The Windup Girl

50

Elizabeth Boudry’s head jerks back. Blood sprays Hock Seng in fine mist, spattering his skin and newly tailored clothes. The white shirt general turns and Hock Seng immediately drops to his knees, making a khrab of obeisance beside the collapsed body of the foreign devil.

The blond creature’s surprised dead eyes stare out at him as he prostrates himself. Spring gun disks chatter across the walls, people are screaming. Suddenly there is silence.

The white shirt general yanks him to his feet and shoves her spring gun into his face.

“Please,” Hock Seng whispers in Thai. “I am not their kind.”

The general’s hard eyes study him. She nods sharply, and shoves him aside. He huddles against a wall as she begins barking orders to her men. They quickly drag the AgriGen bodies aside, then coalesce around her. Hock Seng is surprised at how quickly the unsmiling woman musters her troops. She goes to the monks of the seedbank. Makes her own khrab of respect and begins speaking quickly. Even though she performs a khrab to their spiritual authority, there can be no doubt that she is the one who is the master of the place.

Hock Seng’s eyes widen as he hears what she is planning. It’s terrifying. An act of destruction that cannot be allowed… and yet, the monks are nodding and now people are streaming out of the seedbank, all of them working quickly. The general and her men begin throwing open doors, revealing rack after rack of weaponry. She begins assigning teams: the Grand Palace, Korakot Pump, Khlong Toey Seawall Lock…

The general spares a glance at Hock Seng as she finishes dispatching her people. The monks are already taking seeds down from the shelves. Hock Seng cringes at her attention. After what he has heard, she cannot intend to let him live. The bustle of activity increases. More and more monks stream in. They stack the seeds cases carefully. Rank after rank of seeds coming down from the shelves. Seeds from more than a hundred years ago, seeds that every so often are cultured in the strictest of isolation chambers and then carried back to this underground safe, to be stored again. The heritage of millennia in the boxes, the heritage of the world.

And then the monks are streaming out of the seedbank, carrying the boxes on their shoulders, a river of shaven-headed men in saffron robes, bearing forth their nation’s treasure. Hock Seng watches, breathless at the sight of so much genetic material disappearing into the wilds. Somewhere outside, he thinks he hears monks chanting, blessing this project of renewal and destruction, and then the white shirt general is looking at him again. He forces himself not to duck his head. Not to grovel. She will kill him. She must. He will not grovel and piss himself. At least he will die with dignity.

The general purses her lips, then simply jerks her head toward the open doors. “Run, yellow card. This city is no longer a refuge for you.”

He stares at her, surprised. She jerks her head again and the shadow of a smile touches her lips. Hock Seng wais quickly and climbs off his knees. He hurries through the tunnels and out into hot open air, the river of saffron-robed men all around him. Once they reach the temple grounds, the monks disperse through various gates, separating into smaller and smaller groups, a diaspora bound eventually for some pre-arranged place of distant safety. A secret place, far from calorie company reach, watched over by Phra Seub and all the spirits of the nation.

Hock Seng watches for a moment longer as the monks continue to pour from the seedbank, and then he runs for the street.

A rickshaw man sees him and slows to a stop. Hock Seng leaps in.

“Where to?” the man asks.

Hock Seng hesitates, thinking furiously. The anchor pads. It is the only certain way to escape the coming chaos. The yang guizi Richard Carlyle is probably still there. The man and his dirigible, preparing to fly for Kolkata to retrieve the Kingdom’s coal pumps. There will be safety in the air. But only if Hock Seng is fast enough to the catch the foreign devil before he untethers the last anchor.

“Where to?”

Mai.

Hock Seng shakes his head. Why does she torment him now? He owes her nothing. She is nothing, in truth. Just some fishing girl. And yet against his better judgment he allowed her to stay with him, told her he would hire her as a servant of some sort. Would keep her safe. It was the least he could do… But that was before. He was going to be flush with money from the calorie companies. It was a different sort of promise, then. She will forgive him.

“The anchor pads,” Hock Seng says. “Quickly. I don’t have much time.”

The rickshaw man nods and the bike accelerates.

Mai.

Hock Seng curses himself. He is a fool. Why does he never focus on the most important goal? Always he is distracted. Always he fails to do what would keep him alive and safe.

He leans forward, angry with himself. Angry at Mai. “No. Wait. I have another address. First to Krungthon Bridge, then to the anchor pads.”

“That’s in the opposite direction.”

Hock Seng grimaces. “You think I don’t know it?”

The rickshaw man nods and slows. He turns his bike and aims it back the way he came. He stands on his pedals, getting up to speed. The city slides past, colorful and busy with cleanup activity. A city completely unaware of its impending doom. The cycle weaves through the sunshine, shifting smoothly through its gears, faster and faster toward the girl.

If he is very lucky there will be enough time. Hock Seng prays that he will be lucky. Prays that there will be enough time to collect Mai and still make the dirigible. If he were smart, he would simply run.

Instead, he prays for luck.