The Empire of Gut and Bone (5 page)

T
he capital city was far, far away, in a clutch of hearts that hung in the distant reaches of the Great Body. The sled was too slow, and in any case, the ducts that led to the capital never connected directly to the gut that cradled Pflundt. The boys were told they would have to travel through the flux. They were given a picnic hamper for the ride.

Surrounded by a set of guards in metal helmets, Dantsig led them deep into a cavern. Lanterns lit the walls of a great shaft that dropped straight down beneath the city. A platform was suspended by ropes. When they stepped on, Dantsig pulled a lever, and they all descended.

“There’s a valve,” he explained, “so we can get into the flux.”

“Flux?” said Kalgrash. “What’s flux?”

“There are seven major fluids in the Great Body,” said Dantsig. “Ichor, yellow bile, the hard aliment, the sublime aliment, flux, lux effluvium, and brunch.

“No one knows what any of them are or what any of them do. Some of them might be food. Some of them might be blood or saliva. I don’t know. Who cares? The flux doesn’t move anymore. People say it used to. Maybe because the Great Body is dead. Or we might just be between heartbeats. Or flux might not be blood at all.” Dantsig shrugged and spat over the edge of the descending platform.

“Adding your own fluids to the mix?” Gregory said.

Dantsig smiled lazily. “I generate liquid,” he said. “It condenses in my mouthbox. Design flaw.”

Brian asked politely, “What were you made for?”

Dantsig shrugged. “Exploration. What about you?” Dantsig grinned wolfishly at the boy.

Kalgrash offered, “I was made to ask riddles and smite.”

“Crazy.”

The platform had reached the bottom of the pit.

They’d come to rest next to a huge brass dome — the valve into the flux. They entered the dome through reinforced doors.

They were in an air lock, a docking bay for submarines. The walls were riveted together. Small capsules with propellers and rudders hung from brackets. Men and women in old diving suits clanked around by hatches. Portholes looked out into some green mess in which the beams from electric lights slowly bumbled.

The guards accompanied them to a gangway. It led down through a tube and into a sub: a cramped space filled with tanks and pipes and spigots and dials and
nozzles. Marines, frowning, took up positions around the cabin. Dantsig offered the boys benches upholstered in torn red plastic. A few of the crew, dressed in blue bodysuits and finned helmets, ran past calling unintelligibly to one another.

In a few minutes, there was a jolt, and the submarine moved out into the flux. The deck hummed.

“Whoa,” said Gregory, pressing his palms against the metal wall. “It tickles. The vibration.” He put his hand to his mouth. “It makes my teeth itch.”

Kalgrash offered, “I could remove them for you.”

“Naw,” said Gregory. “What would you do without my winning grin? It would be like the sun had gone out in your heart.”

Dantsig asked Brian over the din of the engine, “What’s with them?”

“They fight a lot.” Brian was too embarrassed to explain that Gregory made fun of Kalgrash for being an automaton. He didn’t want Dantsig to know and to hate Gregory.

The sub nosed through the darkness of the vein, its lights picking out growths and shy, slithering things.

Brian pointed at something finny doing backflips to escape the illumination. “Are they part of the body? Or are they like parasites?”

“Uh, yeah, kid, we’re all like parasites. Hey, will you let me spit in here?”

Gregory said, “Let’s keep the liquid outside.”

“You’re the one who’s seventy-eight percent water, squirt.”

“But the other twenty-two percent is charm.”

“He can add,” muttered Kalgrash in surprise.

Brian was worried that his two friends no longer even pretended to like each other. It made him miserable. He wanted everyone to work together. Everyone should be a unit. Like superheroes. Each with his own power. One can turn things into ice, another can melt them with his thermal fist. As a gang, they’re unstoppable. That was how it was supposed to be.

Instead, he thought of the detective novels he loved, in which everyone was always double-crossing each other. They were always telling each other lies out of the corner of their mouths and hiding things from each other in train lockers. They were telling women they’d love them forever and then turning them right in to the police for fraud. That wasn’t how he wanted his friends to be.

Even worse: He knew that Gregory was really the problem. Kalgrash was incredibly nice — well, when he wasn’t smiting. It was Gregory who persisted in baiting the troll.

Brian wondered why.

He had a long time to wonder. The submarine whirred through miles of duct. It followed hidden routes up veins or down arteries. Once, it passed a huge domed city in the flux, lit with a thousand little brass lanterns.

“When we get to the capital,” said Dantsig, “and you’re in the presence of the Emperor and the Regent, try to class yourselves up a little, got it?”

“What do you mean?” said Gregory. “Brian is already
stunningly debonair. Look at those track shoes, that bowl cut….”

“The track shoes are kind of dirty,” said Brian, kind of miffed, “because I wore them while I was crawling through the dungeons of Norumbega, trying to free you.”

“Hey — hey! None of that, for instance,” Dantsig demanded. “This is the Emperor you’re seeing. There are rules. You can’t turn your back to him. Even if he’s … surprising.”

“What’s surprising about him?” asked Brian.

Gregory said, “He’s a kid, right?”

“Never speak until you’re spoken to,” Dantsig said. “Wait to be presented to people. You’re lower in rank, so you’ll be presented to the nobility. Not the other way around.”

“What’re you talking about?” Gregory said. “I thought you hated the Emperor’s Court. Why are you suddenly getting all Emily Post on us?”

Dantsig looked strained. “The Emperor,” he said, blinking rapidly, “is due some respect.”

“Who’s Emily Post?” asked Kalgrash.

“She wrote about manners,” said Brian. He asked Dantsig, “Can’t you say anything bad about the Emperor? Is it because you’re programmed?”

Dantsig leaned forward. “I can say whatever I want! You got that?” he answered angrily. “I’m just telling you, the palace is a tony kind of rig, and you can’t act like you’ve just stumbled in from the snot-fields of Cheln.”

“Kalgrash did,” said Gregory. “He’s a banjo-plucking hick from the dark side of the gallbladder.”

“I
like
the banjo,” said Kalgrash. “In reality.”

“Gregory,” said Brian, “we should probably … you know … stop making jokes … with …”

“What? Does Emily Post have rules about this, too? In her chapter describing what you can talk about with a troll in a submarine in someone’s artery? ‘Bluegrass music is never a suitable topic for trolls, in or out of submarines.’ ”

And then the troll was shouting and Gregory was laughing and Dantsig was threatening to put out his own eyes with a screwdriver if they didn’t shut up.

Finally, they just turned to the windows and all stared out at the passing duct. Gregory had a slight smile on his lips. Brian looked anxious.

The sub hummed on toward New Norumbega.

The boys were asleep when the submarine docked. It was many hours later, and thousands of leagues of dull green had smeared past the portholes.

Clamps locked down the sub. The boys could feel the sound of screws and winches through their feet. The hide of the sub rattled.

“New Norumbega,” said Dantsig, draped casually over some oxygen tanks. He rose. “Time for the exchange, kids. Put on your best smiles and your bow ties.”

Sailors in finned helmets pulled down a ladder and released the hatch. They led Dantsig, Gregory, Brian, and Kalgrash up into a clammy circular stairwell. The stairs were rusted. The little party ascended.

“Prepare yourselves,” said Dantsig. “Keep your cool. Sure, New Norumbega’s fancy. But they want to hear what you have to say. Hold your chins up high and keep your hands in the open.”

At the top, there was another hatch. Dantsig unscrewed it and raised himself up into brilliant light. The others followed.

It took some moments for their eyes to adjust. They were standing on a bright, salty plain. The overwhelming light came from seams in the sky shining whitely. Distantly, several figures labored toward them across the granules.

There, beneath the harsh light of strange veins, was a shantytown made of planks, old iron, and what looked to be clippings of flesh. Rising up in the middle was a great lumpy tower the color of beef jerky, with wooden gantries hanging on the side of it and uneven turrets sprouting out of the top. It looked like a potbellied stove with five chimneys.

“There it is,” Dantsig announced. “New Norumbega. Home of the Emperor. Capital of the Empire of the Innards.”

T
hat’s the
palace
?” Gregory protested. “Looks more like a slum.”

Dantsig snorted. “If that’s a slum, I’d like to see the cities back on Earth.”

“Pflundt is nicer than that,” said Brian. “Your own fortress.”

Dantsig looked at them, unbelieving. “You two are feeding me the biscuit, right? Because that place is stumendous.”

Brian was about to say something further when trumpets began to play a fanfare. The Imperial delegation was approaching.

Two ranks of armed elfin soldiers accompanied several royal carts pulled by several of the headless, seven-legged beasts that had drawn Dantsig’s sleigh. The beasts were marked with tribal paint in broad stripes of white or spots of earthen red. The carts they lugged were adorned with golden canopies and symbols of power
jutting up on staves. Strings of beads hung from their rigging, glittering in the brilliant light.

On the foremost cart rode the heralds, blowing their trumpets and ghoul-snouted trombones. In the next cart rode a crowd of sullen, imperious courtiers, jostled by the uneven terrain. The men wore navy blazers. The women wore suits with matching skirts and little jackets in coral pink or powder blue.

Then came another cart with an oldish man on a throne. And behind him finally, a cart with racks of immobile heads — the dismantled prisoners, Brian guessed, who would be exchanged for him and Gregory. The mannequin heads stared sullenly in front of them. They were surrounded by guards.

“There they are,” whispered Dantsig. “Everyone wins. You get to talk to the Emperor. We free the heads. The Court hears your spiel about the Thusser Horde.”

Brian held his hand above his eyes to cut down on the glare. The carts were pulling up in front of them. He was excited, but anxious. He couldn’t believe that, after all this time, he was finally going to meet the Norumbegans. He examined them closely — these mysterious eldritch beings who had, in ancient days, created the Game and the City of Gargoyles.

A herald climbed down from the cart and approached Dantsig. He asked a question in the language of the Norumbegans. Immediately, Brian, Gregory, and Kalgrash could feel images and traces of language sliding across their minds, the psychic residue of Norumbegan speech.

Dantsig responded. The herald nodded. Dantsig pointed to the kids and explained something. He and the herald spoke briefly.

Then the herald turned toward the throne cart and cried in English, “Dantsig, Explorer, calling himself Envoy of the Mannequin Resistance, requests permission to approach the cart of His Excellency the Imperial Regent, Duke Telliol-Bornwythe.”

The man on the throne said something to a page boy in a parti-colored tunic who stood up and repeated in a high, girlish voice, “His Excellency, the Imperial Regent graciously grants Automaton Dantsig’s supplication for an audience and demands said Dantsig to approach the Glory Float accompanied by the two children of Earth.”

“Showtime,” muttered Dantsig. He bowed and stepped forward.

Kalgrash began to follow, but the Regent quickly whispered something to his page boy, who announced, in his piping tremble, “No such audience has been granted to the automaton troll champion, who shall remain motionless until such time as he is granted permission to stir.”

“Oh, I’ll stir,” muttered Kalgrash. “A big cauldron of butt-kick.” Still, he remained behind.

Gregory, Brian, and Dantsig approached the throne on its float. The noblemen and women watched this pageant silently, drinking mint juleps.

Now that the carts were close, Brian could see that the glittering ornaments were not all of great expense. The poles were strung with rickrack. The beads that flapped along the canopies were cheap baubles for dress-up.

He was surprised, too, by the figure on the Glory Float, Duke Telliol-Bornwythe. The old man wore a silver wig and a velvet frock coat, but the frock coat was worn, the gold braid rubbed almost white near the buttons. One knee of his silken breeches had been scraped on something long before, and was almost worn through.

The page boy engaged Dantsig in a long conversation in Norumbegan, prodded by the Regent on the throne. At last, the Regent himself spoke.

“Still in English, hmm?” he said. “Very well.” He clicked his tongue in his mouth, as if getting used to the language. He took out a pair of round sunglasses with scratched lenses and put them on. He asked, “You are Dantsig?”

Dantsig bowed. “Your Excellency is gracious to admit me into your august presence. I come as an envoy from General Malark of the Mannequin Resistance.”

“There is no Mannequin Resistance.”

“I am myself a member of the Resistance, Your Excellency.”

“I proclaim there is no such thing. There cannot be.”

“There is.”

“No. There could never be. Automatons cannot rebel. So we recognize no Mannequin Resistance. There is no General Malark. There is, I believe, a
Mr.
Malark, automaton. He has no rank.”

“He is our general, sir.”

“He has no rank. There is only one army — the Imperial Army of Norumbega. Mr. Malark is no longer part of it, having fled into disgrace.”

“I come, sir,” Dantsig insisted, “from the Mannequin Resistance, and — ”

“I have said there is no such body. You will not contravene my word, automaton.”

Dantsig bowed his head and frowned.

The Regent looked at the two boys. “My lads, you are Gregory Stoffle and Brian Thatz? You have the misfortune to be human?”

“Yes, sir,” said Brian. “We’re human.”

“Ah well,” said the Regent delicately. “Nothing we can do about that now.” He turned to Dantsig. “You did the right thing to bring them to us. Thank you. You are a good little servant.”

Dantsig smiled suavely — though Brian could tell the man was livid with anger. “I didn’t bring them on your account,” Dantsig said. “I brought them for the exchange of prisoners.”

“As I say, you are a perfect little servant. You’ve done exactly what you should.”

“We didn’t bring them so you could —”

“You know your master’s will.”

“With the respect due your title, sir, you aren’t my master. I just —”

“Am I not? Well, you’ve done exactly what I wanted. And you are an automaton.”

“But I didn’t … I’m here for
them,”
he pointed at the heads on the cart.

“Them?”
said the Regent. “They’re nothing. They’re heads. Shut off. They’re going nowhere.”

“We’ll check them for damage when we get them on
the sub,” said Dantsig with a hint of defiance in his voice. He no longer looked directly at the Regent. He looked at the dark shadow on the salt beneath the Regent’s cart, as if he couldn’t meet the Regent’s eyes.

“You won’t be getting back on your submarine, Mr. Dantsig. Those machines are going nowhere. And neither are you.”

Dantsig looked, shocked, at the Regent. “You wouldn’t break your word!” he protested. “A Norumbegan nobleman never breaks his word!”

“You can’t make a promise to an automaton,” said the Regent. “Any more than you can pledge something to a toaster. Saying something to an automaton is like speaking in an empty room.”

Dantsig roughly grabbed Brian and Gregory by their collars and was about to haul them backward toward the valve. Gregory and Brian exchanged a look: panic.

They heard the whistle as Kalgrash started to swing his blade.

The marines in their finned helmets raised wands.

Dantsig pulled the boys back from the cart. They stumbled over the mounded ground toward the valve.

“I’ve got your back, Dantsig,” called Kalgrash. “Just tell me when you want the smiting to begin.”

“You won’t take the humans,” the Regent demanded. “You are my servant.”

“I am not your —”

“Perhaps I may say something that shall convince you.”

“I cannot listen to you, sir.”

“Hush, hush. Hush, my boy. In the base of these carts that surround you are electromagnets. If my page activates them, you, your cronies, and your quaint troll will collapse with all memory erased and your workings irrevocably garbled. So freeze. Release the children. Let them come to me.”

Dantsig stood defiantly.
“Breathers!”
he swore. “You
never
keep your word. You
never
follow your own rules!”

“Guards, get the children away from the rogue.”

“If I could curse you …! If I could curse you …!” Dantsig kept yelling. He did not meet the Norumbegan Regent’s eyes.

“But you can’t. You can’t say a word against me.”

Guards stepped forward to guide Gregory and Brian away from the automaton. Dantsig yanked them back.

Suddenly, Dantsig raised his head and looked right at the Regent. “If you’re a danger to the Norumbegan nation, I can. Then I can eliminate you.” He nodded. “And maybe you are. And if that’s the case, then it’s my duty to protect the other breathers, the other Norumbegans. I’m allowed to do that. I’m required to.”

“Careful,” said the Regent. “He appears dangerous.”

“It would be my duty to remove you,” said Dantsig.

“Dangerous and boringly talkative.”

“It would be my duty to destroy you, just like you shut us off. I could challenge you to a duel. I could fight you on the battlefield. I could kill you while you slept.”

The Regent said something to his page boy, who rose with a dial in his hand. He turned the dial slightly. There was a hum.

Dantsig swayed. He looked terrified.

With a clank, Kalgrash fell to his knees.

“No!” Brian screamed. “No! Don’t!”

Gregory ran toward the Glory Float. “Stop it, please!” said Gregory. “We’ll come with you!”

“Please!” said Brian, running to Dantsig’s side.

The Regent didn’t smile. He didn’t alter his face in any way. He simply muttered a command, and the boy turned off the current.

Dantsig sat on the hot granules beneath him. He was breathing heavily. His hands fluttered near his heart.

“So, Mr. Dantsig,” said the Regent. “I am afraid you shall be detained at our pleasure, along with your troll champion and your guards. The children shall be presented to His Sublime Highness, the Emperor of Old Norumbega, New Norumbega, and the Whole Dominion of the Innards, Elector of the Bladders, Prince of the Gastric Wastes, Sovereign of Ducts Superior and Inferior, Lord of All. And he shall determine what shall be done with them.”

Having said that, the Regent clapped, and his soldiers moved in to do his will.