Ironheart (16 page)

‘That was when he came to London,’ said India. ‘He told us he was an explorer.’

Bulldog chuckled. ‘Explorer, eh? I wouldn’t say that. They tried him in his absence and sentenced him to hang. I’d say he’s got a nasty surprise waiting for him when he
gets back to Angel Town.’

Fear was written large across Clench’s face. ‘Please,’ he said, clutching at Bulldog’s jacket, ‘don’t send me back there.’

Bulldog scowled. ‘A lot of us lost friends in that accident,’ he said. ‘The first inhabited place we get to, I’m turning you in.’

‘Wait, wait,’ begged Clench. ‘If you take me with you, I can be useful. I can tell you how the
Lone Wolf
found you.’

Bulldog looked at Clench with renewed interest and India could see what was on his mind.

‘Captain, you can’t take him with us,’ she said. ‘He’s a liar! He’d say anything to save his own neck.’

‘Really now, India,’ said Clench. ‘You told these people you weren’t a runaway but you left home in the middle of the night and your robot friend injured more than a
dozen of your neighbours before you went. So you tell me which one of us is a liar?’

India’s face burned.

‘All right,’ said Bulldog, ‘enough of that. Clench, Fenton, whatever your name is, tell me what you know and I’ll let you off somewhere you can hitch a ride on another
rig. After that you’ll be someone else’s problem.’

Clench adopted the smug look of a man who knew the balance of power had just shifted in his favour. ‘You’ve got a spy on board, Captain,’ he said. ‘An agent working for
the Company. Someone on your crew is not what they seem.’

A Shockwave ran round the little room.

‘India was right,’ said Pieter. ‘He
will
say anything to save his skin. Let’s throw him out now before he poisons the air with his lies!’

Bulldog raised his hand for silence. ‘Who’s the spy?’ he said.

Everybody went quiet as Clench reached for the brandy bottle and poured himself another drink. ‘I heard things,’ he said eventually, ‘while I was on the other rig. They said
someone on
The Beautiful Game
had been sending them messages but they didn’t say who. Apparently the Company has spies on lots of rigs and they’ve got some sort of dead-tech
machine that lets them speak to each other over long distances.’

‘How convenient,’ said Pieter. ‘A story you can’t prove that gets you a safe passage out of here. Let’s not waste any more time on him, Captain, let’s just
shoot him now.’

‘You seem very keen to get rid of him all of a sudden, Pieter,’ said Tashar, raising an eyebrow.

‘What are you saying?’

‘I’m just saying that if we have a spy on board then I’m looking at the man who was the last one to join the crew.’

‘Only eight weeks after you did,’ he snapped back. ‘And haven’t you been very keen to undermine the Captain lately?’

‘Stop it, both of you!’ cried India. ‘Can’t you see he’s making you turn on each other?’

Clench sat quietly in the corner wearing a half-smile.

‘India’s right,’ said Bulldog. ‘He’s probably just lying to save his skin. Lock him in the spare cabin and let’s keep a close eye on him. If he’s spent
a week on a Company rig there may be other things he can tell us.’

After Gorki Station,
The Beautiful Game
turned off the forest trails and through the high mountain passes where, Bulldog figured, the rig would be harder to follow. On
the Captain’s orders, and much to Pieter’s consternation, the rig drove day and night with Bulldog and Tashar taking turns to man the cockpit.

Outside, the scenery changed to an unending cruel landscape of rock, ice and flint-edged mountains that towered above them. The wind blasted the rig continuously and the sky was layered with
dark grey clouds that matched India’s mood. She watched nervously from the mess windows as the rig navigated impossibly narrow tracks through the high passes, dislodging giant rocks that went
plunging into the ravines below.

At the daily crew meeting tensions were still running high.

‘Everybody’s tired,’ said Tashar, ‘and if we make a single mistake we’ll end up at the bottom of a ravine. What’s more, we’re burning too much fuel in
these damned mountains.’

‘It’s the quickest route,’ said Bulldog. ‘It’ll take three days off the journey and no Company rig will ever dare follow us up here.’

‘For good reason,’ said Tashar. ‘No one’s ever attempted to cross this mountain range in a rig before.’

‘Ah! That’s where you’re wrong,’ said Bulldog triumphantly. ‘The last time I was here was fifteen years ago when I was part of Mad Don McNulty’s crew. He swore
blind there was a safe route over these mountains.’

‘Didn’t Mad Don McNulty take shelter in a cave and get eaten by bears?’ said Rat.

‘Well, yes,’ Bulldog conceded. ‘He was trying to prove that mountain bears are less ferocious than forest bears but it didn’t quite work out. The crew lost interest after
that and we all went back to Angel Town. But my point is, Mad Don’s theory was sound, this is the best route across the mountains, you mark my words.’

‘Well, I’m not liking this place one bit, Bulldog,’ said Tashar. ‘There had better be a lot of money at the end of this joyride or you will be needing a new
pilot.’

Later that evening India went in search of Calculus. She found him alone in Engineering reading a heavy, leather-bound book and making neat pencil notes in the margins.

‘What are you reading?’ she said.

‘Just a book I found in Captain Bulldog’s library,’ he said without looking up.

‘Is it exciting?’

‘It is very . . . absorbing.’

She leaned in closer and squinted at the dense text.

‘My dad always used to read to me and Bella before we went to bed,’ she said, giving Calc a meaningful look, ‘even after we were both old enough to read for
ourselves.’

Calculus put the book down with a sigh. ‘I suppose I could read to you if you like,’ he said.

She grinned. ‘Would you, Calc? That would be great.’

He looked down at the page again. ‘Where would you like me to start?’

‘Well, most stories begin with
“Once upon a time”
,’ she said.

‘Very well.’ He straightened in his seat and held out the book in front of him.
‘Once upon a time
,’ he began grandly,
‘laminar flows could be adequately
defined through the application of the Navier-Stokes equations which allowed for the simulation of turbulent flows at moderate Reynolds numbers:

‘Whoa, wait a minute! What on earth are you reading?’

He looked at the cover and then at India.

‘Basic Fluid Dynamics for Sub-Arctic Operations
,’ he said. ‘Captain Bulldog has quite an extensive collection of engineering manuals. If you prefer I could try a different
one?’

‘No thanks,’ she said laughing. ‘Perhaps we’d better skip the story tonight.’

He closed the book with a snap. ‘You’re up very late,’ he said.

‘I couldn’t get to sleep,’ she lied. ‘Knee’s playing up.’

‘Let me bandage it for you,’ he said. ‘I have full training in field hospital techniques.’

She sat patiently while he fetched the bandages and then began to strap her knee with expert hands.

‘I wish Verity was here,’ she said as he worked. ‘She wouldn’t be afraid of Sid or Tashar or of ghosts in the forest. Do you ever think about her?’

He didn’t look up from what he was doing. ‘While I am capable of fully independent function,’ he said, ‘my anticipatory sub-routines do register Mrs Brown’s absence
from my immediate environment.’

India smiled. ‘Yeah, I miss her too,’ she said.

They were both silent for a moment while he carefully unrolled another bandage.

‘What is your father like?’ he said.

The suddenness of his question threw her off guard. ‘Dad? He’s brave and clever and he’s always looking for ways to make life better for people. One year he built an irrigation
system for our whole village. But then me and Bella tried to help and it went wrong and it flooded the house and all of Roshanne’s shoes got ruined.’ She smiled at the memory.

‘You must miss him a lot,’ said Calculus.

Yes. But not the way everyone thinks. They keep telling me he can’t still be alive and that I should just “let him go”. But when I look up at the stars, Calc, it’s like I
just know he’s looking up at the same sky somewhere. It’s like we’re connected somehow Nobody ever seems to believe me though.’

‘I believe you.’

India looked at the android in surprise.

‘You once asked me if there were any others like me,’ he said. ‘And there were. Once I was part of a great army. There were many hundreds of us, we were strong and we fought
many battles. Our minds were connected and we could hear each other’s thoughts; I always knew I was not alone.’

India blinked at him. ‘That’s how it is for me,’ she said breathlessly. ‘Even though Dad’s not here, I can always feel him. That’s how I know he’s still
alive. So what happened to your friends?’

Calculus snipped the end of her bandage and tied it off. ‘We were together for a long time,’ he said. ‘If we were damaged or destroyed our minds could be downloaded into a new
body and we would go on living.’ He fell silent.

India was entranced. ‘So you can live forever?’

He snapped out of his daydream and began to put away the bandages. ‘No,’ he said quickly. ‘After the Great Rains, the knowledge to transfer our minds was lost. One by one, over
the years, the others all became damaged or they malfunctioned and fell silent. Now the only thoughts I hear are my own.’ He turned and placed the medical kit on a shelf behind him. ‘I
was immortal once,’ he said, ‘but not any more.’

India felt a huge sadness for the android. She wanted to say something further but, at that moment,
The Beautiful Game
shuddered to an abrupt halt. The sudden silence from the engines
filled the whole rig.

They found the others in the cockpit, looking out of the forward windows.
The Beautiful Game
had pulled to a stop on a steep slope at the head of a desolate, tree-lined valley. It was
blanketed with a thick layer of unbroken snow and it looked as though no human had ever set foot in it.

‘This is the start of the Uliuiu Cherchekh,’ said Bulldog solemnly. ‘It runs east for over a hundred miles. More than a dozen rigs have gone missing here so let’s keep
our eyes open, people!’

A full moon came out from behind a cloud, sending deep blue shadows across the valley floor.

‘Is it me or did it just get colder in here?’ said Tashar, pulling her jacket tighter.

‘We need to conserve fuel,’ said Bulldog. ‘If we want to keep warm we’ll rely on the wood stove. In the meantime, I’m going to check the tracks and the driveshafts.
We took a pounding in the mountains and I want to make sure everything’s in working order before we go any further.’

India stayed looking out of the window, feeling all of her courage drain away. Back in Angel Town it had been easy to talk about following the trail eastwards across the mountains. But now that
she looked out on the Valley of Death she was reminded of Pieter’s ghost stories. The valley looked like something from a bad fairy tale and the words from her dream came back to haunt
her.

‘Already the bringer-of-death rises in the East. If you stop now then it will be forever winter in this land.’

India sat in the mess room and waited impatiently while the crew checked the rig’s systems. Bulldog and Tashar meticulously ran through every circuit in the cockpit,
testing for any signs of damage.

‘As soon as we’ve finished checking the main drive we’ll get under way,’ said Bulldog. ‘Where’s Pieter?’

‘He went outside to fetch wood,’ said Rat.

Bulldog’s forehead creased into a frown. ‘That was ages ago. I need him back here.’

‘I could go and get him,’ said India quickly, ‘and Calculus could come with me.’

She was anxious to escape from the rig, if only for a short while. Bulldog looked dubious.

‘Come on,’ she said, ‘I’m the only one with nothing to do. Besides, nothing bad’s going to happen while Calc’s with me, is it?’

‘All right,’ said Bulldog. ‘Take one of the sledges with you and collect some firewood on the way. And take Mr Clench too,’ he added. ‘Make him do a bit of work
around here for a change.’

Her heart sank. ‘I don’t want to go anywhere with him. He’s a murderer, you said so yourself!’

‘Well, like you say, nothing bad’s going to happen while you’re with Calculus, is it? Besides, I’m sick to death of hearing him whine about being cooped up. Perhaps a
taste of the cold will shut him up.’ He glanced out of the window ‘Just make sure you stay out of the forest, OK?’

‘Why? What’s in the forest?’

‘Don’t ask too many questions,’ he said darkly. ‘Now go, before I change my mind.’

Bulldog would listen to no further arguments, and twenty minutes later she stepped grumpily from the hatch into the fresh night air, followed by Calculus and Thaddeus Clench.

The sky was clear and the wind carried smells of fresh pine. The moon cast a light so silvery sharp that it almost tingled on the skin. They followed Pieter’s footprints up a low hill
covered with birch and pine while India collected dead branches and stacked them in a wicker basket on the sledge. Clench did little to help and walked behind, hugging himself against the cold and
complaining bitterly.