Clockwork Universe

by Seanen McGuire

  They’d lost half their engines and a considerable amount of hydrogen. But they had gravitational shielding and four very large guns. And so the delivery that would mark a change in humanity’s fortunes came heralded by intermittent bursts of gunfire, riding incandescent streamers that cleaved the sky.

  They ran out of fuel, and ammunition, several hundred leagues from Bombay. By the time they paid for new engines along with several weeks in a shipyard, and rearmed the ship, and refueled it, the cost of their misadventure grossly outweighed any meager profits. They returned to port poorer than when they’d left.

  Yet somehow the Black Shiva always held on to its letter of marque even in spite of the alliances that would, eventually, end the war.

  Captain Sujata Malhotra and her crew dined out on that particular tale for the rest of their long and storied careers.

  Gracie’s Fire

  Leah Cutter

  Mother-of-a-whore my boots hurt. They pinched my toes, chafed my ankles, and the damn heels made my back and calves ache. The best part of every night was finally getting home to the garret above the feed shop and taking ‘em off. Even if they was a present from my long-lost husband, god bless his soul, made outta solid black leather with brass hooks and laces, they felt like they was taking orders from the devil himself.

  I still wore ‘em with a smile. I even practiced walking as gracefully as I could, from one end of The Gold Mine Saloon to the other, across the sawdust and straw-strewn floor, balancing my tray with one hand, like they did at the Barstow Hotel, in the fancy part of town. They did make my hips sway, which garnered attention and more tips. Tips that I saved, tips that were gonna get me out of that garret and maybe buy me my own piece of land someday.

  Not that I was likely to get any tips tonight. The saloon was deader than a priest’s cell on a Saturday night. The seven-twenty train from Sacramento wasn’t coming in: bridge had flooded out (again). As we was directly across the muddy street from the train station, it brought us most of our trade.

  As for folks from here in Stockton, well, Lucky Lucy’s had just opened down the street—and they had dancing girls.

  Mister Thomas didn’t much approve of them. He didn’t make us strip down to nothing either. I couldn’t have worn my dress to church, but it only bared my shoulders, ankles, and arms. I kinda liked the color too, a rich gold across my chest that didn’t show the dirt too much, over a black short-sleeved blouse and a hitched up skirt. It showed off that pale Irish skin of mine, and Mister Thomas said the gold matched my green eyes. Nothing worked with my hair of course—I wore it shamefully short, and it was too thick and black to be much use.

  The only “special” that The Gold Mine Saloon had to offer was that hulking steam-powered contraption that took up half the bar, another one of Mister Thomas’ inventions. Me and the girls done made him get rid of most of thems: the weird, flickering, automatic lights (we all preferred gaslight); the odd moving belt for taking the dishes back to the kitchen (it was nice of him to try and save us some steps, but the pile ups and broken glassware made all our lives hell); and the clockwork automaton that used to run the drink machine (Mister Thomas said it wasn’t alive, and its eyes was just glass, but it’d still watch all the girls walk around the saloon, giving us chills).

  We had traditional kegs of beer, bottles of cheap whisky, and cheap moonshine—cloudy liquid in big bottles that’d eat anything, even brass, if we tried cleaning with it. I coulda made better, but Mister Tomas didn’t want to get into the distilling business, not like that.

  However, the machine, well, it could make pretty much any drink. Large glass jars of colored liquid—pink, brown, green, blue, and yellow—stuck out of one end of the sleek brass, like a peacock’s tail. At least a dozen knobs, wheels, and gears regulated the flow and temperature of the liquid as it churned through the machine. The twisting spigot on the other end looked like glass, but it was hard as diamond.

  That contraption could make damn near anything. Fizzy, sparkling lemonade that tasted like the perfect summer day. Dark, rich wine that reminded you of Mama’s stews in deep winter. That odd, blue drink that left smoke on your tongue and tears in your eyes.

  A lot of the locals didn’t care much for the machine, never buying drinks from it. But sometimes a riverboat hand or a farmer’d get drunk, tell me to make ‘em whatever I felt like.

  I always got a good tip from that.

  Sometimes stupid cowpokes would come in, drunk already, then dare each other to come up with wilder concoctions, and force ‘em down.

  Then I’d have to shove ‘em out the door before they started puking.

  Tonight, though, no one was ordering nothing. Mister Thomas was at his regular weekly poker game—the one I’d rescued him from at least twice over the years—and had left me in charge for the night, as usual. Old Dusky sat at the bar, nursing his customary one whisky. He were a regular, but rarely talked. Just sat, had his one drink, drawing patterns on the bar with his finger. Two businessmen sat in one corner, talking about some land deal they was putting together.

  And that was it.

  I’d already sent all the other girls home, so it was just me behind the long bar. Me in those damn boots that I daydreamed about burning in the grate at the far end of the saloon. I’d set my mind to close the bar early—kick Dusky out and start moving the businessmen along—when the doors swung open and in came this group of four men.

  Well, at first I thought they was men. They was in these big black cloaks with the hoods up, shapeless and hiding their faces. But they were regular height, and didn’t look too wide, either.

  “Gentlemen,” I called out. “We’re clos—”

  That’s when I realized something was wrong.

  They turned to stare at me, all of ‘em together, like they was one person, really. Peeking out from underneath those black hoods was some of the orangest skin I’d ever seen, like they was pumpkins or something. They had weird black eyes and no real noses. Their lips were thin and chins were long and pointed, with warts, like what a witch would wear.

  Course I didn’t scream or nothing. Didn’t know what they were, had never seen nothing like them before, but they was obviously from out of town.

  Wouldn’t know real prices for anything, and it weren’t like we had anything written down, even if they could read.

  And maybe they’d be good tippers, besides.

  * * *

  I got ‘em settled at a table in the center of the saloon. I cut Dusky off, sent him along his way. The businessmen didn’t look too happy about the outsiders there, so it weren’t too long before they was gone too.

  Which left just me and the four newcomers.

  “So what’ll it be, boys?” I asked, coming out from behind the bar, letting my hips sway just a bit.

  None of them paid any attention. They all looked me directly in the face.

  That’d never happened before.

  “Whissskey,” said the first guy. He was a little taller than the others.

  I couldn’t really read his expression, but he seemed proud of himself.

  “Whisky all around?” I asked. They didn’t nod, but they didn’t disagree either. “I’ll bring a bottle. That’ll be a quarter eagle.” I wasn’t about to bring nobody no booze without payment first. At their blank looks, I added “Two-fifty.”

  It was only two bits more than the regular price. I was just including my tip in the cost.

  They had some kind of hissing language they used with each other. Sounded like drunk Mexican to me. The tall one brought out a gold piece from his sleeve and slid it across the table.

  I didn’t try to count how many fingers he had—as long as he kept them to himself, we was gonna be just fine.

  He’d passed me a full eagle—ten whole dollars. “I’ll keep this as your tab,” I told him, picking up the coin and weighing it. Didn’t bother tasting it until after I’d turned away, but it was pure gold as far as I could tell.

  I wouldn’t have kept the whol
e thing, if they hadn’t spent it all by the end of the evening. I would have given them change. Or at least some of it. My mama may not have been kind, but she did raise me to be fair. Mostly.

  I brought ‘em back a bottle of the cheapest stuff we had, along with four clean glasses. Then I went back behind the bar, cleaned up Dusky’s glass, the businessmen’s, and watched my new guests.

  They didn’t seem quite sure what to do at first. Eventually, they figured it out, pouring the booze into the glasses, then the glasses down their throats.

  Maybe they weren’t complete strangers, because they swallowed down stuff that would strip the finish off the bar and didn’t cough or sputter once.

  After they’d finished off a third of the bottle, they seemed to loosen up, as all men do. They leaned back in their chairs, and the tall one even flipped his hood back.

  Damn, he was ugly. Bald as a baby’s butt, with a dark web of lines growing like tree roots out of the back of his neck and up into his skull. His black eyes shone wet and long, kind of like a horse’s. He hissed at the others, getting them to flip their hoods back too.

  The others were just as ugly, though I’d been right—Big Baldy was the tallest of the group, and had the strongest features. The others were smaller, not like kids, but not fully grown, either.

  I couldn’t make heads or tails outta their hissing talk. They did seem worried about something. I sure hoped it wasn’t the money, that they weren’t thinking about robbing the place. I couldn’t get the day’s take out of the bar and to the bank until morning.

  While they was pouring another round for themselves, I got the revolver Mister Thomas had given me, that I’d taught all the other girls to use. It weren’t one of his inventions, no, it was a real Smith and Wesson, a six-shooter, that I made damn sure was kept cleaner than brand new sheets from the Sears and Roebuck Catalog.

  I also started up the coals under the big kettle, so I’d have plenty of steam later if I needed it. Mister Thomas didn’t approve of us wasting his special coal and heating up the water before a client asked for a drink from the machine, but I had a feeling about these four.

  Once Big Baldy and the others had finished their whisky, I came out from behind the bar again. “Want another?” I asked. They was all leaning way back in their chairs now, loose in the way a cowpoke gets after a hard night’s whoring.

  “Thisss machine,” Big Baldy said, waving his hand toward the beast on the bar. “How much for it?”

  “Y’all got enough on your tab for more drinks,” I told him. “Anything special you want? Or should I just make you something?”

  “Make ussss, yessss, make usss ssssomething.” Big Baldy pressed his thin lips together, tightly, pushing them outward.

  Hell, was that a smile? Or was he making a kissy face at me?

  I sure didn’t stick around to find out. I went back behind the bar, tightened the ends of the hoses connected to the kettle, then opened up the valves so the steam would rise, powering the machine.

  It came to life slowly, despite the head of steam I’d already built up. The bottles gurgled—the blue one especially—as seals formed, making sure nothing leaked. Then the dials started lighting up, one after another, showing temperature, pressure, moisture, and a bunch of things Mister Thomas had told me that I didn’t remember and couldn’t read, having never learned my letters.

  So what would it be for Big Baldy? I paused in my considering, looking over the machine at him. He still leaned back, like a lazy cat, playing with the glass in front of him.

  What would make him relax more? I remembered thinking about whoring. Maybe that was what this crew needed. Something that would both relax ‘em, and raise ‘em up.

  I started with the yellow—liquid gold, as Mister Thomas likened it. Then some brown: Those boys needed some earthiness. A touch of blue for whimsy. Then topped it off with the pink, for the frills of the dancing girls up the street.

  It didn’t take the machine long to process, huffing and puffing as it blended the liquids in its sleek innards, finally distilling the prettiest orange drink at the other end.

  I was congratulating myself as I took the first glass over. It looked a perfect match. I was sure to get a big tip from this.

  But Big Baldy looked askance at it. “What isss thisss?”

  “You asked me to make you something,” I shot back.

  Mister Thomas would be so mad at me if I wasted a drink from the machine. He sometimes got angry enough to take it out of my wages. I always made it back, though, fixing something that broke either at the bar or in town.

  “Ssssomething humansss, yessss,” Big Baldy replied.

  Human? Well, hell. These boys really weren’t from around these parts.

  Not like I was gonna stop making ‘em drinks, though. We even served Indians here at the Gold Mine Saloon.

  “Tis human,” I told him. “I made it from the machine built by Mister Thomas. You should try it,” I coaxed. “Just a sip. I’m sure it’s good for what ails you.”

  Big Baldy glared at me, glared at the glass I offered him, but he finally reached out with those too-many fingers and took the drink.

  He brought it to his nose—no idea if he could smell anything through those tiny slits. I was afraid he was gonna unfurl a tongue or something to taste it first, but he brought it to his mouth, taking a small sip.

  After Big Baldy smacked his lips together like an old timer who’d lost all his teeth, he finally looked back up at me. “Issss good!”

  “One for each?” I asked, nodding at the other gents.

  “Yessss! One for everyone here! You too!” Big Baldy said expansively. “Tell usssss your name?”

  “Gracie,” I told him. It wouldn’t harm none, and might keep ‘em friendlier, later.

  ‘Cause I could see that keeping ‘em friendly now weren’t gonna be a problem—that drink had turned Big Baldy into one jovial pumpkin.

  * * *

  “Now boys, I’m sorry to tell you, but it’s closing time,” I eventually told Big Baldy and his friends, Frick, Frack, and Nod. I had no idea what any of their names were, but I was plum tired, through and through.

  And my feet were still killing me.

  They’d tossed me an extra eagle, for my troubles. But it weren’t enough to keep me going, not when dawn was creeping up outa the east.

  “Graccccie,” Big Baldy sang out. “Jusssst one more. Pleassssse?”

  I’d already planned on that. “Last call,” I said. “Last one. Then, vamoose.”

  Big Baldy actually giggled at that, like a weird pumpkin child. “Vamooooshhhh!” he said, his hand flying through the air, toward Frick, Frack, and Nod.

  They chittered at that, like not quite full-grown giggles.

  I knew what I should make them to get them moving along—a drink of home.

  It was a gamble. It might make ‘em morose. I’d done that once already, mixing ‘em a drink with too much of the yellow and not enough brown.

  But they still needed to be moseying along.

  So I gave them great brown muddy skies, with dots of yellow stars, blue hard rocks and soft pink nests.

  Then I mixed up something for me. Started with a solid moonshine base, then mixed in a dash of all the colored liquids.

  Mister Thomas had told me once never to add everything in. It would muddy the drink. Too much of everything and not enough of a single taste, a single feeling.

  But I wasn’t so tired that I couldn’t coax that machine to sit up and sing for its supper if I set my mind to it.

  The drinks for Big Baldy were all a muddy brown, while mine was the color of fire, red and furious.

  I’d actually made this drink one time before, named it after myself: Gracie’s Fire.

  I merely sipped my cordial, planning to finish it later, while the boys slammed theirs back, as I thought they might. “So it’s a good evening to ya,” I said as I came back out from behind the bar, tray in hand. I collected their glasses and the empty bottle, then turned ba
ck toward the bar.

  Big Baldy and the others hissed at each other. I had no idea what language it was, but they sounded more intent now, not so relaxed.

  I got myself back behind the bar again, brought the revolver up beside me, and waited.

  “Gracccccie,” Big Baldy said, standing, swaying.

  I took a sip of my own drink, “It’s been fun, gentlemen, but I gotta close up, and you have to go.”

  “Not without you, Graccccie,” Big Baldy said.

  He made that kissy face again. Shit, he was ugly.

  “And your marvelousssss massssshine.”

  Damn it. I knew they was gonna be trouble sooner or later.

  I picked up the revolver and cocked it. “Can’t have it. Need y’all to just move along, now.”

  “Gracccccie, you wouldn’t ssssshoot usssss,” Big Baldy said confidently.

  I put a bullet into the floor, directly in front of his feet.

  Mama may not have been the best, but she made sure I was well-versed in the essentials: Shooting and moonshine.

  Mister Thomas would just have to understand about the hole in the floor.

  Big Baldy started, then stood up straight. The others chittered at him. He raised one of his odd, too-many-fingered hands and silenced them.

  “I got five bullets still warm and waiting,” I told him. “Now, you’ve been good customers, so let’s just leave it at that.”

  Big Baldy shook his head. “I’m sssssssorry, Gracccccie.” He held up some kind of weapon of his own. It looked like a short rifle, but the end was blown out, like a trumpeter’s horn.