His instincts were part animal, part clockwork, and both made him keep the running lad in his sights until he got close to the steamer. The boy had his head low, his right hand covering the ear, protecting his head or praying it could hide him.
“Shoot!”
His first shot at something mortal.
He pulled the trigger a second before the soldier could leap to safety. There was a report and a blast at the boy’s neck. He fell dry, no screaming, his face crushing the car’s bumper.
Fritz crouched down an instant before a bullet hit the camarada next to him. Ticktockticktockticktock. He pushed the dead soldier away and once again bent himself over the sacks. He shot once, twice, thrice, suppressing every possible movement of the enemy line. He was covering Ernest, ready to throw another grenade, when he heard a low whistling noise. Another bomb exploded close to trucks, but the rise of the high-pitched sound made the troops freeze for a second.
“Fritz,” Ernest yelled.
“I’m coming, for fuck’s sake, I’m coming.” He dropped the carbine and almost threw himself over the steamgun. “Cover me!” The dangling piston insisted on slipping from his fingers, all damp thanks to the vapour leaking from the gun’s opened valve. Even with suppressive fire, enemy bullets kept coming in his direction. He had to keep his head low like the boy he had just killed. After infinite seconds, he managed to fix the piston into position, but it took him another eternity to find a wrench amongst the corpses. The whistle grew louder and louder and, as soon as he turned the screw nut, the machine gun’s long muzzle started to spin, steaming.
Ticktockticktockticktockticktock…
Fritz pulled the trigger, wishing someone had already placed the ammo belt into the feedway. The noise was so loud every soldier this side of the battle was thrown to the ground. It was the sound of a jackhammer crushing the wall of sacks, cars and people standing less than three hundred metres away. Drifting his range, Fritz watched the Stanley dissolve under La Sigaretta’s fire. The car was torn to pieces: wheels, chassis, seats. Bullets of hell-knows-what calibre pierced its hull as if it were made of paper. He slowly turned the gun to the enemy’s central position and thrust the black trucks away with the violence of a thousand lead wasps. He lost connection with time.
“Stop it, Fritz!”
The ventilation system had been down for more than two weeks now, so the steam had already turned into a muddy cloud made of smoke, dirt and blood. The troops behind the trucks broke up and ran away. Two soldiers trying to hide behind the blockade were torn apart by the hellish gun.
“Stop it, Fritz! This thing’s gonna blow!”
He was thrown out from the machine by Ernest and another militiaman he didn’t recognise. All three hit their backs to the ground, their voices screaming all right, all right, it’s okay, I got him. The tin soldier just stared at the city sprawling over him, failing to see any human beings walking the streets at the sphere’s opposite half. It seemed there was no-one at the casino’s tower, too.
They both woke up to the sound of the locomocycle roaring inside the hotel’s garage. They’d ended up falling asleep after a night-long procedure and were still bound together by wires, sensors and robotic hands. They could sense the smell of ozone and boiling chemicals in the air, and heard the sound of a thousand processing clicks from the analytical engine. Both had guns under their pillows.
“It was supposed to be my turn,” Fritz said, partly asking and partly answering. “I just turned off. Sorry.”
“No problem.” Chaya smiled. The only thing still beautiful in this godless world. “It’s all right.”
The door blasted open and they both pointed their guns at whoever was coming in. Emilio raised his free hand, the organic one, making sure the non-human couple could see his face and recognise him. “Thought you heard me coming,” the doctor said.
“The power of habit,” Chaya said, uncocking her Luger. “How’s the city going?”
“Empty. Except for militiamen, not many people are willing to walk the streets these days. Those who have food at home have no reason to go out. Those who don’t, won’t find any outside.” Emilio closed the door behind him with some difficulty. He had a small wooden box in his mechanical hand.
Fritz rested his gun on the improvised stretcher and tried to stand up. His joints creaked loudly. His body was all twisted and warped on the left side, especially his knee, though his right shoulder also cracked. “Any news from the front? How are the men doing?” Four days ago he’d been promoted to captain. Not that it meant anything, since the militiamen followed whoever they thought worth following rather than those with military rank. They’d been close to lots of bombs in the past few days, he and his friends, but maybe because he’d got used to the mortars or maybe because of the nature of the explosives, none of these had hurt him any more than the first one on the Chanteclair had. Actually, it still hurt. “Did they retake the casino?”
Emilio lowered his head and crossed the laboratory towards a tarp-covered table. The sound of boiling water came from it. Only when he walked past Fritz, did Emilio notice how injured his friend was. Gunshots, scraps, deep cuts. Were he human, he’d be dead by now. “No. No, I don’t. No news,” he said, pointing to the hidden table. “Last thing I heard was that the Committee issued some kind of edict saying the militias are now illegal.” The doctor looked over his shoulder. “They’ll find us. Sooner or later, they’ll take the neighbourhood. It’s over. Then they’ll make an agreement with the Consortium and life will be as it used to be before the strike. Or even worse. And I think you two should pack your things and go back to Earth now. An aethership will leave in about three hours. You’ve nothing to do with this war.”
“And you do?” The automaton was craving for an argument.
“Fritz, dear, I think Emilio might be right,” Chaya said. She tried to find some comfort on the stretcher, but the wires wouldn’t let her.
Fritz shook his head. He had his revolver back in his trembling hand. The bomb might’ve loosened some pulley in his shoulder. “We’re so close now. You said that. Besides, there’s nothing for us down there, on Earth. Nothing.”
Emilio and Chaya stared at him. The tick-tock in him seemed to have vanished, or at least couldn’t be noticed above the noises in the lab.
Dr Cavalcante sighed. “So, if we’re to finish this experiment, we better get back to work.” He pulled the covered table and brought it to the space between the couple. The myriad of cables, tubes and wires on the floor got stuck between the table’s rusty wheels. Emilio took the brown tarp off it, uncovering two once-green cylinders and a series of transparent alchemical glass vials the size of pressure pans. The vials were mounted like a ziggurat and were full of boiling liquids, each one of a different colour. The yellows were on the edge of the table and the blacks were actually extremely dense reds. There were also some transparent ones and others reflecting light in gold and silver patterns. At the top of the glass pile, there was a bigger, double-sized vial. It was completely empty and uncapped. “Okay, we’ve been through this before, but just to make sure you got it right,” Emilio said donning his waistcoat and the stenograph. “I’ll plug the drains into you and then attach it to the uterus up there and, and then I’ll link it to the aetheric fusion tank down here, as well. If we’re able to produce enough sephirotic reaction, well, we’ll proceed to surgery. Ready?”
They exchanged nervous glances and smiled, confirming their willingness to move on.
The occultist connected the suspended cables to the wires inside the non-human veins. He activated the apparatus by pressing a switch next to the control panel. Immediately, the prone bodies became stiff, as if they were being electrocuted. He ran to the aether cylinders and turned the valves only slightly to release a tiny amount of aetherfoam. The substance flowed through the tubes until it filled the fusion tank. He returned to the edge of the table and faced the control panel. It was diamond-shaped and over it was a gematria board, a stone abacus and a green phosphorus screen displaying the Tree of Life. Everything was connected by dozens of wires and cables leading to the analytical engine. Opposite him, the tank blending the non-humans’ essences span faster and faster.