The Inexplicables (The Clockwork Century 4)

For all his adolescent philosophies to the contrary, Rector decided at that moment that he wasn’t interested in dying right now—much less at the top of a tower in a poisoned city, inside a wall, at the hands of some stranger. The whole thing felt undignified, and maybe Rector’s life thus far hadn’t been too big on dignity, but it’d be a shame if he died as ignobly as he’d lived.

All of this flashed through his head like a bolt of lightning. He didn’t have time to reflect, and he didn’t have time to second-guess anything; he only had time to charge.

He hollered, because that’s what you do when you charge. He swung the ax at a wobbling, frenzied pitch, and within two seconds he’d crossed the open expanse of floor between him and the man at the edge of the stairs. Houjin was right behind him, waving that sharpened iron bar as though it were a sword and they were the cavalry and this were some kind of heroic last stand—though Rector hoped with all his might that it wasn’t.

They ran at the stunned man, who remained stunned enough that his hand stopped at the edge of his belt and he took half a step back.

The half step either saved him or killed him, and the boys didn’t know which.

Before Rector reached him, the man toppled backwards and downward. He flailed, waving his arms and desperately reaching for some sort of balance, but he didn’t find it. He only found the stairwell hole behind him … right where he’d put his left foot.

This didn’t stop Rector, who was on fire with the zeal of self-defense.

He brought the ax back and punched with it, knocking the off-kilter fellow even farther off-kilter; and when Houjin joined the fray, the weight of the Chinese boy’s heavy iron stick took the right leg out from under the intruder (or were they the intruders? Rector didn’t have time to care).

The man in the jumpsuit went tumbling backwards, down the stairs.

As he fell, he yelped and complained, accompanied by the sound of straining metal stretching, breaking, and crumbling. As they waited for him to hit bottom, Rector and Houjin were petrified—their hands over their mouths, blocking their filters—but only for a moment.

Houjin said, “We had a story!”

And Rector replied, “I forgot it!”

“Me, too!”

“Oh, Jesus, we have to go!”

They scrambled to the other exit, Rector picking up one last stick of dynamite on his way, and Houjin nabbing a smaller coil of wire, one he could carry without breaking his back. Down the stairs they stampeded, no longer worried about the sound of their passage—worried only about escape.

“Is he following us?” Houjin wheezed as he threw himself out the door and into the creeping, thickening shadow of the wall.

Rector didn’t know, so he said, “No!” and kept running.

“Wait!”

“Are you crazy?”

“Wait,” Houjin said again—and with a halfhearted effort to regain his quiet and composure, he gasped to catch his breath. They were still alone, with nothing but the sound of their own breathing filling their ears. “He’s stuck down there, or out cold, or something. We’ve got a minute, I think. ”

“What are you doing?” Rector demanded, still ready to run headlong down the hill and right back into the Vaults without pause. He didn’t want a minute. He wanted out of there.

“The diesel,” he said.

“Too heavy to carry with us!” Rector insisted.

“I know! I don’t want to take it all the way. ” Houjin knocked the nearest steel drum onto its side and gave it a shove. It rolled and sloshed, heavily lumbering over the uneven ground. “Help me with this. ”

“I thought we were running—”

“Just help me,” he insisted, shoving his weapon into the back of his belt. “I have an idea. For later. ”

Rector joined him at the side of the drum, planting his hands on it to help with the shoving, rolling, and guiding. “If anybody sees us, we’re dead! If we get caught, I’m running, and I’m leaving you here. I’m going back underground. ”

“We might be dead already,” Houjin huffed. “If we get spotted, we drop it. All right?”

“Fine,” Rector grumbled, h

alfway praying that someone would see them so he could resume his flight to safety.