Chapter 7

The hangar was crawling with Simon’s men as they prepared the airship for flight. The sun had just risen an hour or so earlier, and yet the men had been working for some time. The preparations needed for the launching of an airship as large as the Iron Dove were numerous but Simon had been determined to have the ship ready for his friend as soon as possible. He had not disappointed.

“Goodness, Simon. You employ this many people?” Levi marveled at the orchestration going on around him as he and the rest of the little group first entered the hangar and sat their things down, waiting for boarding. He hadn’t seen this kind of concentrated activity since the War.

“I told you I was a popular man around these parts,” Simon said, smiling. “Besides, the courier business pays pretty well. If you want something done right, you take it to Spriggs. Now, aren’t you going to introduce me to your fine company?”

“Yes, of course. Simon Spriggs, this is Abigail Graner, Quincy Boone, and my partner Hank Matthews.”

“Ms. Graner, it’s a pleasure,” Simon said, taking her hand and bowing extravagantly.

“Hello, Mr. Spriggs. Thank you for your assistance.”

Simon stood back up straight as Abigail spoke. A more mischievous smile crossed his face, then, and he glanced over at Levi before speaking.

“A German? Heh. I thought we fought to keep you people out of our country.”

“Simon – ” Levi began to warn before Abigail cut him off.

“I am from Anchor, actually. And we fought to keep you out of ours.”

“Anchor, huh? We had a little experience with that place, right Levi?”

“Leave off, Simon.” Levi’s words were quiet, but the other man got the hint.

“Of course, of course. My apologies, ma’am, I was only joking around. We Walton folk are known for our poor senses of humor.”

“Indeed. Please excuse me, I’d like to get some air,” she said, moving off toward the other end of the hangar and the large grass field beyond.

“Well done, you idiot,” Levi said, watching Abigail go.

“It’s alright, I’ll make it up to here. I meant no harm.”

“Be that as it may, son, some people are more sensitive about such things. However, it’s nice of you to be takin’ us up.” Quincy nodded his hat before following Abigail through the hangar.

“I’m off to a great start with your friends, Levi.”

“If you weren’t so… yourself, things would probably be okay.”

“Guilty as charged.”

“I’m going to go on aboard if that’s fine,” Hank said, looking toward the massive airship.

“Yes, go right up. Just ask one of the men to show you to your rooms.”

As Hank moved off toward the waiting ship, Levi shook his head and moved closer. He hadn’t seen Simon in about a year but it felt as if no time had passed at all. That’s why Levi felt comfortable slapping the man on the back of his head.

“You are seriously that stupid? Good God, Simon, she’s a passenger on your ship. You participated in practically leveling her entire world to the ground. Do you have to be a jerk, too?”

“I’ll have you recall that you helped with that little venture, too, you know.”

Levi glanced over to where Abigail stood before speaking.

“That was a war. This is business. There’s no reason to blend the two.”

“War was business for a while there.”

“But not anymore. Your pay will be docked if you act like that again.”

“Speaking of which,” Simon said as he moved over toward his desk, “here’s your bill. I’ll be expecting payment within a week of return. That’s the best I can do for a friend.”

Levi looked down at the final cost and gasped.

“Are you serious? This is a completely ridiculous sum.”

“Supply and demand, brother. I have an airship and you need one. Besides, those are my going rates.”

“And what’s this addition here at the bottom? It almost doubles the fee.”

“That would be compensating for a hazardous work environment.”

“What hazardous work environment?”

“You’re wanting to go on a trip to North Mine and back. That’s roughly three days up, three days back. That’s almost an entire week up in the northern pirate territory. Before the other day, I wouldn’t have needed to charge such things but times they are changing. That’ll also cover expenses in ammunition and the like.”

“So the ship will be flying armed?”

“Of course. I may be known as somewhat daring at times, but I’m not stupid.”

“Alright, fine. But if we make it through all of this without any contacts, which I expect we will, then I want that extra fee removed.”

“Fair enough.”

With a sigh, Levi signed the contract and took his copy, tucking it into an inner coat pocket. He knew that he would probably catch some heat for agreeing to such a figure, but Simon had told the truth. They needed an airship and another one wouldn’t be available for quite a few days. While there wasn’t an extreme urgency to his mission, he wanted to get it over with as soon as possible, all the same.

He took a moment to inform Abigail and Quincy that they could board the ship if they wished, then did so himself. He walked slowly up the gangway, a feeling of familiarity settling upon him as he did. He had, of course, been on a number of airships since the war. It was hard, in a world like Franklin Reach, to avoid it. But there was something special about the Iron Dove. It was, after all, the same model of ship as the Tallahassee, and as such evoked a lot of memories. As the wood creaked below his feet, he felt both disgust and a sense of belonging that threatened to overwhelm his senses. It was always hard, but he managed.

True to his word, Levi could tell that Simon had been working his men to the bone in order to get the ship ready for travel. The deck was in order, to Levi’s trained eye, and all that was left to do was the little things like check food stuffs, make sure that line was properly tied, check that hatch for security. The crew knew what they were doing and that lightened Levi’s mood a bit. It was always good to see people doing something they obviously knew how to do well.

His trained eye also keyed him in on something else. At the front of the deck, something stood covered in a dark grey tarpaulin. Hank and Abigail may be fooled by the simple covering, he thought, but he was positive of what lay beneath. For one, the shape was recognizable, at least to him and for another; without looking he knew what was stationed there during the War: a dual heavy machine gun setup. Tipping the scales at well over two hundred pounds, the two water-cooled guns were fixed to a quick-swivel mount, allowing the operator to swing the guns about quickly and put large quantities of bullets on target. It was outdated even by the end of the war and yet Simon had seen fit to keep it. That brought a slight nostalgic smile to his face.

Their captain had not, however, lingered in the past in all things. At a few more positions not as well concealed sat the newer Browning M1919s; the air-cooled younger brothers to the behemoths at the front. Weighing in at just over thirty pounds, there were fast and mobile, allowing for optimum positioning on the deck during an engagement. Though they had only just starting rolling off the production lines as the War came to an end, Levi had manned one for a time and could safely say that their performance was satisfactory.

Last but not least, as he took his inventory of the ship’s deck armaments, was the three inch gun that sat upon the raised aft deck. Armed with kinetic or incendiary rounds, the gun was a true ship killer. It, like so many other devices of death, came late to the war but Levi had witnessed its capabilities. With three or four ships so armed circling a battle barge, it was only a matter of time. He marveled at what he saw, curious about the itch he felt in his bones. Ironically, the ship was rather underpowered when compared to how it had been armed during the war. While he knew that Simon would have lower gun ports to defend from attacks from below, most of the weapons had been removed to decrease weight and presumably increase cargo capacity. He figured, however, that the current layout was more than enough to deal with your typical pirate ship.

After a time, Levi and the others settled into their quarters, such as they were. Simon had put up some temporary walls on one end of the crew’s barracks, allowing a little comfort for his guests. Despite the effort, though, Levi couldn’t help but feel like he was back on the warships of old. Even the creaks in the floorboards sounded familiar as he moved his bags about. It seemed that they had at least been provided true beds, which was better than the cots the rest of the crew had to deal with. He told himself to thank Simon for that later. In the meantime, he checked in on his guests.

At first, he couldn’t find Quincy. It was little surprise, a few moments later, when he found him down in the belly of the ship with the crew, going over the machinery. Abigail seemed to have completely forgotten Simon’s words and appeared to be in a sunny mood, which made Levi glad. He didn’t want her in a foul mood just because of Simon. Last but not least, he found Hank up on the deck, looking out the end of the open hangar, seemingly bored. There was nothing to be done for it, though, so Levi made his way to the bridge and waited for Simon to cast off.

It took a little waiting, but finally the Iron Dove was ready to begin its voyage. The vessel shook slightly as the mooring lines that held it to the earth were released and it rose into the air. The forward propellers churned to life and slowly the airship glided out of the hangar and into the clear blue sky. Once the building was cleared, the lateral propellers, those that aided the ship in quickly moving up and down, also kicked on and soon the ship was rising above the small city. The four members of the group gathered on the deck to watch Walton Harbor slowly shrink, a thin black trail of smoke still wafting up from the area of the harbor itself.

There was nothing quite like airship travel, Levi had to admit. The speeds weren’t high enough to feel like everything was flying by – as long as the captain wasn’t in a hurry – and yet they were high enough to get you places quickly. It was an interesting dynamic that generated a feeling of only subtle motion, much like a cloud. In fact, they soon found themselves gliding up near the fluffy white clouds of a typical Reach day, Walton Harbor diminishing to nothing back behind them. It was hard to stay sullen in such an atmosphere and Levi soon warmed to Simon again, as did the others.

“So, Mr. Spriggs – ” Abigail started.

“Ah, now. I’m Simon to you.”

“Simon, then. You run a delivery service?”

“Right as rain, dear. My father had himself a small postal delivery setup back at home. Worked for him all my life ‘til I was finally able to get out of the house. But the idea stuck and, low and behold, I’m still doing it; with a few alterations, of course.”

“Like the guns?”

“Like the guns. Just a little protection in these worried times,” Simon said dramatically, bowing his head. He was dressed in something that strangely resembled the stereotypical cowboy of the past century, including the leather vest, jean pants, faded red shirt, and a long coat, and upon his head sat what looked to be an old, worn cowboy hat. Complementing the hat, an officer’s saber rested on one hip, balanced by a Webley revolver on the other. All in all, Levi found the entire getup rather humorous but he tried not to say much about it. It was Simon’s ship, after all. As he walked up to Abigail and Simon, though, he couldn’t help it.

“So you’re, what, a cowboy now? That’s rather impressive. I didn’t think they let horses on airships nowadays.” Simon had just rolled his eyes and pulled his coat in closer.

“I’ll have you know that these clothes are both stylish and functional. It all translates rather well to the airship lifestyle. Besides,” he said, quickly drawing his pistol and dropping into a silly pose, “I just look that good.” It was Levi’s turn to roll his eyes.

“I, for one, find it a very bold statement,” Abigail said. It was hard to figure out what, exactly, she thought that statement to be but neither man decided to ask her. There were too many opportunities to be made fun of in such a venture. Instead, they simply smiled, nodded, and moved on to other topics.

“But it’s a fine day for flying,” Simon said, looking out past the deck.

“That it is. Remember how they used to try getting ships and their captains? All of those posters showing some place in Kansas, claiming it was the Reach. Heh. Good stuff.”

“Why they didn’t just take pictures of the actual Reach is beyond me. This is much more impressive than Kansas.”

“That it is,” Levi and Abigail said simultaneously, looking out.

A short time later, as the sun was starting to set, the two found themselves relatively alone, standing up near the front guns right up at the railing, looking out at the massive expanses beyond. Levi knew that he wasn’t poet enough to ever do the fields of Franklin Reach credit in their description. They were simplistic to an extreme, and that was, perhaps, their most awe-inspiring characteristic. Spread out as far as the eye could see were gigantic fields of grass, yellow and green in the glaring sun. Close by, Levi knew that the grasses were anywhere from three to ten feet in height and acted as a cover for many interesting creatures. By human standards, ten feet was relatively tall grass but off to the west, just at the horizon, the Green Sea could be made out. It was a mighty forest of brilliant green grass that stood on average over one hundred feet in height. It had garnered almost as much attention as the Abascal bushes had when first discovered and was about as dangerous.

As they watched, a small herd of Olympus buffalo moved below them in the same general direction. Even from their respectable cruising height, the creatures were huge. They could make out the large manes that rested on their backs as their massive heads rose and fell as they moved along the plain. They occasionally slowed to a stop and drank at lakes or snacked on the ample grasses, but mostly they ran and their speed was impressive. Though the airship wasn’t going close to its maximum speed, it was moving along at a fair clip and yet the herd was having little trouble keeping up. In fact, a hunting party of airships had been established once a number of years ago in order to kill and return an Olympus buffalo. It was reasoned that, with proper storage and treatment, just one buffalo could feed the then rather small Meadowshire for months. As the trip wore on, however, the hunters realized that their ships weren’t capable of keeping up with their prey and soon abandoned their quest.

“Do you ever find yourself just…staring in this place,” Abigail asked, eyes still trained to the animals far below.

“All the time. It’s hard not to, even after all the time I’ve spent here. I mean, it’s not every day that you get to see animals the size of houses running around.”

“Are there such things at the mine we’re going to?”

“Some, yes. The buffalo generally stay away from the bushes, but they walk by the check things out on occasion. They generally have to shoot at them to make them go away; generally not a good idea to have those things close to buildings and whatnot. At the mine, though, you’ll get some of the smaller creatures, like tolag rabbits, stone birds, and maybe even some of those little goblin things.”

“Goblin things?”

“They’re… well, they’re hard to explain. You just have to see one to really get a picture of the thing. They walk upright, have yellow skin, big ears, big eyes, and stand about three to four feet high. They’re usually harmless. They live in the bushes. It’s the only places they’ve ever been found, actually. They have a crude intelligence – they like throwing rocks and will poke you with a stick if you don’t watch them – but can’t talk or anything. We usually try to just let them by but you bump into a nest of them on occasion with working the mines.”

“I see. This is a very strange place I’ve come to, it would appear. Not at all like Anchor.”

“That’s right,” Levi said hesitantly, “you’re from Anchor. It’s a beautiful world.”

“That it is; but in a more normal sense, I think. It is much like Germany. This, though…this is something completely different.” She suddenly changed direction. “So you know Anchor? You were there during the war, yes?”

“I was there, yes.”

“I see.” She did not speak for some time, and Levi feared to break the silence. It was hard talking to someone whose world you helped destroy. After a time, though, she spoke again. “Will you tell me about it? You said you would someday.”

There was no malice in her voice or features and so Levi nodded his head.

“I came in during the Second Wave; after they started using Travers Stabilizers to let us gate in further from the Source. Spent some time in the fields west of Broken Oak with the flotilla, getting the ships ready to fly. It takes a while to move an airship through a gate. We finally got her into the air and… we went about our duty. About two months later, Anchor surrendered and I got to return home.”

He left out a lot of the gritty details, like how the first thing they did after getting airborne was bombard the town of Broken Oak such that it earned its namesake. Or how he had spent a week on roadway patrol, destroying anything trying to move west. These were things he was fairly sure she didn’t want to hear about. Her next question, however, said otherwise.

“Did you participate in the sacking of Schiedheim?” Her voice was calm, controlled.

“I was in the flotilla that attacked the capital, yes. But you have to understand, I was just following orders. It was a war, after all. Sometimes things have to be done that aren’t particularly – ”

“Levi,” she said, gently resting a hand on his arm. “It’s okay. I understand. No reason to get flustered.”

This reaction was completely beyond him. He would probably be furious if he talked to the person who had bombarded the devil out of his home town. He was actually going to question her about her lack of anger when the airship suddenly gave a violent jerk and started shaking before the sounds of the engines died off. On instinct, Levi quickly put one arm around Abigail and grabbed the ship’s railing with the other.

“Hold on tight.”

“What’s going on,” Abigail asked, frightened.

Before he could answer, the Iron Dove began to list to the left and loose items started sliding down the deck. Holding on tightly to both Abigail and the railing, Levi glanced over his shoulder toward the bridge to see what was going on. Unfortunately, all he could see were a few men doing just as he was. At least they knew how to handle themselves, he thought, strangely detached.

Only a moment later, the vessel gave another lurk as the engines could be heard kicking back to full power. The deck leveled out and the crew rushed out to keep anything else from falling over the side. Levi relaxed and looked at Abigail.

“Are you alright?”

“Yes, thanks to you. What happened?”

“Lateral engines died. This type of ship needs propellers to stay in the air; the balloons only help with lift by lightening the load. But this thing has at least two redundancy systems in place. They shouldn’t have died like that. I wonder…”

The door to the bridge flew open and Quincy was harshly shoved out. He was quickly followed by a group of men covered in grease and grim and behind them walked Simon, his hat sitting slightly ajar atop his head. He seemed to be marginally upset.

“What in the bloody hell is wrong with you, old man? You could’ve killed us all.”

“Oh, nonsense,” Quincy said, slowly backing up. “This ship would have loft for a good fifteen minutes before anything bad happened. So we tipped over a bit. That’s a cargo loading problem, not a mechanical one.”

“Why you…” Simon took a deep breath and started again. “What were you even doing down there?”

“Glad you asked, son. I was sitting in my room and I heard a little bit of a sputter from one of your motors. Well, I thought, seein’ as how I’m the resident machinist on this ship, I’d go and take a look at it. And your mechanics were more than willing for the help at the time, too,” he said, pointing at the dirty men. They suddenly started acting rather sheepish, as though they didn’t want to be in the direct line of sight of their captain.

“And they let you work on it?”

“Don’t meanin’ to be pointing fingers, now. I do apologize, especially to those who were on the deck,” he said, sparing Levi and Abigail a quick nod. “But you check your oil pressure now. You’ll find it’s a fair click higher. She’ll run smooth for a lot longer now.”

“While I thank you for your assistance,” Simon said, slowly, exhibiting more diplomatic skill than Levi had ever seen him possess, “I would prefer if my ship didn’t fall out of the sky again. So stay away from the engine room.”

From the look on Quincy’s face, one would have thought that Simon had just told him his favorite pet was dead. But he nodded all the same.

“Oh, alright. Won’t happen again, I promise ya that.”

“Good.”

The group dispersed, with Quincy and the others making their way back below deck. Simon, shaking his head, walked over to Levi and Abigail. Resting his hand on his saber, he gave a deep sigh and blinked heavily at Levi.

“You could have warned me that one of my passengers was going to be trouble.”

“And what if I had?”

“Would’ve thrown him in a box or something. Bloody man almost hurt my baby.”

“Your ship’s fine,” Levi chuckled. Abigail, too, had a smile on her face. “It’s better than fine, now. You’re a lucky man.”

“Don’t know why you two seem so amused, you almost fell to your deaths.”

Abigail shrugged.

“That’s just our Quincy for you.”

“Yes, well I… what’s that?”

Simon’s attention had moved off past the two on the deck and came to focus on a small dot off some distance in the sky. It could’ve just been a bird or a trick of shadow in the clouds at sunset, but he and Levi had seen this sort of thing too often to ignore it. Calling out to his observer, he walked on up the deck to the front and took a looking glass from the man that quickly appeared. He stared off into the red, glowing clouds for a time before turning and looking at Levi and his men.

“Single runner. Too small to be far from home, but I don’t see a launch source. Two men, post up on the starboard machine guns. Leave the duel covered for now. Chamber a round in the three-incher just to be safe.” As his men scurried off to do his bidding, Simon looked at Levi. “I don’t know what we have here. Doesn’t seem like your typical pirate maneuver.”

“And it’s getting dark. It would be risky trying to hit us now.”

“It’s still a ways off. We’ll see when it gets closer.”

And so they did. After about ten minutes, after failed attempts at contacting the ship with the radio, Simon ordered the signal lights to flare. The large beacon flashed out a specific pattern, telling the smaller ship to identify itself. A few moments later, a light blinked back, saying it was an ally. Of course, in these pirate-infested days there was no way they could take that as the truth, but the possibility of an ambush waned further as the sun dipped below the horizon.

At last, the ship came into view, glowing beneath the spotlights shining on it from the Iron Dove. It was an exceptionally small vessel, with room for only four people or so, though it only seemed to house one. It had a small balloon attached to its top, but mainly seemed powered by two small sets of propellers. It was only a short-range vessel, Levi knew, generally used for ship-to-ship and ship-to-ground activities. The fact that it was so far from any identified home airship was curious, to say the least.

It gave a wide berth to the Iron Dove before it was finally given the signal to approach. Machine guns trained on its cabin, the pilot cast a few tie lines over, which were quickly caught and attached to the deck. The ship was then pulled in close enough for a small gangplank to be thrown across. The captain of the small ship quickly moved across, not even sparing a glance downward at the drop below. He was a short, somewhat fat man with grey hair that was more than starting to fall out. His face and clothing which consisted of what was once a white jumpsuit was covered in soot and he seemed to be banged and scraped in a few places. After a few deep breaths, he looked around and somehow identified Simon as the captain.

“Thank goodness I found you. I thought I’d have to fly all the way back to Walton. Do you have a radio?” The man spoke in quick, nervous bursts in an oddly high-pitched voice.

“Who are you? What’s going on?”

“I’m Matthew. I was the helmsman on the Italian Gold, a cargo ship on its way to the railroad construction site. We were traveling with the Redcar, another cargo ship. We were just flying along, minding our own business, when a large ship was spotted off the portside. We hailed it but we didn’t get any response. It just kept coming right at us. Well, we knew then what was going on.”

The man stopped to take another breath and glanced around at his audience to make sure he had their full attention.

“They did a couple fly-bys with some runners before moving in the people-movers. They ransacked the ships pretty good, but they didn’t really take all that much. They loaded up their movers, to be sure, but it wasn’t like what you hear pirate attacks are like. They seemed to be looking for someone. Well, they obviously didn’t find whoever it was. So they scuttled both of us. The ships were set ablaze and they just flew off, leaving us there. We only managed to save one of the runners by the time we hit the ground. Everyone else stayed to help the wounded and whatnot. So I took the runner to find help.”

Everyone on the deck shared meaningful glances. It was about the worst news that a ship could receive and it would darken morale greatly. Levi was forced to admit that perhaps they wouldn’t be able to get through this little adventure without pirate contact. Looking about, though, he was reassured in this vessel’s battle worth. They wouldn’t be as easy to take down as a cargo ship. Simon had moved closer to the man, resting his hand upon his shoulder.

“Don’t worry, you’re safe now. We’ll radio back and get some help flying this way. We’ll tie your runner off and go see what we can do to help. He about you let one of my men take you down below? You could use some rest.”

“He can use my room,” Levi said. Simon nodded at that.

“To Levi’s room, then. We’ll talk more, Matthew.”

Without complaint, Matthew was led down below deck. Simon set his crew about their new tasks and returned to Levi and Abigail. Where once the blue sky had been the epitome of freedom and openness, the darkness took on a sinister air. He sighed once more.

“This may change things. We can still turn back if you’d like.”

Levi shook his head.

“No. First off, we need to check on survivors. Then we continue on.”

“Why is this trip so important to you, Levi?”

“I don’t know,” he said, honestly. “But we just have to keep going.”

“Alright,” Simon nodded. “We’ll keep going.”

The night progressed quickly. Radio messages were thrown back to Walton Harbor while others were thrown forward in a futile attempt to contact anyone. The radios weren’t necessary, however. After about an hour of flight in the pitch darkness of the Franklin Reach night, the faint glow of fire could be seen on the horizon. Within another half-hour, the full extent of the damage could be seen. It was going to be a long night.