“All right then,” he whispered to himself. “Probably like driving a lorry. How hard can it be?”
Bruce flexed his right foot forward, and the Bear lurched backward, slamming into the bay’s retaining wall. The impact rattled his teeth, and caught the attention of the Cave’s personnel.
“So, not quite a lorry then,” he said, pointing his right foot downward. The Bear heaved again, this time forward. He repeated the gesture, this time on the left, and the left side of the tank also moved forward. To make this thing move, he would have to mimic a belly crawl.
The shouts at his Bear sounded soft, muffled; but from the looks of the ground crew, mallets and spanners held over their heads as if they were pitchforks and torches, Bruce was not making any friends.
Fine. That made pushing forward without caution just that much easier.
His Bear lumbered free of its bay and, with a twist of the bars and leaning left, turned a corner that brought the forge into view.
Something landed on top of his Bear. Whatever it was, it was well over ten stone. A heartbeat later, whatever had landed on the tank collapsed and then slid free. Through his viewport, Bruce saw the workers running in a wild panic. Another thump came from the outside, followed close by the sound of a body falling against the Bear.
“Thank you, Ryfka,” he muttered. “Now we just back up a bit here,” and the Bear stepped back slightly. Bruce could imagine this thing leaning back on its haunches much like a real bear. “Let’s complicate things.”
Both Maxim guns underneath his cockpit roared to life, their muzzle flashes sparking just at the bottom of his peripheral. Against the forge, he could see sparks dancing about its many pitted surfaces. He was not expecting to pierce any part of this furnace, as it was designed sturdy enough to contain melted iron ore. That didn’t mean he couldn’t slow down the manufacturing process.
The spray of bullets was now catching what appeared to be walkways, exhaust pipes, and a pair of control centres on either side of the forge. He could see some workers making a run for it. Again came the thumping against the Bear of one or two brave souls attempting to gain access, only to have a bullet end their impromptu assault. A light flashed yellow in front of him. If he knew Russian, he might know what the light was signalling, but he was going to guess “Low Ammunition” for the Maxims. Thick steam began seeping out of several pipes of the forge. He could also see one of the control stations appeared shattered and ruined. It was a start…
Then the guns stopped.
He pressed the triggers again. Nothing.
His eyes jumped to the control panel. The yellow light had now switched to red.
“Lovely. Now what?”
He then looked around himself. He was in a bloody tank.
Bruce opened the throttle up and the Bear broke into a sprint—or at least, a sprint for a tank—forward. He watched the distance to the forge disappear, and then felt every inch of him jostle on impact. He could hear metal grind and groan as the Bear tried to continue on, but the forge would not relent. Good.
Ignoring the muffled calls for help and thumping from outside, Bruce shimmied out of the pilot’s seat and crawled to the back of his tank, his eyes frantically searching for anything he could use out in the Cave. His eyes went over the gunner’s chair and there he found a small case of grenades. He freed two from their casings, and then he turned around to the engineer’s station. This, due to his lack of knowledge on the Russian language, was the tricky bit of his improvisation.
“You sit here, you’re the engineer,” he said to himself. “Now if I wanted access to a button, but only if things were a complete cock-up, I would make it look like…”
The red button was one of the larger buttons on the control panel. It was framed by yellow and black stripes, and housed under a small glass cover. The Cyrillic label underneath it was printed in large, red characters.
“Yeah, exactly like that,” he said, ripping off its cover and pushing it.
The Bear’s interior lights switched to a deep red. Next to the engineer’s panel, the clock’s hands reset to midnight. The hour hand suddenly locked itself at the three o’clock position while the minute hand started ticking backwards.
Bruce scrambled for the main hatch, opened it to the outside world, and then hurled out a grenade. The club-shape object sailed up into the Cave and disappeared from view. The explosion that soon followed offered him a moment to hoist himself up through the exit. He slid down the back-end, and on reaching terra firma, lobbed the second grenade. Once he heard it detonate, Bruce sprinted. He could try for another Bear, but that would have been pressing his luck. He needed a transport, preferably one faster than these monsters.
Run, he told himself. Just run.
The gunfire was coming now, too much for him to try and discern which one belonged to Ryfka and which were trying to pick him off. It all came down to this hare-brained scheme of his, and how much distance he could put between himself and his tank.
He found the bay where his Bear had come from and dove inside it. He felt the explosion through the ground. Parts of his tank flew in every direction, a good amount of this shrapnel tearing into the forge. Now cracked, it released super-heated iron ore that poured across the Bear’s burning husk, consuming it greedily as if attempting to reclaim it from whence it had come.
Damage done, he thought. Time to pick up Ryfka.
The Cave was Bedlam, and he was no longer a priority to the Houseboys. The damaged forge was now putting out even more heat, and the other Bears in their maintenance bays were potential hazards with the ordinance on board. There was also the forge itself, and the dangers it posed to crew and completed tanks. Bruce kept running towards the mouth of the Cave, the air tasting less and less harsh the closer he drew. His run stopped at the chug-chug-chug of a lorry attempting to start. It was a truck the likes of which Bruce had never seen before. He had seen vehicles with canopies covering the beds, certainly, but never with broad, wide wheels in the front and a series of smaller wheels in the back, all of which turned a wide, sturdy tread. This odd transport was just pulling away when Bruce grabbed hold of the bed’s tailgate and hauled himself up.
He had only just laid back against the truck’s bed when someone pulled him up to his feet.
The Houseboy was about Bruce’s size. So were the other four blokes sitting closer towards the cab.
“You alright there, mate?” he asked. The thick accent jolted Bruce harder than a kick to the bollocks. He had better opinions of his kinsmen.
“Yeah,” Bruce said, nodding quickly. “Things going tit’s up out there, eh?”
The Houseboy blinked. “Crikey, another Australian? Here?”
“Got another surprise for ya, mate,” Bruce said before planting a solid right against the man’s jaw.
The Houseboy toppled back into the other four, giving Bruce a chance to throw the bloke closest to him through the bed’s canopy and out into the dark. He didn’t see who it was or where it came from, but someone managed to plant a good hit to the kidney. It winded Bruce, but he pushed forward from the legs, shouldering his opponent out of the way and ploughing into the remaining three Usher sods. Suddenly he was being picked up, and Bruce grabbed for any kind of purchase. He latched onto a heavy wool coat, similar to his borrowed one, and he dug his fingers deep into it as he was pushed out of the canopy’s hole. They both were suspended outside in the cold morning, but Bruce’s other hand caught the truck bed’s frame. Tightening his grip on the man’s coat, Bruce heaved, and pulled himself back into the truck.
A fist came out of the shadows, but Bruce ducked, hearing the attack sail overhead. He pushed and a Houseboy slapped into the other side of the canvas, which ripped away and sent him sprawling into the snow.
Arms grabbed him from behind and held him fast. Bruce couldn’t see this bloke, but he could see his countryman returning to his feet, wiping away the blood from the corner of his mouth.
“Nice punch there, mate. What—Sydney? Melb
ourne?”
“Brisbane, ya wanker,” Bruce barked. “You Townsville?”
He nodded. “What gave it away?”
Bruce spat on the man’s foot. “Any pisspot throwing his hat in with Usher can’t be all that smart. So, Townsville.”
He drove a fist into Bruce’s gut. Bruce doubled-over, and the man holding him struggled to keep his footing.
“Well, Brisbane,” Townsville said to Bruce, leaning close to his ear, “you’re not long for this world.”
Bruce jerked his head up, clocking Townsville while also knocking the bloke holding on to him back a few steps. They both hit the cab hard, causing Houseboy to lose his grip. Bruce’s elbow connected with the Usher agent’s temple, stunning him enough for Bruce to toss him out into the dark.
And then there was one.
“That’s the problem with Townsville,” Bruce scoffed. “You lot never know when to shut it.”
Bruce drove his fist down onto his fellow Australian, but he only heard the sound of his fist slapping into an open palm. Townsville grunted as he pushed Bruce backward, and then charged at him. Both men fell to the bed as their lorry rumbled around a corner.
One hit to the kidney. Another hit to the kidney.
Yeah, this bloke was definitely from Townsville.
“Breaks my heart,” Townsville said as he shoved Bruce back into the cab, pinning him against it by his throat, “to do this to you, mate.”
Bruce worked against the man’s wrist but then braced his hands against Townsville’s elbow and heaved. Under his grip, Bruce felt a joint pop, and Townsville’s hold was no more.
“Breaks my heart, meetin’ you here,” Bruce wheezed before grabbing Townsville by the collar and pulling him in for a right nose-ender. Under Bruce’s forehead, something snapped.
It had been a long time since he had used the Thunder from Down Under on a fellow Australian. For this plonker, it felt amazing.
Once Townsville slipped free of the truck bed, Bruce grabbed hold of the frame that defiantly attempted to keep what was left of the canvas. It was plenty sturdy, so swinging into the driver’s seat shouldn’t be a problem. Bruce took a deep breath and sent himself around, his grip switching from the frame to the driver’s door handle.
The gun discharged over his head, but the shift downward opened the door, sending him swinging out and into the hood. A thick plume of smoke rose from underneath the truck, and the vehicle accelerated. Bruce swung back towards the cab, but not for long as something—a safe and sure assumption it was a foot—kicked the door away, slamming him into the hood again.
This Houseboy had a bit of smarts about him as the lorry surged forward, uphill.
Bruce was swinging back, faster this time, but just before another kick sent him out once more, he reached around the door and grabbed the driver’s leg.
“Gotcha!” Bruce said.
Then he caught a glimpse of the gun. The one that he had seen earlier.
Bruce kicked off the side of the cab, and the Houseboy slipped off his seat. From the look of this sod’s landing, his neck had broken for sure. The door swung back and Bruce hopped up into the cab. He opened up the boilers and the truck continued forward, unfaltering against the snow. Something about those treads must have been helping them along.
The hill he was climbing levelled out, and the East Entrance appeared in front of him. Bruce maneuvered the truck closer to the access door just as it flew open. Ryfka stepped into view and pointed her rifle at the cab.
Bruce slammed on the brakes and raised his hands into the air. “It’s me!”
Ryfka lowered her weapon and let out a long breath, mist lingering around her as she did so.
Bruce beckoned her into the cab. She had not even settled into her seat before he brought the boilers up to maximum and launched them forward.
Glancing above his head, Bruce found a small light, probably used to check maps in darkness. These Russians were crafty buggers. He leaned into the light, making sure she could see his lips. “Bloody good shooting, Ryfka.”
He glanced over to her. Any pistols on you?
Bruce dug into his pants pocket and fished out his Remington-Elliott. Leaning back into the light, hard to do while driving, he said, “All I got, love.”
He caught sight of the chambers before handing it to her. Only two bullets.
She rapped him on the shoulder. How fast can this...thing...go?
His eyes looked at the variety of gauges. Ryfka slapped him on the shoulder again and pointed to a round window with a single needle that was hovering around the number twenty.
“The velocimeter claims she can get up to thirty. Let’s find out.”
A roar thundered behind him, and a red-orange glow briefly lit the snowy road stretching before them. Glancing in the mirror suspended between them, Bruce could make out the factory receding in the distance, the wing where he knew the Cave was located appeared shrouded in flame.
Bruce then leaned forward in his seat. The perimeter gate was up ahead, but there was someone standing in the middle of the bloody road.
“Oh, you have got to be joking,” he swore.
The short, squat shape was unmistakable. Mama Bear stepped into the light, cradling in her hands a union of a small Maxim, a Mosin-Nagant, and from the looks of the odd cage-funnel underneath, a Tesla attachment. Her hand pulled back the pump action underneath it, and lights of all kinds flared to life.
Bruce tightened his grip on the steering wheel.
The bolt from the Tesla attachment struck the hood, cradling the front of their truck in a web of electricity that danced back and forth. Inside the cab, gauges bounced back and forth, and the light above Bruce blinked before everything went dark.
Mama Bear pushed the pump action forward and levelled the rifle. Bullets ripped through the windshield and hood.
A door opened, and Bruce saw Ryfka lean out and fire the Remington-Elliot twice. He sat up straight just in time to see the perimeter gates snap open on their impact. There was no way to tell how fast they were going, but everything felt steady. They now had to get to the extraction point. In roughly thirty-six hours. Provided nothing went...
The Maxim snarled angrily behind them, and Ryfka let out a scream. She was slipping out of the cab, but he managed to catch her by the wrist and haul her back in. A pair of bullets had torn through her right shoulder. While there were exit wounds, the amount of blood coming out of her was a bit alarming.
“Ah, dammit,” Bruce cursed as he wriggled out of his coat. He balled it up and pressed it as best as he could against Ryfka’s wounds. “Help me out here, love. Push against that.”
Ryfka’s hand joined Bruce’s. He quickly slipped his hand free and pressed hard against hers, earning a small yelp.
“As soon as I know we’re clear,” Bruce said, knowing Ryfka couldn’t see his lips, “I’ll patch you up. Just stay with me.” She couldn’t hear him. This was more for himself. He knew that. “Just stay with me.”
He looked in the rear view mirror. The glow of the factory was growing dimmer by the second, but he couldn’t stop. Not now. They had to get to the extraction point.
“Just stay with me, Ryfka.”
Chapter Thirteen
In Which the Ministry of Peculiar Occurrences Makes a Grand Entrance
After two nights on the floor with Eliza, Wellington could feel a muscle in his back twitching. Still as he looked across the Strategy Room to where she was studying the map of India, he could only smile as his eyes followed the curve of her backsides in the trousers she wore. So improper and inappropriate that we would be exiled from the Empire, she had asked of him.
What he was presently thinking was highly inappropriate, and he did not mind in the least. It was so satisfying to tell her the truth of how he felt, and just as good to seal their sharing the way they had. It had been very much worth it.
Wellington took a turn at the periscope to get his mind off of his lover and back on the mission at hand. Sweeping the landsca
pe revealed green hills slipping by and open skies overhead. No peril on the horizon. He flicked the scope’s arms and sent it back into place in the ceiling. The train was an impressive feat of technology, ingenuity, necessity, and luxury...but it still bothered him: Why wasn’t it a hypersteam?
Sophia del Morte appeared in the entrance, rather incongruously pushing a tea trolley. At his raised eyebrow, she said, “Just making myself useful, and besides, the coffee was atrocious.”
Wellington observed the narrow form of a coffeepot right next to the one for tea.
“Which would you like?” Sophia’s grin suggested both might be scandalous.
Wellington could feel Eliza’s gaze fixed on him, and for a moment he was torn.
“You should have the coffee,” Sophia said, inhaling the scent. “Wonderful, a roast so dark”—she glanced up and shot the two of them a wicked look—“Like my soul.”
Eliza gave a little hiss of annoyance, but Wellington was relieved to see she didn’t reach for one of her pistols. That was an improvement, certainly.
“I think I will have tea,” Wellington said, taking hold of the pot himself. “More my speed.”
Sophia gave a little shrug and poured herself a coffee. “I sincerely hope your director is right about this leisurely pace.” She took a sip. “Jekyll has given these insurgents an incredible power.”
“Indeed they have, Sigñorina,” Wellington agreed, “which can sometimes give men—and yes, women—a false sense of confidence. From what we heard, Nahush’s confidence in electroporters must be what allows him to entrust his Ghost Rebellion to Jekyll.”
“Perhaps after facing you at the Army & Navy Building, he is willing to work with Jekyll as the electroporter offers them an advantage.”
“Tosh, my condition does not play in this whatsoever.”
“Your condition?” Her left eyebrow raised. “Is that what you call it?”
Wellington felt himself clench.
“Fan-bloody-tastic, Sophia,” seethed his partner. “You might want to consider helping him.”
“I am,” Sophia replied tersely. “Instead of treating what happened as an affliction, Wellington should embrace it. What he can do is nothing less than astounding, and it will serve us well in the battle ahead.”
The Ghost Rebellion Page 25
