Chapter Eleven

“Bloody Savages”

1.

Tonight there was a choice of wine or brandy. Provost had brought a nice Riesling from his private stock, and Nathanial chose that instead, pouring a snifter of the brandy for Jasperse, which he took to the guard, who was sitting cross-legged outside Holmes’ quarters, carbine across his lap. Nathanial handed Jasperse the glass, who took it with great relish.

“Ah, the good stuff,” he whispered, as though he cradled a sleeping babe in his hands. He sniffed of its bouquet with his eyes closed, savouring it. “Nerves are settled, then?”

“Quite,” Nathanial said. “Thank you.”

Jasperse nodded. “What you’re doing in there, it’s the best way to stave off the darkness, short of a woman. That’s a trust you must make with your body, Mister Stone. It’s told you what it needs, which is good company and drink, and you’ve listened. Good for you, I say. You’ll find your way through your fears and uncertainty, sure enough.”

Nathanial found the wall and slid to the floor, sitting next to Jasperse. “Been in many difficulties yourself?” he asked.

The man nodded. It was a hard gesture. “Saw a bit of the stuff in Africa. The Zulu were advancing on us in waves. Had one clear the wall and come right at me, howling like a banshee on the moors. Had no weapon on him, but I was so frightened just to look at him all I could do when he charged was fall backwards onto my duff. Luckily, in falling I brought up my bayonet just as he leapt on me. Took him right through the gullet, it did, and the Devil take me if that stopped him. Pulled himself down my blade, trying to inch close enough to get those big, dark hands around my throat, and when he couldn’t go no further and knew his life was slipping away, what did he do? Vomited his blood in my face. There was so much of it, the surgeons were sure I’d go blind.” Jasperse nodded, half to himself. “He was the finest man I ever killed. Bully damned tough one at that. Later, when I was convalescing, I began to hallucinate. They had these bandages over my eyes, you see, and so all I had was my imagination to keep me company at night. I began to see the fellow coming at me out the darkness, over and over again. I’d wake out of sleep and hear him screaming my name as he charged me. It was a miracle I didn’t catch a death from fright.”

“But you did overcome it, yes?”

Jasperse shrugged. “Got a gun in my hands and went back into it. Traded one horror for another until Her Majesty saw fit to send me home, and then I forgot about it.”

Nathanial furrowed his brow. “As easy as all that?”

Jasperse shook his head. “No, but you shouldn’t keep your friends waiting, not with a half-blind old fellow who spins grisly war stories to keep himself awake.”

There wasn’t much to say to that, so Nathanial went back inside.

2.

They were deep in some discussion as he entered. Fullbright turned his head around at Nathanial. “Ah, Stone,” he said. “Good fellow. I was just telling the lads that the Juggernaut has commanded me to have your flyer repaired.”

“It’s not my flyer. It’s Annabelle’s,” Nathanial said, taking up his spot on the settee and grabbing his wine. “And I suppose that’s good news.”

“Oh, but tell him why,” Provost said, an amused glint in his eye.

“Well, as you might know, we have more men than we can safely fit in the cutters, should we be forced to evacuate. Your flyer alleviates that burden somewhat, so the Juggernaut wants it seen to. I sent men out in the previous cycle to begin preliminary reports.”

“Sent men out? To where?”

“Well, out to your flyer, of course.” Fullbright laughed. “We certainly couldn’t fit the bugger in our docking bay, if that’s what you were wondering. It’s too big, Stone. We’ve got it tethered outside of Sunward Observation, just below the viewport, so the men don’t have to travel across the station’s length just to have a look at her.”

Provost could no longer contain himself. “Isn’t that a glowing vote of confidence, Stone?” he said with glee. “The Juggernaut has such faith in you he is preparing to escape this place should it become an inferno.”

Provost and Holmes had a good chuckle over this, but Nathanial failed to see the humour in it. “I’ve been meaning to ask, just what is the plan should we evacuate?”

“Don’t think in those terms, lad,” Holmes said. “You’ll get us back in order soon enough.”

An evacuation plan was prudent at this point. Nathanial, after yet another frustrating day of poring over woefully inadequate reports, regretted his bravado from the other night, when he had pontificated to Dolan on the inherent virtue of the scientific method. “Suppose I don’t. What, then?”

“Something best not to say,” Fullbright said.

“But I want to hear it.”

“Oh, come now, Stone,” Provost said. “I, for one, don’t want to hear this dreary bit of nonsense.”

“Well, I do,” Nathanial said. “Please, Fullbright. Tell me.”

The engineer was annoyed, but he set down his brandy and fixed Nathanial with a serious look. “It’s all really quite simple. If an evacuation is called, the men will be assembled in the galley. The cutters are already loaded with emergency rations and a supply of potable water. More supplies will be added to accommodate additional men. Hague will then address the workers, telling them that we will begin sending men in an orderly fashion to the cutters below.”

“But even with Annabelle’s flyer, there won’t be enough room to carry all of the men,” Nathanial protested.

“Just so,” Holmes said. “Nor can we accommodate any sick or wounded.”

“Department heads will go first, of course,” Fullbright said. “Preference will be given to Crown citizens and the Austrians, and if there is any room left, we will take as many others as we can.”

“And then?” Nathanial asked.

“Oh, don’t be so obtuse, Stone,” Provost said, rolling his eyes.

“And then, we leave,” Fullbright said, with a sigh. “That’s to be it.” Nathanial’s uneasiness must have been evident on his features, for Fullbright added, “Well, I’m sure accommodations for you and Miss Somerset have been made as well.”

“And if not?”

“Well, I’m sure they have been.”

“Quite the opposite, I’m afraid.”

“Now see here, Stone, you can’t possibly—ˮ

Nathanial arched an eyebrow. “Can’t I?” he asked. He told the others what van den Bosch had told him during their first meeting. When he was done, there was silence. No one replied because there was nothing to say. Eventually, they moved away from the subject entirely.

“So, what did you and the Juggernaut have to say tonight, Stone?” Fullbright asked.

“Yes. The old boy was very quiet at dinner tonight,” Provost said. “Hardly heard a roar out of him.”

Nathanial shrugged. His eyes were turned toward the floor, his mind a swirling quagmire of the stabiliser problems, Annabelle’s face, and the imagined screams of dying men.

“Oh, nothing,” he said. “More of the same. He accused me of incompetence. Again.”

“Still no luck convincing him of letting you fire the stabilisers?” asked Fullbright.

Nathanial shook his head.

“Makes sense to me,” Holmes said, “if only on a purely scientific scale. After all, we’ve only van den Bosch’s word to go on. For all we know, the stabilisers are working, and he’s merely having us on.”

“I agree it bears testing,” Fullbright added. “From there, Stone here can take a more…what was the word you used?”

“Holistic,” Nathaniel said. “We need to take a holistic view of the station. The example I used was a medical one. Say a man goes to a doctor complaining of a brown discoloration of his gums. By looking only at the gums, the doctor might be inclined to treat simply the same, but a doctor who sees the man as a whole—ˮ

“Knows to treat the gums would be folly,” Holmes said. “Such a discoloration will likely lead instead to a malady of the liver. Yes, I see what you mean. So, once we have confirmed the stabilisers are indeed broken, we take a look at the station as a whole and find what is wrong.”

“Yes.”

Holmes smiled, and his red, cherubic cheeks glowed. “Good show, Stone. Good show indeed.”

“So how did the Juggernaut enjoy this analogy of yours?” Provost asked.

Nathanial chuckled. “Threw me out of his office.”

The group went up in a chorus of laughter.

“This would be all the more hilarious if our illustrious leader wasn’t playing with human life,” Provost said. “How do we make him amenable to a plan he’s already heard and rejected?”

“The idea is simple,” Holmes said. “Give him an alternative he finds more repugnant.”

“Such as?” Provost asked.

“The labs,” Nathanial said, nodding in agreement with Holmes’ plan. “Professor Wren’s laboratory, to be exact. Whatever great secret Peregrine holds, it is there.”