the new American flag with its shining sun and 69 stars proudly flew over its wake.

  I shall pass over the dinner that the city council president and Koge’s leading citizens gave at the city hall. Such affairs with their speeches are all alike. Captain Bird was an exception, however. He replied to a long and enthusiastic address by the city council president with only these words: “Upwards and ever onwards!” At that we all broke our glasses in deep silence in his honor.

  One can see at once from Captain Bird that he is a true air-man. There is something in his profile and his regard that is reminiscent of an albatross, and I don’t think the entire fellow weighs more than eighty pounds. The officers and crew are of the same superior breed—short, thin, beardless, with wondrously clear and far-seeing eyes, almost piping voices, and that fine, pale skin color that is characteristic of people who spend more than half their lives in enclosed machines.

  After the dinner, Captain Bird was kind enough to invite the entire company on board the Prometheus. Since I think you will be curious to hear about its construction, I shall give you a detailed description while I pass over the many stupid or meaningless interjections and questions that the good citizens of Koge made to Captain Bird, and which frequently brought both him and me to hearty laughter.

  When it floats on the water, the Flying Fish most nearly resembles a swordfish lying on the surface. The entire ship’s outer covering consists of a four-inch-thick aluminum hull in which a high porosity has been created by letting overheated steam flow through the metal during its molten state, resulting in a correspondingly light weight. The entire surface is then ground and polished to mirror smoothness, with the result that the sun’s rays are reflected as though from polished silver and the passengers and crew within do not suffer from the sun’s heat.

  The wings, which are somewhat more than fifty feet long, are made of steel spars that are mounted on cross-ribs and overlap one another to give them more resistance to the air on the downstroke. During the upstroke, the wings are positioned at an angle so they slice the air cleanly with the sharp edge. They are covered with the feather-felt invented by the engineer Kolibri and saturated in an India rubber solution, and in form resemble a flying fish’s pectoral fins. As with the fish, they can be folded along the ship’s length like a fan, and are completely withdrawn into slots along the sides so they offer no resistance when diving.

  By themselves, these black wings stand in amazingly stark contrast to the ship’s silvery surface, but what makes the Flying Fish look most different from other flying vessels is its beak, or rather, its tusk, at the end of the head. This is a strong, pointed iron shaft about eighteen feet long, shaped like the swordfish’s sword, and intended partly to cut through the air during flight, and as it is mounted on steel springs, partly to absorb the shock should the Flying Fish be so unfortunate as to ram into the seabed in its descent. The wings will swing out during any impact, contributing to braking the forward momentum by pressing the entire wing surface against the water.

  In back of the beak, one sees on the Flying Fish’s head nine small holes that resemble the gill slits on a lamprey. From these the machine exudes its superfluous oil, which contributes to keeping the wing joints lubricated as well as to greasing the outer surface of the ship so that both the hull and the wings slide more easily through the water when diving. Along the back of the ship runs a narrow crest that at first glance bears a great resemblance to a dorsal fin. This is the large parachute that when folded helps maintain the ship’s balance in the air and can be opened when extraordinary circumstances demand it. Even if the wings are broken, it will keep the machine floating until it reaches the ground.

  The interior is also different in so many respects from the usual aerial vehicles that I will not refrain from giving you a description of them, although most of it will already be familiar to you. Like the Hexalators, the Flying Fish is constructed with three decks:

  An upper deck that houses the lighter machinery, such as the solar warmth apparatus, the hydrogen generator, the hydrogen collector, and the aero-hydraulic containers;

  A middle deck that houses the flying machinery as well as the officers’ cabins;

  And finally the lowest deck, especially comfortable in its furnishings, intended for passengers as well as cargo packages that must not weigh more than ten pounds apiece.

  As on other air-ships, the crew is quartered in the middle-deck room in the tail. Here is also located the electrical machi
nery that serves for steering, lighting, and telegraphic controls on board. The passengers’ cabins are indeed quite small but strikingly ingenious and tastefully outfitted: an airbed, a matching air canopy, and the usual parachute hanging from the ceiling are the only—but more than sufficient—furniture. The floor is made entirely of Crystalline, a recently invented synthetic substance that is both lightweight and transparent, so that during the flight one can enjoy unhindered views of the earth through several skylights built into the floor. During ascents and descents these are of course hermetically sealed, but the darkness of the night that would reign on the ship in these conditions is completely dispelled by the electric lantern installed in the ship’s stern. This lantern is an outright marvel; although barely larger than a clenched fist, it gives off such a blinding light that it would damage the vision were the glare not moderated by blue and rose-colored glass plates that can be inserted according to taste in the cabin doors’ light openings.

  What most attracts the viewer’s attention and strikes him as something new are the two aero-hydraulic containers that stretch like enormous sacks along the ship’s uppermost deck. These containers rank among those inventions with which the human spirit has celebrated its greatest triumphs. They greatly resemble a bird’s elongated lungs, or even better, a fish’s air bladder, and are made of Ward’s Synthetic Muscle Substitute. When diving into the sea with all vents open, they draw in water that fills their entire spongy and porous interior tissue; then, at the precise moment when the Flying Fish changes its downward angle of motion to an upwards one, a strong electric current from the motor contracts the containers so powerfully that the water is abruptly forced out, lifting the ship into the air.