Shattered Skies

by ALICE HENDERSON

  They glanced at each other, then nodded hesitantly.

  “All right. Let’s get this show on the road. Don’t like to stop too long in one place.” He returned to the engine and threw a few levers. In the middle of the train, one of the cars hissed. The top of it moved, parting at the top and splitting in half. It opened up and outward, unfolding into a huge metal platform.

  “Load ’er up!” Grant called.

  Raven checked the charging level of the maglevs. They were ready to go. He assembled them together and programmed them to work in tandem. Their power cells beeped in unison, indicating they were full.

  He flew them up to the A14, angling them beneath the fuselage and wings. They lifted, their rotors working furiously, finally managing to get it aloft. He steered them over to the train’s platform, the rotors starting to whir erratically, the power cells already depleting. He barely got the A14 positioned over the platform when they gave out, slamming the A14 down onto the train.

  “Hey!” shouted Grant. “You be careful up there. Not a scratch, remember? Not a scratch!” He rubbed his beard thoughtfully. “Forgot to mention that rule. Rule #4: Not a scratch!” He emerged from the engine compartment and climbed up onto the platform, bringing out tow ropes with hooks. Dirk helped him fasten these around the A14, securing it to the train.

  In the cargo car, they loaded up the remaining explosives.

  Then Grant hopped down to the ground, moving back toward the engine. “Let’s get movin’! There’s a turn around a few miles ahead. Hop aboard.”

  Gordon stepped back. “I’ll leave you to your journey. I’m going to fly the plane back. I can help Rivet set up for converting the A14.”

  Raven approached Gordon, then typed into the pilot’s PRD. “Here are the coordinates for the satellite location. I’ll tell her to meet you there.”

  H124 started to climb down from the Crawler, then thought better of it. It was an amazing piece of engineering. She didn’t want it sitting out like this. It had helped them, and could be useful in the future, if not for her, then maybe someone else on a future mission. She remained in the control booth. “You guys go on ahead. I’m going to drive this back and stash it. Then I’ll meet you along the track after you turn around.”

  Gordon looked up at her. “I’ll ride with you.” He grabbed a handle on the lower side of the Crawler and hopped up onto a small ledge.

  “Here, you’ll need this,” Raven said, handing over the portable UV charger. Gordon grabbed it and hauled it up onto the Crawler.

  Raven said goodbye to Gordon, shaking his hand, then looked up to H124. “See you in a few,” he called up. He climbed the stairs into the engine room. Byron joined him, leaning out again, hanging onto the handle. He gave her a small wave as the shielded doors came down. The train began to pull out, steam billowing from the chimney mounted on front of the engine.

  H124 turned the Crawler around, and they made the creeping journey back to the museum. Gordon hopped off as they got close, carrying the portable UV charger. He made his way to the main museum entrance, where he disappeared. Moments later, the huge loading door screeched open. H124 drove the Crawler down the ramp into the welcoming cool and dark. She parked it back at its original display, then climbed down. They shut the loading doors again and made their way through the dark museum to the main entrance.

  “This was an amazing place,” Gordon said as they paused at the door. “Must have been incredible to live back then. So much innovation. Exploration.”

  She nodded. “To have been to the moon!”

  “I know! Can you imagine?”

  H124 could.

  Outside, she accompanied him for the mile back to the plane. They loaded the UV charger into the plane, then she hugged him tightly.

  “I’ll get everything set up with Rivet,” he told her, double-checking that he had the coordinates of the Rover satellite site.

  She pulled away. “Good luck. Take care of yourself.”

  He turned and boarded the plane.

  She looked after him, watching him disappear through the door. Then he stuck his head back out. “About Dirk…you keep an eye on him. Everyone says time heals all wounds,” Gordon said quietly, “but I’ve always found that to be a complete dung pile of rubbish.” Then he climbed into the plane and pulled up the ladder.

  She watched until he taxied off and the plane climbed into the sky. Then she squinted in the direction of the train tracks, wondering if they’d make it all the way to the satellite location.

  Chapter 4

  H124 trudged back toward the train tracks in the blistering heat, past the fallen trees again. Wind whistled through holes in one of the rusted barrels. In the distance she spotted the train chugging back in her direction. It pulled up alongside her, and the shield door opened. She climbed into the engine compartment, purple floor and ceiling lights giving the space a slightly spooky feel. Several view screens showed the dusty world scrolling by.

  As soon as the armored doors slammed shut, H124 realized with a grateful sigh that the interior was climate controlled. Coolness spread over her body. Grant hooked a thumb behind him. “The others are in the back compartments.” As her eyes adjusted to the gloom, she noticed a door leading to the back cars. She stepped up to it and pushed a button. It slid open.

  The door admitted her into an elaborately decorated train car. Red velvet sofas and recliners, linen-covered tables, and a decorative bar filled the space. Byron sprawled on a red chaise-lounge, holding a glass with some kind of amber liquid in it.

  Raven sat at one of the tables, going over the A14’s schematics on his PRD. Like in the engine compartment, this room showed displays projected from outside. They glowed from within wooden window frames, and after a few moments, she forgot they actually weren’t windows.

  “Welcome!” Byron said. “Have a seat. Can I get you a drink?”

  H124’s mouth was parched. “Definitely.” She made a circuit of the room, taking in the furnishings appreciatively. “Where’s Dirk?”

  Byron mouth turned down at the sides. “He found a bed to lie down in. I’m worried about him.”

  “Me, too,” she said.

  They drank in companionable silence, watching the scenery scroll by. Later, they ate MREs and played cards with Raven. Dirk still hadn’t emerged when night fell. She snuck into the sleeping car to check on him, found him curled up on one of the bunks, face toward the wall, his breathing even and steady. She slipped back out.

  * * * *

  The next day, H124 woke refreshed, finding that the gentle rocking of the train had led to the deepest sleep she’d had in a while. She dressed, watching the terrain scroll by on the wall displays. Heat shimmered off vast dry plains. The landscape was the flattest she’d ever seen, without a hill in sight.

  Exploring the train, she passed from car to car, completely taken aback by the sheer opulence of it. More red and purple velvet seats, antique wooden bars, landscape paintings with rich patinas. In one car, she even found a contraption similar to one she’d seen in an old photograph. In the image, a woman had been seated in front of a large machine of some sort with black and white levers and brass foot pedals.

  H124 approached the contraption.

  She pressed one of the white levers and a tone sounded. She pressed another to the right, and a higher tone rang out. She pressed two at the same time, feeling a vibration through the machine as the tones sounded and faded away. A bench stood before it. There she sat down, tinkering with the levers.

  The door behind her whooshed open, and Byron came through. Lights from the screens passed over his face, the golden afternoon sunrays shining from the displays.

  She paused, her fingers lightly touching the levers. He walked over to the bench, sliding in beside her. She could feel the warmth of his body, their sides touching. She swallowed. “What is this?”

  “Isn’t it amaz
ing?” He stroked the levers affectionately. “It’s a musical instrument, a piano.” He smiled, his expression faraway. “When I was a kid, on one of our scouting expeditions with my folks, we came across this old woman who lived in a huge underground bunker. She’d hoarded all kinds of things down there, including this piano. At first she was scared of us, offered to give us things if we left. But my parents were kind to her, intrigued. She painted like my dad, and they got to talking. After that, we went back to see her again and again. She taught me a little.” He ran his hands over the wood. “When she passed away, I was in my teens. It was a real blow. She was so eccentric—knew so much about the world that had come before, and if you were quiet and listened, she taught you things. I couldn’t bear to let the piano go to some Death Rider camp to be destroyed, so I took it. Gave it to Grant. Figured if it were on a moving target, it would have a better chance of survival.”

  H124 looked down at the instrument. “So this is it? The same piano?”

  “The only piano, as far as I know.”

  “Can you play something?”

  Byron looked a little shy, then straightened his back and flexed his fingers. He played two notes, then eased into a wonderful melody with rich bass notes intermingled with melodic higher notes that sang out. She’d never heard music before, not like this. She’d heard some strange sounds piped into the citizens’ quarters in New Atlantic, but they were somehow artificial and rigid.

  This melody cascaded, and he worked the pedals, making the music deep and resonant. H124’s heart started to beat faster. Her mouth came open a little as he continued, moving his body with feeling as the piece grew more intense until it came to a crashing finish. He took a deep breath then, and slowly brought his fingers away from the levers.

  He rested his hands on his legs and looked at her out of the corner of his eye, a bit sheepish.

  “That was…amazing…” she breathed. “I’ve never heard anything like it.”

  He turned to face her, swinging one leg over the bench. The pull to him was magnetic. She did the same, swinging her leg over to face him. They sat there for a moment, his green eyes intense with emotion. Then he reached out, touching her hand, pulling her closer. She moved on top of him, straddling his body, crossing her ankles behind his back.

  They faced each other, his eyes smoldering in a way that robbed her of breath. His hand came up on her back, and he pulled her into a kiss. She pressed her lips to his, their bodies clasped together, and he groaned with pleasure.

  His hands moved up her back, fingers navigating through her hair. She felt a fire building in her down below, a desire to devour him and have him devour her. She bent her head down, kissing him deeply, but suddenly the train lurched, throwing Byron off the bench, toppling her over with him. It lurched again, braking hard, and they went sliding across the room, Byron still holding onto her.

  They sat up, peering outside. H124 sucked in a sharp breath. She snapped her head toward the other window, Byron leaping up beside her. Dune buggies roared into sight on both sides of the train, drivers pulling up flush with them. Their faces painted with blood, teeth bared, the marauders brandished battle axes and shotguns, screaming with fury in the thrill of attack. Each buggy was jammed with attackers. Spikes mounted on the back of each vehicle held human heads, bloody hair streaming in the wind from broken skulls.

  The Death Riders had found them.

  Chapter 5

  The train passed by more and more Death Riders, some on foot, pumping spears in the air, others roaring toward them in jeeps and buggies. She didn’t see any of the heavy trucks they used. The train slowed and the Death Riders started banging against the sides. It ground to a halt. Then the engine chugged again, harder and faster, growing louder, and the train began to move backward.

  The Death Riders pursued, running and pounding on the sides of the train with staffs and spears. Others tried to leap onto the train from vehicles, but couldn’t find purchase. A few fired guns point-blank into the armored sides. She heard bullets pinging off the metal. Their combustible engines roared alongside the train.

  H124 and Byron raced through the door, running toward the engine control booth. They reached it just behind Raven.

  Grant stood in the booth, his face sweaty, his eyes wide. “They’ve built a barricade on the tracks. Some hulking metal wreck of a thing. We can’t get through.”

  “So what do we do?” Byron asked.

  “We have to go back. We have no choice.”

  “Won’t they just follow us?” H124 asked.

  Grant’s face had completely drained of blood, and he looked gaunt through his layer of sweat. She thought of the time she and the others been taken by them, fighting in the arena, barely escaping with their lives.

  “This took some planning,” Grant said through gritted teeth. “They knew the route. There are tons of disused tracks up here. But they knew we’d be using this one.”

  Raven looked nervously out of the window toward the back of the train. “What if they want us to go back? What if they’ve set up a larger war party farther back along the track?”

  H124 grabbed a pair of diginocs off the control board and looked out at the obstruction. Grant was right—it was huge. Some sort of amalgamated, welded monstrosity, a joining of two or more semi-trucks with mounted spikes. It would take an airship to blow that thing off the tracks.

  She paused then, thinking of the explosives they had. “Wait a minute.” She ran back to the cargo car. Digging through a box, she pulled out the remaining explosives from blasting their way into the museum. They didn’t have any remotely detonating explosives left, but they had plenty of self-igniting ones. If she used enough of them…

  But she’d have to travel the distance between the train and the obstruction, and she’d have to be fast. No way she could do it on foot. Her eyes moved around the room, settling on the maglev sleds. They’d recharged their power cores on the platform next to the A14, then stored them away down here.

  Just then the door whooshed open to the cargo car. Byron stood framed there with Raven. “What is it?”

  She held up one of the explosives. “I’ve got an idea.” She grabbed a maglev, unfurling its transparent surface sheet and calibrating the four copters beneath it. Then she paired it with her PRD. “How fast can these things go?”

  Raven stepped forward. “Fast.”

  Byron moved past her, uncurling a second maglev. “I like where you’re going with this.”

  “Wait a minute,” Raven said, holding up a hand. “You’re not thinking of…riding that thing?”

  “We used it to top the shield wall in Murder City.”

  “That was a little different. It doesn’t even have handles.”

  She started stuffing explosives into a munitions satchel, then strapped it across her body. “Keep backing up the train, distracting them, luring them along with you.” She just hoped a group of them hadn’t waited at the barricade.

  She ran to the front of the train. Grant frantically looked out of the windows. Most of the Death Riders were keeping pace with the train. There were a few on foot that had been left behind, but all of the buggies and jeeps bounced alongside the locomotive, Death Riders screaming with the thrill of pursuit.

  Except for the few stragglers on foot, the track to the obstruction was clear. “As soon as you see the explosion,” she told Grant, “start coming back this way.” She glanced up. “Is there a top hatch?”

  He nodded, pointing above his head. “You want me to open it?”

  Byron ran up, a satchel full of explosives slung over his shoulder. She looked to him and he nodded.

  “Open it.”

  Grant threw a lever on the control console, and the hatch clicked and slid to one side. She climbed onto the maglev and steered it up through the hatch. Behind her, Byron did the same. On top of the train, the wind blasted her back, throwing strands
of her hair into her eyes. She lowered her center of gravity, crouching on the maglev, and ordered it to take off at top speed toward the barricade. She startled at how fast it jolted ahead, and had to grip the edges of the thin sheet to keep from tumbling off. It flew over the front of the train, speeding down the tracks, the wind streaming into her eyes.

  The few Death Riders on foot shouted and roared, pointing her out, taking off back toward the blocked track.

  She glanced over her shoulder, seeing Byron grinning, holding on to the maglev at a half crouch, raising his fist at one of the Death Riders. He shouted something at one of them, but the wind carried away his words.

  She approached the obstruction and dug into the munitions bag, pulling out one of the tubular explosives. It had a self-igniting cap, so she struck it, sending a spark to the fuse. As she flew over the pile of debris, she let it drop. It clinked onto the mass of joined metal and seconds later a blinding flash of fire and light shook the mound. But it wasn’t nearly enough. Only a small part of the front blew off. They’d have to drop a number of the explosives at once in a coordinated attack. As she swung around the back side of the obstruction, she saw that two Death Riders had remained at the pile of debris. One pointed a nasty-looking weapon at her, a long gleaming tube with a barbed spear loaded into it. He raised it and she banked away, almost coming off the sled. It wasn’t built for something like this.

  She opened up a comm window to Byron. “We have to drop the explosives at the same time!”

  On her vid screen, he gritted his teeth as his maglev veered to one side, narrowly missing a shot from one of the Death Riders. The gleaming barbed spear flew out, attached to a rope, narrowly missing Byron as he careened by. Instantly the Death Rider began reeling the spear back. He shoved it into the weapon and readied to aim again.

  She flew down the far side of the tracks, beyond the barricade. She couldn’t see any Death Riders this far down the tracks. They hadn’t expected them to make it past the obstruction. She hovered above the tracks about five hundred yards away, and Byron pulled up beside her. Her hands hurt from gripping the maglev sled, and she flexed her fingers.