Wendell hated Conor. There was no other way of putting it.
Ever since he had begun to work for the Steam Union all those years ago, the guy had tormented him without end. Rivals, he and Conor had always been near equal in skill. Yet somehow, Conor was able to get to higher places.
That wasn't why Wendell had left. That wasn't the main reason.
But he still felt no remorse shoving him into the basement with all the other Steam Union guys. Swiftly, he locked the door and latched it with a wooden board.
"Here." Wendell looked up at Frances, who was dragging a chair to the door. She shoved it under the knob. "Extra measures. So, Vanessa's nowhere to be found."
"Gone." He made sure to speak loudly so that he heard over the muffled, outraged shouts. Turning to wide-eyed Idella, he said, "Don't mind them. They're just hungry."
She nodded and shut her eyes, rocking back and forth slowly. Her nonchalance was one of the things Wendell didn't like about her, but he certainly didn't mind it now.
"Knew the girl'd leave. She can't handle a place like this; she should go catch the next airship back to Britain."
"Well, whatever she does now isn't our problem anymore. Those guys are." Wendell stuck a thumb in the direction of the door, which was visibly shaking. "Now, Martin said that you gotta guard them. I'm pretty sure that we need... an hour. Can you handle it?"
Frances winced for a tenth of a second, but then a wicked grin slid onto her face. "Is that a real question?"
"Okay then." Wendell strode to the staircase and cupped his hands around his mouth. "Alo! Hurry up!"
"On my way!" his voice came, and his figure appeared at the top of the stairs. The liquids in the bottles on Alo's belt swished about as he stumbled down the stairs, carrying a contraption that just looked like a heap of dynamite sticks tied together.
Alo had claimed that he had put a lot of work into it the night before, but Wendell didn't buy it; a six-year-old could make a better-looking one.
Reuben clambered down the stairs after him, and Wendell's brows lowered. However, he trusted the cousins' judgement.
"What are we gonna do with you?" Wendell said, thumbing his stubble. Last time Wendell had seen Reuben, the guy had been trying to kill him.
Reuben scratched the back of his neck. "Sorry, Wendell. I mean, I--"
"I don't want to hear it. Stay here with Frances and guard the door. Frances, if he make a move, shoot him."
She nodded once.
He handed Reuben his revolver. "Be careful with her. Gets so much as scratched, and sunrise tomorrow will be considered a miracle."
Reuben gave Wendell a sorry smile, and Wendell almost felt bad. Guy was naïve, not malicious.
He backpedalled towards the front door, Alo following. "Don't let them out." She seemed capable, but fear nagged at his chest.
Her grin grew sharper still, and she leaned beside the basement door, resting her pistol on her shoulder.
Somehow, he found her smile reassuring.
Alo jogged after Wendell towards the mayor's office, where Stiefel and his deputies filed in.
Once inside, Wendell noticed that Nipard's unconscious body was no longer on the floor, and most of the Mazium was against one wall.
"Who are you, boy?" Stiefel asked Martin, who was leaning against Nipard's aspen wardrobe, grinning nervously as he tried to latch it.
"He's with me," Wendell said. "And he's here to talk with you.
"Yeah. But first, Alo, Wendell, come here for a second."
The two of them walked over. "Martin has made some adjustments to our plan," Wendell told Alo.
"Yeah, yeah," Martin mumbled. "So, Alo, some guy swallowed the key to the Mazium vault. Don't look at me like that, it wasn't me. Now, we need you to find another way to get in there and plant the bomb."
"But I don't hav--"
"It doesn't matter. Try something. Now, go." Martin clapped his back, and Alo took off, attracting strange looks from the law enforcers.
Wendell turned back to Martin. "And me?" he asked, eager to be useful.
"You're still giving the speech to the townspeople. I'll deal with these guys, get them to help out." Martin spoke confidently, but his hands were shaking.
"Yep." Wendell turned to the others in the room, but before he could say anything to them, the mayor's limp body fell out of the wardrobe.
All eyes turned to Martin. He put his hand in his hair, looking kind of exhausted. Wendell, however, knew how to proceed.
"Truth be told, it is what it looks like. That is the mayor. Unconscious, not dead. We were forced to knock him out; he was running about like a madman. He was trying to hide the fact that he's embezzling Mazium."
Wendell strolled along the row of drawers behind Nipard's desk, opening them up one by one and revealing all the Mazium inside.
Snitching felt bittersweet. But Nipard hadn't given them the key, and that was the condition.
Also, the guy had it coming.
"We should arrest him?" Freddy had tried to say it like a statement.
"He's the mayor, but he's not exempt to the law," Wendell said. So Freddy and Calvin stepped forward and draped Nipard's arms over their shoulders. "Attend to that black eye, too.
"Now, guys. This is Martin Black." He gestured to Martin, who was closing the wardrobe again. "Take it from me, whatever he tells you is correct. Do what he says."
The deputies nodded, and Sheriff Stiefel just glared, which was his own version of "yes".
Wendell walked up to the tallest deputy and turned up his palm. "Gun." Bart complied, handing it to him. "Thank you."
He spun on his heels and marched out the door. He had a speech to give.
*-*
Alo's bomb wasn't exactly revolutionary, but it'd certainly do its job well, or better.
The night before, Wendell had gotten Alo some sticks of dynamite, and told him to "work his magic."
But Alo thought of himself as a man of science. Well, if he could call mixing anything and everything together science.
Alo put together the bomb in an hour. Wendell had called it a jumble, but Martin had told him it looked like a product of "natural talent". Martin was nice.
Vanessa, on the other hand, grieved for her pocket watch for at least ten minutes.
Alo took a swig of his flask and stumbled down the craggy stones of the mine. In the wall of the entrance was a giant steel door, with a tiny keyhole on the front. Disproportionate.
He eyed it for a bit before lowering himself onto a rock. Taking out Brew #112, he noticed that it was a deep red now. Maybe it could--
"Thief!"
The voice had come from outside the mine. A head poked around the corner of the entrance, squinting. Soon, the man's broad-shouldered body followed, holding a pickaxe in a rather threatening way.
"Back already?" He came charging at Alo, who stood up abruptly and ducked out of the man's path.
Alo held up his hands. "Whoa. You got the wrong guy." But the man ignored what he said and swung the pickaxe at his head. Alo dropped down and scurried the wall. "Listen to me!"
"I don't got a reason to. Unless you're thinking about returning the Mazium you stole, plus interest." He charged again, baring yellow teeth through his black beard and driving the pick into the wall where Alo's head had been under a second before.
When Alo dove out of the way, the bottle bounced between his hands. "Watch it! This thing's precious!" He sighed and placed the brew on the ground, then pulled out an empty bottle from his belt.
"So was the Mazium." The guy charged once more, but Alo sidestepped him like a bullfighter and swung the bottle at the back of his head. It smashed to bits, and the man's body, still in motion, fell forwards.
Working in a saloon came in handy in these cases.
Alo stared at the man for a moment. Apparently, this town had a problem with thieves. But it didn't matter; they were leaving soon, anyway.
He turned to his brew. In that short period, the colour had become a bright red-orange. Picking it up and opening it up, it began to fizz.
He could work with this.
Alo faced towards the vault and thrusted the bottle forwards. The drops of liquid flew like sparks, landing on the wall of steel. Hissing filled the cave as the liquid -- or acid, rather -- ate away at the metal, and in a moment, Alo had his door.
He put one foot through the hole before remembering the body behind him. If he did have to ignite the bomb, the gap in the door would cause the explosion to spread to the cave.
But he could worry about that later. Steering clear of the hole's still-corrosive edges, he ducked into the vault. The size was overwhelming, and Alo suddenly began to have doubts about his makeshift bomb.
No matter. This was just a precaution. Hopefully, nothing escalated. And, honestly, it would suck if they had to blow up all the Mazium in here. The stuff was shiny.
And it was all in a pile in one corner of the vault, enough for Alo to swim in. No wonder they had thieving problems. He could probably buy Canada with this.
Alo made his way towards the pile and attached the bomb to the wall above it, close enough to the ceiling that it would cave if it went off. He took the coil of wire connected to it and looped it around his belt, then walked out and pushed the vault shut.
Not-so-gently, he lifted the unconscious man under the armpits and dragged him out of the cave. Working in a saloon also came in handy in these cases.
Releasing him on the sand outside, a good distance from the mine entrance, Alo made his way back towards the town. And he began to wonder what it would be like to have some sort of device that didn't require a wire to work. Something... wireless.
--