Un Lun Dun - China Mieville [23]
Jones swept Zanna behind him.
“Zann!” Deeba hugged her. They crouched behind the conductor. Zanna’s attacker was waving his sword.
The hands that Deeba had thought were crabs were on the floor between the man’s feet. And poking up from between them was the top of Hemi’s head, his two eyes staring at the girls, then abruptly sinking out of sight.
“What are you going to do?” the man shouted. “My friends are nearly here.” They could hear the grossbottle. “Give us the girl!”
“I’m a conductor,” said Jones, and stepped closer.
“I warn you!” the man shouted, and extended the sword into Jones’s path.
“I conduct passengers to safety,” said Jones. “I conduct myself with dignity. And there’s one other thing that all of us who take the oath learn to conduct.” He reached up and, so slowly his opponent didn’t respond, touched his forefinger to the point of the sword.
“Electricity,” Jones said.
As his skin touched the metal, there was a loud crack. An arc of sparks raced down the metal, into the big man’s hand.
He jerked, and flew back, landing on his back, dazed and shaking. His false beard was smoking.
Jones shook his finger: there was a single drop of blood where he had pricked it. He checked Obaday’s head. “He’ll be alright,” he said to Skool.
“It was that Hemi!” Zanna said. “We saw him in the market.”
“He was upstairs,” said Deeba. “He was looking through the ceiling…”
“He must’ve jumped on just as we set off,” said Jones. “Maybe he was the lookout for this charmer.” He pointed at the still-shuddering attacker. “That went a bit wrong, then, didn’t it?” He took handfuls of cord and ribbon from Obaday’s paper pockets. “Tie him up!” Jones shouted, and several passengers obeyed.
“I dunno,” said Deeba doubtfully. “Didn’t look like that to me…”
Jones looked around. “Well, he’s gone now, straight through the floor. Keep an eye out, alright?” Deeba and Zanna were looking about avidly, but Hemi was gone. “We’ll deal with that later. Have to focus now. That grossbottle’s coming. As quick as you can, stay down and hold on. Rosa! Evasion!”
The bus veered, pitched, and accelerated. Passengers shrieked. Jones hooked a leg around the pole and leaned out, notching an arrow into his bow.
With a growl of wings the grossbottle came close. Jones fired. His arrows thwacked into the fly’s disgusting great eyes and disappeared inside. The insect buzzed angrily but did not slow. The men and women it carried aimed a collection of motley guns. Their faces were ferocious.
One of them called out, “Prepare to be boarded!”
Jones drew his copper club.
“You maggotjockeys!” he yelled. “Leave my bus alone!” He leapt out straight at them.
Zanna and Deeba cried out. Jones flew through the air, shouting: “Un Lun Dun!”
“Look!” said Zanna. Jones’s belt was attached to the bus pole with bungee cord. The tether stretched and Jones grabbed hold of the howdah.
The startled raiders tried to aim at him. He kicked, then whirled his club at them, crackling with electricity. When the pirates rallied, Jones simply let go of their vessel. The elastic catapulted him back across the air into the bus. He somersaulted and landed perfectly.
Deeba said: “That was amazing…”
“Tell me later,” he said, and ran up the stairs, the girls following.
“What was that you shouted?” Zanna said.
“A war cry,” he said. “Very ancient. The battle call of UnLondon.”
The top deck was cramped with pumps and gas machines. In one corner was a pile of dirty clothes. Jones aimed an enormous harpoon out of the rear window. He swiveled as the grossbottle veered.
The bus lurched, brought them almost face-to-face with the grossbottle itself. Jones fired.
A bolt shot straight between the fly’s enormous shining eyes. It jerked, its wings shuddered, and it dropped away.
“You got it!” said Zanna. The dirty body of the fly was spinning as it fell. Little dot-figures leapt from its plunging carcass,