The Derring-Do Club and the Empire of the Dead (38 page)

For one dreadful moment, she thought she’d fallen off and hit the ground, but she’d thumped into the hard surface of the outer skin of the other Zeppelin.

Now she had to open her eyes and actually find handholds, but she found she couldn’t move.

The wind whipped around her, stinging her face. There was a ladder, set against the outside, clearly designed for someone to clamber about risking their lives, probably to trim the mainsail or whatever this damned stupid aerial boat required. It was too far away, yards and yards – too far. The wind was blowing her towards it, sideways, backwards along the vessel, so it would just be a case of letting go.

She’d fly, briefly, and then grab hold. All she had to do was let go. Let go.

“Let go,” she said aloud, the wind grasping her words and flinging them into the bluster and buffet of the slipstream. “Let go!”

She unhooked the umbrella and let go.

The wind did exactly what it had been doing, so she flew back, missed the ladder and struck the exposed metalwork that had been ripped into jagged struts by the collision. She struggled through the opening and into the main fuselage itself.

Suddenly, after the roaring gale outside, it was a quiet, reverberating space. She was again stunned by the sheer size of the vessel, like a hangar containing the round balloons that kept the airship aloft.

She worked her way down gingerly. The last time her knees had been this scraped and gashed was when they’d all played
Source of the Nile
down in the woods as little girls. That seemed a long time ago.

Crew appeared, disgorged from the gondola below, as orders were shouted in German.

Earnestine sank to the deck, conscious of how ludicrous it was to try and bring down the ultimate war machine single–handed.

A crewman ran past her with an axe and clambered nimbly up the superstructure to hack away at the rope. It zinged when it split and whipped away like a venomous snake.

“Deering–Dolittle!”

It was Kroll, the huge man standing over her.

“I can see why Pieter finds you attractive, you are such a spitfire.”

Earnestine pulled herself upright and stumbled away over the metal deck.

Kroll was laughing: “Where can you run, we are kilometres away from the ground.”

He pressed a button on a machine and a figure lurched towards Earnestine. She shied away, changed direction. Coming towards her was the ruined visage of a man with buck teeth and she recognised him as the March Hare.

“Schneider!”

The dead man reacted to the noise but not to his name. The brass fitting in this skull fizzed and his groping arms came up to grab her.

“We kept him here because we didn’t want the Prince finding out,” said Kroll. “He is one of the Untotenfallschirmspringer.”

“I beg your pardon.”

“The Undead Parachute Corp.”

Earnestine doubled back, nimbler than the monster, but running out of options: “I’m none the wiser.”

“These,” said Kroll, turning round to show her his backpack. “They are inventions to allow one to descend to the ground.”

“Really, how lovely.”

“This is a new age, the age of air war, when we, a landlocked country, can go over any defences, any blockades, any fortifications to attack the very heart of an empire. This war of air and untoten, we call it
Blitzkrieg
.”

“I don’t know German.”

“Blitzkrieg means ‘Lightning War’,” the Oberst said, laughing. “When the lightning comes there will be war.”

“But why?” Earnestine shouted, dodging away from the pursuing creature. “Why all this killing?”

“I’m a soldier,” said Kroll. “What else would I do?”

She was back where she started at the port side, the open sky in front of her marked by the blot of the other Zeppelin, now an expanding distance away.

The walking corpse closed in, stumbling and lurching on the pitching walkway.

At Earnestine’s feet was her umbrella. She flipped it up and brandished it like a sword, poking at the Schneider’s approach. They circled each other until the blue spark ordered the creature to attack.

Leading with her right foot, Earnestine stabbed forward. The point of her improvised weapon pierced the creature’s flesh, cracked a rib and was sucked forward through its body as its attack continued. Earnestine pushed. The monster jerked and toppled backwards, hovering for a moment on the edge of the precipice before being ripped out into the void.

Earnestine herself was dragged forward until the handle of the umbrella wrenched free of her grip. She tottered on the edge before grabbing a handhold and her knees slammed against the deck by the opening. Schneider was a flailing shape and then a receding dot.

She heard Oberst Kroll stumble, his polished boots slipping on the walkway.

“Fräulein, such courage.”

She’d die now, she knew it, and that meant she’d never see Pieter again. Instinctively, she reached for his ring and felt the bulk of the Verey Pistol. She pulled it out, turned and aimed at the big man.

“I can’t miss you at this range,” she said.

“You can’t fire that in here,” said Kroll. “Blugas, hydrogen.”

“It’s not ‘can’t,” said Earnestine. “It’s ‘shouldn’t’.”

She fired.

She missed.

The fiery projectile soared upwards across the vast cathedral–like space to penetrate a distant gas bag. For a moment the balloon shone brightly like a gas lamp, beautiful and bewitching, and then it exploded.

A blue radiance, painful to see, trembled along the inner skin of the dirigible like bubbling water flowing along the ceiling above her. There was heat and it gave off water enough to make a rainbow flicker over the gantries and ropes. When the effect reached the far end, the pure burning of the escaping gas ignited the canvas and gas of the motors, the blue rising flames suddenly turned fiery and angry, a roaring combustion that raced back along the walkway.

“Mein Gott!”

A second balloon burst into flame and a third, and then, like dominoes, the combustion exploded each one in turn. The light was blue, a blue beyond blue, and then red flames rippled like angry clouds raining fire.

There was a roar as the air was sucked in. The whole Zeppelin acted like a chimney, and then there was yet another burst of flame as a blugas balloon went up. The shockwave of flames hit Kroll, picked him up, and blasted him through the ruptured skin of the airship and into the void.

Earnestine ducked, burying her face in her hands as the heat washed over her. She’d been protected by Kroll, he in turn by the pack of his parachute.

She ran.

Where was there to go?

Where were the lifeboats?

Behind her, the bow of the Zeppelin split open like a peeling fruit or an opening flower, blooming with rage and fire. Metal split and melted and sprang loose. The Zeppelin was finished: she could either burn or jump, and so she threw herself through an opening and into the atmosphere beyond.

The cold air took her breath away before a wall of heat hit Earnestine hard, punching her forwards and dishevelling her hair and clothing. She grabbed at nothing because there was nothing. The huge domineering airship became tiny so jolly, jolly quickly, a bursting fireball that went up as the metal skeleton of the Zeppelin, its skin in flames, began the long fall to the ground below.

Earnestine tumbled, over and over, waving her arms desperately as she tried to swim in the thin, cold air. Arms out and spread, she was suddenly flying, stable, and looking down. It was a long dive towards London’s hard paving.

Kroll was like a comet trailing smoke to mark his incandescent trajectory, a Chinese firework going straight down. He was on fire.

Earnestine put her arms back and in against her body, her petticoats fluttered and flapped in the increased airflow and then, as the air was sucked out, they stuck to her legs and she plummeted. She found she could turn, tiny alterations to her palms having a decided effect. The streets below looked so far away, but the sudden slapping of mist told her that her velocity was extraordinary. Droplets formed on the outside of her goggles were blown away.

She flew; it felt powerful and incredible as she spiralled around the trail of smoke.

As she whizzed down, she saw Kroll struggling with his parachute, the burning pack generating the smoke trail she followed.

Earnestine made herself into an arrow and flew, closer, closer…

She hit him, sparks erupted from his singed clothing and she almost failed… no! Caught hold, her fingers wrapped around one of the parachute’s straps.

With her other hand, she yanked the clasp open before the shocked Oberst realised what was happening. His face was blackened on one side where he’d caught the explosion and his eyes were bloodshot.

He fought back, tried to hit her, while Earnestine concentrated on the harness. When it came free, the two opponents hung for a moment connected by their tenuous hold on the thin straps.

Earnestine pulled and she had the pack in her hands. She yanked the ripcord.

Nothing happened.

Kroll punched her in the face and she span away.

She saw him wrench the pack on…

Ground.

…click it into place…

Ground.

…pull the ripcord….

Ground.

…the silk parachute burst open, a white rose bloom that burst into red. Like tissue in a fireplace, the thin material, ignited by Kroll’s burning clothes, shone and then blackened instantly into ash.

Her last chance – gone.

No!

Not Earnestine, not a Deering–Dolittle.

She brought her knees up to make herself into a ball and the desperate Oberst seemed to fly upwards.

The sky was awash with clouds and bright, blue expanses of brilliant sky, pierced by falling shapes, burning canvas and fire. She squinted when the sun passed across her vision followed by the flare of vivid red flames of the doomed Zeppelin before her tumbling brought the huge expanse of the Earth into view. It was a massive panorama of grey streets and the sunlight glinting off the snaking Thames. There, somewhere, was the House of Commons, the loop around the Isle of Dogs and–

There!

Yes.

A small falling dot!

She straightened again, her skirts flapped briefly and then tucked back like the wings of a diving hawk.

She struck Schneider’s corpse hard, her fingers torn backwards as she hurtled past, and she dropped below him, even flapped her arms, and then threw herself into a star shape, the air resistance pummelling her and slowing her. The wind caught her skirts, braking her descent enough to fly her back up. She caught him, clambered up his legs, just as the creature turned its murderous intentions on her.

She held his jacket with one hand as she searched for the clasp to the harness.

There was no clasp, no straps, no parachute – they hadn’t put one on him.

The corpse, still very much animate, opened its slobbering mouth to bite and snap, its spittle flecking the air. Hand–over–hand she crawled around him until they were face–to–face. She grabbed the handle of the umbrella, and shoved her elbow joint into the hook of the handle.

Her foot was seized in a vice!

Kroll grasped her ankle.

His momentum caused the three of them to cartwheel.

The ground was suddenly there below, full of hard roofs and pointed towers.

She pulled, the umbrella came away and–

She cried out!

It opened explosively, the thin metal ribs pulling on the stretchers, the whole curved shape threatening to invert. She seemed to leap up into the air as the corpse and the Oberst plummeted towards the model buildings. They struck an angled roof punching two distinct holes through the slates to reveal the rafters beneath.

The black canopy distorted, bowling the wrong way, and then she hit the roof herself, spine–jarringly, and slates clattered loose. The canopy righted itself with a beat as she slid down the slope. Slates, knocked free, cascaded into the street below to explode, hurling sharp fragments everywhere.

Earnestine was in the air again, twirling like a spinning dandelion seed to settle on the pavement over the road with a heavy crunching impact.

She rolled.

Her head connected with the pavement and for a moment she saw swirling specks. She did see lights: a myriad of fiery shards like shooting stars falling to earth. It was a glorious sight, the doomed airship disintegrating high above.

She picked herself up, feeling embarrassed as all the passers–by looking at her in amazement. Then, in a panic she checked her arms, legs, face and chest, a flurry of pattings up and down: she was still in one piece.

“Oh, golly gosh!”

Above the flaming Zeppelin still fell like a rapidly setting sun.

They’d won!

There had been three airships: one hadn’t used its Regenmacher for long, theirs hadn’t at all and Kroll’s was a flaming wreck. Without a thunderstorm their army was nothing – just so many old bones and so much rotting flesh. Earnestine gazed up, elated, and almost felt like crying out for joy (not that she would, of course) such was her euphoria.

A droplet of rain splattered on the lens of her goggles.

Then another.

And another.

The pavement began to mottle as a dark pattern appeared and these tiny lakes spread and joined to create a sea, the rain now ricocheting off the flagstones. Passers–by unfurled umbrellas or ran for cover. The pelting water washed away hope, but it was only rain, just rain. There was a flash and… one, two, three… from twelve miles away a deep ominous rumble.

Earnestine howled.

“Steady on, miss,” said a passing gent, “it’s only a spot of rain and you have a brolly.”

The fight was far from over.

Mrs Arthur Merryweather

The storm was operatic, great swirling heaving waves of dark grey clouds lit by savage flashes of light, a maelstrom of thunder and lightning as if angels and demons fought for the sky itself. The Austro-Hungarian crew, now back in control of their Zeppelin, guided the damaged craft down into the dark pit of hell.

Georgina and Charlotte stood together at gunpoint.