Sky Captain and the World of Tomorrow

by Kevin J. Anderson

  Yes, Franky Cook would take any necessary risks to rescue him now.

  "Commander!" the executive officer called.

  She no longer seemed to hear the continuing explosions around them. "Do whatever you must, Major Slater, but get this platform stabilized. We've got work to do — serious work."

  Not noticing or caring about anything else, Franky and Sky Captain bent over the map with equal resolve. "Under this bombardment, you'll never make it to that island from the air, Joseph," she said. "We'll have to find another way in."

  25

  Another Way In. A Special Amphibious Squadron. Flying Comrades

  Smoke continued to pour into the bridge station. Outside, the huge rotors roared in an attempt to keep the damaged flying fortress aloft, but the leviathan crab walkers continued to fire missile after missile out of the water.

  Holding on to the chart table as detonations made them lurch from side to side, Franky and Sky Captain continued to scour the map for options. Behind them, Polly couldn't help feeling a jealous pang at seeing the other two work so closely as a team.

  Sky Captain jabbed his finger on a discoloration marked on the chart. "Look here. There's a tidal flow along the eastern face of the island. Maybe we could — "

  Franky shook her head, adjusting the neat cap atop her dark hair. "It's too deep. None of our vessels is rated past three hundred meters." She leaned closer. "Wait, this area here…"

  She yanked a clear overlay from the adjacent navigation table, placing it across the map of the ocean to match a crude hand-drawn outline of the newly discovered island. "We just spotted this with one of Dex's sonar mapping probes." She paused, letting out a brief sigh. Good old Dex. Then she cleared her throat and continued. "There's an undersea inlet at the southern tip of the island here. It runs beneath the entire length of the island."

  Just as she was using a grease pencil to mark an area on the map, the bridge took another hit, and a hammer blow of vibrations shuddered through the deck. Franky held the grease pencil so firmly, though, that her line showed only the tiniest fluctuation. "That's your only way in. Everything else is sheer rock to the edge of the water."

  "But you saw the twenty crab walkers down there. What about them?" Polly had to raise her voice over the din of the continuing attack. "How do we get past those machines?"

  With a tone of dismissal, Franky said, "Leave that to me." She turned to her executive officer and gave the order. "Major Slater, alert the amphibious squadron. In the meantime, Joseph, you'd better get your Warhawk ready."

  The air around the smoking airborne base was a tapestry of tracer fire and diving aircraft. Fighter squadrons swarmed around the flying fortress, machine guns ratcheting as they intercepted the explosive rockets that climbed up to the vulnerable target. The turret gunners below the main framework continued to take aim, but deep water protected the submerged crab walkers. One of the gun turrets had been struck by a missile, leaving only a mangled framework of broken glass and melted struts to mark where a man had died.

  On top, the flight deck was alive with activity. Over the wailing sirens and the roar of emergency equipment, loudspeakers summoned the Royal Navy's special operations forces. "Manta Team, report to main staging area! Manta Team, report to main staging area."

  At a separate runway, circular hatches opened and elevated platforms rose from maintenance hangars beneath the runway. A row of strange-looking planes emerged into the open air. Each Manta vessel had a streamlined, sharklike appearance and camouflage marking in oceanic shades of blue. The canopy over each cockpit was a bubble of thick glass. Mirrored spotlights shone like eyes from the blunt noses of the craft; scooped propellers were mounted in the rear of the boomerang wings.

  Royal Navy crewmen prepped the aircraft. Their precision movements demonstrated how often they drilled and trained for emergencies such as this. With a rattle of questions and responses, they raced through checklists in record time. The lead crewman waved a colored flashlight, signaling to one of the low buildings next to the conning tower. He whistled. "All ready!"

  Emerging from the status room, a jumble of black-suited pilots raced down the narrow corridor. Shouting encouragement to one another, they charged into an equipment room, ready to go. They grabbed gloves, tanks, and air hoses. On a rack hung a long row of transparent bubble helmets that looked like fishbowls, each clearly marked with a person's name.

  Once again, Dex had been influenced by Buck Rogers.

  The pilots of the elite amphibious squadron had all been handpicked by Captain Francesca Cook. The unit was made up entirely of women.

  The members of the Royal Navy's special underwater flying squadron wore identical black, formfitting flight suits — part bomber jacket and part scuba outfit, with a silver breathing apparatus secured to their backs. The clinging uniforms left no doubt as to the sex of the amphibious pilots.

  Once suited up, the women wasted no time. They dashed to their waiting underwater planes and climbed inside. Crewmen helped seal the cockpit bubbles, checked to make sure they were airtight, then slapped the sides of the craft. Engines thrummed and powered up. The Manta vehicles levitated slightly, ready for takeoff…

  Men in grimy coveralls worked on the P-40, refueling and resupplying, patching the Warhawk just enough so that it could fly into battle again. Leaving the bridge of the flying fortress, Sky Captain and Polly ran to their plane, which sat where they'd left it, at the end of one short runway. "Polly, you should just stay here. It'll be safer."

  Thunderous explosions continued to echo in the air. Debris from the aerial blasts pelted all around them, rattling off the fuselage of the P-40, but the plane did not appear to be damaged. "Really, Joe?"

  "Get in, then."

  Franky ran alongside them, determined to get to her own aircraft.

  Reaching his Warhawk, Sky Captain yelled back over his shoulder, "Franky, are you sure this is ready to go?"

  "It's in much better shape than when you arrived here, Joseph."

  "That isn't saying a lot," Polly said, but nevertheless she swiftly situated herself in her familiar seat at the rear of the cockpit. Concussions struck all around them.

  "Good luck, Joseph!"

  Sky Captain waved at her, grinning. "Good luck to you too, Franky. Get us to that island, and we'll take care of Totenkopf."

  As Franky settled inside her own plane and sealed the canopy, she adjusted her eye patch, then looked back at the P-40. She and Sky Captain exchanged the sort of exhilarating smile that only two pilots about to fly off into danger could possibly understand.

  As he turned around to face the cockpit controls, Sky Captain noticed Polly's cool glare. "What?" he asked, suddenly self-conscious. "What?"

  "Ahem… what did she say about Nanjing?"

  Fastening his leather cap, Sky Captain pretended not to understand her. "Can't hear you, Polly. Too much background noise. You'll have to speak up."

  Then he hit the ignition, and his engines roared to life.

  26

  Underwater Fight. War Stories. A Monstrous Guardian

  When their engines were powered up and the propellers spun in a blur, both planes strained like horses at a gate, anxious to begin a race. At a joint signal, both Sky Captain and Franky took off, streaking along the newly pocked runway.

  As they accelerated headlong toward the sudden drop-off at the edge of the flying fortress, Polly squeezed her eyes shut. Suddenly they were airborne, dropping away with a stomach-lurching descent. Now that his plane had been fueled and repaired, Sky Captain easily leveled them off, soaring away from the Royal Navy's secret island in the sky. "Piece of cake," he muttered.

  Franky spoke into her headset as she soared ahead of him. "Mind your nose, Joseph. You were always bad on the short takeoff. This isn't like one of those sprawling runways you have groundside."

  "Just try to keep up, Franky," Sky Captain said with a teasing lilt. "I don't want to have to come back for you."

  "You never could take a bit of constr
uctive criticism."

  Behind him, Polly said gently, for his ears alone, "I thought your takeoff was fine."

  Sky Captain turned appreciatively. "Thanks, Polly."

  She seized on it. "Oh, so you heard that, did you?"

  Sky Captain shot her a look of annoyance, then turned his attention back to the controls.

  Immediately behind them, the amphibious squadron took to the air, a rapid succession of plane after plane leaping like fish off a dock. A quick burst of chatter filled the P-40's cockpit as female voices checked in from the elite underwater group. Their launch had been textbook perfect.

  The Warhawk flew alongside Franky's craft, and the amphibious planes swooped in formation. All together, they dove at full speed toward the ocean below.

  "Time for some sport, everyone," Franky said over the headset. Her voice remained rich, calm; she sounded as if she was in her perfect element. "Manta Leader to Manta Team, prepare for impact in ten seconds. Switching to amphibious mode."

  Knowing the rest of the squadron was already following suit, Franky reached for a switch on her control panel. She could feel her aircraft shifting and adjusting all around her. A complex array of servomechanisms shifted plates and vents, locking down seals, preparing the plane for underwater flight.

  When the transformation was complete, Franky saw the looming expanse of water rushing toward her. She and her special squadron had already made a hundred or more successful practice runs, but actual combat was so much more enjoyable. Her plane dove straight down. She called out the countdown. "Impact in five… four… three… two…"

  Immediately beside her, as if it were some sort of choreographed water ballet maneuver, Sky Captain's Warhawk plunged into the waves. Behind them, the full squadron of amphibious planes dove into the water, vanishing beneath the surface, leaving only a scar of churned foam to mark where they had entered the sea.

  The group of special aircraft descended through the cold murk until they began to glide along just above the ocean floor. They cruised silently along as they approached the secret island of Dr. Totenkopf.

  Polly had already seen the P-40's special capability, but she still stared around herself at the eerie submerged landscape. Though they were far from the commercial shipping lanes, the silty sea bottom was strewn with the remains of sunken vessels. Apparently, any ship that passed too close to the mad genius' isolated stronghold became part of the watery graveyard.

  Sky Captain looked out the side of the canopy as they passed over the hull of a massive, ancient ship, already covered with gauzy strands of brownish seaweed. Stenciled across the bow of the wreck, the name was barely readable: VENTURE.

  Polly knew the attack was continuing overhead, and the flying fortress was fighting for survival, but for a moment the scenery around them seemed silent and calm, a much-needed respite after their long adventure — even with the wrecked ships all around.

  Then Franky's voice came over the cockpit communication system, ruining the mood. "Joseph, do you remember that milk run over Shanghai? I was pulling the bus, and you had that jerk for a wingman."

  "Right! We had the target buttoned up, and he was hedgehopping in that little kite, jinxing in the flak and taking quick squirts at foam." Sky Captain brightened, clearly happy to be reminiscing about old war stories.

  Polly couldn't understand a thing they were saying.

  Franky began to chuckle at the memory, as Sky Captain continued. "Pops a rivet, thinks he's taken a hit, and starts yelling in the radio — "

  Franky joined him, and both started yelling in unison, their voices a mock falsetto, "'Protect the rabbits! Protect the rabbits!'" He convulsed with laughter.

  Polly looked at him, bewildered. "What the hell was that all about?"

  He lifted a gloved hand to wave her off. "It would take too long to explain, Polly — "

  "Try me."

  Before he could make up an excuse, the deep water around them was suddenly shattered by repeated explosions, depth charges or artillery launched from submarine guns. The shock waves threw them into turbulence much worse than anything Polly had ever felt in the air. As they rounded a stony canyon wall explosive flak continued to buffet the crack squadron. Orange flashes and blossoms of white bubbles appeared all around them.

  The radar screen on Sky Captain's control panel lit up, accompanied by an ominous beeping tone. "Proximity alarm. Something big… and probably dangerous."

  Franky spoke over the underwater radio. "I'm picking up a sort of cavity on radar — four points to the right, depth sixteen hundred. Look sharp!" Together, the squadron searched the underwater landscape for their target.

  Inside the Warhawk, Polly and Sky Captain spotted it at the same time, a dark and shadowy opening that looked like a dangerous cave, barely wide enough to accommodate the P-40's wingspan.

  Franky signaled him. "Joseph, there's the inlet that leads beneath the island, as you requested. Told you I'd get you here."

  "Does she have to sound so smug?" Polly said.

  Sky Captain had already accelerated toward the forbidding cave. "I see it. We're on our way."

  Franky's plane cruised in front of him, taking the lead. Before they could react, a camouflaged walking machine rose in front of the cave, larger than the other four-legged crab robots. Covered with barnacles and the shredded debris of other metal victims, the machine loomed until it towered over Franky's plane. Mammoth jointed arms reached up with huge sharp claws capable of ripping through the hull of a battleship. The giant crab machine completely blocked the way through the inlet.

  "Franky, look out! Abort the run," Sky Captain shouted into the radio.

  But the Royal Navy commander answered with a cool chuckle. "I never guessed you to be a man who would give up so easily, Joseph." She didn't decelerate at all. "And please don't underestimate my amphibious squadron."

  The Manta underwater planes roared in after her, showing no hesitation. Sky Captain shrugged, then pushed the stick forward so his Warhawk could keep up. "All right."

  Franky stared ahead through the swirling murk, hunched over her controls. Bubbles and submerged explosions made muffled echoes through the sealed walls of her modified plane, sounding like the drumbeats of a drowning percussion section.

  The huge crablike robot grew larger and larger, extending razor-edged armor fins and waiting for Franky to come into reach. She did not show a hint of the awe that she felt. She clicked the microphone again. "Get ready to make a run for it, Joseph. We're going to clear you a path — for Dex."

  "For Dex." Sky Captain looked behind him, catching a glimpse of Polly's grim nod. He drove his P-40 behind the clustered amphibious squadron. Like a locomotive, they charged toward the giant machine.

  At the front of the squadron, Franky lined up the monstrosity in her crosshairs. Her fingers flipped a row of switches, and all systems answered with a comforting glow of ready lights. "Manta leader to Manta Team, cluster torpedoes and stick close to element formation."

  A sequence of angry female voices responded with brusque acknowledgments.

  Sky Captain watched as the squadron drew closer. The seconds seemed to pass with incredible slowness. "Hold on, Polly."

  "Is this going to work, Joe?"

  "If Franky's convinced, then I wouldn't dream of doubting her."

  Polly wasn't comforted by his comment. Instead, she thought again of what a great story this was going to make for the Chronicle… if any of them survived. Even if she had only two pictures left in her camera.

  "Steady… one more second." Franky's finger hovered over the trigger button on her flight stick. The crab robot launched missiles that exploded around her; she and her Manta squadron were moving too fast to make decent targets. The violent turbulence threw off her aim, but she centered the enemy robot again in the crosshairs. More depth charges seemed about to shake her plane apart. She raced headlong toward the four-legged machine. "Fire!"

  Close around her on all sides, the amphibious squadron launched their wing-
mounted torpedoes. Swirling contrails traced dozens of paths, all of which converged toward the underwater monster. They flew in, directly on target, like iron filings drawn to a huge magnet.

  In rapid sequence, all the torpedoes impacted against the barnacle-covered hull, creating a series of speckled explosions. Unfortunately, the dense exoskeleton was proof against even the most powerful projectiles. The spangles of light were like no more than mosquitoes, and the mechanical monster shrugged them off as it continued forward.

  The magnified shock waves swept backward, causing more difficulties for the oncoming underwater planes. The Manta craft scattered, then struggled to get back into formation.

  Sky Captain grabbed the controls, fighting to keep his submerged Warhawk out of a wild spin that would crash him into the sunken wrecks. He pulled up just in time to avoid a direct impact against a jagged rock projection, an ages-old coral stalagmite rising like a barbarian's spear. The hull of the P-40 scraped the rough stone, breaking off the sharp point, which tumbled and spun backward until it lodged in his rudder.

  They careened toward the yawning mouth of the undersea cave and the mechanical leviathan that guarded it. Warning alarms sounded inside Sky Captain's plane as he struggled in vain to guide it. The Warhawk would not respond. Sweat poured down his brow.

  Polly clutched the back of the pilot's seat. "What is it, Joe?"

  Sky Captain fought with his control stick, wrestling it from side to side, but the plane hurtled forward. "I can't steer. Something's jamming the rudder."

  As debris and foam from the succession of torpedo detonations cleared, Sky Captain and Polly suddenly looked up to see the giant machine — undamaged — rearing up and extending its terrible claw arms.

  Sky Captain was speeding straight for it, unable to control his plane. He had no way to stop.