The Gravity Escapement (TWS)

You busy yourself with the paperwork in order to buy some time to think about the question. Truth be told, you haven't actually heard any rumours of the sort, even as an author who keeps her ears open. But you can hardly admit that, can you?

"If tabloids had any scrap of veracity, I'd be of unsound mind to seek you out."

He nods. "Very wise. Your generation needs skeptics." Fishing in a desk drawer, he pulls out and hands you an exceptionally fine pencil: the graphite is beautifully pure, the wooden casing delicately carved. "Here. One of Herr Schrader's new inventions; he calls it a 'mechanical pencil'. It pushes out the graphite as you need it."

You spend a few moments examining the mechanical pencil. At one end a rubber tip, when pushed, releases a spring-loaded catch that forces the thick graphite core outwards. A boon to any aspiring transcription artist. "It's quite a piece of work, sir."

He responds by gesturing at the papers, and by pouring himself a glass of whiskey from a crystal decanter.

You have a glance at the paperwork, then begrudgingly begin to fill it out with the mechanical pencil. As you read, however, you can't suppress a slight curl to your thin lips. Most of the questions are irrelevant and needlessly esoteric, and some, you notice, are downright illegal to ask. You make sure to scrawl and to make your answers as illegible as possible, but some items still end up readable:

Name: Rachel Hsobel
Gender: Female
Occupation: A barely-legible squiggle that might be 'Author' and might be 'Secretary'
Citizenship: Federation of Southern Islands
Place of Birth: R-, C-, FSI
Religious Affiliation: [You fill in several candidates, then scratch them out into an densely-penciled squiggle.]
...
You do your best to treat the rest of the paper like a doodle pad.
...
Have you, in the past or present, been affiliated knowingly or unknowingly with members of the Renegade Nations? You actually think about this one. You were born in the Federation of Southern Islands, but it was still part of the Empire in those days; your family emigrated twenty years ago to Verobraccia, when you were just a wee stripling. But that still technically makes you affiliated with a Renegade, by birth and by familial contact. You scrawl something to that effect, and throw in a few patriotic missives about the rightness of Imperial rule, just to make sure the tichmen don't come for you in the night.

I testify that by signing below, I guarantee that I have spoken true, in the eyes of gods and men, in the name of Source Gloriana and the Empire of Momentum.

x R. Hsobel

conversus in aeternam

McCloud stares at you wordlessly throughout, though when you sneak a glance at him he wears a slight smirk at your antics. At least he approves.

Finally, you shove the papers at him, and he slips them into a prepared manila folder with a light schwip. It already has your name calligraphed on it.

"Five minutes and ten seconds. You write quickly. That's the first good news for today."

You almost see your cue coming too late. "I-I was placed first in my district for transcription skills, sir. I could have written quicker, and better, if... well..." You falter.

"I mislike dealing with the bureaucrats here with Gloriana, but a necessary evil they are now and a necessary evil they will be. Only the best should work directly with the Source, after all. Ah, but I've wandered onto a tangent. Let us get back to the subject at hand: what have you heard about the Gravity Escapement?"

You shake your head somberly. "To tell you the truth, sir, I've heard nothing at all."

He leans back in his chair and smiles. For a moment you think he's mocking you, but his grin widens into something gleeful and child-like, and he begins to laugh. "Good! Very good! If we've managed to keep our little secret from one like you, who swims in the world of information to live, then we've done well indeed."

Oh, he's good. He knows he's got you hooked now. "What would this secret be?"

Still grinning, he reaches into a pocket on his many-such-pocketed vest and pulls out a golden key. "Now remember that you are sworn to secrecy," he begins, patting the manila envelope, "until our story is finished, at least."

"Yes, sir."

A particular book is brought down from the shelf behind his head, and placed in a particular spot on the desk; a turn of the key in an innocuous knothole in one drawer leads to a whirring of gears from... inside the book?

"Do you understand the concept of the inexplicable? I'm of the argument that no one can, that all we can understand of this world is that of the explicable realm. Inexplicable things cannot exist, or are a product of mechanical trickery, or an illusion of the mind." A final half-turn of the key leads to a unlocking click from the book, and his pale hands pick it up carefully, ever so tentatively. "Nevertheless... here is something inexplicable."

He opens the book to reveal a hollow inside; his fingers reach in, pulling out a single metal part - a strangely-shaped pendulum, sheared away roughly at the shaft. He holds it up for a second at arm's length, positioning it to catch the light, and lets go.

It doesn't fall.