Phantasmical Contraptions & Other Errors

by Jessica Augustsson

  “Eleven out of twelve returned,” she told Yahto.

  “That is an acceptable loss ratio,” he replied.

  “We’ll see.”

  After a few minutes the oil flies emerged from Cela’s palm and stood ready at her fingertips. She walked to the center of the smoothed-out place and kneeled, and they all tumbled into the sand, burrowing and resurfacing until features formed in the area they had cleared. The oil flies spent a few minutes building a model of the airship wreckage near Cela’s feet, but she waved them on until they fanned out and built a topography of dunes that rippled out around her. They plowed and fanned the sand until she stood atop a three-square-meter replica of the surrounding desert.

  “See anything, Yahto?”

  The clockwork man rolled to the edge of the plane and turned his head from left to right.

  “I see only a representation of natural desert topography,” he said.

  “Yeah, me too,” said Cela. She stood and opened the aperture in her palm to collect the oil flies, but she saw something that gave her pause. One of the machines was building a tiny structure at the far end of the radius. It looked at first like a row of molars jutting from the desert.

  Yahto saw it too. “Sergeant, this formation is consistent with a mule-train,” he said. His head was locked on the ground in front of him. “Perhaps twenty individuals.”

  She crawled to the edge and watched the oil fly build the forms grain by grain. She kneeled closer and saw the sculptures rise from the sand like pieces on a game board, and when the bot was done, it launched into the air and scuttled down Cela’s thumb, shaking out the sand from its wings.

  “A mule-train that large would have water and diesel,” said Cela.

  “I concur,” said Yahto. “However, they could be responsible for shooting us down.”

  “I don’t think so. The missile came from the south, where they are headed.”

  “There is a small mining town along the projected route.”

  “Could be where they’re going. Siphon as much gas as you can from the Tornado engine and load the mech-mule. Let’s intercept that mule-train.”

  Yahto spun to the south, and gazed across the dunes.

  “Umts’a will respond to our distress call.”

  “Umts’a is out of range. I am giving you an order.”

  Yahto spun back around and the gears of his eyes ratcheted back and forth.

  “Yes, sergeant. As you command.”

  The sun had just broken its zenith when they left the crash site and set out into the desert. They rode in the slacks between the dunes, winding like serpents along the desert’s belly from one soft valley to the next. Sand rained from the lee of the ridges and gathered on the sun-sail as if the desert were trying to bury them one grain at a time. Sometimes a trough would dead-end, and Cela would dismount the mech-mule as it labored and smoked up the soft bluffs, sinking as it climbed until the sand touched the rivets of its steel flanks. Her ribs ached with every step, and she would stop after each summit to drink from the canteen and to check the fuel levels of her companions.

  Several hours passed before the dunes emptied into a hardscrabble basin. There were a few gray shrubs that clung to spots where the ground broke into shale, and in the near distance a low berm grew crooked from the pan like the spine of some half-buried Cretaceous monster. They would soon run out of gas and water, and Cela knew they wouldn’t have a second chance if they missed the mule-train.

  Yahto halted over the flinty ground and opened his hand to the wind.

  Cela took this as a signal to stop.

  “Yahto?” Cela said, her throat parched from the dry air.

  “A frequency,” he said. “It is likely the mule—”

  There was a detonation just a few meters away, and a wave of shale and sand fell over the pair. Cela was knocked off the mech-mule and landed on her broken ribs. She groaned in agony and rolled to her back with debris still falling around them like hail.

  Yahto’s voice bellowed into the dust.

  “We are non-combatants,” he boomed.

  “Ask for a parley,” Cela groaned.

  Yahto scanned the horizon for movement, but the dust was a smokescreen.

  “We request a parley,” Yahto boomed again into the dust. There was no response, so he said it again. On the third time, the dust settled and a woman appeared in the ethers. She stood beside the impact crater with her steel hand brushing the grip of a large caliber pistol on her hip.

  “Request granted,” she said. “But only the human.”

  Cela rolled to her knees and brushed the dirt from her clothes. She looked like she had been pulled from a collapsed mine.

  “I am Cela Atsila,” she said. “Master Sergeant, UCS Air Force.”

  “A Dieselship pilot? Impressive,” said the woman. Her mouth and nose were flesh, but she was otherwise mech. “I am Kavala Roke. No rank or title, though people call me all sorts of things.”

  “Our Dieselship crashed not far from here,” said Cela. “We’d like to join your mule-train until the next town.”

  “Who said anything about a mule-train?”

  “My oil flies surveyed your position earlier today. My clockwork calculated your coordinates and we intercepted.”

  Kavala put a hand on her hip and nodded.

  “Brilliant reconnaissance,” she said. “Now here we are, bartering in the middle of the desert. Is the mech-mule operational?”

  “It got us here, with a few scrapes.”

  “Good. I could use another. And the clockwork, what is his status?”

  “He’s not for trade. He’s part of my crew.”

  Kavala crouched and tussled the dirt with her fingertips.

  “You see, there is something you still don’t know,” she said. “We are traveling to a town called Devil Wells. It’s a kingdom unto itself—a dangerous place for someone like you.”

  “Someone like me?”

  “A twenty-fiver.” Kavala rose from the ground and took a few steps forward. She studied Cela from head to toe. “There is a man in Devil Wells who calls himself the Dieselman. He governs the town—the rigs, refinery, mines, etcetera. Last year he had everyone killed who wasn’t at least fifty-percent mech. As I said, someone like you would be on his radar.”

  “I’m not looking to settle down,” said Cela. “I’d leave on the first transport.”

  “I’m sure you would, but you still don’t understand. All the twenty-fivers he killed still lay in the streets where they fell, dead and mummified by the sun. None of the mostlies that live there are permitted to move the bodies. You see, the Dieselman’s hatred of biology is pathological.”

  “And you’ll smuggle me in and find me a transport? Why?”

  Kavala was close now.

  “Because you will give me the mech-mule, the clockwork and your oil flies.”

  “Why don’t you kill me and take it all for yourself?”

  A smile spread under her steel dome. “All of us mostlies were once twenty-fivers. Not everyone shares the Dieselman’s grim philosophy.”

  Kavala pressed her fingers to her temple and low sound pulsed over the desert floor. A large creature appeared over the crest of the berm; it looked like some kind of mechanized arachnid with clawed legs and a parabolic tail fashioned into a Gatling gun. It scrabbled over the parched moonscape and flattened to the ground so Kavala could mount. Other riders appeared atop weathered mech-mules, all more machine than human, and lined up behind Kavala’s strange metal steed. She fastened a pair of goggles over her ball-bearing eyes and jerked her thumb toward the back of the mule-train.

  “Fuel up and get plenty of water, sergeant,” said Kavala. “Next stop, Devil Wells.”

  Cela and Yahto rode beside each other at the rear of the formation, their shadows stenciled over the papyrus-colored ground like hieroglyphs. The sun was now an hour from the horizon, but the temperature had not dropped since mid-day. The muleteers rode silently, as if asleep on their steeds, and the onl
y sound was the footfalls of the mech-mules and the creak of leather as each rider swayed in their saddles.

  “Sergeant Atsila,” said Yahto, “I should remind you that I am property of the UCS Air Force, and it is against code to use me for barter.”

  “I knew something was bothering you,” she said.

  “It is not bothering me, I was only reviewing the code and tangential protocols.”

  “I’ll take your gyro-drive before the trade. When we get home you’ll be installed in a new clockwork. Better fuel efficiency.”

  Yahto’s gears whirred and clicked but he was otherwise silent, as if calculating some existential dilemma.

  By nightfall they had reached a wide salt pan that glowed under the burn of starlight. The entire basin was warped and pitted as if a molten flow had blistered the ground and stained it an eerie, ashen gray. The mule-train slowed, and the mech-mules pecked their hooves with each step. Only Kavala’s arachno-steed was well-suited for the terrain; it scuttled ahead into the dark horizon with little effort or regard for the others.

  Another fifteen minutes passed struggling through the salt pan until some of the muleteers dismounted, opting to lead their charges on foot. As the terrain worsened, one of the beasts toppled over onto its rider, pinning him against the crystalline stones. The muleteers rushed to him, scrabbling over the ground like spiders. But instead of helping him, they began to disassemble his augments one at time like wolves over an elk carcass. The man yelled and beat them with his fists, but they only worked faster, drilling and prying until all that was left was a headless torso with arms that ended at the elbows.

  Cela pulled her pistol and placed her targets, but there was nothing she could do. The muleteers were running back to their saddlebags with their arms full, and some had returned to right the fallen mech-mule so it could press on, riderless. When the formation continued, they passed the abbreviated man, nothing more than a cooling parcel of flesh against the crackling brine.

  They fell back from the mule-train, and followed in the dark. The caravan was like a trail of insects on the soda floor. Cela dozed in her saddle as the constellations whirled overhead, and as the hours passed, the sun began to tease the low sky with red and orange hues. Against that brightening edge, a row of oil rigs bobbed like drunkards and there was a smell of grease and smelting ore in the wind. The mule-train snaked around pinnacles of sandstone and pinyon pines and soon there were stone huts built into the hillsides that smoked and glowed from within.

  They reached a road that passed along a pile of low-slung shanties, and it was here that Cela saw the first glimpse of Kavala’s warning: a row of corpses kneeled on the shoulder of the road, their leathered foreheads pressed to the ground as if frozen in prayer.

  One of the muleteers was standing nearby, waving the caravan into the loading bay of a large warehouse that mawed darkly at the dry and dusty road. They filed through the bay doors, and the mech-mules lined against a far wall awaiting fuel and oil and cleaner mites to remove the sand from their joints. The muleteers pulled their wares from their saddlebags and began to barter for diesel and ore and threw dice against the walls and drank synth oil from polymer sacks.

  “Welcome to Devil Wells.” It was Kavala, standing with her hand augments open while dozens of cleaner mites swarmed the steel joints. “You’ll find it’s not a friendly town, but it’s better than dying in the desert.”

  “I’ll be fine. I’m not here to make friends,” Cela said.

  “Right. Well, let’s talk business then. I see your mech-mule has made itself at home, that’s good.” She crouched and took a hard look at Yahto’s wheels. “Looks like your friend could use a tune-up, but it’s nothing my people can’t handle. Make sure to transfer the oil flies before you leave him with me.”

  “I’ll need to keep his gyro-drive.”

  “Yes, I was counting on it. I have my own.”

  “Good. When will we leave for the transport?”

  “The truck needs fuel, but otherwise we are ready.” Kavala pointed to a small covered truck by the bay door. “I’ll need you to hide in the back for obvious reasons. I’m sure you noticed the twenty-fivers on the way in.”

  “Yeah, I saw,” said Cela. “Too bad that lunatic didn’t greet us on the road. I’d love for him to meet a twenty-fiver that can shoot back.”

  Kavala grinned. “Careful what you wish for.”

  Cela waited in the back of the truck with Yahto’s gyro-drive hanging like an amulet around her neck.

  “Can you hear me, Yahto?”

  The gyro clicked and two small gears spun a quarter turn.

  “Yes, sergeant.” His voice was flat and gritty. “Signal analysis is my only function in this mode.”

  “Any word from Umts’a?”

  The gyro made a small click. “No, sergeant.”

  “I didn’t think so.”

  The engine started, and Kavala appeared in the cab window and lowered the glass. One of the muleteers was in the driver seat.

  “It’s a short drive to the hangars,” she said. “But the roads are not good. You’ll want to brace yourself.”

  The truck rolled out of the warehouse and bounced along a gravel road. There were safety slings along the sides of the bed and Cela had to grab tight to avoid being thrown about. After a few turns and dips, the vehicle braked and the tires slid over the loose gravel. The cab window opened again.

  “It’s a checkpoint. They must know you’re here.” said Kavala, her voice low. She pulled a lever and a panel slid open along the bed of the truck, exposing the bare ground underneath. “If I give a signal, jump through the hole and lay flat.”

  Cela nodded, and checked the chambers of her six-gun. She heard voices around the truck, and the men from the checkpoint began to shout. There was a rap against the cab window three times, and Cela climbed through the hole of the truck bed and lay underneath the chassis in the hot gravel. The panel closed over her as the mostlies opened the tailgate and climbed in, banging at the metal with the butts of their rifles.

  After a few minutes the tailgate slammed, and the bed panel slid open again. Cela climbed back up through the hole, and the truck accelerated, pebbles spitting from the tires. She couldn’t help but look through the canvas at the mostlies from the checkpoint. She saw four of them standing in the road, looking at the spot where she had lain. One of them crouched and swept at the dirt and lay down beside the spot, and they all began to scurry into their vehicles with their weapons drawn as if suddenly knowing the truth of it.

  Cela banged on the cab window.

  “They know. They’re coming,” she said.

  There was an explosion, and the truck swerved and pitched. Cela tumbled and fell onto the truck bed. Another blast. This time the axle tore from the truck and the vehicle ground to a stop in a shower of sparks. Cela clambered up the side of the truck through the canvas and toppled to the ground with her pistol drawn. There was a burst of gunfire from the gang of mostlies, and the bullets hit the vehicle in a luminous volley.

  “Here, this way!” Kavala yelled, and she and the muleteer scrambled around the corner of a concrete building. Cela followed, bullets pelting the ground as she fled.

  They kicked through the door of a steelworks factory. There were clockworks of all manner and construction standing around with their geared eyes clacking, tools in their hands. A kettle of molten steel glowed orange in the dark factory, sputtering hot sparks into the air. The mostlies were not far behind. They appeared in the doorway, and Cela fired at the first one through. He fell back against the others and then collapsed on the ground.

  Another volley of bullets followed, the slugs whitening as they hit the molten slag that coursed along the hot bed. Kavala rose and returned fire, and the blast lifted another from his feet and slammed him against the far end of the building where he crumpled and lay still. They retreated to the blast furnace, a tall monstrous thing that glowed an aching orange in the smoked-out gloom. The two remaining mostlies followed, firin
g as they advanced. The muleteer was struck in the head before they could round the furnace, and he slid face-down on the concrete floor with his augments splayed like a water strider on a shallow pond.

  Cela and Kavala hunkered behind the furnace, the heat baking the backs of their necks.

  “Well that’s one for you and one for me,” said Kavala. “I’d say we make a decent team.”

  “Decent enough,” said Cela. “But there’s still two left. Probably more to come.”

  Kavala pressed her ribcage and a tray slid open. Inside was a puck that glowed yellow at the center.

  “This will be crude, but effective,” Kavala said.

  “I’m a fan of ‘crude but effective’. Just tell me when to run.”

  Kavala pressed the puck against the hull of the blast furnace and swiped across the center of the thing. The light began to flash red.

  “Let’s go,” she said.

  They bounded through the factory as the mostlies rounded the furnace with their weapons in the air, firing two rounds each. But as they fired a third round, the puck detonated in a flash of white light. The furnace lining buckled and split and molten ore sprayed over the factory floor, engulfing the mostlies in wave of pure, annihilating heat.

  As they reached the loading dock at the back of the building, Cela turned and saw their pursuers flailing in the white-hot slurry, flames piping from their augments as they melted into the flow. Cela flung the door into the guide rail and the two of them ran into the light.

  “There is the hangar,” Kavala pointed across the road to a flat building that squatted over a wide dirt field. “Inside, you’ll find a transport with enough gas. You’re a Dieselship pilot; you can handle it, I’m sure.”

  Cela looked up and down the road.

  “You’re not safe here, either,” she said. “I can take you to Panaka City.”

  Kavala lifted her hand from her side. A mixture of blood and hydraulic fluid gushed over her steel augments and gathered along the chamfer of her waist.

  “I’m afraid I wouldn’t make it that far,” she said, baring her teeth at the wound. “I have friends here that can hide me for a while. Go, before it’s too late.”