London, Winter - 1941
He counted six of them altogether, vague spectres of grey and black lurching drunkenly through the thick curtain of afternoon fog. Thomas ducked in to the entry of a courtyard, his back pressed awkwardly against the sharp grain of the stone, watching the six shambling figures move eastward towards the market square.
Tin men, he thought with distaste. Ryder’s clockwork lackeys.
Thomas waited until they had vanished completely into the fog, kicking up faint swirling eddies of grey in their wake. He shivered, wrapping his arms protectively around his thin chest. The air was bitingly cold by the river and the lamps were still alight along the thoroughfare, glimmering dully through the dense pall of fog that had flung itself across the city. Winter was settling in at last, thought Thomas, his mood lifting as he stepped back out on to the cobbled road, the street now empty and silent once more. He slipped in to an alleyway that took him west, running parallel with the river, careful to keep amongst the shadows and broken lines of the buildings, just as the professor had taught him. Here, at least, he was downwind of the stench that drifted across from the airship factories at this time of day. That side of the Thames had an odour all of its own, a vile mix of rotting flesh, machine oil and bodily waste that choked the air like a thick, black, pall of smoke from an industrial chimney stack. On his left the buildings slouched in squalid negligence; their windows cracked and dark, gables gnarled, malformed, thrusting obtrusively onto the street below.
Something moved in the fog a little further up the street, the briefest flash of copper and chrome amidst the veil of grey, burning fiercely through the gloom. Instinctively Thomas slipped sideways in to a shop doorway as the soft tock-tock of internal ratchets and gears tumbled across the chilly air towards him.
The thing was on him before he had time to register or react; breath catching suddenly in his throat as cold fingers of steel clamped themselves against his windpipe. Thomas shifted his free arm awkwardly, trying to reach the stinger in his jacket pocket. The hand tightened a little in warning, prompting Thomas to rethink his actions.
The blow came without warning, causing his legs to buckle, and knocking the wind from his sails in the process. He fell forward, his head hitting the wall on the journey downwards.
His vision was becoming clouded, hazed with a sort of grey mist, yet even so Thomas knew that the thing that was stomping towards him was real enough and not some fevered by-product of the blow he’d taken to the skull.
It was a twisted abhorrence; a thing that had once been a man, carved out of his worst nightmares. Flesh and bone and steel and iron were fused together in a mockery of the human form; its shrivelled remains caged within a metal frame that criss-crossed the length of its entire body – or, at least, what there was left of it.
“Check for weapons before you move him.” The voice was like a steel gauntlet punching a hole into the air. “And go easy, there, Mr Ryder wants him undamaged.”
More of the metal creatures emerged from the fog, their rusty joints screeching in protest as they pounded across the cobbles, encircling the semi-conscious Thomas. Rough hands began pulling at his great coat, at his shirt, ripping the material in their frenzied search.
They grabbed him again, clamping tight bands of rough steel around his wrists and ankles, lifting him clear of the pavement, until he swung uncomfortably back and forth above the cold cobblestones. They stomped off, carrying Thomas between them like the dead spoils of a big-game hunting party, moving south, with the river at their backs.
The last thing he heard was the mechanical hooting of a steamship down in the harbour, before a black flower unfolded itself at the centre of his vision, and Thomas tumbled down into the darkness.
* * * *
“ –almost gave– "
“ –down there, lads.”
Voices rushed at him from out of the darkness. Vague snippets of sound that tugged him slowly back towards consciousness.
There was something standing beside him, so close he could have reached out and touched it. It was one of the things that had attacked him by the river – one of Ryder’s tin men – he could smell the machine oil, and the decay.
Thomas spat the grass from out of his mouth and dragged his aching body into a sitting position; silver stars dancing briefly across his vision. He seemed to be in some kind of circus tent. The air was hot and uncomfortably sticky, with a strong underlying smell of damp earth and rotting canvas. Sweat was running off his forehead and stinging his eyes.
He tried to speak, to ask where he was, where they had brought him, but his throat was too dry, and only a meaningless jumble of sounds fell from his lips.
One of the metal men stepped forward and shoved Thomas roughly back onto the ground, its lips pulled back in a ghoulish grin. “Stay where you are, lad. The boss has been waiting a long time to have a word with you.”
“Never a truer word spoken.” said a disembodied voice from the other side of the tent. It seemed to be coming from somewhere inside the darkness that clung to the corners of the canvas like silken webs.
Something moved within the shadows, skittering across the hard ground towards him. It was accompanied by a strange, metallic chittering noise; a sound that seemed caught halfway between the squeal of rusting metal and a wet, throaty cough.
Ryder clattered from out of the darkness, the pistons in his eight spider-like legs belching tiny clouds of steam into the cloying air of the tent. His shrivelled, dwarfish body swung awkwardly in the leather harness that hung from the centre of the monstrous iron support frame. In one wizened, claw-like hand he held the crushed remains of Thomas’ stinger.
“I know what yer thinkin’, lad. Ol’ Mr Ryder is the very epitome of the proverbial bad penny. A veritable Marley’s Ghost gliding out o’ the darkness to haunt yer long after the rum ol’ bugger was supposed to be dead.” It was Ryder’s voice all right, or as close an approximation as the artificial voice-box could get. “And you’d be right. But death ain’t for the likes o’ me. I’ve been dead once – so’s most of these lads here – and I didn’t much care for it.”
His words were met by a screech of approval from his gang of monstrous lackeys, who now arranged themselves in a rough semi-circle behind Thomas, cutting off any hope of escape.
“Wenceslas was a fool for thinking he could keep ya from me. Did he honestly believe that packin’ you off like some kind of evacuee would throw me off the scent?”
Thomas shook his head, immediately wishing that he hadn’t; he was feeling sick to the stomach and there was a dull, throbbing pain behind his eyes. “Not true. Running away to London was my idea, not Professor Wenceslas. He was against the idea.”
“‘E knows I’ve got spies everywhere, that’s why. Knows it’s no use runnin’ from me, I’ll always get ya in the end.” Ryder laughed. It was a horrible sound, like sharp chips of ice being pushed into the brain. It rattled the tiny speakers of the voice-box, causing Thomas to jam the palms of his hands against his ears.
Ryder jabbed a talon-like fingernail at the air in front of Thomas. “Caused me a lot of time an’ trouble you ‘ave, chasing ya ‘alfway across the bleedin’ country. Why Wenceslas wanted to go puttin’ these ideas into yer ‘ead in the first place is beyond me. Complete waste o’ time."
He nodded and two of his lackeys stomped forward, scooping Thomas off the floor, propping him up on shaky legs.
“I didn’t ask for this. Why don’t you just leave me alone.” Thomas said. He was tired now, all he wanted to do was curl up somewhere and sleep. “Please, I just want to be left alone.”
“Sorry, can’t do that.” Ryder said. “Ya should know that by now. You’ve got what I want, what I need – what Wenceslas gave ya.” he tapped his chest. “An’ I’m takin’ it. With your ‘elp this reeking colony of freaks an’ degenerates are gonna be taken seriously for once.” The smile froze on Ryder’s lips, then he said, “Open ‘im up, lads."
They dragged him to the rear of the tent, where a small, rust-stained operating table stood, partly obscured by the gloom; the frayed leather straps biting into the sensitive flesh at his wrists and ankles as they secured him to the table. They crowded in around him, a glint of something sharp and smooth and solid in their hands as they each took a surgical tool from the nearby tray.
The moment was worse than he could ever have imagined as they snipped away his clothes and began to tear carelessly into his body with the jagged, almost blunt edges of their instruments; cutting the flesh from his arms and torso, before using their hands to pull at the skin, stripping it all the way back to his neck and genitals.
Thomas screamed and screamed until one of the metal men gruffly told him to give it a rest, stuffing a dirty, foul-smelling rag into his mouth to stem the noise, causing him to gag.
Once the flesh had been torn away they snapped the bones of his ribcage, one by one, the sound like gunfire inside the tent. Beneath the smears of blood and clumps of tissue they found what they had been looking for, the first glimmer of polished silver; smooth, unblemished and unbroken.
Ryder clattered forward, peering excitedly into Thomas’s shattered torso. “To the victor, the spoils.” he muttered, drool hanging from his thin lips.
The table was adjusted quickly, the back half swinging upwards so that what remained of Thomas could be displayed in all its glory.
“Now, that weren’t so bad, was it?” Ryder said, taking a few steps back in order to admire the handiwork. “Don’t know what all that fuss was for – screamin’ an’ carrying on so. Waste o’ time filling ya ‘ead with all these emotions and ideas. Not like ya’s human, is it? Still, what do ya expect with a fool like Wenceslas.” He shook his head sadly, gazing at the thing strapped to the small operating table with a mixture of amusement and pity.
Across the river Big Ben began to chime the hour, its peals rolling across the city towards them like the thundering reports of a mighty cannon, shaking Ryder from his reverie. He rubbed his withered hands together in uncontrollable glee.
“Now that Wenceslas’ device is ours we’ll be unstoppable.” he said. “Unstoppable. With a weapon as powerful as this not even Hitler’s mighty War Machines will be able to stand in our way. The engines of change are beginnin’ to hum, my lads, an’ for once we’ll be the ones stokin’ the boilers.” Ryder gestured at thing that was once Thomas. “Clean it up, we’ve got an appointment with the King to keep.”
* * * *
It was raining softly as the procession of brightly coloured trucks reached the bottom of the hill and turned out onto the road that would take them across London towards Westminster; worn tires splashing through the deep puddles of muddy water that had collected along the bomb-damaged road.
Even though the paint had begun to peel on the side of the truck at the rear of the little convoy, the words could still be read quite distinctly; red lettering shining out from the faded white background, despite the ever worsening weather and the lateness of the hour.
Anyone who happened to see this jolly little procession passing by would smile as they read the words The Chaos Exhibition – a carnival of grotesques, ghouls and unnaturals exhibited for your entertainment and amusement.
But it was getting dark now. Soon the air-raid sirens would be calling out their warnings, encouraging folk to climb into their shelters, sealing the doors shut behind them, safe against the unmanned German bombers that would inevitably appear overhead, like dark chalk Xs upon the evening sky.
For now, as they closed their doors against the gathering dusk, the people had other things on their minds, and the procession of brightly coloured trucks was all but forgotten.
First published in Voices From The Past in April 2011.
