[Early update, then.]
I go and look to see what's going on.
You rap your knuckles against the roof again. After a moment, the coachman is back by the window. "Yes, my lord?"
"I mean to go on ahead, see what's the matter," you reply.
The coachman looks towards the commotion ahead, then back to you, then back forward, like a clockwork sculpture with a broken cog. Finally, he turns back with a look of resignation and pulls open the door. "Very well, my lord."
You pick your way up the street, careful not to let your soft-soled shoes slip on the slick cobbles—what you would do for a pair of heavy boots right about now—and find yourself joining the rear of the great mass of men and women clustered around the source of the blockage. For a moment, you consider clearing your throat to draw attention to yourself. Were you still in Antar, and were this a crowd of junior officers, such a thing would have been only natural. Faced with a superior officer, they would have cleared the way as a matter of course.
But you are no longer in Antar, or even an officer on the active list. You are merely one gentleman, moderately well-dressed, in a crowd full of them. Instead you resort to jostling and edging your way through the crevices in the throng, until at last, you can get a good view of the cause of all this commotion.
It is not in the least what you could have expected.
---
In the clearing ahead, a small-framed man in a soot-stained grey jacket converses excitedly with a pair of Intendancy constables. As he gesticulates wildly with one hand, he wipes at his face with the other, his handkerchief coming away stained grey and black with soot.
Yet the crowd pays them no mind. Indeed, their attention seems to be drawn completely and fully to the contraption sprawled out on the cobblestones, right in the middle of the street.
It is certainly an impressively sized machine, a massive cylinder of wrought iron atop four hugely reinforced wheels, linked together by a spindly mass of rods, sprockets, and pistons. A narrow smokestack is perched atop the frame, though whatever exhaust it might have channelled now pours out the ruptured side of the giant iron chamber, its skin burst open like a sheet of tin by a musket ball. A quartet of limbered cannon sit tethered behind the thing, their presence made forgettable by their sheer mundanity next to such an outlandish machine.
You take a closer look at the machine, but you can't make heads or tails of it. Certainly the very design is a marvel of engineering, and its purpose seems obvious given its location and the presence of its wheels. Yet—
That's when you notice that you're not the only one trying to take a closer look at the machinery. Indeed, not half a dozen paces away from you, two figures observe the thing as they converse quietly to each other. One you recognise as the Duke of Wulfram. The other is no less a familiar face: the Earl of Castermaine, formerly General-of-Brigade in the King's Army. What are they doing here?
I must examine that machine more closely.
You come closer, as close as you dare, given that you are examining a machine which has—judging by the scorch marks on the cobblestone and the debris strewn everywhere—recently exploded.
Unfortunately, you find very little which your first look didn't already uncover. The device's intended purpose as some sort of vehicle is simple enough to discern, as is the reason for its catastrophic failure, but as for the workings of the device itself, those are beyond you.
Perhaps there is some novel conceit behind the machine's operation. That would certainly explain the lack of any draught animals or other evident form of motive force. But whatever it is, that is a topic for the discussion of engineers and craftsmen and other such mechanically minded people, not you.
How is the crowd taking all this?
Out of the entire mass of humanity gathered around the machine, you suppose you must be singular in your attention towards the observers, rather than the device they are observing.
In truth though, you find very little of interest. The crowd bears exactly the sort of emotions you might expect of a group of people observing a mechanical curiosity in a state of distress: anxiety, curiosity, a bit of marvel, a bit of fear. Granted, they are, perhaps, a bit more calm than you would have expected from individuals who have just watched a strange machine explode on the street in front of them, but that is hardly out of the ordinary.
No, if there is any insight to be found in the crowd, it is not for the likes of you to find.
I take a look at that cannon.
Turning your eyes from the centre of the spectacle, you direct your attention to the cannon instead.
At first glance, there is naught amiss with the guns. They're heavy twenty-four-pounders on a field gun carriage, you've seen the like many times before. The weapon itself seems perfectly serviceable and perfectly normal. Perhaps they're on loan from one of the royal armouries. That would mean the Intendancy men were assigned to ensure they weren't lost. The only real question you can think of pertains to their purpose: what are they doing tied to such an outlandish device?
At first, you can only think that the guns were to be used as some sort of anchor, to ensure the machine did not roll away somehow. It is an improbable and impractical explanation to be sure, there are much easier ways to anchor a wheeled cart, most of which do not involve rolling artillery down a publick street, but perhaps there's some other reason.
That's when you realise something else. The gun carriages are strung out, one after the other, single-file, like knots on a rope. To your mind, seasoned by years in close proximity to artillery, only one circumstance could possibly arrange the guns thus, which means the explanation for this entire curious tableau is both more improbable and simpler than you could have first imagined.
In short, whatever the machine is, it was dragging four heavy guns by itself.
On its face, the thought is ludicrous: it takes two dozen horses to pull a load that heavy, but the evidence cannot be gainsaid. Those cannon were being pulled, and that machine was doing the pulling.
Best I speak to Wulfram and Castermaine.
The Duke of Wulfram looks up as he sees you approaching.
"Lord Ezinbrooke?" he asks, a sudden look of worry on his face. "Where is Forsythe? I ordered him to take you all the way to the club."
"He's still with the coach, Your Grace," you reply. "I saw the commotion and came to take a look for myself."
Wulfram accepts your answer with a nod. "I cannot blame you." He waves a hand at the iron machine before you. "Quite the marvel, isn't it?"
"A marvellous waste of time and effort, perhaps," Castermaine grumbles. "Forgive me, Wulfram, but I fail to see the point of such an extravagance. What wisdom is there in committing such prodigious amounts of material and labour for the sake of…whatever in creation this is."
That begs an interesting question. "I must beg your pardon, but what is this device exactly?"
"I believe it is called a 'traction engine,'" Wulfram replies. "It uses a vapour engine to provide motive force without the use of draught animals. There have been quite a few such experiments in Aetoria over the past few years. More in Tannersburg, as well."
"A passing fad, no doubt," Castermaine grumbles. "It's all young men with too much money and too little sense seeing firms like Garing, Gutierrez, and Truscott make money with their new designs for artillery and thinking they can do the same, only with ridiculous contraptions like this instead of something practical."
Wulfram frowns. "Unlike cannon, these 'ridiculous contraptions,' as you call them, may have use in ways beyond making it easier for us to kill one another. A traction engine like that one could be of great use pulling heavy loads."
"A team of horses can do the same work," Castermaine replies with a hint of exasperation. "I have no doubt that a team of horses is a great deal cheaper to acquire and maintain than that monstrosity, as well. Besides…" He nudges his chin at the gouts of steam roiling from the traction engine's wounded flank. "Horses don't explode."
Wulfram inclines his head thoughtfully. "Perhaps you are right, but some of the innovations we've seen over the past few years have certainly been of use. The new streetlamps, for instance. Some of the men running my mining companies have begun using vapour engines to pump water out of deep shafts. Surely, if this war has brought us any positive legacy, it is the wave of invention which it has spurred."
For his part, Castermaine seems less than convinced. "It is a passing fashion, nothing more," he replies. "Give things a few years, and we will all suddenly be taken by some other fancy, and we will realise that water wheels and draught horses were better after all. Machines like this one will be set up as curiosities in some publick square or other, where they belong."
The Duke of Wulfram doesn't reply at first. Then, his brow still furrowed in thought, he turns to you. "What do you think, Ezinbrooke?"
1) "I fear Lord Castermaine has the right of it. Such inventions are a fad, no more."
2) "I think these new inventions may be the heralds of a new age of progress."
3) "I would advise patience, see how these inventions develop before making a judgement."
4) "I cannot say, sir. I am too ignorant of this matter to form an opinion."
---
As of the Autumn of the 613 of the Old Imperial Era:
Sir Alaric d'al Ortiga, Baron Ezinbrooke
Captain, Royal Dragoons (half-pay)
Age: 25
Current Funds: 1754 Crown
Debts: 10860 Crown
Bi-Annual Income (Personal): 135 Crown
Soldiering: 75%
Charisma: 43%
Intellect: 5%
Reputation: 31%
Health: 65%
Idealism: 61% Cynicism: 39%
Ruthlessness: 39% Mercy: 61%
You are a Knight of the Red, having the right to wear Bane-hardened armour and wield a Bane-runed sword.
Friends and Associates
Javier Campos: Colour Sergeant, the Royal Dragoons.
(Born 583 OIE)
Victor d'al Reyes: Eldest son of Baron Reyes. Major, the 8th Regiment of Foot. Formerly Commander, the Experimental Corps of Riflemen.
(Born: 583 OIE)
James d'al Sandoral: Captain (half-pay), the Royal Dragoons.
(Born 592 OIE)
Enemies
Hiir Cassius vam Holt: Takaran Ambassador to Tierra. Eldest son to Richsgraav vam Holt.
(Born 527 OIE)
Eleanora d'al Welles): Countess Welles. Proponent of Military Reform. Friend to Isobel, the Princess-Royal. (Born 587 OIE)
