Cass keeps me between the captives and herself, refusing to look them in the eye.
Her voice breaks a little as she translates. “I didn’t catch the first part of it, but what I could make out was, ‘Please don’t shoot my son.’”
My throat tightens. I’ve jumped a father and son crew. They want nothing more than to save their home. The son eyes the gun a few feet away underneath the plane’s fuselage. He’s got to have enough sense to know I’ll put a hole through him before he makes it two steps.
Please don’t go for it. Please don’t.
His father senses the situation too, taking one of his raised hands and placing it on the shoulder of his son. He whispers something in his son’s ear, drawing him away from the plane while keeping his white eyes squarely on me.
There’s a clatter as the compass falls off the crate behind us. The now unimpeded map rolls itself back up. Rumbling shakes from the center of the earth. The Ark’s on its way.
“Tell them we have a truck outside and that they should use it to leave as fast as they can.” The wrenching of the earth is audible now. “Tell them there’s not much time!” I shout as Cass struggles through my message.
I gesture the gun towards the door “Go!”
This English they understand, as they turn their backs on us and run.
“Je suis desole . . . ,” I yell as they reach the doorway.
‘I’m sorry.’ It’s one of the only French phrases that I do know. I couldn’t spell it if I tried. An old Creole neighbor said it to me when he heard my mother was murdered. It was the only thing he could think to say.
If our ex-captives hear my apology, they don’t show it as they disappear out the doorway.
I lower the gun, spreading my fingers out. They’re shaking. My whole body tremors now.
Cass is already up in the cockpit, prepping the cabin. I put the gun in my belt before slamming the door control and making my way up the ladder. She doesn’t look at me as I push past to the controls. We’ll deal with this later. One crisis at a time.
“Let’s hope this thing has fuel!” I shout back to Cass.
She answers by strapping herself in and pulling back the pin of the machine gun mounted on the end the cockpit.
I close the rattling canopy as I hit the ignition. The controls are similar enough to our Jackals that it only takes a bit of searching to find the instruments I need.
“You’re lucky he didn’t think of pulling this thing on you,” Cass says evenly, referring to the large mounted gun.
I lick my lips, trying to guide us out of the open hangar door. “We were out of its turning radius,” I answer.
“You didn’t know that!” Cass snaps back.
This isn’t the time to pick a fight, but I feel the need to defend myself. “Well, I took a gamble!” I shout back.
“Apparently . . . ” I barely hear her say.
My words catch in my throat as the Ark takes up the windshield. It’s here.
The end of the runway bursts up into the stomach of the warship. Pavement and grass vomit from the earth. There’s not enough room! We can’t get enough speed to take off.
Cass catches her breath as she sees it too, but she’s faster back on her feet than I am. “Put all of your power into it and veer right!” she shouts.
Ratcheting up the engine, I swing the nose northeast.
I flinch as one of The Ark’s cannon’s fires a shot. The shell streaks past. The hangar to our right explodes, sending half its roof sailing up over the row of buildings. It lands on an abandoned fuel truck next to the runway. Flames shoot out from underneath the wreckage, catching all of it on fire.
I get an idea. There’s no way it’ll work, but we have to try. It’s either taking that miniscule chance, or facing the certainty of being crushed by staying our course. I decide to push our luck just one more time.
“Sage, what are you doing?” Cass asks as our landing gear thunders off the runway. I hear her struggle to keep the mounted gun under control as we hit bump after bump on the unkempt green.
“Something really stupid,” is the only thing I can think to say back. The torched roof bears down on us. I hold my breath.
We hit it hard. I realize I’ve done everything wrong. Our landing gear tears from its base, launching us into the air. The plan failed. I thought I could get us the lift we were missing. The engine doesn’t stall though. We’re going fast enough to level out the nose and keep us flying.
That’s exactly it though. We’re flying!
The Ark swoops past us, swallowing the rest of the airstrip. I search desperately for a truck racing from the facility with red barrels bouncing in its bed. I can’t tell anything for sure.
Guilt pours in as I angle our fighter towards the battle in the sky. If there’s someone alive from our crew, we’ll find them there. If the Artemis is trying to escape, Admiral Khan will have assigned pilots to cover its withdrawal. We just need to get close enough to establish radio contact.
Cass yells back over the roar of the engine. “Don’t shoot at anyone unless you can tell they have that wave emblem!”
I nod.
“It’s going to be a complete shit show up here,” she adds.
“Got it!” I offer, hoping to reestablish some normalcy.
Planes of all denominations streak at one another, determined to take down their targets while fighting to dodge their own pursuers. Zeppelins scatter in all directions, some faster than others. The Russian dreadnaught from the day before drones beneath us, concentrating its fire on the Ark. Squinting, I can make out the name scrawled across the balloon. Perestroika. That’s a hell of a name for a ship. For all the talk, those Russians have balls, or, if not that, then some insane sense of duty.
Scanning the radio, I turn the dial to the open frequency, keeping my eyes fixed on the dreadnaught. A mixture of instructions, swearing, and screaming in a myriad of languages floods the cockpit. The cannons of the Ark gradually swivel to meet the guns of the Perestroika. The crew of the Russian vessel continues unperturbed, firing shell after shell into the side of the Ark. I try honing in on any English that might be hurled through the speakers, hoping to find one with an American accent. Or at the very least, a language I recognize.
Suddenly, I make out one word that slims down all of the options considerably. “Mate.” Twitching my fingers back up to the radio, I try readjusting the frequency to our English friend who crackled through.
Cass’s voice pulls at my concentration. “Baz, we’ve got one coming in hot! Five o’clock, way low!”
A pylon of tracers bursts up from below. They miss our tail by just a few feet, but it’s a mistake that can be easily corrected.
Pulling the joystick up, I roll the big plane before the bogey below gets a chance to line us up again. Cass’s hair blocks my rear view as it cascades down from her head, no longer bound by gravity. The tapping sound of her gun fills the cockpit as she fires behind us. The light of her muzzle-fire strobes against the end of the cabin.
“Let me know if they start lining us back up again!” I bellow over the engines.
I don’t think she heard me. Instead, I go back to finding fellow Anglophones. I trust Cass. She’ll let me know if we need to make evasive maneuvers.
“Well you took your bloody time about it!”
That’s it! It may be an argument, but English as a spoken language never sounded so good.
“I did the best I could. These guns are shite. They haven’t been sighted in months!”
I hear the telltale sound of an engine overpowered by terminal velocity as it falls to earth. A dark plane burns past me from above, its halo of shrapnel catching up as best it can. Twisting up, I glimpse two silver planes rejoining a formation. I don’t recognize their emblems.
“Excuse me lads!” I roar into the radio, “Are you attached to the Shipwreck Militia?”
They both begin dipping back into the fray. “Who the devil are you and how did you find this frequency?” one Brit sho
uts back.
I keep my eyes on the firefight between the Perestroika and the Ark. The Perestroika’s beginning to bruise as a veil debris showers down with each direct hit it trades. In contrast, the Ark doesn’t appear locked in a life-or-death fight. It sheds the Perestroika’s volleys as they glance off its angled armor.
“My name’s Sergeant Basmon of the U.S.S. Artemis.”
Silence.
“Do you know it?” I ask.
The British pilot’s voice clips in, “The Artemis? I thought you chaps were black and gold with a bow?”
“Yes, a bow with three arrows. Have you seen it?” I ask, holding my breath.
The British Airman laughs. “Ah yes, a medieval weapon . . . how American. You won’t find many of your friends here I’m afraid. None who are alive anyways.”
My stomach drops.
“I think I last saw the Artemis bugging out heading northwest from the city center,” the other pilot offers.
I turn my head back. “You hear that Cass? The Artemis is still flying!”
She nods her head silently, keeping her vigil.
The Brit speaks up again. “Why? Are you looking to turn tail and run as well?”
I clench my jaw. We’re not cowards, but that’s exactly what we’re doing.
I have the urge to explain that the Artemis is a merchant vessel not meant for offensive actions. That we have civilians on board. But even I can’t deny Admiral Khan’s armed the ship to the teeth with soldiers and planes. That most of the zeppelins in this fight are comprised of innocents.
But we’re still fleeing.
“Thank you,” I manage.
I hit the radio, changing the frequency. Sometimes it’s best to run from debate as well.
An eruption rocks our fuselage from below.
I peer over the canopy just in time to be blinded by the Perestroika. The explosion sends a shock wave across the sky, illuminating all of the hidden ridges of the Ark. Each of its mounted cannons are swiveled to one side, concentrated on where the Perestroika used to be. I can’t tell if the Ark got a lucky shot and hit the Perestroika’s magazine, or if its sheer firepower was enough to destroy it entirely. Either way, we don’t stand a chance. With gravity pulling the wreckage of the Perestroika to its final resting place, I turn the plane until the NW of my compass locks firmly in front.
Forcing the fighter into a dive, I try losing us in the maelstrom below. It’s starting to get a little thin up here. My stomach rises as the nose of the plane dips. I try not thinking about the nausea Cass is probably experiencing. She’s feeling everything I feel, but backwards and without warning. The gun clanks against the aircraft’s tail as Cass lets go of it, grabbing hold of the sides of the cabin.
Down we go. Twisting and turning past the other planes, while trying not to draw attention.
“You know . . . that’s an awful way to treat a lady.”
I open my mouth to answer The Voice, but the words catch in my throat as the image of a furry creature flits by our cockpit. There’s only one pilot in the world who would ever represent himself with an Abominable Snowman.
“It’s Yeti!” I yell.
Cass’s head snaps in all directions trying to spot him. “Where?” she says.
I search too. We’ve lost him in the mix.
“Use the squadron frequency!” Cass shouts.
My hand fumbles with the radio, clicking it to the right spot. I hold my breath, listening intently. Nothing but white noise. That can’t be right!
“Yeti. Yeti! Is that you?” I call out.
“Wha- Is that you Saber?” a breathless Airman Eterro replies back.
“You got it Yeti! Why’s this a dead frequency?”
Yeti’s panicked voice rises from the speaker. “Because it’s a dead Wing!”
I was concerned about finding a pilot we knew, but I never thought it would be this bad.
My mouth dries as I try forming a sentence. “How.. . . . ? What do you mean?”
Yeti’s fear and anger pour through the radio. “How do think man? Everyone in Grey Wing’s either rotting in a manmade crater, or bugged-out.”
All of the familiar faces flash through my mind. He can’t be right.
“What about Sergeant Samuels?” I ask.
Samuels is Cass’s roommate, and an excellent Wing Leader. She wouldn’t have let her Wing break and run if it weren’t a tactical maneuver.
“Samuels is dead,” Yeti says.
Silence.
Yeti’s voice picks up. “Shot her through her goddamn face. They hit her in the cockpit. The rest of the plane was untouched. Like it was a fucking sport or something.”
I shake my head, clearing the image of Samuel’s matted hair plastered against a blood-soaked canopy. Over the engine I barely hear Cass’s faint sobs. She and Samuels had become good friends since Cass joined our crew. Our other fighters, Ritka, Al-Fakani, Dobson, Montobo, Zhou . . . all dead or missing.
“Incoming!”
Yeti twists away as droning engines bear down from above. The tracers rain in a disorienting pattern. My confusion compounds as a fighter with Iranian markings explodes, arcing up past the cockpit.
I peel the nose of our plane sideways.
“There he is! Eight o’clock high!” Cass shouts. Her voice breaks, forcing her to take another breath to finish her sentence, but she’s recovering quickly.
Following her instructions, I catch a glimpse of the telltale gold on black. Yeti’s plane dips and pirouettes as a Cascade fighter boxes him in with tracer fire. I’m not about to lose the last member of Grey Wing.
Propelling the large craft upwards, I lock my sites on the fighter. “Don’t worry Yeti, I got him!” I yell “Just keep shaking your ass!”
I struggle to keep my grip on the sweat-greased joy stick. Reaching deep, I concentrate on my breathing until everything comes into a sharp focus. Blood pumps past my ears. Slowly but surely, the wings and crosshairs become one. I squeeze the trigger. Fire streams on either side of me as the cannons search for their target.
Debris explodes from the Cascade fighter.
I let myself breathe. Direct hit.
My relief sparks into panic. The Cascade pilot continues his course unperturbed, opening fire. I try swinging my crosshairs back up, but it’s too late.
“Yeti, dive!” I yell.
It’s all too late. The Cascade pilot riddles Yeti from wing to wing. Ettero cries out as glass shatters over the radio. A jet of flame pours from his right flap.
“Nooo!”
I’m not going to be responsible for another dead friend because I can’t finish the job. Taking advantage of the Cascade pilot’s attempts to finish Yeti, I swing the crosshairs up again. I blow out another breath, leading the fighter with just enough room.
Pulling the trigger, I watch my duel stream of bullets pour in front of the dark fighter as he moves to evade. The nose of the plane crumples, causing a secondary explosion that rocks my cockpit and sends Yeti fishtailing. There’s no way regular steel could provide that kind of protection.
“Yeti! Yeti, can you hear me?” I yell through the static.
The sound of choking is the only answer.
“Find another way for him to signal!” Cass shouts from the back.
My mind scrambles. “Yeti, if you still have control of your fighter, shoot twice.”
Two tracers pop from Yeti’s stricken plane. I exhale, letting guarded relief trickle back in again.
The com crackles. “I’ve been wounded,” Yeti coughs. “I need to get back to the Artemis . . . so they can patch me up.” He struggles. “Will you . . . will you make sure I make it back Baz? I’m afraid . . . I’m afraid I’m gonna lose consciousness.”
He’s our only ticket back.
“Of course . . . ! Of course. You chart the way back. We can’t do anymore here,” I assure him.
Yeti’s fighter slowly peels off from combat, plotting a course north. We follow suit.
“You got lazy, Kid. You
r letting your friend die.” The Voice grates.
My heart misses a pump. It’s getting worse. She can’t know it’s getting worse.
Cass keeps hands on the trigger of the machine gun, scanning the sky, even as we pull away from the fighting. Watching the light of the explosions illuminate her face, I can’t help but notice the new creases near her eyes that weren’t there before.
I want to take her away from all of this. Go find someplace quiet. Find out what it means not having to live day-to-day. I don’t know if we could though. We’re grounded in all of this. We’re where we belong, and she knows it. It’s not like there’s any other place we’d be safer anyways.
Another British signal raises on the com. I move to silence it. I don’t have the strength to argue with the Brits again.
As my hand brushes the dial, the voice shouts, “Mayday! Mayday! Mayday! This is the H.M.S. Churchill requesting all available support!”
Light bubbles up from the soup below. Fire erupts from the deck of a nearby zeppelin, illuminating the word “Church.” That must be our man.
“This is Captain Raemar Belvadeer of H.M.S. Churchill,””, the harried voice crackles, “We are under heavy attack. Unable to repel our pursuant! Requesting assistance immediately!”
I follow the trail of smoke until the looming form of the Ark bleeds into view.
“Sage, do you see it?” Cass shouts, pointing below.
The front of the Ark swings open from either side, revealing a cavernous hangar.
“Cass . . . Cass I think we need to stay away from this one,” I murmur.
The Ark’s forward cannon pounds one more shot across The Churchill’s engines. The fire on its deck burns brighter as the Churchill loses speed. The Ark begins enveloping the British carrier like a shark swallowing its prey whole. Captain Belvadeer’s pleas become more distorted as the Ark’s bay swoops over the stricken vessel.
The Captain tries once more. “We are being boarded! I repeat, we are being boarded! Mayday! Mayday! Ma-“.
The Ark’s hangar doors slam shut.
Nothing but silence crackles through the radio.
I’ve never felt so small, so out-gunned. The engineering needed to create that image is so far beyond anything we have in the fleet, so far beyond anything we’ve ever known.
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