Chapter 4

The dark shape that filled the far end of the only complete conference room on the pirate skyship oozed dread. Malevolence seemed to seep from every single pore of the shadowy form, and the darkness that filled the conference room, cast by harsh electric lights that were hung from the ceiling and walls by copper wires and cheap adhesive tape, was filled with evil.

The man seated across from the dark shape seemed to be utterly unimpressed – an impressive feat for someone who appeared to be roughly fifteen years old. His hair was cherry red and his face was speckled with a fine patina of freckles. His eye – his left was covered by a sleek black eyepatch – was cat green and sparkled with a kind of manic determination. The only hint that he was afraid was a slight tightness in his jaw and the fact his fingers shook as they slowly clicked bullets into the chamber of a revolver that sat, cradled in his lap.

“Mr. Sharpe,” the figure spoke.

“Comrade, please,” Sharpe said, the word sounding at once perfectly natural with his Scottish accent and also utterly unnatural. “We’re all Comrades here.”

“And yet, you are the one who speaks to me?” The dark shape asked. “They call you Captain Sharpe.”

“They?” Sharpe lifted an eyebrow. His lips quirked in a smirk.

“The newspapers,” the dark figure said. As if speaking the word made the thing real, a newspaper shimmered to life before the figure. Painted in shades of purple and black and gray, most of it was illegible in the darkened room, save for the headlines: SKY PIRATE, CAPTAIN SHARPE, STRIKES AGAIN!

Sharpe scoffed. “I may lead the Toi in battle, but out of it, we discuss. Debate. Agree.” He shrugged, then set the revolver down. “But I guess that kind of thing might seem a bit odd for a Jerry.”

The dark figure paused. “How did you-”

“Oh, I know more about you thank you think,” Sharpe said, ticking off the points on his fingers. His nails were marked by black oil – worked under the quick, outlining them. “When the Tzarina crushed our comrades in the December revolution, the rumor was her mad priest helped root out every cell. But it wasn’t that charlatan, was it?” He grinned. “It was you, Herr Von Sebottendorf.”

The black figure was sitting with perfect stillness. But the malevolence that had oozed from it since the beginning of the conversation had ratcheted up to crackling fury. It was a glare – eyeless and shapeless as it was – that promised snapping bones and marrow sucked through eyesockets. Sharpe spread his hands with a slow smile.

“Our kind don’t survive long if we don’t know who we’re dealing with.”

Von Sebottendorf breathed out a slow, hissing sigh. “Very well, Mister Sharpe...” The honorific was loaded with enough contempt and hatred to blow a hole in the bulkhead. “We both cordially despise one another. But the enemy of my enemy is my useful tool. And so...” The dark shape inclined its head. “My previous tool failed me. And so, I come to you.”

Sharpe drummed his fingers on the counter top. “What do you want and what do you offer?”

The dark shape spread one vague appendage that might have been a hand. A photograph – one that provoked an almost overwhelming wave of relief to Sharpe just by the fact it was a real, physical thing, rather than a shapeless force – slipped across the table. Sharpe took it and whistled slowly, his thumbs brushing along the edges of the photograph. “That’s a Martian Power Unit.”

“That it is. My ... experts ... have disabled the safeguards that prevent any but Tesla or Edison from taking them apart. In that is the promise to shatter the monopoly. What do you think you can do with such a thing, Mister Sharpe?”

Sharpe bit his lower lip. “And in return?”

“In return, all I ask is this.” The shadowy figure leaned forward. The darkness rippled and spread backwards, and a face appeared in the dimness, formed from raw purple energies and crackling blackness. It was a face as craggy and ancient as a cliffside, with eyes as deep and black as the darkest of space. Its lips spread into a wide, wicked smile. “Bring. Me. The Martian!”

I jerked awake with a cry, my arms flailing out wildly. They slammed into the side of the wall and into Tjen’s face. My lover cried out as well, flailed her arms, and tumbled from the bed. The two of us blinked as the lights to the room came on and Oliver Law and his wife and two children came awake as well. Oliver, to his credit, came up swinging – his hands were clasped around one of the cheap bedside lamps that were set next to each bed. He glared around himself while his children scrambled under the covers.

Yalen, meanwhile, snored undisturbed in her mountain of blankets and pillows. As several of the beds weren’t being used – as no one, even those who had bought a ticket in steerage, had wanted to share rooms with a negro family and two Barsoomians – she had been able to plunder them with impunity.

I clutched at my chest, gasping. “We’re in danger...” I said.

“No shit, white boy!” Ollie snapped, then winced as his wife slapped at his arm. “Sorry, Corrie.”

“Shit, shit, shit, shit!” Oliver’s son started to shout the word as he flung back the covers. He laughed and then quite down as Oliver scowled at him.

“What happened? Did you hear something?” Corrie asked, her voice soft and subdued as she looked at me. She stood behind her husband, her hand on his shoulder, but I noticed that she hadn’t stopped glancing at the door to the room. I rubbed my hands against my face, thumbs working grit out of my eyes. Before I responded, I checked the time on the mantlepiece and groaned as the radium painted hands showed that I had dragged everyone out of bed nearer to midnight than dawn. I sighed and then looked at Tjen, who was rubbing her nose with a somewhat aggrieved expression.

“Sorry, Tjen,” I said, softly.

She smiled at me, ever so slightly. “I will forgive you. Your arm, though, I shall not be so quick...”

I looked back at Ollie and his wife. “So, uh ... this is going to sound absurd, but when I’m touching Tjen, I can sometimes ... see ... other places. Other people.” I paused. “And I saw something bad.” I grasped after the images – they were becoming cloudier and cloudier with every moment. It was like trying to keep my fingers around a dream. The first time had been crystal clear and frighteningly easy to follow and remember. This time, though, it felt ... different. I didn’t know why, though. But I did cling to a single name. “Does the name Sharpe? Captain Sharpe ring a bell with any of you?”

Ollie shook his head.

Corrie, though, nodded. “I’ve heard of him.”

The kids looked on excitedly. Yalen continued to snore.

“There were some people in the union who were saying we should go from striking to following Sharpe’s example,” Corrie said. “He’s a communist – when the British pulled out of the islands and abandoned it to the red weed, he stayed behind with other diehards. Everyone thought they starved to death, before they started sky piracy.”

“I didn’t know sky piracy was such a big deal,” I said, sneaking nervous glances at Tjen’s nose. She was no longer touching it and wincing, which I took as a good sign. “I mean, you see it in the movies and on the three-vee, but ... it’s not real is it?”

“It’s less dramatic,” Corrie said, smiling. “But it’s real. One of the excuses they used for not raising our wages was automated transports were being hijacked by pirates.”

Ollie rubbed his chin. “So, you think that this Sharpe is going to knock over the Spirit of St. Louis?” He smirked. “If he does, count me in. These rich a ... these rich folks have been doing nothing but look down their noses at us since the beginning of the trip.”

I sighed, ruefully. The trip had been nowhere near as romantic or exciting as I had hoped air travel might be. The steerage areas were cramped and full of people more interested in getting to Berlin than making small talk. The food was lousy and every few hours it seemed something went wrong. The air-machines that kept things cool would break, or some lights would go out, or something irritating and inconvenient. These minor woes, which might have been easily handled if we could simply leave or walk around on deck, were exacerbated by the curious construction of the cylindrical ship. No deck to enjoy, no fresh air. Just more corridors and elevators heading upwards and inwards, towards the nicer parts of the ship.

I could take a stroll through the mid-decks, but only if I didn’t mind stewards asking me if I was lost every few minutes.

Ollie and his family had a better chance of getting fresh air if they had simply dug through the floor.

And that wasn’t even getting into Yalen or Tjen.

Yalen’s mound of pillows and blankets shifted and her voice grumbled out: “Clearly, you must use the rich.”

I looked at her. “What?”

Her blankets slumped and shifted away from her as she sat up. Her upper arms stretched while her lower arms remained cupped over her breasts. She had taken off her breastband under her blankets, and was doing her best to not scandalize Corrie. She was failing. The young black woman glared at her as if she was Satan herself, but Yalen didn’t deign to pay her any mind. Instead, she explained.

“While I was hunting last night-”

“Oh god,” George muttered, his hand covering his face. They were trying to keep a low profile, the idea of a seven or eight foot tall Green Martian “hunting” through the corridors was enough to give George the vapors.

“-I heard that there was going to be a big party in the core,” she said. “The rich passengers are going. The steward said that the Austrians and the Prussians will be there, and was complaining about having to speak German.”

George frowned, slightly. In his investigations – and from the rumors he had heard – the passengers in first class varied between industrialists from the United States, wealthy civilians from aristocratic backgrounds, and at least two or maybe three delegations from the various German Republics and the Austrian Empire. He looked at Tjen. Tjen was considering.

“Any chance our Hitler will be among them?” he asked.

“I cannot foretell such a thing, due to my pregnancy,” Tjen said – careless of the fact that she had an audience. Corrie performed a double take that would have served her well on the vaudevillian stage, while Oliver’s face held an expression that could only have been described as ‘Thank Christ it’s not me this time.’ Tjen continued, as unstoppable as a locomotive. “That means that we cannot say for sure, but I can say that it is highly unlikely.”

“W-Weeeee still have the information from your first foretelling,” George said. “Can you...” He put his hand on her shoulder. “Can you show me the images? Maybe I can see something you missed. A clue.”

Oliver and Corrie watched, their interest shifting from scandalized to fascinated. Tjen tossed her head.

“Normally, I would say no. But as my powers seem linked to your mind due to the fact you are the father of my child,” she said, rubbing her chin and provoking a second double take from Corrie and a quiet pair of gasps from the children. “It is worth, as you humans say, an attempt.” And with no warning and no pomp, Tjen reached out and placed her palms on either side of George’s, her fingers pressed against his temples. Her fingers worked in slow, easy circles, and George felt his mind buzzing. It grew and grew and grew, and then the fabric of the world surrounding him seemed to tear, as if it was paper and a great knife had been slammed into it. The visions filled his mind...

A vast, dark woods. Explosions flashing between the trees. Grey clad figures ran forward – rifles in their hands. A hateful, suttering flash knocked them down, one by one by one. Then the shout came: Gas! Gas! Gas! And the explosions were muted then, gurgling and coughing and spluttering. Tendrils of fog reached out. The press of something thick and rubbery over the face, gasping, suffocating within and without. A man clutched at his shirt, clinging, face twisted by agony, his lips were turning blue. That vicious flashing again – winking as the cha-ta-ta-ta-ta-ta rang out. The man was pitched down, but still did not die. He went over the shoulder and sprinting, running, rush towards the trench-

Her hands jerked away from my head and I gasped, clutching at my chest. “God...” I hissed.

“What did you see?” Oliver whispered, his eyes wide. “You look like you’ve been face to face with a goddamn ghost.”

Under my palm, I could feel the fluttering of my heart – pounding, pounding, pounding. I closed my eyes and tried to make sense of what I had seen. Slowly, I said: “He was in a war. A war as bad as the Great War – a war that had to be using Tripod technology. They were using gas and machine guns, maybe a heat ray...” I shook my head. “But it was against other humans. A European war, maybe?”

Oliver hissed. Corrie put her hand over her mouth. Tjen looked as if she was considering.

“If he was in this war of the future,” she said. “And that war would set the stage for the worst atrocities to come just as the Great War surely influenced this upcoming war ... then it stands to reason that if he is part of the Austrian or German states, he would be part of the military. There are military attaches as part of any diplomatic meeting.”

“A slender hope,” I muttered.

Oliver held up one hand. “Hey. Lets say you sneak in to this shindig and he’s not there. You still get a chance to get some food that’s worth eating. What’s the worst thing that happens?”

“They find out I’m a stowaway?” I suggested.

Oliver frowned.

“I have an idea,” Corrie said, her voice soft. But her eyes crinkled with a mischievous light.

“Remind me why I’m doing this again?” Oliver muttered.

Because we all have a vested interest in preventing a general European war, I said, my voice echoing in his head as I peered through his eyes. And because you’re as bored as your kids.

Oliver chuckled under his breath. He looked down and I could see how he saw himself. It was ... bizarre. I could, on the one hand, feel only the touch of Tjen’s fingers to my temples. But I could also feel the silken fabric of the borrowed servant’s uniform that Oliver had slipped into. I could feel the tautness of it across his muscular chest, and the sleekness of his his shoes. I could feel the rumble of excitement in his belly, and taste a few half-coherent thoughts that flickered through his mind. I could smell the world through his nose and I could taste his tongue sliding along his own lips.

Remember. Just look around, and I’ll try to identify him. Once we spot him or we fail to spot him, grab some food and slip out. Shouldn’t be too hard. If you get caught, just-

“I know, I know. Grovel,” Oliver said. “Not much they can do. Can’t throw me off the ship in the Atlantic.”

And with that, he breathed in, brushed his hands along his button-down shirt, and started forward. He came to an elevator, where another pair of servants – both black - were waiting. They saw him coming and quickly grabbed onto the door to keep it from skimming up without him. Once Oliver was in, he grinned to them and nodded. “Thanks, kindly. I got stuck toting food for those rich bastards upstairs.”

“Ugh,” the other black man said.

“I hear that one of the kruats is tearing drunk already,” the other one said. “So you watch yourself.”

“I will,” Oliver said, casually. He felt practiced at this kind of dissembling. I almost probed at his mind through Tjen to know more – but then stopped myself. That kind of violation of privacy would have been ... unforgivable. The temptation to simply peek was almost overpowering. It was as if knowing that it was possible made every scruple fling away from my soul. It took only biting my lower lip hard enough to almost draw blood to stop myself. By the time I had pushed the temptation aside, the elevator doors opened and Oliver whistled softly.

The central ballroom of the Spirit of St. Louis was as long as the ship, though quite a bit narrower. It had been bisected by a flat floor that moved right along the axis of the ship, so that the curved area that would have been the floor on the rest of the ship was actually a ceiling. I didn’t know how much cavorite was worked into the central floor to make it the ground, but it had to be expensive. Over that expensive cavorite was expensive marble tiles, while golden finishing gleamed from every portrait frame and statuette that lined the walls. Large tables with silken coverings had been set out, and were covered with foodstuffs. The first class passengers looked like beings from another world.

There were men in field gray dress uniforms, their chests bedecked with ribbons and medals. There were women in gowns made of shimmering fabric that seemed to have a life of its own, glittering as they walked and danced. There were rich Americans with tuxedos and tophats, laughing as they smoke cigars brought to them by quiet servants – one of the men in the center of these miasmatic gatherings was so bedecked in medals and ribbons that I was shocked he could stand. He had huge, dark black walrus mustaches and was speaking English so rapidly and so heavily accentedly that I wasn’t sure anyone around him could understand a thing he was saying.

Oliver swept his gaze around. “See him?” he whispered.

No, I admitted. No one had that harsh, narrow face, or that pencil thin mustache. People tended either towards extravagant facial hair or completely smooth cheeked.

Oliver paused as a woman as curvaceous as an hourglass, with hair the color of spun gold, clad in a dress that would have barely served as a night-gown a decade ago. She walked by with her nose in the air, a twitch to her hips accentuating the jiggle of her rump. As he watched her go, I could feel every feeling he had through the link. He smirked slightly.