Robert Appleton - Prehistoric Clock

Verity’s furious glances appeared to take in the entire tableau in a matter of moments. She withdrew and crouched beside Embrey, whose side bled profusely. He would soon pass out.

“So you’ve thrown in with them, Kibo?” she said, sparking frantic chatter among the other aeronauts. “I have to admit, I didn’t think you had it in you.”

What? The engine man too? Cecil’s jaw slackened when the well-dressed driver stepped forward, buttoning up his waistcoat. Had he snatched Billy for Polperro’s posse? Had he armed the Whitehall gang?

“I’m sorry, Eembu, but she’s right,” Kibo said.

Tangeni aimed his scolding glare and forefinger at the traitor. “You’re a dead man.”

“You’re wrong, brother. You’re all wrong,” the engine man replied. “Billy doesn’t deserve this but you have to think of the greater good. We have enough uncertainties as it is without a boy’s fancies dictating where we end up. We can all close our eyes, picture London and leave no doubt. But the boy is not to be trusted. The consequences are too dire to simply trust in him. You wouldn’t see reason before, when this action could have been avoided, so you’ll have to decide now instead. We’ve no time.”

Cecil slapped Carswell’s rifle away from his face and began crawling toward the Harrison clock. “I’m stopping it,” he said. “Go ahead, shoot me instead. I dare you.”

He hadn’t traversed the first pipe when Carswell yanked him back by his sore leg. “You’ll pay for that.” Cecil pulled himself the few feet along the secondary brass pipe until he reached Embrey. The butt of a steam-pistol peeked out from the young man’s jacket. Verity saw that Cecil had seen and gave him a quick wink.

Yes. Everything in our power. Let them stop us if they must.

He snatched one steam-pistol from Embrey’s belt and Verity snatched the other. Cecil spun and shot up repeatedly at Carswell, each bullet piercing his torso until the bushy-eyebrowed swine spat blood. All hell broke loose in the shadow of the machine. Verity spent most of her bullets trying to hit Kibo, but the engine man darted for cover behind old Kincaid, using him as a human shield. The elder statesman, shot through the heart, slumped lifeless.

Meanwhile, Tangeni sneaked around the back of them and wrestled Kibo.

The two officers went at it hammer and tongs. Kibo was the bigger man but not the tougher. After he ducked a huge roundhouse punch, Tangeni leapt in and jabbed his opponent’s windpipe, crushing his airway. The traitor fell to the floor and choked slowly in the grease and grime, his waistcoat torn and soiled.

Across the factory, the aeronauts and Miss Polperro’s cronies had each other pinned down, the latter group boasting more weapons than anyone had guessed. Kibo had to have armed them. Their bullets ricocheted off water casks and brass scaffolding. Cecil couldn’t tell who was who.

“Professor, can you stand?” Verity knelt over Embrey.

Cecil struggled to one knee, then braced his sore leg. His adrenaline seemed to dilute the pain. “Yes, I think so.”

“Then here.” She threw him her pistol. “For God’s sake, shut this machine down. Kill anyone who tries to stop you.”

“What about you?”

“I’m getting Embrey back to the Empress. He’ll die if I can’t remove this bull-”

A tremendous crash shook the factory. The thudding of collapsed masonry and metal brought with it a plaster cloud thick enough to envelop the gunfight and obscure the opposing sides from each another. Cecil looked first to the boiler room. Had that exploded? No, there was no billowing steam. What then?

The firing ceased. Loose bricks clinked one on top the other as they fell somewhere near the front entrance, while the hiss of settling plaster dust wrought quiet tension in this lull in the fighting.

“Be careful, Professor. But hurry.” Verity turned from the cloud and wasted no more time in dragging Embrey over two pipes and behind the left hand piston. From there, she had a straight path to daylight. Cecil prayed she had some surgical knowledge too-removing a bullet wasn’t something one could or should muddle through.

A queer squelching, grinding noise emerged from inside the cloud.

“God, what’s that smell?” someone yelled.

As the next thump, thump trembled the ground, sounding as though it was shifting piles of bricks already fallen, Cecil rolled up his sleeves. He prepared for a last desperate attempt to stop his machine. For time wasn’t just running out, it had come calling…stalking. Summoned by the gunshots.

The baryonyx!

Its giant snout pierced the cloud before the first screams erupted from the Whitehall posse. Its jaws gaped for a vicious lunge into the cornered men, then snapped shut upon two, hurtling them aloft for a fuller bite. The crunching and squelching resumed at a sickening volume. Gunshots from both sides, designed to ward off the baryonyx, merely enraged it further. Its crocodilian mouth beslobbered with fresh blood now thrust even lower, even quicker.

Cecil spied the Harrison clock’s brass lid vibrating as it dripped moisture. The final accelerating process was about to begin. He climbed the first pipe, smacked his sore leg on the second. Those angry cogs and crank wheels were no longer rotating numbered dials-the machine already had her sequence, her key to unlock time. They were powering the energy transfer itself, the unleashing of built-up psammeticum into the intricate array of mirrors, and the boldest clockwork ever devised.

He spun to make sure the dinosaur was not following.

A sudden blow to his jaw sent him reeling. Delaney, another of the lynchers from the first night, picked him up and thumped his gut. Cecil coughed, struggled to breathe. A few feet away, Miss Polperro shook Billy by the scruff of his neck and glowered at Cecil.

“You’re full of surprises, Reardon,” she hissed. “But I warned you what would happen. Say goodbye to this boy. It’s for all our sakes.”

A tiny dark shape emerged from her matted hair. It rushed across her brow. She recoiled and then shook her head. It shifted again, this time with a speed and scurrying motion Cecil recalled from his recent past.

The spider from the platform.

It stopped on her right temple and must have bitten her, for she shrieked and let go of the boy. The baryonyx answered, its rage deafening the entire factory.

Cecil lunged forward and knocked the revolver from her hand. Billy wriggled free and bolted for safety. Run lad, run. Delaney snatched the steam-pistol from the ground. Frantic, Cecil scrabbled for the second weapon somewhere on the floor. He found it between the bastard’s legs and immediately fired up into his groin. Click. An empty cartridge! Instead, he thumped his attacker’s kneecap with the pistol butt, felling him. He cracked the brass gun against Delaney’s forehead with all his might. The son of a bitch went out like a gaslight.

More screams and gunshots from behind, but also from the front, as well. From outside. Verity and Embrey. He heard other voices too.

He made straight for the clock with seconds to spare. He felt the prickly warmth caused by the hurtling, expanding energy. Every hair on his body stood up. A flicker of lilac light appeared through an old screw hole in the brass casing. He unclasped one side, reached for the other. An extraordinary wrench in his scalp pulled him back. It was as though his hair had burst into flames.

A frightful witch clawed at him, her metal spectacles aglow with lilac light. Her shock of hair resembled a penny dreadful cartoon of Sweeny Todd he’d seen in his youth. At once, the hate broiling in her eyes seemed to encapsulate the very thing he’d railed against all these years. Death. That vicious, remorseless force behind the taking of innocent lives: Billy’s, Lisa’s, Edmond’s…