Worldshaker 01; Worldshaker Read online

  Eight

  Col stood in front of the mirror and examined his reflection. He was still panting from the struggle and his cheeks were on fire. He went across to the washstand, dampened his facewasher and pressed it against his cheeks. It took several minutes before his face went back to normal.

  Then he removed his shirt and washed his arms and chest…anywhere he might have touched her, even through the shirt. He used a great deal of soap and the scrubbing brush. He cleaned the basin too, removing every faintest Filthy smear.

  It was so unfair. Why him? Why now? Just when everything else was going so right in his life, why did this one thing have to go so wrong?

  If only she would go back down Below…But the more he thought about it, the more he doubted it was possible. A way to go down would also be a way for Filthies to climb up. Surely the builders of Worldshaker would have made sure that couldn’t happen?

  At least he didn’t see her again that afternoon. He had dancing practice with Mrs Landry, followed by foils practice with Mr Bantling, followed by supervised jigsaw-puzzling with Mrs Canabriss. Then it was time for dinner in the Northumberland Room.

  Dinner was roast beef, potatoes and something like cabbage, served under lashings of Imperial Brown Gravy. But Col couldn’t concentrate on his food. He kept remembering those words: I’ll drop in again soon. It was like a curse hanging over him.

  “You’re not eating,” Gillabeth observed sharply from the other side of the table. “What’s wrong with you?”

  Col took a new grip on his cutlery and dug in.

  Antrobus was watching him too. Col’s baby brother had reached the age of three without uttering a single childish word or even babbling, yet his eyes fixed upon things with a look of deep concentration. All through dinner, they were fixed upon Col.

  Col found it unnerving. Feeling guilty in himself, he imagined accusations everywhere. And still he couldn’t stop thinking about Riff. It was maddening that even her name had stuck in his mind. Until today, he would never have guessed that Filthies had names.

  So many things he didn’t know and couldn’t ask his family. But perhaps he could ask Professor Twillip. When dinner ended, he decided to pay a visit to the Norfolk Library.

  The Library was a soothing, civilised domain on Forty-Fourth Deck. Shelf upon shelf of leather-bound books rose up out of the gloom on all sides. When Col entered, he saw Professor Twillip working at a table under the sole electric light.

  “Hello?” He swung round at the sound of Col’s approach and looked out over the top of his glasses. “Why, Colbert. Name the most important Greek philosopher before Plato.”

  “Er…Socrates?”

  “Correct. Spell ‘philology’.”

  Tutorials with Professor Twillip always started with quickfire questions. He was a chubby man with a face so pink it shone like a beacon. Though he was middle-aged, his skin was boyishly unlined; as if to compensate, his fleecy hair had turned absolutely white. He was always brimming over with scholarly enthusiasms – of which philology was the most recent.

  Col shook his head. He wasn’t here for a tutorial.

  “Oh yes, of course, of course.” Professor Twillip readjusted his glasses. “I was falling into old habits. No more tutorials. You’ll be moving on to school, and then even higher prospects, so I hear. Well done, Colbert.”

  He smiled the smile of a man who never said anything he didn’t truly mean.

  “What will you do when you don’t have anyone to tutor?” Col asked.

  “Oh, I’ll get used to it, I expect.” Professor Twillip encompassed the library with a sweeping gesture. “So many books still to read. I haven’t finished with the Greek philosophers yet. Then there are the Rationalists and Empiricists of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. Then the Imperial era and the modern Paternalists.”

  Col saw his opportunity. “Who was it who said, The role of the head is to make plans for the body?”

  “That was Fenwick, one of the leading Paternalists. In The Hierarchy of Man, 1872.”

  “Because the body doesn’t have the intelligence to plan for itself?”

  “That’s right. While the head is the seat of reason, logic and language.”

  “Language?” Col frowned. “So Filthies and Menials can’t speak?”

  If Professor Twillip was surprised by the outright mention of Filthies, he soon recovered.

  “Well, Menials can understand but not speak. As for the Filthies…do you know, I’ve never really considered it.”

  “What happens in training?”

  “Training?”

  “When Filthies are turned into Menials.”

  “Oh dear. You know me, Colbert, always the scholar. I’m afraid I’m rather ignorant about such practical matters.” Professor Twillip scanned the shelves. “I wonder where I could look it up? It’s not the sort of thing that books are written about.”

  “It ought to be,” said Col.

  “Why are you so curious?” Professor Twillip pushed his glasses back on his forehead and looked out from underneath. “Ah, I think I can guess. You’re going to be concerned with such matters very soon, aren’t you? Then, perhaps, you’ll be the one telling me.”

  Their relationship had changed, Col realised. He’d always looked up to Professor Twillip, but now there was a sense in which his tutor looked up to him.

  “I’ll miss our tutorials,” he said suddenly.

  “So shall I, Colbert, so shall I. You’ve been an excellent, hard-working student. But I think it’s right for you to move on. Deep down, you’re more of a doer than a thinker.”

  “I wish I could be as good a man as you, Professor Twillip.”

  “Ah, Colbert, it’s much easier to be good in theory. You’ll make a difference to the world one day. I have great faith in you.”

  He steepled his fingertips and smiled. He was looking straight into Col’s eyes, yet he didn’t guess a thing. If you only knew what I’ve been doing, Col wanted to say.

  But instead he said, “Truth is the most important of all virtues. That’s what you taught me.”

  “Yes, Colbert, and I’m sure you’ll live up to it. Telling the truth is the only reason we stand at the top of the natural hierarchy. Lower creatures don’t have our instinct for honesty and integrity, as Fenwick said. Or was it Carrington?”

  Col had the strange notion that his eyes had become a screen, and he could think whatever he liked behind them. He’d hardly had secrets in his life before, so he was amazed to discover how easily they could be kept hidden.

  Professor Twillip was scanning the shelves again; in another minute he would be searching for the volumes of Fenwick and Carrington. The subject of Filthies had been left behind. It was time to leave.

  “I’ve been fortunate to have had you as my tutor, Professor Twillip,” Col said.

  The Professor beamed with pleasure. “Well, thank you, thank you. That’s very kind of you.”

  Col considered shaking his hand, but decided it would be inappropriate. He headed for the library door.

  He felt as though new spaces were opening up inside him, deep private places that had never existed before. He didn’t much like the feeling. Who would ever have guessed that inside and outside could be so different?

  ∨ Worldshaker ∧

  Nine

  That night, Col barricaded his room by pulling his bookcase across in front of the door. No way would he let that Filthy girl – that Riff – come creeping in. When he woke to the morning bell, eight hours later, he was refreshed from a full night’s sleep and Riff no longer seemed so important. What mattered was the magnificence of his future career.

  Sir Mormus was absent from the breakfast table, but he’d left a message for Col with Grandmother Ebnolia.

  “He said he’ll meet you on First Deck,” she repeated. She was small and dainty, with the tiniest of waists and the sweetest of smiles. “Chief Petty Officer Drummel will escort you down there after breakfast.”

  After breakfast, Col
found Chief Petty Officer Drummel waiting for him in the corridor outside the Northumberland Room. They started down the same staircases he had descended yesterday on his way to the tailor’s, then angled off on a different route. They continued past the manufacturing decks to lower levels he had never seen before.

  Twenty-First and Twentieth Decks were the dormitory decks, where Menial drudges slept between shifts. On Nineteenth Deck, Col saw the kitchens, where cooks supervised the preparation of food in enormous ovens. On Tenth Deck, they passed by laundries, smelling of detergent and pressed linen.

  He remembered what Riff had said about kitchens and laundries. So she must have visited these levels too…but no, he shook his head. He didn’t want to think about her.

  On Sixth Deck, they walked past dark rooms filled with earth to a depth of several feet. Glancing in through openings like un-glassed windows, Col could see upright slabs of stone rising in pale rows. The earth itself gave off a musty, mouldering smell.

  “What’s in those rooms?” he asked.

  “People buried,” Drummel answered shortly. “We call them the Graveyard Rooms.”

  Col couldn’t help wondering where the earth came from. Had it been scooped up along the way by the cranes he’d seen? Or loaded in place when Worldshaker was constructed, a century and a half ago? The thought of rooms filled with age-old earth and long-dead bodies made the hairs stand up on the back of his neck.

  Fourth Deck was a repair area, with stacks of timber, metal sheeting, cork, hessian, coils of rope and spools of wire. Lower again was a deck given over to live animals in coops or pens. Col was able to recognise chickens, goats and sheep from illustrations in his Boy’s Book of Animals. Crammed side by side, dull-eyed and sad, they lacked even the spirit to lift their heads.

  The two lowest decks were used for food storage. Col smelled grain, tea, dried fruit, pickles and smoked meats. Drummel led the way to a clearing among the boxes and bags, then stopped.

  “We wait here,” he said.

  Col tapped his foot on the metal floor. “The engines must be right underneath us?”

  “No, this is only First Deck. Bottom Deck under this. Then Below.”

  Five minutes later, Sir Mormus arrived. He rode down on an elevator platform that emerged through the ceiling on four vertical rails. There was a chuffing and hissing, a rattle of chains and a clank of machinery. The platform came to a stop with a great Foosh! of escaping steam.

  Stepping out through the steam, Sir Mormus dismissed Drummel and beckoned for Col to follow. They marched between barrels and crates to another clearing. In the middle was a deep trough with steps going down.

  They descended to a massive steel door, with red lettering that announced:

  DOOR 17

  Authorised Personnel Only

  “Look away,” Sir Mormus ordered.

  There were three small wheels set into the door, with numbers round the rims. Col looked away as his grandfather rested a hand on the uppermost wheel. Three times he heard the click-click-click of wheels rotating and tumblers falling into place. When he looked again, the door was open.

  Sir Mormus ushered him through. Col gaped at the strange world of Bottom Deck: rows of iron piers braced with criss-cross struts, towering black mounds, pools of blue-white light alternating with areas of shadow. From floor to ceiling, it was at least three times the height of a normal deck.

  Sir Mormus locked the door by turning more wheels on the inside, then led the way forward. As they detoured around puddles of water and slicks of grease, Col felt a warmth rise up through the soles of his shoes.

  “That’s the coal that feeds the engines, my boy.” Sir Mormus pointed to the black mounds.

  “Yes, sir. How does it get down Below, sir?”

  “Drops through chutes.” Sir Mormus indicated a group of officers winding crankhandles. “Those men are about to release a quantity of coal from one of the bunkers. We have other chutes for feeding the Filthies. See over there?”

  Col didn’t see a chute, but he saw a circular manhole cover. Piles of bags and sacks were stacked nearby.

  “What do we feed them, sir?”

  “Whatever we don’t want ourselves.”

  Coal dust scrunched under their feet. They passed an array of hoses and pipes, and arrived at a special fenced-off zone around a canvas tent. Warning orange lights flashed on top of the fence poles.

  “Yes, go into the tent,” said Sir Mormus.

  Inside the tent was a flat hatch raised on a coaming a few inches above the floor. The words on the hatch were in the same red lettering as before:

  VIEWING BAY 17

  “Open it up,” Sir Mormus ordered.

  Col crouched, turned the handle and heaved. The hatch came open with a great blast of heat. The noise from Below was like a million pounding hammers.

  Sir Mormus lowered himself in through the hatch and onto a ladder. Col saw a pulsing red glow and billows of smoke…

  Then the smoke got into his eyes and blinded him with tears. He climbed down after his grandfather.

  It was like one of his old childhood nightmares, when floors gave way beneath him and he went tumbling down to the depths below. So many times he had woken in terror, clutching the sheets in desperate hands as nameless horrors rushed up to overwhelm him. But he couldn’t show weakness now. He clenched his jaw and kept going.

  The smoke had a foul smell like rotten eggs. He fought down an urge to cough and concentrated on the rungs of the ladder.

  When the ladder came to an end, he found himself standing not on solid floor but thin wire mesh. The mesh shuddered to the rhythm of the engines as if shaken by giant hands. Col reeled and nearly lost his balance. He planted his feet wide apart and felt the vibrations drumming up through his bones.

  Rubbing the tears from his eyes, he saw that the viewing bay was a kind of cage. About fifteen feet square, it hung suspended from the bottom of Bottom Deck. He stared down through the mesh and glimpsed huge dark shapes and glints of fire, like lava from a volcano. Insubstantial strands of wire were all that kept him from falling into the vast pit of Below.

  He looked away in a hurry. At the other end of the cage, Sir Mormus was talking to the officer on duty. They were little more than silhouettes in the smoky murk, but Col caught fragments of Sir Mormus’s booming speech.

  “Stop sweating, man…fasten yourself up…remember who you are…”

  It seemed he was angry that the officer had loosened his collar in the heat. The officer mopped his brow and fumbled at his top button.

  Col went across to the side of the cage, hooked his fingers through the mesh and looked out.

  He could have been looking out over a boiling black ocean. There were no walls or bulkheads, only endless cavernous space. The echoes of sound suggested dimensions as wide and as long as the juggernaut itself. Tremendous metal wheels and beams rose and fell through rifts in the smoke, looming and vanishing. Sometimes, the nearest beams came scything towards the cage, until Col thought his last moment had come – but always they swung away again. More threatening were the sprays of hot oil that flew through the air and spattered the roof.

  He gritted his teeth and hung on. Reason told him that officers stood on duty here for hours at a time. He had to block out instinctual reactions.

  He was just starting to relax when something new started up. Far below, in some deep gulf, a screech of metal rose above the general pounding din. Then showers of sparks, shower after shower, casting an eerie yellow glow through the smoke. The screech grew louder, a jagged, see-sawing sound.

  Sir Mormus turned to the duty officer. “Give them some steam…aisles five and six…”

  The officer reached for a row of levers that angled down from the roof. He pulled on one, then another. A roaring, jetting sound added itself to all the other noises in the pit.

  Down Below, a cloud of white vapour appeared and spread. Surging and turbulent, it filled the depths where the sparks had been. Col couldn’t guess what was happeni
ng, only that it involved steam.

  After two minutes, the officer returned the levers to their original position. The cloud continued to expand, but now with a lazier drifting motion. The roaring, jetting sound had gone, and so had the screech of metal.

  But what was that other sound? Straining his ears, Col heard a multitude of voices. It must be the Filthies! Were they howling abuse or crying out in pain?

  For a moment, he thought he glimpsed a mass of bodies at the bottom of the pit. Gleaming skin and waving arms…

  The image of Riff flashed into his mind. It could have been her down there, writhing in agony, swearing and cursing.

  He let go of the mesh and backed away.

  Sir Mormus turned and saw. “Hold firm, Colbert! Be a man!”

  “It’s the Filthies, sir!”

  “Of course it’s the Filthies. They shovel the coal and feed the engines.”

  “But the steam…”

  “Gingers them up when they start slacking off.”

  He was staring at Col with heavy frowning brows. Col knew exactly what he was thinking. So the son is like the father after all.

  Col stiffened. He would not be like his father! Never that smell of failure! Never!

  He drove the image of Riff out of his mind. The Filthies are not like us, he told himself, not sensitive to pain and suffering. Not like us, not like us.

  He repeated it over and over, and as he repeated it, stepped back to the mesh. Once more he took up his position and looked out.

  The massed bodies must have existed only in his imagination. And even the cries…the Filthies were cursing because they hadn’t been allowed to slack off. That’s all, nothing more, he told himself.

  After thirty seconds, he knew he was going to make it. Besides, the white cloud blanketed out more and more of the view, and the cries of the Filthies grew more and more muffled.

  Sir Mormus kept him there for another ten minutes. Col concentrated on working out the pattern of the beams as they rose and fell. He studied the cage itself: the bolted door in the side of the mesh, the metal poles and other equipment clipped to the roof overhead. There were dozens of ways to occupy his mind without falling into unwanted thoughts.