Gaslight Trials | The Wattys2023 Shortlister ✔️

5 | A Queen of Bombs

Through a crack in the workshop window, I watch the pallid moon sail across the sky into the arms of dawn, as sleep plays hide and seek with my brain.

Just accept it's a no-shuteye night, I tell meself. 

I try not to, but I can't help thinking of Pa. Is he gettin' any rest? Is he preparing to listen in on today's combat transmission on that static-filled old clunker of a radio at home? Or join the crowds following the morning matches in the square? The people of Fumedge are excited about the Trials.

Walking through the wakin-up streets of Lighthaven, I am immersed in a world unlike anything I've ever known. The city breathes with the rhythmic pulsation of steam-powered machinery, each building a symphony of gears and pistons. The cobblestones beneath my feet seem to dance to the beat of technological progress.

Steam carriages whiz by, their brass exteriors polished to a dazzling shine. I've never seen anythin so pretty in me hometown.

The streets are alive with a cacophony of sounds—the chugging of engines, the clinking of metal, and the occasional release of steam, like a dragon from them kid stoires exhaling its breath. The air is tinged with the scent of oil and metal, a heady concoction that invigorates my senses.

Every building stands tall and proud, adorned with ornate clockwork designs. Enormous clock towers rise above, their timekeeping mechanisms visible to all, ticking away the minutes and marking the passage of time. Tis nothing like Fumedge at all..

Market stalls line the streets, showcasing a mesmerizing array of clockwork gadgets, mechanical wonders, and brass trinkets. Inventors and artisans, already up, proudly display their creations, their eyes shining with passion and pride.

As I wander deeper into the heart of Lighthaven, movin towards the Workshop, I catch glimpses of airships soaring above, their sails billowing with steam. High above the streets, a network of brass pipes and cables crisscrosses the sky, connecting buildings like veins of a grand mechanical organism.

The people of Lighthaven bustle about, each one an individual cog in the city's grand machinery. They wear goggles and gears as fashion statements, a testament to their steampunk spirit. It's a place where creativity knows no bounds, and imagination takes flight on wings of clockwork.

I can't help but feel a surge of excitement and belonging as I walk these streets. Here, in Lighthaven, I am not the outcast for challenging traditions—I am a fellow innovator, a dreamer of limitless possibilities.

The workshop is blissfully empty. There is magic in the eerie quiet, and the sound of stillness casts a spell upon me soul. Light of the gas lamp turns the shadowy shapes on my workbench into a manageable ordinariness of tools.

I pop on me working goggles and grab a welding machine. The disruptor spark gun lies on my palm, a magnificent blend of oak wood, steel and brass. I tighten its chrome and aluminum chassis, and check up on the flexible conduit, pipe and pressure gauge.

All is in order. Dem Exoboots are polished and primed fer the run.

The competition might be beyond my abilities. Lighthaven inventors had access to more powerful tech, gold and materials than I did.

The Puncher, the notorious Red Cap drug dealer and Menagerie owner, is three times my size and now calls himself the Demolisher. 

The Bomb Queen, who could make me explode in twenty different ways. I took a peek at her workspace the other day and she kept a lot of bombs there.

There isn't anyone like me either. I am the only one with sparks. If I play my cards right... Everything should be over by the end of next week. 

When I remove my goggles, sunlight streams golden through the window in a well-mannered announcement of the daybreak.