The Hesit of New Boston

     Carmen and I raised our Thompsons down the steamy metallic hallway from our spots outside the engine room’s door. Fitzpatrick twisted and turned his contraption attempting to lockpick the door. Each click he made annoyed me. His usefulness had been exaggerated, and his delay was only the cherry on the sundae. The visibility was low, and the submachine gun shook impatiently in my hands. Heavy, methodical footsteps continued from around the corner. They grew louder as the autos got closer; the only noise that could drown out the immense humming from the aircity’s propulsion below us. I felt uncomfortable using the Thompson, its weight and design were unfit for my responsibilities. It was more of a deterrence than anything, and mostly useless against autos as I had seen years ago. My Remington, on the other hand, was always close to my heart. The war made paranoid dogs of us all.

     “Fitz,” I said with my back to him. “We’re running out of time.”

     “Almost got it,” he said with obvious focus.

The auto’s footsteps grew louder. They vibrated through my chest, and I could not tell if my heart matched their rhythm or if the fear was overtaking me. For a moment, I was back in no man’s land, rushing behind the autos as they eviscerated the boys in their trenches. I saw the fear in their youthful eyes as bullets ripped them apart, splashing me in their gore. At the time, I was glad the autos were ours, now, my stomach turns knowing the unmerciful, unrelenting violence they were capable of.

Sweat beaded down my damp forehead and I quickly wiped it away with the back of my hand, but to no effect. I looked down at the dirt packed onto the back of my moist hand, but shook out of it, quickly returning my attention to the steam. The temperature this close to the engine room had steadily risen. It made perfect sense why the T corporation used autos to maintain the lower decks. If one overheated and stopped working, they just had to collect the Ether from the machine and send in more to take over its tasks. They had no lacking of robotic slaves to throw into the toil.

     There was a final click and snap, and Fitz quickly slid the door open, weaseling into the engine room with haste and swinging the case down.

“I told you I could get it,” Fitz grinned at Carmen.

She rolled her eyes and moved her head to me, and I went in after Fitz. She kept the submachine gun raised until she came in and closed the door. I let the Thompson hang from its strap around my chest and started to pace as I came up with a new plan.

     “Lock the door,” I said quickly as I thought.

Carmen raised the gun and shot the lock off.

     “It’s locked,” she said, turning to Fitz, quickly grabbing him by the collar, and slamming him into the wall. “What the hell was that?”

     “If you’re referring to our current situation, I say you, dear Carmen, are the one in our little group that has a proclivity to violently and impulsively react to your emotional states,” Fitz explained quickly and calmly, his hand drifting down towards the hidden pistol secured to his waist. “And if I might add, how aft of you to instantly try to pin this on me. That isn’t suspicious at all.”

     “How dare you, you little weasel,” growled Carmen in his face. “When we get out of here, I’m going to—”

     “Quiet!” I shouted at them. “I’m trying to think! Fitz, do your job!”

     “On it, boss,” Fitz said smirking at Carmen. She let go of him and he went over to inspect the engine control.

     “Carmen, what’s the fastest way off this ship?” I asked.

     “That depends,” she started. “Do you prefer falling or bullet fire?”

     “I’m serious, dammit!” I shouted again. “I’m trying to get us all out of here with our heads.”

     “Too soon, boss,” Fitz said with his back to us.

     “I’m getting tired of both of your attitudes,” I snarled. “Maybe I should shoot you both when this is done?” That shut them up. “Good,” I continued, having regained control. “Now, Carmen?”

     “The only way on or off this rig is the elevator or skybike, and I don’t know about you, but I don’t see any bikes hanging around.”

     “They don’t have any fail safes for all the people?”

     “Nope. T corp. was that confident,” Carmen laughed. “Plus, everyone here paid up front so no skin off their back.”

     “Fitz, could you rig something up?”

     “A little busy here.”

     “Just answer me quickly, then!”

     “Fine,” Fitz scoffed. “With the rock, I might be able to, and that’s a heavy might. It entirely depends on our ability to get out of this room alive and then find some form of…” He trailed off. “Honestly, boss, the chances are slim.”

     “Just think about it,” I responded. “Carmen, any way you could get us back to the elevator?”

     “Do fishes eat their babies?” Laughed Carmen. I stared her down. “The answer is: I don’t know, but probably not.”

     “Figure out how to. You’re both giving me slim pickings, but slim is better than a flat-out no,” I said. “Fitz, how long on the engine? Autos are almost here.”

     “There’s a bit of a problem, boss,” Fitz said, scratching his head.

     “What is it this time?” I responded impatiently.

     “They changed their engine design,” he explained. “I’m not familiar with this one.”

     “So? We’re not here for the engine.”

     “That’s just the thing. This was supposed to be multisystem; this only has one.”

     “I’m still not understanding the issue here, Fitz.”

     “On a multisystem, we can just take one rock, and it won’t compromise the system,” Fitz continued. “This baby runs off one single massive rock.”

     “So, shave off a piece.”

     “This is highly volatile stuff, boss. If it went off, it could be worse than London. That was only pebbles. This, well, this is no pebble.”

     “Then, take the whole goddamn thing, Fitz!” I shouted angrily. “We don’t have time for this!”

     “Boss, this whole airship runs off this rock,” Fitz continued. “And probably some of New York. If we take the whole thing, well… I don’t have to explain what—”

     “Yes, I get the point,” I said, taking a moment to think. “How long would we have till the backups fail?”

     “Ten minutes, unless…”

     “Unless what, Fitz? We’re running out of time.”

     “Unless they were just damaged when the autos attacked us.”

     “Dammit.”

     I could still hear Julie’s screams ringing in my ears as the security autos caught her in their line of fire. The footsteps of the autos were right on us. Carmen pressed herself against the wall next to the door.

I turned to Fitz, and looking into his eyes, said: “Do it.”

     “Alright, boss,” Fitz said with a shrug, returning to his work.

     “How long?” I continued.

     “Well, this is a highly delicate and complicated operation, but I’m a genius, so ten, fifteen minutes.”

     “Okay, ten minutes,” I said, turning to Carmen. “How long can you give us with the autos?”

     “Barely even five minutes.”

     “You two are going to have to compromise,” I said to them. Fitz and Carmen exchanged glances.

     “Fine,” Carmen said with a scoff. She shot the door handle off and opened the door. I ran to her.

     “Wait, what’s your plan?”

     “To get you your ten minutes.”

     “Those autos will mow you down.”

     “So, I better be fast,” Carmen said with a smile. She kissed me on the cheek. “Don’t worry, Ellis. This is what you hired me for.”

     “I’ll see you in Chicago,” I responded. My hand trailed along her side as she turned to run into the steamy hallway. I hesitated, watching her silhouette disappear with a lump in my throat. When the gunfire started, I winced and closed the door. After a moment of gathering myself, I looked up. “Fitz?”

     “I’m going, boss.”

     “We can’t lose any more people,” I continued.

     “So, we best finish this quickly.”

     “Right,” I responded. I grabbed the Thompson and peeked out the door, seeing only steam and darkness. The gunfire had trailed down the hallway away from us. Every shot I heard gave me hope. As long as I could hear gunfire, I knew Carmen was alive.

     “Ok, boss,” Fitz said standing up. “I need your help with this part. And you won’t be needing the Thompson anymore.”

     A few moments later we were crawling through the drive shaft of the engine. It was tight and uncomfortable, reminding me of the trenches and what must have been going through the German soldiers’ heads that day. Crawling through piles of dead comrades and friends, surrounded by dirt and muck and blood. The horror. Then I would come along and finish the job.

     “It’s good you sent her out there,” Fitz started.

     “What d’you mean?”

     “I overheard her talking to Julie. They were gonna rub us out once we got the rock.”

     “What’re you talking about?” I said as we reached the engine core. Blue lightning sparked from the machinery and struck the Etherium core that levitated in the center of the chamber.

     “That’s why I alerted the autos,” Fitz continued as he turned a knob with his wrench. The lightning stopped. “Slide in here now, quickly.”

     “You alerted the autos?!” I hesitated.

     “Boss, hurry! I turned off the energy transfer.”

     “Wait, Fitz—"

     “Listen to me, Carmen was not on the up and up. I know your history with her runs red, but she’s dead now. Those autos will have killed her. Now I need you to pull up those big boy trousers and help me push this rock out of this tube!”

     A fire burned inside me. My entire crew had turned on each other and had fallen apart right before my eyes. But we still had a mission to conduct, and I still had a long journey to get through. I gritted my teeth and helped Fitz with the rock.

     The aircity shook and dropped. My heart jumped as we all felt freefall until the heavy thud of the backups turning on stabilized the city's descent.

     I looked at Fitz, seeing a different man, and together we rolled the rock out and placed it into the case.

     “So, who’s the buyer?” Fitz asked as he closed the case’s lid and reached for his waist.

     “The Germans,” I said as I pulled my Remington from its holster by my heart, pointed it at the back of Fitz’s head and fired. His brains splashed across the room and all over the wall. I lifted the case by its handle and carried it out of the room.

     A defused red light blinked through the steam; an indicator of the emergency backups being activated. I hastily made my way through the damp heat and towards the rendezvous before more autos came to deal with me.

     The airlock swung open to the open air, the loud howling of the wind blasting in. The sudden shift in pressure briefly knocked me off my balance. I pressed forward, feeling no need to close the hatch behind me.

The great fans below chugged away desperately trying to keep the city from falling. I found my skybike hidden right where it should be.

     “It was all a show, wasn’t it?” Said Carmen from behind my back. I turned to her, seeing the disheartened red eyes I had only seen once before, and a pistol in her hand. “You were going to kill us after getting the rock, then you’d safely fly away. Why?”

     I thought about telling her the truth; about the horrors I had seen of children massacred by unfeeling killing machines, and my duty to prevent it from ever happening again.

     “There’s another bike,” I lied and pointed. “Just down the way.”

     Carmen shook her head. “No, stop. Not like this.”

     I stepped closer. “Carmen, please hurry before the backups—”

     “I’ll shoot you right here, Ellis. Don’t try it.”

     “You need to go now, so we can meet in Chicago,” I stepped closer, placing my hand over my heart. “Don’t you love me, Carmen? Trust me, because I love you and I wouldn’t lie to you. Go to the bike.”

I reached for the Remington, and she shot my hand.

     “I told you, Ellis!”

     I glared at her, knowing I only had one option left to save the children of the future. I calculated and lunged. All she had to do was shoot.

     I fell to the ground, a bullet wound in my chest, and blood leaking from my body.

     “Carmen,” I said as she stepped over my body and picked up the case.

     “I loved you, Ellis. A long time ago.”

     Carmen left me to the wind’s howl. I gently closed my eyes and laughed while I waited for the city's backups to fail and together, we would plummet a thousand feet to the Earth.