Advanced Clockwork: Young Writers Prize 2014

Chapter 17

It was the dead of night, the only light to be seen for miles in the scar of Delphinium was a small lantern hanging from the rickety sign for the dinky little shop of trinkets. It illuminated the night like a beacon, the light shining on the Clockwork Angle as if it could guide it's namesake back to them. As if it would guide their clockwork angle home.

Gig looked out the window at it, tears still staining her eyes as she waited well into the night for her to walk in through the door and smile like this was just another midnight gig she ran late on. She waited for the one she would pick on, the one she would always make fun of, the one that she called her closest friend, to just walk through the door like this was all just a bad dream. But Eve didn't walk through those doors, there wasn't even a trace of her for a solid week. But Gig still had hope that she would come home to her new family.

"She promised." Gig whispered, her ears drooped down as fresh tears fell down her rosy cheeks and hit the floor in a rhythmic patter. She had never cried like this before, she had never felt this sad to watch someone she loved be gone for so long. Was this what her mother felt like? Was this the pain that she had when Gig walked out the door when she was so young? "Shut up."

"You're talking to yourself again, Gig." A soft voice said gently, his arms snaking around her to hold her in an embrace as gentle as a blanket's hold. " She will be back, give her time." Samuel said softly, kissing the top of her white hair as she clung to his arms like a life raft. "We both know she would never be a damsel in distress, she always finds her way home."

Gig sighed, she didn't like this. If he was right, she should have been home by know. "Something is wrong. She needs us, Samuel. She needs us to find her."

"You know we can't do that." Samuel said gently, as if the thought of speaking any harsher would end up shattering the poor woman farther than she already was. "If we leave these walls, we would be found for sure. We do not even know where they are going, Gig. They could be as far as the Sea of Urhipsies as far as we know by know."

"We use the dogs." She sniffled, her tears drying as a smile touched her face for the first time in weeks. "We can ride the dogs! She built them to ride faster across the desert!"

"What are you rattling on about, woman?" Samuel asked, looking at her in confusion. "Have you finally lost your mind to the point where you do not make any more sense?"

"No! Gods no!" She shouted, her mood switching so fast like someone just flicked on the lights in her mind. "Remember those robots she used to make for us when she first came here to prove to us what she could do? She made four dogs that were large enough to ride into battle on, each based off of the species we gave her."

"I remember those." He mused, letting her go and stepping back as she spun to look at him with mischievous eyes. "The Yindine hound from the mountains, the Houflin wolf from the desert, the Opilion fox from across the vast sea, and the mix-breed of a Houflin wolf and a Pinsilam tiger which you named a Wolger if I am not mistaken." She grinned and nodded, her eyes glowing as if he had hit the jackpot. He sighed and shook his head. "We don't know if those will even run."

"There is no time like now that we can't try them." She shot back, her emerald eyes set in a determined stare. "And besides, this pace is going to get hot soon with all this talk of war going on. All we need to do is get two of the other cyborgs, turn on the robots, give them the sent of their maker, and presto! We can find her in no time just by riding on amazing war steeds."

"Gig, your not thinking this completely through." Samuel deadpanned. "If things are going to get hot, we both are going to need to stay here to give the people we are responsible for the assurance that nothing is going to happen to them in this hour of darkness. We can't go gallivanting off into the desert while we leave the last of our people to the genocide that would lay before them if this ends badly."