Brass Legionnaire (The Steam Empire Chronicles)

by Ottalini, Daniel

  His finger traced the open lower level deck, where his men would descend, precariously strung out along hundreds of feet of wire. There were open deck areas on both levels at the back of the ship, meaning a total of ten lines could theoretically be dropped and manned. It will be like falling ...

  Pushing that thought gruffly from his mind, Constantine let his hand fall to his side, and waited. But a distant memory thrust itself into his consciousness.

  ~ * * * ~

  “Hurry up, Constantine, you’re going too slow!” came Lucius’ high-pitched call.

  That was Lucius, always trying to show off how big and strong he was compared to me. I was seven!

  Constantine looked around at the branches supporting his weight, then tipped his head back to see his brother. Lucius was waiting on one of the highest branches of one of the tallest maple trees in the palace gardens.

  “I can see the Air Fleet from up here!” Lucius crowed, trying to coax his younger brother higher.

  I should have known something was off that day. Constantine and his older brother had never been real playmates. Nor had they ever been very close, even as brothers. Rather, they coexisted ... and, occasionally, interacted in the manner that children do. That is to say, Lucius got into trouble with Constantine and blamed it on his younger brother. That day was no different.

  Constantine looked hesitantly up at the next level of branches. “It’s too high!” he called back, unable to keep a thread of fear out of his voice. “I can see just fine from here,” he added, the lie thin and obvious. Lucius could always see through my lies, especially when I was afraid.

  Lucius climbed down several branches. His grin was malevolent. How could an eleven-year-old have such a smile? “You aren’t afraid of heights now, are you?” Constantine shook his head, alarmed. “You’ve been on airship flights before; this is no different.” Lucius dropped to stand next to him on the same solid branch, grasping a nearby limb for support.

  “It is very different,” Constantine replied. An airship is metal and steel and glass and you can feel it under you, the tribune Constantine thought again, just as he had then. You know when it will go up or down. On a tree, if you fall, that’s it. “On an airship, I can pretend that I’m simply on a boat.” I should never have said that last part aloud.

  “What? Stop talking nonsense.” Lucius exclaimed. His lips tightened. “You’re afraid of climbing a tree? You’d rather ride boats?” He pushed against the branch he grasped, pushing the limb they were standing on up and down.

  The swaying made Constantine’s heart race faster, and he cried out.

  “Little brother is scared of a little rocking?” Lucius sniffed. “You can’t be an emperor if you get scared. That’s why I’m the heir.”

  The limb Lucius was pushing against suddenly snapped. Overbalanced, Lucius fell backward, arms flailing, and fell the fifteen feet to the ground. Hands tight on the tree’s trunk, Constantine shouted his horror, watching helplessly.

  Lucius landed with a thud and writhed slowly on the ground. Servants and guards rushed to his aid. Their tutor turned his wizened eyes up to Constantine and crooked his finger in an unmistakable come here gesture.

  He never forgave me for that perceived insult, Constantine thought as the memory faded. He never would believe that he was the one who broke the branch, that I had not plotted to embarrass him. What was it like even then, the pressure of being heir, or knowing that if he wasn’t good enough, father could appoint me instead? Well, that pressure’s not on me; Lucius has been fully groomed, and I’m the younger son, shipped off to the army. I just have to jump out of a dirigible.

  ~ * * * ~

  The door opened and a deck rating poked his head out. “Please come in, Tribune.”

  Constantine nodded his thanks and walked through the door. The front third of the top deck was given over to the bridge, and the view through the large observation windows, angled to allow for maximum visibility, was incredible. Observation bubbles popped out on both sides of the bridge, providing an even greater viewing range. Within the bridge, several crewmembers monitored a central bank of levers, dials, and gauges, occasionally making tiny adjustments to the controls. The officer of the watch monitored their efforts, and another officer stood in one of the observation bubbles, intent on the view to port. A single security officer stood against the wall to the right.

  Airman Souzetio stood next to a leather-backed command chair bolted to a platform in the middle of the deck. A bronze speaking tube came out of the ceiling and ended right around head height next to the chair. Straightening his back, Tribune Appius marched toward the chair.

  “Ah, there you are, Tribune. I was wondering when we might be getting a visit from you,” the officer in the observation bubble said as he passed. Constantine stopped and saluted. The ship captain gave a half-salute response, offending Constantine’s sense of protocol. As officers of essentially similar rank, he had expected an equally crisp salute acknowledging this.

  Seeing the look on his face, the captain barked a short laugh. “You’ll find we aren’t quite as stiff and formal as the legions, Tribune. You’ll get our respect when you earn it. In the meantime, there is far too much to do to waste all our time saluting each other in the proper increment.” His tone was terse, and Constantine couldn’t help but feel mollified and a bit abashed. The man gestured. “Come over here and see where we are. I’ll describe the plan to you. I assume that Suzzy’s gone over the plan with you?” At Constantine’s blank look, he added, “Excuse me, I meant Airman Souzetio.”

  “Yes he did, Captain ...”

  “Oh for Jupiter’s sake, I forgot to introduce myself. I’m so busy rambling on about the mission that I plum overlooked that. Captain Tiveri Rufius Alexandros, of His Majesty’s Airship Scioparto, at your service.” Both of the captain’s calloused hands enveloped Constantine’s hand and he shook it firmly, his expression enthusiastic. Constantine found himself warming to the seemingly eccentric captain.

  “So, Captain Alexandros, how did you end up with this job? I can’t imagine many ship captains would be willing to leave their ship motionless over a battlefield to drop a cohort of men behind enemy lines.” The question had been boring a hole in Constantine’s brain for several hours now.

  “To tell you the truth, I volunteered at the ... request ... of General Minnicus. I was the only volunteer. No one else wanted to try this new way of fighting a war. But I think it will be a great ‘Emperor card up the sleeves’ of our legion, if you know what I mean. I want to be remembered for helping start this revolution of thinking.”

  Constantine found himself appreciating the captain even more. He was risking not just his life, but also his ship and the lives of his crew, as well as his career. He even genuinely seemed to care about them. Constantine always believed that you could tell something about a man by the way he treated his workers. He didn’t consider himself a man of the plebeian class, far from it, but he did believe that men were men, not cogs in a machine, or animals.

  Captain Alexandros turned the conversation back to the current situation. “We aim to begin practice here, on these fields east of the fort.” He gestured to another command map, where large flat rectangles marked wheat fields. “We’ll start by maintaining a position just over fifteen feet off the ground. You’ll get your first taste of rope drop there. We’ll gradually increase it. It’s also an opportunity for my men to practice hauling your soldiers back aboard. That’s going to be a new skill for us. Fleet regulations only ever explained evacuation, not embarkation by rope-winch.”

  Constantine raised his eyebrows at the captain. “You aren’t inventing this procedure now, are you?”

  The captain shook his head. “No, just performing this highly theoretical action for the first time with live people. We did try it with a bag of flour last week.”

  Constantine had a sinking feeling he knew what was coming next.

  “We ended up dusting the flowers with flour! Ha! Good one, eh? Well, not f
or our pretend person, but pretty looking, I suppose.”

  Sighing, Constantine moved to examine the terrain. To his untrained eye, it appeared to be a nice flat practice area. He asked about weather and wind currents.

  “Very little to speak of today. I’ll drop a few crewmembers down and we can set the anchor down, as well. That’ll help prevent our floating away,” Alexandros responded cheerfully.

  He checked a spinning timepiece on the main control panel. It was mounted on several moving disks that allowed it to stay flat and readable during altitude changes and any other movement. The glistening brass shone in the sunlight filling the bridge. Seeing him squinting, two crewmembers pulled down thin, translucent sunshades, taking the worst blast off the sun’s rays. “I estimate about twenty minutes until our arrival. Better go prepare your men.

  “Don’t be a stranger, Tribune!” he added as Constantine nodded and made to leave. “My door is always open. Figuratively, of course, so please knock before you enter. By the by, would you do me the honor of dining with me tonight after our little escapade? I can truly say I’ll be rightly famished by the time we’re done.”

  Constantine hadn’t been able to leave the base at all during his basic training periods, so he readily agreed. They made plans to meet later outside the main dining hall, where they would dine with the officers, rather than the enlisted men. Tradition held that new cohorts always ate together during training, officers included. With training done, the separation of ranks promptly began.

  With their business concluded, the men saluted each other. Constantine noted with pleasure that the captain’s salute was much crisper this time. “May the gods be with you, Tribune, and with your men. Especially the wind gods—pray for gentle winds.”

  Constantine nodded once, then did an about-face and marched from the bridge, Airman Souzetio trailing him.

  ~ * * * ~

  Julius gripped his carpteneo tightly. The foot-long mechanism weighed about three pounds and had an opening where the rope came in from the top and another opening where it exited the bottom. Side grips could apply pressure to the rope to slow his descent. It could be controlled with just one hand, but Julius did not plan to take any chances. I’m definitely using two hands on this.

  Just a second ago, he had watched a junior flight officer attach his carpteneo to the line, an audible click-click signaling that both hooks had latched securely to the harness around his thighs and waist. The man walked backward right off the edge of the ship and was instantly gone, rapidly sliding down the rope. Everyone who was in a position to watch had leaned over the side of the ship, watching the midshipman swing in the breeze until finally touching down. He unlatched himself and pounded a metal loop into the ground. Pushing the rope through, he pulled it as taut as possible against the resistance of the airship gently bobbing in the wind.

  The same wind billowed Airman Souzetio’s leather jacket. He had left it unzipped, as they were less than fifty feet above the ground, and the warm breeze was pleasant. He was instructing Julius’s group. The rest of the 13th Cohort was split among the three other airdrop positions at the stern of the airship. The two levels of open decking allowed for several drop points. Julius’s group was on the port side of A Deck, the lowest level of the ship.

  “Alright, lads, this is your first real chance to show what you’ve learned. Remember, when you first get off the ship, it’s okay to go a bit slow. Don’t lose your head. Breathe! Loosen your hand, count to two, squeeze, and repeat. That will get you down the rope nice and steady. If this were a real combat drop, you’d be dropping straight down most of the way to avoid any skillful ambusher, while we get to be honking great stationary targets.” He looked around. “Alright you men, who is going to be the first to test the Fates?”

  Several men shuffled. Julius almost raised his hand, then turned the movement into a nervous arm rub. Even I’m not quite ready to be the first.

  Tribune Appius spoke from the back of the group. “If you weaklings won’t volunteer, then I will take the lead.” He pushed his way to the front. “After all, you’ve got to see how a real man does this.”

  He patiently allowed the airman to take him through the steps again, even though they all understood the routine by heart.

  “Clamp your carpteneo to the rope. Make sure the rope is going the right way so you won’t be stuck speeding up instead of slowing down!” Several laughs escaped from the tight, nervous lips of those in his training group.

  “Attach your carpteneo to your harness—make sure you hear the clicks. Then you approach the deck edge, and place your feet on the edge like so.” He guided Constantine to the edge of the deck until he now stood at a forty-five degree angle, back toward the empty air, hands tightly squeezing the carpteneo. It was the only thing keeping him anchored to the ship. “Ah, one last thing. Put your goggles on so that you can actually see the ground coming up at you! It would not do for us to have to scrape you off the ground with a spatula.”

  “Mister Souzetio,” the tribune said, “my hands are currently occupied, could you ... ?”

  The airman gently pulled the lightweight flying goggles from the metal helmet on Constantine’s head down over his eyes. He spent a few seconds adjusting them.

  “Thank you, Mister Souzetio. And now, one last word.” Constantine looked around, and smiled thinly. “I’ll see you on the ground. Last man down runs extra laps tonight.” With that, Constantine pushed off hard, flying backward into space.

  Julius looked over the rail and saw him following the squeeze, wait, release, and repeat steps. The tribune looked like a spider that was lowering herself down a strand of web: dropping, then evaluating, then dropping again. Less than a minute later, Tribune Appius was on the ground, waving at them in an unmistakable Come here gesture.

  The rest of the training squad lined up to descend the rope. Julius found himself third in line, behind Recruit Gnacius and Recruit Kavalinus. A tap on his shoulder prompted Julius to turn to see Gwendyrn smiling grimly.

  “If you stop, I’m not. You’ll just be dead, city boy.” Gwendyrn’s laugh was hard. “I plan on getting down as fast as possible without breaking any body part.”

  Julius frowned. He had been planning on taking it nice and slow, but with Gwendyrn behind him, he would have to speed up the pace.

  Recruit Gnacius latched himself onto the cable and, under Souzetio’s coaching, approached the edge. Finally, with a half-terrified, half-croaked, “Hoorah!” he thrust himself out into space. The rope went taut as it bore his weight, but there was no indication of stress. At least that was what it seemed like to Julius, who was nervously watching for any indication of malfunction in his or the ship’s equipment.

  Gwendyrn caught Julius’s expression. “Are you nervous? Are you afraid of dying? There are a lot more things that you’re better off worrying about. Look at it this way—if your equipment fails, not only will your family be able to get your death benefit, but your short life will end quickly and with little pain. Many others would be jealous!” His orange mustache quivered, then he nearly doubled over in laughter.

  Julius smacked him on the shoulder. Does he take these horrible lines from a book somewhere? No, Gwendyrn would never stoop to actually reading a book. Aloud he growled, “Shut up before I ‘accidentally’ cut your harness strap.”

  Recruit Kavalinus went over the side, still muttering a prayer to Jupiter.

  “Keep on moving. We don’t have all day!” Airman Souzetio motioned for Julius to move up. Julius swallowed the lump in his throat and shuffled ahead.

  Souzetio helped him latch his carpteneo onto the main line. The man’s brown eyes found his. He nodded. “You can do this. Don’t doubt yourself. Just follow your training. It’s the best feeling in the world, after this first go. This one is all about getting rid of the nerves. Next one is all enjoyment,” he murmured reassuringly.

  “Good luck, don’t make a big splotch for me to land in!” called Gwendyrn.

  Cold sweat trickled down J
ulius’s back. He could feel it under his helmet and armor. His trembling hands pulled his brass-rimmed goggles over his eyes, then grasped his carpteneo. He inched his way back toward the edge. Souzetio was smiling and waving him ahead. He smile seemed to say, Hurry up before we die of old age.

  Julius took a deep breath and leaned back into space. You can do it! one part of his brain encouraged. Are you crazy? the rational part of his brain countered. Shut up, he told them both. He bent his knees, and—pushed!

  For a moment, it felt as though his stomach had dropped out of his body. The wind whistled past him, twisting him around on the rope. Remember your training! His brain screamed at him. Julius grasped the carpteneo with both hands and squeezed. His descent stopped. He continued spinning lazily, getting a panoramic view of the landing field and surrounding forests. Taking a deep breath, Julius loosened his grip on the carpteneo. His body began to creep down the line. A slow smile spread over his face. More confident now, he loosened his grip and his body dropped at a steadier pace.

  He briefly looked up and saw Gwendyrn leaning over the side. He appeared to be shaking his head at someone behind him. Focusing on his own situation, Julius continued to tighten, then relax his grip on the line. The ground approached in fits and spurts. Finally, Julius lowered himself the last couple of feet and he gasped out a pent breath as he felt his feet touch terra firma. His legs were wobbly and his shaking fingers fumbled as he tried to detach his carpteneo from the line. The ground crew member stepped forward and wordlessly helped.

  His knees still weak with the aftermath of terror, Julius hobbled over to the legionaries who had already descended.

  Tribune Appius slapped him solidly on the back. “By the gods, Julius, stop making us look like amateurs out there! You’ll have to give us all some specialized instruction, it appears!”