“G Series. All fifteen units steady at eighty-five percent awakening. No abnormalities detected.”
He announced his check aloud, both to prevent careless oversights and to temper his excitement. Hörbiger viewed himself as but a component in the plan, a mechanical part that existed to perform this task. In the past he’d allowed his emotions to get the better of him, ruining everything, and this was the result. His opponent acted exclusively on her emotions. Becoming a machine was the only way to defeat her.
“Filling ballast tanks on tubes one through four. Monitoring angles, shifting to vertical positioning.”
A dull pumping sound echoed through the cramped control room. He listened as the ballast tanks beneath his feet filled with water. In sixty seconds, the Wiege’s tail was below him, leaving only the nose above water. To an
observer, they appeared to be on the verge of sinking, but as these vessels had been designed for aquatic launches of explosive missiles, this was normal operational procedure.
“Pyrotechnic fasteners activated. Nose cones released,” he said.
A muffled explosion sounded overhead. The sudden loss of pressure shook his eardrums, but Hörbiger ignored this, clutching the microphone.
“Earth, draw near. Fire, dance. Water, swell. Keter, Chochmah, Binah, Chesed, Gevurah, Tiferet, Netzach, Hod, Yesod, and Malchut; the ten sefirot with Da’at added, become emeth. I speak for the Shem HaMephorash, and as your father, I now release the seal upon thine eyes. Awake, Golems!”
Beneath lumps of earth, Hörbiger could hear the sound of pottery shattering…
5
“Golems? That’s the Germans’ secret weapon?” Finding this hard to believe, my voice was louder than I’d intended. “The clay dolls that Jewish rabbi make? I heard those were useless for anything beyond household chores. Only women and children would be afraid of them!”
The assembled officers all shot me looks of disgust. Naturally, they were all women. Most were quite young, around twenty, and some even looked to be still in their teens. My dismissal of women and children had definitely been a poor choice of words, but it would be useless trying to take it back now. But how had they all understood me? I thought I’d been directing my thoughts directly at the lieutenant.
The girls here were alchemists, or at least apprentices. Mages were in contact with my “side” of things at all times and so could easily perceive my nature and voice. But that wasn’t true for alchemists. They would have had to undergo a great deal of preparation to hear my own “voice.”
I suppose Lieutenant Rose Diana Gandly had gone to just those lengths to prepare. I looked closely at the floor and spied the answer: a small magic circle drawn on the bridge. Anyone within range would be able to hear me.
Before I managed to recover from this realization, the lieutenant turned toward my perch on the naval charts and explained calmly, “We fear golems because they deserve to be feared. Those who fail to fear them often die. I’ve lived long enough to know better.”
I adjusted my posture and tone. “Preconceptions can certainly lead to defeat. In which case, please explain. Your mortal enemy created these golems we are about to encounter?”
“Indeed. ’enrich ’örbiger was obsessed with golem research when he lived in England. He immersed himself in Jewish mysticism, memorizing Sefer Yetzirah and Sefer Ha’Zohar in the original Hebrew, and talked about artificial life awake or asleep. He returned to Germany five years ago, mainly because the elder Magus Craftsmen and I refused to help him.”
“Whatever the reason, England lost the foremost expert on golems to the enemy then. You could have imprisoned or killed him rather than allowing him to return home,” I said.
The lieutenant shook her head sadly. “’enrich performed many experiments, several of them nearly successful. No matter how I objected, nothing got through to him. I told him golems could never contribute significantly to the war, that they’d never be worth the cost. And you know what he said? ‘When the tab is settled, everything comes out a net loss. But as the numbers rise, that loss turns to profit. One day, I will lead a profitable band of golems.’”
“I have not met the man, but he clearly does not lack confidence or vision. Rational arguments make no headway with men like that. To battle them, you need an approach that defies reason…”
No sooner did those words leave my mind than realization dawned: The Princess of Wales was exactly that reason-defying approach. As I was about to be flung onto the front lines of this battle, my mind reeled, but I wasn’t given time to recover. Something pounded furiously on the window.
The gremlin was perched outside. It stuck its face in a tiny gap, saying something to the lieutenant in words I couldn’t understand. Its already sinister features twisted in a manner altogether uncanny.
Lt. Gandly nodded, frowning, then in a voice that belied her age, announced, “Ready the searchlights. Objects floating at three o’clock, distance of 9,000. Lookouts, confirm position and distance.”
Using searchlights in an area where U-Boats might be lurking was a huge risk, but she would have known that. Gandly had decided that locating and eliminating the enemy must take priority over all safety considerations. The bridge instantly filled with a hum of activity. Beams of light shone onto the water’s surface, the chief navigator spun the wheel, and the gunner shouted orders down speaking tubes.
The Princess of Wales became a single living organism that rocketed toward war.
“Word from the lookouts. Objects confirmed in designated area. Clearly man-made. Resemble periscopes but far larger!” one of the women said.
This report made up Lt. Gandly’s mind.
“Don’t let them get away! Increase speed to forty knots!”
I couldn’t believe my ears. This ship could go that fast? Old protected cruisers could barely top twenty knots. From the smell of the smokestacks I knew this ship was burning coal, not oil. This would make rapid acceleration nigh impossible.
Despite that, the Princess of Wales moved along, as fast as a brand-new destroyer or torpedo boat.
“Lieutenant. Is this ship not burning ordinary coal?” I asked.
“You caught that, huh? This ship’s chief engineer is an expert in phlogiston alchemy. The coal is mined in Birmingham, but it burns fifty times brighter than normal.”
“Impossible! The boiler would explode!”
“Not ours. Strengthening spells have been cast on the boiler and turbine. Ours may be the most durable machinery in the entire Royal Navy.”
“That’s not the end, is it? To achieve acceleration like this you must be working against the rules of the natural world on any number of levels.”
“That we are. We’ve dramatically increased lubrication on the ship’s hull. Fluid friction with the sea water and the friction surrounding the screw are both greatly reduced, to the point where this ship treats the water’s surface like an ice skating rink,” she said.
Alchemy on this scale would require calling in favors from the world’s greatest alchemists or at least gathering a large number of still fairly impressive ones. Even mid-tier alchemists and alchemists-in-training could do a great deal in sufficient numbers. Special Alchemy Craft truly was an apt name.
The lieutenant gave the order to attack. “Scattershot anti-submarine guns, prepare to fire. All charges at a distance of 300. Load fresh charges as soon as you’re done!”
In less than thirty seconds the guns mounted on the bridge spat fire, and the night sky lit up. These were two mounted guns for mortar fire. Ordinary anti-sub depth charges would be released from the racks at the ship’s stern, or fired from the ship’s side, so being able to fire in the direction the ship was headed was a huge advantage.
Two years later—having gained the official name “Hedgehog”—this weapon would be officially unveiled, granting the British a great advantage in their battles against U-Boats, but the paths traced by this first launch were clearly not ordinary as they didn’t follow standard launch arcs. Ignoring gravity and the laws of physics, they changed direction and freely rocketed toward their targets.
“Those shells—they’re guided by alchemy?” I asked.
“Yes. Aren’t my students talented? Mortar shells fly slow enough that they can easily correct the course. If the war had begun a year later, I’d have trained them to the point where they could redirect the main battery’s fire. That travels faster than the speed of sound, but alas, it remains a mere theory.”
As she finished, the fireworks went off. Not all the shells hit their targets, but several clearly did. The light of the explosions briefly turned day into night…and gave us our first look at the real threat.
It moved toward us, as though its feet literally walked upon the night.
Its head was like the Great Buddha in Nara; arms like the trunks of sacred trees; narrow, jointed waist like a hornet’s; spindly legs like that of a newborn fawn.
Screams echoed across the bridge. I nearly screamed, myself. The creature’s monstrous form loomed right over us, close enough to reach out and touch.
“Lieutenant…is that…a golem?” I whispered.
Even Lt. Gandly had turned pale. She managed to answer me though.
“I can’t believe it… Even if you grow a golem for ages you might get them to be three meters; the largest are never taller than four. They’re nothing but dolls made of dirt and sand and water. If you make them bigger they simply collapse under their own weight.”
“How deep is the water here?”
“Lots of shallows on the south shore of the Isle of Man. Likely around eight meters.”
“The thing’s at least fifteen meters above the water. That makes it over twenty meters tall. Is this ship any match?”
Silencing me with a glare, she ordered, “Ready main cannons. Armor Piercing Rounds. Target the giant golem!”
The Princess of Wales had four 15.2 cm/45 naval guns. As the protected cruiser Andromeda it had had sixteen guns, but they’d removed the extras to make way for other equipment.
Whatever the caliber, there simply weren’t enough weapons. This weak fire wasn’t going to help. To bury this monster, you’d need the main battery on a battleship.
But my fear subsided mere seconds later. The guns fired at quick-fire speeds, trailing rainbows in their wake, and pierced the shambling golem. Only one bullet hit home, but it was clearly a fatal strike. That one blow demolished the monster’s head, literally blowing it clean off.