Airships & Automata

By C.S. Wright, LM Cooke, Steven C Davis and 5 more

A collection of new and original steampunk short stories.

Tommy's Game by LM Cooke

A young man is drawn into an unusual - and lethal - game of chance.

Celestine by Steven C Davis

A sophisticated automaton awakes in a confused state in a laboratory; how did she arrive there and what is her purpose?

Spinners by Ian Caldwell

A strange group of friends and their broken-down automaton attempt to escape a life of drudgery at the bottom of a city that has seen better days.

The Sad Clockwork Boy by Jon Hartless

Gabrielle is trapped and lonely in a loveless marriage—but finds companionship and more with a new addition to her household.

The Incredible Airship Circus by SJ Menary

When an old friend turns up at the Airship Circus, beaten and dying, Pierre, a young tinkerer, is led into investigating a dark and dangerous secret.

Flugmaschine (or How Germany Conquered the Skies) by Danielle Miller

A young woman fascinated by engineering and the sciences is forced by her father to become a governess and must find another way to fulfil her dreams.

A Day at the Scrapyard by SG Mulholland

A disreputable group of scrap men have to deactivate a powerful military automaton and can only hope that they survive the job unscathed.

Dayne by Angela Tysver

An inventor's greatest creation now has plans to remake the world but what can he do to stop it?

Looking for a New England by CS Wright

Two travellers between worlds crash land in a dirty and unpleasant version of 19th

 century London and must work with a bumbling inventor if they have any chance to return to their own universe.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Cogsmith Publishing
• Release date: Jun 30, 2016
• ISBN: 9781533751133

C.S. Wright

CS Wright is an engineer who has been writing science-fiction and fantasy short stories for over twenty years. He is currently working on his first novel, To Burn An Empire, a thriller set in an alternative Victorian London as well as a series of pulp style short stories about the adventures of a group of 'Space Rangers'. He lives in the West Midlands with his partner, Gemma, a self employed artisan who is also in training to become a mad cat lady.

Book preview

First Published 2016

This edition published 2016 by Cogsmith Publishing

This publication copyright © Cogsmith Publishing 2016

Tommy’s Game copyright © LM Cooke 2015

Celestine copyright © Steven C Davis 2016

Spinners copyright © Ian Caldwell 2016

The Sad Clockwork Boy copyright © Jon Hartless 2016

The Incredible Airship Circus copyright © SJ Menary 2016

Flugmaschine copyright © Danielle Miller 2016

A Day at the Scrapyard copyright © SG Mulholland 2016

Dayne copyright (c) Angela Tysver 2016

Looking for a New England copyright © Cogsmith Publishing 2016

This book is a work of fiction and, except in the case of historical fact, any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form, or by any means (electrical, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise) without the prior written permission of the publisher. Any person who does any unauthorised act in relation to this publication may be liable to criminal prosecution and civil claims for damages.

For further information visit the Cogsmith Publishing Facebook page, www.facebook.com/cogmithpublishing.

Foreword

By CS Wright

In the summer of 2012, I discovered a wonderful and new (to me) sub-genre of science fiction known as ‘Steampunk’. Now, I realise that this makes me a bit of a latecomer but I soon realised (as I am sure that many others have) that I had loved it for a long time already. I grew up reading the works of H.G. Wells, Jules Verne, Sir Arthur Conan Doyle and Michael Moorcock whose Oswald Bastable character, though written many years before the term was coined, was most definitely a steampunk adventurer. I have also long thought that modern clothing really is a little bland and perhaps a little of the Victorian aesthetic could help with that...

It was around this time that I moved to the West Midlands - coincidentally very close to where the first ever steam engine was built - where my partner, Gemma, and I attended some steampunk gatherings and were delighted to meet a number of hugely talented writers, artisans and musicians as well as people who just enjoyed dressing up and being silly for the weekend (something I have no problem with at all!). Almost all of them were open, friendly and extremely passionate about what they were doing.

As a writer of science-fiction, I was inspired to incorporate steampunk into my own work; how could I not? There was so much potential for wonderful stories to be written here. I quickly found that there was considerable debate among enthusiasts as to what exactly constitutes ‘real’ steampunk, often degenerating into vicious (and inconclusive) online battles.

Having decided that the definition that worked best for me seemed to be ‘science fiction inspired by the Victorian aesthetic’, I embarked upon my (still unfinished) steampunk novel, To Burn An Empire. Whilst working on this, I found myself wondering what other writers who had never written steampunk could do with the genre and began asking around. I am fortunate enough to have made the acquaintance of a number of writers so I got in touch with them and asked if they would like to write something for an anthology. This definition of steampunk and the inclusion of references to airships, automata or both was the only brief given to them.

My initial enquiries were met with some very enthusiastic responses and the result was this fantastic little collection of stories. Some have been written by experienced writers in the genre and other writers had almost no prior knowledge of the genre but all of them came up with some amazing ideas. I will leave it up to the reader to decide which category you think each writer falls into!

From LM Cooke’s dark tale of a gambler’s encounter with a strange and deadly game of chance, to SG Mulholland’s scrap-yard romp to Jon Hartless’ tragic and unconventional story of love and marriage, all have something unique to offer and I hope you enjoy reading them as much as I have enjoyed putting this anthology together.

––––––––

CS Wright, May 2016

Tommy’s Game

By LM Cooke

LM Cooke is a writer of dark fantasy and science fiction, influenced by authors such as Tanith Lee and JRR Tolkein. She is author of ‘The Automata Wars’, a steampunk trilogy, Volume 3 of which will be available from early 2016. She has also contributed short stories to the first three volumes of ‘The Asylum Chronicles’ steampunk anthologies, all published through The Last Line.

LM Cooke is also vocalist in the band Crimson Clocks; and co-host on the GASP (Gothic, Alternative, Steampunk, Progressive) radio show on BLAST1386. In her spare time she plots galactic domination, while pandering to an overindulged feline. Find out more at www.LMCooke.com.

It was raining. The streets were awash; a passing carriage splashed filthy water over some urchins, crouched in the gutter. They flinched but didn’t turn from their task; three hands busy reclaiming spilled produce, taters and beets, from the gutter. The boy with one hand – the other almost certainly lost to the plague – looked up. A streetlamp illuminated his pale visage. His face was pinched and hard, his eyes like granite, more rat than child. The rat turned back to the spilled vegetables, cramming them inside his coat, dexterous despite his missing extremity. Sullivan felt a phantom twinge in his wooden foot, his own sacrifice to the plague. He looked away, wiping his fingers on his coat. The boys made him feel dirty.

He was clean, though. Cologne scented his skin; pungent oils slicked down his hair; sweet-scented wax twirled his moustache to perfection. His clothes were soft and smooth against skin that remembered well how dirty wool could abrade. His shoes, despite a slight spatter from the rain, were shiny and pointed. A huge umbrella kept the worst of the downpour from the shoulders of his cashmere coat, and ensured his silk top hat remained immaculate. He looked every inch a gentleman.

Which was good. It meant he had pulled it off, had fooled all those idiots, those in-bred toffs. It meant that he could walk amongst them – not ignored, better than that. It was the very opposite; they acknowledged him, raised their hats in greeting, accepted him as one of their own.

He permitted himself a small inner grin.

Another carriage approached, close to the side of the road. It lurched as it hit a pothole, and a spray of water arced up, over the pavement. Sullivan cowered towards the wall for cover. He heard one of the rat-children swear, violently, fluidly, ferociously. The carriage slowed, and pulled up at the side of the road, listing to one side in the terrible gradient of the gutter. Sullivan swore as well, curse words that no gentleman should be familiar with. Then he sprinted from the relative cover of the wall to the carriage door. It opened at his approach. Sullivan furled the umbrella and swung himself inside, just remembering to doff his top hat before it was knocked off and into the filth of the road. The door clicked shut as he sat down. The carriage lurched as it pulled away from the steep kerbside, then settled into a slightly more even gait as it progressed over the potholes.

A man was sitting opposite Sullivan. At his side was a large, leather valise, good quality, a gentleman’s item. Although it was night, the man wore dark-tinted spectacles. His beard was neatly trimmed, his hair thinning a little on top, the remainder drawn back in a neat queue, revealing his ears. One of those ears was pink and fleshy, the other ostentatiously golden, carved and encrusted with jewels. Mr Blood had also played host to the plague, but unlike the boy on the street or Sullivan himself, he had the money to replace his loss with something expensive and tasteless. Sullivan’s plain, wooden foot twinged again. Though soon, if all went well, he would have the money to replace it with something much more functional.

Blood smiled, revealing snaggled, yellowing teeth. When he spoke, it was final confirmation, if any were needed, that this mouth did not belong to a gentleman. The expensive trappings that he wore were too vulgar, too tasteless to show him for anything other than what he was – a lord of the underclasses, head of the biggest of the gangs that ran the city beneath the noses of the gentry. Those trappings did not penetrate below the surface of the man’s skin.

‘You’re late,’ he snarled at Sullivan. His voice was cracked, scratchy, a sign of a man who too frequently indulged habits best left unindulged.

Sullivan shook his head. ‘I’m not,’ he said. ‘You were late...’At a look from the other man he subsided. Mr Blood was not known for his gentle nature – in fact, quite the opposite. It was best not to correct him.

Blood slid nicotine-stained fingers between the buttons of his silk waistcoat and scratched at his stomach. Sullivan averted his gaze, just as a gentleman would have behaved. Blood grinned again, this time in satisfaction.

‘You’ve scrubbed up well, young Sullivan,’ he said. ‘You look the part, all right. Now – can you act it?’

Sullivan nodded, a confident gesture that belied the tight knot currently residing in the pit of his stomach. ‘I’ve had no difficulties,’ he began.

‘So you say, so you say,’ Blood interrupted. ‘But all you’ve done so far is shilly-shally round the edges. What happens once you start playing for real? What happens then?’ The man tapped the end of a silver cigarette holder against his teeth, absently. Sullivan was uncomfortably aware of the holder’s sharpened point. Like all of Blood’s toys, it was designed for a dual purpose. Like all of Blood’s toys, that secondary purpose was to inflict damage.

‘No one will suspect,’ Sullivan said. He could feel a trickle of sweat running down his spine. This was the acid test. If he could convince the intimidating, murderous Blood that he was ready, then everyone else was child’s play.

Blood stared at him hard, unspeaking. The gang lord’s nose virtually twitched as he leaned forward, looking Sullivan up and down. Sullivan kept his gaze steady, supercilious, contemptuous, even. He was a gentleman. He was not cowed by street scum such as this. He had money, and privilege, and power, was born to them; by rights the world belonged to him. Believe it, he told himself. Believe it!

Blood sat back in his seat, seemingly satisfied. His yellowed fingers caressed the valise at his side. ‘So, boy,’ the gang lord said. ‘You look right. You act right. And,’ and he gave an exaggerated sniff, ‘you certainly smell right. Now – this is the important bit,’ and he leaned forward once more, nose to nose with Sullivan, eyeballing him at extreme close range. ‘Why should I trust you with my money?’

Sullivan tried not to flinch, mostly managed it. ‘Sir!’ he protested. ‘You’re paying me to do a job. I wouldn’t stiff you – not me, sir!’He managed to hold onto the upper-class accent. The missing foot twinged again. His payment would buy him a new foot, and a new jaw for his mother; he needed Blood to believe him. He tried not to breathe in too deeply. Blood’s rotting teeth lent his breath a most offensive odour; at this range it was eye-watering.

Blood sat back once more. He was no longer smiling. ‘Just remember, boy. I know you. I know where you’re from. I know your pretty mother’. Sullivan winced; Blood knew well how his mother looked these days. ‘I know how to find you if you run,’ Blood continued. ‘And I know how to hurt you, more than you have ever been hurt in your life before. Do you hear me?’

Sullivan swallowed. ‘I hear you,’ he said.

Blood slid the valise over to him, but kept his hand on it. ‘You may know your way around a casino, boy,’ he said. ‘But don’t get cocky, and don’t make a spectacle of yourself. You’re looking for one man, remember - and it’s him that you’ll need to lose to. You can play some small, safe bets to make it look good. But my money is to go to that man. Do you hear me?’

This time Sullivan just nodded. He knew the drill. Blood owed a substantial sum of money for something, some service not quite legitimate. It might be hard to explain why someone had suddenly acquired such a substantial sum, but a large gambling win was completely explainable, and thus granted the transaction legitimacy.

The money out of his hands, Blood lost interest. He opened a garish gold cigarette case, removed a smoke, then leaned forward to rap on the driver’s partition. The carriage ground to a halt. Blood didn’t spare another glance as Sullivan exited, opening his umbrella once more against the lashing rain. The carriage drove quickly away, dirty water spraying from its wheels.

Sullivan glanced around. Blood had dropped him in an affluent-looking suburb. From here, he could take another carriage to the city centre, arriving in a manner appropriate to one of his assumed station. And from there, the sky was the limit.

The Sky’s The Limit was the best high end casino in the city. Membership alone was extortionate. And if you couldn’t afford membership, you would certainly not be able to afford to gamble, given the high stakes placed at the tables on a daily basis. Sullivan had never been inside before; a gambling connoisseur he might be, but this place was too far above his means. Tonight, though, Blood had created membership for him, and had provided the funds with which he would play. Sullivan felt a surge of excitement as he stood before the doors of the Grand Royal Hotel and looked upwards. A white cloud of steam showed where The Sky’s The Limit was moored to the roof terrace of the swanky hotel.

A doorman checked his credentials. A burly man in an incongruous bellhop’s uniform – security rather than lift management – rode silently up to the 25th floor with him. Sullivan tipped the man smoothly as he exited the elevator. Not too much, not too little, just enough to ensure he would not standout in the man’s memory.

He found himself standing inside a little glass gazebo, filled with exotic, unfamiliar, expensive-looking flora. An illuminated path led through the arching greenery. He followed it, finally exiting onto the roof balcony.

It was still raining sharply. A group of young women were draped over the balcony despite the downpour. Clean women, no evidence of plague disfigurement. One immediately moved to stand by him, holding an umbrella over his head. He didn’t see the umbrella at first. He was busy trying not to stare at her cleavage, spilling out of a delicate white lace corset, augmented with brass filigree work. She wore no skirt, just knee-length bloomers that provided him with too great a view of her silk stockings, tied with a ribbon about her thigh. The water droplets covering her made the bloomers cling, wetly.

A face. She had a face, too. He tried to look at it. Around her head, a brass circlet held her damp, loosened hair back. She looked like a sodden angel.

‘I say,’ a voice said. The elevator had disgorged another occupant. ‘A fine piece of filly, what?’ This gentleman was already well-lubricated. His features had a cruel cast, the face of someone unused to refusal. Sullivan hated him on sight. The angel was unconcerned. In fact she smiled, thrusting her damp chest into the newcomer’s face as she held the umbrella over both of them.

‘This way, gents,’ she said with a smile that did not reach her eyes; yes, Sullivan was still looking at her eyes. She turned and walked across the roof. A strange contraption was fastened to her back, something metal. Her buttocks shifted as she moved, the bloomers taut against them. Pink flesh showed through the wet silk. Sullivan’s new companion followed, his eyes on her rear. Sullivan quickly pursued them, anxious not to lose the protection of the umbrella. Three other girls, equally angelically dressed, followed behind them.

The first angel turned and smiled brightly at them. Her eyes were hard and cold. ‘I hope you gentlemen don’t mind heights,’ she said, indicating an elegant sedan chair, one of several lined up on the roof. Sullivan eyed it with trepidation as she opened the door and gestured for him and his companion to enter. It was comfortable enough, filled with deep cushions, though the comfort did not ease Sullivan’s nerves. He swallowed hard, settling back against the chair and clutching the armrest.

‘Come, sir! You’ll need a strong stomach upstairs,’ Sullivan’s companion sneered.

‘My stomach will be fine,’ Sullivan retorted. ‘Once we’re there...’

The man laughed wildly, spilling liquid from the champagne flute he was clutching. ‘Better make haste, then,’ he cried. ‘Come, angels, paradise awaits...’

Maintaining her frozen smile, the girl closed the door behind them. Then she moved to one of the poles of the sedan chair, while the other three girls took the remaining positions. At a signal, each reached to her shoulder and pulled a lever. From the back of each, huge brass wings unfolded with a click; the contraption Sullivan had noticed earlier. The wings began to vibrate. The girls seized the chair poles, their wings buzzed and the chair began to move skyward. Sullivan could only watch as the women bore them upwards, their wings glowing in the night lights, their lissom forms soaked and revealed.

The other man laughed raucously. ‘Come, my angels!’ he leered. ‘Convey us to heaven!’

The girls flew straight and true, accustomed to this burden. Even so, the wind buffeted them and the chair lurched violently; Sullivan fought not to heave. Overhead, the white cloud that hid the airship grew closer and closer, until finally the steam was dispersed by motion of the girls’ wings. The angels expertly guided the chair between masts and ropes, and brought it down gently amidst some artfully placed foliage on the deck of The Sky’s The Limit.

‘Thank you, angels!’ Sullivan’s companion cried. Sullivan understood now; the angels, the white, heavenly cloud, the exotic foliage all added up. The Sky’s The Limit was promoting itself as a paradise on earth. An angel opened the sedan chair door, and helped him from it. Two burly men in exquisitely tailored suits, somewhat less angelic than the girls, were waiting to greet him.

Sullivan stood carefully, feeling his legs shake. ‘First time, sir?’ one of the suited men asked, pleasantly. ‘You’ll be all right once you get your air legs. Stand and catch your breath, why don’t you.’

Sullivan stood where indicated, grateful for the fresh air in his face after the constricted space of the pod. He breathed in deeply. After a few moments he realised that he could see lights in the darkness, beyond the billowing steam that issued from the engines keeping the airship afloat. The whole of the city was arrayed dizzyingly in front of him.

‘Easy, sir.’ The man in the suit was gently ushering him away from the exterior, towards the cabins below decks. ‘A drink on the house will see you right. And don’t forget your bag, now.’

The valise. Sullivan had indeed nearly forgotten. To have lost Blood’s dirty money before he had even entered the casino would have been beyond disastrous. Clutching the valise to him, he nodded his thanks to the suited man, and headed towards the cabin door, through which his erstwhile companion had already disappeared.

Inside, it was as if the wind and the rain and the faint creaking of ropes and rigging on the decks had never been. Sullivan felt as if he had entered another world as he stepped down a wide, oak staircase onto a broad marble floor. A doorman greeted him, took his coat and hat. Unasked, a waiter placed a glass in his hand. More angels, with delicate lace wings rather than brass contraptions, but otherwise dressed similarly to those outside, trotted about with trays