“Not counting the vast gathering of Demons and Darklings that appears to be growing by the day,” said Ned’s dad.
“Yes, Terry, not counting them. I have a great-uncle, ancient by anyone’s standards, who I haven’t seen in decades. We kept in touch loosely over the years, but when Barba stole the Twelve’s tickers … well, he started to make contact more regularly.”
Benissimo’s shoulders finally dropped, if only a little, and he sat forward in his chair. “Go on, Tinks.”
“He’s been working on something, something of a breakthrough, and wants to meet.”
“What kind of a breakthrough?”
“All I know is that it has something to do with Tickers – all Tickers.”
Benissimo pushed his chair back. “Fox, we’re going to need transport.”
“I shall make arrangements. How many men do you need?”
“None.”
“None?”
“If Barba didn’t know about us working together, he certainly does now. The smaller we keep this, the better our chances of going in unseen. Olivia, Terry and I will pay a visit to the Fey. Ned will join George and Lucy as they chaperone the Tinker on his family reunion. By blood and thunder, we may well have a way out of this mess before the week is out!”
Benissimo’s chest was now puffed up with swagger and his whip wriggled like an excited eel.
Ned’s mum, however, was not satisfied. “Now you look here, Bene, I haven’t agreed to any of—”
“Mum!”
Olivia Armstrong turned to Ned. “It’s not up to Benissimo, or you. None of this is up to any of us.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Yes, son, what are you saying?” added Ned’s dad.
“We’ve spent months in hiding, like everyone else in this room, and for what? To find a way of undoing the Darkening King. Well, Bene’s got one – better than anything we came up with – and if we don’t all pull together then we may as well walk into the taiga and tell Barba he’s won.”
Ned’s dad’s eyes shimmered with what looked like a glint of pride, but Olivia Armstrong still needed convincing.
“Ned, you’re just a boy and—”
“Mum, I’m going, and that’s final.”
George chuckled nervously and Mr Fox stared at his notebook and hummed. Things were about to go one way or the other.
“Ned, I …” began Olivia, but as she looked at the faces round the table something shifted and she sighed. “Fine.”
Lucy didn’t say anything but put her hand on Ned’s with a gentle squeeze that said: “well done”.
Father and Son
here was a time before the Hidden, before circuses, before Ned had found his mum, when his world had consisted of Terry Armstrong and a decidedly odd mouse.
Ned stood on the runway, with the very same mouse on his shoulder and a worried but loving father unable to let go. Everything had changed and yet so much was the same.
“I’ll be all right, Dad.”
“All right isn’t the same as safe.”
“None of us is going to be safe until this is over.”
His dad peeled away, eyes misty but brimming with pride. “It takes a brave boy to do the right thing, even when he’s scared.”
“Takes a brave dad to let him.”
His dad’s stare flitted to Lucy and George, who were helping the Tinker board their Chinook.
“You really think Lucy can help you?”
Ned turned to look over his shoulder. “I don’t know what I’m supposed to do with the stone, or even why it has to be me, Dad, but if it does, and if it’s linked in any way to my ring, then yes, I’d say Lucy is the only person who can help me.”
“Keep her close, son, her and the ape.”
***
Elsewhere, in the Siberian taiga, three clowns made ready. Sar-adin eyed them disdainfully. Barbarossa had insisted he send them and it was only when his master explained why that the Demon understood. Eanie, Meanie and Mo were in turn cruel, stupid and grotesque, but together they had a strange way of getting things done.
“Find them, or the master will have you skinned.”
“No skinny-do, Sar-adin. Mo findee boy, Mo good clowney,” simpered the big one.
Barbarossa understood the importance of his underlings’ weaknesses. Of all the traits that the three unwashed creatures had, cowardice was their most useful attribute. They would do absolutely anything to please Barbarossa and his Demon – they were simply too frightened of what would happen to them if they didn’t.
Clockwork Museum
s the van trundled through the streets of Amsterdam, Ned found himself missing the sway and tilt of an airship. There was something in the purr of their propellers and the yawn of their rigging that gave him a sense of calm. That said, George’s snoring had much the same effect.
Holland is known for many things: the flatness of its land, its football and its tulips. The capital, Amsterdam, has a complex web of canals and an abundance of bicycles that weave and dodge through its cars and trams, but there is one thing it does beyond compare: museums.
Down a lesser-known street in one of its lesser-known suburbs is an almost completely unknown museum, mostly because nobody knows it’s there. Mr Cogsworth’s Mechanarium had sat in quiet obscurity for decades and when the Tinker parked down an alleyway to its side, Ned could see why. The sun was setting and under its gentle orange glow it was almost impossible to see into the museum. The windows were black with years of grime, and what might have been a signpost was so riddled with cobwebs and dust that its brass lettering had turned to a greying blob of meaningless shapes.
“Come on,” said Tinks. “He said to be here before closing and we’ve only a few minutes.”
There was an apish rumble from within the van. George had woken up.
“I don’t like it. Not one bit,” he muffled.
Ned patted the van’s rear doors affectionately. “It’s all right, George. It’s his great-uncle and we don’t want to scare the locals now, do we?”
“I’m not scary; I’m perfectly polite.”
“Don’t worry, any trouble and we’ll squeal,” said Lucy, and she joined Ned and the Tinker as they made their way to the entrance.
“Dear old Faisal. We minutians have a longer lifespan than most, but it’s a wonder he’s still going. He was such a character in his day, always about to discover the next big thing,” explained the Tinker, who was on this rare occasion excited to be in “the wild” and out of his usual lab coat.
As they opened the front door, they were met by a mass of miniature musical instruments, seemingly welded together into a single machine: a piano keyboard no larger than Ned’s hand, cymbals the size of ears and tiny trumpets the length of fingers, amongst others. They were all arranged round an opening in the wall and doing their best to play a rendition of “Happy Birthday to You”. Sadly the brass section blew out little more than dust and the piano was completely out of tune. Little bulbs lit up at the machine’s centre round a doll-sized conductor. The doll turned on its heel and gave a metallic rasp.
“One visitor, one coin,” came the recording.
Then the doll held out its hand.
The Tinker grinned and produced three coins from his pocket.
“You know, before we made Tickers we used to make toys. Great-uncle Faisal’s house was full of them.”
He placed a coin on the conductor’s hand and the mechanical wonder flung it over its shoulder, where it was caught by a flapping metal purse. Sadly, with the third and last coin, the little automaton’s arm broke clear off and the metal disc spun to a standstill by its feet.
“I’m guessing he doesn’t get a lot of visitors,” smiled Lucy.
All the same, the turnstiles turned and beyond them the museum sprang to life. Countless light bulbs buzzed with light, spelling out the words MR COGSWORTH’S MECHANARIUM – WELCOME. The “W” of WELCOME promptly blew a fuse and there was a moment when they thought the whole
room might go dark. A voice rang out through speakers in the ceiling with much the same metallic twang as the entrance’s conductor, though it did seem a little more human somehow.
“Welcome, visitors! You are on a tour both historic and wondrous. The life and times of Faisal the Magnificent. Oh, and please do not touch the exhibits.”
What came next really was wondrous, though Ned wasn’t entirely sure it was historic. The walls, floors and ceilings came alive with tiny clockwork people, and only four of them malfunctioned before completely falling apart. They busied themselves with the moving of stages and props, some large, some less so, and all spinning in and out of view in a dizzying rotation of sound and moving metal. Ned’s ring finger hummed ever so softly and his thoughts went to his dad. Terry Armstrong would have been in his element.
“1862 – Rocket-mail,” announced the voice over the speakers.
And in front of them a small rocket on wires was dragged through the air, dropping tiny paper envelopes that the automatons caught with varying success.
“Oh, I remember my father telling me about that one!” grinned the Tinker excitedly.
“1877 – the Underwater Bicycle.”
Out of an opening in the wall came a half-sized bicycle ridden by an equally small pilot, who gasped for air as he rode along a metallic ocean floor.
“Possibly not his best,” whispered Tinks, who Ned noticed was looking more and more misty-eyed by the second. The entire exhibition was devoted to the inventions of his great-uncle.
Everywhere they looked, exhibits went by, lit up by spotlights in the ceiling, and it took Ned a few moments to realise that they were standing on a conveyor belt. They passed by three more rooms with a never-ending display of contraptions.
The Auto-chewer was incredibly messy and spat out bits of half-munched biscuit all over the automaton it was supposed to be chewing for. Mr Moppit was an early Ticker design that had mops for arms and legs but made more mess with its “multi-hose” than it was able to clear up. As they approached the late 1800s, something changed. There were fewer exhibits to do with helping people get about or chew their food, and more and more exhibits to do with the advancement of Ticker design itself. When they passed the 1900s, everything suddenly stopped and the lights grew dim.
“Thank you for coming. Please make your way to the exit.”
“Now what?” asked Lucy.
“I’m not sure, Miss Lucy. I suppose we wait.”
The room was eerily quiet, its contraptions lifeless and still. Ned was just beginning to think that Tinks’s great-uncle was no more than a footnote in a museum when a door opened at the far wall, and a brass Ticker stepped into the room.
The Ticker was about Tinks’s height, with brass eyes, a wire-brush moustache and a round, barrel-shaped belly. Every step from the old machine caused a tiny puff of steam and one of its legs clearly needed oil, judging by all the noise its joints were making. No detail had been spared. It had a monocle lens at one eye, and a rather friendly multi-jointed face that seemed quite capable of turning a smile. And in fact, at the sight of Tinks, it did smile, and Tinks himself looked positively close to tears. Whiskers too, who had till then been sitting very quietly on Lucy’s shoulder, hopped down to the ground and ran up to the old machine in a scurrying blur of rodent excitement.
“Mr Cogsworth!” exclaimed Tinks. “By the Great Gear, he actually finished you! I remember old Faisal building your parts. He said you’d change the world. Said you’d be a bigger deal than the Auto-chewer.”
“Hello, Tinks. Let’s hope he was right.”
Mr Cogsworth
ed and his two companions found themselves sitting in Great-uncle Faisal’s cosy living quarters. Family pictures covered the walls and a much younger Tinks was in several of them. A kettle boiled on a wood-burning stove that looked as if it hadn’t been used in years, and the Ticker that was Mr Cogsworth rummaged away steamily in a cupboard for some teabags. As he did so, Whiskers continued scampering between his legs like an excited puppy.
“Do forgive me, it’s been an age since I’ve had to brew tea,” croaked the machine.
Aside from the comfy chairs and pictures, the rest of the room had been given over to become a workshop of sorts, with a similar appearance and organisation to the Tinker’s.
“Home from home, eh, Tinks?” whispered Ned.
The Tinker smiled so wildly it looked as though he might hurt himself.
“Tell me, Mr Cogsworth, where is my great-uncle?”
“If you don’t mind, sir, there are a few things I should discuss with you first. For one, the reason that he asked to see you.”
Mr Cogsworth closed the cupboard and his shoulders sagged. “I’m so sorry, I’m afraid we don’t seem to have any tea.”
Ned had had Whiskers all his life, and he must have seen hundreds of Tickers since discovering the Hidden, but Faisal’s invention really was quite unique. The only Ticker he had ever heard speak was the Central Intelligence and the thought of it doing so made him shudder. Mr Cogsworth, on the other hand, was rather polite and moved with a certain slowness that made him seem almost gentle.
“Can’t Faisal tell me himself?”
“Of course, but before you see him, you really must hear what I have to say.”
And at that, Mr Cogsworth moved rather stiffly to one of the armchairs before sitting down with a rusty groaning of his springs.
“Do you know why your great-uncle left Gearnish?”
“My father wouldn’t speak about it, but I later found out that it was not under the best circumstances.”
Mr Cogsworth’s bulb-like eyes dimmed. “You’re quite right. You see, Faisal was one of the very first to really push advances in Ticker design. He was way ahead of his time and within a few short years his creations were being produced all over the city. Great advances were made by your great-uncle and later by others. But his focus soon turned to the pursuit of AI – artificial intelligence. He wanted the machines to think for themselves. He envisaged a future where Tickers might replace farmers, doctors and factory workers; food and medical attention for everyone. The Central Intelligence was his very first experiment in that field.”
The Tinker’s face turned to ash. “Great-uncle Faisal? He-he developed the Central Intelligence?”
“Yes and no. When he published his findings, the ruling Gears who ran the city immediately went into production, despite his warnings that they weren’t ready. Furious, he locked himself away to continue his studies till, more than a year later, he came upon something. He realised that AI, by its very definition, was dangerous in that a creature without a soul could not truly determine right from wrong. But it was too late, the Central Intelligence had already been built, and it quickly set about automating the city’s factories – seemingly without any problems. Only your great-uncle foresaw what would happen.”
“And then, Mr Cogsworth? What happened then?” demanded the Tinker.
“Your uncle expressed his concerns to anyone that would listen, but those in charge did everything in their power to ridicule him; to make sure that his findings were thrown out as nonsense by anyone he took them to. A broken and discredited man, nearly at the end of his days, he left Gearnish and came here.”
The Tinker looked truly devastated. “Well, it’s just awful – poor Great-uncle Faisal, all those years locked away in this museum, and for what?”
Mr Cogsworth’s metal face rippled into a smile. “To crack the AI problem and learn how to undo the machine that his research had helped create.”
The Tinker’s little brow wrinkled. “And did he?”
“Oh yes, Tinks, he did. He knew that without a soul, an AI was just a set of numbers, a code. But your great-uncle is a very tenacious man. He discovered – with a little magical assistance – a way to duplicate the soul, to make a digital copy, so to speak, the first of which he put into a wind-up mouse.”
At this Whiskers leapt on to the automaton’s lap, his little head bobbing up and down ha
ppily. Ned’s eyes grew wide – surely he wasn’t talking about his mouse?
But before he got a chance to ask, Mr Cogsworth continued. “After many years, he went on to further his findings, in me. You were right, Tinks, I am indeed a bigger deal than the Auto-chewer.”
“I’m sorry, Mr Cogsworth, I’m not sure I understand. And where is he? Why can’t he explain all this himself?” demanded the Tinker.
“Oh, but he just did, Tinks. I am your great-uncle Faisal, and the one thing capable of bringing down the Central Intelligence.”
A Decent Pub in Dublin
erry and Olivia Armstrong could not be a more formidable force, especially when combined with the enigma that was Benissimo. There was very little that Terrence, with the help of his ring, could not “amplify” into existence, and in turn, there was very little that his wife did not know about how to fight, what tools to use, what strategies to employ and with what mindset to do the fighting. Before Ned’s birth, Terry and Olivia Armstrong had followed the Ringmaster into the fray countless times and the “old-goat”, impervious to harm as he was, had never let them down.
Today, though, was not that kind of day.
“I thought you said the Seelie Court were friendly?!” roared a red-faced Terry Armstrong.
“King Oberon was – his son’s another matter!” panted back Benissimo.
Their party of three had been running now for more than thirty minutes. The streets of Dublin had a turning, twisting way to them that seemed to go on endlessly and the screaming Fey behind them did not know the meaning of tiredness. An angry fairy could chase its target indefinitely. Sweat pouring, chests beating and tempers flaring, Benissimo and the two Armstrongs stopped to look back down the street at the approaching throng of crazed magic. It was three in the afternoon and the busy shoppers going about their business couldn’t see through the Fey’s glamours. Had they been able to, they would have screamed at the tree-men, twenty feet high, with jagged branchy spears; they might have marvelled at Oberon’s Nightwatch, a magical battalion of inch-high knights riding on the back of hummingbirds; or perhaps been petrified by the sight of magic-wielding spell-casters with the body armour of insects, barrelling between the tree-men’s legs in blurs of green, lilac and blue. Luckily for the innocent shoppers of Dublin, all they saw was an eccentric-looking man in a top hat and an out-of-shape Englishman with his increasingly hot-tempered wife tearing down the street.
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