Chapter Nine

“Full of Sound and Fury,

Signifying Nothing”

1.

“WHAT THE DEUCE?” Folkard reached up for the plate, but it would not move. He looked at Annabelle. “How did this get here? I thought the professor…”

Annabelle could offer no explanation. She had been there; she had seen him enter the airlock. He said he disposed of the plate; why would he lie? She shook her head. This was silly. “How can it possibly be here? I saw Nathaniel with it; he took it to the airlock with him!” She thought back; had it been in his possession when he returned? No, she would have seen it. And he had no time to store it elsewhere. No, that was ridiculous. Even if he had returned with it, how could he have got it to the control deck without being seen?

“Could there have been more than one?” Folkard asked.

She shook her head. If there had been then either Arnaud or Nathaniel would have told her, of that she was sure. Either way, it still did not explain how the plate could have mysteriously appeared on the control deck. There was always someone there, and recently it had only been Folkard and she. “I can’t explain it. Maybe we should ask Nathaniel?”

“He has returned?” Folkard stared at her.

Annabelle wasn’t entirely sure she liked the look of surprise on the captain’s face. Honestly, after everything he and Nathaniel had been through together, she would have expected at least a small show of relief.

Folkard nodded curtly. “Then by all means bring him here, although what good it will do I cannot see.” He indicated the scene outside the flyer. “We’re still being pulled in, and there is simply nothing further we can do to prevent our demise.”

“Captain!”

“I’m sorry, Miss Somerset, but that is the short of it.”

Annabelle could not believe it. She had never seen the captain defeated before; even after the last visit to Luna when he’d first discovered the influence of the Heart, and he all but resigned his commission. He had bounced back, worked with Bedford to clear both her and Nathaniel’s names. He was not prone to defeat.

She stood from her seat. “We will find a way out of this, Captain. We do not give up. Or so I’ve always been led to believe from you.” Just as she made to move, the flyer rocked so violently that she found herself being flung through the air into the door. The deck continued to vibrate around her; the orrery crashed to the grating, soon followed by the aetherlabe.

She made to stand, but found her mechanical leg unresponsive. She lifted the petticoat of her dress, aghast to see the leg being wrenched from her knee as if by some unknown force. She fought back the scream of pain, tears in her eyes. Tearing at the skin of her knee joint, the leg tore away and flew across the control deck where it fastened itself to the bulkhead facing the aether tear.

“Captain, I…”

Folkard didn’t seem to notice. He only had eyes for the energy storm outside. “This is it,” he said, “we’re going in!”

2.

THE ENGINE ROOM shook as Fenn scrambled toward his sleeping space to grab his Bible. The pipes by which the steam moved around the flyer rattled, starting to shake free of their holdings. It was only a matter of time before every pipe burst. Even now he could see hairline cracks appearing in the boiler. Soon it would all erupt, filling the entire engine room with the superheated steam that usually fuelled the aether propeller. Before he died, he had to make some peace, if not with Professor Stone, then at least with God. He had, reasons notwithstanding, betrayed not only a good man but his oath to Her Majesty’s Royal Navy.

Even if, by some miracle, the prof was successful in disposing of the plate and they were able to escape the pull of the aether tear, Fenn didn’t fancy their chances of continuing on to Mars. There would soon be no means by which to propel Esmeralda. The propeller was burning out, the governor was overworked, and in the vacuum the liftwood slats were of no use at all. At worst she would drift listlessly in the aether, and at the best she’d be espied by some passing craft. If they made it to Mars at all, it would not be in this flyer.

He barely had a chance to close his eyes in supplication when the boiler burst and he was covered in superheated steam. As his nerves were shredded by the pain of his epidermis peeling and bubbling, his final thought was not of his betrayal of Stone or the Navy, but rather the thought that he had somehow let down his grandfather…

3.

ITEMS ONCE SECURE had been shaken free and were floating around the lab like slow moving projectiles. Arnaud batted aside a test tube. By some miracle his toujours had survived his brush with the aether and the plate was gone—not that it had saved Esmeralda. Together they stood in each other’s embrace, looking through the glass of the porthole, watching in horror as the purple energy of the aether tear lashed out towards the flyer. Each lick of its tendril rocked the flyer more, causing the two men to stagger backwards despite the magnets in their shoes.

“This is it,” Arnaud said, his voice calmer than his heart rate would have suggested. He looked up at Nathaniel, but his toujours was looking away, his grey eyes resting on the porthole, his brows knotted in thought.

“We will have only a few seconds of consciousness,” he said, his voice even calmer than Arnaud’s. Even his heart was calm; the steady beat of it vibrated against Arnaud’s hand which rested gently against Nathaniel’s chest. It was as if this was nothing more than a science experiment for him, not the end of his life. “Ebullism will come as a consequence of our sudden exposure to the vacuum; gas bubbles will form in our bodily fluids, the membranes of our eyes and mouths will…”

“Nathaniel! Stop!” Arnaud did not wish to hear his forthcoming death dissected so. He knew enough to realise it would be, for a few seconds, excruciating as they fell into unconsciousness. Fortunately, they would not be aware of their own deaths minutes later from hypoxia.

“I’m sorry. This distresses you?”

“Of course it does!”

“Ah.” Nathaniel nodded, his expression neutral. “But death is a natural consequence of life. Why would it distress you?”

Arnaud could not believe his ears. He, too, could show clinical detachment at times of stress—it wasn’t unknown—but not when faced with his certain death. And worse, the death of the man he had fallen in love with. Her remembered stories his father told him of his mother’s death, of the void left by her absence. He would, at least, be spared that.

Crack!

His eyes snapped back to the porthole. The crack spread across the glass, until it was a spider web of lines. “Nathaniel,” he said softly. “Je suis content…”

The rest of his sentence vanished with his last breath as the porthole glass erupted into the aether tear.

4.

JACOB FOLKARD KNEW only one way to face death—head on and with dignity. So he had angled Esmeralda to face the aether tear. Looking directly into the maw of death, he had made his peace. He’d lived a long and fruitful life. And he was ready to meet both his Maker and his dear Charlotte. If he were facing this alone, he’d have no regrets.

But he wasn’t alone.

Miss Annabelle sat adjacent to him, fastened tightly to her seat, her eyes closed. He supposed she was making her own peace. Not even twenty-one yet, she had lived a short life, but in the past year or so she had led a very eventful one. Seen and done more than most women her age. And yet she still had so much life in front of her. He had made a promise to Bedford to keep her safe, to ensure he returned her so that they could be wed. But Bedford knew him well, and he would know that Folkard would have been by Miss Annabelle’s side until the end.

There was some peace to be found there.

Now it was time to meet Charlotte again…

5.

ATMOSPHERE SUITS. SHE still held that they should have all worn them. Surely those extra seconds of air would have counted, given them a chance to prepare for the next life? The captain was right in so much as they would die horribly regardless, once the aether tear enveloped the flyer, the atmosphere suits would provide little protection. Still she could see the cracks appearing in the glass before her; soon they would be blown out and the vacuum would kill them within minutes. Not that they would be conscious at the time.

Annabelle knew she should be more dignified in this approach to her death, but as the certainty took hold of her she realised she was scared. She didn’t want to die. She had so much to live for. She had to find that girl seen in her dreams, the one who had invaded her thoughts ever since Peregrine. Her daughter she was sure. And then there was George. She would die never having known him fully.

Such thoughts!

She should be ashamed, but what did it matter? She would be dead soon, all she had was her thoughts.

Annabelle looked over at Folkard. His eyes were resolutely fixed on the crackling maw of the aether tear, his lips moving, intoning words she could not hear. Perhaps it was a prayer, a final supplication before he met his God. Annabelle wasn’t so sure she believed in such an entity. Once maybe, but since she saw her parents killed by the Apaches such faith eluded her. She believed in people; in Uncle Cyrus, in Nathaniel Stone, in George Bedford… Men who had showed her much love and faith. She would miss them all so very dearly.

She reached into the pocket of her blouse and fingered the pocket watch nestling there. She knew not what was to greet her after death, but she hoped she would finally be reunited with her parents.

“Captain, I just wish to say…”

A tendril of crimson smashed against the windows, shattering them in an instant. Any words Annabelle wished to speak were sucked away with the air…