“I bet it does. Maybe that’s what I’ve been doing wrong all this time, Ambrose. Should have been introducing myself to the ladies as the man with the Spear of Destiny.” Gar winked at Suri, who turned her face and grimaced.
The Mercurion—Ambrose?—sighed in dismay.
“Eh.” Gar waved like he was shooing a fly. “Anyway, we’re ready to go when you folks are ready to pay. She’s fueled up and ready to fly.”
“Great.” I hesitated before sending him the party request, hanging back from the edge of the gangplank. There was no reason for me to feel as distrustful as I did, other than the fact that Gar was… well, Gar. “Say—you got any idea what Cloud Emperors are?”
“Cloud Emperor Jellyfish. They aren’t dangerous to ships, unless you’re a big damn idiot.” Gar replied. “You see ‘em all the time over the open ocean. Great big man o’war lookin’ critters. You’ll find a pod of three or four of them hanging out over the water, dipping their tentacles in like fishing lines. Only problems you can have with em are if you fly into those tentacles, or if you scare ‘em.”
“What happens if you scare them?” Rin asked nervously.
“They fart,” Gar replied. “And somethin’ that size, floating around all full of who knows what? You don’t want that thing fartin’ anywhere near your goddamned engines. They put out some kind of gas that screws with navigation. Anyway, we ain’t afraid of em: the Strelitzia can fly rings around the bastards, and they don’t give a damn about airships. Hell, I got one of those game achievements from flying this ship between their tentacles once. Piece of cake.”
Ambrose sighed again. Emphatically.
“Hah.” Suri laughed, rubbing Cutthroat’s neck as the hookwing stamped and snorted. “You got a hookwing berth?”
“Sure. You got my money?” Gar asked, shooting me a suspicious glare.
“Sure do.” Against my better judgement, I sent Gar a party invite.
[Garcia Martinez has accepted your Join request.]
“Wait: You used your real name when you loaded in?” I opened my Inventory and set up the transfer from my Kingdom Funds.
“Yeah. Why not?” Gar shrugged. “Ain’t got nothing to hide.”
“Fair enough.” Before I sent the money over, I took a peek at his available character details. He was an Artificer, and his Advanced Path was probably the most matter-of-fact class I’d ever seen in a fantasy game: ‘Airship Engineer’. He was only Level 17, but his Skills were off the charts. He had Advanced and even Master levels in a range of different abilities: Airship Mechanics, Sapping, Improvised Construction, Materials Development… real-world technical skills, with hardly a mention of magic.
“How the hell did you get yourself an airship by Level 17?” I sent the money across, puzzled.
“Why? Got a problem with prime numbers?” He accepted his three grand, then immediately opted out of the Party.
“You know that every question isn’t some kind of attack on you, right?” I gestured between the two of us. “I’m trying to figure out who me and my people are going to be spending the next week with. I don’t need your life story or anything, but some basic info would be nice.”
Gar thought about that for a minute. “I’m good at my job. Like to fly. Not great at small talk and not good at playing games. How’s that for an answer?”
“We can help you level, if you’d like!” Rin said. “I’m a crafter, too!”
The man’s expression flickered briefly as he glanced at Rin. For a moment, he almost looked pained. “Polite of you, but I don’t need any help, miss…?”
“Rin,” she replied, sticking out a silvery hand. “Just Rin. Pleased to meet you!”
I smiled at Suri and Karalti as I watched him hesitate, then grudgingly shake. Rin had a way of opening people up.
“Alright. Enough chit-chat.” Gar shook out his shoulders like an irritated bird, then motioned with a hand. “Up you go. The dinosaur goes below decks. We got a single stall for live cargo down there. Just make sure she doesn’t cause any trouble.”
“I’ve got food for her in my Inventory. As long as she has her face in a trough, she’ll be fine.” Suri clicked her tongue, and started Cutthroat up the gangplank.
“I bet she does, given she’s the size of a god-damned school bus.” Gar eyed the hookwing dubiously as she strutted past, keeping her nose close to Suri’s hair.
Ambrose peeled off after her, and the rest of us followed. Karalti reached for my hand, craning her head to take in the sights as we headed for the bulkhead door. Gar bounded up the ramp after us in a long-legged stride, waving at the curious crew members gawking at us through the portholes. “Alright, slackers! Gangplank up, sails out! Let’s get this show on the road!”
“Phew.” Karalti gave me a sidelong look. “He’s kind of intense, isn’t he?”
“You know, I knew a Garcia Martinez in the Army,” I said. “It’s not an uncommon name where I’m from, but I have to wonder if he’s the same guy.”
“Maybe!” Karalti bounded ahead through the door, sniffing deeply as the warm, slightly stale air from the cabin washed over us. “Are you excited to go to Meewhome?”
“I’m wondering what flavor of goat rodeo we’re gonna to have to deal with on our way to Meewhome,” I replied. “Because it’s practically a law that if a bunch of player characters with an important plotline get on an airship or a train, intending to travel to some important destination, something with a lot of teeth and a grudge is going to screw them on the journey.”
Chapter 36
4 Days Later.
A guttural scream of terror ripped Karalti and I out of slumber.
"AAAAAAHHHHHHH! FUCKFUCK OH! OHNO NO NO NOOOOOO!"
There were series of splintering crashes, like someone overturning something large out in the hall, followed by roars. The scream lost its terror and flared into open, full bore rage:
"FUCK, FUCK! YOUR WHORE OF A FUCKING HOOKWING IS DIGGING UP MY BED! GET THE FUCK- NO YOU BITCH OF A BEAST, LET THAT GO!'
Gar’s rant was drowned out by a deep-bellied bestial snarl, then a pistol shot that echoed through the airship like a whip crack. Karalti and I scrambled up in our sheets, and Karalti tumbled off the narrow ship’s bunk with a frightened ‘eep!’ as we hastily equipped weapons and clothing.
“What in the ever-loving fuck is going on out there?” I rolled up, fully dressed, and helped Karalti to her feet on the way out.
“I dunno!” She followed me at a run.
Cutthroat’s roars were intermittently drowning out the sound of humans shouting, yelling, and cursing. We burst out the end of the corridor into an atmosphere of raw, unadulterated chaos. Gar and Suri were arguing outside his room. Our captain had his pistol in one hand and a pillow in the other, which he was clutching against the front of his naked crotch. The door to his quarters—and every other door on the way there from the lower deck—was either flat on the ground or hanging off its hinges. Beyond was a larger ship’s berth with a single bed, currently groaning under the weight of Cutthroat. The hookwing was bleeding from a slug to the shoulder, but her jaws were set, her eyes fixed forward. The rest of the room was trashed. Everything that could be considered remotely soft had been pulled in and under her stamping feet, clothing packed down under blankets and curtains, the stuffing of the mattress now torn and shaped into a cup-like depression. She was now settling into this, arms spread, feathers fluffed, head down towards the door. Her throat was now blushed bright red, puffed up to a degree I'd never seen it before, and she was making the weirdest honking, booming noises by vibrating it like some manner of drum.
It was a nest.
She had nested in the Captain's quarters.
Karalti gawped at the scene ahead, open-mouthed. “Matir have mercy.”
“No. Oh no. No-no-no-no, you have got to be fucking kidding me.” I felt my temples start to throb, and reached up to grip the top of my head. “When we were testing that parachute… did her and Payu, like…”
“Yea
hhh…” Karalti winced. “I think they miiiight haaaave.”
“-And just what part of hiring you meant you could fucking shoot my fucking hookwing!?” Suri was right up in Gar’s face, nearly nose to nose with him.
He snarled back at her, brandishing the revolver. “How about the part where she busted out of her stall, wrecked everything in her path, and kicked me out of my own goddamned bed!?”
“It’s not her fuckin’ fault you don’t have a proper fucking hookwing stall!”
“We have room for a normal, average-sized hookwing, not this giant crazy puta!”
Suri’s eyes flashed. “Then why’d you even let her on-board? Why’d you charge us for the berth? I could have left her at the castle, mate. You saw her on the docks. You knew what you were fucking signing up for!”
He shoved her. She shoved back. He brought his fist up, and Suri headbutted him so hard he dropped his pillow and reeled away, blinking stars.
“You wanna fuckin’ go me, cunt?” Suri spread her arms and backed him into the wall. “Put your fuckin’ toy down, and we’ll fuckin’ go right here!”
“Guys! C’mon, Suri, Gar! Cool it!” I held up my hands and stepped in.
Suri snorted like a bull as she pushed past Gar and stormed into the bedroom. Gar rubbed his face, still cross-eyed. He was bleeding from the mouth.
“Jesus Christ, that bitch is strong,” he muttered. “Hey! You get back here! That’s my goddamn room!”
“Get stuffed, mate.” Suri snapped back over her shoulder, kneeling down to inspect Cutthroat’s injury. Cutthroat puffed her feathers up and hissed, glowering stoically at us through the doorway. Gar made to storm in there, and I caught his arm and spun him back.
“Dude, you need to fucking chill.” I snapped at him, feeling my own temper start to rise. “We’re in a videogame with resources everywhere, we’ve insured your ship, and we’ll pay for repairs. Cutthroat’s just an animal. This isn’t her fault.”
“JUST an animal? That giant cock of a dinosaur busted in my door, came storming into my room, bit the shit out of me and took over my goddamned bed!” Gar groaned, reaching up to check his teeth. “You didn’t tell me she was about to lay a clutch of eggs!”
“WE didn’t know she was about to lay a clutch of motherfucking eggs!” I took my braids in my hands and pulled them in frustration. “Fucking hell, Suri. What are we going to do with hookwing chicks? What do you even FEED hookwing chicks?”
“I don’t know!” She couldn’t mask the panic in her voice.
“Well, if it's anything like dragons, you chew up a bunch of meat, store it in your crop, and throw it back up for her!” Karalti trilled. “That’s what I’d do!”
“Cheers. That’s real helpful.” Suri puffed a lock of scarlet hair from her face.
“Yeah! And she’ll beg for you to throw up the food like this.” Karalti opened her mouth and began bobbing her head in a vigorous, unfortunately sensual manner, fluttering her hands like winglets beside her ribs.
I pinched the bridge of my nose. “Karalti? Can you not?”
“But she has to know how to do it! Cutthroat won’t leave her nest until the babies hatch!” Karalti struck a pose, pointing at them. “Suri, you have to provide for your family! She’s counting on you!”
Suri put her face in her hands. “I’m gonna skin Taethawn alive, Hector. I’m gonna have myself a fuckin’ Meewskin coat.”
“Purrr! Purrr!” Cutthroat grumbled and chirped in her throat, fluffed her neck feathers, then turned her head to delicately preen Suri’s hair.
“I’m taking your berth for the rest of this goddamned trip. You can sleep on the piss-damned floor, you crazy bitch.” Gar made a sound of disgust, pulling a bottle of Vlachian slivovitz out of his Inventory. “Jesus Christ.”
“Call her ‘bitch’ one more time, and I’ll throw you through your own fucking bridge.” I stepped up this time. “That’s my girlfriend you’re talking to.”
“Your girlfriend? What about Little Miss Dragoncooter over here?” Gar motioned with his head toward Karalti. “You two’ve been all bunked up together like a pair of-”
Karalti rumbled as she turned on him, slowly. “WHAT did you just call me?”
Fortunately, before Gar could answer, the Strelitzia’s proximity alarms went off—and the intercom crackled.
“Captain! Need you on the deck!” Ambrose’s voice buzzed out of the hallway speakers. “We’ve a lot of Cloud Emperors up here.”
“Lord help me. Pregnant dinosaurs, flying jellyfish… all I wanted was to spend my fucking afterlife in peace.” Muttering to himself, Gar finally equipped his clothes—the same ratty ones he’d been wearing since we met him, and flashed one last withering look toward Cutthroat before striding off.
“Can you go keep an eye on that bitter old bastard and make sure he doesn’t try to dump us in the ocean? I’ll stay here and… sort out whatever is happening.” Suri squeezed a handful of her hair. “I don’t even know if she actually has eggs. She won’t move her arse to let me check. I mean, she might just be psyching us out? Right?”
I eyed Cutthroat as she quorked smugly to herself, wiggled her tail, and settled back down. “I’d say the odds of her actually laying actual eggs are pretty good right now.”
“How the fuck did Payu even get to you?” Suri moaned, as we left her to tend to her mount’s injury. “Cutthrooooat…”
Shaking my head, I made my way to the bridge, and nearly ran headlong into Rin as she tried to careen through the door I was just exiting. I caught her before we collided and opened my mouth to speak before I saw what was going on behind her and my eyes widened.
Thousands. There were thousands of titanic jellyfish sailing above, beside, and below the ship. They ranged from creatures the size of a car to the size of a cumulus cloud, some of them so huge it was impossible to look at them without craning your head. They were long, puffy and blimp-like, with a central sail running down the length of their translucent bodies. At the core of each jellyfish was a bright, churning blue light, which shone through their gel-like flesh like a bioluminescent lighthouse. Every [Cloud Emperor Jellyfish] was slightly different, sliding past us in iridescent shades of blue and purple.
“Oh thank goodness you’re here!” Rin gasped. “I was just about to come and get you! What happened? I heard a pistol go off.”
“Uhh… ummm…” I tore my eyes away from the sight outside and looked down along the deck. Gar was at the helm, with one hand on the control wheel and the other dancing over the magitech holoscreen that managed the ship’s navigation and controls. His other crewmates had their own flight consoles, frantically delivering reports.
“Rin! Guess what? Cutthroat’s gonna be a momma!” Karalti exclaimed, squeezing past me and running over to the window. “Wooow, look at these!”
“Cutthroat’s going to be a… OMIGOD!? She was pregnant!?” Rin’s voice nearly hit the ultrasonic range.
“Yeah. And she’s decided that Gar’s cabin is the place to raise her kids.” My eyes were drawn up to the sight outside. “Wow. This is fucking incredible.”
“This is fucking insanity, is what it is.” Gar was fuming, glancing between the console and the sky ahead of us. “I’ve never seen so many of the damn things in one place.”
Rin squealed in excitement, clapping her hands. “Omigosh! Little hookwings! We should have a baby shower!”
“A baby shower?” Karalti looked at her over her shoulder. “Is that where people throw babies at you, and you have to try and catch them in your mouth or something?”
“Wh… what?” Rin deflated slightly, her hands still pressed together. “N-No! Why would anyone do that?!”
“Because babies are delicious! Baby camels, baby iguanodons, baby corrun… they’re the perfect food if you’re raising eggs.” Karalti’s expression turned distant and dreamy as she looked back to the window. “Huh. I wonder what baby Cloud Emperors taste like?”
“My guess? Neurotoxins followed by a slow, agonizing dea
th.” I wandered over to the railing, watching as one of the jellies cruising close to the ship sucked in a bladder full of air through a valve at the front of its gas chamber. A few seconds later, it blasted a shower of clear, clean water out the back of its body.
“Mmm. Spicy jellyfish…” Karalti barely seemed to notice I was there.
I left Karalti to her calamari-based fantasies and went to go check in on Ambrose. He was working on his controls, all eyes forward. “How’s it looking? Are we going to make it through?”
“We should. As long as we don’t provoke them and cause the herd to vent a huge amount of gas.”Ambrose had a hollow, knocking voice, as if a drum had learned how to talk. “They don’t notice us. We don’t bother them. That’s the best we can hope for.”
“What kind of gas?” Rin asked as she joined us.
“Argon. Hydrogen.” Ambrose replied. “Screws with airship engines.”
“Hey, look! Cutthroat isn’t the only one with eggs! The jellyfish are spawning!” Karalti pointed outside, jumping up and down in front of the railing.
Sure enough, a cluster of the giant creatures were mingling within viewing range. One Cloud Emperor sprayed a fine pinkish mist from its outtake valve, showering the other Cloud Emperors behind it. The jelly’s suitors sprayed it back, but from the front.
“Ahh.” I heaved a deep, contented sigh. “Ladies and gentleman, we have just witnessed nature’s biggest bukkake.”
“Is this how we die?” Karalti asked innocently. “Falling out of the sky in a big metal box, covered in jellyfish spooge?”
“What are we going to do if they attack?” Rin asked Ambrose, tearing her eyes away from the scene outside.
Ambrose shook his head. “They won’t. Cloud Emperors are too massive to care about us. If you’re stupid—like Gar—you can get tangled in their tentacles if you fly a thousand feet or lower between them and the ocean. But at this height, no.”
“I heard that, you walking talking RealDoll,” Gar snapped. “Once! It only happened once! And we made it on the second try!”
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