"There is just never enough!" Roger Copperfield fumed, hunched over his desk in the pit of the boiler room below Croft University. Eight-year-old Tessa watched hidden in the crutch of the stairwell as her father stared at the pile of bills on his desk. He pulled a cork off a large bottle of rum and swallowed the last of its contents. Wiping his face on his sleeve, the disgruntled man stared at the bottle a long moment. In a fit of rage, the mechanic hurled the glass container into the boiler. The fire hissed and snapped. The shattering glass punctuated the man's anger and despair as he shouted, "It wasn't supposed to be like this!" Shoving all his paperwork to the ground, he overturned a bookshelf and punched the wood frame. The weak man staggered, clutching his hand, sinking into the rickety chair with a pitiful whimper. He sat there for a long moment before slowly opening his desk. Staring at its contents, Tessa's father absentmindedly began fingering something within its drawer.
Tessa recalled how nervous she felt as she slowly crept down the stairs. How she would later understand the significance of her father's expression as he withdrew his pistol, the polished steel glinting off the lantern light. But at the time, when she was still too young to grasp his train of thought, she asked nervously, "Papa? Are you all right?"
Jumping at the sound of her voice, Roger Copperfield turned to face Tessa, tears brimming in his emerald eyes as he put the gun down onto the desk. "Tessa, what are you doing here so late? I thought you went home hours ago."
Tessa shook her head as she looked down at her feet. "I came to bring you dinner," she said, handing him the basket with a few slices of meat, cheese, and bread. "I...know it's not much, but it's something." She felt her freckled face flush before wringing her hands and admitting, "I may have had some of it on the way over...."
"Oh, my dear Tess," The thin man looked at the offered meal and grimaced, "But where did you get this?"
Tessa's heart sank. "The lunchroom."
His tone grew stern. "Tess, the lunchroom has been closed for hours. Even if it wasn't, how could you have afforded it?"
Tessa looked down at her feet again, feeling her cheeks burn with color. "I'm sorry. I just thought that you were hungry. I know we, we don't have much, but what we do have— you haven't been eating, so I thought...."
Her father sighed before setting aside the basket. But instead of reprimanding her as she had feared, he spread his arms and embraced her. "Thank you so much, my little sprout. You are too good to me." He tried to hold back the tears streaming down his gaunt cheeks as he asked kindly, "What did I ever do to deserve you?"
The young girl began to cry too, the hot tears rolling down her round face as she blubbered, "I'm sorry, Papa. I'm sorry that we never have enough."
Sitting up, he grasped her shoulders and said with a stern conviction, "Now you listen to me, Tessa C. Copperfield, I want you to pull yourself together! Things might be hard right now, but that doesn't mean you give up, feeling, feeling sorry for yourself." He cleared his throat as he wiped her face, choking on his own emotion.
Tessa looked up into his loving emerald eyes, as he gave a rare smile, "After all, what can we do but, hope for the best, and, and keep moving forward?" Her father stood, putting the gun back into his desk. "Yes. No matter what, we must keep moving forward..."
Ever since that night, Tessa tried her best to take that lesson to heart. She only wished her father had listened to his own advice, instead of finally pulling the trigger.
The morning after she got back from being fired from Higgins Manner, she had gone home, hoping to find solace and comfort from her parents. Instead, she discovered the place was a wreck, and that all of her mother's things were gone.
Tessa had asked the neighbors franticly if they had seen either of them, and was informed that the two had a huge fight the night before. Tessa's mother left with several suitcases, and after a great deal of commotion, her father left and as far as they knew had not returned.
Fearing the worst, Tessa had rushed to the campus.
However, she was too late.
The image of her father's lifeless corps in the boiler room of the university flashed before her eyes in stark contrast to Mr. Wooster's body, now laying dead in the hallway of an abandoned townhouse in the flooded city of Utopia.
Tessa shuddered as she pulled her arms away from her face, still covered in Mr. Wooster's blood, taking in the darkness of the apartment stairwell. "Come on now," She said with a shaky voice, "Pull yourself together. Y-you must keep moving forward."
The distraught woman forced herself off the floor and took stock of herself and what she had to work with. Using the light from the nearby window, the inventor found her electric lamp. Turning it on, the dark retreated further into the townhome as the upper landing was illuminated, revealing the gruesome details of Mr. Wooster's demise. The young woman turned away a moment, before steeling herself and looking over in greater detail the fresh cadaver.
She had not realized it before, but there were several teeth puncture wounds deep in the man's gut. Even if she had stemmed the bleeding leg, it was now clear to her that there was little that she could have done to stop his inevitable death.
Setting down the lamp on the floor next to her, Tessa hissed as she looked into his empty eyes, "I am so sorry, Mr Wooster." Tessa then carefully looked over his body for anything of value, or that could be used to help her situation. Aside from his ID, a certificate from the States indicating his status and position for the federal government, and a rather hefty wallet filled with a sizable sum of money, the pickpocket found a small notebook and a series of letters. Opening them, she discovered its contents to be a little journal, stuffed with sketches of the Oni people and his thoughts and feelings on them. The last entry had a letter in it folded up and carefully stuck between the pages. The latest entry was dated the day before.
July 4th, 1880
I still haven't told Xo-Xing. I know I should, but I haven't given up hope, not yet. Perhaps I could convince some of the senators to reconsider at the event tomorrow. I just need to keep him away from the Congress members until I assure them of the necessity of the motion.
Intrigued, Tessa looked at the previous entry.
July 2nd, 1880
I received the notice I dreaded from Congress. They have utterly rejected the proposal to accept the Oni tribes into the States as equals. Instead, the greedy bastards have elected to annex the region entirely. Under the new bill, the land would be carved up into a series of new territories, disregarding the traditional boundaries of the natives in favor of what the enterprises want. The Hawks have given themselves all the provisions they need to reap the land's benefits without having to recognize the natives as people.
I had hoped after the abolishment of slavery and the grassroot movement to view all men as equal, that we would have seen the natural conclusion of that trend. For the Albanese to reach out to our more beastly cousins, the Oni and the Mur, as well as the Jotnar. Never mind all of the human natives across the land. For all of their differences, they are still intelligent, capable beings. The Congress refused to acknowledge the matter, however.
I should have known. Those pompous hypocrites in Congress only see the valuable copper and gold under their feet. They never wanted equal rights for them. Rather, they used the movement to take away the power of the wealthy property owners of the South, and their economic influence. Look no further than the ex-slaves and how the heads of state still treat the natives. Congress could care less about their wellbeing or their rights.
Why can't they see the benefits of aligning ourselves with these people, so different, yet like us? If they are not even willing to see their own kind as equals, how could we have ever expected them to see Representative Xo-Xing and his race as anything but monsters? I have no idea how I am going to tell him this. We are on our way to the opening of the Grand Spire in Utopia. I need to let him know before we get there, but how? Maybe I could talk to the Congress and petition them to reconsider.
This will crush him.
Tessa considered what she read and wondered if Wooster ever told Xo-Xing about this. Based on her interactions with the two politicians at the party earlier that night, it was unlikely. Pocketing the journal, the money from the wallet, and the letter, the fatigued young woman began rummaging through what she still had. Her tools, the electric lamp, her mini-air compressor, and its accompanying grapple gun and cables, the spyglass taken from the observation stand in the ballroom, and Gray's cutting torch from his lab.
The grapple gun needed to be re-pressured, and Tessa was pretty sure that she had enough charge on her compressor's battery for at least two more shots, but she was unsure what good it would do given her situation. At best she could get a line across the flooded street to the other houses on the next block over. Peering down the stairs, she made sure that the monster was truly gone, before exploring the rest of the upstairs of the flooded house. Searching the rooms, it was clear that even these small residential housing units were powered by electricity, at least when the dam and the power grid were operational.
Whoever lived there left in a hurry. Taking advantage of the lack of people and finding suitable replacements, Tessa removed her bloodstained and tattered blouse, skirt, and gloves, swapping them with a pair of sturdy pants, a thick leather waistcoat, and a snug undershirt. Re-donning her toolbelt and bags, she continued searching through the house. Tessa found at least a few useful items, including a matchbox with half a dozen matches, a backpack, a spare power pack, and a revolver with some ammunition in a safe on the third floor. Using a clever trick Donny taught her, she cracked the safe with relative ease. The inventor also found a couple of kerosene lamps and a rather large can of kerosene in the bottom of the pantry.
Still numb and a bit shaky from the attack, Tessa sat at the table in the kitchen and set to work taking apart the spyglass from the ballroom. Both trying to keep herself occupied and her mind off of the dead man in the hallway, she spent some time setting up her mini-compressor on the table, having it charge the grapple gun as she figured out how the optical device functioned. Seeing several things that could be improved upon, Tessa proceeded to reassemble it in a more compact fashion, taking away the unnecessarily large casing, and reorganizing the internal mechanisms to fit on her face like a mask. Using a modified strip of leather that she salvaged from the bag, she made it hands-free. Turning off the lamp, the inventor tried them on.
Activating the internal power supply, she found to her delight that the device worked. They looked and felt more like welding goggles than a mask, but they still served their purpose as they provided the means to both see in the dark, and with a turn of a knob, to detect body heat. She adjusted the distance of its telescopic function and smiled. She felt she did reasonably well at making the device far more practical, and only at the expense of its brass casing. Resetting the scope and turning it off, she slid the apparatus down around her neck, turning the lamp back on. The flickering flame, however, gave her an idea. She proceeded to take the excess parts from the spyglass and storing them away in the backpack, cleared room for the kerosene. Using several bottles and strips of cloth, Tessa threw together a set of firebombs. Tessa thought she could at least scare off the monsters and try to make for the others at the boat.
Just as Tessa finished charging the canister for her grappling gun and had finished off the last of the kerosene on her firebombs, the inventor heard gunshots from outside. Forcing herself up, she stumbled over to the window and looked out. Down the street, she spotted Gray and the others cornered on a patio frantically fighting off the monsters that attacked her and Wooster.
Rushing back to the kitchen, she secured her gear to her toolbelt, along with the electric lamp, pistol, and firebombs, throwing most of it haphazardly into her commandeered backpack. Hurrying for the window, Tessa withdrew the fully charged grappling gun. Taking aim, she squeezed the trigger, the cable and anchor shooting forth with a loud pop. The wire trailed after the projectile with a whiz. Tessa's aim was true, the anchor embedding itself just above a window across the way with a satisfying thud. Checking that it was secure, she detached the wire spool and fashioned the other end of the cord to a stable edifice in the room. Cutting the reel free, she stashed it in her bag along with the disengaged air compressor and gun.
Using a coat hanger, Tessa took the wire and fashioned it over the cable. She shook her head, closed her eyes, and with a gasp leaped out of the window.
Her shoulder protested the abuse as she braced herself. Tessa went hurtling through the window legs first, smashing the glass with a loud crash.
Rolling out into the room, she came to an abrupt stop as she collided with a table and some chairs. She dared not move for a long moment until her head stopped spinning, and she could confirm that she was indeed in one piece. She had partly ripped her stitches. The wound starting to bleed once more. Taking a bit of cloth, she took a moment to rebandage her arm. Drawing herself upright, Tessa stood to dust herself off, before realizing with an excited exclamation, "Wait! It worked! Ha!" She grinned to herself, glancing out from the second-story window she had just come from across the way. "What until Lonny hears about this!" But even as the excited inventor thought this, Tessa heard a hideous roar coming from the streets below, accompanied by several more gunshots. Remembering herself and why she took such a risk in the first place, Tessa rushed off, through the darkened rooms until she found the window above which the others were cornered against.
Sticking her head out, she could see them all trying to force the monsters back. Rummaging through her bag, Tessa pulled out one of the firebombs
"Gray!" she called down. "Heads up!" She lit the first bottle and tossed the flask at the beasts. It shattered on impact with a woof, its contents igniting and startling the giant lizards. They backed away but moved in from another angle. "Get in the house already!" Tessa shouted.
Lonny cried, frustrated, "The door is locked!"
Cursing to herself, Tessa rushed past the hall and down the narrow stairs, wading through the knee-high water before reaching the door. Unlocking the portal, she wrenched it open. The others all stumbling backward with a splash. They each scrambled past Tessa as the monsters began to close in again. Pushing past Vain, Tessa lit a second firebomb and smashed it into the gaping maw of the terrifying beast. It reeled back, bashing into the other two with it. A bloodcurdling screech rattled the air as its flaming mouth distracted the foremost monster.
Forcing the door shut, Tessa bolted it. "Up the stairs. That won't hold them for long!"
The twins were the first to the landing, followed by Gray and Diana, but Vain quickly grabbed a nearby sofa by one end and shouted, "Help me move this thing!"
Sloshing over, Captain Brine and Tessa helped pile it against the door, along with the other furniture they could before a massive thud knocked half it down. Tessa and Captain Brine forced the barricade back into place as Vain tried to recover her footing. All three threw their weight behind the door, doing their best to hold it shut.
Lonny shouted from the top of the stairs, "Come on, ladies! Move it or lose it!" Tessa turned to see Donny and Lonny at the head of the stairs with an upright piano teetering on the edge of the last step. All three glanced at each other before scrambling up to the landing and past the piano. The massive lizards broke through the barricade, slashing apart the couch as they all at once tried to squirm their way through the door.
"Now!" Donny shouted. All of them shoved the instrument over the side. It slid down the stairs halfway until it caught on a step, its forward momentum sending it head over heels straight into the monsters smashing them with a terrible crunch, blood spurting past splintered wood and copper wire. One of the lizards was surely gone, as the other two tried to pull themselves from under the dead weight of the piano and the body on top of them. For good measure, Tessa lit another one of the firebombs and tossed it down on the remains. The two other monsters hissed in alarm as they frantically tried to get away. Tessa watched with an odd satisfaction as they burned.
Lonny grabbed her by the shoulder, causing her to cry out as she shrank away. "Watch it!"
"Sorry, love, but we need to go! Come on!"
They all ascended the stairs, as the fire kept the monsters at bay. Reaching the third floor, Gray opened one of the back-facing windows and made his way out onto the balcony. One by one, the others followed through. Looking around, Tessa saw that the buildings on this side were much closer together. Using the latticework on the wall of the house, they all climbed up to the roof, and jumped to the next building, and then the next. After putting some distance between them and the monsters, Vain pointed out a glass roof on one of the corner buildings. Dropping down into the elevated courtyard one by one, the disheveled group found it to be a greenhouse in the middle of one of the more significant buildings.
Tessa was startled by all the plants, some with leaves as big as her, others with spindly vines wrapped around themselves and neighboring vegetation. A sweet, almost sickly smell filled the air as rows upon rows of flowers adorned both the walls and floor space.
"Is everyone all right?" Tessa asked winded, taking a head count.
Vain spat, "No, no, we are not! Those things nearly took us all. If it weren't for Brutus slowing them down, they would have!" Vain gasped as she held her side, fresh blood staining it.
Captain Brine took a step closer, pulling out a light. "Easy there. Let's have a look at that."
"Back off!" She swatted at the man, pegging him in the nose.
"Boy, you sure chose a piss poor time to pick a fight," Brine said, wiping his bloodied nose on his sleeve.
Vain glared at the ex-Loyalist with venom in her voice, "Don't you touch me." She staggered.
"Miss Fisk." Gray held up his hands. "Captain Brine is merely trying to help."
"Stay out of this!" she said through gritted teeth.
"Now look here," Gray said, miffed, but she cut him off.
"Mustached prick, you think you know everything?" she said, struggling to stay upright, leaning against a wall, "Your oh-so-grand education! All your money. Silver spoon shoved up your ass!" She grimaced as she spat, "But in the end, all of that privilege didn't amount to much, did it?"
Gray asked, peeved, waving his hands, "What are you on about?"
"I'll tell you what it is," Captain Brine said, annoyed. "She's blaming us for her boys getting whacked off back there."
Stepping in between the three, Diana hissed as she held up her hands, "This isn't the time for this."
Ignoring Diana, Gray criticized the Black Coat, "What? You think this is somehow my fault? Or the Captain's?"
But Vain did not answer. Instead, she slowly slid to the floor in a motionless heap.
Diana, Lonny, and Tessa rushed to her aid. Ripping her tattered coat off, they found she had several puncture wounds along her side and a rather nasty gash where it appeared several teeth had gouged her.
"Miss Fisk," Diana encouraged, tapping her face, "stay awake. You need to be vigilant."
Lonny produced a knife and proceeded to rip the coat into manageable strips.
Pulling back her shirt, Tessa started to patch her up with the makeshift bandages that Lonny handed her. She was at least partly relieved that her injuries were not nearly as grievous as Mr. Wooster's.
"Stop. Stop fussing over me. It's nothing," Vain panted, squinting as Tessa pulled tight the last strip. "Damn, that stings."
"Take it easy, Miss Fisk, at least for a moment." Tessa tried to be encouraging.
Vain laid her head against the wall. Still holding her side, she asked Tessa, "Where is Carl?"
"And Mr. Wooster?" Representative Xo-Xing asked.
Tessa grimaced. "Those things attacked us before they got to you guys. They caught Carl by surprise and Mr. Wooster...he died trying to save me."
Xo-Xing appeared stunned by the news. "Dead?"
Tessa nodded. "As is Carl." She looked away with remorse, unable to meet their gazes.
There was a long pause before Gray said, "We did not account for such monstrosities in our planning. Though it is a terrible loss, we must consider the greater dilemma at hand and the other lives at risk."
"And how do you suggest we proceed then?" Xo-Xing asked, livid.
"We need to somehow get to the power plant." Gray scratched his head. "What do we have left to work with?"
"The boat is out of the question," Donny said, opening one of the windows along the wall and looking down the street. "And those things will make it hard to simply walk there."
Looking to the others, Tessa asked, "Is it still stuck?"
"Capsized," Lonny said, sitting down on the floor between Vain and one of the larger pots. "When the monsters attacked, they overturned the top-heavy craft. Nearly bit my head off."
"We could take the elevated rail," Diana suggested. "Or, more pointedly, walk the line to the power plant. There is a station not far from here that we can get on the track from."
"Do we have any other options?" Donny asked. "One that does not involve so much elevation?"
Lonny looked up at her twin brother with a raised brow. "Since when are you scared of heights?"
"I'm not," he said, crossing his arms. "But I am rather afraid of being spotted by a patrol craft or a looming airship."
"I think I prefer the chance of being spotted to the certainty of being eaten," Tessa said with a shiver.
"Agreed." Gray nodded. "But we must move quickly; I would be amazed if we haven't drawn the attention of every Boomer in this part of the city."
Vain took a deep breath, before forcing herself up, much to the other's protest, but she shrugged them off, picking her repeating rifle off the ground. She began reloading, stating rather bluntly, "Between the monsters and the shooting, it would be hard to miss us. I only hope that you still have some fight left in you." Vain glared at the others before priming the riffle and gingerly slinging it over her shoulder. The dark-skinned woman stepped over to where Donny was peering out the window with trepidation in her voice, "This is certainly no place to die."
Diana watched, contemplating. "I must agree. I do not like the idea of staying in one place for too long for that very reason."
"All right then," Gray said. "If we are all in accordance. As much as I would love a good rest, we ought to keep moving."
Due to the nature of the tight clustering of buildings, they made quick time to the rail station at the edge of the district, relying on Tessa's last grappling hook and a series of makeshift ladders and ramps leading from one room or window to the next.
They were just navigating the final set of buildings when Tessa said, "Dem Xo-Xing, about Mr. Wooster."
The Oni delegate sniffed. "He was a good friend. Wooster has done so much for my people and me. It is unfortunate that he is with the ancestors now."
Pulling the journal from her satchel, Tessa handed the book to him. "I retrieved this off his body or what was left of it. I thought that perhaps that you would want it."
Xo-Xing looked at the book for a moment in her hands, before accepting it from Tessa, "Thank you, Miss Copperfield. It is a thoughtful gesture." He slipped the book into his coat pocket as he followed the young woman through the doorway and out the window onto an iron fire escape.
Treading carefully in more ways than one, Tessa asked, "Why do you and your people want an alliance with New Albion?"
The Oni representative looked puzzled at the sudden question. "Simple. Why have enemies when you can have friends?" He looked back at her. "Why do you ask?"
Tessa shrugged. "I just have a hard time understanding why you would want to ally yourself with the people that took away so much of your homeland."
He pondered a moment before saying, "Yes, it is true that there are those that feel it is a betrayal of who we are, but I feel at least, as do others from my tribe, that we must try to work together if we hope to move to a better understanding. If we fight against your people, we are only feeding into what they misbelieve about us. After all, is it not like your colonists and loyalists? You are stronger united, rather than divided. That is why we are trying to unite our tribes with yours."
Tessa thought about what he said. About her misgivings about the Oni. She was not one to take rumors and unquantified facts lightly, but even she had unknowingly fallen into believing a few of the stereotypes concerning Dem Xo-Xing, Dev Le-Ren, and their kind as a whole. Xo-Xing's hopes of a mutual understanding between the humans of New Albion and the Oni tribes were to Tessa naively optimistic, but then she was already privy to the verdict on his hopes for unification.
"It will take a long time I fear, for the States to accept your kind. Prejudice does not die so easily. Just ask any Loyalist who fought in the war what they think of the New Albion Republic. To this day, they still call them oppressors and tyrants."
"But surely there are those of New Albion who seek a better future? Your friends Mr. Gray and Higgins are proof enough of that."
"Then clearly you do not know the two of them all that well," Tessa said under her breath as Gray looked back toward them from the opposite building, helping Diana across the plank they had set across the gap. But even as Tessa mumbled to herself, Diana's words echoed through the inventor's head. People change...for better or worse. She briefly considered telling Xo-Xing about the letter and the last few entries in Mr. Wooster's journal, but she decided against it. They all had enough to deal with. One more thing to fret over, especially one that Xo-Xing could do nothing about, seemed a cruel thing to add to the already long list.