Читать книгу The Grand Dark онлайн | страница 63

“Fräulein?”

Helene jumped at the sound of the man’s voice, almost dropping the little chimera. She turned and found herself face-to-face with a tall, ruddy man in the white uniform of the ship’s crew.

“I’m very sorry,” she said. “I’ll go back with the others.”

“There’s no need for that,” the man said. “The Kapitän saw you rescue your little pet and sent me to invite you to see the control room. Only if you like, of course.”

It wasn’t a hard decision, as Helene had no desire to return to the tedious decadence of the party. She stroked the little chimera and said, “Thank you. I’d love to.”

The man made a small bow. “I’m Leutnant Dietze. Please follow me.”

As they went down a short flight of metal stairs, Helene told the Leutnant her name.

“It’s delightful to meet you, Helene. The control room is right through here,” Dietze said, opening a door for her.

It was a whole different world in the control room. A crew of six men and women nodded at her when she came in. The floor rumbled and the noise of the engines was like thunder. Helene looked around, startled by the sound.

A gray-haired man in a uniform with gold stripes on his shoulders approached her. “It is a bit loud, isn’t it? But you get used to it,” he said. “I’m Kapitän Siodmak. Welcome to my ship …”

“Helene,” she said quickly. Like the Leutnant had, he made a small bow, but he didn’t extend a hand as she expected. She realized why when she looked closer. Both of his arms were mechanical, intricate contraptions of wood and metal. When Helene looked at the rest of the crew again she realized that many of them also had artificial limbs or eyes. War veterans, she thought. To keep herself from staring, she turned back to the Kapitän and locked her gaze on his eyes.

If he noticed her shock, he didn’t let on. “Would you like to see how we pilot the ship?” he said.

“Very much,” said Helene, gripping the little chimera nervously.

Kapitän Siodmak swept his mechanical arm toward an intricate control panel that took up much of the room. Helene approached it tentatively. A complex array of dials, switches, gauges, and levers covered the console, which was strangely shaped. Instead of the hard lines she expected, the control panel was somewhat rounded, with small pipes that looked like veins running along the top and sides. The panel appeared vaguely organic to her, which wasn’t nearly as startling as what she saw under a glowing dome in the forward center of the console. There was a large knotted mass of what looked like pink tissue. It pulsed slightly with each bump and turn of the ship.