They say that when a wise man faces death he will reflect upon his life and choices. When Lady Hyacinth Grimm faced a forty-ton octopus shaking her submarine like a maraca, she reflected on her life and decided this was all her mother's fault.
~~~
When her twin daughters turned six, Lady Delphinium Grimm summoned them to the sitting room. As she was of the opinion that children should not be seen or heard, especially by their parents, this was a momentous occasion. She arrived in a flurry of lab coats and petticoats, and her daughters gazed up at her.
Lily, a golden-haired cherub, curled her hair around her fingers and smoothed her dress. Appearance was very important, she had learned, especially when it came to getting out of trouble.
Hyacinth, a square-jawed girl whose hair had gone straight past strawberry blond to carrots, tried to stuff an entire meat pasty into her mouth at once. With her other hand she clung to the leg of her Frankenstein's Abomination of Science.
"Ladies, it is time that I explained to you how the world really works, instead of the fairy tales your nannies and father have been telling you. You have good breeding and wealth. To succeed in this world you need only beauty or intelligence. Lilly, you have both, so you must choose."
Lilly pouted and looked up through her eyelashes. "Why do I have to choose, mumsy?"
"A professional woman must always be thinking, and thinking causes unsightly wrinkles, particularly between the brows. Why, if my research into plant toxins hadn't paralyzed my upper face, I would look my real age. Not even your father could overlook such a flaw."
The twins thought this through; as they did a wrinkle appeared between their brows. Lilly said, "All right. Which will make me richer?"
"Beauty, without a doubt. It is much easier to bend men to your will than the physical laws of the universe."
"Okay." Lilly chose to use her beauty to snare a rich husband and was guaranteed success in life.
Hyacinth glanced up at her Abomination of Science. The grey humanoid crouched beside her and said, "Go on, young mistress."
Unfortunately, he said it in Cantonese, which Delphinium thought was a gibberish language. The lady would have furrowed her brow if her face were capable of it. Her husband insisted that speaking nonsense gave the Abomination 'personality', as if that was a desirable trait in a lady's companion, but Delphinium called it shoddy craftsmanship. At least the nanny had impressed upon Hyacinth that was no longer to speak gibberish back.
Hyacinth squared her little shoulders. "Now it's my turn to choose?"
"Elder gods, no. You have neither beauty nor brilliance, so it is best to resign yourself right now to spinsterhood and mediocrity."
Little Hyacinth scowled with her entire body, red face nearly disappearing between her hunched shoulders. Then she began to scream at a volume and pitch that would impress an opera singer.
"There is no use struggling against fate," Delphinium said loudly. "You will never succeed."
Hyacinth decided to spend her life proving her mother wrong.
~~~
As she grew into a young adult, Hyacinth was forced to concede that she would never have the dewy skin, rosebud lips and flowing black tresses of the heroines in her romance novels. Her curvy figure refused to conform to an hourglass shape, even with the best new corseting technology attempting to rearrange her internal organs. She didn't excel in her lessons either, even though she stole her father's experimental smart pills. Still, Hyacinth had an ace up her sleeve: you didn't need intelligence or beauty to be a great scientist and go on romantic adventures. All you really needed was madness.
With her mother's scientific pedigree and her father's wealth, the Royal University was only too happy to admit Hyacinth. Despite failed classes and a rejected thesis, she persevered. She was certain that the madness was in her all along; she just needed a chance to prove it.
Six years of effort came down to this: the committee's response to her second thesis. Hyacinth stood in the center of the Grimsby Hall auditorium. It's two-story windows were completely covered by velvet drapes, so lanterns of odd-colored gas provided the only light. Hyacinth wore her most intellectual fall ensemble and a second pair of laboratory goggles for extra gravitas. In a semi-circle around her sat the Royal University's most prestigious professors and fellows, all masters in their respective disciplines, and half of them asleep.
The head of the committee, Doctor Thrikopolis, wore a metal mesh affixed to her scalp and a forbidding expression. A squirrel dug through the papers stacked in front of her. "Let me see if I have this right. Your lobotomy experiment was a complete medical success."
"Yes, doctor."
"The experimental subject survived the procedure with the full use of their faculties and without growing additional limbs. They did not transform into any type of hideous, mindless monster."
"That is correct."
Doctor Thrikopolis flipped through the thesis paper in front of her and continued, "In fact, according to their testimonial, the procedure made them feel ten years younger and cured their hiccups. Is all of this accurate, Lady Hyacinth?"
"Well, yes, but—"
Doctor Thrikopolis bellowed, "What kind of mad scientist are you?!"
This woke some of the older committee members, who looked around blearily before returning to their naps. Hyacinth's advisor, Professor Rumplewitt, hid his face in his mechanical hands.
"I tried very hard!" Hyacinth said. "Just look at my diagram. I added a moat of aetheric energy around the operating room for no logical reason. A minion even fell in!"
"Did it kill them?" Professor Barnaby asked. It was the first interest she had shown in the proceedings.
"Well, no. He said he felt a lasting sense of peace and harmony."
There was a moment of horrified silence.
The top-hatted Doctor Hanofer, professor of drama, asked, "Were you cackling so hard that you fell in and had to be revivified?" He looked doubtful, and Hyacinth knew why: she had been his student in Maniacal Laughter 101 and hadn't managed more than a crazed giggle.
"No, professor."
"But at least you laughed while performing the lobotomy."
"Well... no..."
"Taunted your subject with their helplessness? Declared yourself invincible?"
"I meant to, I really did, but performing the brain surgery was very distracting."
Professor Hanofer threw up all four of his hands in dismay. "Oh, woe is me. To have such a trial upon my soul as a student who cannot even deliver a simple villainous monologue!" He flopped on the table, a picture of despair.
Hyacinth looked to her advisor for guidance, but Professor Rumplewitt had now retreated completely under the table. Hyacinth started to suspect that she was not, in fact, going to be granted First Class ranking. She pouted and took deep breaths in preparation for a massive tantrum. She needed that first class ranking to shove in her mother's face.
Doctor Thrikopolis snapped her fingers and the squirrel retrieved another piece of paper for her. "This is the rejection of your first thesis. It reads: 'logical, comprehensible, likely to benefit the world, and accomplished successfully with no loss of life or danger thereof.'"
"But this time the experimental subject and my minions were in terrible danger!"
"They were in danger of becoming happy and healthy!" Doctor Thrikopolis banged her fist on the table, waking two hedgehogs that grunted at her. "By the elder gods, you are disregarding the very methods of madness! Unless your subject transforms into a ravening monster and eats you in the next five minutes, I am going to grant you a degree in engineering."
Gasps echoed around the room, momentarily louder than Professor Krillhan's high-pitched snoring. Engineering was what the lower classes did because they didn't have the insane brilliance to be real scientists. In this hall, "grave-robbing" would have been less insulting.
"You can't do that to me!" Hyacinth stomped her foot.
"Unfortunately, you are correct. By the by-laws of this university, I am not permitted to give out engineering degrees just to embarrass the recipients. I checked." The squirrel nodded in agreement. "Nor am I allowed to expel any student whose parent has given the Royal University a sizeable endowment. By the by, pass our thanks to your father for funding the reconstruction of the high explosives building. Five times."
"My father is a great patron of education," Hyacinth said. She wasn't certain what that meant precisely, but she knew it involved bribes. "So... does this mean I will have to redo my thesis? Again?"
Hyacinth thought that would be unfair in the extreme, as Hyacinth was already two years behind her classmates; why, little Phyllis Hydrochloric already had her master's degree. Still, given one more chance Hyacinth was certain that her own experiments could be unhinged and lethal.
The suggestion that Hyacinth might stay at the Royal University caused angry rumblings from Hyacinth's former professors, and a keening howl came from where her advisor was hiding under the table.
"No!" Doctor Thrikopolis said. "To prevent most of the university's faculty from quitting, I have no choice but to graduate you."
Hyacinth squealed, delighted. Professor Rumplewitt poked his head into view, his bald pate shining with hope. His hair--thick and black just six years ago--had gone grey the day he'd been made Hyacinth's advisor. It had taken just three months for him to tear his hair out over her.
"Now, as to the matter of your rank..."
Hyacinth bit her lip and crossed as many fingers and toes as she could. From Doctor Thrikopolis' expression, Hyacinth guessed that she wouldn't get a First Class ranking. Still, it shouldn't be too hard to work her way up from Second Class. As long as she didn't get the bottom ranking, she could still face her mother at Christmas holidays.
"Let the record show that the Royal University of Mad Science has never graduated such a pitiful mad scientist. Until today." Doctor Thrikopolis picked up her bronze-headed gavel. "Lady Hyacinth Grimm, you are hereby granted the title of Mad Scientist: Fourth Class."
Bang. The room erupted in chatter as the committee members woke up their colleagues to gossip.
"—an entirely new rank, not even her father's endowment can cover that up—"
"—deserves it. Did I tell you she befriended my fanged monstrosity? A fierce killer, and she had it rolling over for tea cakes—"
"—to her mother, embarrassment to the college, even an embarrassment to her sister. Did you hear that Lilly's latest soiree—"
"—would not stop talking, even after I sewed her lips together she kept mumbling nonstop—"
"—fourth class? That's nearly as humiliating as the engineering degree—"
Hyacinth screamed over them all, "That's outrageous! Unacceptable! I demand an apology! You can't do this to me!"
"Actually, I can," Doctor Thrikopolis said. For the first time, her austere face broke into a grin. A leather-bound book thumped open next to her and the two hedgehogs flipped through to the correct page. "According to article ninety-three, subsection twelve, paragraph twenty, the committee chair has full discretion in choosing a graduate's ranking."
"But it's not fair! I deserve First Class! Give me First Class. Now now now now now now now now--"
"The tantrum is a bit over-the-top, don't you think?" Professor Hanofer said. "If you're going to faint, stop talking and do it!"
There was a murmur of agreement. Then one querulous voice rose over the others.
"Has anyone seen my glasses? Hmm? What? On my forehead? Oh, yes, right you are." Professor Krillhan, founder of the botany department, stood carefully on his hundred-year old legs. "Objection! I object to this proceeding. Lady Grimm is a young woman of great talent and potential, and I move for her to be awarded First Class."
Hyacinth gasped in relief (and to catch her breath). Professor Krillhan had always been kind in herbology class, and he was still revered at the university for creating the first exploding pumpkins. If the professor believed in her, surely he would sway the others.
Talking right over the colleagues trying to interrupt him, Professor Krillhan said, "Why, it was only last week that her mutant venus flytrap ate not one, not two, but three minions! That is a body count truly worthy of First Class status."
Hyacinth drooped. That was her mother's thesis from twenty-five years before.
"What's that? Stop yelling at me, Robert, I can hear you fine. What do you mean this isn't Lady Delphinium?"
Doctor Thrikopolis waited for that fuss to die down. "Lady Hyacinth, Mad Scientist Fourth Class, I dearly hope that you will take your title back home and bury it along with your dreams. I hear they make excellent fertilizer for hollyhocks."
Professor Krillhan looked impressed by his colleague's knowledge.
"I refuse! I will not leave this university until—"
"You will be posted to a traveling research position as far from this university as inhumanly possible, or I will ensure that no lab in the empire ever gives you space. Do you accept?"
Face blotchy with humiliation, Hyacinth glared up at Doctor Thrikopolis and said, "I accept." What she meant was, Just you wait. The next time you see me I will have won Mad Genius of the Century, and you will be granting me the rank of First Class. And when you do, I will spit in your face.
Unfortunately, Hyacinth wasn't very practiced at subtext, so all she communicated was a sense of spite.
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Author's Note:
Thanks for reading! This is chapter one of a steampunk parody about a girl and her thirty-ton octopus. I've finished the novel and am posting every Friday as I edit each chapter. Please let me know what you found funny, liked, didn't like, or want more of!
Also, could you take a moment to comment and tell me which cover image you prefer?
Cover A:
Cover B: