Obsidian Eyes (29 page)

Saturday, 24
^th
September.

Straight after breakfast, they saddled the horses and rode out to the KRAC base. On the ride, Jared caught himself wishing Allie accompanied them. He regretted how they left things and wanted to talk to her, to hear her voice, and explain himself.

At the entrance to the base, two bored-looking guards staffed the front gate. They gave the cousins a familiar salute and waved the duo straight through to the grounds. They walked their mounts down the wide main road toward the heavily fortified research building. On the manicured lawn in front of the main building, a drill sergeant yelled at a rangy group of hopefuls.

Duncan drew his horse to a halt, a wistful look on his face as he watched.

The sergeant had eight recruits lined up, about to start a game of capture the flag. Jared halted next to Duncan and let the reins slip through his fingers as his horse nibbled the short grass. They knew the sergeant; he designed brutal exercises for the cadets each holiday.

“Two men in each team,” the sergeant yelled. “Hand to hand, first team to capture the flag wins the round. Last team standing wins the game and full bragging rights.”

The sergeant glanced over to where Duncan and Jared sized up the recruits with open interest. “Are you two slack jaws in or out?”

Duncan turned to plead with Jared. “We have to do this.”

“We don’t have time,” Jared said. He knew how much Duncan would want to participate, but they should check in with Zeb first.

Duncan had the expectant look of a large puppy desperate to go outside. “Oh c’mon,” he wheedled. “They want us to join in, look at them all fresh faced and unsuspecting, they’re just asking for it.”

Jared was as eager as Duncan to burn off some energy. And he hated to overlook the opportunity of a fair fight. It was a brief tussle to decide to put their mission aside for a short time and go with his gut for once, tired of always putting duty first. Zeb would be busy in the laboratory anyway and wouldn’t notice their delayed arrival.

“You’re right, it won’t take long and it would be rude to refuse the sergeant’s invitation.”

Duncan gave a whoop of joy and leapt off his horse. Jared vaulted down and they hitched the reins over a nearby rail. Both youths took off their jackets and threw them onto the grass before joining the line-up. Half the recruits looked to be of a similar age to the McLarens, the rest a few years older.

“Who wants to be first up?” the sergeant barked.

“We do,” Duncan replied. He leapt out of the line-up, practically skipping to the middle of the field.

Jared followed him out as they waited for the game to commence.

The sergeant pointed to the next two recruits in line. “You two, out you go.”

Two older men strode out, elbowing each other, confident they could easily beat the two pups before them. Proving pride comes before a fall, the older recruits were both on the ground before they knew what happened. Duncan utilised an elbow to the head and Jared took a slightly longer two blows to fell his opponent. Duncan strolled over and plucked up their opposition’s flag while the two older men lay prone on the ground.

The next two recruits were more cautious, having seen how the cousins dispatched the first couple. They still only lasted about sixty seconds longer, before they too were on the ground while a whistling Duncan took their flag.

By the time the third pair hit the ground the sergeant started to laugh out loud. Jared and Duncan displayed a lifetime of fighting each other and together. They covered one another with an innate sense of where their partner was. They virtually didn’t have to look, let alone voice, their intentions and they moved like well-oiled clockwork. They were also fit, strong, and fast with good technique, not to mention they spent every holiday since they were twelve training under the old sergeant. The other recruits didn’t stand a chance.

The sergeant waved the last two hopeful soldiers into the fray.

“Up and over?” Jared asked of Duncan.

“Aye.” His cousin knitted his fingers together and bent at the knees.

Jared took a run and planted a foot in the awaiting hands and Duncan hefted him upward like a caber. Jared somersaulted in the air, soared over the heads of the last two men and then landed on the other side. There was a grunt from one man as Duncan hit him in the kidneys, and he hit the ground with another blow to the neck.

The remaining man took a foot in the chest from Jared, who finished him with a blow as he descended to the ground. The cousins strolled over to the last flag; Duncan plucked it from the ground and held it over his head, an enormous grin plastered over his face.

Both boys puffed from the exertion. The adrenaline of the fight kicked in and released endorphins through their bodies. Duncan slapped Jared hard on the back and wore the widest grin; even Jared smiled openly for a change.

The sergeant approached. “Always a pleasure watching you work, boys.” He gave them a crisp salute. “The general asked earlier if I had seen you two, so you better report in.” He turned back to his recruits, littering the ground.

The cousins picked up their discarded jackets and then headed down the wide road leading toward the laboratory. As they approached, Jared thought how unremarkable the structure looked from the outside. The wire fence ringing the perimeter, a tiny stone guard hut and the two sentries blocking the entranceway, the only clues the building was anything other than an enormous storehouse. Only on closer inspection did you see there were no windows and the walls were constructed from enormous slabs of hewn stone. Each large block interlocked with its neighbour to make impenetrable walls. The sentries carried rifles, which they unslung as Jared and Duncan approached.

“Where do you think you’re going?” one guard asked as they halted at the gate.

“Zeb Lithgow is expecting us, we’re helping him with a project,” Jared replied.

The guards looked them up and down. One grabbed a clip board from the hut. “Names?”

“Jared and Duncan McLaren.”

The guard ran a finger down a list before looking up. “You’re on the list, you can go through.”

A few long strides down the short walkway and they pushed through the heavy metal doors into a small atrium. The doors had a mechanism that didn’t release the inner doors until the outer ones closed and vice versa. They waited as the outer doors gave a hiss and sealed themselves, and the inner doors released with a slighter higher pitch.

They exchanged looks as they entered the dim interior of the enormous building. On first entering the warehouse the interior seemed sparsely lit. They soon realised it was simply because the hanger was so vast, and so completely taken up with contraptions of every kind, that the multitude of light globes struggled to penetrate the space. They stared in wonderment at the array of contraptions and devices scattered around them.

A smaller block structure dominated one corner, with another set of mechanical doors secured by a time delay lock. Each dial contained a mechanism that triggered an hour delay before the next dial could be turned. Large waxed canvas suits hung on a wall next to the heavy door. Fabric limbs dangled, waiting to be filled. The very few allowed in the bunker had to wear the protective suits and brass helmets.

Behind the thick steel doors lay the meteor known as the Stone of Coulags. Foreign governments paid or negotiated for access to the stone. Mechanisms were arrayed around the meteor to absorb the invisible emissions, which gifted metal components with sentient abilities and perpetual motion.

Zeb’s laboratory at St Matthews looked like a toy shop by comparison to the hangar. His tinkering with clockwork pets and trinkets transformed here into items of dark intent. In the main body of the hangar, numerous tables held automatons, weapons and unrecognisable twisted metal in various stages of evisceration. Strange metallic marionettes made from artificial limbs hung from the ceiling, arms and legs akimbo and catching the light like alien puppets. Every object created for one purpose: war.

At the back of the warehouse, Jared could make out the skeletons of two airships, but couldn’t ascertain if they were being stripped and cannibalised, or reassembled. He thought warehouse a far more fitting epitaph than laboratory, as this was no simple lab. The sheer scale of the work in progress made him wonder that Lord Lithgow and Zeb toiled here alone. Around them were enough projects to bury a team of scientists for decades.

As they scanned their surroundings, they kept their eyes and ears peeled for any sign of Zeb. They detected a scurrying noise from a far corner, like a rat burrowing into a nest of newspaper. Jared followed the sound, skirting around an enormous metal contraption stretching out lobster claws the size of an average man. Vacant eye orbs the size of dinner plates dominated its cow-sized hulk.

He found Zeb scratching through papers on a workbench running almost the entire short side of the warehouse. The wall behind was covered in enormous pin boards and black boards, each decorated in complicated schematics, diagrams, calculations and notes.

“Ahh,” Zeb said, peering over the top of his magnification goggles. “You finally got here.”

Duncan beamed. “We had to take care of some recruits on the way in.”

“How is your work going?” Jared asked. “Have you found anything?”

“No.” Zeb scratched his head before lifting the goggles off his face to scratch the bridge of his nose, leaving a dark sooty smudge. “All of my father’s latest notes seem to be here, as is the rocket we were working on.”

Zeb waved a hand at a steel table containing an oblong contraption, roughly six feet long and two feet in diameter. It had no skin, only a rough skeletal structure, revealing the inner mechanism. Overall, the device resembled a scaled down airship skeleton.

“We know he was taken because of it,” Jared said, eyeing up the innocuous piece of equipment that had the ability to devastate hundreds or even thousands of lives. “How long would it take to replicate?”

“It took us a year to get to that stage,” Zeb said. He lifted his magnifying goggles off to replace with his wire-rimmed glasses. “And it’s still not complete.”

Jared breathed a sigh of relief. “So he won’t have built another one then.”

Zeb shook his head. “Not on that scale, no.”

“Uh-oh.” Even Duncan saw the red flag.

“So he could have built a smaller one in the last two weeks?” Jared couldn’t believe his ears.

Zeb pursed his lips. “It would have to be considerably smaller of course. Tiny, in fact.” He held his hands several inches apart to demonstrate. “And that’s assuming he had access to the right componentry and tools.”

“The Whisperers want this.” Jared ran his gaze over the contraption. “Who knows what they have access to, or if the guilds are working together.” He walked closer to the rocket. His eyes tried to follow copper wires, gears and wheels, trying to see what they linked to, and where they led.

“That is the problem,” a voice boomed from the shadows and then an older man, in full dress uniform, stepped into the weak light.

The youths recognised him. Jared and Duncan stood straighter, spines stiffened.

“General Galloway,” Jared said, inclining his head.

“Fortuitous finding you two here. I saw the swath you cut through Roydon’s latest recruits.”

Duncan sniggered, and earned an elbow in the gut from Jared.

“The problem, General?” Jared prompted.

The general looked thoughtful, before continuing. “Military intelligence has sources all over the world, at all levels. Except for the guilds. We have never successfully penetrated their networks. We need to find Lord Lithgow before he can replicate the rocket. I’m sure you appreciate we’re running out of time.”

“Shame you don’t have any guild contacts.” Jared wondered why they didn’t use Lieutenant Harris, and then wondered if the general knew his history as a Runner.

The general swung his attention to Jared, a twitch of his moustache indicated a smile hid underneath. “Yes. What we need is someone we could utilise in that direction. Like your friend who has been training with Marshall.”

Jared tried to weigh up how much Marshall had passed to the general about Allie’s background. They themselves knew scant little beyond that her father was guild aligned. “Allie is following up a guild lead in London. She is hopeful it will shed some light on the situation.”

“Hmmm.” The general digested the new information. “When does she report back?”

“She’ll be coming to Edinburgh in a few days.” He was loath to put a timeframe on her arrival in Edinburgh. Though he hoped she would hightail it to them after her meeting on Sunday. He wanted to keep a spare day or two up his sleeve; no point in giving the general everything up front for nothing in return.

The general rubbed his hand over his chin in a contemplative manner. “Marshall speaks highly of you boys, as does my sergeant.” An uneasy silence fell while the general hummed in thought before making his decision. “I want you to report in once your friend arrives in Edinburgh.”

“We can handle ourselves.” Jared bristled at the thought of having to ask permission before deciding on a course of action, even though the military training screamed at him to follow the chain of command.

General Galloway gave the youth a stern look. “This mission is being run by Lieutenant Harris, you will follow his lead.”

Jared took a deep breath, but he knew better than to argue with a superior officer. “Very well, sir.”

Satisfied, the general turned on his heel.

“What do we do now?” Duncan asked, once they were alone again.

“We wait for Allie,” he replied. “And hope she learns more than we have.”

And I hope she gets through her meeting safely.
He didn’t want to contemplate not seeing her face again.