The Iron Man [Serial]

Mother of the World

Our motorcade drew to a stop on the outskirts of the capitol, north of Cairo.  It was uncomfortably warm, even with the cabriolet's canopy extended to block sunlight. The Nile glittered, taking a bend here to run almost east-west, so that the roadway also shifted eastward, and the sun's apparent position moved from slightly ahead to my right, causing me to squint. Our drivers and escorts exited the vehicles to check the tanks and condensers in each.

Alpha walked toward the steam-cab I shared with Hypatia, as we were discussing the meaning and origin of the Egyptian term fellah-- today meaning an outdoor laborer of the Manual caste --which I gathered came from similar sounding Arabic words related to plowing and tilling.

"Does Alpha know about your fellows?" Hypatia asked.

"That this fellow feels filía for fellow fílous?" Alpha asked. "You seem friendly."

"I felicitate you." I laughed and smiled at him.

 Alpha gave me a side-eyed glare. "You know that means 'congratulate'?"

"He knows," Hypatia said,"Julien was saying you were clever and observant to notice we have come to an understanding."

"That, too, but I meant the tongue twisting." I smiled up at Alpha, then stage whispered to Hypatia, "Don't know if he's more fallah or 'fellaretor'."

Alpha coughed. "The correct Latin form is fellator. And there is no way I am telling." Yet, he smiled like he could not stop. Seeing him try not to laugh only made me smile and laugh. "This is juvenile," he managed.  Alpha turned away.

I bit my lip, trying to collect my own wits. "I'm sorry," I said then. "Captain?"

Alpha beckoned with an arm. "Come on. Out."

"I am sorry." But, I opened the door and stepped down from the cab.

"I am not angry with you," Alpha said. Once I was beside him I could see he smiled. "I came over here to collect you." He turned again to the cab to tell Hypatia he would be back. Alpha then led me a short distance from the vehicles.

"It was a crude sort of humor," I admitted.

"Nothing I haven't heard. You should probably learn some truly rough language if you do mean to join the Navy."

I laughed. "Hypatia's been helping with the paperwork. We will file everything after my birthday."

"Of course. Listen, you'll be welcome to visit Abdeen Palace, but I'm going to divert your cabs to our Garden City apartments. You'll be closer to the hospital, and free to come and go without the security checks and tourists."

Alpha gave to me some papers, which he drew from an inside pocket. One informed me how to find Murphy in his hospital room. The other was to present to the attendant at the apartment building in order that I should obtain keys to the listed apartments.

"Erik, Hypatia, Mother and Elena will come with me," Alpha said, "I'll be by in the morning to see Murphy, if I'm able. In the next couple days the Malik will want us at his Necropolis Camp."

We walked back to the vehicles, but Alpha stopped me once more, just before we reached a cab where Hedone, Nikola and Garin waited for me.

"I want you to know, it worked out for the best Hedone acting as Mr. Tesla's liaison. It wasn't what I planned, but it's what I should have anticipated more likely to work. I underestimated them both. You letting me know of everyone's support: I appreciate it. You did right. Understood?"

"Yes, Captain."

"Carry on, then."

I smiled. "Aye, aye."

I sat beside Garin in the large steam-cab. Dolores, Prim, and the Chief followed in another cab, and luggage in one of the enclosed strongcars. It was mildly disorienting riding while seated on the backward-facing bench seat. I found it easier to twist to my side to view the scenery. I did not think my companions took offense to my looking away from them, as they seemed just as interested in our new surroundings.

Garin had been to Alexandria before, but not here to Cairo, and for Hedone and Nikola this was also their first visit to Egypt. Cairo seemed to grow up around us, with lower residential buildings and small shops on its outskirts, and then as we entered the older parts of the city, grand antique architecture, with domes and minarets or columned porticoes, mixed with taller apartment buildings, offices and shops, and finally towering new facades came into view.

There were vehicles everywhere I looked. The streets were tree-lined along many sections, but their surfaces were covered in a dry layer like dust, and crowded with steamcabs, street-cars, bicycles, and donkey carts. There seemed no sense to when and where vehicles, people, and animals crossed paths or made lanes. Once we stopped for a flock of goats, and in another place a mass of pedestrians welled up from an underground Metropolitan rail station to block our turn.

Men in pale robes crowded many streets, but there were women, people in loose blue or black garments, and those in three-piece suits or frocks. It was not London, but they had their Code, with the long loose gallabeyya for the Manual Caste, and dark suits for Scribes.

It seemed hardly a exaggeration to say there was a coffee house at every major intersection. And at some few of these we could see men outdoors reading, drinking, or even smoking from waterpipes.

Above every street there was a web of wires for telephon, wirefax, or sharing electricity.

Along the curbs between walks and streets were so many bins of refuse, and so many sleek cats of every pattern and color. I thought I even saw a monkey.  

The Garden City neighborhood was clearly upscale, with gently curved roads, large fenced residences, sky-scraping apartment towers with views of the Nile, and more trees and beds of flowers than elsewhere. At street level were coffee houses, restaurants, banks and Mercantile posts.

Finally, we came to our assigned apartment building.

-----------

Chapter 57! Now nearly in reach of 2,000 reads! Thank you all for reading, and especially for the recent comments. I <3 comments.

Media for this chapter is the song "White Rabbit" (a cover) by Emiliana Torrini, which was featured on the Sucker Punch Soundtrack (a movie I recommend). I originally chose it because I thought we'd get to the scene in Murphy's hospital room by the end of this chapter, though it didn't turn out that way. But, it still works as a song about traveling into a new realm. I even threw in one historical smoking reference...but no caterpillars.

I viewed a lot of video of modern Cairo and photos of early 20th Century Cairo to decide how describe this alternate version. Historically, Cairo did not have a Metro until much later, though there were known proposals in the 30s. Here, there's a brief mention that suggests they have one, but how far they've built the system is to be revealed later.

Please bear with Julien's sense of humor and poor language skills. He's coming out, as it were, of what was a repressive and lonely environment and testing some boundaries. He's getting braver and more confident, which will have consequences-- good or bad --further on.