Patch's Arc

Chapter 1 of 7

Patch had been walking in circles for three days, and his stuffing smelled like wet coal. He knew because he had passed the same broken lamppost four times. He was a teddy bear the size of a loaf of bread, with a black eye patch stitched over one button eye and a small sword strapped across his back. Somewhere below this maze of pipes and dripping brick, the girl who had loved him into life was lost. He meant to find her before the smog ate her lungs. The tunnels changed. He was sure of it now. A passage he had marked with a scratch was gone the next hour, replaced by a wall of sweating iron. Without a map, he would rot before he found her. He needed someone who understood how the underbelly moved. He climbed a ladder toward a crooked light and found a toy shop wedged between two leaning chimneys. The sign above the door still promised delight in faded paint. Patch pushed inside. Gears clicked. A rocking horse with no head rocked by itself in the corner. A rail-thin woman knelt on the floor, prying the eyes out of a porcelain doll with a screwdriver. Cracked goggles pushed her ink-black hair off her forehead. Her coat was covered in stitched-on paper — blueprints, Patch realized, each one crossed out. She did not look up. "Door's shut for a reason," she said. "Toys walk out, they don't walk in." Patch drew his sword. It was the length of a nail file. He set it on her workbench, hilt toward her. "I need a map of the tunnels. I can pay." She finally looked. Her eyes moved from the sword to the eye patch to the coal dust matted in his fur. She snorted. "No map exists. The pipes shift when the furnaces breathe." "Then I need something that shifts with them." She went still. Then she stood, crossed to a shelf, and lifted down a brass compass the size of her palm. Its face was open. Tiny gears turned inside it, chasing each other in slow circles. "Prototype," she said. "Reads pressure, not north. Follows the live vents." She held it out but did not let go. "Why should I give it to you?" "A witch is down there….She’s being held prisoner.” His voice was cloth and gravel. "She’s my friend. I have to save her!” The woman's mouth twitched. She let the compass drop into his paw. "It's not finished. The needle sticks when the air goes bad. When it sticks, you run." Patch closed his paw around the brass. It was warm, and heavier than he was built to carry. "One more thing," she said as he turned for the door. "The vents lead down to the sump. Whatever's taken your witch — it lives there too." Patch stepped back into the smog. The needle inside the compass began to turn.