Gloom Rising (The Book Wielder Saga 1) (21 page)

“Any chance of crossing over in Industria City or is it too dangerous?” Winston asked.

“I wouldn’t advise it,” Kaine spoke regretfully. “We used to have a bit of safe territory there but the Angels and Patriots have been rowdy since they grouped up. Plus you’d have the Inquisition to worry about.”

“I could cross over and see if the Freaks, Alts, whatever, are up for taking you to see it from here?” Wayne suggested.

“Sure. Bring some candy though, it will go down well,” Winston suggested.

Wayne nodded and left with Blake to raid the stores for anything sugary.

“Right, so we’re all set on this course of action then?” Kaine directed his attention to Kat and Albert.

“Definitely,” Kat said coolly.

“Of course, the Concealed Council is ready to play its part,” Albert said formally.

“Good!” Kaine clapped his hands together. “Now if you wouldn’t mind, I’d like a private word with my old friends from the Shadow Circle. Please make yourselves welcome here, and we’ll have a good old celebration later.”

The two other factions left the room and went downstairs to enjoy themselves.

“That is and interesting choice of allies, my old friend,” Lucius grinned.

Kaine shrugged. “Albert’s a bit uptight but I figured his political knowledge would come in handy, and Kitty Cat… well, you’ve seen how
eager
they are.”

“Reckless fighters like Kat and the rest of her people will be hard to control,” Xavier said disapprovingly.

“They don’t need controlling, Xavier, you old stick in the mud,” Kaine smiled. “They just need
unleashing
in the direction of our enemies.”

Wayne and Blake arrived back at the office with a couple of carrier bags full of sugary snacks and a few filled with smelly raw meat.

“Good thing us Dogs have a sweet tooth,” Blake joked.

“I better have some steak left over,” Kaine grumbled.

“You do boss,” Wayne said. “Right, I’ll be back soon.”

“Oh, that meat smells good!” Lewis said, holding his rumbling stomach.

“There’s something seriously wrong with you,” Winston joked.

Wayne carried a bag of candy and a bag of meat in one hand, and produced his book with the other. He enlarged it to its natural size and opened it on Kaine’s desk, and with a wave of static and distortion he was gone.

“Who’s coming with me then?” Winston asked.

“We’ll all go,” Kaine said. “I’d like to see the Gloom for myself, if you don’t object, Lucius?”

“Not at all. I was going to suggest the same myself.”

“I’m looking forward to seeing what the Gloom looks like over this side of the world!” Lewis said enthusiastically.

“I’m sure it will be just as grim and dangerous as our neck of the woods,” Winston replied.

It wasn’t long before Wayne appeared back without the shopping bags. “They’re game. They said they’ll take us to the Foreman on their train.”

“I can’t wait to see that!” Lewis said happily.

“I can,” Winston mumbled. Unstable Gloom technology still gave him the creeps, with the exception of Olex the Spidercar that he still saw and spoke to sometimes in Gloom City.

“Could you please do the honours, Winston?” Lucius asked politely.

“Sure.” Winston stood up, pulled his book and quill out of his jacket, and made a rectangular portal appear at one end of the room.

The edges of the portal moved slightly and glowed orange like embers. The usual hard to perceive un-light seeped out around it’s edges, and a rusty old-fashioned factory filled with dust covered old machinery of unknown purpose could be seen through the interstice.

The members of the Dogs of War were awestruck.

“Quite the party trick, hey guys?” Veronica chuckled. She took Winston by the hand and they walked through first before everyone else followed after.

When everyone was through Winston closed the portal behind them, just in case something tried leaving the Gloom in their absence, and they proceeded carefully down to the ground floor of the Gloom factory.

The top three floors may have been discarded but the ground floor was a hive of activity. Rust covered and brass coloured machinery throbbed and vented steam as half puppet, half clockwork, or steam powered Alternatives tended to them. They wore an array of different industry related clothing including boiler suits, overalls, gasmasks, and flat caps. A conveyor belt was running with Alts quickly assembling all sorts of mechanical bric-a-brac with well-trained lightning fast finger movements.

“So this is the Gloom, aye?” Kaine said appreciatively. “It’s not so bad. Feel like there’s a spring in my step.”

“It’s not too bad when everyone’s not trying to kill you,” Wayne said. “Supernaturals get a buzz out of being in the Gloom but it starts making your head go funny if you’re here for a while.”

“One of our Mages who stayed in too long ended up going half-demon,” Lewis added.

Wayne wasn’t that surprised. “I’d heard of Supernatural Book Wielders getting addicted to this place and going missing. I figured they might become part of the scenery or something, if they didn’t end up dead.”

An Alt wearing a greasy orange boiler suit and a gas mask was waiting for them by the front doors. “One of you the Winston?” he barked in a rough voice through the gasmask.

“That’s me.” Winston stepped forward.

“Good, good. Me Team Leader here, you call me TL. I take you to Foreman.” TL raised his gasmask enough to expose his yellowy-brown teeth and popped a square of chocolate in his mouth. He put the gasmask down again and shivered all over as he chewed. “You follow me now. You make deal; bring more good things, yes?”

“Yes, that’s the plan TL,” Winston replied politely.

“Good, good, we go train now.” TL left the building.

The group followed the Team Leader Alternative out into the Gloom’s reflection of Rigorton. The air was hazy with smoke and fumes that tickled the nose. All around them was the clacking and clanging of machinery, big clockwork and steam powered mechanisms spun and whirred around, and power cables ran building to building that were mostly exposed, cackling and buzzing with surges of sickly green electricity. The sky above was so thick with fluffy clouds of yellow, brown, and grey pollution that the usual purple clouded Gloom skyline couldn’t be seen at all.

Gloom vegetation sprouted where it could amidst the industrial chaos. In damp dark alleyways Ashrooms and other fungi huddled together in pools of gloom water and sludgy industrial waste, and Nightmare Nettle and other magical plants sprouted through cracks in the crumbling concrete underfoot. Blightmoths and other flying creepy crawlies continually engaged in kamikaze flights into the cackling green electrical equipment.

The buildings were dirty and rundown but were alive with activity. Most of the windows glowed with sickly yellow light or the familiar green of witchlight, gutters dripped and pipes poured out Gloom water and industrial sludge waste, vents steamed and chimneys spilled out smoke adding to the pollution above. Many of the buildings had rusty signs that were fixed in place or swung creakily from iron poles. Most of them read along the lines of ‘Exhaustown; a happy place to live. Work hard or die’.

Along the roads, personnel and cargo spiders scuttled and steamed, cracking the roads as they went. Huge tracked trucks rolled along with big angry features on their front sections, hooting their extremely loud and deep horns if anything got in their way, and other wacky Alternative magic and steam-powered vehicles added to the traffic. An Alt on a demonic looking motorbike, all shiny silvery metal with sharp spikes and a menacing Cyclops eyed front with six big exhausts, plodded down the road.

“Wow,” Lynette exclaimed. “Kavarne, take a look at that bike!”

“That is a pretty sweet ride,” Kavarne growled, impressed.

“You want bike? You have bike!” TL said, and approached the Alt on the bike.

“I on break, I promise!” the biker Alt said defensively.

“Break over, no more break for you! Meaty people want bike, you give bike! Go work now, Work hard, no breaks!” TL said angrily.

“I sad now, back work I go. Look after bike, it called Merv,” the Alt said to Lynette.

Merv revved its engine in the sound of a laugh.

“Thanks, I will,” Lynette said cheerfully. “Mind if I drive, Kavarne?”

“Sure minx. It looks big enough for me to be on the back I suppose.”

“We take train to Pollutia City, you go big road, stay on road, giant worms off road, chomp, chomp, many teeth.”

Lynette looked pleadingly towards Lucius and Xavier. “Can we go on the road? Please guys? Winston and Lewis have got plenty of protection. Please?”

“Please?” Kavarne imitated playfully with puppy dog eyes. “Pretty please with sugar and sprinkles on top?” Then Lynette gave him a slap on the arm.

Xavier sighed. “If you must. Is that alright, Lucius?”

“Fine with me. Take TL’s advice though and stay on the road,” Lucius said.

Lynette was giddy. “Yes! Thank you, thank you boss man and Xavier!” She climbed on and gestured for Kavarne to join her.

He climbed on the back awkwardly but the beastly bike Merv was more than capable of taking the weight.

“See you there,” Kavarne said gruffly.

Lynette revved the engines and flared off down the road cheering. Everyone chuckled except for Xavier who shook his head disapprovingly.

They carried on following TL until they came to the Exhaustown train station where the hulking goliath of a steam train was waiting for them. It had vintage style carriages that all looked as decrepit as most things did in the Gloom.

“I wish we’d taken the bike now,” Kaine muttered to Lucius.

“Wow, how cool! Check this train out, Winston!” Lewis said enthusiastically, running off to check out the front of the train.

“Has he been taking something?” Veronica asked Winston quietly.

“No more than usual,” Winston replied. Lewis had been a bit odder than usual as of late.

“Call it Shaman instinct, but I don’t think he’s well,” Brooke added. “I can’t put my finger on it but something’s not right.”

“Yeah, I agree. Call it Bloodmage instinct,” Veronica said, half-serious and half-jokingly.

“Hmm... he’s always been like that,” Winston said defensively. He didn’t want to think that something bad had happened to his friend, but maybe he had spent too much time in the Gloom.

Winston went to see Lewis, who was admiring the burly front of the black steel train. It had a fine curved bar plough at the front and two big angry looking witchlight lamps for eyes. It hooted its steam whistle a few times as Winston approached.

"How cool does this train look, Winston?" Lewis asked merrily.

"Are you feeling alright Lewis?"

"Yeah, of course, why do you ask?"

"You just seem a little... off lately. Like, you're chirpier than normal, especially in here."

"I bet Veronica said something, didn't she?" Lewis chuckled. "She's winding you up, man. I'm the same as ever. I'm happy here because we don't need to worry anymore. You're the famous Winston bringer of candy crap! You're Alt royalty now, so none of them are going to touch us. If anything we're probably safer here than we are in the real."

Once again Winston was defeated by Lewis’ weird way of thinking. "If you say so. Shall we get on the train now?"

"Definitely. Lead the way oh mighty Winston, lord of liquorish, conveyor of caramel, king of candies, sultan of sugars..."

Winston laughed. "Okay, shut up now."

They both made their way to the station platform where the rest of the group were waiting for them.

TL pointed to the best looking carriage right at the front. "You get on, luxury carriage, plenty good yes? I stay here. You see Sheriff in Pollutia, he take you see Foreman. Many byes."

The gang got on board the 'luxury' train carriage and TL signalled for the train to go. It hooted its steam whistle as they chugged out of the dilapidated station.

Inside the carriage was as good as could be expected in the Gloom. It was one big open seating section with dusty and torn padded benches. Witchlight lamps hung in the corners and by the seats, and a broken web encrusted chandelier that was occupied by little red and black spiders with hissing humanoid faces rocked side to side in the centre of the carriage's ceiling. The windows were dirty but intact, and a few of the group began wiping them clean to see out of them better.

Veronica, Winston, Lewis, and Wayne took a seat on the benches that were close to the front and had a good view out of the nearest window, and the others hesitantly followed, testing the seats with their hands or poking at them before they finally took a seat.

"Is the Gloom always this... weird?" Kaine asked, trying to get comfy on one of the benches.

"I wish I'd brought some booze," Blake said. "I could use a stiff drink. I feel great but this place is seriously messed up."

Wayne nodded. "Yeah, but trust me, it gets worse than this."

"Yeah, you should try it when there's a whole army of Freaks after you," Lewis said. "Or a Demon."

"He's right," Wayne agreed. "These highly populated parts aren't too bad. It’s the desolate areas that get seriously fucked up and dangerous."

"At least if I get some portals open you and the rest of the allied Book Wielders won't have to face it on your own anymore," Winston said.

"It does make a nice change being here with backup," Wayne said appreciatively.

"Winston, look!" Veronica said, pointing out of the window.

The train track was running across an elevated platform along a perfectly straight line east towards the Pollutia, the Gloom version of Industria City. The sky between Exhaustown and Pollutia was relatively pollution free and shone with the actual dull dark purple of the Gloom sky. A road was running parallel to them on the ground below them in the distance, and a few trucks and tankers rolled along venting lots of smoke from their exhausts. They could just about make out Lynette and Kavarne riding Merv. Small flares of green witchfire sparked from Merv's six exhausts as they charged along and dodged passed the slower moving traffic. Off the road there were dozens and dozens of sharp tank traps and big spiked spherical mines littered about at random. The barren grey cracked earth churned with underground activity as giant worms coiled their way here and there, occasionally surfacing and exposing their disgustingly huge pale ridged bodies and giant circle mouths filled with row after row of rotating pointy teeth.