Cold Copper

Chapter Eighteen

“Um,” Rose said, since she couldn’t think of anything else to say now that the puppet creation was on its two legs and standing there like a soldier awaiting orders.

“Don’t move,” Hink said quietly behind it. “We don’t know what it can do.”

“But it doesn’t even have a head.”

“Lots of things don’t have heads and still do a lot of harm,” he said. “Back away from it slowly.”

“You just told me not to move.”

“Well, now I’m saying back away.” He pulled his gun.

“You’re not going to shoot it, are you?”

“Not unless it shoots first. Or maybe before that.”

“Oh, no you won’t, Captain. I just made the poor thing. I won’t watch you blow it to bits.”

“It ain’t a baby, Rose.”

“I know what it is and isn’t. More than you do. And I also happen to think it isn’t a threat to us.”

“On what grounds?”

“It has no mind.”

“Neither does a gun.”

“Neither do you, Lee Hink. Listen to me,” she said. “There’s nothing to tell it what to do. No steering device. No telegraph wire, no levers or pulleys sending it to do anything. I don’t even think it could take a single step if it tried.” To prove her point, she walked toward it.

“Woman, you want me to shoot you too, so you and I can still be alive to argue this issue? I said stop moving.”

“Just wait. For once, think first, shoot second.” She put her hand on the puppet’s shoulder, careful to be beside it and not in front of it just in case she was mistaken about what it could do.

The puppet soldier did nothing.

“It has no head,” she said again to Hink, who had walked up behind it, gun still drawn. “No trigger, no driver. A power source, yes. But that’s all it has. Put your gun down.”

Hink scowled at her, and she gave him a wide-eyed look. “You aren’t afraid of a puppet, are you?” she asked.

“I’m not afraid of anything,” he snarled. He slammed the gun into the holster and hissed, likely at the pain from jostling his wounded side so hard.

“But you,” he said, “are too trusting.”

“I just know what goes into the things I make. And this thing—soldier maybe?—this soldier isn’t complete enough to do harm. Like I said, something’s missing.”

Hink walked around to stand in front of it, and Rose backed up too. They stood there a while, tipping their heads and staring at it, like two patrons in an art gallery trying to see the craftsmanship in a painting.

“Gimbals well with the shift of the car,” Hink noted.

“Has a sort of ball and rocker system set up in the ankles and torso. Keeps it standing.”

“So you think it’s made for ships? Sea or air?” he asked.

“I think watching it keep balance proves it can at least stand a deck,” Rose said.

“What else do you think it can do?”

Rose shook her head. “If I had to make a guess? It walks like a man, or does the kind of work a man does, but doesn’t tire until the…the battery there runs down. It could be a worker. For a factory or a mine of some sort?”

“I’d think it would cost too much to make a thing like that, metal and rubber and wires. Men are cheap. Maybe it’s something for the rich. A toy?” he said. “A servant?”

She shrugged.

“How long do you think the power in it lasts?” he asked.

“I don’t have the foggiest idea.”

Silence as they stared at it some more.

Finally, Hink said, “Well, I’m done being baffled by it. Let’s turn it off.”

“I agree. No need for it to just stand there doing nothing. Also, it’s giving me the goose chills.”

Hink grinned. “I thought you said you weren’t afraid of it.”

“I’m not afraid. Just unnerved, I think. It has no head.”

“There is that,” he agreed. “Do you suppose I just turn that orb the other way to unscrew it?”

“I think so, yes.”

Hink walked up to it and did so. The entire thing stiffened, then slumped, falling forward. Hink caught it, grunted a bit. “Heavier than it looks,” he said as he lowered it to the ground. That he did gently, as if it contained nitroglycerine.

He stood back up, the copper and glass device balancing on his palm. That had come loose a lot easier than Rose expected.

“Did you break the wires?” she asked.

“Which wires?”

“The copper ones.”

He gave her a look. “Rose, all the wires are copper.”

“Oh, for heaven’s sake. The copper wires attached to the battery.”

He lifted the thing, held it so the lamplight caught it and studied the edges. “Nope. Doesn’t appear I did. Four wires, just like before. Do you have any complaints if I keep it in my pocket?”

“Other than it’s not yours? No complaint from me.”

“Come on now, Rose. Tell me you don’t like a man who isn’t afraid to just reach out and grab what he wants out of life.”

“Oh, sure. Confidence in a man is one thing. Thievery—”

The train car tilted so hard she was thrown off her feet and landed on her back end and elbows, then slid down the sloping floor and slammed into the door.

Hink was upended right behind her but somehow managed to land by locking his arms on either side of her, so he didn’t completely crush her when they collided.

The puppet came sliding toward them next, and Rose had a moment to be grateful the door she had fallen against was locked tight on the outside.

Then the dead body started speeding their way.

“Move!” Rose yelled. “Dead body, dead body!”

Hink pushed to one side, rolling, and grabbed ahold of her coat lapels as he did so, yanking her aside with him.

The puppet soldier thunked into the door where they had been only moments before. Then the dead body smacked into it with a meaty thump.

Rose suddenly realized she was sitting, well, mostly lying, across Hink’s body, their legs tangled in a most improper manner.

“Hey,” she breathed.

“Ma’am,” he said with a suggestive grin. “I do believe we have gotten ourselves into a bit of a jumble.”

“You’re going to kiss me, aren’t you?” she asked.

“I’m confident I am.” He did just that, and Rose was not shy about kissing him back. This was it, the last straw. She could feel it in every inch of her bones. Her heart was well and truly set on this man. He might infuriate her, test her patience, but she loved him. Not just because he was the first wild-minded fellow she’d met outside her little town.

She loved him for challenging her, for caring for her, for the wild, adventurous troubles he seemed to constantly land himself in.

Plus, he had a sweet airship. She couldn’t deny that added just a bit to her feelings for him. The Tin Swift was a place she could belong. A job she would love, running the boilers across every sky in the world. And Captain Hink was a man she could happily spend her life with.

All these thoughts flickered through her mind in a rush, then were replaced with this: his mouth pressing gently against her lips, catching at the curves of her with delightful attention to detail.

Just to see what he’d do, she opened her mouth a bit and gently bit his bottom lip.

What he did was groan, but not in painful sort of way. Then his mouth was over hers with a bit more intention and he did something with his tongue that made her lose all breath and all thought, and go wobbly at the knees.

She liked the feel of him, the taste and scent of him. She savored his body, strong beneath her, arms possessive around her.

And then the entire world crashed around them.

They were untangled and unkissed in a most startling way. One second the freight car and everything inside it went weightless and stirred up; the next second everything was thrown to the ground with a bang.

“Rose,” Hink called out. “Are you okay?”

She took in several hard breaths before she could push words out of her lungs. “I am. I am fine.”

She had landed against a wooden crate and scratched up her back a bit, and lost the belt on her coat, which might have been Hink’s doing, but other than straw in her hair and stuck to her dress, she seemed to have all her limbs in the right places.

Hink pushed himself up off the dead body, and straightened his coat, checking for the copper device in his pocket.

“You have a gun on you?” he asked quietly.

Rose checked to see if her gun was still tucked in her pocket. “Yes,” she said. “I have it.”

“Good girl. Now come stand here with me, back to mine, facing that door.” He pointed.

She walked toward him, the tone of his voice telling her this was not the time to ask questions. She did it anyway. “Why?”

“Because we just landed. Any minute now someone’s going to open one of these doors to see if their freight is intact. And they aren’t going to like finding us inside.”

She said no more, but stood, back-to-back with her airship captain, U.S. Marshal, and love. Rose Small raised her gun, cocked back the hammer, and waited for the door to bust open.