Year of our Lord 1887

Isabella Bird watched in contemplation as the Great Storm approached from the horizon.

There was a distance there, like a man gazing upon what he could not fathom.

Oh, she had heard the reports - there wasn't a man nor woman in New London who hadn't, she reckoned - but this would be the first time she had set eyes on it. Even through the frost-tinted glass, she could find it clearly - a vast rolling wave of wind, snow, and storm that stretched across the horizon infinitely, slowly but most certainly creeping its way towards them, devouring all in its path.

Tesla City was there, somewhere within that storm. So was the outpost they had established there, though it had been evacuated long ago. Thank the Lord the garrison there had returned safely, and with them as many Steam Cores they could've piled onto their sleds.

The scale of the thing beggared belief, truly, and if Isabella was any less pious a woman, she would imagine it the work of God Himself. Oh, she had heard about those radicals, the ones harping on about how the Great Frost was the second coming of the Flood of Genesis. Utter madness, was it not?

And even if that was the case - Isabella quirked her lips into a humourless smile - then weren't they safe as could be in one of the last arks on Earth?

She stared by way of the Eastern Outpost Depot, golden lights flickering like glowworms as the elevator crawled up and down the face of the Pit. Those were the last scouts, weren't they? The last little wave of survivors found in the blasted wasteland. To arrive just ahead of the Great Storm… they must've been hounded by the winds all the way back to the city.

Alive, by a mere hair's breadth. But Isabella couldn't help but wonder how many did not make the last leg of their journey.

It was a saddening thought, and a rather fatalistic one, she'd admit. But when staring upon that Great Storm, that great devouring beast that came on as unstoppable as the approach of night? Fatalism became rationalism.

Isabella shivered to her bones, the temperature suddenly plunging. She pulled her cloak closer to herself, almost trying to meld into the fabric. Her breath was steam now, fogging over the windows. She did not try to wipe them - it was too bloody cold for her limbs to leave the relative warmth beneath the cloak. Isabella instead snuck her arms into her dress and pressed them against her skin.

Besides, the hoarfrost would claim it soon, as it would all things.

"Get away from the window, Madam Bishop," Mister Aynesworth advised, "God won't fault you for arriving a little late, would he?"

"Miss Bird, please," Isabella stood up and moved closer to the boiler, "My husband passed away even before this little ice age of ours, Lord bless his soul, and I'd rather meet my sister bearing my own name."

She sat on the chair there, shifting it as close to the boiler as she dared to without getting burned. Isabella felt the heat melt into her skin, caressing her like a lost lover, and she sighed in satisfaction.

"Melancholy does not suit you, Miss Bird," the man said, his pen scratching against the paper, "I thought you were made of sterner stuff, considering your experiences."

"Never experienced anything like this, have I now?" she shot back, before slumping.

No need to get so worked up about that, does she? Best preserve what little energy she had. Isabella leaned closer to the boiler, so close that she imagined she could hear the water bubbling within. Snowmelt, it was, and there was no shortage of it. And the heat was sourced from the Generator itself - luxury afforded by only the first two rings of houses.

The steam would then be circulated around the house through pipes. But it would always be warmest at the boiler itself.

The wind was picking up outside, now, and the whole building was starting to rattle a little. She ignored it - a little turbulence wasn't much, they had all survived worse, when they were still rabble huddling away in hide tents.

Now they were rabble huddling away in a great three-storey house. That afforded a little dignity, did it not?

"I would've liked to go to India, did you know?" Isabella murmured, "The Jewel in the Crown of the British Empire, it was called then. What an empire we are now. If the Frost had been polite enough to come a little later, I may have just as well."

"If you did," Mister Aynesworth replied distantly, "You would be dead."

"Not sure if I would have preferred that," she admitted.

There was no reply. Isabella craned her head around to see the man busied away scribbling at the last scrap of paper he had, too consumed by his endeavour to pay any heed to her meaningless words.

"No time for a little introspection, Mister Aynesworth?" she asked, "It's the end, now, surely you could put that pen of yours away and finally save yourself some effort."

"This is my last directive, Miss Bird," with a flourish of his pen, the man signed the paper and rolled it up, "What you speak of - does it not apply to the entire city? Live or die, it is in the hands of the Lord, now."

Mister Aynesworth stood up, and Isabella followed his action. She followed him down the stairs, where he strode purposefully into the common room. The house was not theirs, but shared between nine people - five adults, and four children. Well, it used to be ten, but Miss Holland was stowed away at the infirmaries now. Aynesworth handed the paper to Mister Haddock, she saw.

"You are certain?" she could hear Mister Haddock ask, "Our coal stores-"

"Have been emptied," Mister Aynesworth told the man, "Every house has been given their ration in coal, wood, and food. Empty the streets and get everyone inside."

"The infirmaries-"

"The Flying Norseman and the White Bostoner will suffice, no?"

"...Aye," Mister Haddock stared down at the paper, "That's it, then? Everything we've worked for, has it come down to this?"

"Know that we've done our best. God save us all."

"God save us all," he agreed, before throwing on his coat and dashing outside.

"Come, Miss Bird," Mister Aynesworth glanced her way, "I need someone to keep me sane."

"You do," she agreed.

Just as she turned to make for the door, an ice-cold hand gripped her wrist. Isabella jolted in surprise, swivelling around to see little Beatrice staring up at her with wide eyes. The girl looked like a ball with all the fur she had been swaddled in, but even then Isabella could painfully see her dainty lips a pale shade of blue. It wasn't enough. Nothing was, now.

"Where are you going?"

Isabella bent down, "Under the Generator, missus. Someone has to keep it alive through the Storm. You'll stay here, won't you? I need you to be brave and take care of Matilda and Warren and Edward."

Beatrice nodded her tiny little head, "I will!"

"That's good," Isabella wrapped her arms around her and held her shivering form close, "Your father would be proud of you."

"Will you come back?" Beatrice buried her face deep into her furs, voice muffled.

Isabella's heartstrings twinged. Only God knew the answer to that.

"I will," she assured with a voice of steel, "We will all make it out of this. Has Mister Aynesworth done us wrong before?"

"No."

She pulled away and stared into Beatrice's eyes, "Go find your friends and bring them back here. Can you do that for me?"

"Yes!"

Isabella shooed her out the door, before following her out into the city. She could feel Mister Aynesworth's presence behind her closing the door shut.

The cold hit her like a bloody dreadnought. It was as if she had walked directly into a wall of solid ice, startling off what warmth she held in her bones. But it was worse, she knew, up there. Because the Pit stowed them away from the worst of the frigid winds, and Isabella was thankful for small mercies. Already, she could feel her eyes freezing over. Isabella blinked furiously, keeping her head down so as to not blind herself.

New London was still bustling, even at this time. But it was the dusk of things, now. The towering guard stations stood like silent sentinels, the red-black banners of the Order billowing in the rising gale, held down admirably by pegs. The searching spotlights were no longer present, the watchtowers vacant.

The last of the flying hunters were being lowered into their hangars too, and with them the final stores of game they would have. The last wave of refugees being ushered down through the city hurriedly by Mister MacLachlan's scouts, being driven into whatever houses still had space.

Shouts rang out across the streets, of bellmen hurrying the last workers back into the safety and warmth of the houses. Soon, New London would be all quiet. For the first time, Isabella imagined, since they had arrived so many weeks ago. It felt like an eternity since, though she knew it to be only a little over a month.

And yes, as they crossed the grounds towards the Generator, she knew that some things would remain the same.

The pipes running along the streets still hissed with steam, melting whatever snowdrift before it could build. The Steam Hubs chugged along, glowing red-hot, as they would until the last stockpiles of coal went dry. The automatons toiled tirelessly, towering over New London atop their spindly legs, bursts of superheated steam flaring out of their Cores. They would keep the city alive, she knew, even if New London would share the fate of Winterhome.

They crossed over the Execution Platform, the rack empty of a body, and descended down a hatch. Immediately, they were enveloped in a comforting blanket of heat - almost as if they had entered a wholly new dimension. Stepping off the last rung, Isabella hastily shrugged off her coat and threw it onto a hook.

"Mister Bankes!" Mister Aynesworth called, "All is well?"

"The Generator is being a dear," they shook hands, "No outstanding issues at all."

"Good to hear."

"Miss Bird," Bankes greeted, "A pleasure."

"Likewise."

Isabella removed her gloves and bit into them as she wrung out her hair of molten snow. She found herself a place to sit - right before a panel of gauges that indicated the temperature aboveground at various areas of the city.

"How long will the Generator last?" Mister Aynesworth asked.

"A sennight?" Mister Bankes replied, "Does it matter?"

"No," Aynesworth admitted.

Isabella raked her eyes across the control panel, at all the little dials and fiddles that she could not make heads or tails of for the life of her. But there was a lever there that she did understand, if only for the bright red markings and bold label above it - OVERDRIVE. She could only pray that the small legion of engineers maintaining the machine did not lose focus. Or that the workers in the mines do not falter. Or that the automatons keeping the city alive do not malfunction. Or another half a hundred things left to the caring hands of the Lord.

She sighed deeply, the steady hum of the Generator easing her bones. They were in the warmest place in the city, and they would be the last to die, if it came down to it.

Only so that they would remain alive just long enough to come to terms with those they had failed.

Mister Aynesworth held down a switch. There was a click, then a haze of static.

"This is the Captain," he spoke into the pipe, voice dark and grave, "Brace yourselves. The Storm is here."

Isabella Bird closed her eyes. The Storm was only getting louder.