Perdido Street Station Part 37

In one slick movement, Isaac turned to his laboratory worktable and scooped up two huge gla.s.s flasks of discoloured liquid, still spinning on his heels, and hurled them over the rail at the invading officers like bombs.

The first three militia through the door had regained their feet, only to be caught in the shower of gla.s.s and chymical rain. One of the ma.s.sive jars shattered on the helmet of one officer, who hit the floor again, motionless and bleeding. Vicious shards bounced off the others' armour. The two militia caught by the deluge were still for a moment, then began to shriek suddenly as the chymicals seeped through their masks and began to attack the soft tissues of their faces.

There was still no gunfire.

Isaac turned again and began to grab more jars, taking a moment to pick strategically, so that the effects of the cascading chymicals were not entirely random. Why don't they shoot? Why don't they shoot? he thought giddily. he thought giddily.

The wounded officers had been pulled out into the street. In their place, a phalanx of heavily armoured officers had entered, bearing iron shields with reinforced gla.s.s windows through which they stared. Behind them, Isaac saw two officers getting ready to attack with khepri stingboxes.

They must want us alive! he realized. The stingbox could kill, easily, but it could also not. If deaths were all that were desired, it would have been far easier for Rudgutter to send conventional troops, with flintlocks and crossbows, than such rare agents as humans trained in stingbox. he realized. The stingbox could kill, easily, but it could also not. If deaths were all that were desired, it would have been far easier for Rudgutter to send conventional troops, with flintlocks and crossbows, than such rare agents as humans trained in stingbox.

Isaac hurled a double salvo of trow-iron dust and sanguimorph distillate at the defensive huddle, but the guards were quick, and the jars were shattered with twitching shields. The militia danced to avoid the dangerous gobbets.

Each of the two officers behind the shield-bearers spun their jagged twin flails.

The stingboxes themselves-metaclockwork engines of intricate and extraordinary khepri design-were attached to the officers' belts, each the size of a small bag. Attached to each side was a long cord, thick wires swathed in metal coils, then insulating rubber, extendible more than twenty feet. About two feet from the end of each cord was a polished wooden handle, one of which each officer held in each hand. They used these to whirl the ends of the cords at terrible speed. Something glimmered almost invisibly. At the tip of each tendril, Isaac knew, was a vicious little metal p.r.o.ng, a weighted clutch of barbs and spikes. These tips varied. Some were solid, the best-made expanded like cruel flowers on impact. All were designed to fly heavy and true, to puncture armour and flesh, to grip without mercy inside torn flesh.

Derkhan had reached the table and was huddling by Lemuel. Isaac turned to grab more ammunition. In the moment of silence, Derkhan raised herself quickly on one knee and peered over the tip of the table, taking aim with her great pistol.

She pulled the trigger. At the same instant, one of the officers let fly with his stingbox.

Derkhan was a decent shot. Her ball flew into the viewing window of one of the militia shields, which she had judged its weak point. But she had underestimated the militia's defences. The porthole cracked violently and spectacularly, whitened completely with shards of gla.s.sdust and a crack-lattice, but its structure was interlaced with copper wire, and it held. The militiaman staggered, then stood solid.

The officer with the stingbox moved like an expert.

He swung up his arms at the same moment in sweeping curves, flicking the little switches in the wooden handles that allowed the cords to slide through them, releasing them. The momentum of the twirling blades took them flying through the air in a flash of metallic grey.

Cord unravelled almost without friction from inside the stingbox, through the air and the wooden handles, slowing the blades hardly at all. Their curving flight was absolutely true. The jagged weights flew in a long, elliptical motion through the air, the curve shallowing rapidly as the cables attaching them to the stingbox extended.

The buds of sharpened steel smacked simultaneously into each side of Derkhan's chest. She screamed and staggered, her teeth gritting as the pistol fell from her spasming fingers.

Instantly, the officer pressed the catch on his stingbox to release the pent-up clockwork within.

There was a sputtering whirr. The hidden coils of the motor began to unwind, twirling like a dynamo and generating waves of weird current. Derkhan danced and spasmed, agonized yells spurting out from behind her teeth. Little bursts of blue light exploded like whiplashes from her hair and fingers.

The officer watched her intently, twiddling the dials on his stingbox that controlled the intensity and form of the power. There was a violent, cracking jolt and Derkhan flew backwards against the wall, collapsing to the floor.

The second officer sent his sharp bulbs over the edge of the table, hoping to catch Lemuel, but he was flattened hard against the wood and they flew harmlessly around him. The officer pressed a stud and the cords rapidly retracted back into a ready position.

Lemuel stared at the stricken Derkhan and hefted his pistols.

Isaac bellowed in rage. He hurled another vast pot of unstable thaumaturgic compound at the militia. It fell short, but burst with such violence that it splashed onto and over the shields, mixing with the distillate and sending two officers screaming to the floor as their skin became parchment and their blood ink.

An amplified voice burst through the door. It was Mayor Rudgutter's.

"Stop these attacks. Be sensible. You aren't going to get out. Stop attacking us and we will show mercy."

Rudgutter stood in the midst of his honour guard with Eliza Stem-Fulcher. It was highly unusual for him to accompany a militia raid, but this was no ordinary raid. He was stationed across the road and a little way along from Isaac's workshop.

It was not yet completely dark. Alarmed and curious faces peered from windows up and down the street. Rudgutter ignored them. He took the funnel of iron away from his mouth and turned to Eliza Stem-Fulcher. His face was creased in irritation.

"This is an absolute b.l.o.o.d.y shambles," he said. She nodded. "Well, however inefficient they are, the militia can't lose. A few officers might be killed, regrettably, but there's no way der Grimnebulin and his cohorts are getting out of there." The faces peeking nervously from behind windows all around suddenly annoyed him.

He raised the loudhailer sharply and yelled into it: "Get back into your houses immediately!"

There was a gratifying flurry of curtains. Rudgutter stood back and watched as the warehouse shuddered.

Lemuel dispatched the other stingbox-wielder with one elegant and careful shot. Isaac hurled his table down the stairs taking two officers with it when they had tried to rush him, and now he continued with his chymical sniping. Yagharek was helping him, at his direction, showering the attackers with noxious mixtures.

But this was all, could not but be, doomed valiance. There were too many militia. It helped that they were not prepared to kill, because Isaac and Lemuel and Yagharek had no such constraints. Isaac estimated that four militia had fallen: one to a bullet; one to a crushed skull; and two to random chymico-thaumaturgic reactions. But it could not last. The militia advanced on Lemuel behind their shields.

Isaac saw the militia look up and confer for a minute. Then one of them raised a flintlock rifle carefully, aiming it at Yagharek.

"Down, Yag!" he yelled. "They'll kill you you!"

Yagharek dropped to the floor, out of sight of the a.s.sa.s.sin.

There was no sudden manifestation, no creeping flesh or vast stalking figure. All that happened was that the Weaver's voice sounded in Rudgutter's ear.

. . . I I HAVE BOUNDED UNSEEN UP TANGLING WIRES OF SKYNESS AND SLIPPED MY LEGS SPLAYED w.i.l.l.y-NILLY ON THE PSYCHIC DUNG OF THE WEB-REAVERS THEY ARE LOW CREATURES AND INELEGANT AND DRAB WHISPER WHAT HAPPENS HAVE BOUNDED UNSEEN UP TANGLING WIRES OF SKYNESS AND SLIPPED MY LEGS SPLAYED w.i.l.l.y-NILLY ON THE PSYCHIC DUNG OF THE WEB-REAVERS THEY ARE LOW CREATURES AND INELEGANT AND DRAB WHISPER WHAT HAPPENS M MR. M MAYOR THIS PLACE TREMBLES . . .

Rudgutter started. That's all I need, That's all I need, he thought. He replied with a firm voice. he thought. He replied with a firm voice.

"Weaver," he said. Stem-Fulcher turned to him with a sharp, curious gaze. "How nice to have you with us."

It's too d.a.m.ned unpredictable, Rudgutter thought furiously. Rudgutter thought furiously. Not now, not b.l.o.o.d.y now! Go and chase the moths, go hunting . . . what are you Not now, not b.l.o.o.d.y now! Go and chase the moths, go hunting . . . what are you doing doing here? here? The Weaver was infuriating and dangerous, and Rudgutter had taken a calculated risk in engaging its aid. A loose cannon was still a lethal weapon. The Weaver was infuriating and dangerous, and Rudgutter had taken a calculated risk in engaging its aid. A loose cannon was still a lethal weapon.

Rudgutter had thought that the great spider and he had something of an arrangement arrangement. As much, at least, as it was possible to maintain with a Weaver. Kapnellior had helped him. Textorology was a tentative field, but it had borne some fruit. There were proven methods of communication, and Rudgutter had been using them to interact with the Weaver. Messages carved into the blades of scissors and melted. Apparently random sculptures, lit from below, whose shadows wrote messages across the ceiling. The Weaver's responses were prompt and delivered even more bizarrely.

Rudgutter had politely bade the Weaver busy itself chasing the moths. Rudgutter could not order, of course, could only suggest. But the Weaver had responded positively, and Rudgutter realized that stupidly, absurdly, he had begun to think of it as his agent.

No more of that.

Rudgutter cleared his throat. "Might I ask why you have joined us, Weaver?"

The voice came again, resonating in his ear, bouncing on the bones inside his head.

. . . INSIDE AND OUTSIDE THE FIBRES ARE SPLIT AND BURST AND A TRAIL IS TORN ACROSS THE WARP OF THE WORLDWEB WHERE COLOURS ARE BLED AND WAN I I HAVE SLID ACROSS THE SKY BELOW THE SURFACE AND DANCED ALONG THE RENT WITH TEARS OF MISERY AT THE UGLY RUIN WHICH STEMS AND SPREADS AND BEGINS IN THIS PLACE . . . HAVE SLID ACROSS THE SKY BELOW THE SURFACE AND DANCED ALONG THE RENT WITH TEARS OF MISERY AT THE UGLY RUIN WHICH STEMS AND SPREADS AND BEGINS IN THIS PLACE . . .

Rudgutter nodded slowly as the sense of the words emerged. "It started from here," he agreed. "This is the centre. This is the source. Unfortunately . . ." He spoke very carefully. "Unfortunately, this is a somewhat inopportune moment. Might I prevail on you to investigate this-which is indeed the birthplace of the problem-in a little while?"

Stem-Fulcher was watching him. Her face was fraught. She listened intently to his responses.

For a strange moment, all the sounds around them ceased. The shots and yells from the warehouse momentarily died. There were no creaks or clanks from the militia's arms. Stem-Fulcher's mouth was open, as she hovered ready to speak, but she said nothing. The Weaver was silent.

Then there was a whispering sound inside Rudgutter's skull. He gasped in consternation, then opened his mouth in outright dismay. He did not know how he knew, but he was listening to the uncanny sound of the Weaver picking its way across various dimensions towards the warehouse.

The officers bore down on Lemuel with a remorseless precision. They tramped across Vermishank's corpse. They held their shields triumphantly before them.

Above, Isaac and Yagharek had run out of chymicals. Isaac was bellowing, hurling chairs and slats of wood and rubbish at the militia. They deflected them with ease.

Derkhan was as motionless as Lublamai, who lay still on a cot in the corner of Isaac's living s.p.a.ce.

Lemuel let out a desperate yell of rage and swung his powderhorn at his attackers, spraying them with acrid gunpowder. He fumbled for his tinderbox, but they were on him, truncheons swinging. The officer with the stingbox approached, twirling his blades.

The air in the centre of the warehouse vibrated uncannily.

Two militiamen were approaching this unstable patch, and they paused in puzzlement. Isaac and Yagharek each carried one end of an enormous bench, ready to hurl it at the officers below. Each caught sight of the phenomenon. They stopped moving and watched.

Like some eldritch flower, a patch of organic darkness bloomed from nothing in the centre of the room. It expanded into physical reality with the animal ease of a stretching cat. It opened itself, and it stood to fill the room, a colossal segmented thing, a ma.s.sive spider-presence that hummed with power and sucked the light out of the air.

The Weaver.

Yagharek and Isaac dropped the bench simultaneously.

The militia stopped pummelling Lemuel and turned, alerted by the changing nature of the aether.

Everyone stopped and stared, utterly aghast.

The Weaver had manifested standing directly over two trembling officers. They let out little cries of terror. One dropped his sword as his fingers numbed. The other, more bravely but no less ineffectually, raised a pistol in his violently shaking hand.

The Weaver looked down at the two men. It raised its pair of human hands. As they cringed, it brought one hand down on each of their heads, patting them like dogs.

It raised its hand and pointed up at the walkway, where Isaac and Yagharek stood dumbfounded and afraid. Its unearthly singsong voice resonated in the suddenly quiet room.

. . . OVER AND UP IN THE LITTLE Pa.s.sAGE IT WAS IT WAS BORN THE CRINGING THUMB THE TWISTED RUNT THAT FREED ITS SIBLINGS IT CRACKED THE SEAL ON ITS SWADDLING AND BURST OUT I I SMELL THE REMNANTS OF ITS BREAKFAST STILL LOLLING OH SMELL THE REMNANTS OF ITS BREAKFAST STILL LOLLING OH I I LIKE THIS LIKE THIS I I ENJOY THIS WEB THE WEFT IS INTRICATE AND FINE THOUGH TORN WHO HERE CAN SPIN WITH SUCH ROBUST AND NAIVE EXPERTISE . . . ENJOY THIS WEB THE WEFT IS INTRICATE AND FINE THOUGH TORN WHO HERE CAN SPIN WITH SUCH ROBUST AND NAIVE EXPERTISE . . .

The Weaver's head moved with alien smoothness from one to the other side. It took in the room in its multiple and glinting eyes. Still no humans moved.

From outside came Rudgutter's voice. It was tense. Angry.

"Weaver!" he shouted. "I have a gift and a message for you!" There was a moment of silence, and then a pair of pearl-handled scissors came skittering through the door of the warehouse. The Weaver clasped its hands in a very human motion of delight. From outside came the distinctive sound of scissors being opened and closed.

. . . LOVELY LOVELY, moaned the Weaver, moaned the Weaver, THE SNIPSNAP OF SUPPLICATION AND YET THOUGH THEY SMOOTH EDGES AND ROUGH FIBRES WITH COLD NOISE AN EXPLOSION IN REVERSE A FUNNELLING IN A FOCUS THE SNIPSNAP OF SUPPLICATION AND YET THOUGH THEY SMOOTH EDGES AND ROUGH FIBRES WITH COLD NOISE AN EXPLOSION IN REVERSE A FUNNELLING IN A FOCUS I I MUST TURN MAKE PATTERNS HERE WITH AMATEURS UNKNOWING ARTISTS TO UNPICK THE CATASTROPHIC TEARING THERE IS BRUTE ASYMMETRY IN THE BLUE VISAGES THAT WILL NOT DO IT CANNOT BE THAT THE RIPPED UP WEB IS DARNED WITHOUT PATTERNS AND IN THE MINDS OF THESE DESPERATE AND GUILTY AND BEREFT ARE EXQUISITE TAPESTRIES OF DESIRE THE DAPPLED GANG PLAIT YEARNINGS FOR FRIENDS FEATHERS SCIENCE JUSTICE GOLD . . . MUST TURN MAKE PATTERNS HERE WITH AMATEURS UNKNOWING ARTISTS TO UNPICK THE CATASTROPHIC TEARING THERE IS BRUTE ASYMMETRY IN THE BLUE VISAGES THAT WILL NOT DO IT CANNOT BE THAT THE RIPPED UP WEB IS DARNED WITHOUT PATTERNS AND IN THE MINDS OF THESE DESPERATE AND GUILTY AND BEREFT ARE EXQUISITE TAPESTRIES OF DESIRE THE DAPPLED GANG PLAIT YEARNINGS FOR FRIENDS FEATHERS SCIENCE JUSTICE GOLD . . .

The Weaver's voice shivered in some crooning delight. Its legs moved suddenly at terrifying speed, picking its intricate way through the room, rippling through the s.p.a.ce.

The militia crouching over Lemuel dropped their staffs and scrabbled to get out of its way. Lemuel looked up at its arachnid bulk through swollen eyes. He raised his hands and tried to cry out in fear.

The Weaver hovered for a moment before him, then looked up at the platform above. It stepped up lightly and was instantly, incomprehensibly, on the walkway, a few feet from Isaac and Yagharek. They stared in terror at the vast and monstrous form. Those pointed spike-feet pranced towards them. They were immobilized. Yagharek tried to move backwards but the Weaver was too quick . . . SAVAGE AND IMPENETRABLE . . . SAVAGE AND IMPENETRABLE . . . it sang, and scooped Yagharek up with a sudden motion, sweeping him under its humanlike arm where he twisted and cried out like a terrified baby. it sang, and scooped Yagharek up with a sudden motion, sweeping him under its humanlike arm where he twisted and cried out like a terrified baby.

. . . BLACK AND RUSSET . . . sang the Weaver. It tottered elegantly like a dancer on her toes, moved sideways through twisted dimensions and was once more by Lemuel's cowering form. It grabbed him and bundled him dangling beside Yagharek. sang the Weaver. It tottered elegantly like a dancer on her toes, moved sideways through twisted dimensions and was once more by Lemuel's cowering form. It grabbed him and bundled him dangling beside Yagharek.

The militia stood back, dumbfounded and terrified. Mayor Rudgutter's voice sounded from outside again, but no one listened.

The Weaver stepped up and was once again on Isaac's raised living s.p.a.ce. It skittered up to Isaac and grabbed him under its free arm . . . EXTRAVAGANT SECULAR SWARMING . . . EXTRAVAGANT SECULAR SWARMING . . . it chanted as it took hold of him. it chanted as it took hold of him.

Isaac could not resist. The Weaver's touch was cool and unchanging, quite unreal. Its skin was as smooth as polished gla.s.s. He felt himself lifted with breathtaking ease and enfolded, cosseted under that bony arm.

. . . DIAMETRICAL NEGLIGENT FEROCIOUS . . . Isaac heard the Weaver say as it retraced its impossible steps and was twenty feet away, standing by Derkhan's motionless body. The militia around her moved away in concerted fear. The Weaver fumbled for her unconscious form and tucked her up next to Isaac, who felt her warmth through his clothes. Isaac heard the Weaver say as it retraced its impossible steps and was twenty feet away, standing by Derkhan's motionless body. The militia around her moved away in concerted fear. The Weaver fumbled for her unconscious form and tucked her up next to Isaac, who felt her warmth through his clothes.

Isaac's head was spinning. The Weaver moved sideways again and was across the room, beside the construct. For a few minutes, Isaac had forgotten it even existed. It had returned to its customary resting place in the corner of the room, from where it had watched the militia attacks. It turned the one feature on its smooth head, its gla.s.s lens, towards the Weaver. The ineluctable spider-presence flicked the construct up onto its dagger-limbs and tossed it nimbly up. The Weaver caught the ungainly man-sized machine on its curving chitinous back. The construct balanced precariously, but did not fall no matter how the Weaver moved.

Isaac felt a sudden, murderous pain in his head. He cried out in agony, felt hot blood pumping across his face. He heard Lemuel scream a moment later, echoing him.

Through eyes bleary with confusion and blood, Isaac saw the room flicker around him as the Weaver paced through interlocking planes. It appeared beside all the militiamen in turn and moved one of its bladed arms too fast to see. As it touched them, each of the men screamed, so that a weird virus of agonized sound seemed to pa.s.s around the room at whiplash speed.

The Weaver stopped in the centre of the warehouse. Its elbows were pinioned, so that its captives could not move. With its forearms it dropped red-stained things across the floor. Isaac raised his head and looked around the room, trying to see through the burning pain below his temple. Everyone in the room was crying out, cringing, clapping their hands to the sides of their faces, trying without success to staunch gouts of blood with their fingers. Isaac looked down again.

The Weaver was scattering a handful of b.l.o.o.d.y ears onto the ground.

Below its gently moving hand, blood spilt across the dust in slicks of dirty gore. The gobbets of freshly sliced flesh fell, tracing the perfect shape of a pair of scissors.

The Weaver looked up, impossibly laden with struggling figures, moving as if unenc.u.mbered.

. . . FERVENT AND LOVABLE . . . it whispered, and disappeared. it whispered, and disappeared.

What was an experience becomes a dream and then a memory. I cannot see the edges between the three.

The Weaver, the great spider, came among us.

In the Cymek we call it furiach-yajh-hett furiach-yajh-hett: the dancing mad G.o.d. I never thought to see one. It came out of a funnel in the world to stand between us and the lawgivers. Their pistols were silent. Words died in throats like flies in a web.

The dancing mad G.o.d moved through the room with a savage and alien step. It gathered us to it-we renegades, we criminals. We refugees. Constructs that tell tales; earthbound garuda; reporters who make the news; criminal scientists and scientific criminals. The dancing mad G.o.d collected us all like errant worshippers, chiding us for going astray.

Its knife-hands flashed. The humans' ears fell in flesh-rain to the dust. I was spared. My feather-hidden ears hold no delight for this mad power. Through the ululations and the despairing wails of pain the furiach-yajh-hett furiach-yajh-hett ran in circles of delight. ran in circles of delight.