Chimera Book One

Chapter Twenty

‘Get out of here,’ demanded Circinus. ‘You cannot be found.’

Sir Regulus shook his head.  ‘I’m not leaving you.’

‘You must.’

‘Whirlitzer must know you survived.  It changes everything.’

‘Which is why you must go now before you’re discovered.’

‘He’s coming back!’ said Jamie, looking into the warehouse at the approaching figure of the armchair-ape.

‘Go!’ said Circinus.

With slow, faltering steps, Sir Regulus turned from her.  At first, he moved reluctantly towards the trolley train, before breaking into a run, Kyp and the others doing likewise.  Scooping Bertram from the floor, Sir Regulus deposited him into the first of the trolleys and covered him with sacking.  Jamie climbed inside the second trolley and pulled a sack over his head.  Sir Regulus looked back at the scrap-pile.

‘Oi!’ bellowed the armchair-ape, seeing them now.

‘We have to go,’ said Kyp.

Sir Regulus clambered into the trolley behind Jamie and wrapped himself in sacking.  Kyp jumped into the next, leaning out to pull the lever to start the train.  The trolley-train short forward and clattered its way out of the warehouse.  Strings of bare-bulbs zipped past in bright, white lines, the trolleys taking sick-making corners at high-speed, their wheels igniting sparks.

The train sped onwards until, after many more break-neck bends and stomach-churning drops, it began to slow and the track level out.

‘This is it!’ shouted Sir Regulus.  ‘Make a run for it as soon as the train stops. Ready yourselves!’

Kyp waited, the blackness beneath the sacking giving way to muddy light as the train clattered through another pair of double doors and stopped.

‘Now!’ cried Sir Regulus, at which point they all sprang from their trolleys. Bertram and Jamie were already running full-pelt across the factory floor when Sir Regulus called them back.

‘Something’s not right,’ he said, looking around at the deserted factory.

All around them, machines had been left running, jars, containers, and baskets half-filled.

‘Where is everyone?’ asked Kyp, unnerved by the abandoned crates and empty conveyor belts.

‘I don’t know,’ said Sir Regulus.  He glanced about unhappily.  ‘Follow me and stay close.’

They walked from empty chamber to empty chamber, through silent sorting rooms and vacant loading bays.  Kyp expected to be seized upon at any moment by angry mobs of metamorphs alerted to their escape from Oddznbodz.  As more time passed without incident, Kyp’s feeling of dread became almost unbearable.          

 ‘Listen to me,’ Sir Regulus told everyone as they neared the Auxiliary’s imposing-looking doors.  ‘We’re fugitives.’  He looked at Bertram.  ‘Avoid doing anything that might draw attention to yourselves.’

The factory door opened to reveal a chaotic scene, the city’s streets crammed with panicking creatures and ribbons of smoke unravelling into the air.

‘What’s happening?’ asked Kyp, as a stampede of soffalos rushed past in a blur.         

‘Look!’ cried Jamie, pointing towards the sky, where huge flocks of vanity sparrows whirled in confusion.

‘I can’t see anything!’ complained Bertram, butting Kyp’s ankles. ‘I can’t see!’

Sir Regulus pushed his way out into the street, stopping a passing sock-snake, its polka dots muted with dust.