Ethinium's Vault (Steam & Aether Book 1), page 50
Cream slashed as Rip brought the muzzle down, the blade slicing through gunmetal and wood. The weapon fell apart in Rips hands, its muzzle and stock clattering to the floor.
Cream drew back for another slash and Rip retrieved a Webley loaded with enhanced bullets. He squeezed off a round without aiming, the gun barking in the darkened hallway, its flash lighting up the building’s interior like a bolt of lightning.
The bullet slammed into Cream’s middle. Blood blossomed like a flower over his stomach, staining his shirt. He snarled and swung wide and high with the blade.
Rip ducked before he could squeeze off another shot, the razor sailing in an arc above his head. Behind him he heard Blair dropping lightly through the hole in the stairs he made.
She pulled out a flashlight and turned it on, lighting up the dusty hall and shining it in Cream’s face as she raced toward him.
The man roared in rage and threw a cloud of dust in both their faces. Then he turned and ran down the hall.
Rip coughed and pulled his shirt up over his nose.
“Don’t breathe it! Poison!”
Blair coughed and covered her face with a hand, but she had already sucked in a good lungful of the dust.
Slowly, she sat down.
Rip rushed to her, feeling a bit lightheaded himself. He squatted down beside Blair and held her shoulders, fanning away the dust cloud from her face.
She coughed again.
“Don’t breathe it. Cover your face.”
“Do you suppose . . . it hurts . . . enhanced people?”
Her eyes rolled into the back of her head as she slumped over.
Rip stared at her for a moment, shirt still over his nose. His nostrils tickled, the dust working under his makeshift face mask.
Slowly, his eyes constricted. Darkness swelled around his vision, and he slumped over, too.
-+-
Cream ran down the hall and into his room. The soporific cloud he had concocted, keeping in a pouch under his cloak for emergencies, would not keep the pair out for long. Certainly not if both the man and the woman were enhanced. He had only a few minutes at most to get out of here.
He ripped open a dresser, pulling out a small bottle of vinegar filled with the earlobes of his recent victims. Each one represented a successful pruning, and even though he had no desire to walk around with his trophies, he did not want to leave them behind, either.
Because now it was time to leave.
He turned to head back out the door and stopped. There in the hall, blocking his way, two young girls stood staring at him in the gloom.
The electric torch the woman turned on earlier still worked, providing more light in the hallway from its spot several feet away on the floor. He could see these girls were likewise dressed in RVS khakis.
“Get out of my way!”
Both girls smirked. Each simultaneously unstrapped Tommy guns off their shoulders and slid back the bolts. They opened fire in the small room, a long line of bullets spewing into him at close range.
Some of them missed, even at this narrow distance. The ones that hit spattered across his enhanced body, breaking the skin and sinking an inch or two into his flesh.
He screamed in pain, taking a couple steps back. The girls advanced into the room, still pulling the triggers until their drums depleted, the sounds of empty shells pattering on the wooden floor like rain.
Abruptly, the gunshots were replaced with the sound of impotent clicks.
Still standing with his back against the wall, covered now with gunshot wounds like some form of massive bleeding measles, the physicker glared at them. Evening light filtered in from dozens of fresh bullet holes in the outside wall.
Painfully, he pulled out his blade and flicked it open. The girls’ eyes grew wide, and they quickly tried to swap out their drums.
With a yell, Cream jumped at Anna, swinging the blade like a scythe.
She squealed and skittered out of the way, struggling to reload.
Cream could not stop his momentum and he crashed into the wall next to the door. The wood gave way in a shower of splinters and he stumbled into the hall, crunching through the paneling.
By this time, Molly successfully slammed home a fresh drum. She turned and opened up on the physicker from inside the room, spraying him with more bullets out in the hall.
He covered his face and screamed, holding onto the razor. When her drum emptied once more he brought his hands down and glared at her, eyes red with rage.
Cream reared back to strike as Molly stared at him open-mouthed, amazed the man was still standing.
Before he could lurch back into the room, Rip showed up, enhanced wrench in hand. He looked woozy and unsteady on his feet, but he was awake.
The enhanced metal from both instruments clanged in the hall. Rip twisted with his wrench, and the blade jerked out of the physicker’s hand. When it hit the floor, Rip kicked it away, sending it skittering across the wood.
But when he looked down to kick, Cream slugged him in the face and Rip flew backward, dropping his wrench.
Cream stared at Molly, still in the room, and rushed her.
She screamed as he toppled over on her, blood smearing them both.
Anna jumped out of the hole in the wall and looked down at the floor. There in the dim light, Rip’s enhanced wrench twinkled at her. She grabbed it and ran back into the room.
Screaming, she slammed the wrench into the back of Cream’s skull, putting in every ounce of adrenaline-fueled energy she could muster.
The wrench sank all the way in, and Cream collapsed, the life finally sapped out of him.
Anna panted, catching her breath, staring at the fresh corpse with the wrench sticking out of its head.
“Molly? Are you alright? Where are you?”
A muffled voice came in reply.
“Get . . . him . . . OFF ME!”
125
Rip sat beside Blair in a hansom cab, the horse methodically clip-clopping over the cobblestones toward Pickle Leigh Street.
She snored lightly, her head leaning against his shoulder.
He didn’t mind. He felt sleepy himself as he reflected on the fight’s aftermath.
The girls were reunited with Lady Fisher. Rip gave a preliminary report to Hedgefield, who asked him to appear before a larger hearing on the morrow.
Rip suggested that Blair outranked him, so she should probably be the one making any public statements.
Hedgefield glanced at her. She could barely stay awake, even standing there.
“You’ll do fine,” she said, yawning. “You can’t twist your way out of this just because you don’t like speaking in front of crowds.”
“Am I that obvious?”
“I’m a spy. I know people.”
With assurances from Lady Fisher that Anna and Molly would also appear for the report, Rip said goodbye to everyone and hailed a cab. He helped Blair inside when one stopped to pick them up.
On the seat, Blair leaned back, exhausted.
She smiled sleepily and said, “Your first team.”
He chuckled.
“It didn’t really feel like an official one. It was more like part of a larger team . . .”
But she was already snoring.
At the townhome he helped her out and managed to get her awake enough to walk on her own. He tipped the cabdriver and helped her inside.
Nancy met them at the door. She grew alarmed at the sight of Blair, leaning against Rip.
“Is she injured?”
“She’ll be fine. She’s just under the influence of some sleeping powder, or something.”
Nancy ran off to prepare Blair’s bed. When Rip felt reasonably sure that Blair could follow her and not fall asleep halfway down the hall, he headed for the guest cottage.
Honestly, I feel pretty tired myself, he thought.
He picked the lock to his cottage’s door, out of habit. He walked past the sofa and the pile of books from Blair’s library nearby, and headed for his own bedroom.
There, he stripped to his underwear and plopped down on the bed.
“Man, that powder really did a number on us,” he said, suppressing a yawn.
Absently, he opened his implant’s interface, grateful for easy access to his stats.
[Unbreakable Will] and [General Combat] had each gained two points since he last looked. He was pleasantly surprised to see both go up, thanks to the fights with the Luddites and Cream. He had also gained one point each in [Detect Traps], [Lock Picking], [Night Vision], [Mechanical Discernment], and [Weaponry].
While the haul was not as impressive as it had been after going down in the steam vault and fighting all those enhanced robots, it seemed evenly distributed.
He noted the implant also acknowledged his knighthood, and he wondered if any stats might develop out of that.
Obviously not yet, at least at this level, he thought.
[You are a Tier 2.72 Battle Rogue Technologist.]
[Nobility Achieved. Level: Knight]
[Skill: Unbreakable Will, 1.12]
[Skill: Detect Traps, 1.12]
[Skill: Vampiric Speed (Boon), 1.25]
[Skill: Transporter (Combo), 1.30]
[Skill: Night Vision (Boon), 1.32]
[Skill: Disarm Traps, 1.45]
[Skill: Lock Picking, 1.50]
[Skill: Mechanical Discernment, 1.53]
[Skill: Stealth, 1.56]
[Skill: Weaponry, 2.32]
[Skill: General Combat, 2.49]
He put his hands behind his head and stared up at the ceiling, thinking about tomorrow. Rip sincerely hoped his public hearing, in which he would be forced to play the role of team leader and do most of the talking, would not be a big spectacle.
“Maybe it’ll be held in one of the smaller rooms. Maybe it’ll even be a private hearing.”
But in his heart, he doubted both statements. First, Cream was already a media spectacle, and so was he. Second, he had seen the way these things worked. The king might ask for a second private hearing, with far more detail. He’d probably be talking in front of people all day. Or at least until lunch.
With those thoughts in mind, he rehearsed what he could say out loud for public consumption. Not too much happened that should be secret, he thought, but he would probably downplay some of the more grisly details, at least in public.
“Gotta remember everything’s gonna be repeated in the papers.”
Then his mind drifted to the marketplace and the prototype speed loader Sergio Cuellar had developed. He wondered if the man had been able to start a production line yet. Would that be something that Blair’s father could assist in? Rip filed away that thought for later.
With the introduction of petroleum jelly and fluoride toothpaste, he hoped to start leaving a mark on this world, making it a better place. He thought back on all the history books he had read, and the papers he had written in college, and considered the next suggestions he could offer to help this world along.
“Someday, I’ll have to tell them about the transistor.”
His mind wandered over to all the disabled robots down in the vault. At some point, that would need addressing, too. Perhaps the best thing to do tomorrow, after the hearings, would be to encourage RVS to send him back down there. Those girls from Lady Fisher’s school certainly seemed capable enough. Maybe they would be interested in joining a group going there?
“Speaking of the girls . . .”
He looked over at the wrench sticking out of his jacket pocket. The image of it sticking out of Cream’s head was still fresh in his mind.
“That was the first thing I found in this world. It’s been worth its weight in gold.”
Then his eyes grew heavy as drowsiness began smothering his mind.
Rip’s thoughts turned to Blair before he closed his eyes and drifted off to sleep.
-+-
A giant black airship sank slowly out of the snow clouds at the Gretna Green steam vault, nose pitched down and its propellers working hard, forcing it lower.
At the last minute, the dirigible leveled out and dropped its mooring ropes in the middle of the giant outer ring. Sewer troopers ran out, grabbing the lines and feeding them into massive ground winches. Immediately they brought the ship under control, then slowly pulled it to the ground.
Its huge sliding door rolled open, so recently used to drop enhanced robots over Ethinium. This time Dar Caul stepped out, scowl firmly fixed to his face under his black peaked cap.
Another man approached, likewise wearing a black cap and a black leather overcoat. He nodded at Caul, silently greeting him as an equal.
Almost imperceptibly, Caul nodded back.
“Dar Moss.”
“Dar Caul.”
“You have found it?”
“Yes. The last one was finally recovered in a search today.”
The two walked side-by-side, heading for a doorway inside the ring. The sewer troopers they passed snapped to attention, but the men ignored them.
“How many were there?”
“Altogether, 1,581. The last one must have been carried away by the wind. We found it a good half mile from the others.”
“And all are readable?”
“Yes.”
They reached the door and Moss opened it, waving for Caul to enter first before following him inside. Their black leather boots clanged on the metal floor.
Moss stopped three doors down where a robot stood, cradling a big 9-50 in its arms.
He produced a key and unlocked the door. They walked inside to a large room with four long tables, sewer troopers moving all around them with cloths and brushes.
Caul looked at all 1,581 punchcards Dr. Oggolopoli had lost during his escape. Some looked wet, still. Some had been crumpled, and smoothed out. Others looked like they landed in mud. The troopers tended to each one, cleaning them and smoothing them out.
Another trooper walked around with a notebook, marking down details about each card.
The lines on Dar Caul’s face eased. He did not smile, but his perpetual frown decreased in intensity, somewhat.
“This is very good. How soon can we run the cards through our tabulator?”
Moss grimaced.
“I can’t say for certain yet. Our next challenge is figuring out their proper order. However, we can do experiments for that. Already, I have a team making a backup set of cards so that we can run multiple instances without losing any.”
Caul nodded, his eyes taking it all in.
Moss looked at him, expectantly.
When he did not reply, Moss said, “Rest assured, Dar Caul, we will succeed.”
“Good. I want my own otherworlder. And, I want to know how to cross over to their world, as well. We need to figure out how to send our people there.”
Moss nodded.
At last, Caul had seen enough. He turned to leave and Moss followed.
At the door, Caul glanced back one last time at all the tables and the punchcards.
This time, his lips slowly curled up in a smile.
* * *
End of Book I
Other books by Jaxon Reed
Science Fiction
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The Redwood Trilogy
Redwood: Servant of the State
Redwood: Twelver
Redwood: Battle Cry
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The Empathic Detective Trilogy
The Empathic Detective: A Mystery Thriller
Ghostsuit: An Empathic Detective Novel
Cybershot: An Empathic Detective Novel
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Pirates of the Milky Way
Digital Assassin
Clarion’s Call
Condor Rising
Halcyon’s Heirs
Solar Storm
Tetrarch’s Dilemma
Operation Starfold
Golden Alliance
Subversive Elements
Terminus Epsilon
* * *
Agents of the Planetary Republic
Detective Wilcox
Storm Warning
Triskelion Conspiracy
Operation Counterforce
Clarion Protocol
Miriam’s Dilemma
Counterforce Two
Diplomat’s Peril
Choose Revenge
Director Wilcox
* * *
Star League Assassins
Digital Death
Last Cohort
Assignment Diego
Epsilon Redux
Lost Quadrant
and more coming in 2022-23
* * *
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* * *
Fantasy
The Forlorn Dagger Trilogy
Thieves and Wizards
Pirates and Wizards
Dwarves and Wizards
* * *
The Fae Killers Series
Tiff in Time
Ghost of a Chance
Rick or Treat
Booked for Death
* * *
The Dungeon Corps Series
Dungeon Corps: Crypts of Phanos
Dungeon Corps: Maze of Menos
Dungeon Corps: Depths of Dwarland
* * *
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* * *
Visit Jaxon Reed’s Amazon Page:
https://www.amazon.com/Jaxon-Reed/e/B00Q9N5TQ2/
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For previews of upcoming books, works in progress, sales and free days, visit:
https://jaxonreed.substack.com
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Jaxon Reed, Ethinium's Vault (Steam & Aether Book 1)
