Venice

I went back to my room to prepare for the evident and upcoming danger. I hadn't been wearing my trousers underneath my dress, or my boots for that matter. So I put on my hideous, yet sturdy, brown and black traveling dress, trousers, and boots. Very unladylike, but what the heck, I've never been one for fashion. I put my regular explosives in their designated pockets in my dress, trousers, or boots, and then the shooting stars in my 'special' pocket, and then my ever present, lighter, a new, reusable contraption that produces flames in an instant. That went into a special, adapted compartment in my fingerless glove on my left hand. As I was braiding my long hair for the trip, I heard a knock on my door.

"Hello Mina," I said smiling "won't you come in?"
"Hello Amelia," she said obliging.

I shut the door and continued to braid my hair, walking back to my vanity. Mina was sitting at my table. I noticed her appearance had changed too. The first thing I noticed was that her flame red hair was down, and she was in a small leather jacket, with a turned up collar, tight leather trousers, long, black boots, and a black cloak. All together, she looked rather intimidating.

I finished braiding my hair and smiled, slightly lifting up my dress.

"You're not the only one in pants."

"Very classy." She said smiling.

"So, what brings you here?"

"Have you seen Skinner?" she asked bluntly.

"Come to think of it," I said recalling, "no, I haven't. When Henry and I went around to spread the news, Skinner wasn't in his room, and I haven't seen him for quite some time now, he usually comes to visit me."

"Suspicion has been running about the ship, strange things of misfortune, caused by some unseen hand. The men suspect ghosts, but as we all know…"

"It's probably Skinner." I finished.

Just then a knock came on the door, and Dorian's head popped into my room. Sure, you can come in! I thought, a little insulted.

"Mina, I need a word with you."

And with that Mina was gone. He's probably gone to nail her once more. I thought bitterly.

Whoa! Where'd that come from?

I'd noticed that, in the past few days, my mind had reverted to the way of thinking I had when I was a street urchin. And sex was just something that happened, like pick-pocketing some rich old geezer so you could buy dinner. Nobody thought anything of it. But my ways had changed since James brought me to Christ. This change of mindset was probably my natural instinct coming on because of the impending danger.

I headed topside to get some flying practice in quickly, and detoured past Allan's room to double check my safety. Confirmed.

"But make it quick." He said hurrying off to the conference room.

Sooner that I thought was possible, I had taken to the sky, twirling and tumbling all of my worries away. But I reminded myself of the present situation, and got to work on my evasive maneuvers, attacking maneuvers, etc. I practiced offence, then defense, then offence again. I even made my own stratagems involving select members of the team (pretty much whoever was below me at the time during battle).

Battle. I thought as I landed back on the deck, I never thought that I'd actually be in a battle.

But then, who am I kidding? I should have known that, upon gaining the ability to fly, that something like this would happen.

But not global Armageddon!

I rarely ever talked to myself like this, so I knew that my nerves must be taking their toll on me. I walked over to the edge of the deck and leaned over the rail, looking out on the horizon. I suddenly bowed my head and prayed. I begged God to not let me die, but that if this was, in fact, my time to die, that I would die with honor and dignity, doing His will.

I said Amen and looked up. I saw movement in the water, small splashes coming closer and closer. Then they stopped. Suddenly I heard splashes coming from right below me.

Bottle nosed dolphins! A whole pod! I had only seen these magnificent creatures in the books James taught me from. I looked up to the sky and thanked God for this miracle of beauty and wonder. As they came up to the surface, they squeaked at me. I could only smile back. After a while, they stopped following the Nautilus, and swam off to their underwater home. I walked back to the stairwell, but stopped short when I heard them calling from a distance. I looked out to the sea, and then, just below the horizon, I saw them. Several of the dolphins leaped to the sky in a mismatched formation.

I could learn a lot from them on aerial tactics. I thought surprisedly.

I walked down the spiral stair, satisfied and ran into Jekkyl at the bottom of the steps.

"Out for a fly?" he asked smiling.

"Last minute practice." I said, smiling back.

"If it's not to bold to say," Jekkyl started slowly, as if unsure, "I enjoy watching you fly. The way you move is so graceful, that I don't think your father could have picked a better woman, or man for that matter, to teach how to fly."

That might have been just a bit bold. Sweet, but bold.

"Thank you." I said, not wanting to sound rude.

We walked along the corridor chatting, and he asked me if I would join him for lunch.

"Well, I don't see why not." I said as we headed down to the kitchen.

Okay, so he was charming, in a strange, awkward kind of way. We had lunch and, pretty much, talked together for the rest of the day.

That evening, before we landed in Venice, Henry accompanied me to my room for some last minute things. I gathered up my pyrotechnics lab and went over to secure James' notes. But I stopped short, realizing that I wasn't alone. So I inconspicuously sat on my bed, pretending that I wasn't doing anything that had to do with something being under the bed. Henry walked over and sat next to me.

"Amelia," he said softly, "I-, I just want you to know, that," he looked into my eyes and I knew that he was about to say something really dumb.

"I want you to be careful." He finished. I nodded solemnly.

"No, I mean it," he grabbed one of my hands forcefully, yet gently, "I care too much about you to know that you might get seriously hurt. Actually," he said, his face becoming stern, "I think I care about you too much as it is."

"I don't understand," I started. He was really scaring me. He looked at the floor,

"I don't let myself get too attached to other beings. For fear that I might lose them, and have to deal with that pain wherever I go."

"Along with the pain you have to bear anyway." I finished, bending over to look at his face. I grabbed his other hand and held both of his large hands in my small ones.

He looked at me,

"Don't worry," I said smiling, "I can handle myself. Besides, we'll only be diffusing some bombs. I probably won't even have to fight."

"But it's not the fighting that worries me," he said, looking scared, "it's Hyde."

"Hyde?"

"Yes," he said, swallowing, "he's been badgering and bullying me to let him out since the day he saw you." A look of disgust swept across his face, "He wants to 'have his turn with you'."

I swallowed and, sort of, changed the subject,

"You can talk to him?"

"Yes, well, you see," he started, "whichever one of us is on the 'outside' can see and talk to whoever's on the inside, simply by looking in the mirror."

"So you can see him in the mirror, standing next to you?"

Henry shook his head solemnly "He is me. And I him."

Just then a loud knocking came on the door.

"Miss Amelia?" came the muffled voice of Ishmael. I ran up and answered the door, leaving Henry staring at his, once again, empty hands.

"Yes?"

"It's time. You too Doctor." He said looking back into my room. Henry stood up and followed me out of my room.

But, just then remembering, I went to secure James' notes. I was about to ask Henry to leave, but then I realized that he meant too much to me to not trust. Ishmael left with a nod from me and Henry shut the door behind him. I reached underneath the bed and pulled out the lingerie wrapped parcel. I looked at Henry and smiled,

"Safety precaution." He just smiled and chuckled to himself as I proceeded to open the briefcase.

I immediately knew that something was wrong.

"Somebody's messed with the notes." I said, my eyes bugging out.

"How do you know?" asked Henry, concerned.

"His theorems are always third to the bottom and the journal is always stored so that the binding is elevated ever so slightly by James' favorite pen. Somebody's messed with it."

"Well," Henry said anxiously, "we really need to go. I'll help you figure this out when we get back."
I merely shut the briefcase, locked it, and hid it between the box spring and mattress.

When we reached the conference room, we saw that we were the last members to arrive. Mina looked at me with an, 'I know what you just did' kind of look. I just smiled back at her, despite my extreme discomfort. We were led out of the Nautilus and on to the solid, cobblestone streets of Venice. There were already men outside, preparing the divers, already in their diving suits, to descend underneath the city and diffuse the bombs.

"Hurry men!" Nemo shouted, "We must find those bombs!"

"Amelia," said Allan, walking over to me, "how long precisely do you think we have till the bombs go off?"

"Well, it depends on what size the bombs are."

"Rough estimate?"

"Fifteen minutes."

"Nemo…" he walked off.

Suddenly, there were explosions coming from further in the city. All of our heads snapped up to see a multitude of fireworks exploding in mid air.

"Goodness, I feared the worst!" said Mina, putting her hand over her heart.

I just snickered, "The worst those things could do is burn the hairs of your arms. And that's only if they backfire on the ground."

"I suppose its for the masquerade going on down there." Said Jekkyl, pointing down at some buildings illuminated by multiple torches. I could hear the murmuring of a multitude of people. I imagined them all dancing; the women in their beautiful dresses, the men, all dressed up and feeling lucky, all hiding behind their mysterious masks.

Suddenly, earsplitting explosions came from a few miles away. The ground shook violently, the water lashed against the Nautilus. I looked up, already knowing the answer. No fireworks.

"The bombs…"

"To your stations men!!!" Nemo yelled.

There was some Indian yelling coming from the crow's nest on the top of the Nautilus.

"The buildings, they're falling like dominos." Said Nemo

"Dominos?" said Sawyer. We all looked at him with interest.
"I have a plan."

After about a few moments of shouted discussion, we devised a plan that, if executed correctly, would end in the demise of the automobile. We were going to take the car and head off the falling buildings. The Nautilus would then target the car and blow up the last building to fall, ending the domino effect. Quatermain would be driving, but the rest of us would go along to make sure that nothing stood in the automobile's way. The car had no roof now, so we just jumped in the back.

I looked back at Henry and beckoned for him to come, but he just stood there and shook his head.

"Jekkyl!" Allan shouted, "We'll need Hyde!!"

"Henry please!" I shouted, my arm reached out.

"NO," shouted Henry, "He'll not control me again."

Dorian turned to face him, "Then what good are you?"

And with that, Quatermain took off, the tires squealing. I looked back at Henry,

Please, I don't want to do this alone.

I was seated on the other side of Mina, who was sitting next to Dorian, who had his arm nonchalantly placed around Mina's shoulders.

We sped through the thin streets of Venice, the car squealing at every turn, and bumping on and off the road. Suddenly, armor plated men were shooting at us from across the road.

"This is my stop!" shouted Dorian as he jumped out of the car and walked over to the men, drawing his sword.

"Dorian!" Mina shouted.

But the car kept speeding on, towards its imminent destruction. Mina and I looked at each other. She looked calm and ready, but I could tell she could see the fear in my eyes. She reached a hand out to calm me, but there were bullets whizzing past us, coming from above. Sawyer and Allan both shot at the men on the roof tops, but to no prevail.

Suddenly, Mina put her head between the two front seats and said savagely,

"Save your bullets, these men are mine!" and with that last word, she flew from the car.

Hey, I thought I was the aviator!

But then I looked closely to see that she was being carried by multitudes of bats. I figured that now would be a good time for me to leave, seeing as I didn't want to be around when the car was blown up.

"I'm out!" I shouted, taking off.

I put my special, fingerless gloves on, which protect me from being burned.

I followed the car from the air, tossing my small, but deadly smoke bombs at the men on the rooftops across the street from the car. Mina was mauling men, several at a time on the other side of the street, above the car. The men didn't shoot at me, because my traveling dress was so dark that they couldn't see me in the night. After I ran out of smoke bombs, I started tossing the medium sized dynamite. Strong enough to knock a few men off of the roof, but not strong enough to blow up the building.

When they finally realized that the bombs knocking their men off of the roofs were coming from above, they started shooting at random spots in the air. I started flying in random patterns, tossing bombs the whole way. Suddenly, a sharp pain stabbed at my left arm. I looked down to see blood oozing from my forearm. My throwing arm. I'd been shot.

The blood was now, practically, gushing out of my arm. I winced in pain as I clutched my arm to my body.

Sorry Allan, you're on your own. I thought, looking at the car as I turned to fly away. Bullets were still whizzing past me, so I gained some altitude, getting out of their firing range, and flew back to the Nautilus.

When I landed, my breathing was strained, and the pain was shooting up my entire arm. I walked over to Henry who ran over to me, knowing that something was wrong.

"Amelia," he said when he reached me, "what…" he stopped short when I showed him my arm.

"I was giving them some cover, and then the men started shooting at me, and one of them got lucky." I said smiling. Despite the intense pain in my arm, I was surprised that I managed to stay calm, conscious, and sane. All of my pain tolerance had seemed to have disappeared since James took me in.

"Come on." said Henry, monotone. He pulled out his handkerchief and wrapped it tightly around my arm. He then put his other arm around my shoulders and led me back up into the ship. He took me to the clinic, where he sat me down and treated my arm to the best of his abilities.

I was lucky. The bullet entered through the top of my arm and stopped short of my bone. Henry gave me some rare, expensive numbing liquid.

"You don't have to waste that on me." I said, still breathing heavily.

"You're worth it." He said looking me in the eye. I could see genuine concern behind a monotone mask.

Just as my arm was starting to go numb, Henry said, "You may want to turn away. You won't feel anything, but the sight is gruesome."

"I'll be fine." I said smiling. I may have lost my pain tolerance, but these eyes have seen worse.

Henry sighed and looked at me. He slowly reached over for a pair of thin pliers and a scalpel.

"Hold on." He said. And it started.

I looked on for a while, but then had to turn away. Then the noise started bothering me, and I could feel my arm being tugged by some loose piece of skin.

I turned and buried my face into Henry's shoulder. He stopped shortly, puzzling, but then went back to work. I sat there, as comfortable as I could get, waiting for it to end. And like that, it was over.

"There you are," he said softly, "good as new."

I looked down to see him finish taping the gauze to my arm. He had stitched the hole up and wrapped my arm up from my elbow, to my wrist. I lifted my head slightly off his shoulder and looked up to see his face inches from mine.

The next thing I knew, we were attached at the lips for quite some time. Typical, I know, but still…

We separated after a while and Henry looked at me. He reached down and picked up the bullet. It was brown with dried blood, and scratched up from Henry's tools. He held it up to me, "I swear to you," he gestured at the bullet, "this will never happen again. Nor anything like it. Not while I still breath."

Just then we heard explosions and shouting coming from outside. Henry and I both stood up, but I started swaying. Henry steadied me and said, "The antiseptic will make you dizzy for a while, and it will sting once you recover the feeling in your arm, you should probably stay here."

"No, no, I'll be fine!" I said smiling. Henry sighed and took my good arm, leading me out of the Nautilus and onto the street.

Mina, Allan, and Nemo were all out there, and we went to them.

Mina looked at me with concern, "What happened to you?"

"I got shot," a look of horror crossed her face,

"But don't worry," I said, quickly, "Henry fixed it, and besides, it wasn't even that bad."

And, of course, my nerve cells in my left arm regained consciousness just then. I winced in pain, and the smell of the antiseptic burned my nose.

"Where is everybody?" Henry asked, his arm around my shoulders.

"Well as we all know," said Allan, "Skinner's gone AWOL, Dorian's inside, and, well, as for Sawyer…"

"He'll live to see another day." Sawyer walked out of a cloud of smoke. Mina walked over to him, and wiped some blood off of his forehead. He looked a bit scared when she licked her fingers.

"Don't worry," she said, smiling, "I've had my fill."

"Captain!" we turned to see Ishmael stagger down the ramp, out of the Nautilus.

Nemo and Sawyer ran over to him. Henry and I, followed by Mina and Allan, jogged over to see what was wrong.

"Who did this to you?" Nemo demanded. Ishmael had been shot.

"I-It's not- not- Skinner. Not-Skinner." He staggered. "It's D- D- Dorian- Dorian Gray." And with that, he died.

"That-!" Nemo ran off into a string of Indian profanities.

There were some klinking and clankings and groaning of metal on metal.

"The Nautiloid!" said Nemo, standing up, and running inside the ship. But to no prevail. The white circle on the side of the ship opened up, and a smallish water vehicle came out, suspended on a long metal rod. Suddenly, it dropped into the water. Spikes radiated out of the back and spun around, spinning the whole thing around to face us. In the window, was the smirking face of Dorian Gray. That snake. He looked at Mina and blew a kiss in her direction. I looked at her and saw her eyes turn red with fury. She turned and stormed off into the ship, just as the Nautiloid turned and disappeared into the water.

"Quickly! Back to the ship!" Nemo shouted, running back into the ship. Later, in the conference room, Nemo showed us a unique tracking device. It was a large orb spinning inside the wall. It was rough and had raised portions and lowered portions. It looked like a globe. There were two metal poles, which ended in lights, scraping the surface of the globe. He pointed to the pole with the larger light.

"This is us," He then pointed at the smaller one. "and this, is the Nautiloid. We can easily overtake him within several hours."

"Captain." Said Nemo's new first mate. "We found this in the boiler room."

It was a record.

"Play it." Ordered Nemo. The first mate put the record on the player and put the needle on the record.

"Are you ready doctor? Go ahead." Said a woman's voice.

"Hello gentlemen," M paused, "and Amelia and Mina. No doubt you've figured out the true identity of my wolf among you sheep."

"Growl." Said Dorian's voice. Mina scowled.

To make a really irritating, long message short, M told us about his true identity (Apparently, Allan had had a run in with the Phantom, and found out his true identity), Dorian gave some irritating input. He went on to explain that Dorian had stolen samples of Mina's blood, Skinner's skin, one of Henry's potions, copies of James' notes, and pictures of the inside of the Nautilus. Henry became furious when he heard this, but stopped when his hand rushed up to his ear.

"Are you alright?" I asked, concerned with his peculiar behavior.

"Yes," he said, giving a weak smile, "it's nothing."

I had just realized it, but the whole time, Henry had been looking at himself in the mirror, with a concerned expression.

"Now, you probably think that I just like the sound of my voice, but what you don't realize, is that, during this recording, the record has been emitting high frequency sound waves. These sound waves are only audible to animals, and are capable of shattering crystal. Which is attached to the three bombs that Dorian has placed on your ship…"

Before he could say anymore, Nemo took the record player, and flung it to the ground.

Just then, I put it together. Henry can see Hyde in the mirror, and Hyde has animal features… such as their hearing. Suddenly, the ship shook violently, for a very long time. Red lights flashed everywhere, and sirens went off. A man ran into the room,

"Captain! The main boiler room has flooded!"

"Close the hatch!"

"But sir! There are still men in there!"

"NOW!"

The man ran off to carry out Nemo's orders.

Henry turned me around to face him,

"I'll be back, I promise." He kissed me, and then left, running down the hall.

"Jekkyl!" cried Nemo.

"Don't worry," I said, drawing everyone's attention to me, "he knows what he's doing."

My arm was stinging again, so, through all of the hubbub, I plopped myself down in a nearby chair. Henry must know what he's doing, I reassured myself, but I couldn't help but fear for my love.

My love…

Mina put her hand on my shoulder,

"Are you all right?"

"Yeah," I turned to smile at her, "I'm fine."

There were men running and shouting all around, but the league stood steady, waiting for Jekkyl, or Hyde's return. We could all feel that the ship was slowly sinking to one side, when suddenly, we were all jerked to the opposite side.

I had fallen out of the chair, and nearly landed on my injured arm, everyone else had been standing, so they were sent flying off their feet. But the minute the ship started shaking, Nemo shouted, triumphantly,

"He's done it!"

Apparently he had, the ship stopped shaking, and men had stopped shouting. We all stood up and started to put things back together. I righted my chair, and started picking up some shattered glass, when Henry walked in, fixing the cuff of his sleeve. He looked healthier, now that I noticed, and he was smiling, walking a brisk walk. When he walked in, he was congratulated by Alan.

"Perhaps you are of some use to us, afterall."

Henry merely smirked, and then looked around the room. I stood up, nonchalantly, to throw away some of the glass shards, and he saw me. He walked over to me, and, as I disposed of the trash, turned me around. He held my face in his hands gave me a short kiss, then held my so fiercely, that I never thought he'd have let me go, and turn to Allan.

"Sir!" cried a crewmember to Nemo. Everybody followed the captain over to a man at a table in front of an odd contraption. But I soon realized the man to be using Morse code.

"It's from the Nautiloid." The man then recited from the headset he was holding to his ear, " 'Hello my freaky darlings,'"

"It's Skinner!" said Sawyer.

" 'Stowed away on little ship with Gray. Sending you coordinates. See you soon.'"

Just then, a thin piece of paper staggered out of a thin slot in the machine.

Nemo ripped it from the slot, and said, reading it, " They are heading to Siberia!"