by Sean Kennedy
“Kneebone?” Jazz asked.
He frowned at the hesitant tone in her voice, which was very un-Jazzlike. He hoped she wasn’t about to ask him something personal concerning him and Icarus. “Yeah?”
“If we get out of this alive, I want you to do something for me.”
“Uh, sure.” He wondered just what in the hell he was setting himself up for. “What?”
“I want you to buy me a dress—”
Before he could even make any squeak of response, she continued.
“And I want you to help me choose it.”
Had he come back to the right ship, and the right Jazz, after his final night with Icarus? He stared, open-mouthed, at her for a good while before she looked away.
“Okay, laugh. I know you want to.”
“I’m not going to laugh,” he said truthfully. “I’m just a mite perplexed about why you want a dress. And why you think I’m a good judge of character as to what kind of dress you should obtain. Isn’t that the kind of thing Lady Bart would be good at?”
Jazz mumbled something to herself that he didn’t catch, and then said more clearly, “It’s for Lady Bart I want to wear it. As a surprise.”
“Oh.” Ezra grinned to himself.
“Don’t look so goddamned happy about it! It doesn’t mean anything! It would just ruin the surprise if she helps me shop for it, that’s all. And a man’s opinion would be helpful, even if that man would rather see some young shirtless vagabond with wings upon his back modeling for him!”
Such a vision of Icarus distracted Ezra for a brief moment, but he shook it off because currently it only brought him a feeling of melancholy. The weather wasn’t helping. “I’d be pleased to go dress-shopping with you, Jazz.”
“Don’t get any ideas!” she chided him. “This isn’t a full time thing, I like my pants thank you very much! Dresses are….” She got lost, trying to think of the appropriate insult with which to throw at them. “Anyway, it’s for Bart. A flight of fancy, if you will.”
“Because she wore breeches for you?” Ezra asked in a stunning moment of clarity—as analyzing Jazz could be a dicey proposition at the best of times and was usually to be avoided.
Jazz looked fierce, as if she were about to shoot him down, but she settled back into her chair and admitted it was so. “Yes. So I want to do the same thing for her.”
“Is that—” Ezra began to say, but broke off.
“What?”
He felt foolish, but thought he might as well go through with it because he really wanted to know. “Is that what love is like?”
“Like what?”
“Doing things to please people, even if you don’t like it or don’t agree with it?”
Jazz raised an eyebrow. “We’re not talking about a dress now, are we?”
Ezra licked his lips nervously, and shook his head. “I guess not.”
“It’s part of what love is, I guess. I want to do this because it will make Bart happy if I occasionally wear a dress for her, just like she knows I like it if she wears breeches once in a blue moon. Sometimes you do what you don’t want to do just so you can make that other person laugh. So I guess that’s what is part of love, yeah.”
Ezra mulled this over.
“You let Icarus go, even though you wanted to kidnap him all over again just to keep him safe, right?” Jazz asked.
He nodded.
“Because it makes him happy, even though it makes you miserable?”
“I don’t think it makes him happy, but it’s what he wanted to do. So, yeah.”
Jazz flipped a switch on her console, and the starter engine of the Lilliput kicked into life. “Then I think you’re in love.”
It sounded ridiculous to say it, or even to think it, but Ezra tried it out on her anyway. “You may be right.”
Satisfied, her hands skimmed over the console as she gave the ship one final check. “Let’s go save your man, Ezra Kneebone.”
As the Lilliput shot into the sky, neither of its riders could resist whooping with a myriad of emotion that neither one of them could define anymore.
THE sensors were giving strange readings, the clouds were ever-darkening, and Ezra couldn’t help but wonder if they were portents of what was to come. He couldn’t help but think of Icarus flying through the storm, a target for both men and Mother Nature, with the odds stacked against him. He wished he could rip his accursed brain out of his head and no longer think of anything—it was far too distracting. Of course, flying around brainless would be no help either. And there would be the obvious joke that Jazz could make, that how would he be able to tell the difference?
“That weather is affecting the sensors,” he told Jazz grimly.
“The wind shear isn’t helping us stay up as easily, either,” she replied just as grimly.
“I don’t think we’re going to be able to read other ships until we’re almost on top of them.”
“Good think I’m such a brilliant flyer, then.”
“We’re going to need it.”
Their bravado rang hollow to Ezra, and he suspected it did to Jazz as well. They were in trouble, and the only good thing about that was the fact that everybody else in the skies would be in the same unenviable position. Even though Icarus was the most likely target, Ezra thought that they would be lucky beyond reckoning if they got through the day without loss of life. The lure of the reward was too much for people to be scared off by the upcoming storm and the surefire risk involved. Not to mention the glory of capturing or killing the county’s most famous bandit.
“A miracle’s too much to ask for,” Ezra murmured to himself.
Jazz didn’t question him; she was too busy consulting the instruments and keeping an eye out ahead of them when the sensors failed to give them the usual information they provided.
And the alarm squealed before they even saw the ship in the gloom, so at least something was working in their favor.
“Pull up!” Ezra yelled. “Pull up!”
“Already on it,” Jazz said through gritted teeth.
Like a mythical creature from below the sea, a whale hanging in the air, the dirigible looked far too close for Ezra’s liking. “We’re going to hit it!”
“Keep your pants on!”
“If you keep yours on!”
Jazz laughed like a loon as they fell back against their seats, the Lilliput almost perpendicular in the air, their world feeling like it was turning upside down. Ezra expected to see sparks striking off the side of the ship, they were that close, but thankfully they weren’t close enough. He could, however, read the name of the ship as they shot past it—and groaned. It was the Bubulcus.
And sure enough, a familiar voice squawked over their comm system. “Kneebone! What the fuck are you playing at?”
Ezra opened a channel to the Bubulcus. “Sorry, it’s the weather. Didn’t see you.”
“Well, that’s bleeding obvious! Tell your little lady to cool her heels!”
“You call me little lady one more time and I’ll ram your monster of a ship so hard through its core they’ll be searching for your body parts with tweezers upon the ground!” Jazz yelled.
“Did you hear that?” Ezra asked.
Just as Harding began to sputter a response, Ezra closed the channel.
“That man!” Jazz said venomously.
“I think we’ll just mute him from here out.”
“No,” Jazz said, obviously unhappy. “Keep the channel open. You never know if he might have something useful to say. Any chance of this storm coming down?”
Ezra pored over the sensor readings. “Don’t like your chances.”
“I wonder how many ships there are out there.”
“We’re still the smallest. We can go places they can’t, and get in closer.”
“This is madness, Kneebone. But you know what?”
He was almost too scared to ask. “What?”
“I love it.” She downchanged the thrust and the Lilliput lurched nose-fir
st toward the ground, which could still not be seen. It seemed instinctual for Ezra to shut his eyes, but he forced them to stay open.
They broke through the cloud, and the town of Waulkham Hills lay below them and to their right. The gloom hadn’t dissipated, however, and the streets looked far different than on the days when they blistered in the desert sun.
But the sky was full of their “colleagues,” other dirigibles and airships all hoping to get their piece of Icarus.
“Laying in course for Broadmeadow Pines,” Jazz said resolutely.
“There’s one good thing at least,” Ezra said.
“What’s that?”
“They’re all still hanging out here. Maybe everybody didn’t get the inside info we got.”
“Which is strange,” Jazz frowned. “If they want him caught, they’d want as many people to know to reduce his chances of getting away.”
“Unless someone wants the glory for themselves,” Ezra said.
It didn’t take a genius to figure out who it was. With the sensors working a little more consistently now that they were below cloud cover, Ezra watched as one ship detached itself from the others and began turning in the same direction they themselves were headed.
The Bubulcus.
“Harding,” Jazz breathed.
Ezra nodded. “Should’ve known.”
“It means there’ll be fewer ships in the skies. Less people to fight.”
“It also means that we’ll be far more recognizable amongst the scrum,” Ezra said softly. “They’ll be able to tell we’re set on saving, not capturing, him.”
The shadows above them darkened, and the cabin felt oppressive with the new silence between them.
“KNEEBONE,” crackled a voice over the Lilliput’s speaker.
Ezra and Jazz exchanged glances, and he flipped a switch to activate their end. “Kneebone here.”
“You have good sources,” replied the voice. Harding, of course.
“As good as yours, Harding. Obviously.”
“The Lady Bartholomew really shouldn’t be so careless.”
Ezra could see Jazz bristling, and he held up a hand to quiet her. As if that would stop her if she had a mind to blow her stack. “You think I don’t have sources other than her? I guess you underestimate me.”
“That’s not so difficult to do. If it wasn’t the good lady, who was it?”
“You expect me to tell you?” Ezra laughed. “At least give me the least amount of credit you can afford.”
“I told you before, Kneebone. Icarus is mine to bring in. I’ll blast you out of the skies if I have to.”
Jazz flipped the mute button. “The Bubulcus is right behind us!”
“He wouldn’t dare,” Ezra fumed, toggling the switch again. “Then you’ll have to do it now, Harding!” And he blocked the lines of communication between them before the other man could even respond.
Aghast, Jazz said, “You did not just dare him to fire upon us!”
“I might have.” Ezra calmly activated the guns, preparing for a defensive shot.
When the fire from the Bubulcus came raining upon them, Jazz made the Lilliput duck and weave as if she were a dancehall partner drunk on wine and still thinking she was steady on her feet. “Why aren’t you firing back?” she yelled.
Ezra, his finger on the trigger, remained calm. “Just wait a minute.”
Jazz continued to fly in a zigzag pattern just in case, but it seemed that the Bubulcus had only released one volley of fire.
“Return to normal flight path,” Ezra told her. “It was just a warning shot. As I suspected.”
The Lilliput maintained a steady position, and Jazz’s hands relaxed their grip on the throttles. “Okay, what made you think it would only be a warning?”
“Because if he did shoot us down, it would only be a distraction from his real goal.”
“Getting Icarus.”
“Yes. And he couldn’t risk that.”
“Nice of you, however, to risk our lives taking a chance on that,” Jazz grumped.
Ezra grinned. “Is it taking a risk if I already know the outcome?”
“You’re getting too cocky, and that’s worrisome.”
“I need to be cocky,” Ezra shrugged. “I can’t go into this half-hearted. Not today.”
An alarm sounded from the console, and Jazz slapped her hand upon it. “We’re nearing Broadmeadow Pines. This is it, Kneebone.”
The fog, unfortunately, was still out in full force and visibility was disconcertingly low.
“I don’t like this,” Jazz murmured. “We’re going to have to go in pretty close. We’ll be able to see the numbers of the carriages.”
“The fog’ll help with his getaway, though.”
“The Bubulcus is a pretty big cloud-buster.”
“Just take us in, Jazz.”
The Lilliput dipped toward the ground, and Ezra felt his stomach drop. Jazz sailed them right along the now-perceptible railway tracks. “Two clicks,” she announced.
They would be there in under a minute. Probably less than it took him to think it would be less than a minute. Ezra found himself biting at his thumbnail; a habit his mother had despaired of when he was a child.
An alarm rang out on the console.
“The Bubulcus is gearing up!” Jazz yelled. “Dammit, too close!”
Ezra saw the shadow pass over them before the Lilliput shuddered with contact. The readouts indicated that they were just clipped on the port side, but it threw them off course and Jazz had to fight for control. The ground below rushed up to meet them, but at the last second Jazz pulled them out of freefall.
Deftly, one hand on the comm, Jazz broke the silence between the ships. “Damn you, Harding!”
“You’re in my way,” came Harding’s smug reply.
“And you’re in ours,” Jazz replied coldly.
Ezra only had time to scream her name before the Lilliput banked to the port side again and gave chase to the Bubulcus. They were merely a fly against the flank of a horse, such was the difference between the span of each craft—but Jazz was determined to be the nastiest fly that ever bothered a horse.
“Target them, Kneebone,” she demanded.
“Jazz, this is madness—”
“He’ll resort to firing on us again. And next time he won’t miss.”
“We need—”
She ignored him. “Take out their weapons! Do you want them to use them on Icarus?”
That settled the matter. Deep down he knew he was probably making the biggest mistake of his life—for Harding would make sure he would more than pay at a later date—but Ezra took a deep breath and fired upon the Bubulcus, targeting their cannons.
The sky erupted in flame as the Bubulcus was hit. It was a perfect targeting on Ezra’s behalf; there was no other damage to the ship other than their weapons system.
Their console immediately lit up as the Bubulcus tried to open communications with them.
“Ignore it,” Jazz instructed. “What can they say that we don’t already know? They’ll make us pay, get us back, so forth, so forth. I’m tired of hearing that pompous git squawking at us!”
She was tired of it? Ezra laughed heartily, even though it seemed like he was laughing more in the face of their imminent destruction.
“They’re targeting us again,” she reported.
“I don’t have to tell you—”
“I’m already on it, Boss. Evasive maneuvers.”
There was no slick slide of escape for them this time; the Lilliput screamed in protest as Jazz rapidly changed course.
The Bubulcus, now weaponless, had seemingly decided that if they couldn’t blast them out of the sky, it would take the next best course of action and simply ram them. The sheer size of the Bubulcus would destroy them; no trace of the Lilliput would be found any bigger than a dime.
If Ezra had had an instruction to yell at Jazz, he doubted it would have been heard over the cacophony of sound within the cockpit. Betwe
en the shrill alarm of proximity breach, their own overworked engines, and the approaching engines of the Bubulcus, human noise would have been easily drowned.
The Bubulcus was now filling their entire line of sight out of the cockpit window; time slowed as the Lilliput began to edge away, a small sliver of sweet blue sky appearing on the eastern fringe. Ezra’s eyes widened as salvation and sanctuary beckoned, and he wondered in a mad fit if it was possible for him to get out and just give their ship an extra push that might be enough to buy their freedom.
But freedom was theirs regardless. The blue of the sky widened and the proximity alarms died out as the Lilliput slipped out from under the shadow of the Bubulcus and back out over the railway tracks below them.
For once, there was no victorious whoop from Jazz. She wiped sweat from her brow and simply said, “That was close.”
“Need I remind you that that was your idea?”
“And it was a good one.”
Seeing they were still alive, he couldn’t disagree. It wasn’t worth the argument, although he liked to believe that she was relieved he didn’t press the point.
Having been distracted by their run-in with the Bubulcus, they almost overshot the coordinates for Broadmeadow Pines. They flew overhead, almost taking the roof off the small weatherboard building that served as a hold for cargo, and that the Metal Bird was now pulling up beside. People milling about on the veranda that was now serving as a platform looked up, holding onto their hats as the kickback from the engines threatened to steal them away. It was almost enough to make Ezra grin again.
“They’re definitely loading the train,” he observed. “Perfect timing.”
“So we haven’t missed the show yet,” Jazz said grimly.
“Icarus will probably wait until the train is in motion. Although it makes it harder for him to shift the cargo, it also means it will be harder for them to defend it.”
“And attack him,” Jazz added.
“Yeah.” Ezra took a deep breath. “That too.”
“You ever get that feeling that no matter what we do, we’ll end up getting screwed?”
