The Lost Compass

by Joel Ross

  I started to say something about fancy dances, then noticed the Assemblers eyeing me like I was an upper-slopes lordling. The adults peered at me quickly, while the kids giggled and nudged one another.

  Isandra and Isander even offered me a ride in the elevator. I said no, but Bea hopped around, squealing, “Me! Oh, me, I’ll go!”

  “You don’t want to see the gearslingers’ shops instead?” Hazel asked Bea offhandedly.

  I scratched my cheek to hide a smile. I knew that Hazel just wanted Bea to stay close to the rest of us so we could keep an eye on her.

  Bea immediately forgot about the “up-and-downer” and dragged us to the garages on the second floor. When we stepped inside, she gasped in awe, then called a friendly greeting to a machine near the door. Foggium compressors hissed, and tools drilled and whirred.

  Swedish and Hazel wandered off, while Bea tugged me and Loretta past deflated dirigible skins toward some Subassembly gearslingers in a spark-welder workshop.

  “And look at you!” Bea said to a wall of transparent nanofiber. “Such a pretty, flitty glide-wing.”

  “That’s a glide-wing?” I asked.

  “Of course! What’d you think it was?”

  “Um. A wall.”

  She slugged me in the arm. “It’s leaning against the wall!”

  “Oh.” I rubbed my arm and looked closer. The fiber glide-wing wasn’t quite as long as the wall, but it was close. “Right.”

  “What good is gliding?” Loretta asked.

  “The idea is to save fuel.” Bea trailed her fingers across the nanofiber. “You turn off your engine and glide. But it takes more fuel to carry a wing than you save by—” She spun toward a worktable. “Look at that gyroscope! Look at the gimbals!”

  “I would,” I told her, “if I knew what a gimbal was.”

  “It’s a ball of gim,” Loretta said. “Obviously.”

  Bea slugged me in the arm again, giggling. “Silly!”

  “Hey! What’d you hit me for?”

  “But that poor tes-array.” Bea frowned at some disassembled gear. “See how unbalanced he is?”

  “The balance is fine,” a leathery-looking gearslinger said from the worktable.

  Bea wrinkled her nose. “The spindle arms are cattywampus.”

  “What’s ‘cattywampus’?” the gearslinger asked.

  “‘Cattywampus’ is bad,” I told the gearslinger.

  “And ‘purple’ is good,” Loretta explained.

  “You’re the kid!” the woman gasped, shocked and thrilled.

  I lowered my head in embarrassment. “Yeah, I guess.”

  “She’s not talking about you, lug nut,” Loretta said, elbowing me.

  She was right. The leathery lady was staring at Bea. “You’re the girl who fixed the warships! Captain Nisha told us all about you.” She raised her voice. “Hey, everyone! It’s the geargirl from the Anvil Rose!”

  9

  GREASE-SPECKLED GEARSLINGERS CROWDED around Bea and started pelting her with technical questions. Loretta and I hung around until I was sure that Bea was okay, then slunk away. The air smelled of oil and iron shavings as we pushed through one of the heavy curtains that divided the garage.

  We found Hazel sitting with the legless guy from the mess hall at a desk cluttered with brass and springwork devices. “This is Captain Osho,” she told us. “He’s been farther across the Fog than anyone. He flew for months—and used this gear to get back.”

  “What’s that one?” Loretta asked, pointing at a boxlike thing.

  “A chronometer,” the captain told her. “You need a fixed time standard to calculate your airship’s longitude.”

  “I do?” she asked.

  When Captain Osho laughed, his beard shifted like an animal’s pelt. “I mean, a captain does,” he said.

  “Oh.” Loretta pointed to a brass disk with hinged arms. “How about that one?”

  “It’s an astrolabe!” Hazel said.

  “That’s right,” the captain said, reaching for another device. “And this is a crossbow quadrant. . . .”

  “Wow,” Loretta said as we slipped away. “That’s a hundred new kinds of boring.”

  “Yeah,” I said. “Where’s Swede?”

  “Playing bootball on the first floor.”

  “You don’t play?” I asked her.

  “Not anymore. I kept getting penalties for . . . y’know.”

  “Stabbing the other team?” I guessed.

  “No.” She sighed. “Stabbing is against the stupid rules. I just kicked too hard.”

  “There’s no penalty for kicking the ball too hard!”

  “Not the ball,” she said. “The players.”

  So Bea tested Subassembly technology, Hazel researched navigational techniques, Swedish made friends with bootball players, and Loretta and I focused on the important stuff: complaining about how bored we were.

  The two of us spent the day together, getting lost in the hallways, swiping food from the kitchen, and trying not to worry about Mrs. E. Well, at least I was trying not to worry. Loretta never worried much. She just figured that if any problem arose, she’d punch it in the earlobe.

  When we met the rest of the crew in the mess hall for dinner, Bea chattered about the new gear, but I heard an undercurrent of nervousness in her voice. And Swedish, Hazel, and I kept exchanging silent glances. None of us could relax until we checked on Mrs. E.

  When we crowded into the infirmary, we found Mrs. E sitting up in her bed, a tired smile on her face. A kimono pooled around her frail body, and her eyes looked like her eyes again. Pale, but not white.

  Bea bounded forward for a hug. Before she could ram Mrs. E, Swedish caught her and swooped her into the air with a sudden laugh. He lowered Bea to kiss Mrs. E’s cheek. Then everyone starting talking at once. Telling her everything that she’d missed from before we left the junkyard.

  “—then we stole a thopper,” Bea babbled, her voice rising above the hubbub. “Such a purple mayfly! But militia ships came after us, with flamethrowers and cannons, and Swedish crash-landed and—”

  “That wasn’t a crash,” Swedish said. “That was as soft as a kitten’s purr.”

  “—and the engine exploded!” Bea continued. “I think because the seals melted? Or maybe the—”

  “I’m so glad.” Hazel pressed Mrs. E’s hand. “I’m so glad.”

  I didn’t know what to say, so I just stood there watching Mrs. E’s face. Every flicker of humor in her eyes was a miracle.

  “Don’t tire her out,” the doctor told us from the corner.

  After quieting for a moment, Bea couldn’t contain herself: she bounced on a nearby cot and told Mrs. E about hitching a ride on the Anvil Rose and fleeing from Kodoc, and how I’d dived off the Predator. Except according to Bea, all the really exciting stuff centered around engines and propellers. So the rest of us chimed in, until Hazel wrapped up with a description of my Fog test, and Swedish added a list of all the food we’d eaten since we arrived.

  Mrs. E smiled faintly. “Roasted eel sounds grand. Now where’s Loretta? Come here, child, let me see you.”

  Loretta slunk from behind Swedish. “I don’t look like much.”

  “Nonsense,” Mrs. E said, peering at her. “You look like a girl of rare sense and strength.”

  “I do?”

  “You do. Perfect for my Swedish.”

  “That’s what I keep telling him!” Loretta said, her eyes bold again. “You know what he’s like, though, the big lug nut.”

  Swedish muttered, “What I’m like is ‘standing right here.’”

  Mrs. E caught me making mocking kissy faces at Bea and said, “When you’re done with that, Chess, why don’t you tell why they tested you?”

  I unpuckered my lips. “They want me to dive for them. To find some map that leads to the Compass.”

  “Before Kodoc does,” Bea added.

  Mrs. E frowned, then looked at Hazel, a silent question in her gaze.

  “I don’t kno
w what to think,” Hazel admitted. “The cogs aren’t telling us everything. They’re keeping secrets.”

  “You don’t trust them?”

  “I trust them to protect Port Oro.”

  “That’s an important job.”

  “I guess.” Hazel tucked a braid behind her ear. “But it’s not mine. My job is protecting us.”

  “But is that enough?” Mrs. E asked, her voice fading slightly.

  “She got us here, didn’t she?” Swedish demanded. “Nobody else could’ve done that.”

  “Nobody else could’ve come close,” I added.

  “That’s why Hazy’s the cap’n,” Bea said.

  “She’s way more than enough,” Loretta agreed. “Sometimes she’s too much.”

  “I didn’t mean to criticize Hazel,” Mrs. E said, a weak smile on her wrinkled face. “She is the best example I know of the saying ‘Fall down seven times, stand up eight.’”

  “Chess is better,” Hazel told her. “He’s fallen down a thousand times.”

  “What I mean is . . . if Kodoc gets the Compass, he’ll be a danger to everyone. Defending Port Oro might be the only way to defend ourselves.”

  I scratched at the bandage on my leg. All I cared about was the crew, but maybe Mrs. E was right. Maybe the best way to protect us was to protect everyone.

  “So what should we do?” Hazel asked, taking one of Mrs. E’s hands in both of hers.

  “I don’t . . .” Mrs. E’s voice trailed off. “I’m not sure.”

  “Well, what do you think?” Bea asked.

  “I think . . .” Mrs. E closed her eyes briefly. “I think you should spend a day on the Port. Listen to what the cogs tell you. And then . . .” She opened her eyes and looked at Hazel. “Do your job.”

  10

  AFTER BREAKFAST THE next morning, we headed to the sixth floor, where the skyscraper connected to the mountain.

  A sort of airlock opened onto a wide cable bridge that stretched a hundred yards before reaching a square building on the mountain. The alumina planking swayed underfoot, and Loretta groaned when she saw the drop.

  “I don’t know why you’re scared of heights,” Swedish said. “You’re not scared of anything else.”

  “Because I can’t stab heights,” she told him.

  We crossed through the square building, where heavy posts anchored the bridge to the ground, then stepped onto the mountain.

  “Port Oro,” Hazel announced, with a spin that made her skirt twirl.

  Bea hopped up and down like she was testing the firmness of the ground under her feet. “Not too bad,” she decided.

  I laughed at her—then I started jumping up and down, too. Enjoying the solid earth of Port Oro underfoot for the first time. Swedish grabbed Loretta and spun her in a circle. She gave a happy shriek, and Hazel kept twirling and twirling.

  Finally, breathless, we stopped—and everyone looked faintly embarrassed. Swedish cracked his knuckles. Loretta checked her knife. Hazel smoothed her skirt, I tugged my hair over my freak-eye, and Bea skipped uphill along a path of crushed asphalt, singing, “Port Oro, Port Oro, we’re on Port Oro!”

  We followed her past cramped huts and neat two-story houses that lined the road. Carts rattled on the bustling street, and shrieking kids chased a pigeon behind a woven-plastic tent.

  A lady in a straw hat watched us from a doorway. When we got closer, she called out, “Hey there, kids.”

  My hands clenched into loose fists. What did she want? Why was she talking to us? My junkyard survival instincts kicked in, and I stepped in front of Bea, while Loretta started drifting in a wide circle to flank the woman.

  I swept the street with my gaze and didn’t spot any threats, . . . but I didn’t know what threats looked like in Port Oro, and my ignorance scared me.

  As Swedish edged toward the doorway, Hazel cautiously said, “Hello.”

  “Headed to the market?” the lady asked.

  “Maybe,” Hazel said.

  “Nice day for it,” the lady said.

  “Okay,” Hazel said, and tilted her head a half inch.

  The head-tilt meant “keep moving,” so I slunk past, keeping Bea close behind me. A minute later, Loretta fell into step beside me with the sharp alertness of a hunting cat, and Swedish and Hazel brought up the rear.

  At the end of the block, I exhaled in relief. “What did she want?”

  “I think,” Hazel said, tucking a braid behind her ear, “I think she wanted to say hello.”

  “Why?” Loretta asked.

  “Maybe that’s what they do here,” Hazel said.

  Loretta squinted at her. “But . . . why?”

  “Just to be friendly!” Bea said.

  We teased her for being such a baby—nobody would say hello to a bunch of slumkids just to be nice—and followed the road into a neighborhood where smokestacks rose above stone cottages. Higher on the mountain, pinwheel-blimps spun overhead, powering machines below . . . and two more people said hello.

  “Next time, you try it,” I told Loretta. “Say hello to someone.”

  “I’m not trying it. You try it.”

  “I don’t even like saying hello to people I know.”

  “Hi, there!” Bea called to an old guy wheeling a chickpea cart. “I’m Bea!”

  The old guy peered at her. “Well, hello, Bea.”

  “Hello!”

  “Are you . . . lost?”

  “Not really,” she told him. “We just don’t know where we’re going.”

  I almost groaned, and I swear I heard Loretta gritting her teeth. The first rule of the junkyard was Always pretend you know what you’re doing. Well, maybe that was the second rule, after Don’t talk to strangers!

  “You should head to the market.” The old man pointed uphill. “There’s a bridge not three blocks from here.”

  “Thank you, sir,” Hazel said, and dragged Bea away.

  “What?” Bea said, squirming free. “This isn’t the junkyard!”

  “We don’t know what this is!” Hazel scolded. “All we know is that we’re somewhere in Port Oro, and . . .” She paused. “And you’re right.”

  “She is?” I asked.

  “I am?” Bea asked.

  “Yeah,” Hazel said. “It’s silly to act like we’re still in the junkyard.”

  “Ha-ha!” Bea crowed. “Who’s the baby now?”

  “You’re still the baby,” Swedish told her. “Now let’s see what this marketplace is all about.”

  We followed the old guy’s directions and crossed a footbridge toward a bustling marketplace where drummers beat rhythms on plastic buckets and cracked data pads. Most people ignored us, but a few said hello. The first few times that happened, we all said hello back and they eyed us strangely. That was apparently too many hellos, even for Port Oro.

  We gaped at barrels of pickled eggs, cages of lizards, and tables with ostrich jerky. One stall sold camel-tail stew and goat’s-foot jelly, and the next offered tamales and sticky rice balls.

  So much food, and so few guards. Way too few to keep a gang from grabbing everything. Maybe there really weren’t gangs here—but then, what did alley kids do for food? I was still trying to figure that out when Bea and Swedish stopped at a table with springs and bolts and corroded batteries.

  Apparently I wasn’t the only one wondering about stealing, because while Bea chatted with a radiator, Loretta swiped a cucumber at a veggie stall.

  “Put that back!” Hazel hissed. “We can’t afford any trouble.”

  “He’s got more’n he needs,” Loretta said.

  “Now!” Hazel snapped.

  “I just want to know what it tastes like,” Loretta grumbled, and started slipping the cucumber back into the pile.

  The vendor spotted her and slammed his hand on the table. “Hey!” He scowled at Loretta. “You’ve never tasted a cucumber?”

  “Nah,” she said warily. “I hear they taste like pigeon.”

  “Pigeon?!” The vendor pulled a cleaver from his s
mock and slashed at Loretta.

  She said, “Eep!”

  Hazel said, “Hey!”

  I said, “Wha!”

  Then Loretta was standing there with half a cucumber in her hand. She looked at the vendor. She looked at the cucumber chunk. She looked back at the vendor.

  “Share that with your friends,” he growled at her.

  We didn’t wait around. Hazel grabbed Bea’s hand, and we scurried across the marketplace. We slunk behind a crate of rock salt where nobody could see us and ate the cucumber. It didn’t taste anything like pigeon.

  When we finished, we licked our fingers and wandered the market. The scent of hog maw made me dizzy, and my stomach rumbled. The whole cucumber theft had gone so well that Loretta wanted to steal a sugar beet for Swedish, but he stopped her: “They might be watching.”

  “I thought they were only on the Rooftop,” Hazel teased.

  He eyed the crowd warily. “That’s what I thought—but now I’m not so sure.”

  “You’re such a needle-nose!” Bea told him. “This is the purplest place on Earth!”

  “It’s too good to be true.”

  Hazel smacked his arm. “Bea’s right. You are a needle-nose.”

  “That doesn’t even mean anything.”

  “Now you know how the rest of us feel when you talk.” Hazel suddenly stared across the market. “Ooooh! Look at that.”

  She squirmed through the crowd toward a stall overflowing with colorful dresses, military regalia, and gauzy scarves. While she fingered every ribbon and bandolier, Loretta tugged a cap onto her spiky hair, and Bea bought a bundle of wires and started making a twisty.

  When nobody was looking, I rummaged in my pocket for the fancy see-through plastic fork I’d been saving and traded it for a blank notebook. Then I tucked the notebook into my jacket, feeling pretty pleased with myself.

  After we dragged Hazel away from the clothing, we strolled past stalls that sold fishing nets and pigeon-feather blankets toward a display of tools.

  “Check it out!” I said, eyeing a hacksaw on a cluttered table. When I scavenged in the Fog, I needed a saw to cut metal free from the ruins, and I’d lost my old one on the Rooftop.