Confrontation

As transcribed by Bellatrix S. Bracken from an Edison cylinder found among the disheveled effects of Prof. Nareth E. Nishi, probably recorded during the morning of 29 August:

Times passes, and I lose track. [pause] I have been practicing humour, but that is not a jest. So many events, they slip through my fingers, through my mind's fingers. This journal, its purpose, if ever it was known to me, eludes me now.

Yesterday, the grim visage of Mr. Edler Reifsnider returned once again to the Imperial Theatre in the Canal District, despite Mayor Sprocket's refusal to permit its demolition. Miss Paine first noticed the commotion, and called for me. When I arrived, he was shouting profanities at the urchins, and, likewise, they were shouting back at him. I asked the man what business he thought he had being there, given the Mayor's decision, and I shooed the orphans outside. He seemed quite flustered, and refused to give me a straight answer, in part, I believe, because I am a women. I told him to leave immediately, before things grew any uglier than they already had. But as he exited the theatre, some of the bolder of the urchins, rightfully outraged at how this vile man has treated them, advanced upon Mr. Reifsnider. Before I could intervene, he had begun throttling them most cruelly with his cane. At once, I dragged the bastard back into the theatre [pause] We soon found ourselves in the moldering auditorium, and he began to make threats against my person. Moments later, and much to my relief, Mr. Lucius Sin arrived, and if I was not capable of intimidating Mr. Reifsnider, Dear Lucius was. Sometimes, I have found, there is great need of a reanimated soul trapped in the form of a Titantic steam-driven automaton. Lucius chased the bastard from the theatre, and I only just managed to catch up with him before he began firing off blue-white volleys of electricity at the man. It all sounds like some absurd penny dreadful.

[pause]

I will say [pause] I should say [longer pause] blasted Reifsnider did not leave without first laying upon my head what I fear may prove a terrible curse, or perhaps what would more fairly be named a threat. "You have a choice. Continue down this road and perhaps you will end up with more than you can understand," and then later, "But I will tell you this...when it happens, and oh, by god, it will happen, there will be no one capable of stopping it." I will not now [pause] I will not dwell upon the meaning of these words, as I think I understand them all too clearly.

[pause]

My mind is so cloded, and it is sometimes hard to place events in proper order by chronology. I had meant to begin with an account of my latest [pause] my latest episode [loudly exhales] and that was [pause] day before yesterday, I believe. Yes. In my garret above the Museum...the Museum has been so neglected [pause] There was another episode, as though the Whole fears I will forget how near she presses in upon this world.

After the nasty bit of business with the orphans yesterday, a sudden exhaustion overtook me, the sort of spell which often presages my, my episodes. I retreated to the Abney Park lab, where I found Miss Beq Janus waiting for me. We had planned to discuss the plight of the orphans, I believe. And then...as has been happening again...I slipped. And she was there to see my vanishing and my returning, though fortunately Miss Maertens had arrived, and Miss Paine shortly thereafter. I am too weary now for this account, so I must condense. Soon, I slipped a second time, into that blackness between moments and stars, and this time, and this is most extraordinary and unsettling, Miss Paine was apparently dragged along in my wake. When we once again found ourselves in the laboratory, after maybe only thirty seconds or so [long pause] she described the experience as being smothered or suffocated [pause] she was quite pale and grew increasingly ill. And, of course, Miss Janus had seen the whole affair, after having witnessed the episode the day before, and she had too, too many questions to ever easily be set aside. I considered, for a moment, simply killing her. It would have been the wisest course of action, the most expedient. Instead, clinging [long pause] clinging to the shreds of my humanity, and after she had promised to keep any secrets revealed upon pain of death. And after both Miss Paine and Gloriana had agreed [pause] I showed her my truer face, that truer form, the navigator the Whole would retrieve, that thing Captain Susenko calls "the pilot." I showed it to her, and so Beq Janus has joined our odd fellowship. We are eight now.

My work on a new time cabinet continues. The field stabilizer is finally functional.