Skybreaker

by Kenneth Oppel

  I peered through the eyepiece. Just as the pirate neared the coffin, there was a shout from one of the others. The man before us whirled in alarm, and the next thing I knew he was screaming and convulsing and tentacles were flailing about with great lightning cracks. A terrible smell reached me even through the coffin.

  Kate gripped my arm, terrified.

  “The aerozoan got him,” I said.

  A chorus of curses and exclamations rose from the other pirates and gunfire cracked the air. Several bullets smacked the coffin’s wall but amazingly didn’t come through.

  I kept watching. The aerozoan had been hit and was slewing around the room like a punctured weather balloon.

  “Get ready,” I said. “We’re making a run for it.”

  We crouched.

  “Oh!” said Kate.

  Worried she’d been hit by a stray bullet, I looked over.

  “Something poked me,” she said, and I spotted a tiny switch jutting from the side of the coffin. Before I could stop her, Kate reached over and touched it. A door dropped open in the coffin’s bottom, and she disappeared.

  BLUEPRINTS

  Through the trap door I saw stairs, and quickly threw myself down them. Kate was picking herself up at the bottom and shining her torch around. We were in a tunnel. I could almost stand upright, but had to stoop a bit. I pushed the trap door firmly shut, just in case the pirates opened the coffin.

  Kate began to speak, but I hushed her. We were directly beneath the floor of the engineerium, and I did not know how easily we might be heard. One passage led forward, another led across the ship to the port side. I took Kate’s hand and started forward. The corridor was narrow but, like everything in Grunel’s ship, very well constructed, with wall paneling and light sconces, now dark. The floor was a metal catwalk, and beneath our feet I could see the Hyperion’s ribs and her outer skin. I paced out the distance as I walked, keeping silent until I reckoned we were well past the engineerium.

  “No wonder the crew never saw Grunel,” I whispered. “I can’t fathom this fellow. He has a perfectly good passageway along the keel, but he’d rather scuttle about like a ferret.” I nearly brained myself on a low beam, and cursed under my breath.

  “He was very short, you know. This would have been perfectly comfortable for him,” Kate said.

  “Odd little man,” I muttered.

  “I feel extremely grateful to him right now. Where do you think this leads?”

  “Right back to his stateroom. And I bet that other branch back there keeps going to the dead zoo. He probably popped up inside the yeti case.”

  The passage ended with a spiral staircase, and at the top was a small landing and door. I reached for the handle, praying it would not be locked. It turned, but when I pushed, the door didn’t move. I put my shoulder to it, with no good effect.

  “Try pulling,” suggested Kate, and I felt like a fool, for I could now see the hinges were on my side.

  I pulled hard, but the door was stubborn. I heard a faint crackling of ice and it shifted a smidgin. The effort left me winded. Kate grabbed hold too, and we hauled with all our weight. Loose ice showered down on us as the door slowly swung open.

  Kate was wheezing from exertion and held her mask to her face so she could catch her breath. We stepped into Grunel’s bedroom. The door was not simply a door, but an entire bookshelf. A burst water pipe had filmed it with ice. Hal had swept most of the shelves clean of books when searching, but had never noticed they hid a secret passageway.

  Kate gasped when she saw Grunel. His sheet was on the floor, several feet from his body, as if he’d thrown it off in a fury. He was staring at us. It seemed no matter where you were in the room, he was looking at you. I hoped he hadn’t heard me call him an odd little man. I saw the snapped fingers on his right hand, where Hal had wrenched the locket from his grasp. I wished I had the photograph of his daughter to return to him. I did not like to think of him separated from it in death. Of all the things he’d taken aloft with him, this was what he’d clung to at the end.

  “I’m sorry,” I said to him, under my breath.

  Before I closed the secret door, I had a quick look around to find out where the catch was. Now that the shelves were empty, it was easy to discover that one of them could be tilted up slightly, and behind it was a little brass button.

  “We should go,” said Kate. “They’ll come looking for the blueprints here.”

  Warily, listening all the time for Rath and his men, we left the apartment and made our way forward. Once past the officers’ quarters and the ladder down to the control car, the keel catwalk began its upward curve to the ship’s bow. We labored up the steps, pausing several times so Kate could gulp some tanked oxygen. I was breathing hard, and my temples throbbed. We reached the top of the stairs and were inside the ship’s nose cone. There was a small landing and workspace here, where the crew could tend to the mooring lines and forward gas cells. Running aft, through the ship’s very center, was the axial catwalk, disappearing quickly into the gloom.

  “Where are they?” Kate whispered.

  “Cruse,” hissed Hal.

  I turned to see his head sticking out from a large storage locker. We’d walked right past it. Hal ushered us inside and slid the door shut. The locker was filled with harnesses and fleece-lined coats and patching gear, but deep enough to fit all four of us. Hal’s choice of hiding place was a good one, for even if the pirates did search the bow, we had two possible retreats: back the way we’d come to the keel, or along the axial catwalk.

  “You had me worried,” wheezed Hal. He did not look at all well.

  “We hid in the coffin,” said Kate, and quickly told him of our escape.

  Hal nodded, though his eyes seemed unfocused. I didn’t think he was taking much in.

  “So Nadira had nothing to do with Rath finding us,” Kate told Hal pointedly.

  “Good to hear,” said Hal vaguely.

  Nadira’s breathing was quick and shallow, even though she was sitting and breathing tanked air.

  “How are you feeling?” I asked her.

  “Fine,” she said, her voice muffled through the mask.

  “She’s not fine,” said Hal. “She fainted when we got up here. She came round once I got the mask on her. I think her lungs are filling with fluid.”

  I nodded calmly, hoping my face did not betray my worry. I knew that at its worst, hypoxia could drown you, or make your brain swell fatally. Nadira was still conscious, which was a good sign, but I didn’t know how long she could last. I had no idea how high the Hyperion was now; at least she was no longer climbing, held in check by Rath’s ship.

  “Is there anything else we can do for her?” Kate asked.

  “Just keep her on oxygen and resting,” said Hal.

  “The only real cure is going down,” I said.

  “A bit beyond our control right now,” Hal added grimly, and started coughing.

  “Hal,” I said, looking at him, “do you need some oxygen?”

  “What? No, I’m fine,” he spluttered. “Save it for the girls.” He looked at Kate. “How’re you making out? Getting enough air?”

  “After wearing a corset, this is a walk in the park,” Kate said.

  I chuckled. Maybe that was why she was faring surprisingly well. I’d always assumed it would be Kate who flagged first, that Nadira’s harder life would make her more resilient. But altitude sickness could strike anyone at any time, even the most fit.

  “Cruse, what about you?” Hal asked.

  “I still feel all right.”

  “Lying’s not going to change anything.”

  “I’m not lying.” It vexed Hal that I wasn’t harder hit. He’d spent far more time at high altitudes than me—or so he said—but maybe not this high, or for so long. I felt the altitude sorely, I surely did, but it was not crippling me the way it was the others. I felt as if my body was calibrated for lofty heights. For me, the cold was the hardest part.

  “Did Rath see you?
” Hal asked.

  “We’re still the ship’s ghosts,” I told him, and regretted my choice of words. The possibility of the Hyperion adding us to its eternal crew seemed far too likely right now.

  “We’re all going to die if we don’t get down soon,” said Hal. “That’s the long and short of it.”

  “We need to radio the Saga again,” I said. “They might be able to pick us up.”

  “What if they can’t?” said Kate.

  “There are two ornithopters,” I said uncertainly.

  Kate’s eyes widened. “But they weren’t even invented in Grunel’s time!”

  “Well, he invented his own and kept it quiet. Nadira and I saw them in a hangar near the stern. Weird-looking things.”

  “You’ll not get me in one of those,” said Hal. “We don’t even know if they work. And where would you propose to land? We’re in the middle of the Antarctic Sea.”

  “We need some way off, Hal,” I said.

  “I’d rather try to steal Rath’s ship. There were eight men, you said? So probably at least three back on board…”

  I started shaking my head, the idea seemed so impossible. “How would we board her in secret, Hal? Anyway, they’re all heavily armed.”

  “I’ve still got four bullets. Their ship may be the only way off this floating morgue.” His anger billowed from his mouth like dragon’s smoke.

  “The Saga may be all right,” I said. “We need to find out at least. I’ll try to raise her again.”

  “I’ll come with you,” said Kate.

  I looked at Hal; he nodded. I was the only one who knew Morse code, and someone needed to stay with Nadira in case Rath came. It took all her strength just to breathe.

  We would have to be careful. Even now Rath’s crew was probably fanning out through the ship, looking for the blueprints. The control car wouldn’t be an obvious place to search, but they might have their own reasons for making a visit.

  We took the stairs down to the keel catwalk and then the ladder into the control car. With Kate’s help I hurriedly connected my torch batteries to the wireless. I put on the headphones. Kate climbed the ladder to keep watch. I did not want to be cornered down here.

  I sparked out my message to the Sagarmatha then paused for a minute to listen to the static. After transmitting a second SOS, I heard only more dead air. Fearing the worst, I sent a third distress message, and the moment I lifted my fingers from the spark key, I heard a return beep.

  I snatched at the notepad and wax pencil, so surprised I almost missed the first few letters.

  Dorje here. Cruse?

  Yes, I typed back jubilantly.

  Others okay?

  Yes. Hiding. Rath aboard. Oxygen almost gone. Can you come?

  Need three hours. Will come.

  Decoding the last two words I almost started crying.

  Will dock under control car. Be ready.

  Yes.

  I unhooked the batteries, took the message pad, and ran to the ladder. Kate looked down at me expectantly.

  “You got through!”

  I nodded. “They’re coming to get us.”

  The news warmed me. We hurried back up to our hiding place in the ship’s bow, and I told Hal and Nadira of our good fortune.

  “She’s well made, the Saga,” Hal said with pride. “They’ll be patching like mad.” He looked at his watch. “Three hours.”

  “Won’t Rath see them coming?” Kate asked.

  “Not if Dorje brings her up from below,” I said. “Rath’s right on top. He’s got no sightlines straight down.”

  “And their cannons will be useless,” Hal said. “They’ll have no clear shot. Dorje will nudge up beneath the control car. It’ll be a tricky business.”

  I knew there was an emergency hatch in the control car floor. We’d have to get a line between the two ships, and then clip on with our harnesses and lower ourselves down.

  “Just three more hours,” I told Nadira.

  “They still don’t know we’re here,” Hal said.

  “Exactly,” I said, wanting to reassure Kate and Nadira. “All we have to do is sit tight. They’ll never find us.”

  “We can sit tight,” said Hal, looking at me, “or we can get the blueprints.”

  I would be a liar if I said the thought had not occurred to me, but I wouldn’t have been bold enough to voice it.

  “They could be anywhere,” I said.

  “How many of those…things…buttons were there on the pneumatics?” Hal wanted to know. His sentences were starting to falter, which I knew was a bad sign. I recited all the buttons I’d seen below Grunel’s message tubes: servant’s room, engineerium, dead zoo, gardens, animal paddocks, captain’s cabin, landing bay.

  “But Hal,” I reminded him, “the capsule might be trapped inside the system.”

  “It’s too dangerous,” said Kate. “Why risk getting caught?”

  “You got what you came for,” said Nadira, removing her mask and looking fiercely at Kate. “If we don’t get those blueprints, I’m sunk. I’ve got nothing to go back to. You’ve got your specimens. You’ve got each other.”

  Her eyes drifted over to me. I looked down, not knowing what to say. I suppose she’d seen Kate and me holding hands, or maybe just noticed the way we’d been talking—and that had been enough. I somehow felt responsible for Nadira. She was alone in the world, and hadn’t had any breaks—and wouldn’t unless we found the blueprints. I wanted to make things right for her.

  “I don’t want anyone’s pity,” Nadira said, starting to wheeze, “but I do want a nice big pile of gold.” She fixed the mask over her mouth and breathed hard.

  “Nadira’s right,” said Hal. “This job’s yielded nothing for the rest of us. But those plans are worth a lot.”

  I could not deny my own temptation. It wasn’t just the money the plans would bring, it was the notion of preserving Grunel’s Prometheus Engine. The machine would change the world and make all sorts of wonders possible. The aerial city of my dreams.

  “There aren’t that many places to check,” said Hal. “What was it? Eight or nine? It’s easily enough done if we’re careful. And Rath still doesn’t know we’re here.”

  Kate was shaking her head. “There will be other salvages, Hal.”

  “No,” he said savagely. “There won’t. All my hopes were hanging on this one.” He looked at me. “I’ve not done as well as you might think. The Saga’s mine in name alone; it’s the bank that nearly owns her. I was counting on this trip to clear my debts. If I go home empty-handed, they’ll seize my ship. I clawed my way to where I am, through luck and sweat, and I’ll not be ruined.”

  I did not know what to say, I was so shocked. All along I’d imagined Hal to be as strong and triumphant as the Eiffel Tower. He was all success: suave, handsome, wealthy, the captain of his own ship. I didn’t know whether to pity or hate him, for his big talk had made me feel so puny and worthless. And yet, I did not like to see him laid low.

  “I’m still against it,” said Kate.

  “For,” huffed Nadira.

  “For,” said Hal. “Cruse, what d’you say?”

  “For,” I said.

  Kate stared at me, shocked. “Matt!”

  “We can’t let Rath destroy the blueprints as well as the machine.”

  “Is that it, or is it the money?” she demanded.

  “Both,” I said. “It’s both.”

  “That’s three out of four,” said Hal. “Clear majority.”

  “Oh, it’s a democracy now, is it?” said Kate.

  “Not at all. I’d have done it my way regardless.”

  “You should stay with Nadira,” I told Kate. “We can’t leave her alone.”

  Nadira was shaking her head. “I’m coming.”

  “You’re not going anywhere,” I said.

  “I’m fine on oxygen!”

  “Cruse’s right,” said Hal. “You’d be a danger to yourself and the rest of us.”

  Angrily Nadira star
ted to rise. I watched, awed by her determination. She made it halfway up, then staggered off balance. I caught her and helped her back down. She wouldn’t meet my eyes.

  “You’ll get your share,” Hal told her with surprising gentleness. “You needn’t worry.”

  I knelt beside Nadira and checked the oxygen tanks. I figured she’d have enough to last until the Saga came.

  “You’re doing great,” I said.

  “Not really,” she replied.

  I could see she was scared. “You’re a rule breaker, remember? You’ll be fine.”

  She nodded tiredly. I don’t think my pep talk cheered her at all.

  “Go!” she said to Kate through her mask. “No point you staying.”

  Kate sighed and looked at me. “If you’re hell-bent on doing this, we better do it quickly.”

  I did not like to leave Nadira alone, but she was right. There was nothing more we could do for her, and three sets of eyes were better than two—though I had no intention of letting Kate go off alone.

  “You’ve got the gun,” I told Hal, “you’re on your own. Kate’s with me.”

  “Fair enough,” he replied. “We’ll split up and meet back here.”

  We agreed on how to divide the ship, and then Hal set off down the steps to the keel. Kate and I headed silently along the axial catwalk, keeping our torches off so we’d see Rath’s men before they saw us. The thought of ghosts and specters no longer scared me. We reached the aft companion ladder and cautiously started down.

  First stop was the orchard, but the blueprints weren’t there, so we made our way to the landing bay. Inside, Kate’s eyes lingered on the two ornithopters.

  “Strange-looking birds,” she whispered. “I wouldn’t call these ornithopters. Chirothopters, maybe. More like bats. The wing structure is quite different.”

  “No time for this,” I hissed at her, searching the walls for the message tubes. It didn’t take long—but the blueprints weren’t here either. I imagined them hurtling endlessly through the labyrinth of pneumatic piping.

  As we headed for the dead zoo, I heard a great deal of noise coming from the engineerium. Rath’s crew would still be dismantling Grunel’s machine and turning the entire room on its head, trying to root out the blueprints. It wouldn’t be long before their search took them into the rest of the ship. We’d have to be quick.