Kylie Chan - The Gravity Engine

The other rooms on the ground floor were furnished with European-style pieces that were detailed with inlays of wood and semi-precious stones without being overly ornate. There was a large, comfortable living room with many cushions on the floor, still appearing as new, and a massive black glass fireplace that would be a feature of the room on a cold night. He looked up; the construction was silver amalgam and glass panels, and he wondered how the ceiling–floor interface worked.

The next room was a library, holding old-fashioned leather-bound volumes. He took one down and opened it to find hand-written and brilliantly decorated text. The subject matter was obvious; detailed techniques for forging high-quality steel, complete with diagrams and instructions. He closed the book and looked around. The room was filled with these priceless manuscripts. One of these books may contain the secrets of creating the buildings and lowering the gravity. His memorisation skills were non-existent and he wouldn’t be able to carry the library away with him, so he would have to find a way to return and collect them after he’d left.

He went up the stairs and along the balcony that circled the entry hall. Each door led into a guest room and they all appeared identical. The one next to Clarissa’s had obviously been lived in for a while; his mother’s room. He went into the room next to that and sat on the bed. Each room had a bath and washbasin in a corner but no separation from the sleeping and washing parts, except that the glass-tiled floor around the bed was covered in finely woven rugs depicting pine branches. A heavy wardrobe stood next to the wall and he opened it; it was full of the soft cotton unisex robes that Clarissa and Rhonda were wearing, all in pastel shades of blue and grey. A chest of drawers held female underwear and cotton breeches. Another guest room would probably hold clothing for a man and he went out to find one.

He found male clothes in the next room, robes and breeches that would fit him, and male underwear. He fell onto the bed and looked at the ceiling. The time difference between Western China and Northern Europe must have been ridiculous and it was probably insanely early in the morning where he was from, but he wasn’t tired at all – he was too overwrought at the thought of these wonderful women who were intelligent and self-aware, who considered themselves his mother and fiancée, and who were demon copies.

He woke later with a start. He had a moment of disorientation before he realised where he was. The room’s window was dark and he had no idea how long he’d slept. He pulled himself out of bed feeling gritty and needing a shower, but he didn’t know how long he had until dawn, when his captors would come for him.

Teleportation out of the mansion was impossible – his teleportation skills were blocked again. Time to do it the old-fashioned way. He went as silently as he could out of his room onto the darkened landing; all the other doors were closed. He sent his senses out; Rhonda and Clarissa were both still asleep in Clarissa’s room and he didn’t disturb them. He went downstairs and opened the door to the kitchen to find all the demons lying on the floor or sitting against the wall. No way could he creep through there without waking them. He returned to the entry and had an inspiration; he flew up to the ceiling to take a glass panel out and go exploring.

He flew too high and hard in the low gravity and crashed into the glass. He stopped and hovered just below it. He heard movement; someone had heard the noise and was waiting to see if it occurred again before investigating. After a few minutes of silent hovering he put his hand on the glass panel and unravelled the metal holding it. The panel fell into his hands and was liftable – heavy, but liftable – and he flew through the opening it made in the ceiling and placed it on the roof to one side.

The sky was mostly dark with a brighter smudge on the eastern horizon – dawn soon. The air was bracingly cold and full of the suggestion of snow. He tried to teleport again and failed; something about the nature of these European Heavens was severely limiting his powers.

He flew higher over the city and sent his senses out. There were life signatures of birds and small animals, but nothing larger than a rat. He flew a kilometre over the breathtaking spires and found a building that looked promising; six storeys high, and more blunt and utilitarian than the prevailing airy decorative style. He landed in front of its door and tried it, and it swung open easily.

It was another library, with a vast central atrium the full six storeys tall and stacks of shelving containing hand-lettered and bound manuscripts, covered in a light layer of dust. The floor hadn’t been walked on in a very long time. The amount of knowledge held there was awe-inspiring. Due to the Celestial nature of the location, he had no trouble reading the shelf labels: there were books on history, philosophy, engineering and ‘magic’. He opened a magic book and it was detailed descriptions of something identical to the Asian methods of energy manipulation – chi gong and martial arts. He walked up a flight of spiral stairs to the first level: medicine and history. He opened a history book and it contained a detailed description of the Roman expansion two thousand years before. He shook his head as he returned the book to the shelf; he had to find a way to retrieve this treasure from the demons’ control.

Something shifted in the corner of his eye and he turned. The building was changing – the metal brightened from grey to almost white and the dust disappeared. He watched with wonder as the structure around him flared into life, the crystalline lamps becoming more brilliant and the glass clearer and more perfect.

A rhythmic banging began some distance away and it took him a moment to realise that it was the sound of a helicopter. He sent his senses out: it was the Demon King, returning with a Shen whose nature was completely different from any Michael had experienced before – the spirit of the city. The city must be responding to its spirit’s return.

The Demon King needed to stay unaware of his ability to leave the mansion otherwise he would probably be locked up. He rushed out the door of the library, closed it behind him, and flew as quickly as he could back to the mansion with sound of the helicopter’s rotors seeming directly behind him. He flew through the roof and replaced the panel with a quick weld of the amalgam. He hoped that was enough to hold it as he flew down to the bedroom he’d chosen.

His feet touched the landing just as the front door opened and the King entered with the spirit of the city.

‘Prince Michael,’ the King said, moving forward to speak to him. ‘Please come down here.’

Michael took a huge stride over the balcony balustrade and landed in front of the King on the floor below. He studied the spirit of the city; it appeared as an elderly European man in a brown robe similar to a monk’s habit. The hood was thrown back and the man had long grey hair held in a braid that fell down his back and a long beard fastened in multiple smaller braids. His intelligent green eyes studied Michael curiously.

‘How did you get out of the mansion?’ the King said, his voice sharp with controlled anger.

Michael considered playing dumb for a moment and decided it wasn’t worth the effort. ‘The building’s made of metal.’

‘And?’

‘And I’m my father’s son. I could dismantle the entire building in less than five minutes.’

The King turned back to speak to the spirit. ‘Is there a building in this city that isn’t made of metal?’

The spirit smiled slightly, and when he spoke his voice was warm and rich. ‘No. I’m one hundred per cent silver, except for the parts that are glass.’