Fatima's secret lair underneath the University seemed at first to be little more than a warren of tiny rooms for her to hide in alone while awaiting our arrival. A tour around it hardly took a hundred steps. As it turned out, however, Fatima was hardly isolated, and her reach extended a great deal farther than the confined spaces of her concealment. She was in fact part of an active network of Localist resisters, some of whom held menial jobs within the Palace or the Army where they could gather intelligence. One such contact worked in Constantinople's aerodrome servicing the zeppelins and other aircraft of the city. Indeed, this Mechanic had worked on the Vimana himself and assured us that she was once again in top form, merely awaiting the Sultan's inspection before launch. It was an unexpected godsend -and yet it was also the coincidence that most certainly sealed our fate.
I should perhaps explain first how it was that we received this fateful news. You see, the resisters kept in contact through a series of small, wireless Magneto-Electric Telegraphs, each with a transmission range around a half-mile, which were connected in hexagonal relays. Their ephemeral sounds were less traceable than sending paper messages by couriers, and more reliable too. Before this system was put in place the resisters had apparently employed street children as runners, placing both the messengers and messages at some risk during the night-time. Through the MET relay, Fatima was able to message her contact in the aerodrome directly even at four o'clock in the morning. Rather than standard Morse Code, they used mechanically-generated codes of apparently random patterns to encrypt the message.
It took several tries -presumably to wake the sleeping Mechanic- but within some dozens of minutes, we were able to make contact and establish a plan with someone halfway across the city. (Truly, we live in an Age of Marvels!) According to this plan, the Mechanic would unlock the worker's back entrance and open the bay doors in the hangar, thus allowing us to reclaim the Vimana in much the same fashion that we had taken her in the first place back in London. As long as we made it to the aerofield before the dawn shift, we should be able to launch when least expected and gain enough of a head start in our swift skipper to make it away.
Our main problem was making it to the Aerodrome before dawn. Already, the pocket-watch on Fatima's desk read a half past four. The sky would be lightening within the hour, and the aerodrome was located some distance outside of the city centre to minimize the chance of accidents.
"How shall we make it in time?" I asked. "Fatima, have you an auto? Will an auto draw too much attention, speeding through the streets before dawn?"
"I have something better," Fatima grinned. "Follow me, and don't forget the supplies."
We gathered up the bundles of supplies that Fatima had assembled for us while waiting on the telegraph. These including fresh clothing (thank God! That over-sized soldier's uniform itched me so, and it smelled), some useful tools and medical supplies, funds in various paper currencies and in gemstones, a few bound volumes of Fatima's own scientific researches that she wished to keep out of the Sultan's hands, and of course the all-important letters outlining the Ottoman Empire's plans for world war. It was fortunate that the Vimana had been re-stocked with victuals and drink, for the packs were heavy enough already. Shouldering my share of the supplies, I followed Fatima and Eva out into the spiral stair. We went up, so I expected that we would head above-ground immediately. However, Fatima stopped at the very next door and produced a key ring from inside her robes.
"This way," she whispered as she opened the door, "to Constantinople's own electrified underground railway!"
To our amazement, the doorway opened into a maintenance tunnel that led to a Tube stop clearly modeled on London's latest improvements to the Underground. We emerged from the warren to find a cavernous room still strewn with the rubble of construction, but clearly nearing completion. A half-finished mosaic of ornate tiles spelled out the station name "UNIVERSITAS" in stately Roman script. The rails gleamed orange in the light of Fatima's torch.
"It will be the most modern underground rail system in the world!" I exclaimed "Quel dommage that we cannot see it completed."
"At what cost, such modern accomplishments?" Fatima said quietly.
"I know. But still, it is a marvel of transportation. Are the lines electrified already?"
"Not yet. Only one steam train is running, for the workers. But it is a fast train, and it is stopped in the next station over. All we need to do is follow the tracks to the next platform."
Fatima leapt down onto the rail bed, then turned back to motion us forward. Framed in the mouth of the tunnel with her torch's light barely keeping back the darkness, she looked the very picture of an explorer venturing into the unknown. I followed suit with a mix of eagerness and dread, excited for the adventure but feeling a certain taboo against walking on underground rail tracks. My city-bred instincts whispered to me that an incoming train might dash us to our deaths at any moment, and no amount of rationalization could overcome the feeling of impending disaster.
It seemed an eternity passed before Fatima called for us to climb up. Ahead loomed a huge, dark shape: the underground steam-train. The narrow ledge we climbed up onto suddenly expanded into another platform, this one even more complete than the previous, with fully tiled walls and handsome stone floors. Once we reached the middle of it, we could admire the train car. It had an experimental and extremely advanced design that put me in mind of a bullet moreso than a steam engine.
"This model is already built to run on electricity, but it has a steam backup engine. Can you imagine the day when all things will be electric, and even the steam-suit will be an outmoded technology?" Fatima asked.
I shook my head. It sounded outlandish to me, when steam-power was such a proven method for accomplishing so many things.
"Are all the people of Constantinople such modernists?" Eva asked. It was not a jibe; her tone indicated that she truly wondered, and indeed was questioning what she knew of Science and the Moslem world. Fatima, however, replied bitterly,
"I could wish it so. But then, look at where our modernism is leading us, into war with the very imperialist powers we despise and yet imitate."
"Well, I hope this particular piece of modernism will lead us to the aerodrome," I said to break the solemnity of the moment.
It shook Eva back into the present as well, and she climbed in to stoke the engine with all the reassurance of her self-education. Fatima pulled out a map of the Underground lines and took the conductor's seat. I deciphered the controls and signs regarding the train's operation and relayed the information to Eva to help her avoid mechanical accidents.
With all three of us so involved in separate tasks, it was a rather astonishing moment when the great engine chugged to life and all the lights in the cars came on. The interior was beautifully appointed in brass and leather, with close-woven Persian rugs on the floors. (Fancy trying that in London! They wouldn't last a day.) The train picked up speed rapidly and like a bullet fired from a gun it shot through the pitch-black tunnels beneath the city streets. Even though the stations were not lit, the texture of the darkness changed with each one we breezed through, conveying an enormous sense of speed. I have ridden the Tube many times, but never in a fashion so swift and free. We barely paused even when we changed lines once at a station so large it must certainly have been the central hub; there, service lamps picked out vast, vaulted ceilings and columned walls. But our speed was such that it seemed a mere fleeting vision, like a dream that vanishes ere it is perceived.
The trip was over very quickly, or so I felt, relishing the locomotion as I did. Fatima called for the brakes a station early, as it took that distance to slow our momentum. But soon enough we were at a halt and our stop was filled with soot and smoke from our own still-chuffing engine. The moment we opened the door, Fatima and I began to cough heavily; Eva, perhaps more accustomed to the smoke, merely wrapped a shawl around her face and gestured for us to get out ahead of her. Fatima soon found the correct exit and brought us out at the aerodrome.
The sky was beginning to pale in the East and for a moment I feared we might already be too late. But after a long, tense moment of observation, we saw no light yet aglow in the aerodrome and no movement of men in the streets around it. We crept around the building to the service entrance. The Mechanic was long gone, but the door was unlocked and the roof retracted as he had promised, leaving the hangar open to the still-dark heavens directly above us. As we crept past sleeping zeppelins and flitters, I noted that almost all of them appeared to be civilian craft, some quite fanciful but not very robust in design. There were relatively few of military make or usage.
"Where are the great barques and dreadnoughts of the Ottoman Sky Navy?" I asked in hushed tones.
"Aloft," Fatima whispered back. "Inshallah, aloft far away."
This was slightly ominous, but I put it out of my mind as we worked quickly to stow our supplies, inflate the gas bladder, and secure the rigging. It felt very good to be back on board, though in the back of my mind I already wondered how we would arrange sleeping shifts with three people and still only one bunk.
