Author's Notes: There are some things you should know before you read this. 1) It was written & originally posted way back in early March 2005, in between the first broadcasts of episodes #3 and 5. Therefore, there are bound to be things in this story that were subsequently proven inaccurate. I expected that when I wrote it. You must therefore consider this story AU. 2) I was both in a hurry (since I was trying to finish 'The Switch' at the time) and feeling like being very goofy when I wrote it. So, some of the humor is of the tacky/crude/groaner sort. In the vein of being silly and dumb, I also loaded it with anachronisms on purpose including how the characters talk and the 'Clark Kent joke' late in the story. If you don't like tackiness, groaner humor, or anachronisms, you aren't going to fare well with this story. I'll skip over comments that complain it's tacky/crude/anachronistic because I've already owned up to that fact. Fair enough? 3) I like to exaggerate the quirks of particularly fun characters, so Siroc is a bit more eccentric in this story than he is on the show. 4) I know nothing about history. I do my best, but errors will be creep in. So, some anachronisms aren't on purpose. Still, it's only fan fiction and meant to be read for fun. ;-) Please forgive my complete ignorance of all things scientific, medical, historical or French. Blame the Internet's translator's sites if my French is wrong.
Rating: For ages teen and up for some action-type violence, character owies, some angst, mild language, and extremely dumb humor. Largely Siroc-centered, but everyone has at least one big scene. Nothing in here should be interpreted as 'shipiness (gen or slash). Original characters are not meant to be Mary Sues, are not my alter-egos and are not based on anyone I know. Opinions expressed are strictly the characters' g . And speaking of Jeanette, as a member of the double-X chromosome gender, I hated writing a woman like her, but I needed a ditzy-doodle for plot purposes. I apologize upfront. Cities in France, except Paris, are fictional.
Disclaimer: The characters aren't mine, they're Dan Angel's, Billy Brown's, and PAX TV's, except for Monsieur Vieaux, Cecily, Bastelier, the doctor, Jeanette, Francois, Madame Vieaux, and my throwaway villains. I'm not profiting from this except in words from people who like my writing (thanks and hugs to those kind people). All inventions mentioned herein are real or based on real ones (which is obvious in cases like the vacuum), you can look them up if you want. I was going to give proper credit, but I couldn't track down names to save my life. If you know who invented what, go ahead and say so in the reviews.
Young Blades
"Red-Handed"
by llnbooks (a.k.a. llnbooks)
Teaser
She hadn't bothered to completely change out of her uniform. Changing out of the elaborate wrappings and bulky garments that masked her obvious feminine attributes and transformed her every morning from 'Jacqueline' to 'Jacque' was a lengthy, cumbersome process. She had thrown on the bulkiest shirt she could find, which would pass for a nightshirt if anyone saw it, but she would leave on her trousers and she put off undoing the wrappings around her torso and letting down her hair for the night until she was sure that she would be allowed to sleep. Instead, she lay on her bunk and waited for the inevitable.
Jacqueline didn't have to wait long. She'd barely been stretched out on her bed a half-hour before it happened. Some nights, it was a mysterious odor---often quite noxious, some night it was an odd colored fog-like smoke drifting through the gap under her bedroom door, some nights it was a loud thump or crash, and some nights it was the sound of a small explosion like a shot from a pistol. Her first night in the Musketeers' barracks, it had been a horrendous thump that woke her, and she had rushed from her quarters---almost breaking her neck in her attempt to dress to cover her curves and draw her sword in one motion---in her grogginess believing that the barracks were under attack. This evening, it was a combination of the sound of a muffled crack and then, before she even climbed off the bunk and opened her bedroom door, a faint odor that would have made kitchen trash smell like a meadow by comparison drifted down the hallway. The explosion and the odor had unmistakably come from the room at the end of the hallway.
Seconds after she stepped into the corridor, her comrades appeared, first Ramon and a few moments later D'Artagnan. Both looked to still be half-asleep and were in varying degrees of half-dressed, a fact she couldn't help but notice but pointedly ignored. She may have been posing as a man among the Musketeers ranks, but she was neither dead nor oblivious to the hazards of her disguise---namely that, since all except D'Artagnan believed her to be one of them, the men had no compunctions at all about wandering around the barracks in half-dressed states. In fact, as the only one privy to her secret, she was sure that D'Artagnan was going out of his way to do so just to irritate her.
D'Artagnan and Ramon nodded in acknowledgement to her, but no one said a word or even asked what had happened. There were a few complaints and idle threats shouted from elsewhere in the barracks, where others were trying to sleep, but no one, save for the three of them, bothered investigating the disturbance. Everyone knew what it was.
Wiping sleep from his eyes, Ramon led the way to the door at the end of the hallway. He never bothered with the courtesy of knocking (no one did, which was why Jacqueline had to keep her door locked at all times), but opened the door and walked right into the room. As soon as the door opened, purple foam ebbed from the room and into the corridor like a foul-smelling tide.
"This is new," was all Ramon said.
The three of them covered their noses and mouths with their handkerchiefs or pinching their noses closed and braved entering the room. They did their best to step around the goo. Ramon tried fanning away the smell with his hand and squinted, eyes watering, through the fog rising from the substance. It took a minute to spot the familiar figure that was running around the laboratory with bucket of rags, attempting to mop up the runaway wave of foam.
"Siroc?" Ramon tried shouting, but with the smoke stinging his throat, it came out as a squawk.
The inventor paused in his task only long enough to turn and look in their direction.
"Are you all right?" Ramon asked.
Apparently unfazed by the mess or the smell, Siroc resumed his clean up efforts. "I'm fine..just mixed a sulfur base by accident. I must have mislabeled the jar…although I'm not sure how that's possible…" His brow furrowed in concentration as he mentally recreated the experiment that had spawned the offensive tide.
Ramon still eyed the mess warily. "Are we in any danger?" He had to repeat the question a couple of times to break the inventor's concentration. When Siroc finally raised an eyebrow at his friend's question, the Spaniard gestured to the foam.
"No, no…I don't think so…" He snatched up another rag and dashed to intercept a curl of foam that was heading beneath his door into the adjacent stables. Jacqueline was long-since certain that these—creative accidents---were the reason Captain Duvall had stuck the scientist and his laboratory in the quarters closest to the stables…and the street…and farthest from the rest of the barracks, where an accident would do the least damage to the rest of their headquarters.
Ramon nodded, taking his friend at his word. "Goodnight, Siroc."
Siroc, in pursuit of the escaping foam, waved over his shoulder in reply. They left him to his work, closing the door behind them as they left the room. Siroc would likely be spending the next few hours before dawn cleaning up, Jacqueline knew, but he probably wouldn't be conducting any more of his experiments that evening. She could finally change into her bedclothes and go to sleep.
D'Artagnan trudged off in the direction of his own room, shaking his head. "Every night…"
1
On the Boulevard Trudeau
"Someone was in my lab."
Jacqueline had been trying to decide which was less tolerable---being paired for the long hours of patrol with D'Artagnan and his constant innuendo or with the rather taciturn inventor, who this particular day, still smelled faintly of the horrid foam from the previous night. She'd been riding as far upwind of Siroc as she could without being rude to escape some of the stench. The entire barracks still reeked of the stuff so that her appetite for breakfast had been wrecked entirely. The men had no such problem---she supposed they'd grown accustomed to dining despite the occasional strange odors from Siroc's experiments by now…or else they'd lost their sense of smell altogether.
Siroc had been preoccupied with his own thoughts for most of the morning that he and Jacqueline had been riding patrol. Probably planning whatever experiment or contraption was going to awaken everyone that evening, she mused with a pang of dread. It was hard to tell what was going on in his mind, actually; she had only been with the Musketeers a couple of weeks and had barely worked with the inventor at all during that time. She didn't know much about him beyond the fact that one needed a team of horses to drag him out of his lab when he wasn't on duty and that he was the last one to go to sleep at night and the first one awake in the morning (being in the room nearest Siroc's, she could hear the noises and thumps whenever he was at work in the lab). It would seem there just weren't enough hours in the day for every project Siroc wanted to complete. She almost envied his having found the one thing in the world that he loved to do more than anything. Since her father had been murdered and she'd been forced to go on the run, she had felt adrift; her only purpose and pursuit in life was revenge on the man responsible for his death---Cardinal Mazarin. She didn't have time to think about where she belonged or what she would do with her life if she were allowed to choose.
Still, just a bit of conversation for the sake of warding off boredom during patrol would have been nice.
Jacqueline had resigned herself to a rather quiet patrol when the inventor had startled her with the remark. She reined her horse a bit to fall back within a conversational distance of him. "How can you possibly tell?" she asked. The laboratory---with its books, crates, jars, bottles, tools, drawers, cabinets, and dozens of half-completed projects---looked like nothing but one large pile of clutter to her.
"I've kept every book, jar, bottle, stick, and measuring spoon in exactly the same place in every laboratory since I was eight years old. I can tell," Siroc insisted.
"You were arranging books and jars when you were eight? Didn't you ever hear of playtime?" Jacqueline glanced at him and smiled just to let him know she was teasing. From the look in his eyes, he wasn't joking at all.
Siroc had noticed the signs of something amiss after cleaning up the foamy mess the previous night. It was the fact that he'd mixed sulfur into his base during his experiment that had started him wondering. It wasn't like him to make such a mistake. In trying to figure it out, he had checked to be sure all his bottles were correctly labeled and in their proper place on the shelf. That was when he had noticed that some of the bottles had been turned so their labels did not face forward, the way Siroc always kept them so that they were easily readable. He supposed he could have put them back on the shelf that way…he had to frequently stop whatever project he was working on, put his materials away, and run out of the lab when called to duty.
Next, he noticed the books---he kept them in a very precise order, and they were quite clearly out of order. That unsettled him. His friends and comrades were welcome in the lab anytime they wished, of course, but the thought that someone had been in his private laboratory without his permission, riffling through his belongings and haphazardly shoving them back on the shelves wherever they felt like felt like a gross invasion of his privacy.
Then he'd seen the red smudge, and moral outrage had given way to cold fear. The streak of red marred the corner of a drawer that Siroc kept locked at all times under direct orders of Captain Duvall. The red dust was an 'alarm', of sorts, that Siroc had designed to alert him if anyone besides him had opened that drawer.
Siroc had Jacqueline's full attention now. She reined her horse to a stop. "What was in that drawer?"
Paris; Boulevard Trudeau; Five Years Earlier…
The chase began at the royal palace, a considerable distance from the alley that fronted Siroc's small room beneath the theater belonging to Monsieur Bastelier. The young inventor was, for the moment, ignorant of the fact that two figures in black were winding their way through the streets of Paris, approaching Boulevard Trudeau at breakneck speed, ignoring the shouts of "Stop!" from the two men in the gray coats of Musketeers who gave chase. At that moment, Siroc's entire being was focused on the tiny model he was constructing on his improvised worktable.
He didn't mind the cramped quarters. The only initial inconvenience was that there simply wasn't space for both a bed and a worktable, and Siroc had solved that problem within an hour of moving in: He'd shoved his small bunk into the corner farthest from the alley so as not to be disturbed by the drunks as they stumbled out the rear exit of Bastelier's theater and stumbled past Siroc's window. Then, Siroc had sawed the legs off his worktable and instead suspended the table from the wall using chains. While he was working, the tabletop hung directly above his empty bunk. When he wanted to sleep, he needed only to unhook the tabletop and stowed it beneath the bed. He didn't sleep more than four hours each night anyway. The few shelves he could fit in the room were filled to capacity with his bottles and jars and tools. His books were stacked, in their proper order, in another corner of the room. Another corner held a stand with a pitcher and basin.
A larger space for his laboratory would have been nice, of course, but this room was all he could afford since he'd moved to Paris, so it would have to do. Siroc had his privacy---he even had his own entrance, a door that opened into the alley, so that he didn't need to go through the theater and cross Bastelier's path if he'd rather not. Since maintaining employment—and keeping up with the rent---had been something of a problem, Siroc frequently wanted to avoid his landlord's path.
That night, unaware of the chase winding its way to his doorstep, Siroc had occupied his few free hours with his latest project. It had come to him in a moment of inspiration while working at the blacksmith's barn that morning: The horseless carriage. He'd thrown together a model in record time, and then began puzzling over a system of bands that would turn the wheels. With the right source of propulsion, those bands would be able to turn all four wheels simultaneously. What would the carriage use for propulsion, though? Pedals perhaps…
Unfortunately, he'd wound the bands too tightly. When he let go of the model just for a moment, the contraption had rolled across his worktable, taken flight across the tiny room, and collided with the bottles on Siroc's shelves. The bottles, in turn, had fallen from the shelf into the empty porcelain chamber pot, of all infernal places, shattered, and their contents mixed together into a pool that promptly began smoldering.
An angry voice from upstairs responded to the crashing noises immediately: "Siroc! What was that noise!"
"Nothing, Monsieur Bastelier!" he shouted back. Siroc looked around the room, frantically trying to figure out what to do with the smoking mixture. He couldn't allow the smoke to be seen, or its horrid odor to drift up the stairs, or Bastelier would throw him out on the street.
"If you've broken something, boy…" Bastelier threatened.
"No, no…just…chasing off a rat. No need to concern yourself…" Siroc mentally added, Don't come down here… He had to do something quickly---the fumes were so vile that the odor was actually making him see spots. Opening the window wasn't going to alleviate the problem quickly enough.
There was really only one thing to do.
Siroc picked up the basin and ran up the three steps that lead to his door, holding the smoldering pot as far from his face as he could and holding his breath. He kicked open the door and ran into the alley calling, "Gardez l'eau!" not because it was (entirely) accurate but because it was the only thing that sprang to mind in his hurried state. The warning…and the fact that the warning had come from someone carrying a chamber pot spewing blue smoke… penetrated even the rum-soaked minds of the vagrants in the alley and they ran away as fast as their unsteady legs allowed…
Present day
Jacqueline doubled over in her saddle with the force of her laughter, belatedly realizing her chuckles were decidedly unmasculine.
"It wasn't that funny," Siroc said.
She wiped tears from her eyes. "I'm almost afraid to ask what this has to do with the thieves at the palace?"
Boulevard Trudeau, Five Years Earlier
Siroc left the smoldering mess in the alley. His head was spinning badly from the fumes. When he ducked back into his room, he found a handkerchief and used it to cover his nose and mouth. The room still stank of the mixture…
Predictably, Bastelier's angry boom came from upstairs once more: "What's that stench!"
"Umm…" Siroc picked up a large book and attempted to fan the vapors out of the room through the open door. More vapors were coming into the room from the basin than were being fanned away, so he finally gave up. "…cheese?"
Bastelier harumphed. "Doesn't smell like it." Siroc heard the man's heavy footsteps coming down the stairs towards his room and calculated that he was about five minutes from being homeless.
First came the thump---two of them actually, only seconds apart---from the alley. Siroc knew that sound: It was the sound of bodies falling on pavement.
Then he heard the clink. The soft noise had come from the direction of the staircase, and Siroc turned just in time to see something bounce down his steps. The tiny object skittered across his floor and vanished under his bed. He was momentarily torn between investigating the strange object and seeking the source of the thumps, but chose the latter. Still covering his face with the cloth, he ran back up the stairs and into the alley, where he was greeted with the sight of two men in black garments sprawled face down on the pavement, surrounded by the cloud of vapors emanating from the basin.
Oh no, I killed them…
Siroc dove to the men, checking for signs of breath and heartbeats. It was with no small relief that he realized they were merely unconscious, not dead. He fetched a towel from his room and used it to cover the basin, hoping to cut the fumes, before returning to the duo. He tried shaking them by the shoulder. "Monsieur? Are you all right? I'm terribly sorry about this…" He wondered how angry they would be when they did finally wake…
"Madre de Dios…"
Siroc jumped a bit, thinking for a second that the oath had come from one of the men in black. He hadn't heard the sound of approaching footsteps, he only turned at the sound of the oath to discover two more men—these two wearing the gray coats of Musketeers---standing behind him. The Musketeers recoiled immediately from the stink, hesitating to approach. Distantly, Siroc noted that one was a dark-haired Frenchman and the other (if the accent hadn't made it apparent) a Spaniard. Siroc's main worry was that he'd just traded homelessness for residence in the king's dungeon. Surely rendering innocent men unconscious, however unintentionally, had to be some sort of crime.
Covering his face with a handkerchief, the Frenchman approached first. He stared at the unconscious men. "Are they---?"
Siroc answered quickly, "No, no…they're fine."
The Spaniard frowned, looking from the men to Siroc. "What did you do to them?"
"Nothing…I didn't…I wouldn't…not intentionally…" Siroc had no idea how to explain what had happened, so he pointed to the half-covered chamber pot. "…the vapors got to them."
Both Musketeers glanced at the chamber pot, then at Siroc, eyebrows arched in question.
"Not like that! It was the horseless carriage and….and the bottles fell in…and then the smoke…" Siroc felt his ears going red under their quizzical stares. Not only will I be homeless, not only will I be in the dungeon, but there'll be some dreadful nickname for me involving chamber pots while I'm imprisoned…
"What did you do, boy!"
The inventor and the Musketeers both whirled. Bastelier's large form was framed in Siroc's doorway. The landlord took in the sight of the unconscious men, the Musketeers, and the inventor…then saw the smoke. "Not again! I've had quite enough of you, boy…every night…" He pointed a fat finger at Siroc. "You pack your things and get out now!"
Siroc checked his pocketwatch. Five minutes on the button.
To Siroc's surprise, the Spaniard intervened: "This man had just helped us apprehend thieves who robbed the Prince himself…" The Musketeer fished through the thieves' pockets until he produced a small gold statue and a fistful of gems. "…and without the use of force. We're quite in his debt, as the Prince will be. Surely, you don't wish us to tell His Majesty that you rewarded this man's heroism by putting him on the street?"
Bastelier glowered at the Spaniard, but relented, not wanting to risk the Prince's wrath. He nodded his agreement to the Musketeer. To Siroc, he said only, "Clean up this mess, boy." Then he skulked back into the theater.
The Spaniard whistled. "I've met men trampled by horses who were in better humor than that man." He quirked an eyebrow at Siroc. "No relation of yours I hope?"
"Bastelier? Definitely not."
"Well, that's a consolation, at least." The Spaniard extended his hand to Siroc. "Ramon Montalvo Francisco de la Cruz. And my friend is D'Artagnan."
Siroc returned the handshake, feeling the first faint hope that he wasn't going to spend the night in the dungeons or sleeping on the street. "Siroc."
The fact that most people tended to react to the name 'D'Artagnan' either with awe or by challenging the Frenchman to a swordfight told Ramon that this kid wasn't from anywhere around Paris...or that he didn't get out of the house much. "Siroc. Pleasure to meet you. Tell me, are we in any danger here?"
Siroc had no idea what he meant. He followed Ramon's gaze to the basin. The cloth covering the chamber pot had begun to dissolve and the liquid inside was smoldering anew. The sides of the basin began to bubble. Siroc dove for the pot, snatching it up. He had to get rid of it before it did more harm, but where….
Finally, he had an idea. "River?" he asked the Musketeers. Two weeks in Paris, most of that spent running between his cramped home and wherever he was employed on a given day hadn't left Siroc much time for learning his way around the city.
D'Artagnan and Ramon pointed to the west. "That way," D'Artagnan answered.
"Merci." Siroc took off running, lugging the smoking basin with him.
As he left the duo, he heard the Spaniard say, "Pleasant fellow. Not a talker, but still, not boring. And what are we going to say if people ask why the river is smoking?"
D'Artagnan answered, "We won't say anything----we were never here."
"Fair enough."
Present day
"Did the river smoke?" The mental image of blue smoke rising from the Seine and the population of Paris, er, remarking on the phenomenon almost elicited another fit of laughter from Jacqueline. She contained herself only because the inventor was looking a little put out by her mirth.
"The theory was that the water would neutr----" Siroc noticed the grin tugging at the corners of her mouth and finally laughed a bit himself. "Only for a minute or two."
Boulevard Trudeau, Five Years Earlier
There was nothing left of the pot except scorched and oddly twisted porcelain that might have made a nice museum piece. Mercifully, it was very late in the evening (or very early in the morning), and the streets had been nearly deserted, so few people had witnessed either his dash—trailing blue smoke---to the Seine River or his walk back home, lugging the remains of the basin. By the time Siroc found his way through the unfamiliar streets back to the Boulevard Trudeau, the first streaks of gray dawn were lighting the sky, Bastelier's theater was darkened and empty, and the Musketeers and their quarry were long gone. His landlord would be asleep somewhere upstairs by now, and Siroc took great care not to make even the softest noise that might awaken him when he entered his own room and closed the door.
Siroc would have to leave soon for his job at the blacksmith's, so there was little point in trying to sleep now. He would have time only to change clothes and have breakfast before…
Then he remembered the small object that had fallen down his staircase when the thieves in black had collapsed on his doorstep. Forgetting melted basins and the upcoming day of horseshoes and hammers, Siroc moved to search beneath his bed until, by feeling around blindly, he grasped an object---round and heavy and the size of a melon. Pulling it from beneath the bunk, he found what seemed to be nothing more than a large chunk of volcanic pumice. The thieves took this? They'd hardly fetch a good price for it…
It was very heavy for simple pumice, Siroc automatically began scrutinizing the rock. Very heavy….and there was something wrong about the texture. He gave a gentle squeeze just to check, half-expecting his thumb to go right through the stone…
…and the stone split neatly into two halves.
Interesting.
There could be no doubt that the 'pumice' was nothing more than a fake shell, but Siroc barely had time to wonder what it was made of, because the contents of the shell drew his eye at once. Nestled within the 'pumice' were two objects that on first glance looked like diamond or crystal. The first object was the smaller and tubular in shape; the second, larger object was a pyramid etched with what might have been hieroglyphics (if they were, they were of a sort Siroc hadn't studied…and he'd studied quite a lot). The tubular crystal was unmistakably meant to be inserted into the pyramid, for the bottom of the pyramid had a circular opening of the exact same dimension of the cylindrical piece.
One thing about being an inventor was that, in a mental debate between scientific curiosity and prudent caution in determining a course of action, curiosity almost always won. At least, it did in Siroc's case. So, the temptation to see what would happen when the two crystalline pieces were merged quickly overrode his apprehension.
He didn't have time to regret the decision.
Immediately, the pyramid glowed with brilliance purple light. The beams moved almost like living tendrils, radiating in all directions as if seeking something. They fell onto the metal objects piled on shelves and scattered across the worktable. They found the handles on the drawers and, in turn, the drawers opened of their own volition and, as Siroc watched, the utensils and gadgets within the drawers and on the shelves began to shudder and buck, and finally became airborne. In the space of five seconds, every metal object in the room---many of them pointed and rather sharp---was on a collision course with the pyramid grasped in Siroc's hand.
Survival instinct saved him. He dropped the pyramid at once and dove for the only available refuge in the room---the tiny space between his bed and the workbench—while around him the inanimate objects in his quarters were drawn to the crystal pyramid. When the small utensils had piled themselves atop the object, the drawers pulled themselves free of their tracks and landed with noisy thuds atop the utensil pile. The lantern (thankfully, Siroc hadn't the money to buy oil to keep it lit) mounted to the wall pulled itself free and crashed into the drawers. Then, as the purple rays tugged at their metal pieces, the doors began opened with a bang and began to pull themselves free of their mountings…
Siroc dove for the rubble pile. With extreme difficulty, he fought to against the pyramid's magnetic grip to sort through the debris until he found the crystal. The cylindrical piece resisted his efforts to separate it from its cradle. Finally, Siroc had tried smashing the pyramid against the floor, hoping to dislodge the tube or shatter the pyramid…
The solution would have been more obvious if he hadn't been distracted by the chaos: It was only a matter of pressing one finger against the tube to pop it free of the pyramid and the glow---with its accompanying magnetic force---ceased at once. Every possession he had was lying in a heap around him, but quiet and order were restored.
Almost. From upstairs, Bastelier's voice thundered: "Siroc!"
Present Day
Jacqueline frowned, questions filling her mind rapidly. "That's what was in the drawer? What was it? Why didn't you return it to the Prince? Does the Captain know?"
Siroc held up one hand. "One que---"
Motion, barely glimpsed from the corner of his eye, drew his gaze to the forest ahead of them. Something had moved in the undergrowth. As Siroc watched, what could only be the muzzle of a pistol poked from the brush and trained itself in the direction of the two Musketeers.
"Jacque, watch out!"
She hadn't seen the weapon, but at his shout, she reacted without question. Siroc had leaned forward so that he was almost lying flat across his horse's neck, so Jacqueline did the same. The shot rang out only a moment later, and she almost felt the ball as it sailed over their heads.
A masked rider emerged from the overgrowth. He was clad in a black uniform that they both recognized---they'd seen men in such uniforms when they'd rescued the captain's nephew from his abductors only a couple of weeks ago. The rider stared at the Musketeers for a moment---impossible to tell what he was thinking when the mask covered his face---then he turned and urged his horse to a gallop. He disappeared into the forest.
Jacque and Siroc pursued him. This far from the city, there was no way to know if any of the other Musketeers were close enough to have heard the shot and investigate, and they couldn't let their attacker slip away.
However, the farther into the woods they went, the more apprehensive both of them became. It was Jacqueline who slowed her pace first, proceeding with more caution. Siroc followed suit.
"He's trying to lead us deeper into the forest," she observed. She'd do what she had to in order to bring the man to justice, but she wasn't willing to be baited into a trap.
Siroc nodded. He'd just been thinking the same thing. They'd been sitting ducks on their horses. Why had the rider waited until he'd been spotted to fire? And why had his shot gone so wide of both of them?
A second shot rang out, and Siroc felt something like a giant fist slam into his shoulder. The impact knocked the breath right out of him, dislodged him from his mouth, and he hit the ground hard. The shot and the fall momentarily stunned him. From very far away, he heard Jacque shout his name. Then the pain came, white hot, radiating from his shoulder through his entire being.
Jacqueline heard the shot, heard a grunt from Siroc, and turned in time to see him fall from his mount and hit the ground with a jarring crash. He didn't move. For a terrible moment, she felt a déjà vu and the image of her father falling to the ground dead, mortally wounded by a bullet from the gun of Cardinal's guard, replayed in her mind.
"Siroc!" She was torn between the desire to go to her friend and the certainty that they were under attack.
The choice was made for her when four riders in black appeared, bearing down on the Musketeers. She drew her sword and put herself between the riders and her comrade. One moved directly for the unmoving Siroc. The other three answered Jacqueline's challenge by raising their own blades. They drove her back, away from Siroc, surrounding her until she had escape from the onslaught except by diving from her own horse. She rolled away and then quickly climbed to her feet, backing away to keep her foes in front of her as the trio tried once more to surround her.
The fourth rider dismounted, stalking over to Siroc's inert form. With the toe of his boot, he rolled the young man onto his back, presuming the Musketeer to be dead. The last thing the rider in black saw was the telltale glint of steel---Siroc's eyes snapped open and, before the attacker could react, he drove his blade hilt-deep through the man's sternum. The man in black was dead before his body hit the ground.
The battle raging between Jacqueline and her opponents paused for a millisecond at the noise of the man's death rattle. Jacqueline breathed a prayer of thanks before renewing her fight against the black-uniformed men. Another rider in black, realizing the blonde Musketeer was not as dead as they'd first presumed, abandoned the scuffle with Jacqueline and strode towards Siroc.
Siroc managed only to push himself up into a sitting position, but still raised his sword with his good arm, intent on delaying her death and his own for as long as possible.
The rider paused mid-stride, staying out of the wounded man's reach, abruptly changing his tactics. He sheathed his sword and pulled his pistol from his belt. He trained the weapon at Siroc. "The Stone of Vesuvio. Where is it?"
Insanely, sitting there with crippling pain in his shoulder, waiting to die, it was the man's hands that had Siroc's attention. The riders were all wearing gloves, but the Musketeer would have wagered that, beneath those gloves, at least one of the men now had bright red hands. He wondered which one it was, if the man pointing the weapon at him now was the one who'd had the temerity to intrude into Siroc's laboratory. He glared at the rider, "Were you the one who disorganized my books?"
The man drew back the hammer of the pistol. "The stone."
"I really have no idea what you're talking about," Siroc tried.
The man fired. Siroc squeezed his eyes shut and willed himself not to flinch. As he expected, the shot missed his head by the slightest of margins and slammed into the dirt behind him. The scuffle between Jacqueline and the remaining riders ceased at once and all three watched the standoff. The two riders kept their swords pointed towards Jacqueline, lest she interfere.
"The stone."
Siroc would have shaken his head at the man's stubbornness, except that, half-dizzy as he already was, he was afraid the motion would cause him to blackout. "Am I supposed to be gallivanting around the forests with an artifact like that in my pocket? That would be irresponsible of me..."
The eyes, visible through the rider's mask, blazed in fury now. In one smooth movement, he turned the pistol away from Siroc and aimed it squarely at Jacqueline. Siroc did not look at his comrade, knowing if he did, his friend would be shaking her head, 'Don't tell them.'
"Ah, I see my reputation for brashness precedes me." Carefully, Siroc unfastened his gray coat. There was a false lining sewed inside. When he tore it open, a small cloth bag tumbled out. Siroc passed it along to the rider.
The rider inspected the contents of the bag. Satisfied, he tucked the bag into his own pocket, but did not lower his weapon until his fellow riders had confiscated the Musketeers' blades. When they did, the two raised their own pistols towards Siroc and Jacqueline and cocked the weapons…
The third rider snapped, "Leave them! We have what we came for."
One man in black protested, "But we were told----"
"I don't give a damn. One dead Musketeer brings the wrath of the whole of the Musketeers down on you, but two dead Musketeers?" The rider shook his head. "Take their horses. By the time they reach Paris----" He eyed Siroc's wounded shoulder. "If they reach Paris, we'll be long gone. Move out!"
Grudgingly, the other men did as were told. Forgetting the Musketeers, they gathered the reins of Jacqueline and Siroc's horses, mounted their own rides, and galloped deeper into the forest. The thunder of hoof beats faded rapidly, leaving Jacqueline and Siroc stranded.
2
Monsieur Vieaux's Apprentice
"You should go after them. You can follow their tracks."
"Yes, probably," Jacqueline said in answer to both of Siroc's statements, but she made no move to do either. She moved instead to help him. He was managing to sit upright by leaning his back against a tree, but the effort it was costing him was betrayed by his pallor and the clench of his jaw as he gritted his teeth against the pain. Blood soaked his shoulder. He had his good hand pressed against the wound, but Jacqueline would need to examine the injury and bandage it as best she could. She balked, not from the injury or the crimson stains, but because the image of her father and a similar wound would not let her be. Stalling, she asked, "How bad is it?"
He made a face as though that were a ridiculous question. "Well, it's a metal ball lodged in my shoulder, it hurts like the devil, and this coat's completely ruined, so it's not great…I mean, there's clearly nothing to be said for getting shot."
"Clearly. I owe you one for saving my life."
"Just one? I counted at least twice I saved you..."
He was teasing her now. She must be doing worse than she thought at hiding her discomfort if he was trying to put her at ease. She forced a smile. "You sound like D'Artagnan."
Siroc considered that. "Do I? Must be the loss of blood…"
Jacqueline had to bite her lip at that one. He'd never know how accurate that remark had been…
She could put it off no longer. She composed herself, forcing her father's memory from her mind. As gently as she could, Jacqueline helped him out of his bulky coat, then carefully pulled his shirt back to get a look and the wound. She kept up the dialogue as she worked, to distract him from the pain she was no doubt causing with her ministrations and to keep herself from becoming ill at the sight of the injury. "How far would you say it is back to Paris?"
"On foot? One hour. Three?" He knew that was an optimistic guess, and so did she. They'd have to hope they ran into someone---preferably someone with horses or a cart---along the way, or…well, they would simply have to find someone. Jacqueline would not let herself think about the consequences if they didn't.
"You wouldn't have anything for dressing wounds, would you?" she asked him.
"In my bag…"
She took a glance around, but didn't see a bag.
"…on my horse," he added.
"Of course." Jacqueline cringed at her own word choice. "Now, Ramon's got me spouting rhymes." She leaned back, weighing options. She really had no idea if the wound was serious or not. Siroc might have known, he'd no doubt studied medicine along with the myriad other science texts he'd read, but he was in no condition to be of help. What to do now? The wound needed bandaging, and they had none. She'd have to improvise something, and all they had were the clothes on their backs. Jacqueline for damn sure wasn't stripping off her shirt, not if she could help it---
Her gaze fell on the corpse of their attacker…and on the shirt he wore beneath his black uniform. That will do.
She removed the rider's mask, studying the man's features. She didn't recognize him. Then, she turned the man's head so that Siroc could see his face. "Anyone you know?" she asked.
Siroc shook his head, "No."
Next, Jacqueline rolled the body and methodically stripped off the dead man's shirt and began tearing it into strips. The glint of steel drew her attention to something the other riders had missed: While concerning themselves with taking Jacqueline and Siroc's weapons, they'd completely forgotten the pistol still tucked into their own comrade's uniform. A quick search of the body found three more shots for his pistol. Three shots. She could work with that. He also still had his sword, so she took that as well. Things were looking up.
Next, again as methodically and carefully as possible, she removed what was left of Siroc's ruined shirt and set about bandaging his injury. He watched her struggle to get the bandages to stay in place and began thinking aloud: "…you know, with a bit of epoxy around the edges, a bandage might hold itself in place…"
She had no idea what that meant, but still grinned a bit. Well, that was one way to distract him, so she pressed, "Have you always been an inventor?"
In spite of the situation, he grinned at the question. "You could say that."
Guierre, France…many years earlier…
The consensus about the small village was that there was "something very odd about that child".
In every way, he was unlike his peers…right down to his sleep habits: Four hours of sleep each night, then up and at the world. No amount of threats, pleading, lecturing, or confinement to his bedroom had any effect. He simply didn't require the rest. Growing weary of attempting to change his habits, his parents next tried to occupy his early morning hours with chores to tire him into sleep, to no avail. Resigned, they instructed him to sit quietly with his books until it was a more appropriate hour to be up and about.
The extra time for study served only to feed his innate curiosity, and his natural hyperactivity didn't lend itself to long hours of inactivity. He could barely abide losing precious time to slumber, much less tolerate whiling away the hours sitting around. It was too great an inconvenience when there was much to see and much to study in a very large world.
Very early one morning, while the sky was still black and the stars shone brightly, he crept out of the house to the barn, picked up some of his father's tools, and set about testing an idea he'd had while studying a text on the subtle changes arch of the sun throughout the year. By the time his parents awoke that morning, the roof of their stable had been replaced by a rather bizarre concoction resembling a staircase---painted bright white on the face of the 'steps' and black on the sides. The boy explained that the white was meant to repel heat during the summer, when the sun was directly overhead, and the black was meant to attract the heat during the winter, when the angle of the sun was lower in the sky.
Not as appreciative of the scientific practicality of the atrocious-looking thing, his parents had to pay to have the roof restored to its former run-down glory immediately.
By the time Siroc had turned eight, he had an entire corner of the barn set up with his own set of tools. He spent most of his waking hours there building "toys" (what his father called the odd contraptions his son constructed, since he had no idea really what else to call the things). The set-up came to an abrupt end when one of the boy's creations nearly burned the barn to the ground. This event convinced his harried parents that the boy would be better off at a school where teachers could properly channel his…'creativity'.
The schools' responses to their new student usually arrived very quickly. The letters to Siroc's parents usually opened with "Please come and collect your son immediately…" and invariably concluded with "You will, of course, compensate the school for the necessary repairs".
"He's always had a brilliant mind. Ever since he was a small child," Mother had explained to one particularly agitated headmaster.
Father interjected, "He just wastes time on trivial pursuits. An honest job and some real work would do him good."
Mother frowned at that. "He's only eight."
The Headmaster interrupted, "We appreciate Siroc's…creativity. He's our brightest pupil. It's just that…" The man tried to be delicate. "…we feel he'd do much better with a private tutor. A mentor if you will. With Siroc's intelligence, he simply requires more—attention---than it's possible for our teachers to give. We have the education and safet—er, well-being---of the other students to consider. I have a name to give you…" The headmaster picked up a quill and carefully printed a name and address on a piece of parchment.
A voice from the corner of the room suggested, "If you devised a hollow container with a quill tip at one end---something slender to rest comfortably between the fingers---you could fill it with ink so that the quill would ink itself…"
The headmaster quite distinctly whimpered. "Yes, yes, very good, Siroc, I'll see to that at once. Now, Monsieur, Madame, here's the name of the teacher I had in mind. Monsieur Antoine Vieaux. He was an instructor at our school for many years before he retired. For the right price, I'm sure he'd agree to take on young Siroc as an apprentice."
Father took the parchment. "Merci."
The headmaster added, "There's just one other matter…" He sorted through the papers on his desk and handed one to Siroc's parents. "…you will, of course, compensate our school for the damages?"
All eyes turned to the boy, who'd been sitting in a chair in the corner for the duration of the conference. Despite the fact that his eyebrows had been completely singed away and his hands were now tinted bright red, the boy still managed to affect a look of complete innocence.
Mother sighed, "Oui, Monsieur…"
Present Day
"Right, then," Jacqueline's voice brought Siroc's drifting attention back to the present. She had finished with the bandages as best she could. His shirt was a wreck, but she salvaged enough pieces for strips to immobilize his bad arm. Next, she helped him pull his good arm into the sleeve of his overcoat and fastened it closed as best she could. "We have to get moving."
His eyelids were drooping. Jacqueline raised her voice: "Siroc? Are you ready?"
He opened his eyes at once. "No."
"Good. Let's go." Jacqueline took hold of his good arm and, with some difficulty, pulled him to his feet. Hr grunted at the motion. She caught him around the waist with one arm, letting him lean on her for support. "No time to waste…" When he didn't answer, she shook his good arm. "Siroc? You were telling me about red hands and laboratories? Tell me some more…"
Guierre, France. Many years earlier.
"Siroc! Do hurry up. Monsieur Vieaux's carriage is coming. No time to waste!" Father's called from the other room.
Siroc was doing his best to obey, but he was being slowed both by the task of packing and by the distraction of an itchy collar. His mother had insisted the boy dress in his very best clothing for Monsieur Vieaux's arrival ('best' being the coat and trousers that the child hadn't wrecked with dirt smudges, grass stains, grease and oil from his tools, or managed to burn holes in while working on his projects). She'd starched the collar of his finest shirt into inflexibility, so the material was stiff and scratched at his neck with the slightest turn of his head. There was nothing to be done for the green tint on Siroc's hands. The color vexed his parents despite his promise that it would wear off in a few months. He didn't see why they should be upset---it was his classroom experiment that had been ruined by a too-skittish instructor, after all.
Packing troubled him more than inconsequential details such as clothing. He had one trunk in which to collect everything he was going to need during his time with the Vieauxs. The space was much too limited for all the books, tools, and clothing he wanted to take with him. No matter how Siroc arranged and rearranged the items, the trunk simply wouldn't hold it all. He decided that he would have to take only what was the most important, therefore, some of the clothing would have to be left behind. He needed only a couple changes of clothes---his mother had said he would outgrow most of it within the year anyway. Tools and books, however, would serve him much longer.
"Siroc! Leave the trunk and come here!" Father sounded more impatient now. After removing half of the clothing from the trunk, Siroc managed to close the lid. Satisfied, he hurried to join his parents at the front door.
"This collar itches. Isn't there something that could make the fabric…softer?" Siroc complained.
His mother crinkled her nose. "Why ever would one wear a soft collar? That wouldn't be very fashionable. Here, let me help." She did her best to adjust the collar and then set about finger-combing his hair, which simply refused to lie flat. She'd been weepy and fussed this way for the past week as Siroc's departure loomed closer, but had offered her son constant encouragement. This is an invaluable opportunity, Siroc. When such an opportunity comes to you, you must be brave. She'd said the same thing each time he'd been bundled off to a boarding school in the past year.
Her eyes fell on the singed remnants of his eyebrows and she made a soft noise in her throat. "Those eyebrows…Monsieur Vieaux is a scientist, Siroc. Treat him with all proper respect…"
"Yes, Mother…"
"…dress your very best for your lessons and do precisely as he tells you…"
"Yes, Mother…"
"…You'll be traveling in important circles and meeting the finest people in Guierre, perhaps even the society of Paris, so…"
Father tsked, "Try not to cause any fires or turn their hands red."
"Yes, Father."
"Armand!" Mother shook her head. "Your father is teasing you, Siroc. Now, when Monsieur Vieaux arrives, you'll say---good heavens, when did you last wash behind your ears? You can't have dirty ears to welcome such a refined gentleman as Mons…"
She noticed that she no longer had her son's full attention. Siroc and his father were staring at the carriage that was ever so slowly winding its way up the path to their small farm. "What is that?" Father gaped.
Upon second glance, they could see that it was no 'fine carriage' approaching the house. It was a wagon, and a rickety one at that. The sides were tall, the lumber faded and split with age. Letters, equally faded with age, painted on the side of the cart read: G. Vieaux---A Handy Man For Your Home Or Shop. Repairs, Chimney and Street Sweeping, Stables Cleaned. Negotiable Fees. The smell of dirty straw and dirt poured from the wagon. Assorted tools and brushes were visible through the gaps between the boards. A dapple-gray horse well past its prime tugged the wagon along at a snail's pace. The driver was a gray-haired man in clothing nearly as soiled as the cart. It was impossible to distinguish if his skin were tanned or merely caked in dirt.
"Perhaps you should change your clothes," Father suggested to Siroc.
Seemingly oblivious to the family's stares, the driver greeted them with a cheerful "Bonjour!" and a grin that was brilliant but missing more than a few teeth. "Monsieur, Madame…and you must be Siroc?"
"This has to be a mistake," Mother gasped. This was the venerable Monsieur Vieaux? The man royalty and the wealthiest of the wealthy had once sought to instruct their children?
"Monsieur Vieaux?" Father asked rather nervously.
With some difficulty, the driver climbed down from his perch on the rickety cart. "I'm late, oui. My apologies. I'm afraid Gaston doesn't move as quickly as he used to…but, neither do I, as you can see." Vieaux hobbled a bit as he approached the group, but his smile never dimmed.
Mother was still wide-eyed. "Monsieur Gilbert Vieaux…" The elderly man gave a slight bow in answer and gallantly kissed the back of her hand. "It is our honor to meet you. This is not meant to be disrespectful, but we were told that you are a professor of the sciences---"
"…and you wonder why a man of sciences travels by such humble means, oui?" Vieaux finished for her. "I am indeed a scientist---scientist, inventor, philosopher…skills in limited demand among the common population, I'm afraid. One must pay one's bills however he can manage, but do not worry, Madame, Monsieur, this is only my job during the day." He directed his smile to Siroc. "Perhaps I should say our day job?"
Siroc dove behind his parents.
"The Lord gave us daylight for our physical labor and the evening for intellectual pursuits. This is also why He gave us the lantern. Work first, study afterwards." Reading skepticism on their faces, Vieaux sighed. "I can assure you, I'm well qualified to help young Siroc acquire a proper education in all things scientific. Of course, he will have to pry himself away first…" He nodded to the boy, who was still hiding behind his parents.
Mother reached backwards to pat the boy's shoulder, "Siroc, manners! Say hello to Master Vieaux."
Siroc peeked out from behind her, only enough to glance at the man. The one eye visible to the elderly professor still betrayed wariness. "Hello," the child said.
"You can handle a pitchfork and shovel, yes?" Vieaux asked him.
The boy gulped and disappeared back behind his parents.
"Siroc, go and fetch your trunk," Father ordered. Happy for the chance to get away, Siroc ran for the safety of his bedroom.
Vieaux called after him, "Let me help…"
Father held up a hand, "There's no need, Monsieur."
The older man insisted, "The trunk must be heavy. It's no trouble."
Father finally smiled. "You misunderstand, Monsieur. Siroc has his own way of doing things…" A distinct creaking noise from the direction of the boy's room underscored his father's point. "There, you'll see for yourself in a moment…"
It was Monsieur Vieaux who watched, open-mouthed, when Siroc reappeared. The child was easily managing to lug his large trunk---easily because he had attached wheels to it so that the heavy baggage rolled smoothly across the floorboards. He stopped before the adults, apprehension in his eyes.
"Mon dieu…" Vieaux murmured. "How old are you, boy?"
"I'm nine this month," Siroc answered.
"Nine?" The professor repeated.
Mother misinterpreted the question. "He'll be no trouble, Monsieur, I promise."
"Trouble?" Vieaux shook his head. "On the contrary, Madame, if this is an indication of what the boy is capable of achieving, then I expect he'll be challenging me for the duration of his apprenticeship…and keeping me on my toes." His brilliant grin returned anew. "I'm looking forward to it even more now. Tell me, Siroc, have you any other creations to share?"
The boy brightened, all apprehension vanishing in the face of the older man's interest in his work. No one had asked to see one of his inventions before…unless they wanted to confiscate it. "Oui, Monsieur, in the barn…wait, I have some in here!" Siroc dropped to his knees and unlocked the trunk.
Vieaux kneeled next to him. "What ever happened to your hands?"
"The base was too acidic."
No further explanation was needed for the professor to comprehend. "Ah…that would account for the eyebrows as well. We shall repeat your experiment and ferret out the error in calculations as our first lesson…"
Mother was more worried about what was conspicuously absent from the trunk. "Siroc, where are the rest of your clothes?"
"There wasn't enough room for all of them. I need my books and tools," Siroc answered.
Vieaux laughed and patted him on top of the head in approval. "The boy knows his priorities. We'll get along just fine…"
Present Day
Jacqueline used the first shot when, after walking for what felt like an eternity, they emerged from the forest. She fired into the air, and the crack of the pistol echoed. She knew it had to have been heard for miles, and waited several minutes for someone to investigate the sound. There wasn't a soul to be seen any place and no one appeared in response to the shot. Where the hell is everyone? If D'Artagnan was off pursuing some simpleton of a mademoiselle or Ramon was off on another afternoon of poetry and that infernal 'coffee' drink while she and Siroc were having a crisis, she'd use the pistol to knock both of them in the head…
Siroc had stopped talking. He'd opened his eyes for a moment at the boom of the pistol shot, but only a moment. She knew the effort of walking was wearing him down, and she hated causing further exertion by forcing him to talk, but she knew it was important. Jacqueline shook him again and raised her voice. "Siroc? The Vieauxs? Tell me about them…"
Guierre, France. Many years earlier
The most remarkable thing happened shortly after Siroc's arrival at the home of Monsieur and Madame Vieaux: He overslept.
Vieaux's day, like Siroc's, began before dawn. Siroc's responsibility, as part of his board with the couple, was to report to their small barn to feed the animals, brush Gaston, make sure Vieaux's tools were in good repair and that the cart was clean, and to be ready by sunrise for a day of helping his instructor with odd jobs for the people of Guierre. After a full day trudging around cleaning stables, repairing carriages, and any other tasks they were employed to complete, the two of them returned to the farm. Siroc would go to his room---a cozy room adjacent to the barn---to find clean towels and a tub full of hot water waiting, provided courtesy of Madame Vieaux. She would scrub the dirt out of his work clothes as best she could, and when she felt the fabric was beyond salvaging with soap or the boy had just outgrown the articles, a new set of clothes would appear along with the towels. Siroc knew his parents were not paying the Vieauxs enough money that she should go to such expense as new clothes, but Madame Vieaux wouldn't hear any argument or accept anything beyond gratitude for such gifts. Siroc was expected, after work each day, to bathe, change into the clean clothes, and then report with his books to the main house for evening meal and lessons.
A large room at the rear of the house had been transformed into Vieaux's laboratory. Vieaux's reputation as an instructor turned out to be well deserved, and he had given the boy free rein to use the laboratory any time he wished, so long as his lessons and chores were completed first. Siroc had never had unfettered access to such a laboratory before (in fact, his instructors at every boarding school had been wary of letting him loose in their laboratories even for lessons), and he spent more time there than in his own room. Vieaux forgave the occasional "accident" with good humor.
Unaccustomed to that much physical labor, and losing too much sleep in his enthusiasm to try every experiment that he'd never had the means to attempt before, Siroc had simply worn himself out by the end of his first week at the Vieaux's. On his sixth morning there, Siroc opened his eyes and, to his very great surprise, saw the first pale streaks of dawn through his bedroom window. He had all but jumped out of bed, dressed in a hurry, and ran into the barn to take care of his morning chores. He had slept five hours! How had that happened?
He found Vieaux in the barn, already halfway through Siroc's chores. "If you doused the oil lamp at a reasonable hour, you'd awaken at a reasonable hour, Siroc," Vieaux said in greeting. His tone was one of amusement, not anger. The elderly man had already grown used to being awakened by the late night noises from his laboratory. He would tell Siroc later that having the boy in the house had given him more empathy for what Madame Vieaux had tolerated so many years living with an inventor.
Siroc began to explain, "I was working on---"
Vieaux waved a hand. "Yes, yes, the second rule of innovation is 'when the creative flame is burning, never douse it. It may not re-ignite.'" The older man was rather fond of coining such pearls of wisdom. "However, the first rule is 'never let the mind override the body's better judgment." He turned to wink at the boy. "In other words, sleep when you're tired."
The boy sulked. "What if sleeping douses the 'creative flame'?"
Vieaux grinned. "That's why the Lord gave us quills and parchment---so you can leave yourself a note to remember where you left off." With that, his instructor passed Siroc a bucket of grain for Gaston.
It wasn't long after that Siroc came up with a way to be sure he didn't 'oversleep' no matter how late he stayed in the laboratory. It was a simple matter of using a scale, a bell, a counterweight, and sand from hourglass to devise a 'clock' (of sorts) that would ring the bell to awaken him precisely four hours after Siroc activated it…
Present Day
His legs felt like lead, his shoulder ached, and, even though he was leaning most of his weight on something (he could quite convince his heavy eyelids to open long enough to see what was supporting him), Siroc was actually quite tired at the moment.He had no recollection of why, given those facts, he had decided that a walk through the countryside was a good idea. Maybe Master Vieaux was right about listening to the body's 'better judgment'.
Siroc faltered a step. That was the only warning Jacqueline had before he stumbled and nearly tumbled to the ground. Since she still had his arm wrapped around her shoulders, Jacqueline managed to prevent his fall, nearly loosing her own footing as she did so.
"…rest when you're tired…" he mumbled, not opening his eyes.
"All right." Was that a request or was he starting to babble? Jacqueline didn't know, but she stopped. She would let him rest for a minute, but that was all the time they could spare. Awkwardly, still supporting his weight, she loaded the second shot into the pistol and fired into the air again.
"Hello!" Her shout followed the pistol shot. "Anyone!" Honestly, we should be close enough to the city for someone to hear us…a farmer, a Musketeer, a vagrant for God's sake…
No one answered, and she couldn't wait. She had to get Siroc home.
"Come on, Siroc…we have to keep moving. Let me help." He was getting heavier the longer they walked, leaning more of his weight on her, and Jacqueline almost stumbled herself as they resumed their hike towards the city. "Siroc? Keep talking. When did you leave the Vieauxs?"
Guierre, France. Several years earlier
"…in the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. Amen."
The congregation responded as one: "Amen."
Monsieur and Madame Vieaux insisted that a person needed to attend to the soul with the same fervor with which he cultivated the mind and cared for the body. It was only then, Vieaux said, that a person could be whole. Siroc had thought that, as a guest in their home, perhaps he should at least respectfully sit in the back of the church or at least in the pew behind them, but they wouldn't hear of it. No, from the first week he'd arrived in their home, Siroc was required to sit each Sunday beside Madame Vieaux as part of their family. He had spent every Sunday for the past seven years repaying that privilege by keeping at least one set of pristine clothing to wear to church (although he had improvised soap that left the collar much softer and less scratchy), studying the scriptures with the same attention he gave his science texts, and doing nothing whatsoever that would remotely embarrass the couple.
"This concludes our services for the day. May the Lord bless you all," the priest blessed the congregation.
Usually, once the services were concluded, Siroc went to fetch the cart while the Vieauxs waited in the church. That morning, however, Monsieur Vieaux turned to the teenager before Siroc could stand up and head to the door. "Siroc, I've asked the Rollins' boy to bring our cart around. I wonder, would you escort Madame Vieaux to the cart and see her settled? I'll be along in a moment."
"Yes, sir," Siroc answered automatically. The request puzzled him. As Madame Vieaux took his arm and let him lead the way to the door, Siroc glanced back. Monsieur Vieaux had gone to converse with the priest---and spoke to the priest for quite a long time. Siroc had helped Madame Vieaux aboard the cart and waited a quarter hour with no sign of his mentor emerging from the church.
So, when someone behind him cleared their throat for his attention, Siroc expected it to be Master Vieaux. He turned to find a trio of girls standing there. One of them, blonde and very pretty, had made the noise. She stood a few steps in front of her friends. She blushed a bit, which only made her more attractive. "You're Monsieur and Madame Vieaux's son?" she asked.
"Uh…" He was staring, but he couldn't help it. His mind had abandoned him completely, which made formulating a reply very difficult. "…no, apprentice. I'm Monsieur Vieaux's apprentice."
The girl smiled. "'Monsieur Vieaux's apprentice…" She indicated the lettering on the side of the rickety old cart. "…You can repair a cart, oui?"
Siroc's brain still wouldn't help him, and now his heart was pounding rather loudly in his ears, so he settled for nodding rather dumbly.
"Good." She handed him a small piece of paper. An address and a name—Cecily—had been printed in small, neat letters on the parchment. "At your convenience, Monsieur Vieaux's apprentice." With that, she hurried back to her friends, waved a farewell over her shoulder, and the trio went on their way, exchanging whispers and a couple of backwards glances at him. Siroc could feel his ears go red under their scrutiny.
"The mademoiselle might find it less cumbersome if you offer your name next time."
Siroc hadn't seen Monsieur Vieaux approach, but obviously his mentor had witnessed the exchange. Automatically, Siroc offered him the paper. "It was…she has work for us."
His teacher wouldn't take the paper. "Somehow, my boy, I think if I were the one to answer her call, the lady would be terribly disappointed." Monsieur Vieaux was smirking rather enigmatically, and even Madame Vieaux was smiling. Siroc wondered if it was possible that he could blush hard enough to burst into flames. "Never disappoint a lady, my boy," Vieaux added.
Present Day
"Always good advice," Jacqueline confirmed.
Guierre, France. Several years earlier
Siroc knew it would be impolite to ask his mentor's business with the priest, but he still could not help but wonder about it for the entire drive back to the Vieauxs and the rest of the evening. He had worked side-by-side with his mentor all day every day (except Sundays) studied under Vieaux's tutelage every evening for seven years. The man's energy for work and for intellectual pursuits had always been boundless. Despite the gap in their ages, Siroc was almost always the one trying to keep up with the pace of the older man…until the past few months. There were days, more and more of them each month, when Vieaux had sent Siroc off to handle the day-to-day tasks of his 'handy man' services on his own, saying only "I'm a bit tired today, Siroc. Would you mind seeing to our customers yourself?"
The pattern repeated itself the next morning. Siroc was awake before dawn, as customary, and had finished feeding Gaston and preparing the cart by sunrise without one sign of his mentor. The teenager hadn't wanted to intrude on his mentor's privacy, so he waited until he finally saw lamplight in the kitchen window of the main house—a sign the older man was finally awake and about---before going to see what had delayed Vieaux.
"Monsieur Vieaux?" He knocked quietly, not wanting to disturb Madame Vieaux, who considered dawn 'an ungodly hour to be about any business' and adamantly refused to have anything to do with the early hour.
Vieaux's voice answered the knock at once. "Goodness, my boy, you should know there's no need for you to knock." He shook his head affectionately at the teenager's ingrained politeness. It was a gesture of Siroc's respect for his mentor and for Madame Vieaux, the older man knew. As such, even after all their time together, Vieaux had never rid his apprentice of the need to use such formalities with him and gave up trying. "Come in, come in."
Siroc opened the door and stepped into the small kitchen, still mindful to step lightly and not wake the lady of the house. Vieaux sat at the dining table, a pot of tea and two cups in front of him. "Good morning, Siroc," he greeted, offering one of the cups to his pupil.
Vieaux was still in his sleeping clothes. Siroc knew what that meant, but he had to hear it from his mentor. "I have the cart ready."
"Oh, bless you, my boy." Vieaux sipped at his own tea, weariness etched at the corners of his eyes. "I'm a bit tired today. I wonder if you would mind---?"
Siroc knew the question and answered at once, "Of course, sir." It wasn't unexpected.
Vieaux nodded, "Thank you, Siroc."
The teenager turned back to the door, but Vieaux called after him: "Wait a moment. Here, sit with me."
The odd request unsettled Siroc a bit, though he wasn't sure why he was apprehensive. He joined his mentor at the table as requested, taking the chair opposite Vieaux's. "Siroc, are you happy with us?" his mentor asked.
"Yes, sir." Siroc wracked his brain trying to remember if he'd done something of late to make Monsieur Vieaux think otherwise, but couldn't recall anything.
Vieaux seemed pleased by that. "I became a teacher because Madame Vieaux and I weren't able to have children of our own. I wanted to be able to pass along everything that I'd seen and learn---to pass along my joy at simply having the ability and time to see and learn. Alas, my students did not share my zeal for science and innovation…my lessons were merely necessary burdens for them to endure for the required hours until they could be off on more enjoyable pursuits. But you, dear boy, you…understand. When I met you, I saw the same intelligence, the same inquisitive nature I had as a child.
"I brought you here because I knew I could foster that busy mind of yours, because I finally had someone to---inherit---all the things I'd learned and seen. Granted, I did not appreciate just how busy that mind of yours is. You never stop asking questions about everything around you---the hows, whats and the whys---and you never stop trying to find the answers to your own questions. I've never seen anyone resent the necessity of sleep for stealing time from innovation. I've rather enjoyed having someone who shared my passion for learning and creating."
Vieaux sighed, glancing down at a spot on his teacup, avoiding the teenager's gaze. "The problem, Siroc, is that you've learned all I have to teach you years back…learned from me and surpassed me. Crafts that travel underwater. Flying machines. Horseless carriages. I'd never have thought of them." Vieaux chuckled at the memory of how many gadgets and models lined the shelves of his laboratory/classroom---all of them the boy's designs---and how many experiments had been conducted (and how many fires and spills doused and covered before Madame Vieaux could discover them) in that room. "I should have sent you away at least one full year ago, but I didn't. I have nothing left I can teach you, and I've done an unforgivable thing---I've kept you here for selfish reasons…"
Already shocked at his mentor's confession, Siroc couldn't imagine what was coming next, but he didn't interrupt.
"…I really do enjoy having the company of another inventor, but…you've also taken on more work for me lately, I know, and that keeps the roof over our heads and food on our table. But, that's not fair to you, Siroc. The Lord has a much grander scheme for your life to bless you with the mind he's given you, grander than puttering in an old man's laboratory and mending the roofs and carriages of Guierre. It's time that you discovered that scheme."
Siroc sat quietly for a long time, absorbing all that Vieaux had said. The teenager had known his time with the Vieauxs would come to an end sooner or later, but now that the time was upon him, Siroc was hesitant to go. Worry for the elderly couple, who were like grandparents to him, was foremost in his heart. Monsieur Vieaux couldn't endure the strain of his work anymore. What would become of the Vieauxs without Siroc there to help? How would they support themselves? Even with the help of their friends, they couldn't manage this farm by themselves. How would Siroc earn a living if he left, for that matter? He hadn't given much—any---thought to where he'd go, to any sort of profession, once his days of studying were completed.
Inspiration came to him at once. "Rooms in Guierre are quite scarce at the moment. You could rent the room off the barn—my old room---for almost what my parents have paid you each week."
"I could at that," Vieaux agreed.
Siroc drummed his fingers on the tabletop, the pace of the nervous tapping increasing in pace as his mind started racing. "Respectfully, Monsieur, I doubt you will be able to keep up with the workload after I've gone. You'll need to hire someone---hmm, but I suppose their wages would cost almost as much as you'd receive in rent for the room."
"True," the older man humored him.
"Perhaps the simplest solution would be to forgo the price of renting the room and accept labor as barter for board…then you could keep all the profit from your business and avoid the burden of wages."
Vieaux nodded, "Perhaps."
"You would still find yourself short on money each month…" Siroc fell silent again, as if seriously considering the matter. "You have a fine laboratory, but I suppose there will be a few hours each day when it will sit unused---you do need to sleep at some point…"
"As if you were one to talk," Vieaux teased.
"I think renting the laboratory is the only answer…sharing time, if you would, with another inventor. I'm sure there's an inventor in need of access to such a fine workspace would be willing to pay a fair price for the use of your facilities."
Vieaux hid his grin by taking another sip from his cup. "I'm sure."
Siroc's fingers abruptly ceased their drumming. "Well, then, it seems perfectly clear that you need only to find an inventor willing to barter labor for board and to pay a bit for the use of your laboratory, and you'll have all your financial matters resolved."
"I would at that."
"Then, it's fortunate that I'm an inventor willing to barter labor for board and to pay a bit for use of a fine laboratory. It's settled." The teenager rose from the table. "And as daylight is now wasting, I'd best get to it."
Again, Vieaux stopped him before he could reach the door. "Siroc?"
Siroc stopped. The elder man also rose from his chair and walked over to the younger man. Vieaux reached into Siroc's coat pocket and withdrew the parchment with Cecily's name and address written on it. "Work tomorrow. Today…go 'fix a carriage'."
Present Day
"He was ill?" Jacqueline deduced. When he didn't answer, she prompted, "Siroc?"
There was no warning this time as Siroc's knees buckled and he collapsed, dragging her to the ground with him. Jacqueline was grateful that they landed side-by-side. Unable to break his own fall, Siroc would have probably crushed her if he'd fallen on top of her. She untangled herself from him, kneeled, and again shook his good shoulder. There was not a hint of response from the still figure.
Truly alarmed now, she hurriedly loaded the third shot into the pistol and fired into the air one last time.