The Black Lung Captain (2 page)

Malvery's retort was little more than an irate wheeze. He staggered off towards the cargo ramp on the
Ketty Jay's
far side.

'Robbing the children didn't go to plan, then?' Crake asked the captain, one eyebrow raised.

Frey shoved the lockbox ful of coins into Crake's hands. 'It went wel enough. Where's Silo and Bess?'

Crake regarded the leaking lockbox disapprovingly. 'Silo's in the engine room, trying to fix the problems we had on the way over here. Bess is asleep in the hold. Should I wake her?'

'No. Get on board. We're going. Last one in, shut the cargo ramp.'

He spared a moment to check on his outflyers before boarding the
Ketty Jay.
The Firecrow and the Skylance were rising verticaly from the clearing as their aerium tanks flooded with ultralight gas. Satisfied they were on their way, he ran up the ramp.

Malvery was beached and gasping just inside the hold, surrounded by a large puddle. Frey paid him no attention. Nor did he spare a glance for the hulking metal form of Bess, standing dormant and dark by the stairs. She'd long ceased making him uneasy.

He sprinted up the steps to the main passageway. It was cramped and dimly lit, the cockpit at one end and the engine room at the other, with doors to the crew's quarters and Malvery's tiny infirmary between them. Hydraulics whirred as the cargo ramp closed, sealing the aircraft.

He pushed into the engine room, a smal space cluttered by black iron gantries, alowing access to al parts of the complex assembly overhead. It was warm and smeled of machinery. Frey cast around for signs of his engineer, but the only crew member in sight was Slag the cat, a scraggy clump of black fur, watching him from an air vent.

'Silo! Where are you?'

'Up here, Cap'n,' came the reply, although Frey stil couldn't see him. He guessed his engineer was working around the other side of the assembly. The
Ketty
Jay,
like most aircraft, had two separate sets of engines: aerium for lift and prothane for thrust. Both were tangled together in this room in a confusing jumble of pipes, tanks and malevolent-looking gauges.

'Are we ready to go?' Frey asked, addressing the room in general.

'Wouldn't advise it, Cap'n.'

'Can she
fly?
he persisted. 'It's a bit urgent, Silo.'

A short pause. 'Yuh,' he said at last. 'Gonna fly like a slug though.'

'That'l do,' said Frey, and pelted out of the engine room, his feet squishing in his boots.

Jez was already at the navigator's station when Frey bundled into the cockpit and threw himself into his seat.

'Destination?' she asked.

'Up,' he replied, and boosted the aerium engines to maximum. The
Ketty Jay
groaned and shrieked as her tanks filed. Frey leaned forward and peered through the windglass of the cockpit. The first of the vilagers had reached the clearing now, but they were too late. The
Ketty Jay
was dragging herself off the ground and into the air.

Some of them aimed rifles and tried to fire, but their weapons were stil too wet to work. One of them made a suicidal dive for the
Ketty Jay's
landing struts as they retracted. Luckily for him, he fel short. The vilagers raged and yeled and threw what stones they could find, but the
Ketty Jay
kept rising.

Frey felt secure enough to make an obscene gesture at his pursuers. 'Thought you had me, didn't you? Wel, let's see you yokels fly!' He slumped back in his seat as they cleared the treetops. Deep relief sank into his bones.

Jez got up from the navigator's station and stood next to him, staring into the night sky with sudden and worrying intensity. Frey folowed her gaze.

There were several smal, dark shapes in the distance, coming closer.

'Tel me those aren't what I think they are,' he said.

'Yeah,' said Jez. 'It's the vilagers. They've got planes.'

Two

A Ramshackle Squadron — Technical Difficulties —

A Moment Of Clarity — The Fruits Of Persistence

Frey stared out of the cockpit at the dim shadows of the approaching planes. He was getting toward the end of his tether. The paltry amount of money he'd stolen from the orphanage could not be worth this level of aggravation.rey stared out of the cockpit at the dim shadows of the approaching planes. He was getting toward the end of his tether. The paltry amount of money he'd stolen from the orphanage could not be worth this level of aggravation.

'Planes,' he said, in the dul tone of one perilously close to going berserk. 'Jez, explain to me how come a bunch of backward country folk have their own air defence force.'

Jez narrowed her eyes. 'Cropdusters modified for fighting forest fires. Mail planes for local deliveries. Personal flyers. There's a smal cargo craft in there. Some of them are prop-driven.' She counted. 'There's eight of them in al.'

'Propelers?' Frey scoffed. 'Any of them have guns?'

'Not that I can see. Some of them are open-cockpit two-seaters, though. The passengers have rifles.'

Frey could barely make out the shape of the aircraft at this distance and in this light. But it was no surprise to him that Jez could see every detail. Her eyesight was, literaly, inhuman.

He glanced at his navigator. She looked like a normal young woman.
Very
normal, he thought uncharitably, since his habit was to only pay attention to the pretty ones. She wore practical, shapeless overals and kept her brown hair in an unflattering ponytail. But she was more than she appeared to be. Frey had made it his business not to think about what she actualy
was,
but the fact that she had no heartbeat was a pretty hefty clue that something wasn't quite right.

Stil, al of them had their secrets, and on the
Ketty Jay
you didn't ask. She was an outstanding navigator and as loyal as you could want. She was the only other person aboard who was alowed - or indeed able - to fly his beloved aircraft in his absence. That decision had taken a lot of trust on Frey's part. Trust didn't come easily to Frey. But she'd been on the
Ketty Jay
for over a year now and she'd never let him down.

In the end, it didn't matter
what
she was. She was crew.

Frey fired up the prothane engines and swiveled the craft, presenting her stern to the approaching planes. 'They realy think they're going to catch us in those junkers?' he said. 'Let's show 'em what a
real
aircraft can do.' Jez braced herself against the back of his seat as he lit up the thrusters.

The expected acceleration didn't come. The boom of ignition was far feebler than Frey was used to hearing. At first the
Ketty Jay
didn't move at al, struggling to shift her own weight. When she began to push forward, it was like moving through treacle. The clearing ful of angry vilagers slid away beneath them, but not half as fast as Frey would have liked.

'Silo wasn't joking about the engines,' he murmured.

'You ever heard him joke about anything?'

'Suppose not.' He leaned back in his seat and belowed out the cockpit door. '
Malvery! Get up here!'

The
Ketty Jay
was picking up speed, but far too slowly. There was a silver earcuff lying in an ashtray set into the brass and chrome dash, between the dials and meters. He snatched it up and clipped it to the back of his ear.

'Harkins. Pinn. Can you hear me?'

'Yes, Cap'n, I'm, er, you startled me a bit, I mean, loud and, erm, I can hear you, yes,' came Harkin's babbled reply.

It sounded as if he was standing right next to Frey, instead of sitting in his cockpit fifty metres away. He was wearing an earcuff of his own, as was Pinn. When one of them spoke, the others could hear what they said. It was one of Crake's little tricks. Sometimes having a daemonist on board came in handy.

'What's up with the
Ketty Jay?'
asked Pinn. 'Her thrusters are barely lit. Might as wel strap a gas stove to her arse for al the acceleration you're getting.'

'Technical difficulties,' Frey replied. 'We've got incoming craft. They've a couple of rifles, that's al. No real danger, but the
Ketty Jay
isn't going to outpace them til she builds up speed. Keep them off me as best you can.'

'I'l keep them off you, alright,' Pinn said eagerly. 'I'l—'

'And
don't
shoot them down. I don't want them madder than they already are.'

'We can't shoot them down?' Pinn cried. 'What are we supposed to do? Hypnotise them with fancy flying?'

'It's a bunch of cropdusters and mail planes, Pinn,' Frey told him. 'They're not much of a threat, and I could do without the Navy coming after us. We've managed to stay beneath their notice since the whole Retribution Fals thing. I'd like to keep it that way. Let's keep the needless slaughter to a minimum, eh?'

'You, Cap'n, are a pussy,' said Pinn.

'And you're scared of water.'

'He's scared of
water?'
Harkins crowed eagerly.

'Don't you start, you jittery old git!' Pinn snapped. 'You're scared of
everything.'

'Not water, though,' Harkins replied, with an unmistakable note of triumph in his voice.

'Everyone shut up and fly!' said Frey, before they could get into an argument. Pinn subsided, grumbling.

The
Ketty Jay
had picked up a respectable amount of speed now. Malvery appeared at the door of the cockpit, stil red-faced from his run earlier.

'You belowed, Cap'n?'

'I need you up in the bubble. There's planes on our tail. Don't shoot at them unless I give the word.'

'Right-o,' said Malvery. He returned to the passageway and climbed the ladder that led to the autocannon cupola on the
Ketty Jay's
hump. From there, he could act as Frey's eyes astern. Frey wished there was a better way to see what was going on behind his craft while he was airborne, but if there was, he hadn't found it yet.

'They're catching us up, Cap'n,' Malvery reported. 'You might want to go a bit faster.'

Frey swalowed his reply and concentrated on flying. The Vardenwood lay for hundreds of kloms in al directions. In the far distance he could see the grand city of Vaspine, a crown of lights on the highest hiltops. Below them was the forest, cut through with steep, sharp valeys that joined and divided haphazardly.

'What's the plan, Cap'n?' Jez asked.

Frey hated being asked that, usualy because he didn't have an answer. 'Wel, they can't realy do much. They don't have guns that can penetrate the
Ketty Jay's
hul. Pinn and Harkins can stay out of their range. We just need a bit of time to pick up speed, then we'l leave them behind.'

Jez returned to the navigator's station and began looking at her charts. Frey watched Harkins and Pinn drop back, behind the
Ketty Jay
, out of his line of vision.

'Er, one of them's coming up on us awfuly fast, Cap'n,' said Malvery. 'Cropduster, by the looks.'

'Put a few warning shots across his bow,' Frey caled. '
Warning
shots, Malvery.'

'Got it, Cap'n.' The autocannon thumped out a short burst.

'Hey, how come Malvery gets to shoot?' Pinn complained in Frey's ear. Frey ignored him.

'Doesn't seem to have done much good, Cap'n,' said Malvery from the cupola.

Frey puled the flight stick sharply left. The
Ketty Jay
responded with an unsettling laziness.

'That didn't do much, either,' Malvery said. 'He's gonna pass over us.'

'You see any guns?'

'No.'

Frey frowned. He wasn't quite sure what the pilot of that plane thought he was going to do to a craft the size of the
Ketty Jay.
He was stil wondering when an avalanche of dust hit the windglass of the cockpit, and he found himself flying blind.

'Cap'n!' Malvery yeled. 'I can't see for buggery up here!'

'What in damnation just happened?' Frey panicked, wrestling with his flight stick. The thrusters were labouring. The
Ketty Jay's
Black-more P-12s could usualy chew through anything, but in their present state, they were having trouble unclogging themselves.

'He dumped his tanks on you!' Pinn told Frey. 'Al his fire-fighting dusty stuff. Can't hardly see you in the cloud! Ah, there's more of them coming in now!'

Frey banked again. He heard Malvery open up with the autocannon above him. 'Malvery! I said no!'

'Oh,
now
you've found your morals?'

'You've seen how they are! If we kil one of 'em, they'l never leave us alone.'

'Cap'n, we should—'

His reply was cut short by a heavy thump from above, that shook the whole aircraft. Frey felt the
Ketty Jay
plunge a few metres.

'You've got to be joking,' he muttered to himself.

'Cap'n!' Malvery, slightly hysterical this time. 'He's trying to land on us!'

The
Ketty Jay
rocked again. Frey swore under his breath. The pilot wasn't trying to land on them. He was trying to force them down, bumping them from above with his undercarriage wheels. What kind of crazed idiot did anything
half
that dangerous?

'Can we
please
just shoot them?' Pinn cried.

'I've just robbed a bunch of orphans!' Frey snapped. 'I don't want anything else on my conscience today!'

'I thought you said
you
were an orphan?' Pinn said. 'Doesn't that make it alright?'

Frey bit his lip and sent the
Ketty Jay
into a dive, venting aerium gas from the tanks to add speed to his descent. The dust had sloughed off the windglass, smearing as it went. It was enough to see through, barely.

'Lose 'em in the valeys?' Jez suggested.

'Lose 'em in the valeys,' Frey agreed.

Frey was getting angry, and when he got angry he got reckless. He dearly wanted to machine-gun the vilagers out of the sky, but he was too afraid of the consequences. His specialties were minor smuggling, petty theft, a gentle bit of piracy where nobody got shot and not too much was taken. They were soft crimes which the Navy were far too busy to concern themselves with. Once in a while somebody died, but usualy it was a guard too stupid to drop his weapon or a criminal who x probably deserved it anyway. People who accepted the risks and were paid to take them.