Legerdemain, Chapter Three
Jun. 18th, 2010 01:37 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
foolish_m0rtalGenre: Fantasy, Steampunk, Alternate History
Rating: PG- some swears. Ladies cover your sensitive ears.
Summary: In 1800s London-Aldwych, stage magic always comes second to the scientific and engineering advancements that are quickly becoming the new marvel of the age. But Charles East (The Enchanting East, Monday-Saturday at 1:30PM, half-price on Sundays at 4PM) stumbles upon other magic that is practiced by an altogether other sort of Londonite. And sometimes when you pull a rabbit out of a hat, there is no place to put him back.
Well well, we're just zipping on along, aren't we? I'm dead tired after work, so please be kind and correct any weird mistakes I've made. I'm thinking of making the end version of this into a PDF, since I like PDFs and it seems like everybody's a PDF lately.
“Guess who I saw on my way back from the market?” Charles said when he got back to Henry’s. Margaret was stumbling around in the kitchen re-establishing a bit of her humanity amid the banged up spoons and chipped plates, and did not take kindly to Charles being awake and cheery at her when she was trying her best to be miserable.
“Hmgh,” she said and collapsed into one of the chairs. She had put her crumpled dress from yesterday back on and without her shoes and her hair like a giant tangled mass parted to one side, she looked like she had gone out walking in a typhoon.
“I saw Professor Briggs, who I think I introduced you to one time when we went to the Manchester orchestra concert at his theatre, and then-”
She sighed, raised a hand, let it drop, and then raised it again. Not now, Charles, she signed at him finally. I’ve a headache.
“Tea?” Charles asked, pointing at the stove.
I’ve had tea, thanks, she replied sourly.
“Breakfast?” he asked, holding up the bags in his hands.
Her eyes widened, and she got up to help him with the bags. Oh, you’re wonderful, she said enthusiastically as she saw the makings of breakfast. Make me sausage and eggs and porridge.
And then sat back down with her hands curved possessively around the paper sack of sugar.
Charles snorted. “Yes, mistress.”
I’m tired, she replied and dismissed him theatrically with a hand.
Charles laughed. “Oh yes, I forgot. You were in a magic show yesterday. I don’t suppose there was anyone up there with you?” He sighed and started getting out the pans and bowls. “Well, you’ve got more reason to be tired than I do.”
Then he winced and clicked his mouth shut, because that hadn't come out the way he'
She just shrugged nonchalantly and finished off the rest of her tea, unsympathetic to his awkward overtures. She had always been unabashed about things like this, though she said it was because Charles was always embarrassed enough for everyone.
Charles was counting out the number of eggs they’d need when he heard her rap on the table irritably. He turned around. “Sorry, what were you saying?”
You were telling me about the market,she said, one hand absently tracing the perfect circular scars at her neck.
“Where’s your vocoder?” Charles asked sharply, forgetting breakfast for a moment.
She shrugged. It’s at work.
“You shouldn’t leave it lying around.”
She rolled her eyes. I know, I know. Mother. And then stuck her tongue out at him.
Charles grinned. Margaret always hated her vocoder. He could understand. Though he’d only heard it a few times, he remembered it had been more machine than human with its soft staccato tones, but she was lucky to have one at all, at their price. That was why she had taken a side job as his assistant after all. But vocoders were expensive, even the cheap early models without the human rendering, so it had taken all three of them along with Henry’s father to finally buy one.
Charles had even swallowed his pride and gone back to his family for help; they had of course been happy to give him the money once they had heard what he was intending for it, but it had rankled Charles to go back to them all the same. With their money, they probably could have bought all of them vocoders. They had offered to buy one of the high quality ones that sounded eerily human and could be adjusted to a tone of the speaker’s liking, but Charles had said no, they already had one picked out, and if they decided on another one, he’d earn the extra money himself. No reason going more into debt to them than he already was.
I don’t need it except for work and doing the shopping, Margaret said. I like who I am better without it.
“Should have thought of that before you threw in with our unsavoury lot,” Charles said. “But it’s working? Needs any oil? Is it useful?”
Very useful, Margaret admitted. I am grateful for it, even if I never wear it around you.
“Well if anything else, Henry and I know more hand language than god,” Charles conceded.
She rapped the table again.
“I haven’t been avoiding your question.” He turned back to breakfast. “So Briggs let me into the theatre to look around. I thought I was alone in there. I was in the front row where I’d been sitting-” he darted a glance at the closed bedroom door, because Henry didn’t know he’d gone to the show. He would have got hell for it. “And then I ran- literally ran- into Perceval Fletcher.”
Perceval Fletcher, she said as he slid the toast from the pan onto her plate. That other magician? Mid-Day?
“Yes, the Mid-Day magician- my hand to Ruthie.”
She crunched noisily into a piece of bread and chewed pensively for a minute. He’s quite nice-looking, she concluded.
“Is that really all you have to say?” Charles demanded.
She thought about it. Good luck with your rivalry, she offered, raising an eyebrow.
“I’m afraid there is no rivalry, for all that he's from Keating,” Charles told her. “I think we’ve agreed just to let each other co-exist.”
Co-exist, she mocked him, smirking. Flash little university boy.
“No porridge for you,” Charles decided, folding up the bag and putting it away in the cupboard. She waved her arms in consternation.
He was laughing and coming very close to spilling the half-cooked eggs in the pan all over himself when the door to Henry’s room opened.
“A man can’t get any sleep with you two shouting at all hours of the night,” Henry grumbled, rubbing his eyes. He pulled a little on Margaret’s messy hair but in general was acting like last night had never happened.
“Morning,” Charles said.
“Hmm? Oh, good morning to you too, you annoying little-”
“No, it’s morning already,” Charles said. “I bought us breakfast.”
“Annoying?” Henry amended quickly. “I meant...enchanting!”
“Haha,” Charles said dryly, and Henry made a rude gesture as he stumbled off in search of the wash basin. Charles watched Margaret follow him with her eyes.
“Is this going to be a problem?” he asked slowly.
Is what going to be a problem? she replied innocently, and he gave up and went back to the eggs.
“Hullo!” Henry shouted considerably more energetically as the three of them burst back into Eichmann’s theatre. “We’ve had our liquor and our sleep and our breakfast, and we’re back!”
Eichmann just grunted and kept his seat at the ticket box. He was reading the newspaper and seemed reluctant to tear his eyes away from the “Government to Overhaul Public Service Automata” headline.
“Good morning, Mr. Eichmann!” Henry said loudly as they paraded into the backstage door. Eichmann ignored first him and then Margaret, who fluttered her fingers at him saucily as she passed him.
“Herr Eichmann,” Charles said quietly as he followed them in.
Eichmann grunted again. “Decent show yesterday, East,” he said, his eyes still glued to his paper.
“Thank you,” Charles replied, but Eichmann had apparently decided he’d spoken enough for the week, so Charles just ducked his head and shut the door behind him.
“Why does he always talk to you?” Henry complained.
Because he’s not a louse, Margaret signed impishly.
“Oy!” Henry said, and Charles let out something mortifyingly like a cackle.
They nodded to a few of the stagehands that were out setting up for someone else’s dress rehearsal and went to the back to their work area in the small room adjoining the scenery workshop.
Henry put an arm around Charles’s shoulders that felt terrifyingly like a chokehold on his neck and steered him bodily to the Disassembler. “Now the rest of the world thinks you did perfectly yesterday, but thing that only you, me, and Margaret over there know is that this trick almost went buggy and damn near took off your hand. So.” Henry propelled him towards the machine. “You’re going to do this trick for me until you can prove you can do it without any major dismemberment or death.”
“Major?” Charles asked, already taking off his jacket and rolling up his sleeves. He threw his jacket over to Margaret, who was perched on top of some of their empty equipment boxes. She caught it and put it over her shoulders.
“I can only ask for so much from you apes,” Henry said long-sufferingly, and Margaret gleefully threw the jacket into his face.
It was well into the afternoon before Henry was satisfied that Charles could pull off the trick without maiming himself. And then they had to work on The Disassembler (they had to come up with a better name, they just had to) to reinforce the blades inside, which meant Margaret had to station herself by the door to chase off the shop’s sweeper whenever it got too close.
“Wish Eichmann would get a newer model,” Henry grumbled as they scrambled to dump their wooden supports onto the table. The sweeper whirred, spun around angrily once, and then left the room to do another circuit around the shop looking for fallen sawdust or discarded planks. “That thing will eat anything wooden that’s left on the floor.”
“It’s built for it,” Charles pointed out.
“Yes, but it’s stupid. Would probably eat the heels off Margaret’s shoes if she let it.”
Margaret immediately removed her shoes and put them on the bench next to her.
“I said it might, not that it would,” Henry said irritably. “Get those off the bench- that’s disgusting.”
She flashed two fingers at him but put her shoes back on and then patted them lovingly with a hand.
“Yes, we know you love those damn shoes,” Henry said. Charles secretly liked the musical clonk-clonk sound they made against the cobblestones when she walked. Henry spun around to glare at him as if everything was his fault. “What is it with women and shoes?”
“Probably the same thing that’s with men and liquor,” Charles said mildly, already gluing some of the parts together.
“But that’s different,” Henry protested. “When you find a decent glass of whiskey it’s like...it’s like...”
Perfection, Margaret signed dreamily. Like when you find the most beautiful pair of shoes.
Henry nodded. “Yes exactly. No, wait a minute!” He pointed at her, but she was laughing silently. “Stop- stop twisting my words and being so...logical. That’s Oxford’s job over here.”
“Titus Salt,” Charles said exasperatedly. “And most days I wish I hadn’t told you at all. I’ve started keeping a count of the college mockery, and that’s two just for today.”
“Two?” Henry turned to look at Margaret admiringly. “Got an early start today, did we? That’s my girl.”
Margaret saluted him with the tips of her fingers.
“Seems like university doesn’t pay though, does it?” Henry continued smugly. “What, with you in performing jobs and all.”
Flunker? Charles asked her discreetly, pretending to adjust the collar of his shirt.
Her mouth twisted, and one of her eyebrows twitched up. You’d like that, wouldn’t you? she said wickedly.
Charles flashed her an identical smirk. Maybe.
Charles didn’t even realise they had been working so late till Margaret tapped him on the shoulder and rubbed her eyes.
I have to go to work, she signed tiredly and pinched her own cheeks to make herself look more lively. And I’m hungry.
As if on cue, The Merry George started clanging for eight o’clock, and Henry put his face down onto the messy table and groaned.
Charles patted his shoulder almost sympathetically. He was used to getting caught up in work and forgetting about things like sleep and food; they had called it ‘gearing’ in university, and it had been almost a tradition to see how long students could last. The record holder to this day was Samuel Whitting, who had stayed up for five days straight to do last minute work on his end of term project. Students had lined up to shake hands with him (with his professor ceremoniously bringing up the end) as the medics had carted him to the hospital just on the other side of the bridge. Charles thought that whoever had set up a hospital, a pub, and an all-night coffeehouse directly across the bridge from Titus Salt had had remarkably assiduous business sense.
“M’gna leave too,” Henry said, looking piteously up at Charles. There were wood shavings stuck to his face and in his hair. Charles smirked and then yawned. Ruthie, he was getting old- he couldn’t stay up like he used to anymore.
“No, no. Don’t d-don’t do that...” And then Henry yawned too and ruffled at his hair. “I’ll take you out somewhere to eat,” he offered, looking sleepily at Margaret. “And see you to work- where is that, anyway?”
Too far for you to keep your eyes open, Margaret said, shaking her head and handing Charles back his coat. I’ll see myself there. Go home.
“Mm,” Henry protested, but he was already half-way out the door. “Lock up,” he told Charles before leaving.
“Some manager you are,” Charles groused good-naturedly as he hurried Margaret out and locked up the workroom before the sweeper could come in to inspect it. When they passed the ticket booth, it was already crowded with people lining up to see- Charles flipped around and craned his head to see the poster- the Mechanical Menagerie. Whatever the hell that was.
“Should I come with you?” Charles asked, already knowing Margaret would refuse but trying to be a gentleman anyway.
I said no. See you Wednesday. Margaret waved him away, tucked her coat closer around her, and walked off down the street to look for a pub that served late dinner.
Charles turned back to head home too. He didn’t live in a place anywhere as nice as Henry’s, which might have had something to do with Henry’s grandfather being a quite a successful politician. That Henry was still on friendly speaking terms with his family might have helped too. Charles did his best to ignore his family- the fact that they had booted him out and now wanted to reconcile after three years still made him unbelievably angry. It was also probably why he was still keeping stubbornly to the magic business instead of employed elsewhere checking someone’s bloody calculations or helping...oh, overhauling public service automata or something. There was an independence to the performing profession that he hadn’t discovered till he’d experienced it. It was stressful, thankless, and outright murderous most times, but it was also wonderful in unexpected ways.
His landlady’s door was closed when he slipped into the front parlour, but he could hear her faint scratchy melodograph tinkling out a popular song he should have probably recognised. He rounded the tight narrow stairs up to the second floor and made sure to keep his flat keys with the shop keys so he wouldn’t leave them at home again. It was actually Henry’s responsibility to keep all the work keys, which meant Charles always ended up with them. Henry really was a bad manager.
Charles laughed to himself and kicked the corner of the warped door till it gave. That's what he liked about these old places- the doors had theft security. Even if you had the keys, you could barely open them.
His flat was dim and stuffy in the darkness. He opened one of the windows to let in the cool night air and then popped in the ash screen so all the dirt from the factories wouldn’t blow inside and coat everything in sight. He had learned his lesson from the first time.
There wasn’t much to his flat- it was just a single room with a couch and small bashed up sitting table in one corner for visitors, a bed on the other side, two bookshelves, and a giant workbench taking up the rest of the room.
One of the bookshelves kept all of his clothes and necessities because really, a bookshelf was just like a wardrobe, except the wardrobe had been five shillings more just for a set of doors. The bookshelf had more shelves, at any rate.
The other bookshelf actually had books- textbooks from university, popular volumes from subscriptions to Magusfacio Prima and The Everyday Engineer, and a small embarrassing collection of every novel Joseph Crowther had ever written. A few shelves of books he’d taken with him after he’d left his family’s house. And another even smaller collection shoved behind the bookshelf from authors such as Geist, de la Blanc, and a very rare epistolary by Tavoularis. He had found some of them at university, shuffled around discreetly by certain groups of people. He’d pasted brown cardboard over the covers and kept them out of sight, but they still burned a hole through his wall. They were horribly incriminating- if the blues ever searched his flat and found those, well...that would be the end of it for him. He could have probably stood a better chance in court if he’d kissed the Prime Minister in the street.
Just like he did every day, Charles swore that sometime soon he would get rid of them and be done with looking over his shoulder, but he still had them after all these years. He couldn’t just get rid of them- they made him feel less solitary, less vulnerable in the cold dark mornings of London-Aldy when he couldn’t sleep and thought this was as much as he was ever going to get- that he was going to utterly die old and alone in his stupid cluttered overpriced little flat.
Charles banged into the workbench and grunted in pain. There were bits of things scattered on it- half-formed devices he had yet to complete and pieces of old machinery he had bought cheap at the market and taken apart for parts or just to see how it worked. But university laboratories had drilled a strict regime into him, and the damn workbench was cleaner than all of his flat and probably more than half his clothes.
Charles yawned widely again and didn’t even bother going down to the common kitchen to put supper on; he just shed his clothes as he stumbled through his tiny flat and flopped face first on the bed.
“Ouch!” he said into his pillow. He arched his back, dug out whatever pointy metal bit was digging into his stomach, and threw it somewhere near the workbench.
Then he put his face back down with a sigh, and this time he was asleep in under two minutes. So much for gearing.
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So in this world, the Big Ben was named after George Stephenson, English Father of Railways, darling of the Victorians, and just generally a crazy awesome engineer. I thought this was appropriate, since steampunk generally puts more importance to science and engineering than to some random member of Parliament named Benjamin Hall- I mean, what?
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no subject
Date: 2010-06-17 08:08 pm (UTC)Also *stares at* Merry George. XD
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Date: 2010-06-18 01:02 am (UTC)It's really fun writing those three, because they're very at ease with each other.
I like George Stephenson much better! It was either that or Isambard Kingdom Brunel! No one in hell wants their clock named 'the Industrious Isambard'
no subject
Date: 2010-06-17 09:10 pm (UTC)no subject
Date: 2010-06-18 01:06 am (UTC)