But then Rector saw lanterns, and heard a loud clang that shook the whole block. He and Zeke stopped moving, stuck right where they were with one foot up and half a breath drawn in. Then they heard, “Be careful with that!” They knew the voice.

“It’s Huey!” Zeke said with relief.

Huey went on to inform some unseen person, “And keep it away from the gas lamps. Keep it away from all the lamps, until I say so. We’ll need to pour it in a few minutes. Mr. Harper, do you have those pipes set up? Those hydraulics?”

“Almost,” Mr. Harper grumbled back.

Rector stood up straight and said, in an almost normal speaking voice, “Hey, Huey, and whoever else you got over there…”

The sounds of guns snapping to attention stopped him short.

He threw his hands into the air.

“I was just going to say,” he continued, “that it’s only me and Zeke. Don’t anybody shoot us!”

“Hey guys!” Houjin said cheerfully. Rector still couldn’t see him through the gathered murk, but when the boy’s shape emerged from the blackened fog, he recognized the gait and the general shape. “Everybody put down your guns.”

Someone—Mr. Harper, Rector assumed—groused something about being ordered around by a schoolyard full of boys, but none of the boys in question gave a damn.

“How much longer before it starts?” Zeke asked.

Houjin looked anxiously up at the wall, and out through the darkness toward the tower. “Not sure, but not long. You two had better get in position.”

Rector said, “We’re headed there now. Got sidetracked.”

“Sidetracked?”

“Lost,” Zeke clarified. “It’s dark.”

“Do you know where you’re supposed to go?”

Zeke nodded. “Roof of the old governor’s mansion. Climb up the back side, where the wall’s done fallen away, and up top we’ll find extra gas for the lights.”

“Yaozu made you memorize that, huh?”

“More or less.”

“All right, then go on,” he told them almost reluctantly. “I’ve got work to do here. Be careful.”

Rector slapped him on the shoulder. “You, too, Huey. Now, you want to point us toward this governor’s mansion?”

“Straight up the hill, count four blocks, and it’s the big white house on the right. Can’t miss it.”

“I could miss a city full of houses at this time of night,” Zeke said ruefully. “But I can count four blocks.”

Before they left, a Chinese messenger came running up to Houjin. He had a lantern in his hand, and sweat had dampened his shirt. His mask’s visor was filled with condensation, and his eyes were wide. He rattled off something fast that Rector didn’t understand, but Houjin made a snappy reply and then translated the highlights.

“The Station men are setting up the pump boxes now. Rector, Zeke—you’d better run!”