Engines of Obsession: Chapter 35

Chapter 35: The Great Escape

Turner awoke to the smell of burning wood, along with aching pain all over his body and stinging wounds on his legs. The table that had hit him was on its side next to him. While it didn’t block his vision, it had probably saved him from whatever explosion had come from that strange box.

That same explosion had blasted out the bottom of the window, leaving a gaping hole in the building. The charred wood was smoldering, but thankfully not on fire. Blood seeped into his breeches from cuts on his legs, and his boots were in tatters as well, but the splinters didn’t seem to have gone very deep.

With a little groan of pain, Turner hauled himself to his feet. Thankfully, the explosion hadn’t been loud enough to damage his hearing… and that meant he could hear the shouts and strange crashing noises outside all too clearly. Whatever was going on, it was getting very close to him.

He took a quick look to his right to see that the stranger he’d killed was still there, but quickly made the decision not to search him yet. The body wasn’t going anywhere, and it sounded like the scuffle outside was still going strong, gunshots and shouts filling the air.

The floor had partially caved in, so Turner opted not to search for the stairs. Instead, he just took a few steps forward and then braced himself, sliding down as the floor crumpled further. It dropped him onto the hard pavement fairly easily, his fall only about six feet.

He still let out a grunt of pain as the impact jarred him and made him realize that his injuries were more severe than he’d thought. He couldn’t feel anything worse than a bruise – except for the numerous shallow cuts on his legs – but he was pretty sure he’d be black and blue all over soon enough.

He couldn’t have been out for very long. Turner saw Nora and Nikandros standing by the shop entrance, and he could make out movement within, which he presumed to be Anne and Penelope.

Some deep part of him chided himself for letting them get away, but that part went quiet quickly when he glanced further down the street—up from where they’d come.

Blakely’s guardian was much closer now, and it looked like the strange smaller constructs were no longer carrying it. He saw the damaged squat machine he’d glimpsed earlier, now turned upside down with the side torn open, revealing its complex mechanical innards.

But the real sight was the massive bipedal, lizard-like thing. An armor-plated terror in bronze.

The mechanical beast towered over the defenders of the city, who scrambled for cover behind various carts and low walls. Smoke and flames covered the streets and buildings, and Turner saw the toothy metal maw open up and let loose a gout of fire that sprayed a burning liquid at a cluster of guardsmen. They scattered rapidly.

None of them were hurt, but from the groaning soldiers being pulled away by their comrades, Turner bet that wasn’t as common a result as they’d like.

Fortunately, the mechanical beast had not escaped the battle unscathed. It had two smaller arms higher up on its body, and one of them had been torn off outright. Large punctures marred parts of its plating, and its powerful legs didn’t seem to work right. One of them lagged and dragged behind, scraping a furrow along the road. Several of the armored plates had been torn off, and it was leaking an oily fluid every time it took a step.

The guardsmen were aiming at the openings in the plating, but despite the damage, the artificial beast was still too fast. It was hard to get a good shot in on the more delicate internals.

“Turner!” Nora called. She was already rushing up to his side, panting heavily from exertion. She gave a quick update.

“We got them into the shop. Blakely says she’s found a way to shut down her guardian and told us to do what we could to help the locals. She’ll handle the rest.”

Turner nodded. He’d already taken his revolver out and was checking the cylinder. He knew his pistol couldn’t do much against this thing, but he also hated to see a town this old getting torn to pieces. If all he had to do was distract it for a few moments, that would probably be fine.

“All right,” he said. “I guess we try and draw it away. Maybe a little to the north.”

Before he could move, Turner heard a fluttering noise. A small paper bird flipped by and landed on his shoulder, where it immediately began to tip over, going limp. He caught it in his injured hand and glanced toward the shop, where Penelope gave him a small wave with her fingers before shutting the door.

With a soft grunt, he shoved the paper bird into a pocket to look at later. He didn’t have time for this nonsense right now.

The giant construct stomped forward again, cutting short Turner’s thoughts for plans. He nodded to Nora, who realized she probably shouldn’t be there and retreated back toward Nikandros and the wounded soldiers. She’d probably work on keeping them alive and treating their wounds.

Even if she had a better chance of beating this thing, there was no point in risking both of them.

With a loud shout, Turner took off running past the guardian automaton. He kept his revolver in his left hand, ready to fire and see if he could use that to draw its attention – but he needn’t have bothered.

The rattling, mechanical roar sounded far more primal than he expected, and the construct turned about to follow his movement.

Maybe this wasn’t such a great idea, he thought to himself.

Too late now.

The lizard-like machine dragged itself around and gave chase. Turner was fortunate, he realized, because that chase was delayed when an entire side panel swung open and half fell off, dragging on the ground with a loud, rattling noise.

He could see the various pistons, wires, and gears inside that allowed it to move. Several were already broken, but this machine was built for combat, and must have had numerous redundancies, because it was only slowed rather than stopped.

The staccato sound of several rifles going off told Turner that the locals were still putting up a fight. He didn’t see any damage to the construct, though. These rifles weren’t like Milo's. They didn’t have the sheer penetrating power his did, so he doubted they were doing much.

Most likely, they were doing the same thing he was: stalling for time.

Despite all that had happened, and his brief bout of unconsciousness, Turner was pretty sure it had been less than half an hour since the battle had started. Maybe forty minutes, given the time he’d spent talking to Blakely and Penelope.

Either way, artillery or cannons were likely on the way. Durocor was a well-fortified city, but it wasn’t prepared for something popping up in the middle of town like this.

The huge construct kicked a shattered cart out of the way, forcing Turner to duck before he scrambled back and over a low wall dividing the street from a small park. Another barrage of shots from the soldiers nearby made the construct pause, turning its head back and forth to look for the returning threat.

It was powerful, but didn’t appear to be particularly smart.

It was then that he saw it.

The gleaming blue glow was faint and flickering, hidden behind layers of gears and armor. Even so, the massive amount of damage the other smaller constructs had done had been enough to expose what Turner knew powered the thing: that small crystal that gave Nora so many headaches.

If a bullet could hit that, it would bring the construct down right away.

“Aim at the left side, just below the arm!” he shouted to the soldiers.

Turner winced as he pulled himself up from behind the wall. His legs were still bleeding, and his chest felt like someone had been pounding on it with a hammer. He was already out of breath. Maybe the injuries from the earlier explosion were worse than he’d thought.

Fortunately, he didn’t have to move for very long.

The guardian construct’s tail smashed into another building, crumbling the stone away… but also shearing off part of its own tail. Built for combat or not, stone walls were pretty tough, and even this thing couldn't crash through them unscathed.

A few scattered gunshots tried for the area Turner had pointed out, but to no visible effect.

Despite all the attacks, the damaged guardian construct was once again turning southward. It wouldn’t take long for the automaton to hit areas that were less damaged. Turner still had no indication that Blakely had done anything to stop the mechanical monster.

He shouldn’t have taken the job.

He already knew she was an amoral witch… why would she keep her word? She had what she wanted, which left everything up to him.

Not that Turner felt he could really defeat the monster, but maybe if he started shooting toward the vulnerable areas, it would at least turn toward him again and give the artillery time to move and get in position. And maybe he would get lucky.

Taking a deep breath to steady himself, Turner aimed his revolver at the slight sparkle he could glimpse. He couldn’t afford to wait. He had to take the shot now.

And for the second time that day, Turner felt as if his body was hit by a train when the explosion threw him back.