kidnappers intending to use her to incentivise her grandfather to work more quickly and disclose to them the secrets of the Tablet. Winifred is kidnapped in London but rescued in Germany by Lady Mechanika. Using a flying dirigible hot air balloon provided by a Rosicrucian secret society, Lady Mechanika and Winifred are over the Sahara on the way to the archaeological dig when the dirigible is attacked by a group connected to the people who meanwhile have taken forcible charge of the archaeological expedition. They pose as Germans but are in fact Serpent creatures able to assume human form. Lady Mechanika and Winifred escape the explosion of the dirigible, cross the desert with the help, first, of a slaver party and, later, of a band of female warriors, the Desert Wraiths. Eventually Akina, one of the warriors joins the two of them in finding, attacking and overcoming the Serpent group before the Serpents are able to take the Tablet, which turns out to be a nuclear weapon, to destroy Berlin. In order to rid the world of knowledge of the weapon, the escaping Lady Mechanika and friends launch the weapon from the archaeologist's dirigible into the heart of the mountain below where other weapons of the same kind are thought to be hidden. Winifred returns to London with her grandfather; the scientist goes into hiding with another identity for cover; Lady Mechanika receives a coded thank you message from the leader of the Rosicrucian group. Vol. 3: The Lost Boys of West Abbey Set in West Abbey, a poor district of Mechanika City, the story begins with a young orphan boy and an attempt by his captor to trap the boy's mind in the body of a mechanical toy. Lady Mechanika's inability to recall her own origins prompt her, once the newspapers write about “secret mechanical experiments and murders,” to assist, unofficially, Detective Inspector Singh of the City police. In this she is aided by her friend, Mr Lewis. The bodies of five suffocated street urchins are found in a creepy basement mechanical workshop, each of them bearing on their foreheads blood-marks written in Hebrew. Having interviewed other urchin boys, the search is on for a man known only as “the toy man”, whose face is half covered by a scar. One of the boys has pickpocketed the toy man and taken a small Jewish relict, which is handed to