by Sean Kennedy
He looked up to find Icarus watching him with a look of distaste. “No time to get all moral,” he explained. “He would have shot us if he got the chance. I didn’t shoot him.”
Although the look on his face didn’t entirely disappear, Icarus nodded. “Give me the gun.”
“You don’t trust me?”
“Let’s just say I’m not going to shoot to kill.”
“I hope you won’t live to regret that,” Ezra told him.
“The gun,” Icarus said firmly. “Now.”
Ezra handed it over without a word, although he wasn’t happy about it.
“Thank you.”
The ship lurched again, and Ezra fell against Icarus. Both men tumbled to the ground and rolled the length of the rapidly tilting floor. As Ezra hit the wall, he could hear the engines straining trying to keep the ship upright. Then Icarus crashed into him, losing the grip on the gun. A bullet fired, and both men automatically covered themselves so they wouldn’t get shot.
“This ship is going down!” Ezra yelled. “We’ve got to make a move!”
Icarus nodded and scrabbled for the gun again. “Let’s go.”
Unsteadily, they got to their feet and headed for the door. The once-flat floor was now acting as a hill that led up to the exit. They eventually made it, having to use the heavy and immovable cargo grates as foot and hand holds to help themselves along.
They paused at the door to catch their breath, and Ezra panted, “Most ships will have an emergency exit, and if we’re lucky and they’ve prepared, we should find some chutes there.”
Icarus was no longer arguing about the safety of parachutes; he merely looked like he would rather be anywhere than a ship that was likely going down in flames.
“Truth be told,” Ezra continued, “they usually aren’t that far from the cargo hold.”
“Isn’t the cargo hold usually a giant exit?” Icarus asked.
Ezra nodded. “But there were no chutes in there. We have to find the buggers first.”
They were wasting time. He moved out cautiously into the corridor. So far, so good. The corridor was empty, but that didn’t mean they were alone. In a ship in crisis, people would soon be leaving their posts to let the inevitable happen, although they would try to fight it to the very last minute.
There was only one way to go: the left. They moved quickly but silently up the passageway, coming to a junction breaking off into two corridors that looked indistinguishable from the other.
“Which way?” Icarus asked.
“Left would take us further up the ship, probably to the cockpit. I say we avoid that.”
Icarus nodded and started down the right corridor.
“Hey, wait!”
But Icarus plunged on, and Ezra followed. Smoke was starting to fill the passages, and Ezra knew it wouldn’t be that much longer before the call to abandon ship would be made. His heart was racing in his chest, and he was relieved when he saw a large door with a porthole up ahead.
“That’s it!” he cried.
Icarus coughed as he skidded to a stop, and his breathing was labored as he opened up the storage cabinet near the door.
“Chutes?” Ezra asked.
Icarus nodded, unable to speak.
Ezra pushed him aside gently and grabbed the first available parachute. “Let me help you with this one.”
Icarus made to push him away, obviously to say he was no invalid in need of help, but he doubled over coughing again.
“Stop fighting me,” Ezra said, and surprisingly, it worked. He fitted the straps over Icarus’s bare back and across his chest, fingers dancing nimbly over the skin. With the harness in place, he tugged at it to make sure it was secure. Satisfied, he stood back. “Not as elegant as your wings, but they’ll do for now, right?”
Icarus nodded and croaked out, “Thanks.”
A laser bolt hit the bulkhead above them. They reacted instinctively, flattening themselves against the wall. Crew from the ship were on their way to their own escape, and had been surprised by the presence of the prisoners.
“Get your chute on!” Icarus yelled, firing his own pistol in retaliation.
“Not enough time!” Ezra barked. He reached across and grabbed the handle of the emergency door.
Icarus’s eyes widened. “I’m not leaving you here!”
Ezra grinned. “Who said I’m not coming with you?”
Icarus fired off another shot, and looked back wildly at Ezra.
Ezra snaked his hands between the chute straps and Icarus’s skin. “Hope this holds the two of us!”
“You’re crazy!” was all Icarus managed to yell as the emergency door fell away, and the two men were sucked out into the maelstrom of wind beyond.
Chapter 15
GETTING out of the smoke had rapidly improved the state of Icarus’s lungs, because the man yelled throughout the entire free-falling process. Ezra would have been amused had he not been hanging on for dear life. He managed to stabilize his balance a little more by wrapping his legs around Icarus’s waist, even though this sent them careening even faster.
Of course, this made it harder to pull the release string on the chute. His hands were wrapped around the harness, and there was no way he was releasing one to do it unless he wanted to end up an unrecognizable mess on the desert floor. Icarus was too distracted having his own private meltdown, so Ezra had one option left. He nuzzled against Icarus’s side, his cheek resting against the comfortable warmth of skin and the blood that moved beneath it, and found the tab with his teeth.
He pulled it, and his neck jerked uncomfortably as they stopped falling and shot upwards instead. As the chute unfolded above them, Icarus finally felt safe enough to look down at Ezra and yell, “Are you okay?”
Ezra nodded exhaustedly. As they floated downward, he looked up to see the great dirigible above them listing and beginning to fall. Other chutes were now blossoming in the air around them as the crew sought their own safety. They were too concerned with themselves now to give even a second thought to Ezra and Icarus, but Ezra knew that they should hit the ground running regardless in case they decided to change their minds.
Now he would probably never know who the captain was, and how he knew him. And Ezra didn’t like mysteries.
“It’s not so bad,” Icarus said, interrupting his thoughts. “I mean, it’s nothing on my wings, but still….”
“Release that second string,” Ezra instructed him. “You need to steer us some distance away before that ship falls on us.”
Icarus looked up and saw the distressed ship, uncomfortably close. He released the second string and found he could now direct the chute against the wind, as if it were a tiller on a small boat.
“Try and get us as far away from the rest of them as you can,” Ezra said. He closed his eyes, his head resting against Icarus’s chest—or, more like the harness against his chest—and let himself enjoy the sensation of the other man against him and the wind keeping them afloat.
“Don’t fall asleep on me,” Icarus chastised him. “I’m not hauling your heavy ass across the desert.”
“Hey,” Ezra said, sounding muffled against the harness. “Don’t you be dishonoring the state of my ass.”
“I was dishonoring the size of it, not the look of it.”
“Nothing wrong with a big ass.”
“Didn’t say there was. Just said that as there was so much of it, it would be hard to carry.”
Ezra looked up at him. “It’s a pretty ass, I’d bet you’d like it.”
Icarus laughed. “You need to get some new lines.”
Maybe he did. But there was that change in the air between them again; the antagonism and suspicion were becoming less guarded.
“There she goes,” Icarus said softly.
As best as he could, Ezra twisted his neck so he could look back. The ship that had temporarily been their prison was now plummeting back to earth, so fast it almost seemed slow in its tragic last seconds in the sky. Already on f
ire, it retained its shape until the moment the nose caused a crater in its first contact with the ground. The nose crumpled, and fresh explosions burst along its side as the whole ship flattened out upon the dirt, all its beauty and majesty now nothing more than molten steel and crumpled framework.
“That’s a sight I never like to see,” Icarus murmured.
Ezra, who also felt a pang in his heart at the senseless destruction, swallowed around the dryness in his mouth. “It never gets easy.”
They were losing altitude, but steering away from the field of debris.
What I wouldn’t give for the Lilliput right now, Ezra thought. But that only made him think of Jazz, and knowing that the last time he had seen her she was flying off in their own damaged ship, her fate unknown. He felt sick at the thought of the Lilliput lying on the ground like the ship below, and Jazz possibly being a part of the wreckage.
But he couldn’t think that way. He knew Jazz and how resourceful she was. She would have dumped the Lilliput, had it come to that. They might have joked together in the past about going down with the ship, but they knew it wasn’t worth the risk. And Jazz had so much to live for, even if you just took the Lady Bart into account.
No. Jazz was alive, and probably busting a gut to try and figure out where he was.
“Get ready,” Icarus said, interrupting his stream of consciousness again.
Ezra looked down; the ground was rushing up to meet them.
“Lift your legs!” he yelled to Icarus, even though he was sure the other man probably knew to do that already. Luckily his own legs were still wrapped around Icarus, and if they had minds of their own, they would probably be reluctant to give up such a position.
Both men yelled as their bodies hit the hot desert floor with a bone-crunching thud. They rolled together, getting twisted up in the ropes and the chute itself as momentum carried them along.
In a tight ball of fresh pain, they eventually came to a stop. Moonlight filtered through the chute wrapped around them, giving an ethereal effect, as if the rest of the world had faded to white around them and left them alone and safe against everything that plagued them.
“Are you okay?” Ezra asked.
Icarus coughed up some dust. “Yes, I think so. You?”
“As far as I can tell.”
“No broken bones?”
“Won’t know until we move, I guess.” Ezra had landed on top, his hands still buried beneath the harness. He pulled them out and braced himself with one on either side of Icarus so his weight was no longer crushing him.
They stared at each other for a long moment, bruised, bloody, and covered in dirt.
Strangely, Ezra thought Icarus had never looked better. They had survived, yet again. Maybe that had something to do with it. The threat of death always made you appreciate the little things more. He leaned in and claimed the mouth he was beginning to know very well. Icarus didn’t resist; in fact, he pulled himself up and snaked his arm around Ezra’s waist to drag him in closer.
There was a moment when they could have started going further; the parachute was damn good at making them forget where they were; everything seemed unreal and isolated beneath it. But they eventually pulled away from each other, and Icarus hurriedly began pulling at the straps of the harness to get himself free.
“We better get going,” he said, fumbling with one of the buckles.
Ezra’s hand closed over his and helped him release it. “I know.”
There was regret in his tone, but there was nothing else they could do.
Crawling out from under the chute, they looked up to see the others from the ship silhouetted against the dark sky, but not that far from landing. Without a word, they ran further into the desert, hopefully to freedom.
LADY BARTHOLOMEW ran down the stairs, most unbecomingly for a woman of her status, pulling on her gloves. At the bottom of the staircase, she paused for breath, and it was at that moment that Albert realized she was most scandalously wearing men’s breeches.
“Lady Bartholomew!” he cried.
She looked up from her gloves, frazzled, and adjusted the small travel hat upon her head. “Yes, Albert?”
“What are you wearing?”
Bart looked down at herself. “What does it look like?”
“Breeches!” Albert could hardly get the word out.
“Why, yes, they are. If I have to travel, Albert, I wish to be comfortable.”
“Travel, Madam?”
“Yes, Albert. And you’re coming with me.”
He couldn’t have looked more horrified, even if she had told him that as well as wearing breeches she would be forcing him to change into a hoop skirt. “Where are we going?”
“Jazille and Ezra are in trouble. We must go to them.”
“Those ruffians!” he spluttered.
She glared at him. “My friends.”
“Pardon me, Lady Bart—”
“I certainly don’t pardon you, Albert,” she said, as haughtily and as freely as her social status expected of her. It helped in situations such as this when she had to buck convention. “And I don’t mind you speaking out of turn, especially as I know you actually quite like Jazille and Ezra.”
“Be that as it may, exactly where are we going?”
Bart checked her reflection in the mirror. “Settler’s Pass.”
“That’s an outlaw town!”
“Then pack accordingly for danger and adventure!” She turned and gave him her most beguiling smile. “I know I have.”
Albert almost fainted as she drew up the side of her jacket and revealed a holster containing a laser pistol. “Madam!”
“And look at this!” she instructed, bending down to unzip her boot and display a long hunting knife. Her hat slipped on her head, and as she came back up, she frowned. “Perhaps when you go to change, Albert, because you should be comfortable for the journey, you can fetch me my flying cap and goggles. I believe this hat will prove to be most unsuitable.” She unpinned the headwear in question and handed it to him.
He took it from her with a slight bow. “Yes, Lady Bartholomew.”
“Oh, Albert?”
“Yes, Madam?”
There was a mischievous glint in her eye. “We may be on a rescue mission, but that’s not to say we can’t have some fun!”
“As you wish, Madam. I’ll bring my Winchester Sure-Laser.”
Bart clapped her hands with unrestrained glee and went to see about getting her trunks loaded.
TWO injured men made their way as fast as they could across the rapidly heating desert floor. The morning sun was just beginning to rise above the canyon walls, and those walls were starting to offer little relief from the glare.
Icarus skidded to a stop and leaned against the rock wall. “I just need to rest a moment,” he wheezed.
Ezra turned and came back alongside him. “I thought you wanted to get as far away as possible from the ship?”
“I do,” Icarus panted angrily. “I also have a hole in my belly that’s telling me to stop.”
Ezra nodded. His own leg was hurting; he could only imagine a bullet in the stomach would be worse.
“Are you thirsty?” Icarus asked.
Ezra nodded. “No use thinking about it, though. We have no water.”
“We’re standing on a riverbed, Kneebone.”
Ezra looked down at the dry dirt by his feet. “I don’t think there’s been a river here for a long time.”
“I know this desert like the back of my hand,” Icarus said. “I spend most of my time here hiding out between raids.”
That answers the question about whether he has ships, Ezra thought to himself, a flicker of hope awakening in him. “You know where there’s water?”
“I believe so.”
Believe so? That didn’t sound too confident. But, as Ezra realized, it was the best option they had at the moment. They wouldn’t be able to survive too long out here without water.
“When you get your breath back,”
he said, “lead the way.”
“EZRA! Ezra Kneebone, come in, goddammit!”
Jazz slapped the console in frustration, as if that would magically restore her contact with Kneebone. All she received in reply, however, was the sound of static, which only served to infuriate her further.
At least Bart was on her way. She had already been in contact, at least, checking in with Jazz as she waited at the station for Albert to buy their tickets to Waulkham Hills. Jazz allowed herself one small smile at the thought that this would be one train that would remain unraided by Icarus, although Bart would have been excited if it had. It was one of the many things Jazz loved about her—her exuberance for situations that would make most people run away screaming.
If only she had her own ship like the Lilliput, she would already be here. Personal dirigibles would revolutionize travel—if Ezra and Jazz ever managed to act upon their patent.
She had given Bart a list of parts she needed, which Bart was to pick up before they set out for Settler’s Pass. Luckily, the Lilliput’s damage had looked worse than it actually was, although that was due partly to Jazz getting the ship away before Kneebone’s attackers could put more bullets in her and managing to have her pretty close to the ground before she crashed. She had spent the day pulling out ruined parts, replacing them with spares for those they had spares for, and when there was nothing left, patching up the holes in the hull made by the gunfire.
And in the meantime, she was slowly going crazy without having someone to speak to. She wasn’t sure why; there were periods of time when she and Ezra could go without talking (although that was admittedly rare as the man liked to hear the sound of his own voice). It was just the oppressive silence of the downed aircraft, out in the middle of the desert, without even the sound of the engines running to give any form of background noise. She had never realized how comforting such a simple sound was before.
But now she only had the dead of night to look forward to, and she was dreading it. Having experienced it already, the anticipation of a second night alone was even worse.
