The Circus Infinitus Stories Volume 1

by Ethan Somerville

  Vestra turned it over. “This will do nicely. Ah – I’ve seen these before. The common scavenger gremlin. These arrive first to soften everything up for the real invaders.”

  “Real invaders?” exclaimed Tumblety.

  “Now they have their specimen, we’d better descend into the bowels beneath the stage,” the Ringmaster declared as led the group over to a small access hatch in the metal floor, “I guarantee that’s where Icarus has gone.”

  But before the Ringmaster could lift the hatch, a gelatinous mass dropped from some overhead pipes and pooled on the floor right in front of him! Flash aimed her pistol and Xiva cracked her whip.

  “Stop!” shouted the Ringmaster. “It’s alright – it’s only John!”

  The Elephant Man solidified into human form. He looked exhausted, and his flesh was singed in places. “I … I spotted Icarus,” he gasped as he sagged against a pillar for support, “but he blasted me with a lightning bolt.” He staggered, falling to his knees. The Ringmaster stepped forward to help him.

  “You’re in a bad way. We’ll take you to Francis.”

  Merrick lifted his clublike hand. “Don’t bother going down below – he’s next to the Omniportallis.”

  The Ringmaster whirled around. “Victoria – take John. The rest of you – come with me.”

  The Wolf Woman grunted and scooped up John Merrick as though he weighed nothing, sprinting off back to the tiers of seats.

  “What’s the Omniportallis?” asked Flash as they followed the Ringmaster at a run through the dark, ominous circus.

  “We use the Omniportallis to move around. If Icarus is there, it can only mean one thing.”

  There was a deep clunking noise that vibrated through the entire building. It was followed by a horribly familiar whine of machinery powering up.

  “We’re about to leave!”

  They rushed across the stages to the Professor’s set-up, the twin poles of the Jacob’s ladder may have been silent and dead, but the rings against the wall behind were very much alive and glowing with power. Fortunately they weren’t spinning yet. A ragged figure crouched at the difference engine’s control board, punching keys one-handed.

  “Icarus!” thundered the Ringmaster, his voice quivering with power. Few had heard him use such a tone before, and they were afraid.

  But Icarus turned with a snarl. He looked like a man – a creature – possessed. His one eye stared wildly at them. His mechanical arm appeared to be working fine but his human one was broken, snapped just below the shoulder and dangling limply, the fingers clutching wildly at nothing. His coat hung in tatters and black buglike creatures were clinging to his head and chest.

  “Sweet Eridos,” the Ringmaster gasped in horror – then jumped out of the way as Icarus hurled a lightning bolt at him. It struck the wall and spread out in a fantastic spider-web of light. The Ringmaster had never seen him fire one so powerful – at least not without his portable bolt-thrower.

  Xiva came in with her twin whips, hoping to ensnare the Professor. One wrapped around his neck. Such a strike would normally have choked a human, but Icarus caught hold of the leather and pulled, yanking Xiva off her feet. Bus Boy raised one of his enormous weapons.

  “No!” warned the Ringmaster. “You’ll blow him to bits!”

  “If that’s what it takes!” shouted the zombie soldier. “Either that or he’ll kill us all!”

  “Wait!” The Ringmaster focused his concentration, struggling to penetrate Icarus’s new telepathic defences. But he simply wasn’t good enough – he knew what he had to do – he could feel the knowledge he once had – but he couldn’t reach across the void on his mind. He swore and switched to a different power.

  The scuttling of tiny metal legs grew louder, and gremlins started to drop out of the darkness onto Flash, Xiva, Felina, Bus Boy and Steam Saw. They managed to destroy the first dozen or so but soon there were hordes of the things! And they were coming from all directions, moving as one.

  “Oh no,” Flash whispered. “Gremlin Armageddon!”

  “Icarus!” the Ringmaster shouted as he forced Professor Abbacus back from the Omniportallis’s controls with his psychokinesis. “Stop this! We’ll die if we shift now, in this condition!”

  Icarus fought against the TK with phenomenal strength, struggling to bring his arm up. Sparks sizzled around the mechanical limb as he built up another discharge. The Ringmaster managed to shove the arm back, sending his lightning bolt up into the ceiling. There were now so many gremlins in the room that several pattered down, molten chunks of useless metal.

  Then several creatures dropped onto the Ringmaster, biting into his flesh and breaking his concentration.

  Behind him the others fought for their lives against the rising tide. Steam Saw sent a hail of metallic parts flying with his enormous spinning sawblade. Bus Boy blew multiple monsters into shrapnel with his deadly blunderbusses. And he recycled fallen rubble to use in his weapons, blasting the creatures apart with pieces of their own fallen comrades. Flash picked them off with deadly accuracy, and Xiva whipped them from the walls. Felina tore them to shreds, a deadly whirl of teeth and claws.

  But it wasn’t enough. There were simply too many, and coming too quickly. Everyone began to feel tiny metal mandibles bite at their bodies, tearing through their clothes and into their flash. “I hope the doctor and Vestra come up with something soon!’ Flash cried.

  The Ringmaster struggled against the creatures on him for a few seconds, then charged across the floor at Icarus, who had abandoned the keys and was heading for the massive control lever. Ignoring the biting teeth, he launched himself at the Professor, cannoning into his wiry metal body. “I can’t let you do this!” he shouted. He managed to slam Icarus’s metal arm down on the floor. Sparks sizzled around his hand, searing into his flesh. He gritted his teeth against the pain.

  In the light of the glowing Omniportallis, the Ringmaster could clearly see Icarus’s face. The one eye he had thought blazing with fury was actually staring pleadingly into his own. Then he felt the briefest of telepathic contact.

  Help me

  “Icarus?”

  Then Abbacus twisted his body, throwing the Ringmaster off him. But his other hand, the one dangling at the end of the broken arm, had caught hold of the Ringmaster’s cloak. As the Ringmaster struggled to rise, he saw Icarus methodically snap the fingers back, releasing the grip.

  “Fight it!” the Ringmaster shouted. “You can control them! It’s your body!”

  But Icarus turned and headed back towards the control lever.

  Over the sound of thousands of tiny, scuttling feet came the clatter of something larger and heavier. “Oh come on!” cried Flash in desperation, already bleeding from a dozen places. The gremlins didn’t do a lot of damage, but so many together – it would be the death of a thousand cuts.

  Then, somehow, the tide lessened. The attacking creatures dropped from their bodies and scuttled away across the floor. A large, shadowy figure stalked out of the gloom.

  “Sweet Jesus!” Flash lifted her pistol.

  “No!” Felina slapped her hand down. “It’s Victoria! She’s changed! It must be after midnight now!”

  Arachnora the Spider Queen marched forward, her pale face taut with concentration. “They have insectoid minds, and I can control them to a small extent, but I can’t hold them forever!”

  Bus boy and Steam Saw needed no further urging, using their weapons to hack into the retreating fray. Flash, Xiva and Felina swung around in time to see Icarus release his hold on the Ringmaster’s cloak and run towards the Omniportallis lever.

  “Stop him!” the Ringmaster yelled.

  Felina launched herself across the room, but knew she wouldn’t reach him in time.

  Then two more figures stepped out of the darkness. Before Felina could reach Icarus, someone fired a jet of bright green viscous material at him. The strange liquid splattered him from head to toe. He staggered, steam hissing ominously from his joints. Then he froze a
nd crashed to the floor.

  Professor Artemis Vestra and Dr Francis Tumblety emerged, carrying metal tanks on their backs. Hoses ran from the tanks to makeshift sprayguns in their hands. Dr Tumblety looked supremely pleased with himself. After all, he had wanted to knock Abbacus onto his metal backside for a long time.

  “Time to clean up this circus!” shouted Vestra, letting fly at the walls with the glowing liquid. Tumblety joined him. Great swathes of gremlins froze in the streams and rained to the floor, where the others soon began smashing them with various weapons.

  The Ringmaster picked himself up, still bleeding from numerous bites and cuts, and badly singed from Icarus’s power. But the more minor wounds were already healing. “A most timely arrival,” he called to Vestra and Tumblety. “A few seconds later and we would have been lost in the Immaterium. What is that stuff, by the way?”

  “A harmless glue that freezes on contact with the air,” Vestra explained. “Easy enough to make – with the right ingredients.”

  “Or the right talent,” Tumblety added pointedly.

  “Yes, I’m not sure how you managed to change those compounds into the exact ones I wanted. But this mixture seems to be doing the trick! We should have this place gremlin-free in no time. Getting it up and running may take a little longer though.”

  The Ringmaster walked over to Icarus, sprawled beneath a thick layer of the stuff. “How long does it last?”

  “Forever – until it’s scraped off.” Vestra glanced down at Icarus. “When we’re finished, I will have to make you a solvent, otherwise he’ll be stuck like that!”

  Of course the Circus had to close down for the next few days while everyone cleaned up and fixed the damage the gremlins had caused. Artemis, Flash and Xiva were only too happy to help. It was Professor Vestra who eventually got all the bugs out of Icarus’s system and repaired the damage they had caused. He made copious notes while poking around inside Abbacus’s internal workings. Fortunately Icarus was unconscious while this was going on, only waking up after his furnace was reignited. He stared miserably up at Artemis, the Ringmaster and the others who had gathered around.

  “I’m sorry,” he wheezed at last. “Those … things made me do it. I couldn’t stop them. I tried, but they had total control of my mechanical body.” He turned his head away. “I don’t even want to think about all the damage I’ve caused.”

  “We can fix it,” the Ringmaster assured. “Professor Vestra, Flash and Xiva will help. It’s not as bad as it looks.”

  “I don’t think they actually wanted to destroy the place,” Artemis explained. “They only took metal from systems they didn’t need, such as the lights and the stage mechanism.”

  Icarus tried to lift his human arm, but it was still broken, his fingers bent back. “I did this … to myself,” he whispered.

  “I know what it’s like to be under the control of someone – something else,” the Ringmaster told him. “Come – I’ll take you to your stage. Get some electricity into you; you’ll be healed up in no time.” He helped Icarus up, and the Professor felt himself move more easily than before, with no squeaks or stiffness.

  “I seem to be more … efficient,” he remarked.

  “Oh,” Artemis blushed modestly, “that was me. I … um, fixed a few things while you were out, cleaned some cogs, oiled some gears, tightened some screws. You won’t need as much coal to function, either.”

  Icarus turned to stare at Artemis. Everyone in the room expected a massive eruption of fury. Indeed, a smoky cloud puffed from the Professor’s chimney. But then he said softly, and with more gratitude than anyone had ever heard him use, “thank you Professor Vestra. It was time I had a tune-up.”