Oiling The Wheels Chapter 01
Chapter 1 - Abel
The hot dust burned his lungs and his vision was blurred by the layer of grime on his goggles. He tried to prise them off but realised that his good, right arm was trapped. Isaac raised his other hand and gently pushed the goggles from his face, leaving his hand in sight for examination. It was intact, but the fingers were bent out of shape. Repairable but currently beyond the range where they were able to manipulate small tools. He looked down at his good hand. There was no blood but he was starting to feel the pain. The heavy beam was pinning his forearm and he dared not try to pull it out for fear of tearing the flesh. He couldn't trust the damaged fingers on his other hand so he twisted his body until his left foot was under the beam pinning his hand. Slowly he prised it up and slid his arm out. A quick visual inspection showed no breakage and the pain when he flexed his fingers told him that he could use it, but it would not be easy for a while.
He took a deep breath and looked round at the wreckage. He could see the city on the horizon, at least fifteen miles away. They'd come further than he had dared to imagine. Moments later he caught sight of Abel, lying half covered by wood and metal. He called, then tried to crawl towards him when he received no reply. He couldn't move. His right foot was caught under the debris. As he looked closer he could see hydraulics leaking from it, and the knee was crushed almost flat. He glanced back at the city. The alarm must have been raised by now and they had to move. He unclipped his right leg and crawled as best he could towards Abel.
He was still alive, but unconscious.
He shook him awake. “Abel, we have to move.”
Abel's eyes opened and struggled to focus. “Isaac? Did we make it?”
“Fifteen or so miles beyond the wall, but we need to get going.”
Abel raised his head and examined what was left of his torso. “You go. I'm finished.”
“I'll carry you.”
Abel smiled as best he could. “We both said that we would rather die than continue working in that god forsaken place of Bafeld-Inwic. Well it looks like I got my wish.”
He tried to move the wreckage from Abel's body but stopped when he heard him gasp. “You go, Isaac. It's ok. You have a life to lead, I've taught you as well as I could. One of us has to survive.”
Isaac's eyes dropped. “I'll stay with you.”
Abel looked down at Isaac's missing leg. “What happened?”
“It's crushed. I had to unfasten it. I can't run, I'll stay here.”
Abel reached down and unclipped his own leg. “Take mine, I'm not going to need it. You need to get away before the patrols arrive.”
“But you disabled all the transport.”
“It won't take them that long to realise. The armoury won't be able to repair them, but they still have horses. There are still some of them that remember how to ride.”
Isaac took the leg and clipped it onto his own body.
“Take the gold. And the transport parts, but you must destroy those. The city engineers will take for ever to recast replacements, but they could find ways to reinsert them.”
“But what about you?”
Abel thrust the bags into his hand. “Just go, Isaac. We flew for fifteen miles, no one has ever done anything like that before. Let everyone know what the city and the king is really like. I'll give you as much time as I can.”
Isaac looked down at the mechanism in Abel's hand, then their eyes met.
“I'm finished anyway, Isaac. I'll wait until the first patrol arrives before I use it. It should give you a decent start. Now just go.”
He swallowed hard and bent down to kiss his mentor on the forehead. Then he stood up and slung the bags over his shoulder and set off for the port of Millsford.
Abel's leg was a little shorter than his own, so it took him a while to accommodate the difference. By the time he entered the town, he appeared to have nothing worse than a pronounced limp. That would hardly be noticed amongst the detritus that gravitated to a town like Millsford, but the high quality of the bronze of his left hand would need to be kept hidden from the prying eyes of the general riff-raff. He needed to find somewhere to do some minor repairs on it before he left.
He rounded the next corner and found himself in the middle of a market. He rushed past the stalls of fruit and pies but couldn't find what he wanted. The sacks over his shoulder were starting to attract the stallholders' eyes.
He quickly looked around for what seemed the least ignorant. “Can you tell me if there is a metal artificer in this town?”
The stallholder moved his gaze from Isaac's shoulder and screwed up his eyes.
Isaac shook his head. “Ok, is there a blacksmith?”
The stallholder pointed and Isaac set off as fast as Abel's leg would let him, but he could feel the eyes pressing into his back.
As he hobbled through the back streets he could hear the sound of a hammer beating time on an anvil until the rhythm was interrupted by the sound of a distant explosion, and his path was blocked by a figure covered in sweat and muscles staring towards the distant column of smoke rising into the air.
Isaac had no inclination towards social niceties nor the time to mourn his mentor. He thrust a gold coin into the blacksmith's hand. “I would like to engage your services for a little while.”
The blacksmith looked Isaac up and down then pointed at the column of smoke. “That anything to do with you?”
Isaac sighed and reached into the sack for a further coin.
Isaac was surprised how well the blacksmith could repair delicate pieces of metal and within a quarter of an hour he was reassembling his left hand. The blacksmith had straightened out the fingers but the joints were stiff and would take more time to return to their original state than he could afford. He slipped his tools back into his belt and stood up.
The blacksmith stared at his right leg. “I could sort out the length for you.”
Isaac shook his head. “I'm sure you could. If I had time. But thank you for the repairs to my hand.”
Isaac held out the hand to shake the blacksmith's own, but drew it away when the blacksmith just stared.
The docks were full of vessels. Many looked as though they were converting back to sail, but Isaac tried one which was lying low in the water and should be ready to leave.
The captain shook his head. “Not a chance mate. I've cargo starting to rot. The engine has failed. My so-called engineer says he needs spare parts. These days the city keeps its machine parts to itself.”
He looked round the deck. There were signs of chips of wood still on the deck and his nose detected no rotting smell. Probably an illegal cargo of timber set for Anthorpe.
Isaac set to go, but the captain caught sight of his left hand as he turned. “Who made the hand?”
Isaac slipped the hand back in his pocket. “It's not functional. It's just for decoration.”
The captain chuckled. “I'm not going to give you away, but if you made that yourself you could earn your passage if you can do better with the engine than that bastard engineer.”
The engineer could not have been more than fourteen years old. He was covered in grease and had parts of the engine spread out on the floor. As he turned, Isaac could see clear patches on his face beneath his eyes.
The main drive gears seemed to be intact. Isaac breathed out. Any repairs to them would have required a recasting, something that he could not do quickly and certainly not on the boat. He bent down and examined one of the cogs on the floor. It was badly worn, but was missing several teeth. A quick glance round the floor showed several more in the same sorry state. He pulled the bag of parts close to his chest and thought of Abel's instructions to destroy them, but his mind was already sizing up the broken parts on the floor and matching them up to the ones in the bag.
He sat down next to the boy. “Can you put these back into place?”
“But they're broken. They won't work.”
Isaac smiled and pulled a cog out of the bag and placed it next to the first broken one. “I think this will serve as a replacement for the moment.”
The boy's eyes widened. He picked up the cog. “What metal is this?”
“We need to sail now. What's your name anyway?”
The boy lifted his eyes. “It's Gery.”
“Ok Gery, no more questions. Start putting the engine back together and hand me any of the broken parts, I'll find something to replace it. When we are out of port, we can talk.”
Abel had made a great sacrifice to enable him to escape. He thought of the patrol that had found their flying machine before Abel blew it, and them, apart. Abel had been single minded in using all means to cover their tracks. As he looked across at the young engineer reassembling the engine, Isaac wondered if he could be just as ruthless.