Gideon Smith and the Brass Dragon (40 page)

Chantico scowled at her but glowed with pride at the morsel of praise she had thrown him. Bent murmured, “He's going to have his work cut out with that one, mark my words.”

Gideon checked the guns Rowena had brought him from the small armory on the 'stat and began to pass them to Chantico to store in the Steamcrawler. It had been agreed that Gideon, Chantico, and Inez would take the vehicle into the Nyu Edo streets and tackle the dinosaur. Jeb Hart, by tacit agreement of them all, had done quite enough; if anyone was going to get into trouble with Walsingham for rank dissent, they decided, it might as well just be Gideon.

Or, as Bent had said, considering the prone body of Edward Lyle, “Might as well be hanged for a sheep as a lamb.”

It was properly dusk now, and below in Nyu Edo glass balls strung together along the hilly streets began to glow into life.

“They were my invention,” said Serizawa proudly. “Fully automated. At this time each evening, gas begins to flow into each globe and is lit by a sparking flint.”

“They'll help us track the beast.” Gideon nodded, watching patches of the city plunge into darkness, strip by strip, as the dinosaur crashed through the chains of lights.

“'Ere, Gideon, before you go,” said Bent, plucking his sleeve and taking him to one side. “I just wanted a word.”

“Quickly, Aloysius,” said Gideon, but not unkindly.

Bent nodded. “I just wanted to say … look, you saved my life back there, Gideon. I really thought Lyle was going to kill me. But I know you.… I know what you must be feeling.”

“Yes,” said Gideon. And Bent was right. Gideon had shot the Governor of New York, and he accepted all the attendant trouble that was going to blow in with that. But more to the point, he had shot a man, in cold blood, right in the head. Eventually he said, “Captain Trigger once said to me that a hero is only as brave as other men, but just for five minutes more.” He smiled crookedly. “It didn't feel a very brave thing, what I did.”

“That's a good thing,” said Bent. “The minute you stop feeling terrible about killing a man, you're no longer a hero. You're a villain. You're going to have to make tough choices in your job, Gideon, and I don't envy you one bit. But I think you made the right one there. If you hadn't shot Lyle, he'd have shot me. And God knows how many would have died down there.”

“Speaking of which,” said Gideon. “Inez? Are we ready to go?”

“Just feeding the furnace,” she called back. “Two minutes.”

Gideon took the opportunity to quickly climb aboard the
Skylady III
. He found Serizawa in the galley, where Maria lay, naked, on the main worktable. Gideon averted his eyes as Akiko and Michi watched from the side.

“I am sorry I had to shoot that man in front of your daughter,” said Gideon to Akiko.

She shrugged wearily. “I suppose now that we are cast out into the lawless land we must get used to that sort of thing.”

“There is a place, quite far from here,” said Gideon. “A new community of people like yourselves. We could perhaps take you there?”

Akiko smiled. “We will need friends. Thank you.” She looked at her husband and squeezed her daughter tightly. “Our little Pathway. I told you she was well named.” Gideon turned to Serizawa, who was standing, his fingers steepled under his chin, staring at Maria. Unlike Gideon, who regarded Maria as a woman, it was clear Serizawa saw her through an engineer's eyes, as a particularly complex puzzle.

“Here,” said Gideon, and placed his hands on either side of Maria's navel. How he had longed to take her in his arms, to touch her. But not like this. He massaged her stomach until, just as she had shown him on their very first meeting, her torso parted with the slightest click, doors opening on tiny hinges to display her clockwork innards.

“Fascinating,” breathed Serizawa. “I can see that there are hydraulic pipes that have been severed, and one or two cogs have been smashed.…”

“You can fix her?” said Gideon.

“She is very special to you,” said Serizawa. “Important.”

“Yes,” said Gideon. “She is very special. To me as well as to the country.”

Serizawa nodded. “Then I will fix her.”

“Gideon!” called Inez from outside. “We are ready!”

The little girl, Michi, broke free of her mother's arms and walked over to Gideon, her face serious.

“Can you stop the monster, please?” she asked in perfect English.

Gideon squatted down and ruffled her black hair.

“Yes,” he said. “That's what I do.”

 

29

S
ISTERHOOD

“Are you sure you want to do this?” asked Gideon. The Steamcrawler was rumbling and shuddering, perched on the crest of a compacted-sand track that led down a steep hill from the complex of warehouses and laboratories toward Nyu Edo.

Inez opened her mouth to answer, but Chantico got there before her. “Yes,” he said. “We both had a good look at this machine on the flight over. We think we know how to make it go.”

Inez nodded. “Chantico is right. It needs a lot of coal to feed the furnace and someone to steer it.”

Gideon sat in the rear of the cockpit, by the two guns that were mounted on the steel carapace. “I didn't mean that,” he said. “You are putting yourselves in grave danger. This is not your fight.”

“It isn't your fight, either,” said Inez. “You are British. The Japanese are your enemies, yes?”

Gideon shrugged. “Not really. Not my enemies personally. Besides, it is my fight. I destroyed their only defense against the tyrannosaur. If people die down there, it will be my fault.”

“This land…,” said Chantico haltingly. He swallowed and tried again. “The Nameless, he said … he said this land is injured. Fractured. It needs healing. I think this is a way for us to help.”

Gideon nodded. “You are both very brave. You have my thanks.”

From below, there was a roar. The sky was dark now, and the black patches among the lamp-lit streets marked the progress of the dinosaur. Gideon said, “We should go.”

Chantico climbed into the space beneath Gideon's perch. There was coal in the open furnace, already burning with fierce heat. The Steamcrawler pulled against the brakes that held fast its steerable wheels at the front and its long tracks that ran the rest of the length of the vehicle. Inez sat in the sprung driver's seat and surveyed the leather-covered steering wheel and the array of levers.

“I think this is the brake—” she began, and the Steamcrawler jerked forward, the tracks spitting dust into a huge cloud behind them, and then began to roll down the hill with a speed that tore Gideon's breath from his throat.

Inez raised her gloved fist high above her head, her black hair flowing from beneath her cowl. “La Chupacabras!” she called, as Gideon's stomach flipped and the Steamcrawler tore into Nyu Edo.

*   *   *

Nyu Edo was all hills, and Gideon was exhausted from holding on to the edge of the cockpit by the time the Steamcrawler had swept at a speed unimaginable for such a heavy metal vehicle down one and up another. Inez whooped and hollered as she dragged the machine around corners, its tracks skidding on the roads. Once the rear of the Steamcrawler smashed into a column holding up a string of gas lamps, and they came crashing down behind them. A small shrine in the middle of the road was plowed through, the stone statuary grinding under their tracks, making Gideon fear they were going to be upended. Periodically, Chantico raised his sweating face from the furnace to gulp fresh air and glance fearfully at the erratic route Inez was taking through the town.

Once they were in the town, which was eerily devoid of life, it was more difficult to track the tyrannosaur. Gideon begged Inez to stop the Steamcrawler; she did so by hauling on the brake lever, causing the vehicle to skid outward, rear first, into a fence bordering a block of small wooden houses with pagoda roofs.

Trying to push away the chugging of the steam engine, Gideon clambered up onto the metal shell of the Steamcrawler, listening to the night. A roar suddenly split the air, close enough to make Gideon throw his hands to his ears. Ahead of them was a patch of darkness between two large houses. Gideon held up his hands for quiet, peering into the blackness, just as a small group of men came running from the far right.

The first of them glanced with puzzlement at the Steamcrawler but urged the rest on. Gideon counted a dozen, all wearing black armor composed of metal scales and plates, joined together by rivets and lengths of silk. They had metal plate helmets with broad neck guards and carried long swords. Gideon searched his memory and came up with a name for the weapon: katana.

“Samurai,” he said quietly. He had read of them—in
World Marvels & Wonders,
of course—but never thought to see them.

Inez stared at the backs of the men as they jogged in formation into the dark street. “They have only swords?”

“The samurai are fearsome warriors,” said Gideon. “But even so…”

There was a volley of shouts from the alley, then a terrible, high-pitched scream. The first of the samurai came running out, eyes wide and shining with terror, followed by two more. There was a rhythmic beat of thunder, or an earthquake that shook Nyu Edo, the Steamcrawler rattling as it bounced upon the dry, compacted earth.

Then the beast stepped out of the shadows. It let the ragdoll shape of a decapitated samurai fall from its jaws, and roared.

“My God,” breathed Inez. “I had no idea.…”

Gideon stared at it. It seemed even more magnificent here among the incongruous roads and streets of civilization than it had in the jungle of the lost island, as thought it had suddenly become the head of a whole new food chain and knew it. The dinosaur threw back its head and roared again, shaking the glass out of the windows of the houses all around them. Then it bent forward, creating a straight line from the tip of its nose to the end of its tail, and turned its huge head—as big as their Steamcrawler—to one side, regarding them curiously.

“Inez,” Gideon said softly, calmly. She ignored him, transfixed. “Inez.”

“Yes?” she whispered.

The tyrannosaur sniffed the air, its yellow eyes staring unblinkingly at them.

“Does this thing go backward?”

The dinosaur took a step toward them, crushing the corpse of the samurai and barely noticing. It straightened, towering above the pagoda roofs, then bent forward sharply, its gore-dripping jaws widening.

“I think so,” she murmured.

“The guns,” said Gideon. “They are facing backward. I need you to go back as quickly as you can and turn the Steamcrawler around. Can you do that?”

Inez nodded. The tyrannosaur took another tentative step and lowered its head. It was barely twenty feet from them. Gideon felt its warm, fetid breath wash over him.

“Quietly … slowly…,” he said.

Chantico popped up his head. “Why have we stopped? What's the—”

The tyrannosaur's eyes flickered at the sudden movement, and it reared backward.

“Now!” shouted Gideon.

Inez slammed one of the levers, and the Steamcrawler lurched … forward, taking them another five feet closer to the dinosaur.

“Backward!” shrieked Gideon, pushing Chantico's head back below. “Shovel coal, for God's sake!”

The tyrannosaur roared straight at them as Inez found the right lever and the Steamcrawler began, painfully slowly but with gathering speed, to reverse back up the road they had come down. The dinosaur watched them, almost quizzically, for a moment then put its head down and began to follow in huge, thunderous strides.

As the Steamcrawler picked up speed, Gideon drew the pearl-handled revolvers and began firing at the beast. He winced as the bullets pinged off its scaly hide. “We need to turn, Inez!” he shouted. “I need the bigger guns!”

Inez suddenly yanked the steering wheel, and the Steamcrawler veered to the left, Gideon ducking low as the rear of the vehicle slammed into the fragile wooden frame of a house. Inez pulled forward and turned up the hill as the dinosaur came within feet of them, its glistening maw opening wide. Gideon began to empty the bullets from the gun mounted at the back of the Steamcrawler.

Stung by the bullets, the beast faltered and slowed, glowering at them then redoubling its pace. Gideon fired a whole belt of bullets, most of them bouncing off the thing's hide but several finding a home in its softer underside, as evidenced by the dinosaur's anguished howls and the holes oozing with black ichor that peppered its belly.

But still it came. The gun clicking emptily, Gideon switched to the other one. “Perhaps we can lead it out of the town,” he shouted over his shoulder.

“We'll lose speed on the hills,” called Inez. “What about down toward the sea?”

“Whatever you—” began Gideon, but the breath was knocked from him as Inez swung the Steamcrawler hard to the left and then, incredibly, pulled on the brake lever.

“What are you doing?” he screamed. They had put another thirty feet between themselves and the tyrannosaur, but the gap was closing fast.

“Señor Smith…,” said Inez, and he chanced a turn. There, ahead of them in the road, was a woman, her eyes tightly closed, her kimono torn and muddied. She sheltered three tiny children within her thin arms.

Gideon swore and began to pull at the trigger of the gun. The tyrannosaur was evidently a quick learner because it came in low and fast, snarling, the moon glinting off its green, scaly hide, its soft underbelly close to the ground, its feet pounding the road.

For a moment its eyes met Gideon's, and it hissed, as though recognizing him.

Finally,
its gaze seemed to say.
Finally, after all this time. I have found you.

“I'm sorry if Rubicon stole your baby,” he murmured. “But it's you or me. And I'd rather it was you.”