Cipher Hill

by Joseph R. Lallo

  Lil stifled another cough. “I reckon I’ll take my chances with the fug, on account of how much of a pain I’m liable to be for you until it gets the better of me.”

  He leveled his weapon, attempting to take aim at her half-seen form hidden behind the pipes. A sudden motion convinced him to pull the trigger. Something clattered to the ground, and footsteps dashed for the exit on the far side of the room. He stepped forward to find she’d thrown her weapon aside. He took a breath, pistol still at the ready, and approached the nearest speaking tube.

  “Captain, be aware that our prisoner liberated herself. Take all appropriate precautions. The problem should sort itself out, but I wouldn’t place too much confidence in my own precautions. This crew is roach-like in its capacity for survival.”

  #

  Prist, as gingerly as possible, pushed the canvas-wrapped charge down the barrel of the gun. “Are you certain about this? This is a rather awkward means of loading a weapon,” she said, feeding the charge deeper with a pole.

  “We are absolutely not loading it properly, but we are also using improper ammunition and propellant, so allowances must be made,” Gunner called.

  He stuffed some improvised packets of powder into the portion of the gun usually intended for the ammunition itself and slammed it shut.

  “That’s far enough,” he called to her. “We’ve got to get this aimed and fired if we are going to have time for a second shot.”

  She stepped aside and watched as he angled the weapon upward. “How do you know you are aiming the weapon correctly?”

  “Intuition,” he said. “Misusing and abusing weaponry as often as I have has afforded me a considerable amount of it.”

  He glanced back and forth between the ship and the angle, adjusting it a few times.

  “Fingers in your ears, Samantha,” he announced.

  She obliged. He fired. The gun lurched backward and rattled the ship with a resounding thump. Smoldering pieces of canvas traced an arc through the air that entirely missed the flying fortress ahead of them. Their attack fell well short. Return fire from two of the ship’s cannons struck the side of their ship, rupturing at least one steam line.

  “What happened?” Samantha asked.

  “Occasionally, intuition requires some trial and error,” he said, cranking the muzzle back down. “Quickly, reload!”

  Prist wrapped a second shell and stuffed it into the muzzle somewhat more roughly than last time. Gunner packed some additional charge this time, and when all was in readiness, adjusted the angle.

  “What formulation are we loaded with?” he asked, squinting at the angle of the rain as lightning lit up the sky.

  “Formulation one,” she said. “It is one of the only reliable ones we have left in any quantity.”

  He lowered the muzzle a hair. “Better to hit the deck than the envelope then. Prepare to fire!”

  She dashed aside, and once again he launched the weapon. Another arc of embers traced its path. This time it struck, at least vaguely, where he’d been aiming. The ship was too distant for them to see the impact itself, but as a fresh bolt of lightning danced from cloud to cloud, the results of the attack were clear. Blue crystals formed, covering at least two of the rear cannons with their twinkling crust.

  “Brilliant!” she crowed.

  Gunner dashed to the nearest speaking tube. “Captain! Two cannons disabled for now. Can we risk a third shot?”

  “If you can take out that third cannon with it, we can risk it,” Mack said.

  Gunner grinned. “Another formulation one, Samantha. Let’s see if we can make this one a direct hit.”

  Chapter 15

  Lil held her breath. If she moved slow and breathed easy, the malfunctioning filter mask was just enough to keep her from passing out. Unfortunately, dashing through an enemy ship that is under fire is not something that lends itself well to calm, easy breathing. The wisps of fug that had made their way into her lungs burned terribly. It brought back horrid memories of the torture she’d endured while in the clutches of Skykeep.

  She emerged onto the main deck and surveyed her surroundings. Wind and rain pelted the ship. A crust of jagged blue crystals covered the aft decking, with the limited crew desperately chipping away at it. Far behind, she saw the second dreadnought. A smile came to her face as she realized Captain Mack must be at the helm. The smile vanished when she saw the muzzle flash of some manner of massive gun on the deck.

  Lil slid behind a low wall separating two levels of the deck. Voices rang out in confusion as the attack struck the ship and the odd crackling sound of additional crystal followed. In the chaos, Lil allowed herself a ragged cough and a deep, painful breath. This time it was almost pure fug. Her eyes watered and her chest heaved. As far as she knew, there was only one way she was going to keep from succumbing to the toxic fumes.

  She dashed for the helm. The captain of the ship was shouting orders with a level of panic that suggested it was his first time in command of a ship in battle. It would have been wise for her to approach from behind, but time did not currently allow for much in the way of wisdom. He noticed her drenched form a moment before she made contact.

  Though Lil’s frame was anything but stout, the captain was a typical example of a fug man: wiry and slight. They may have been stronger than they looked, but they were just as light as they looked. The pair of them tumbled to the deck. He managed to throw her from atop him, and they both scrambled to their feet.

  “Contact with the prisoner!” the captain cried. His hand clawed at a holster on his belt, only to find it empty.

  “Just what did you think I was after when I rolled you, fella?” Lil croaked, raising the pistol.

  She stepped backward, keeping the pistol raised, until she reached the helm. The controls were utterly incomprehensible. There were enough of them here to control the Wind Breaker five times over. But when it came right down to it, there were a few things that were unmistakable. This was the ship’s wheel. That was a row of throttles. Which meant this must have been the pumps for altitude. She spun the valves fully open. Immediately, she felt the odd weight of a ship swiftly rising.

  Two of the other crewmen, heeding the captain’s call, approached from the aft end of the deck. Lil’s eyes flicked to the controls again. The fasteners holding on the controls were odd, with gaps in the middle. She reached out and pinched the fastener. The valve wheel popped off.

  “Oh! You made it so all of the controls could be popped off in a hurry. Handy!” she quipped with a ragged breath.

  One by one she popped the altitude controls off and tossed them aside. When the last of them was gone, she gave the ship’s wheel a spin. The whole dreadnought lurched and swung. Lil took advantage of the disorienting motion to tuck the pistol into her belt and spring to the rigging. Her normally sprightly navigation of the rigging was labored and slow as her lungs ached for air, but she still managed to climb high enough for the crew below to have trouble taking proper aim at her.

  #

  Captain Mack gazed at the ship ahead as it rose toward the thick, churning surface of the fug. It was pivoting and shuddering in a way that suggested it was either out of control or being controlled by someone who didn’t know how to do so. Either suited his purposes, as the ship was moving too quickly for the cannons to take proper aim. The direct hit they’d taken while putting Gunner’s cannon into play had damaged the feeds to some of the propellers. They weren’t as fast as they should have been. The rapid ascent presented problems as well, a fact that was not lost on Nita as she dashed to the captain’s side.

  “I was able to route around some damage,” she said, “but if we take many more hits, we’re going to lose our edge, and that ship might have a chance to get away. We need to get above them so we can try boarding to retrieve Lil!”

  “This ain’t my first battle. But the one thing they got that’s still working like it oughta is the cluster of envelopes. Best we can do is climb as fast as them.”

  Nita glan
ced along the deck, then back to the captain. “Captain, can you get close? And can you get under them. They have grapplers. We can hook them from beneath and scale the cables.”

  “Ain’t a great plan. You seen what we got in the belly of this ship. We get under them, they can start droppin’ bombs on us.”

  “You get us under them and I’ll make sure those doors are jammed before they can dream of dropping something on us.”

  Mack furrowed his brow. “Like I said, ain’t a great plan. But we ain’t got a better one. Get to them grapplers and be ready to climb. Take Coop and Nikita with you. Next to Lil, he’s quicker on a rope than anyone. I’ll have Wink keep his ears open. If there’s somethin’ we need to know, have Nikita tap a message on the line.”

  Nita nodded and dashed to the upward-pointing grapplers. Mack knew she was all-too familiar with them. Back when they’d first tangled with a dreadnought, those massive hooks had been what had yanked the Wind Breaker hard enough to dump her overboard. It seemed only proper that she get a chance to use them to set things straight.

  #

  Lil panted and wheezed. She thumped along a catwalk running around the edge of the dreadnought’s massive main envelope. The limited crew of the ship had not pursued her, no doubt because they had their hands full dealing with Mack and the others on the offensive. That was just as well. It was possible that if they’d followed her this far, she wouldn’t have been able to get away.

  She couldn’t tell if the burning in her lungs had been improving, or if she’d simply become used to it, but it was no longer her main concern. Right now what worried her was how terribly winded she was, even as she’d slowed to a trudge.

  “There just ain’t enough… air in my air…” she huffed.

  Her red, teary eyes turned to the sky above. The fug here had the telltale thickness of where the terrible fumes met the fresh air. She was close. Slowly, the comparative brightness of the stormy night sky—a dark shade of gray rather than utter blackness—emerged through the fug. The chemical chill dropped away from her exposed skin, and instead she was treated to the more natural iciness of falling rain and wailing wind. Joyously, triumphantly, she pulled the mask from her face. She took a long, deep breath and released it as a grotesque hacking. The proper lungful of fresh air hit her like a tonic, revitalizing her. She could feel her strength returning, though her body was still keen on purging every last curl of fumes from her lungs with body-shaking coughs. She spat into her palm and watched as the rain rinsed away a few worrisome purple flecks.

  “Ain’t never did that before…” she said.

  Lil looked over the curling, churning top of the fug, watching it recede like some manner of wicked tide, dropping down the massive curve of the envelopes.

  “Just a little more and I’ll have the run of the ship again, mask or no.” She smiled. “Ain’t nothin’ can keep a Cooper down!”

  With her newfound strength, she scrambled up the curve of the envelope, eager to get far enough from the fug to avoid catching a stirred-up streamer of the stuff. When she was at the peak of the envelope—where a handy crow’s nest sat affixed to the stiff, fortified fabric—she turned her attention to the mask.

  “If I’m lucky,” she mused, twisting and tugging at any piece of it that could move, “whatever Tusk did to this thing’ll be easy to fix. Just in case—”

  She reached back and slid the hidden knife from her belt. Having already escaped the notice of the guards who confiscated her weapons and sliced through the ropes that bound her, the little gift from Nita had twice proved its worth. If the sabotage to the mask was minor, it could make a passable substitute for a screwdriver fix it.

  Fate chose that moment to test her interminable optimism. The ship shuddered and trembled. Though she was quite near the countless engines that forced the dreadnought through the air, and thus could barely hear herself shout, the impact of whatever it was that had caused it to shimmy in such a way hit her ears like a clap of thunder. Already strained rigging dug deeper into the envelope. Then, slowly, she watched the fug start to fold over the bottom curve of the envelope again.

  “… I reckon I ought to have a word with them boys about their lousy timing…”

  #

  Nita stood at the winch beside one of the handful of grapplers bolted to their dreadnought’s deck. It was straining and stuttering. Despite having a steam hoist system every bit as potent as the one on the crane back at Cipher Hill, it was completely locked up in its attempt to reel the ships closer together. The captain had reversed the phlogiston pumps, though, causing their ship to shed altitude. The combined weight of the two enormous warships was enough to drag their enemies down.

  Coop had finally returned from operating the cannons, and there was no prize for guessing who he’d met along the way. In addition to his usual rifle and pistol, he was strapped with at least three more guns. That Nikita was clinging to the outside of his coat rather than huddled underneath suggested the heavy duster was hiding additional weaponry. Gunner had seen to it that he was prepared.

  Another man might have asked the captain to hold things steady or asked for assurance from Nita that the grappler would hold. They hadn’t even gotten a clear view of how the grappler had affixed itself to the belly of the ship above. For all they knew, it was simply embedded in the wood itself, ready to let go at any moment.

  Coop had only one comment before hauling himself up along a line thicker than the Wind Breaker’s mooring line.

  “Stay close,” he said.

  Nita set her eyes on the dense purple mist above. It was a long climb, and a disorienting one, insomuch as the ships were dropping into the fug at the same rate that she was climbing out of it, so the indigo clouds never seemed to draw any nearer. She worked past the edge of the main envelope and continued onward. Her mind should have been awash with a thousand worries. The line was vibrating so violently under the strain of the twin ships that it almost numbed her fingers as she climbed. Somewhere above her there was a row of bomb bay doors that could at this moment be opening to dump their payloads onto the ship below. She didn’t know how many fug folk awaited her on the ship above or how well armed they were. She could be climbing directly into an ambush. None of those things even occurred to her. The only thing on her mind was the knowledge that somewhere up there, Lil needed her help. That was all that mattered.

  Using a technique Lil herself taught Nita, the engineer ascended the rope. The thrashing sounds of the engines below her slowly faded, and the struggling sounds of the ship above took their place. For a brief, terrifying moment, the length of rope she clung to had both its top and bottom hidden in the thick mist. Nita felt like she was hanging from a narrow thread in an endless toxic sea. Then, slowly, the belly of Tusk’s dreadnought parted the mist above.

  The grappler had punched through one of the cannon bays on the side of the ship and was well and truly lodged. She climbed to the jagged wooden hole and squeezed through. Once inside, she twisted the knob on a small phlo-light on her tool sash. The cannon bays were long hallways along the sides of the ship, lined with wheeled cannons sitting in ruts in the floor, the better to spill off recoil. This bay appeared to be entirely deserted. Coop, despite having arrived well ahead of Nita, was still dashing along the hallway, testing door after door in hopes of finding one the crew had neglected to seal.

  Nita stepped up to the nearest of the doors. It was clear why Coop hadn’t simply broken one down. Exposed as they were to the outside via copious openings for cannons, the wall and doors were easily as heavily fortified as the hull of the ship.

  Coop glanced in her direction. “Outside of the ship’s too tough to climb in a storm like this. It’s gonna take an awful lot of bullets to bust through one of these,” he said. “You got any brighter ideas?”

  Nita looked to the door, then glanced aside. “Use something bigger than bullets,” she said.

  #

  For the first time in his life, despite having used them to great effect throug
h various directives and orders, Tusk found himself behind the wheel of the dreadnought. The captain had left to track down someone who could locate or replace the controls for the phlogiston pumps. Most of the rest of the crew had rushed to the belly of the ship to do something about the grappler that had punched into the ship’s side. A figure stumbled out of the rain. It was Mallow.

  “Mallow! Where have you been?” he called.

  “The rest of the crew was busy. I was trying to ready the secondary helm! I think I’ve got it ready.” He wiped rain from his forehead. “Please tell me you’ve got a plan, sir!”

  Tusk’s keen mind swept over the possibilities. “We have two under-crewed ships. Two crews pushed to the limit. The Wind Breaker crew is far closer to being on even footing with us than I would like. The art of crafting schemes is to arrange situations such that one never finds oneself at a disadvantage. For decades I’ve not once allowed myself into a situation with any possible outcomes that did not favor me in some way. But this… this is a situation beyond my control. The Wind Breaker crew simply doesn’t know enough or doesn’t care enough about the dangers they are in to be cowed by threats. Fear of consequences more often than not robs even the most stalwart of warriors of the motivation and ambition to complete what they seek to do.”

  “The Wind Breaker crew is fearless!” Mallow said.

  “No. They aren’t fearless. Shamefully, I’ve let them get close enough for me to see in their eyes that they are every bit as terrified as anyone else. But it doesn’t seem to matter to them. They navigate danger like a fish in water. It severely limits our options.”

  “Tell me we are going somewhere, sir! Tell me you had a destination in mind, that help is on the way.”

  “We are heading somewhere, but there is no help waiting for us. That is not the nature of our visit.”

  Mallow glanced at the controls. “Bombs! We can open the bomb bay doors!” he said.

  The underling reached for the controls. Tusk knocked his hand aside.