Raining Fire

by Rajan Khanna

  To Diego, for example. He was right, back at the plant. I have mired him in a long stream of shit. Everything that he laid at my feet was true. Ruining his chances for a council seat on Tamoanchan when I brought a live Feral to the island. Convincing him to go to Gastown, only to be captured and tortured. And while I wasn’t the one who asked him to get me off of the island after Mal arrived, he did it for the reason that he does everything—he’s a good man. I always knew that, Diego. You have so much to give people. But I just saw that as more for me to take. I’m sorry. I haven’t had many friends in my life. You were one of them, but I know you could have been much more of a friend if I had just been one back. I have never known anyone in the Sick more loyal, more steadfast, and more willing to do what’s right. That I’m only realizing it now is a tragedy.

  And of course your sister, Rosie. She and I, we never really got along well. We push each other’s buttons too much. And she’s kicked my ass on more than one occasion.

  But, Rosie, the truth is, if it came down to it, there are few other people that I’d want more on my side in a fight. You’re sharp and one hell of a fighter, and one of the toughest people I know. I gave you a hard time for what happened with Maya, for getting played and letting her escape, but the truth is that the Cabal played all of us. What they did to you was cruel. I know how lonely life can be. You thought you’d found someone to make the loneliness go away. I’m sorry I didn’t say that. I’m sorry for my part in all of that.

  Thoughts of new friends get me thinking of old friends. Of old times. Claudia and Mal and the others who used to fly with us at times. And Tess.

  Tess, I’m glad I killed you. I’m sorry, but I am. You thought you were doing your job, playing all sides, standing neutral in the center. I get it. You wanted to survive. That’s what motivated me for most of my life. If staying alive meant not getting involved, well, that was just how it had to be. But Miranda helped me see how not picking a side was actually picking a side. I’m no hero, but I’ve tried to do something right with my life—most of that came from helping Miranda. You just sat in your library, on your throne, hoarding—information, supplies, secrets—a greedy queen of a bloodstained world. I’m sure you helped some people. But you certainly harmed some as well. You lived a long life, but it had to end. I’m glad I was the one to end it.

  Mal . . . you’re maybe the hardest person of all to untangle from this knot of history and feelings. You want me dead, and I get why. Maybe I deserve it. I left you behind, all those years ago, left you to die. The truth is, I’m sorry for it. I thought I was doing the right thing, making the right choice, sacrificing one life to save three others (one of them myself). But I can’t help thinking that one of those lives was Tess, back in the beginning of her empire. That’s the thing about choices—you never know where they are going to lead. But the thing I’m most sorry about is for not trying. I might have been able to figure out a way to try to save you. I might have been able to come back and try to track you down, or at least confirm, as I thought, that you were dead. But I didn’t. The truth is, I was scared, and I ran. And now we’re enemies.

  Deep down, that eats at me. Because we once were friends. I once thought it was going to be you and me, Mal and Ben, gallivanting through the sky, foraging and bartering and trying to outdo one another. Fuck, I wanted to be you. As cool, as capable. I wanted to be the man you challenged me to be. But, again, I was scared. Scared to leave my father, scared, maybe, to step into that role. Thing is, I’m really proud of who you’ve become (minus the wanting to kill me). I knew you were great, but I didn’t expect you to be such a good leader. You take care of your people. You liberated Tamoanchan. And you took the fight to the Valhallans at Gastown. If you have someone like Rosie willingly following you, then you must be doing something right. So I’m sorry. For failing you. And for failing our friendship.

  * * *

  That leaves only two more good-byes, to two of the most important people in my life.

  Claudia . . .

  I don’t even know where to begin. Excepting my father, I’ve known you longer than anyone. I had a thing for you the moment I met you. I couldn’t have asked for a better traveling companion or someone to have at my side in a sticky situation. When we got together, I thought to myself, this must be what love is. And it was . . . only not the kind of love I came to know later. But that’s okay. I have never felt more comfortable with another person, not even my father. I could be myself around you, even with all the ugliness. And while you might have called me on it from time to time, you always accepted it, accepted me, and I will forever be grateful for that.

  You always had my back. Always. I’d like to think that I always had yours. Until the end. I’m so sorry for the way that I treated you. For the way I shut you out and climbed down into that hole. It seems stupid now. Why didn’t I just talk to you? If anyone, it could have been you.

  I don’t blame you for cutting me off. I don’t blame you for not wanting to ever see me again. I just wish that I could say I’m sorry. In person. Look you in the eyes and thank you for all that you’ve done for me over the many years. The countless times you’ve gotten me out of scrapes, the endless number of arrows you’ve used to help save my ass, the patience and the care that you’ve shown since we first met.

  There will never be another like you, Claudia Nero, and I’m just glad I got to spend as much time with you as I did. I know I caused you pain, and I know I left a broken trail behind me, but I hope you at least take some comfort from the good times.

  * * *

  That leads me to the last good-bye. The one I’ve put off saying for all these months. The one that I’ve been trying to avoid.

  Miranda.

  What can I say, Miranda? What can I put into words to express how I feel about you, and about what happened to you? You literally changed my life. When you ran into me, chased by a pack of Ferals, I didn’t want anything to do with you. Little did I know, that moment was a point around which my life would pivot. You won me over. With your intelligence and your determination, and the vision that you painted of the future. I didn’t think very much beyond the next day or the next week back then. You were talking about the next year, the next ten years. And saving the world.

  I thought you were crazy. I still think you were a little crazy. But that craziness infected me, more tenacious than even the Bug. You showed me that there was still something to believe in, not matter how difficult the path. You showed me that there was still hope in the world and that there were things worth fighting for.

  So I tried to. I tried to stand by your side and be your support and help do the things that you couldn’t do (not that there were many of those).

  The simple truth is, you made me a better man, Miranda. In all kinds of ways. I was never fully reformed, not really. I still fucked up a lot of things. But without you, I would be dead, or hollow, and neither of those things appeal to me much.

  I never got to say it to you, and I will always regret it, but I love you. I never would have imagined it. Not back then. But you came into my life like a wildfire and set everything alight. I didn’t know how much I loved you until you were gone. And I wanted to be gone, too. Some part of me still does. But I didn’t realize, until now, that that part of me that wanted to be gone as well was the old Ben. Wanting to escape the pain. Thinking about myself. That’s not what you would have done. That’s not what you did even while you were fighting off the Enigma virus. You fought up until the end. Against the enemy. And I should do the same if I want to honor you. If I want to honor the love I had for you.

  So that’s what I’m doing. I’m going to fight the enemy. If it means sacrifice, well, so be it.

  And if that idea is true, that we see our loved ones on the other side, then I hope that you’ll forgive me. For leaving you. For letting you die alone. But I promise you, if you let me, you will never be alone again. I will never leave you alone again.

  * * *

  Saying my good-byes, espe
cially to Miranda, only hones my commitment to my current course. I am an arrow, already fired, and I must find my mark. So it’s important that I keep the White Wolf on course, with no interruptions or mishaps.

  Navigating on an airship in the Sick is not an exact science. You’re lucky if you have a few maps, luckier if you have distinct landmarks to orient by That’s why the west of the country always seemed easier. You have the mountains there, and the cities seem more clearly demarcated. Move east, however, and everything just kind of blends together. How to tell whether you’re over the ashes of Kansas or Missouri or Illinois? But that’s where I’m heading, east and up to the ruins of Old Chicago.

  I can tell when I’m getting close. It’s mostly a straight shot east and, at my speed, I should be close to my target. So I have to prepare.

  I start by bathing. There’s plenty of water on the ship, and though it’s not warm, I find the touch of cold invigorating. I find some soap and wash myself. We had access to water and soap at the plant, but it was a pragmatic affair—get in, wash yourself, get out. Now I take my time, enjoying the feeling of my clean skin after I scrub it. Then I wash my clothes, too, such as they are. They took my coat at the plant, and the Star of David that was pinned to it, the second one I had (the first one, my father’s, I had lost).

  I put back on the worn shirt and pants, the boots that have seen better days. But they’re mine. And they’re clean. I’ll face the day as myself.

  * * *

  A little over two days, mostly because a storm a day into the journey pushed me off course, and I’m finally coming up on my target. I’ve been checking the maps and my instruments, and I think I see it, a dark speck, off in the distance.

  Things were probably much easier back in the Clean. Dad said they had devices that would give them their exact position no matter where they were on the planet. Of course, those went to shit after everything went down. No one was around to maintain whatever network they relied on, so everything died.

  Like everyone else in the Sick, I use charts and landmarks and compasses and the sun. It’s a large part of why most people tend to stick to areas they know well. I’ve known zeps, pilots, who head out in one direction or another, willing to deal with whatever they find. Hoping for new frontiers, new places to forage, anything. The more rational of those types head toward the eastern part of the continent. I’ve met others who headed south into what used to be Central and South America. There are fewer airships out that way—the US invested most heavily in that mode of transportation in the first place—but raiders and pirates hide out in that region a lot. It can be dangerous sky to thread. The crazy ones sail east hoping to make it to Europe. The really crazy ones fly west, heading for Asia. I’ve only met a few of them, and I never saw them again. But that doesn’t mean much. Maybe one of those guys is sitting pretty in a safe space in Old England. Or maybe some of them found some sanctuary in Japan or China or India somewhere. Me, I’ve heard horror stories of those places, enough to make me not want to try my luck.

  My part of the sky is big enough. Does the Cabal have hands large enough to hold it?

  I don’t know.

  The speck grows larger in the window. Not a ship. Something bigger. Something mostly stationary. Valhalla was the first city built in the sky. The concept was the same as Gastown—inflate enough ballonets and fill enough envelopes, and you can float almost anything. But whereas with Gastown they had a lot of people coming together to build it, people who were investing with their ships and their barter, ships that could help control the city’s position (and which could help compensate for the weather), Valhalla didn’t have that. Valhalla was constructed, the way I hear it, out of force of will. They didn’t have the ships. Not at first. So they needed something to help keep the city stable.

  They settled on mooring it to a building, the tallest building they could find. And that, in this area, was the Willis Tower. I heard at first they used metal cables some forager found that were long and strong. But soon they added to this, more and more cables woven into it. Rope, too. And cloth. Much of it colored. So it became known as Bifröst, the rainbow bridge that some ancient people believed led to heaven. Which suited the people running Valhalla.

  I’ve heard about Bifröst for a long time. Always wondered what it looked like. I once asked Dad if we could go visit Valhalla, wanting to see the city in the sky. This was before Gastown existed. He said no. I didn’t understand it at the time—I just thought he was being controlling. But after I met a few Valhallans, I understood why. Dad didn’t trust them. I didn’t trust them, either.

  Now, through the optics mounted in the gondola, I see Valhalla. A long platform, suspended beneath a mass of balloons. On the edges, connected by their own cabling, are an assortment of ships. They look like hard ships, combat ships. No fluffy junkers here. These are raiding ships, pirate ships, warships. Some of them look like they’ve seen action.

  Four ships break off from their positions around Valhalla and move toward me, growing ever larger in my view.

  This is it, then. The moment of truth. I just need to get close enough. I’ve dumped all my extra ballast. I’ve rigged the engines. Now I jump the last obstacle.

  My hand hovers over the radio switch. I hesitate. This is for you, Miranda. For you, Dad.

  I flip the switch into the on position, and almost immediately a voice barks over the connection. “White Wolf,” it says, recognizing the ship. “Why are you returning so soon, Shiv?”

  “This isn’t Shiv,” I say, hoping my voice sounds confident, and not as shaky as the rest of me feels.

  “Where is she?” the voice asks.

  Thank you. “She . . . didn’t make it.”

  “Who is this?” the voice asks, full of alarm and menace. “Give the passcode.”

  “My name is Tran,” I say, reaching for the name of a boffin I knew. I don’t say, “one of the Cabal,” because of course that’s just a name that Miranda and I made up, but that’s what I’m going for. “The plant is under attack. It might have fallen by now.”

  “We know,” the voice says. I had wondered if they did. I’d heard they sometimes relayed messages between ships, using their radios. “Why are you here?”

  “Cargo,” I say. “Helium. And data. The results from the experiments. All they could salvage before the plant fell. I was told to bring it here.”

  “Hold,” the voice says. So I do. But I check my windows. The ships are still moving toward me. They all carry weapons, trained on the White Wolf. If they were to hit the cargo hold, the whole ship would go up. C’mon. Just one last bluff. Let this work.

  Another minute or so passes. Then another. The enemy ships move forward. But so do I. I’m edging nearer to the city, but not close enough. At this speed, if they start shooting, I might be able to crash the ship into the far edge of the city, but it would be close. And if they rip apart the envelope, there’s no chance of that.

  The radio crackles to life. “Bring her in slowly,” the voice says. “We want a look at what you have. Those escorts will guide you.”

  “Copy that,” I say, as a smile breaks out on my face. I reach for the controls, ostensibly to do as they say, but I push the engines harder than I should. It will take a few moments for me to overcome inertia, but my acceleration is enough that I’ll soon jump ahead—and then I’ll be within range of the city and they won’t be able to stop me unless they manage to incinerate the whole ship.

  The plan is to put myself between them and the city. Shooting at me would put the balloons of the city in the direct line of fire, not to mention the people on the city itself.

  The real trick is going to be avoiding the guns below. Too many guns on Valhalla would mean too much weight, so they put them down on the skyscrapers beneath us.

  I’m out of ballast, and I’ve already vented some of my gas, so this will be tricky.

  I take the few minutes before the engines kick in to run down to the cargo hold. Three Firestorm bombs stand in a row, webbed to
gether with a cargo net. Three tapered cylinders with glossy orange hulls and guts of liquid fire. I arm them each in turn, aided by the instructions in each of the boxes, and my earlier review of them.

  When I get back to the gondola, the White Wolf is just pulling ahead, and immediately the bullets start to hit the air. But I’m on a course with the city and the Wolf’s belly is full of hot death.

  The chatter of gunfire is loud, even in the gondola, and I can feel several bullets find their target. The dash lights up—some of the ballonets have taken a hit, and two of my engines are gone, but I still have speed.

  Choke on this, you bastards!

  This is it, then. The moment before the sky falls. Hopefully on all of us. I close my eyes and think of Miranda, and—

  The radio crackles to life. “Ben.” A voice I recognize.

  “Rosie?” I grab for it. How in the hell? “Get clear! You don’t—”

  “Miranda’s alive.”

  I pause for a moment. It doesn’t make sense. “What?”

  “Miranda’s alive. She got word to Malik.”

  “No,” I say. “That can’t be.” Can it? “How? Where?”

  “She’s on Valhalla!”

  It’s a trick. It has to be. Mal found out I was at the plant, and he’s using Rosie to turn me back around. Using the one thing they both know will make me.

  And yet . . .

  “Ben,” Rosie says. “She sent one of her journals.”

  Damn it.

  Every second we’re moving closer to collision. Every moment, pieces of the White Wolf are splintering off into the sky.

  “Ben,” Rosie’s voice calls across the void. “I know it sounds ridiculous, but it’s true. She survived the attack. She’s on Valhalla.”

  I shouldn’t believe her. But I want to. If there’s a chance, no matter how small, that what she’s saying is true, then I have to make sure. If it turns out to be a manipulation, then someone is going to pay.

  I’m on a collision course with the city, I’ve armed all the bombs, and this ship is blown to hell. There’s no way I’m pulling out of this in time.