Fic: Galatea in Bronze (With Gears)
Title: Galatea in Bronze (With Gears)
Fandom: Mag7
Characters/Pairing: OT7 Steampunk
Rating: Gen
Summary: Josiah's not really Dr. Frankenstein; JD's almost certain of this fact.
Notes: Much belated b-day fic for
van. I will confess now to never having read Frankenstein or watched a movie adaptation other than Mel Brooks, so I went a bit Greek on this one. The ending is very much unbetaed but I hope it suits you anyway.
Galatea in Bronze (with gears)
If JD's being honest with himself, he probably should have realized what Josiah was up to long before it reached the point where pitchforks and torches were all but inevitable, but in his defense he'd been rather busy with the arduous task of salvaging his hopes and dreams from the wreckage of the Iron Horse (and, ok, so maybe that was more than a little melodramatic, but he'd spent months tweaking the Mark 5's clockwork brain, and he was sure that if Nathan hadn't been so full of doom and gloom and the threat of amputation after the Horse malfunctioned, Chris would have eventually come around to his and Josiah's way of thinking). True, the evidence of Josiah's cockamamie scheme was right out there in plain sight for anyone brave enough to venture into the workshop to see - the book, dog-eared and ragged and the margins full of Josiah's neat copperplate; the lightning jar; the fiddly little instruments and the sudden explosion of copper wires covering Josiah's primary worktable - but Josiah just naturally defaulted to playing around with lightning when he had no other projects on hand, creating elaborate and meaningless mazes of wire and glass just to see the lightning move. (Also, he has some sort of complex and deep-seated grudge against Faraday, despite the fact that Faraday's been dead for more than three years. JD doesn't even attempt to explain or understand it but he does know better than to suggest the use of magnets when Josiah's up to his elbows in shattered Leyden jars.) Besides, everybody knows that Frankenstein is an allegory of human nature, not some sort of resurrectionist's "how-to", and even if Josiah decided that he was once again going to flaunt the fact that when it came to admitting the impossibility of an idea he didn't really belong to the grand set known as "everybody", there was still all that recent unpleasantness with the dead girls and "McCormick's Mystical Maginarium".
All of which is really just his internal rationalization for why he's so shocked when he goes into the workshop for the first time in three weeks (he still thinks Nathan confining him to the clinic was a gross overreaction to the very minor and totally not gangrene at all, Nathan infection that set into his broken leg) and sees a sheet covering what looks suspiciously like a body-shaped object on Josiah's worktable when, in hindsight, it was really only a matter of time before Josiah decided to test the true effects of lightning on the squishier disciplines of science.
For a moment JD can't breathe around the knot in his chest; it feels a lot like betrayal, but JD doesn't know whose betrayal is pressing down on his heart. After all, it's not like he wants to believe that Josiah's killed a man and brought his body back to his workshop, but on the other hand he can so easily believe that this is exactly what's happened, since there's a reason everyone thought Josiah killed those girls. And Josiah is just so damn curious about everything, and he's been reading Frankenstein, and oh Christ that's Vin's hat at the head of the table, and JD's pretty sure he hasn't seen Vin in a couple of days, and he knows Josiah's been mucking around with exploding bullets, and Vin never could say no to testing a gun and JD's not sure if the fact that maybe the body on the table is there because of an accident and not because of malice aforethought makes the fact that Vin's dead any better, and he doesn't know if maybe he should tell Chris that Vin's dead or if he should let Josiah get on with his experimenting and hope that maybe Josiah's right and he can harness the power of lightening to bring Vin back to life before anybody notices that something's wrong, or -
"JD!" Josiah booms, his voice full of unexpected pleasure; his hand is heavy and immovable when it lands on JD's shoulder. JD squeaks and turns and he wants to hustle back up the workshop stairs as fast as his still healing leg will allow him, but he hesitates too long, torn between running and satisfying his curiosity, and by the time he decides finding Chris would really be the most prudent choice it's too late and he's already heading deeper into the workshop, caught up in Josiah's wake.
"You're just in time," Josiah says, gripping the sheet covering the body on the table. "I need your help with my latest project."
"Josiah, I-" JD begins, but whatever he wants to say - a protest, an agreement, a gentle suggestion that perhaps Josiah's spent too long inhaling the fumes of his forge - dies on his lips as Josiah pulls the sheet away revealing that the body on the table is not so much a body as it is an…automaton, is the closest word JD can find to describe the thing. It's human shaped, yes, but so very obviously not human at all, being made in equal parts of badly tanned leather, slightly scorched copper, and sun-bleached wood sanded smooth and pale as bone.
"That's not Vin," JD says in a rush, relief flooding through him like a shock from Josiah's lightning jar, and pushing away all of his doubt and guilt and fear that Josiah really could be as mad and monstrous as Walter Conklin said he could be. He looks down at the thing on the table to hide the blush he knows is heating up his face, and frowns, already seeing the shape of Josiah's idea and how it could be improved. His fingers itch to touch, to feel, to prod the clockwork within, to fully understand Josiah's dream, but he's poked at Josiah's inventions without permission before and he really only needs to have three of his fingers almost removed by an unseen latch to learn his lesson. He picks up Vin's hat, instead, and raises a questioning eyebrow at Josiah.
"Different project," Josiah says, bluff and blustering, his eyes crinkled up in the way he thinks makes him look subtle and mysterious but really just makes him look drunk and crazed; although, oddly enough, when he's drunk and crazed he looks nothing at all like this. He frowns as he parses JD's words and then rears back, a look of wounded affront on his face. "You thought-"
"Well you had his hat!" JD says, a bit snippier than he intends to. "And you've been reading that book!"
Josiah snorts, and his fleeting smile is startling normal and fond. "JD," he says, in a patient tone that makes JD bristle, "everybody knows lightning can't bring back the dead."
"Yeah, well, everybody also knows you shouldn't mix potassium and water, and I didn't see that stopping you from blowin' up the Mark 3." And, ok, maybe JD is still kind of pissed off about the Mark 3, but that was mostly because they'd finally managed to make the Iron Horse move in the field, and he'd kind of hoped he'd have a little more time testing his clockwork brain before the thing exploded and he had to build the thing all over again.
"That was different," Josiah says, settling into the old argument as easily as JD. "I keep telling you that if we'd been able to properly harness the energy of that explosion-"
"Josiah, you used ten pounds," JD says. "Chris says Howard Johnson's still finding scraps of the Mark 3 in the cow pasture out by his creek and that's more'n twelve miles away."
Josiah grins, broad and satisfied, and says, "That was a good day."
JD can't help but grin back, because it had been a good day; they'd gotten the horse to run in a circle before it blew up, which was way more than the Mark 1 or 2 had done. Of course hashing over what constitutes a perfectly reasonable application of volatile chemical reactions isn't going to explain what Josiah was doing with the thing on the table, so JD tamps down his urge to discuss the latest journal articles about what Fremy is doing with flourite and prods Josiah's creation. "So whatch'ya makin' if this ain't some kind of Frankenstein monster?"
"This," Josiah says, his voice as soft as it ever gets, and full of a fondness JD's never heard before, "is my Galatea."
"That's, uh." JD swallows and drops the hand he's been prodding as surreptitiously as he can; he's been hanging around Josiah and his penchant for the Greeks long enough to recognize that name. He casts about for something to say, because he feels like he ought to, but what do you say to a man about his half-made love machine?
"She's got lovely springs," JD settles on at last. "Real shiny."
Josiah barks out a laugh and slaps JD on the back. "Relax, JD, I don't fancy myself the next Pygmalion." He runs a finger along a smooth expanse of wood and JD wonders who Josiah thinks he's fooling. "Galatea is for the world, not for me."
"The world, huh." JD considers the thing on the table, tries to come up with a reason for its being that doesn't make him blush harder than a bruised peach. He frowns as he considers the empty space within its head-piece and casts a suspicious eye at Josiah. "You ain't gonna make me steal you a brain," he states with as much conviction as he can muster.
"Of course not." Josiah snorts, and JD feels his shoulders relax a bit at the sound. "That would be ludicrous. An organic brain could never handle the complex equations necessary to make her move and think, especially a dead one! She will have a brain of iron and lightning!"
"Ah," JD says. "Um. That's...good?"
"It's better than good, JD, it's revolutionary!" Josiah smiles, and JD feels his face stretching into an echoing smile, a recognition of the delight of exploration and invention. Josiah slings his arm across JD's shoulder and turns them away from the table. "I would never ask you to steal me a brain," he says, seriously, but with that twinkle in his eye that JD knows means Josiah's getting ready for what he considers a joke. "I will, however, need you to find me a heart."
***
For the most part, JD really likes being sheriff. He likes his shiny star and the responsibilities it carries, and the dollar a day Judge Travis pays him, and being able to justify all the time he spends in the workshop as being part of a "public safety initiative". (It's an Ezra phrase, and JD's awfully fond of using it, especially whenever Mary questions him about all the time he spends with Josiah rather than sitting at his desk in the jail where Walter Conklin can find him and subject him to another rant on all the town beautification ordinances Vin's wagon breaks.)
What he doesn't like, however, is the fact that being the official sheriff means he has to actually tell someone what he's doing in Josiah's workshop and, more importantly, what Josiah is up to, just in case they need to organize a precautionary town-wide evacuation. Also, after the Mark 5 took out over half the town, Chris had been damn insistent that one of the new laws in town was that Josiah was no longer allowed to create mechanical life (there had been a referendum and a unanimous vote at the last town hall meeting and everything) and the sheriff is supposed to enforce the law. On the other hand, he ain't sure if this is one of those real laws, like the one about not driving cattle down main street, or one of the "just on the books" laws, like gambling being restricted to licensed establishments, and not wherever Ezra happened to set up a book or a game of cards.
Anyway, JD reckons Galatea ain't exactly like the Iron Horse (or the Brass Donkey, or the Steel Mule…Josiah ain't always the cleverest at naming things) and JD's pretty sure he can convince Josiah to run her off of mechanical energy, make her out of clockwork and springs and gears, not fire and lightning. Besides JD's been itching to build his new design for automated instructions and complex task paths.
Still, he supposes he should maybe tell someone about Galatea, just in case Josiah wasn't joking about stealing a heart.
He ain't gonna tell Chris, though, that's for sure. Chris'll just want to put a stop to it, and JD knows that if Chris puts a stop to Josiah's work now he'll just use it as an excuse to stop Josiah from doing any inventing. JD knows full well that if you give Chris an inch, he'll come back with an entire rope to string you up with. And Nathan ain't even a realistic choice because Nathan'll just start listing off all the ways this will end in blood and broken bones, and JD's already had two weeks of that lecture - he can recite it by heart, practically. He would tell Buck, because he's always told Buck about Josiah's latest ideas, but Buck's been acting kind of squirrely since the accident, and JD's pretty sure Buck won't see just how amazing Galatea could be.
Which just leaves Vin or Ezra.
JD grimaces. That ain't a choice he's particularly happy with, especially since he's still feelin' awful guilty over the fact that he thought Josiah had killed Vin; and he ain't too proud of the fact that if he can't find Vin right now he might go back to thinking the worst, might go back to thinking that the leather that made up part of Galatea's body looked an awful lot like the leather of Vin's coat. Besides, even if he finds Vin, JD's not exactly sure he's up to facing him without babbling incoherently about death and lightning…or thinking about why Josiah had Vin's hat down in the workshop. Could be something innocent, could be Josiah's just making Vin another gun, but if that's the case, JD can't really understand why Josiah needs Vin's hat; and if it ain't innocent, if it turns out Josiah's up to somethin' that'll hit one of Vin's secret sore spots, well, JD ain't gonna be the one to light off that powder keg. Vin ain't always careful about who ends up caught in the fallout of his implosions.
On the other hand, he's pretty sure Vin won't go down into Josiah's lab and mess with things in order to create better odds like Ezra will. JD won't ever ask Ezra (or any of the other fellas) about just how many times Ezra's gone in and rigged the odds to be a bit more in his favor - and, perhaps, made something go wrong when it should've gone right - but he's pretty damn sure Ezra's done it at least once. Of course that's a point in the favor of talking to Ezra right now; it ain't too hard to throw a spanner into some of Josiah's creations, but it takes a real keen mind to understand how to muck things up in a way that can't be detected. Ezra may not be as enthusiastic as Josiah or himself, but JD knows Ezra's read some of the same books they have, that he's familiar with Babbage and Faraday and Foucault. More importantly, Ezra's read the same books that Josiah has, the ones that have nothing to do with science and machines and have everything to do with a sculptor falling in love with his creation; for all that JD is dying to see Galatea realized, he knows that Josiah's gentle affection to her disparate parts ain't normal, ain't something JD can deal with on his own. And Ezra's got a slippery sort of mind - the kind of mind that would understand JD's decision to obey the letter, if not the spirit, of the law, and be open to hearing JD's concerns. And if Ezra maybe decides that it ain't stacking the world in his favor if Josiah actually brings Galatea to life and decides to take steps to re-rig the deck, well, "public safety initiative" ain't the only phrase of Ezra's that JD's decided to adopt - he's gettin' awful familiar with the concept of "plausible deniability".
Of course intending to do something and actually doing it are two separate things, especially when it comes to getting Ezra alone, which is why Galatea's already disturbingly woman shaped - if not exactly capable of doing anythin' more than turn her head and maybe respondin' to simple questions if they can ever figure out how to give her a tongue to speak with - by the time he finds Ezra sitting out in front of the hotel and staring at the mid-morning bustle of Four Corners with bleary hatred. JD hesitates for a minute before mounting the hotel's steps and sitting down beside him; like everyone else, he hates dealing with Ezra in the mornings, especially if there are rumors that someone cleaned him out at the poker table last night. Still, JD knows he can't put off telling someone about Josiah's latest project for much longer, and at least he knows that everyone else will steer clear of Ezra this morning, since he's the only one crazy enough to brave Ezra's morning wrath. (This is not a new realization, but it's one that fills JD with a vague sense of guilt born from a childhood of having his mother sigh despairing sighs every time he came home singed and smelling of chemicals, and before he steps foot onto the porch he once again promises the memory of his mother that he's going to work on his whole lack of self-preservation, really.)
"You," Ezra says, voice rough and accent thick, as JD pulls his chair closer to the table with an accompanying screech, "are not my coffee."
"No," JD says. His foot is tapping like a telegraph machine, and he wonders, idly, what his nerves are saying. "Um."
"If you don't turn into my coffee in the next 30 seconds, I shan't be responsible for my actions."
"I-" JD takes a deep breath, trying to prepare himself for what he's about to say. Pinned by the force of Ezra's baleful, bloodshot glare, JD is suddenly struck by just how bad of an idea this really is. In all that time he spent justifying his decision to tell Ezra about what's going on down in Josiah's basement, he never really thought about how, exactly, he would go about with the telling. Even if Ezra were in a good mood - even if this conversation was taking place over cigars and glasses of Nettie's moonshine in the homey comfort of the saloon at midnight - JD's pretty sure starting the conversation with "Josiah's got a girl in his basement" would still be the wrong way to go.
"15 seconds," Ezra rasps.
"You ever hear of Pygmalion?" JD blurts out.
Ezra frowns at him and JD bites down on his tongue because he knows - he knows - that if he doesn't stop talking now he's going to be telling Ezra all about the breast versus no-breasts debate he had with Josiah last night and he really doesn't think Ezra wants to hear about that. Quite frankly, he's sure that nobody wants to hear about that. JD was there for the entire thing and he wishes he hadn't heard it. He looks at his hat instead, and makes a note that the weird stain hasn't so much spread as it has started to slowly eat its way through the material.
"JD," Ezra says at last, "I, uh. I realize that Miss Wells does have the misfortune of co-habitating with that harridan aunt of hers but if you're turning to the Greeks for ideas of relief, I suspect you need to have another talk with Buck about taking advantage of more, uh, traditional outlets-"
"What?" JD says, and then his mind skitters down the path he knows Ezra's on and he feels a horrified blush flame across his cheeks. "No! I - Jesus, Ezra, what are you insinuating?"
Ezra coughs and fishes his flask out of his jacket. He takes a sip and coughs again - a rough, whiskey cough, not the "I am trying to buy some time" cough he'd coughed earlier - and looks at a point over JD's shoulder with a pained expression. "Son, must you really ask?"
"Yeah, Ezra, I must, because -" JD stops himself with an effort and takes a deep breath. He's getting off track again and as much as he wants to continue putting off what he knows will be a truly uncomfortable conversation, he knows he has to get it out now or actually do his duty as sheriff and tell Chris about Galatea. "Nevermind," he says. "I just wanted to let you know that-"
"So Josiah's buildin' a girl in his basement," Buck says from right behind JD, loud and obnoxious and so startling that JD squeaks a little as he twitches violently away from Buck's voice, from his presence.
"A girl," Ezra says, flatly, at the same time that JD says, "How do you know that?"
"Accordin' to Mary, Josiah's created a -" Buck opens up the paper he's holding under his arm and shakes it out before clearing his throat and saying in a sonorous tone, "'modern wonder' that will be certain to 'astound and amaze' us - though that's what she said 'bout the Iron Horse and that whirlie bird and the little clockwork firefly, so I reckon 'astound and amaze' is just her way of sayin' we're all gonna be runnin' for cover in a couple of weeks - and he's gonna be displaying her this afternoon from 2 to 4 in the church." Buck puts the paper down on the barrel top serving as Ezra's table and grins at JD; it's the same grin he had on when he found out JD was going to be sheriff, the one that meant Buck found the whole thing funny in the same way that gangrene and gut wounds were funny. "'Course Mary didn't go into specifics in her article, so I gotta ask: this girl of Josiah's, she anatomically correct?"
"I-" JD looks down at his hands, struggling for the right words. He really does not want to discuss Galatea's more cosmetic aspects with Buck, largely because they still make him uncomfortable in ways he ain't too proud of, but also because there's still a part of him that expects Buck to be mad, to be obstinate and blustering and to not understand.
"I think, Mister Wilmington, that the more pertinent question to be asking is why we're only hearing about this...project of Josiah's now. I believe there is some sort of law requiring our good sheriff to report on Josiah's more, uh, ambitious inventions before Mary writes about them in our quaint little paper."
"I just gotta tell someone," JD says defensively. "Law don't say when I have to tell them."
"Uh huh," Ezra says and JD takes a deep breath to argue his point further, to add that Galatea can't really be considered an artifact of mechanical life when there ain't nothin' really alive about her, ain't nothing really independent or anywhere near working, when Vin saunters up and says, "Anybody know why Watson's sold out on pitchforks and lamp oil?"
"Why are you looking for pitchforks?" Buck asks.
"Why not?" Vin drags a chair over to their barrel and sits down in it, automatically tilting it back so he can rest his feet on the porch rail.
"I believe I have an answer," Ezra says, pointing to an article right below the one announcing Josiah's newest invention. "It appears someone has organized an angry mob to storm the church as soon as Josiah's little show-and-tell is over."
"Pitchforks and torches," Vin says. He glances over at Ezra, a smirk dancing around his lips. "Well, least it ain't tar and feathers."
JD sighs and stares morosely at the picture in the paper, tuning out Vin and Ezra's genial sniping. It's the same picture Mary always runs when announcing one of Josiah's new inventions - the one where Josiah's missing an eyebrow and looking rather singed around the edges, the one she took back when Josiah first moved into town and folks were genuinely excited about the prospect of having their very own inventor - and JD's eye is drawn, as always, to the small box balanced precariously on the edge of the worktable; it was the first time he'd been able to realize one of the things he'd dreamed of, and even though the box and its dancing copper crow had ended up a casualty of one of the many explosions that plagued the workshop, the sight of it, forever preserved in this grainy picture, still fills him with pride and reminds him of why he'd signed up to be Josiah's watcher in the first place.
"You reckon Chris seen the paper yet?" JD asks, stubbornly holding onto the miniscule hope that maybe he has time to fix things before Chris needs to know anything.
"Oh, I expect he has," Buck says with a grin. "This was his paper."
***
"You have to admit," Josiah is saying to Chris and Nathan when JD enters the church, "they're being very polite about this."
"Josiah, it's an angry mob," Nathan says in the pained tone of one who has spent the better part of an hour arguing with Josiah.
"Yes, but they published a notice!" Josiah says as he rummages through his toolbox. "Most angry mobs don't think of doin' somethin' like that."
"That ain't polite," Chris says from where he's leaning against a disused pew. "That's just weird."
"Whole damn thing is weird," Buck says as he pushes his way past JD and walks up to where Galatea lies on what's left of the church's altar, chest cracked open and whirring gears exposed. Buck looks down at her and JD fights back the urge to pull Buck away - for all that Galatea gives him a mild case of the heebie-jeebies, she's still his and he don't like the idea of anybody other than himself or Josiah poking around inside her. But Buck just shakes his head and lets out a low whistle, though JD can't tell if it's an admiring whistle or an incredulous one.
"Beautiful, ain't she," Josiah says, beaming widely. He looks down at Galatea and fiddles with something inside her, then says, "Say hello, Galatea."
"You fixed the speech error," JD says excitedly, forgetting in an instant all the dread and burgeoning anger that'd been building during the walk from the hotel's porch to the church. "Did you figure out how to keep the wax from melting?"
"Better," Josiah says as Galatea clicks and clacks behind him. "Telegraphs, JD! Have you ever stopped and contemplated the majesty of the telegraph machine? The entirety of the human language reduced to patterns of dashes long and short, patterns that can be arranged in a myriad of ways limited only by the boundless reaches of math and science. Why, with telegraphs and Morse's code, a man in the middle of Africa can be told that it's raining in Missoula with just the push of a few buttons! Shakespeare, JD! Even the breadth and depth of Shakespeare can be encompassed by--"
"So, you sayin' she can hear us talkin' right now?" Buck asks, cutting Josiah off mid-rant.
"Ah, well, no. Not yet. We're still havin' some difficulties with the auditory capture. The math works, but the medium…"
"The medium keeps meltin'," JD says. "And I'm tellin' you, Josiah, that no matter how much you love it, beeswax ain't the answer to the problem."
"Perhaps, perhaps," Josiah says dismissively. "Regardless, Galatea may not be able to hear - yet! - but that don't mean she can't communicate. See?" he says brandishing the strip of paper that had spooled out of Galatea's mouth as they'd talked. "She says she's awful glad to meet everyone."
"How she know to say that if she can't hear?" Buck asks, suspicious.
"Well, it ain't elegant, but for now we're using this here modified telegraph receiver to talk to her," Josiah says. He pats the little machine fondly and JD beams with pride. It'd been his idea to attach Mary's smallest set of moveable type to the telegraph receiver, and as cumbersome as it was to wait for the machine to translate each key to the appropriate set of Morse code, it was faster than waiting for a human to do it. He kind of wishes he'd been around to see Josiah hook it up, especially ‘cause the last time he'd worked on the typing machine he hadn't quite been able to figure out how to keep the thing from occasionally shocking the user.
"Lemme guess," Chris says, speaking to Josiah but eyeing JD. "You had to tell Mary what you needed her type for and that's how she got to know ‘bout this Galatea thing."
"Um," JD says. They're heading down a path that will lead to Chris lookin' at him in that disappointed way that always makes JD squirm, and while he hadn't given a whole lot of thought to the words he'd say to Ezra ‘bout Josiah's latest invention, he had spent quite a bit of time thinkin' ‘bout what he'd say to Chris. "Well, see, I meant t' say somethin' to you earlier, like I was s'posed to, but, well, that law ‘bout not creating mechanical life? It ain't exactly clear on what's meant by ‘life', ‘cause, well, Galatea, she ain't-. I mean, she don't-. Well, what's ‘alive' anyway?!"
"Josiah," Chris says, and JD finds himself cringing under the piercing weight of Chris's gaze, "you reckon this girl of yours is alive?"
"Of course," Josiah says, without even a moment of hesitation. "But why're you askin' me?"
"Who else we supposed to ask?" Chris says.
"Why not ask her?" Josiah says, pushing the typing machine toward Chris.
"Hmm," Chris says, and JD can see him mentally gird his loins before he reaches out to touch the type keys. Chris types slowly, carefully, with intense concentration and a bit of swearing, and as frustrated as JD is by the slowness of the process, there's a part of him that doesn't want to know what Galatea thinks. For the most part, he reckons Galatea ain't gonna say anythin' - he designed her brain, after all, and he knows that there ain't nothin' in there sophisticated enough to respond to a question as complex as this, to a question that has stumped and frustrated the greatest philosophical minds for centuries - but there's that part of him (the part that thinks, sometimes, that what Josiah builds more often than not skirts over the line between the possible and impossible, between that which is real and that which is the stuff of dreams) that's holding his breath because it knows Galatea will be able to respond and answer that ineffable question.
For a long moment after Chris finishes his painful typing, the church is silent. And then Galatea starts whirring, the fine brass cogs in her brain going faster and faster until all that's left is a high pitched whine that sets JD's teeth on edge. Her body begins to shake and tremble and JD is torn between wanting to rush forward and hold her down, hold her steady, and run far away because he knows that the shaking is often a precursor to the exploding.
"Josiah-" JD says just as the smoke starts to rise from Galatea's body, thin and acrid; JD knows it's metal and leather burning somewhere inside her, and as horrified as he is by what's happening there's a shameful part of him that wishes Galatea's head was open so he can see just what in the world could be making her melt her gears.
"Galatea?" Josiah says, his big voice turned small and lost at the sight of his creation dying in front of him.
"Josiah," Nathan says in a gentling tone. "Josiah, I reckon you might need to-"
But before Nathan can finish, the whining stops and all that's left a smoking husk and strip of paper that's singed and browned around the edges.
"Whoo-ee," Buck says, softly. He steps forward and plucks the bit of paper out of what's left of Galatea's mouth. He peers at it, turns it this way and that, then hands it to Josiah. "What's it say?"
"Um…'Bad kernel, does not compute. Abort, retry, fail?'" Josiah says after a moment. He looks down at Galatea and sighs. "What does that even mean?"
"I reckon it means it's all for the best," Nathan says. "There are some things man shouldn't be messin' with and building yourself a woman's one of 'em." He pats Josiah on the arm and says, "I gotta say that I'm right glad you ain't gonna be showin' her off. Means I've got some time to restock on my bandages and restock my shelves."
"Well," Chris says. "Guess someone ought t' tell Mary so she can start spreading the news and call off that angry mob 'fore they start congregating."
"Hell, I think we oughta let Conklin have his fun. It'll be a hoot and a half."
"Yeah, up 'til they burn the whole town down," Chris says as he and Buck saunter out of the church behind Nathan. JD watches them go, then steps forward to the altar and it's sad display.
"Josiah?" he says, hesitant, unsure if he should intrude on this moment.
"What does it mean, JD," Josiah says, his gaze still fixed on Galatea's last words. "It's not something I taught her."
"I don't know," JD says. He glances down at Galatea, at the cracked and blackened paint on her face, and clears his throat. "Josiah, what're you gonna do now?"
"Oh I don't know," Josiah says. He sighs and reaches for his toolbox. "I suppose it's for the best. I reckon the world weren't ready for something like her."
"You gonna rebuild her?"
"No," Josiah says at last. "No, I reckon Nathan may be right. I suppose there are some things man shouldn't meddle with. Still," he adds as he opens Galatea's head and exposes the mess of melted gears and wires, "this has been a most fruitful experience. I reckon some of what we've done here can be used for the Iron Horse."
"Josiah," JD says, relief warring with exasperation, "Walter Conklin damn near ran you out on a rail today 'cause you built Galatea, and she wasn't exactly what you'd call functioning. The Iron Horse is almost ready to be ridden. What d'you think they're gonna do to you when you start showin' off mechanical life that actually works?"
"Well, JD," Josiah says, "I reckon they'll just be glad I ain't buildin' me another woman."
This entry was originally posted at Dreamwidth where there are
comments
Fandom: Mag7
Characters/Pairing: OT7 Steampunk
Rating: Gen
Summary: Josiah's not really Dr. Frankenstein; JD's almost certain of this fact.
Notes: Much belated b-day fic for
van. I will confess now to never having read Frankenstein or watched a movie adaptation other than Mel Brooks, so I went a bit Greek on this one. The ending is very much unbetaed but I hope it suits you anyway.
Galatea in Bronze (with gears)
If JD's being honest with himself, he probably should have realized what Josiah was up to long before it reached the point where pitchforks and torches were all but inevitable, but in his defense he'd been rather busy with the arduous task of salvaging his hopes and dreams from the wreckage of the Iron Horse (and, ok, so maybe that was more than a little melodramatic, but he'd spent months tweaking the Mark 5's clockwork brain, and he was sure that if Nathan hadn't been so full of doom and gloom and the threat of amputation after the Horse malfunctioned, Chris would have eventually come around to his and Josiah's way of thinking). True, the evidence of Josiah's cockamamie scheme was right out there in plain sight for anyone brave enough to venture into the workshop to see - the book, dog-eared and ragged and the margins full of Josiah's neat copperplate; the lightning jar; the fiddly little instruments and the sudden explosion of copper wires covering Josiah's primary worktable - but Josiah just naturally defaulted to playing around with lightning when he had no other projects on hand, creating elaborate and meaningless mazes of wire and glass just to see the lightning move. (Also, he has some sort of complex and deep-seated grudge against Faraday, despite the fact that Faraday's been dead for more than three years. JD doesn't even attempt to explain or understand it but he does know better than to suggest the use of magnets when Josiah's up to his elbows in shattered Leyden jars.) Besides, everybody knows that Frankenstein is an allegory of human nature, not some sort of resurrectionist's "how-to", and even if Josiah decided that he was once again going to flaunt the fact that when it came to admitting the impossibility of an idea he didn't really belong to the grand set known as "everybody", there was still all that recent unpleasantness with the dead girls and "McCormick's Mystical Maginarium".
All of which is really just his internal rationalization for why he's so shocked when he goes into the workshop for the first time in three weeks (he still thinks Nathan confining him to the clinic was a gross overreaction to the very minor and totally not gangrene at all, Nathan infection that set into his broken leg) and sees a sheet covering what looks suspiciously like a body-shaped object on Josiah's worktable when, in hindsight, it was really only a matter of time before Josiah decided to test the true effects of lightning on the squishier disciplines of science.
For a moment JD can't breathe around the knot in his chest; it feels a lot like betrayal, but JD doesn't know whose betrayal is pressing down on his heart. After all, it's not like he wants to believe that Josiah's killed a man and brought his body back to his workshop, but on the other hand he can so easily believe that this is exactly what's happened, since there's a reason everyone thought Josiah killed those girls. And Josiah is just so damn curious about everything, and he's been reading Frankenstein, and oh Christ that's Vin's hat at the head of the table, and JD's pretty sure he hasn't seen Vin in a couple of days, and he knows Josiah's been mucking around with exploding bullets, and Vin never could say no to testing a gun and JD's not sure if the fact that maybe the body on the table is there because of an accident and not because of malice aforethought makes the fact that Vin's dead any better, and he doesn't know if maybe he should tell Chris that Vin's dead or if he should let Josiah get on with his experimenting and hope that maybe Josiah's right and he can harness the power of lightening to bring Vin back to life before anybody notices that something's wrong, or -
"JD!" Josiah booms, his voice full of unexpected pleasure; his hand is heavy and immovable when it lands on JD's shoulder. JD squeaks and turns and he wants to hustle back up the workshop stairs as fast as his still healing leg will allow him, but he hesitates too long, torn between running and satisfying his curiosity, and by the time he decides finding Chris would really be the most prudent choice it's too late and he's already heading deeper into the workshop, caught up in Josiah's wake.
"You're just in time," Josiah says, gripping the sheet covering the body on the table. "I need your help with my latest project."
"Josiah, I-" JD begins, but whatever he wants to say - a protest, an agreement, a gentle suggestion that perhaps Josiah's spent too long inhaling the fumes of his forge - dies on his lips as Josiah pulls the sheet away revealing that the body on the table is not so much a body as it is an…automaton, is the closest word JD can find to describe the thing. It's human shaped, yes, but so very obviously not human at all, being made in equal parts of badly tanned leather, slightly scorched copper, and sun-bleached wood sanded smooth and pale as bone.
"That's not Vin," JD says in a rush, relief flooding through him like a shock from Josiah's lightning jar, and pushing away all of his doubt and guilt and fear that Josiah really could be as mad and monstrous as Walter Conklin said he could be. He looks down at the thing on the table to hide the blush he knows is heating up his face, and frowns, already seeing the shape of Josiah's idea and how it could be improved. His fingers itch to touch, to feel, to prod the clockwork within, to fully understand Josiah's dream, but he's poked at Josiah's inventions without permission before and he really only needs to have three of his fingers almost removed by an unseen latch to learn his lesson. He picks up Vin's hat, instead, and raises a questioning eyebrow at Josiah.
"Different project," Josiah says, bluff and blustering, his eyes crinkled up in the way he thinks makes him look subtle and mysterious but really just makes him look drunk and crazed; although, oddly enough, when he's drunk and crazed he looks nothing at all like this. He frowns as he parses JD's words and then rears back, a look of wounded affront on his face. "You thought-"
"Well you had his hat!" JD says, a bit snippier than he intends to. "And you've been reading that book!"
Josiah snorts, and his fleeting smile is startling normal and fond. "JD," he says, in a patient tone that makes JD bristle, "everybody knows lightning can't bring back the dead."
"Yeah, well, everybody also knows you shouldn't mix potassium and water, and I didn't see that stopping you from blowin' up the Mark 3." And, ok, maybe JD is still kind of pissed off about the Mark 3, but that was mostly because they'd finally managed to make the Iron Horse move in the field, and he'd kind of hoped he'd have a little more time testing his clockwork brain before the thing exploded and he had to build the thing all over again.
"That was different," Josiah says, settling into the old argument as easily as JD. "I keep telling you that if we'd been able to properly harness the energy of that explosion-"
"Josiah, you used ten pounds," JD says. "Chris says Howard Johnson's still finding scraps of the Mark 3 in the cow pasture out by his creek and that's more'n twelve miles away."
Josiah grins, broad and satisfied, and says, "That was a good day."
JD can't help but grin back, because it had been a good day; they'd gotten the horse to run in a circle before it blew up, which was way more than the Mark 1 or 2 had done. Of course hashing over what constitutes a perfectly reasonable application of volatile chemical reactions isn't going to explain what Josiah was doing with the thing on the table, so JD tamps down his urge to discuss the latest journal articles about what Fremy is doing with flourite and prods Josiah's creation. "So whatch'ya makin' if this ain't some kind of Frankenstein monster?"
"This," Josiah says, his voice as soft as it ever gets, and full of a fondness JD's never heard before, "is my Galatea."
"That's, uh." JD swallows and drops the hand he's been prodding as surreptitiously as he can; he's been hanging around Josiah and his penchant for the Greeks long enough to recognize that name. He casts about for something to say, because he feels like he ought to, but what do you say to a man about his half-made love machine?
"She's got lovely springs," JD settles on at last. "Real shiny."
Josiah barks out a laugh and slaps JD on the back. "Relax, JD, I don't fancy myself the next Pygmalion." He runs a finger along a smooth expanse of wood and JD wonders who Josiah thinks he's fooling. "Galatea is for the world, not for me."
"The world, huh." JD considers the thing on the table, tries to come up with a reason for its being that doesn't make him blush harder than a bruised peach. He frowns as he considers the empty space within its head-piece and casts a suspicious eye at Josiah. "You ain't gonna make me steal you a brain," he states with as much conviction as he can muster.
"Of course not." Josiah snorts, and JD feels his shoulders relax a bit at the sound. "That would be ludicrous. An organic brain could never handle the complex equations necessary to make her move and think, especially a dead one! She will have a brain of iron and lightning!"
"Ah," JD says. "Um. That's...good?"
"It's better than good, JD, it's revolutionary!" Josiah smiles, and JD feels his face stretching into an echoing smile, a recognition of the delight of exploration and invention. Josiah slings his arm across JD's shoulder and turns them away from the table. "I would never ask you to steal me a brain," he says, seriously, but with that twinkle in his eye that JD knows means Josiah's getting ready for what he considers a joke. "I will, however, need you to find me a heart."
***
For the most part, JD really likes being sheriff. He likes his shiny star and the responsibilities it carries, and the dollar a day Judge Travis pays him, and being able to justify all the time he spends in the workshop as being part of a "public safety initiative". (It's an Ezra phrase, and JD's awfully fond of using it, especially whenever Mary questions him about all the time he spends with Josiah rather than sitting at his desk in the jail where Walter Conklin can find him and subject him to another rant on all the town beautification ordinances Vin's wagon breaks.)
What he doesn't like, however, is the fact that being the official sheriff means he has to actually tell someone what he's doing in Josiah's workshop and, more importantly, what Josiah is up to, just in case they need to organize a precautionary town-wide evacuation. Also, after the Mark 5 took out over half the town, Chris had been damn insistent that one of the new laws in town was that Josiah was no longer allowed to create mechanical life (there had been a referendum and a unanimous vote at the last town hall meeting and everything) and the sheriff is supposed to enforce the law. On the other hand, he ain't sure if this is one of those real laws, like the one about not driving cattle down main street, or one of the "just on the books" laws, like gambling being restricted to licensed establishments, and not wherever Ezra happened to set up a book or a game of cards.
Anyway, JD reckons Galatea ain't exactly like the Iron Horse (or the Brass Donkey, or the Steel Mule…Josiah ain't always the cleverest at naming things) and JD's pretty sure he can convince Josiah to run her off of mechanical energy, make her out of clockwork and springs and gears, not fire and lightning. Besides JD's been itching to build his new design for automated instructions and complex task paths.
Still, he supposes he should maybe tell someone about Galatea, just in case Josiah wasn't joking about stealing a heart.
He ain't gonna tell Chris, though, that's for sure. Chris'll just want to put a stop to it, and JD knows that if Chris puts a stop to Josiah's work now he'll just use it as an excuse to stop Josiah from doing any inventing. JD knows full well that if you give Chris an inch, he'll come back with an entire rope to string you up with. And Nathan ain't even a realistic choice because Nathan'll just start listing off all the ways this will end in blood and broken bones, and JD's already had two weeks of that lecture - he can recite it by heart, practically. He would tell Buck, because he's always told Buck about Josiah's latest ideas, but Buck's been acting kind of squirrely since the accident, and JD's pretty sure Buck won't see just how amazing Galatea could be.
Which just leaves Vin or Ezra.
JD grimaces. That ain't a choice he's particularly happy with, especially since he's still feelin' awful guilty over the fact that he thought Josiah had killed Vin; and he ain't too proud of the fact that if he can't find Vin right now he might go back to thinking the worst, might go back to thinking that the leather that made up part of Galatea's body looked an awful lot like the leather of Vin's coat. Besides, even if he finds Vin, JD's not exactly sure he's up to facing him without babbling incoherently about death and lightning…or thinking about why Josiah had Vin's hat down in the workshop. Could be something innocent, could be Josiah's just making Vin another gun, but if that's the case, JD can't really understand why Josiah needs Vin's hat; and if it ain't innocent, if it turns out Josiah's up to somethin' that'll hit one of Vin's secret sore spots, well, JD ain't gonna be the one to light off that powder keg. Vin ain't always careful about who ends up caught in the fallout of his implosions.
On the other hand, he's pretty sure Vin won't go down into Josiah's lab and mess with things in order to create better odds like Ezra will. JD won't ever ask Ezra (or any of the other fellas) about just how many times Ezra's gone in and rigged the odds to be a bit more in his favor - and, perhaps, made something go wrong when it should've gone right - but he's pretty damn sure Ezra's done it at least once. Of course that's a point in the favor of talking to Ezra right now; it ain't too hard to throw a spanner into some of Josiah's creations, but it takes a real keen mind to understand how to muck things up in a way that can't be detected. Ezra may not be as enthusiastic as Josiah or himself, but JD knows Ezra's read some of the same books they have, that he's familiar with Babbage and Faraday and Foucault. More importantly, Ezra's read the same books that Josiah has, the ones that have nothing to do with science and machines and have everything to do with a sculptor falling in love with his creation; for all that JD is dying to see Galatea realized, he knows that Josiah's gentle affection to her disparate parts ain't normal, ain't something JD can deal with on his own. And Ezra's got a slippery sort of mind - the kind of mind that would understand JD's decision to obey the letter, if not the spirit, of the law, and be open to hearing JD's concerns. And if Ezra maybe decides that it ain't stacking the world in his favor if Josiah actually brings Galatea to life and decides to take steps to re-rig the deck, well, "public safety initiative" ain't the only phrase of Ezra's that JD's decided to adopt - he's gettin' awful familiar with the concept of "plausible deniability".
Of course intending to do something and actually doing it are two separate things, especially when it comes to getting Ezra alone, which is why Galatea's already disturbingly woman shaped - if not exactly capable of doing anythin' more than turn her head and maybe respondin' to simple questions if they can ever figure out how to give her a tongue to speak with - by the time he finds Ezra sitting out in front of the hotel and staring at the mid-morning bustle of Four Corners with bleary hatred. JD hesitates for a minute before mounting the hotel's steps and sitting down beside him; like everyone else, he hates dealing with Ezra in the mornings, especially if there are rumors that someone cleaned him out at the poker table last night. Still, JD knows he can't put off telling someone about Josiah's latest project for much longer, and at least he knows that everyone else will steer clear of Ezra this morning, since he's the only one crazy enough to brave Ezra's morning wrath. (This is not a new realization, but it's one that fills JD with a vague sense of guilt born from a childhood of having his mother sigh despairing sighs every time he came home singed and smelling of chemicals, and before he steps foot onto the porch he once again promises the memory of his mother that he's going to work on his whole lack of self-preservation, really.)
"You," Ezra says, voice rough and accent thick, as JD pulls his chair closer to the table with an accompanying screech, "are not my coffee."
"No," JD says. His foot is tapping like a telegraph machine, and he wonders, idly, what his nerves are saying. "Um."
"If you don't turn into my coffee in the next 30 seconds, I shan't be responsible for my actions."
"I-" JD takes a deep breath, trying to prepare himself for what he's about to say. Pinned by the force of Ezra's baleful, bloodshot glare, JD is suddenly struck by just how bad of an idea this really is. In all that time he spent justifying his decision to tell Ezra about what's going on down in Josiah's basement, he never really thought about how, exactly, he would go about with the telling. Even if Ezra were in a good mood - even if this conversation was taking place over cigars and glasses of Nettie's moonshine in the homey comfort of the saloon at midnight - JD's pretty sure starting the conversation with "Josiah's got a girl in his basement" would still be the wrong way to go.
"15 seconds," Ezra rasps.
"You ever hear of Pygmalion?" JD blurts out.
Ezra frowns at him and JD bites down on his tongue because he knows - he knows - that if he doesn't stop talking now he's going to be telling Ezra all about the breast versus no-breasts debate he had with Josiah last night and he really doesn't think Ezra wants to hear about that. Quite frankly, he's sure that nobody wants to hear about that. JD was there for the entire thing and he wishes he hadn't heard it. He looks at his hat instead, and makes a note that the weird stain hasn't so much spread as it has started to slowly eat its way through the material.
"JD," Ezra says at last, "I, uh. I realize that Miss Wells does have the misfortune of co-habitating with that harridan aunt of hers but if you're turning to the Greeks for ideas of relief, I suspect you need to have another talk with Buck about taking advantage of more, uh, traditional outlets-"
"What?" JD says, and then his mind skitters down the path he knows Ezra's on and he feels a horrified blush flame across his cheeks. "No! I - Jesus, Ezra, what are you insinuating?"
Ezra coughs and fishes his flask out of his jacket. He takes a sip and coughs again - a rough, whiskey cough, not the "I am trying to buy some time" cough he'd coughed earlier - and looks at a point over JD's shoulder with a pained expression. "Son, must you really ask?"
"Yeah, Ezra, I must, because -" JD stops himself with an effort and takes a deep breath. He's getting off track again and as much as he wants to continue putting off what he knows will be a truly uncomfortable conversation, he knows he has to get it out now or actually do his duty as sheriff and tell Chris about Galatea. "Nevermind," he says. "I just wanted to let you know that-"
"So Josiah's buildin' a girl in his basement," Buck says from right behind JD, loud and obnoxious and so startling that JD squeaks a little as he twitches violently away from Buck's voice, from his presence.
"A girl," Ezra says, flatly, at the same time that JD says, "How do you know that?"
"Accordin' to Mary, Josiah's created a -" Buck opens up the paper he's holding under his arm and shakes it out before clearing his throat and saying in a sonorous tone, "'modern wonder' that will be certain to 'astound and amaze' us - though that's what she said 'bout the Iron Horse and that whirlie bird and the little clockwork firefly, so I reckon 'astound and amaze' is just her way of sayin' we're all gonna be runnin' for cover in a couple of weeks - and he's gonna be displaying her this afternoon from 2 to 4 in the church." Buck puts the paper down on the barrel top serving as Ezra's table and grins at JD; it's the same grin he had on when he found out JD was going to be sheriff, the one that meant Buck found the whole thing funny in the same way that gangrene and gut wounds were funny. "'Course Mary didn't go into specifics in her article, so I gotta ask: this girl of Josiah's, she anatomically correct?"
"I-" JD looks down at his hands, struggling for the right words. He really does not want to discuss Galatea's more cosmetic aspects with Buck, largely because they still make him uncomfortable in ways he ain't too proud of, but also because there's still a part of him that expects Buck to be mad, to be obstinate and blustering and to not understand.
"I think, Mister Wilmington, that the more pertinent question to be asking is why we're only hearing about this...project of Josiah's now. I believe there is some sort of law requiring our good sheriff to report on Josiah's more, uh, ambitious inventions before Mary writes about them in our quaint little paper."
"I just gotta tell someone," JD says defensively. "Law don't say when I have to tell them."
"Uh huh," Ezra says and JD takes a deep breath to argue his point further, to add that Galatea can't really be considered an artifact of mechanical life when there ain't nothin' really alive about her, ain't nothing really independent or anywhere near working, when Vin saunters up and says, "Anybody know why Watson's sold out on pitchforks and lamp oil?"
"Why are you looking for pitchforks?" Buck asks.
"Why not?" Vin drags a chair over to their barrel and sits down in it, automatically tilting it back so he can rest his feet on the porch rail.
"I believe I have an answer," Ezra says, pointing to an article right below the one announcing Josiah's newest invention. "It appears someone has organized an angry mob to storm the church as soon as Josiah's little show-and-tell is over."
"Pitchforks and torches," Vin says. He glances over at Ezra, a smirk dancing around his lips. "Well, least it ain't tar and feathers."
JD sighs and stares morosely at the picture in the paper, tuning out Vin and Ezra's genial sniping. It's the same picture Mary always runs when announcing one of Josiah's new inventions - the one where Josiah's missing an eyebrow and looking rather singed around the edges, the one she took back when Josiah first moved into town and folks were genuinely excited about the prospect of having their very own inventor - and JD's eye is drawn, as always, to the small box balanced precariously on the edge of the worktable; it was the first time he'd been able to realize one of the things he'd dreamed of, and even though the box and its dancing copper crow had ended up a casualty of one of the many explosions that plagued the workshop, the sight of it, forever preserved in this grainy picture, still fills him with pride and reminds him of why he'd signed up to be Josiah's watcher in the first place.
"You reckon Chris seen the paper yet?" JD asks, stubbornly holding onto the miniscule hope that maybe he has time to fix things before Chris needs to know anything.
"Oh, I expect he has," Buck says with a grin. "This was his paper."
***
"You have to admit," Josiah is saying to Chris and Nathan when JD enters the church, "they're being very polite about this."
"Josiah, it's an angry mob," Nathan says in the pained tone of one who has spent the better part of an hour arguing with Josiah.
"Yes, but they published a notice!" Josiah says as he rummages through his toolbox. "Most angry mobs don't think of doin' somethin' like that."
"That ain't polite," Chris says from where he's leaning against a disused pew. "That's just weird."
"Whole damn thing is weird," Buck says as he pushes his way past JD and walks up to where Galatea lies on what's left of the church's altar, chest cracked open and whirring gears exposed. Buck looks down at her and JD fights back the urge to pull Buck away - for all that Galatea gives him a mild case of the heebie-jeebies, she's still his and he don't like the idea of anybody other than himself or Josiah poking around inside her. But Buck just shakes his head and lets out a low whistle, though JD can't tell if it's an admiring whistle or an incredulous one.
"Beautiful, ain't she," Josiah says, beaming widely. He looks down at Galatea and fiddles with something inside her, then says, "Say hello, Galatea."
"You fixed the speech error," JD says excitedly, forgetting in an instant all the dread and burgeoning anger that'd been building during the walk from the hotel's porch to the church. "Did you figure out how to keep the wax from melting?"
"Better," Josiah says as Galatea clicks and clacks behind him. "Telegraphs, JD! Have you ever stopped and contemplated the majesty of the telegraph machine? The entirety of the human language reduced to patterns of dashes long and short, patterns that can be arranged in a myriad of ways limited only by the boundless reaches of math and science. Why, with telegraphs and Morse's code, a man in the middle of Africa can be told that it's raining in Missoula with just the push of a few buttons! Shakespeare, JD! Even the breadth and depth of Shakespeare can be encompassed by--"
"So, you sayin' she can hear us talkin' right now?" Buck asks, cutting Josiah off mid-rant.
"Ah, well, no. Not yet. We're still havin' some difficulties with the auditory capture. The math works, but the medium…"
"The medium keeps meltin'," JD says. "And I'm tellin' you, Josiah, that no matter how much you love it, beeswax ain't the answer to the problem."
"Perhaps, perhaps," Josiah says dismissively. "Regardless, Galatea may not be able to hear - yet! - but that don't mean she can't communicate. See?" he says brandishing the strip of paper that had spooled out of Galatea's mouth as they'd talked. "She says she's awful glad to meet everyone."
"How she know to say that if she can't hear?" Buck asks, suspicious.
"Well, it ain't elegant, but for now we're using this here modified telegraph receiver to talk to her," Josiah says. He pats the little machine fondly and JD beams with pride. It'd been his idea to attach Mary's smallest set of moveable type to the telegraph receiver, and as cumbersome as it was to wait for the machine to translate each key to the appropriate set of Morse code, it was faster than waiting for a human to do it. He kind of wishes he'd been around to see Josiah hook it up, especially ‘cause the last time he'd worked on the typing machine he hadn't quite been able to figure out how to keep the thing from occasionally shocking the user.
"Lemme guess," Chris says, speaking to Josiah but eyeing JD. "You had to tell Mary what you needed her type for and that's how she got to know ‘bout this Galatea thing."
"Um," JD says. They're heading down a path that will lead to Chris lookin' at him in that disappointed way that always makes JD squirm, and while he hadn't given a whole lot of thought to the words he'd say to Ezra ‘bout Josiah's latest invention, he had spent quite a bit of time thinkin' ‘bout what he'd say to Chris. "Well, see, I meant t' say somethin' to you earlier, like I was s'posed to, but, well, that law ‘bout not creating mechanical life? It ain't exactly clear on what's meant by ‘life', ‘cause, well, Galatea, she ain't-. I mean, she don't-. Well, what's ‘alive' anyway?!"
"Josiah," Chris says, and JD finds himself cringing under the piercing weight of Chris's gaze, "you reckon this girl of yours is alive?"
"Of course," Josiah says, without even a moment of hesitation. "But why're you askin' me?"
"Who else we supposed to ask?" Chris says.
"Why not ask her?" Josiah says, pushing the typing machine toward Chris.
"Hmm," Chris says, and JD can see him mentally gird his loins before he reaches out to touch the type keys. Chris types slowly, carefully, with intense concentration and a bit of swearing, and as frustrated as JD is by the slowness of the process, there's a part of him that doesn't want to know what Galatea thinks. For the most part, he reckons Galatea ain't gonna say anythin' - he designed her brain, after all, and he knows that there ain't nothin' in there sophisticated enough to respond to a question as complex as this, to a question that has stumped and frustrated the greatest philosophical minds for centuries - but there's that part of him (the part that thinks, sometimes, that what Josiah builds more often than not skirts over the line between the possible and impossible, between that which is real and that which is the stuff of dreams) that's holding his breath because it knows Galatea will be able to respond and answer that ineffable question.
For a long moment after Chris finishes his painful typing, the church is silent. And then Galatea starts whirring, the fine brass cogs in her brain going faster and faster until all that's left is a high pitched whine that sets JD's teeth on edge. Her body begins to shake and tremble and JD is torn between wanting to rush forward and hold her down, hold her steady, and run far away because he knows that the shaking is often a precursor to the exploding.
"Josiah-" JD says just as the smoke starts to rise from Galatea's body, thin and acrid; JD knows it's metal and leather burning somewhere inside her, and as horrified as he is by what's happening there's a shameful part of him that wishes Galatea's head was open so he can see just what in the world could be making her melt her gears.
"Galatea?" Josiah says, his big voice turned small and lost at the sight of his creation dying in front of him.
"Josiah," Nathan says in a gentling tone. "Josiah, I reckon you might need to-"
But before Nathan can finish, the whining stops and all that's left a smoking husk and strip of paper that's singed and browned around the edges.
"Whoo-ee," Buck says, softly. He steps forward and plucks the bit of paper out of what's left of Galatea's mouth. He peers at it, turns it this way and that, then hands it to Josiah. "What's it say?"
"Um…'Bad kernel, does not compute. Abort, retry, fail?'" Josiah says after a moment. He looks down at Galatea and sighs. "What does that even mean?"
"I reckon it means it's all for the best," Nathan says. "There are some things man shouldn't be messin' with and building yourself a woman's one of 'em." He pats Josiah on the arm and says, "I gotta say that I'm right glad you ain't gonna be showin' her off. Means I've got some time to restock on my bandages and restock my shelves."
"Well," Chris says. "Guess someone ought t' tell Mary so she can start spreading the news and call off that angry mob 'fore they start congregating."
"Hell, I think we oughta let Conklin have his fun. It'll be a hoot and a half."
"Yeah, up 'til they burn the whole town down," Chris says as he and Buck saunter out of the church behind Nathan. JD watches them go, then steps forward to the altar and it's sad display.
"Josiah?" he says, hesitant, unsure if he should intrude on this moment.
"What does it mean, JD," Josiah says, his gaze still fixed on Galatea's last words. "It's not something I taught her."
"I don't know," JD says. He glances down at Galatea, at the cracked and blackened paint on her face, and clears his throat. "Josiah, what're you gonna do now?"
"Oh I don't know," Josiah says. He sighs and reaches for his toolbox. "I suppose it's for the best. I reckon the world weren't ready for something like her."
"You gonna rebuild her?"
"No," Josiah says at last. "No, I reckon Nathan may be right. I suppose there are some things man shouldn't meddle with. Still," he adds as he opens Galatea's head and exposes the mess of melted gears and wires, "this has been a most fruitful experience. I reckon some of what we've done here can be used for the Iron Horse."
"Josiah," JD says, relief warring with exasperation, "Walter Conklin damn near ran you out on a rail today 'cause you built Galatea, and she wasn't exactly what you'd call functioning. The Iron Horse is almost ready to be ridden. What d'you think they're gonna do to you when you start showin' off mechanical life that actually works?"
"Well, JD," Josiah says, "I reckon they'll just be glad I ain't buildin' me another woman."
This entry was originally posted at Dreamwidth where there are
comments