20th of Arrestre, Continued

The General's corpse lay in the hallway.

It was out of sight of the control room windows, but I could still see it, the shine of his boots catching in the corner of my eye as I sat at the operator's station and began trying to learn the controls.

I kept half-expecting him to reanimate and come up off the floor shooting at me. It took several long moments spent repeating desperately to myself that I had seen the deep slashes that laid his ribs open — and the slick pool by the map table where he had bled out all over the floor — in order to calm the frantic hitch in my heartbeat.

Abruptly, the ceiling sconces blinked back on, then the porthole fuzzed and flickered above me, and the deep hum of the engines started up.

Because Arramy was down in the propulsion room, bringing the airship back to life.

But not the General. The General won't be coming back to life... Focus, ninny. We are stealing the General's ship... Now you're smiling. Why are you smiling? There is something wrong with you, in your head... I bit my lower lip and scanned the control panel, making myself read the neat little placards above each toggle and dial and lever.

The listening device was the same as the one in the General's old office, at least, and had the earpiece and mouthpiece, but I had never seen an array of controls quite like this one before. 'Wave in.' 'Wave out.' Those were for the sonulator. Good. Fine. Then there were several dials that seemed to involve 'tethering' and 'wave sources,' with a small porthole that sported crosshairs hovering over a rolling coordinate grid that spun crazily when I touched the toggles marked 'altitude,' 'longitude,' 'latitude,' 'pitch,' and 'yaw.' I didn't have any idea what that meant, but the operators had used those dials when they were speaking to the other airships.

There was also the message tape machine, which I had seen plenty of times in the Headquarters, but never used. With no one to collect the messages, screeds of tape had been spooling out of the machine uninterrupted for several minutes, and a pile had grown beneath the machine.

I had just started scanning through the movement reports from the forces on the ground when the quiet tread of boots in the hall had me snapping around, my pulse leaping all over again.

Arramy came to a stop in the doorway, a pensive look on his face, his eyes following my reaction, noting the way I dropped everything and jerked myself up out of the operator's seat, well-ready to bolt.

I blinked, then slowly sat back down, trying to hide the shaking of my fingers in the cuffs of my jumpsuit sleeves. It was still so painfully new, seeing him there. It felt like I was dreaming.

"Do you know how to work that?"

I flinched again, his husky brogue doing something dangerous to my heart. He had asked a question and was waiting for an answer. I couldn't make my voice work. At all. My mouth refused to even move, so I settled for nodding hesitantly, and ran a hand through my hair. For the first time since it had been shaved off, I truly felt the change the Paradazh had written on me, unable to keep from seeing me through his eyes. Small. Filthy. Skinny. Wild, boyish hair, skeletal fingers, boney wrists, hollow eyes...

He was quiet for another few seconds, just watching me. Then he took a breath and let it out, that muscle flickering in his cheek again as he looked down at the floor, his throat bobbing visibly. Then he shook his head once as if coming to a decision, straightened, and stepped into the room, striding to the map table. "I need you to tell the airship approaching us to come about."

I pursed my lips and turned back to the controls. I had seen the operator working them. All I had to do was recreate what she had done. Simple. Yes. I closed my eyes. She had taken the mouthpiece out of its holster... then used the toggles on the rolling grid to... "Can you give me the airship's coordinates?" I asked, wincing at the sound of my own dry, scratchy words.

My voice had even changed. I couldn't remember when it had started going, exactly, but I had lost it while I was down in the General's prison, and now it grated like sandpaper, ugly and harsh, all the musical qualities that been trained into it replaced by a painful, broken, whispery alto. Not important. I ground my teeth and glanced over my shoulder at Arramy, waiting as he did a few rapid calculations on the map table.

"Sixty degrees latitude, one twenty-four long, altitude fifteen hundred seventy air meters."

Frowning, I began raising and lowering toggles until I thought the rolling grid was showing the right coordinates in the crosshairs. Then I picked up the mouthpiece, shoved the earpiece against my temple, and slapped the red 'tether' toggle down.

Nothing but the windy hiss of static.

I tried again, adjusting the altitude slowly, until a quick burst of vocal sounds made me tense. There, then gone. I rolled the altitude back up a little. It was like listening for someone shouting through a long tunnel in the wind. I caught another little snatch, then had to try again.

That time I caught the thread of conversation and slapped the tether down again. A stream of Paradazh echoed in my ear — an operator telling a commander on the ground that there was a group of rebel soldiers taking shelter behind a maintenance building in the Manufacturing parking yard.

I took a deep breath. Put on my best Paradazh. "Airship, this is the Fortress. Come about to..."

"Bearing line two-zero-four," Arramy whispered.

"Bearing line two-zero four," I repeated in Paradazh.

For a moment there was a pause in the chatter, and I froze, thinking I had got the hail wrong. Then a man said, briskly, "Reporting bearing line two-zero-four, aye sir."

I glanced back at Arramy and nodded.

A hint of a smile crinkled the corners of his eyes. "Read off the last few ground reports from the tape," he said quietly.

Turning, I took up the mass of message tape in wobbly fingers and drew it out straight, quickly finding the most recent break. "The seventh heavy division is in position at the south Manufactuing sector gate. They're taking fire, but nothing they can't handle. Waiting further orders."

"Tell them to re-rout to the Medical Sector and storm the rail lines."

Right. Another thing I had never done. I scooted over to sit in front of the rollotype machine jutting from the controls. I knew how to use that, at least. Now I just had to figure out how to fake a command from the General.

All the message tapes had included a sort of address ahead of the message.

What would the General's command address be? I took a moment to search the machine, then realized all of the previous messages were handily recorded on the machine's spent tape spool. I snatched it off its little spindle and yanked the tape free till I found it.

"Do I need to tether the wave to their current position?" I asked over my shoulder.

"Aye, but just the ground coordinates. Zero the altitude," Arramy said. Then, without any warning, he lunged for the floor, dropping below the top of the map table.

With a gasp I did the same, diving under the operator's station as a flyer engine went zipping past the airship window. Then a second. And a third.

Rigid with new tension, I huddled beneath the station desk, staring at Arramy.

He stared back, eyes glittering as he hunched his long frame into the shadow of the map table.

We stayed like that for several long, agonizing moments. Then Arramy got to his feet, checking the port and starboard windows. "They're gone," he said. "We need to work fast. We won't get that lucky again."

Biting back a groan, I pushed myself back up and sank into the operator's seat. With stiff, clumsy fingers I found the coordinates as Arramy gave them to me, and tethered to the wave, finding that strange, telltale tunnel of sound and centering in on it. Then I began punching out the General's command line, copying it from the spent spool. I followed that with the decoy message, all the while trying to ignore the rumble of an approaching airship.

Arramy swore under his breath and began jotting another set of co-ordinates on a scrap of paper before moving toward the hallway, handing me the paper as he passed me. "Those are two more land units. Send them to the Medical Sector rail line too."

My mouth went dry, panic threatening to wrap itself around my ribs at the thought of him leaving. "Where are you going?"

"I'm going to man the guns. Just keep working as long as you can," he called, already jogging down the hallway.

Next to me, the message tape machine began spewing a new screed, and I jumped, my breath coming in quick little jerks until the machine stopped whirring and clacking. Then I snatched the tape up.

"Message received," I whispered, reading the blocky Paradazh rollopress letters. "Proceeding to Medical Sector rail tunnel. Will report again on arrival."

They bought it.

Just keep working. Yes. Good. I swallowed around a hot lump in my throat and glanced down at the paper. Co-ordinates. Numb, I reached for the toggles on the rolling grid again, dialing it around to the intersection he had given me. Using the earpiece to tunnel in on the empty space. Then I tapped out the command line again, followed it with a command to pull back and re-route to the Med Sector rail tunnel.

I was halfway through the second set of coordinates when a line of tracer rounds pocked off the hull just above the control room, and the porthole window expoloded in a shower of crumbled hexglass. That was followed immediately by the steady, repetitive chack chack chack of heavy artillery fire reverberating through the ship.

Breathless, I turned to stare through the empty window frame, the cold evening air rushing into the cabin, sending papers and message tapes fluttering. A flyer engine careened past outside, the fish-like body streaming fire, its foldable wings disintegrating.

Arramy's hoarse shout jerked me back into action. "Kid! You alright?"

"I'm alright!" I called back, grinding my teeth when my vocal cords objected and my voice broke.

I whipped back around and began pecking out the General's command line on the rollotype.

Again, the ship's guns coughed, and Arramy yelled, "They're comin' in hot!"

"Re-route to Medical Sector rail tunnel, join heavy artillery unit," I muttered, pounding each letter into the tape.

A resounding boom echoed from somewhere belowdecks, and the airship swayed backward. A split-second later another, much larger explosion lit up the sky outside in a wall of bright white, the blast tearing through the air in choppy waves. In the next instant something struck the belly of the airship, and everything came to a screeching, shuddering halt.

The operator's chair tipped over and I hit the floor. My knees took the brunt of the fall, cracking against metal tile, pain stabbing down my shins and up my thigh bones. Ignoring it, I shoved myself back onto my feet, tottering unsteadily.

Everything was glowing, lit up from all sides. Then a rush of acrid, black smoke came billowing into the map room, bringing a flood of sparks swirling with it as it poured out through the gaping window frame.

"Arramy!" I coughed, terror clawing through my chest, eyes watering, lungs burning. Clamping an elbow over my nose, I took a shaky step toward the hallway. I had no idea what I was going to do, I only knew Arramy was in that, somewhere, and I had to find him. I took another step, then stopped, my heart skipping a painful beat.

Arramy was there in the smoke, coming toward me at a run, silver eyes fastened on me, teeth bared in a snarl. "Run!"

Choking, I turned and stumbled for the aft deck.

Strong arms caught my waist, hauling me through the archway and onto the aft landing platform as the airship began a slow death spiral, the deck beginning to tilt crazily. With us still on it.

The only thought in my head was getting off the ship before the gas in the huge lift chambers ignited.

Arramy staggered and I grabbed at his arm, somehow pulling him along, my muscles screaming as we barreled toward the flyers. On pure survival instinct I headed for the one the Counselor had already primed for release, driving my body forward even while great plumes of fire boiled upward into the sky from the forward end of the airship.

We were only a matter of meters from the flyer when an ominous tearing sound came from behind and below us, loud enough to be heard over the rush of wind and the squealing hiss of burning rubber. The airship's nose began rising.

Arramy shouted a curse and snagged the back of my jumpsuit with one hand as the new angle sent us skidding toward the flyer, a sickening view of the valley floor rolling out below us as the airship's tail swung downward.

My stomach lurched straight into my mouth.

We were falling, our feet skimming and slipping over the deck, then touching nothing but air.

A scream tore out of me, little more than a breath of air whistling from my throat as a gust of flames raced upward along the spine of the airship, the heat of it rippling over my skin.

Then, reaching wide, Arramy hooked the winch housing with his free arm, his big body straining as he took both his weight and mine. For a moment I hung there, suspended by the collar of my jumpsuit, the force of it yanking at my throat.

"I'm gonna swing ya toward the flyer, lass!" Arramy's harsh growl was my only warning before he jerked me out away from the deck, throwing me free of the airship — and straight at the tail fin of the flyer.

I had exactly half a second to twist myself around, and then I hit the taught waxed canvas of the flyer's hull, scraping along it until my hands found the slender rear edge of the upturned wing. Flyers are for flying! In! Get in the flyer! Still falling, I changed the trajectory of my momentum, curling my legs in and using the wing like a lever to flip myself up and over the top of the flyer in a move that would have made Marin proud. Another half-second.... Then I was landing in a graceless heap on the instrument panel inside the pilot compartment, my feet punching a webwork of cracks in the luxenglass wind guard.

Breathless, I scrabbled forward and fell into the footwell. Tried to get up. To get out of the way. To make room for Arramy. But there was a loud bang, and the flyer went shooting along its track, propelled from the deck by the taut release wires in the winch.

Time stopped. In slow motion, I brought my head up, staring wide-eyed over the back of the pilot compartment as the flyer burst free of its mooring, ejecting from the airship at a steep downward angle... Away from Arramy...

Everything was happening in blurry pieces, random details rolling into focus.

Heart pounding... Blistering heat... Straining to see, to get a last glimpse... Arramy letting go of the winch housing, kicking off the deck just as a wall of fire erupted from the tail section of the airship, lighting up the darkening sky.

Both of us dropping into thin air... Arramy spinning in wild free fall, alone... Flames licking along the nose of the flyer... Burning pieces of the airship's hide fluttering in the air next to my face...

I had mere seconds. Clinging to the steering yoke, I pulled myself back into the seat, wedged my knees into the footwell and turned to look at the control panel.

Dials. Toggles. Couldn't read any of it. Something else. Anything.

There.

Grappling gun.

No way to know if the line was long enough, no choice. I tore it out of the straps holding it to the wall of the compartment, whipped around, took aim at Arramy, and pulled the trigger.

The line zipped through the barrel, trailing after the spear end.

One heartbeat. Two...

The spear head arced past Arramy's shoulder, narrowly missing his left arm.

See it! See it...

With a jerk, the line yanked tight on its anchor point in the hull of the flyer and the gun tore from my hands.

The flyer jittered, beginning a tight leftward spiral as the added weight of something large created drag on that side. I wanted to turn, to make sure it was Arramy, but it was all I could do to hang onto the seat and stay inside the compartment as the spin shoved me hard against the opposite wall. Fighting centrifugal force and the rush of wind, I leaned over, straining with my left hand, reaching for the switch marked 'retract.' Once. Again, harder. I felt the little metal button punch downward. The faint whir of gears. Then, facing forward, I found myself looking at what we were hurtling toward: the earth coming up at us in a rapidly spinning vortex of trees and rocks and grass... fast... so fast... Not so fast though that I wasn't fully aware of how much time I didn't have. My heartbeat thundered in my ears, marking off the seconds as the grappling line hummed back into its reel. One. Two. Three. Too many. Too many —

Something struck the side of the compartment.

A blackened hand appeared, grabbing at the edge of the wind guard. Then Arramy was dragging himself over the padded rim of the compartment and into the pilot's seat. He planted his feet on the set of paddles in the footwell, got one hand on the steering yoke, then hit a toggle on the control panel.

The flyer's engine coughed and sputtered, stalled, then coughed again. He hit the toggle again. This time the lights came on in the compartment, the dials coming to life, the communications array glowing blue.

Another toggle.

The wings began moving into flight position.

I sucked in deep breaths, lungs heaving, my entire body tensing, bracing for the impact rushing up at us. The stony mountain slope was almost pretty, all rosy and golden in the light of the airship burning overhead...

Arramy hauled on the yoke and stomped on a paddle, throwing us out of the spin. The flyer shuddered, its lightweight frame shaking, its engine screaming as Arramy brought the nose inching up.

Somewhere above us, the airship's last lift chamber finally exploded. The whole thing began disintegrating, pulling apart at the seams. Pieces of it began raining down, the huge curve of the engine housing wheeling through the air just behind us, a broad chunk of tail section to our left, mangled railings and girders swiping at us with gnarled glowing fingers, showering the flyer with embers of burning rubber.

Arramy swore as a scorched place appeared on his pants eg, then another on his sleeve. I hissed as hot flecks spangled my face and clattered over my jumpsuit, catching in the fabric and biting holes wherever they landed.

Then the engine housing hit the ground beneath us with a dull thud, sending a plume of dirt and debris shooting upward. Small rocks and bits of wood peppered the belly of the flyer as Arramy wrestled the craft out of its dive, leveling out, the blue-light engine under our feet wailing like a wraith, carrying us away from the wreck.

For several long, impossible seconds, we shot off down the valley, buffeted heavily by the aftershocks of the massive forward section of the airship coming down behind us.

There were little coals everywhere, pattering over the floor, hissing against the wood of the footplate. With a ragged cry of alarm, I swatted and stomped on them as best I could, but still more bloomed on the flyer's waxy hide. Batting at the one on Arramy's arm, I got a blurry, jumpy glimpse of a smoldering hole eating away the flyer's left wing. More holes began spreading on the nose, tongues of fire and smoke streaming from them.

Then the flyer began shaking hard, shimmying to the left as the hole in the left wing grew, the edges glowing bright in the wind and sloughing sparks.

Hissing through his teeth, Arramy eased the nose downward, fighting the steering yoke hard to keep the flyer under control while once again we headed for the ground.

As if in a nightmare, the crater that was once the Headquarters yawned ahead of us, alight with small fires. In front of it, along the edge of the parade ground, there was now a makeshift barricade of rubble facing the Manufacturing Sector. From our vantage point a hundred meters in the air, the pop and flash of artillery was visible on both sides, flickering in the dusk, large bore incendiary rounds tearing across the broad stretch of open bomb-pocked ground between them.

We were going down in that.

It was like preparing to drown. I dug my fingers into the padded seat, slammed my feet into the space beneath the control panel. Gulped for air. Saw mounds of dirt and torn up turf blurring past. Heard Arramy shouting over the roar of the engine, "Hold on, kid! Hold on!"

Then the flyer dipped hard left, the wing ripped off, and the belly slammed into the sloped side of a bomb crater.  

AN: 

So... *wrings fingers* 

Any notes???

(Don't worry, this isn't the end! Just thought I'd say that, in case you were... ya know... wondering...)