by C. Mahood
We were both speechless. It had been a long time since we had seen such beauty, especially in the face of a sailor. They had the longest hair, tied back with spotted bandanna, they wore overalls with blouses underneath, sleeves rolled up, but most impressive, they had all their own teeth. Truly wonderful.
Some of them sported very impressive tattoos as well. Most curious.
When we spoke up with words of peace, their captain approached. She had long and curly, fire red hair. All loose and flowing past the length of her shoulders. Her eyes were green and she sported some freckles on her nose and cheeks. Her lips were a scarlet red and she stood a sturdy six feet all. A healthy two inches more than myself. My mouth was dry and finding the words was difficult at first. She welcomed us and reached out to shake my hand. Her grip was both tight but yet gentle. My fingers felt both crushed and comforted at the same time. She introduced herself as Maria, and her assistant was Eleanor. The ship was called the 'winged lady.' We discussed our arrival and she asked us many questions about what we saw at the prison and the journey here. Her assistant, a small, stocky woman with a bowl cut hair style, wearing spectacles as large as her face, scribed down every note she could. Jotting details and sketching plans and maps of the layout. A most skilled artist at that. We walked towards the ship and boarded. It was a heavily modified ship, much like the Annabel. The interior was spotless. Bill was most impressed with something to do with conversion of fuel efficiency of something along those lines. I tent to tune my brain out when he begins to speak about such things.
As we made our way to the captains quarters we noticed that the walls separating the rooms had all been removed and everything was in the open. Just hammocks folded in the corners and an open planed living quarter. It seemed huge and deceptively like that of a house rather than a claustrophobic airship.
We sat at the large metal table that was bolted to the ground. A simple but great idea. Our conversation was revolving around our areas of travel before it was brought suddenly to the point by Captain Todd. He asked directly of the whereabouts of Danny Racket and why were attacked by them after they bought the slaves. The reply we received threw everything we knew into orbit.
We had only seen things from one point of view. To us it seemed as though The pirates were purchasing slaves. They turned up and the leader of the village would trade coin for slaves. We had understood why Danny had shot the Feline’s leader. To us it seemed like justifiable anger. He had seen the injustice and decided to take matter into his own hands, by killing the one responsible for the slave's suffering. In all of this we were wrong. After we explained to the women what we saw and believed they simply smiled and carry on with the story, the truth.
They told from the other side of the story. They explained that they had contact with the Felines Village for years now. They had been liberating the people from under the guard of the Grey men for a number of years. Each time they arrived they would give money they had rounded up to the queen of the Felines. This was to help her round up more people to be liberated. Yes, the Felines were being taken as slaves. They were not happy about it, but a cover needed to remain to avoid suspicion of the Grey. The queen was one of the bravest agents they had. She bore the constant disgust of her people, constant berating of her name and her family and constant ridicule. In fact, she was the greatest thing to happen to them. She would round up the 'slaves' then lead them to the Crew in front of us. From there they would be taken to 'the path' and set free. To live without masters in a dimension of beauty, freedom, peace and endless prosperity. Unfortunately, her cover would remain forever. Danny rocket saw to that. He saw a perfect opportunity to take her out once his suspicions had been confirmed.
This story was unlike anything I had ever heard.
Captain Todd
May 13th
I had that lad so wrong. I feel like a prick! After taking him under my wing and looking out for the lad, it turns out he is the Son of Sir Bleakly. I know this, vie known for a while really, but the rage surfaces every now and then and I get hacked off all over again! The galls told us all about him. As soon as they saw what he did they knew who it was. People had been chatting on the free radio waves, apparently, about the Grey men having a spy placed on the crew of a routine airship, to, how they said, infiltrate the rebels and stamp them out. They knew Who Danny was as soon as he fired. That's why they broke in and took him. I argued with them about Biggs, why did he have to die. They had no answer, just an apology. Now, I'm a Realist, I am more than aware that Biggs wasn't the sharpest knife in the block, but he had a good heart. The reason he was killed. Its Danny that has to answer for it. Bloods on his hands, and his that’s and all.
The ladies told us more about the Grey. They have infiltrated the IDLSSW, using this to go from dimension to dimension, controlling whatever they can in the name of “God” Pile of hardened piss if you ask me! They have been preying on people’s fears and insecurities, for god knows how long. It has to stop. We are bringing the fight to them. As it turns out, our mission for Danny has brought us to the correct spot. He is here, hold up in the central offices. We are going to get that son of a bitch. Make him, and his father pay! He thinks he is going to destroyer all the followers of the winged man. Well he has another thing coming. This 'winged man' sounds like a good fella and I fancy meeting him one day. Turns out the ladies were planning on bringing Danny here to prison, but the Grey were waiting here already. Southey basally just handed him back to his own people. Bloody stupid, but how could they have known I suppose We are going to make our way there soon. I think everyone needs to make themselves safe and get some rest. I am coming to the end of my parchment and scroll. My ink is running low and so is my patience. I feel this may be my last entry, not just because I have had my fill of recording thoughts but I have another feeling too, a sickly, uneasy feeling in my stomach. Will leave one more note after this. I have a bad feeling. Things will not transpire as I hope I fear. Ah well, sure, wasn’t it a good run? Aye.
George Thomas.
May 14th
We spent an evening of planning and speculating on both our defences and your counter attack tomorrow. The point was argued very strongly by Captain Todd to simply attack, all guns blazing now. But this would be a fool’s errand. We would surly perish under the superior numbers and lack of strategical advantage. No, we decided to bring them to us. We would make a strong show of weakness. Let one or two scouting troops catch glances of our failing and cracked barriers, put our wounded in full view, this would give the impression that we were weak, losing and of no threat. In fact, we would have our entire district rigged with booby-traps. We would make a small, superficial attack on the central district. Not trying very hard, then be forced back to our final district. There The ship would leave the port and head back on itself to the dock on the far side, where the Annabel is now. Maria and her crew know the Grey men very well. She explained that once they see any weakness they concentrate on that area. This means that once they start driving our attack back, they would pull all troops to swell the ranks of the forward attack. This would give the Annabel time to be armed and return with the winged lady to our district where we could use the mounted cannons to wipe out the invading force after they had finished fanning through the tunnel. Then, once the grey had been taken care of, we would push towards the central district. The plan is flawless. The time will come in the morning when we have to act. I am a crew member and willing now to die for these men. My rapier in hand I am ready to stand shoulder to shoulder with my crew and the rebels, in the name of the winged man. Let morning come.
Lieutenant Steven Hartley.
May 17th
The fighting is over. To say we won would imply that we were victorious. That begs a follow up question, define Victorious? Victory in battle is simply the completion of your goals and a favourable outcome towards your own side.
I cannot scribe this to be true.
I can write this however. The plan formulated by Mr Thomas and The Ca
ptain, in collusion with Maria and the crew of the Winged Lady, went flawlessly. Once we pushed forward we were met with heavy artillery. They had stationary guns erected when we came. This knocked us back faster than we anticipated but the plan was still intact. All numbers were pulled to force us back. We retreated, still in combat, back into the district. The Grey men fell for the bait and saw our wounded and lack of ammunition. They pushed forward and pulled all units into the attack. The Winged lady had time to sail off, I was told by Mr Ironforn that when they arrived on the dock, the Annabel was unguarded and he sailed her back just in time. We had been forced back into the headquarters of a trader building. The firing upon us and shelling was relentless. We vastly underestimated the sheer amount of ammo the grey men possessed. Luckily once all of the troops were in position to flank and surround us, the two ships arrived, firing in unison and flattening the Grey men where they stood. The plan had worked like clockwork and to the second. Our losses were minimal. Their losses were high. We took no prisoners. The ships took care of that for us. There were no injured. You were either alive or dead after an attack from both of the S-345 ships.
Usually the latter. Always, in fact. We had our window now. The streets were clear. All the civilians who had seen the fighting rose up now, the renaming Grey men were killed by civilians. It was an awakening. We gathered our numbers and marched on the central buildings. Where we believed Danny to be. Maria accompanied us. The only one of our crew to remain was Bill Ironforn. He was working with one of the winged lady's engineers to make modifications to each of the ships, doing what real engineers do. Helping each other…. well they call it that, but in truth they are simply stealing technology and ideas from each other. We split up into two parties. Myself, Mr Thomas and Maria went in one group, Captain Todd led the other, with the entirety of the Annabel’s crew. The search for Danny Racket was afoot.
On entering the central district, we congregated on the top of the steps leading to the north side entrance of the main building. Initially I had believed this to be a large pyramid building but on getting closer I realised it is a cluster of buildings, graduating in height the closer to the centre they arose. The central building was a square symmetrical based building that rose high up vertically. The architecture was only slightly striking at the top the rest was simply a flat concrete or stone surface with three square windows on every floor. No character or personality imprinted onto it whatsoever.
On our entrance as a large group we met little resistance, a few guards tried to fight initially but they were under orders of the grey men, and they cared not for them govern as much as we did so they lay down their arms when asked after several warning shots.
Captain Todd suggested that we refuse the lifts as they are too easily sabotaged, instead we should take the stairs, clearing a floor per group each time. This worked well, my group took floor two, four and six, the Captain took floors Three, five and seven. We passed the Captains squad as we moved up to the eighth floor. We exchanged glances and smiles, none of us had encountered any difficulty. It was worrying as we knew there were forces in this building, and we knew Danny Racket was here too. Still, the ascent was easy, there were a few shots fired but no great obstacles to overcome. We began to believe that the entirety of the Grey men forces had converged on our previous position, our ambush in the docks, but we were mistaken. We had reached to tenth floor. This was different. Instead of having a doorway to a hallway with rooms of it, identical to the floors below, this floor was open. It opened up to corridors left and right with windows creating the exterior wall. The middle must have been the large board room. We could hear the cocking of guns and the winding of power weapons and chains, the rustle of armour and the creak of leather gloves, wrapping tight around brass and wooden handles. The Captains squad had caught up, we decided to split and flank. My squad go right and the larger party goes left. We would distract them and turn them to us as the other team moves in.
We crept close to the wall, heads down and slowly without a sound. We could hear the other squad, their sheer numbers brought noise, Mr Thomas decided that we needed to move faster, so we did. Once we turned the corner at the far end we discovered that there was no fourth wall. The floor opened up into an open plan space. Large, curved tables swooped the inside of the walls. Chairs had been overturned and stacked into a barricade against the far side main doors. There were clothes and piles of weapons stacked high in the middle. There stood only twelve men, all dressed in grey robes. They huddled together and one man, our goal, stood above them, reading. He was quoting from the book of the winged man, preaching of the evil of unacceptable compliance. The evil of content and comfort. As we walked forward the second party burst round the corner on the far side. Al the men in grey stood and were fired upon in seconds. Their robes spotted with red before soaked in crimson as they lay motionless. Mr Racket remained standing. He turned to me at first then to Mr Thomas. He smiled and winked, then turned to Captain Todd. Before his head had fully turned and his eyes focused on its target he was hit in the jaw so hard his feet left the floor. Captain Todd was on top of him before he hit the floor, pummelling his face. Quickly he was restrained and torn of Danny who was kicking and flailing to get him off. The screams were inaudible from the captain he just pointed at Danny yelling all form of profanities and swears in more languages than I was aware he spoke.
Danny Was helped to his feet once more and opened his mouth to return a reply but a second assault on his delicate face was brought forward by the second captain on our side.
Captain Maria had one hell of a left hook.
Captain Maria Jones
May 18th
I knew I should not have done that, I knew hitting the boy was wrong, but he is almost eighteen and he is much more dangerous than any child I knew. We needed to know the truth and he needed to know we were serious. Once he came around again we had him tied to a chair. I promised him that no more harm would befall him if we were told what we needed to know. He reluctantly agreed. Although Captain Todd was not happy with my promises. Their first lines on question began while the bodies of the other grey men were being dragged away. Their bodies placed in the lifts and sent to the ground floor. They were dead now so we had no quarrel with them and should be treated with the respect that the dead deserve. My crew had been selected to take the bodies to the docks once more where they were to be buried at sea, the customary way. They were then to head to the living and suburb districts to unlock the tunnels are free the civilians. My assistant remained behind from the crew to transcribe the conversation had with young Mr Racket.
Please find it attached.
Transcript of “Racket, Danny” interrogation.
Interviewer: Captain Charles Todd
Racket – So, Captain, your brain finally caught up with the rest of the world eh?
Todd – Shut it Danny, I've no time for your shit now. You may have been promised protection from death and a trial at a later date, but that won’t stop me knocking every one of your teeth out, you little piss fart!
Racket- Pleasure as always captain.
Todd – SHUT UP BOY
Racket – Shutting up sir (the record show that Danny winked and laughed, mockingly here)
Todd – Rite, so we know now that you are the son of Sir Bleakly, and spy for the Grey men. Is this true?
Racket – Aye sir
Todd – Good, also over time we have come do notice the ever present “Grey men,” in dimensions we were sent to under the impression they are uncharted. Did your father have knowledge he was sending us such places?
Racket – Captain, I pity you, your really don’t under…
Todd – SHUT IT! Just answer to bloody question.
Racket – But to answer the question I need you to.
(Let the record show Captain Todd punched Racket in the mouth, dislodging a front bottom tooth)
Todd – I can keep doing this, build myself a collection of teeth. Now did you father have knowledge of this?
Todd – So he knew we were going to places where the grey men had been.
Racket – Yes, but more importantly, the winged man.
Todd – Sorry?
Racket – The Winged man, that is who my father is obsessed with. Don’t you see, he wants his power. The church of the Grey is failing; he needs to meet the creator. He needs to meet with God.
Todd – You father want to meet God?
Racket – Is it so hard to understand? The Grey men took the teachings of the winged man and brought them to the masses. They believed this message to be true and wanted all to hear.
Todd – So they forced and enslaved people into believing?
Racket – NO! They, WE, want to spread the word of the winged man. Only in repentance, surrender and service can we truly know light!
Todd – And financial contributions?
Racket – Well yes that is one small part of it but the…
Todd – So the rich can get a nice we pathway to heaven then? While the poor suffer and have to slip on down to hell? Is that it?
Racket – Well, no there are other arrangements that can be made.
Todd – we have seen those arrangements, selling loved ones for coin? Homes burnt, and cities being overrun.
Racket – The path to heaven is paved with obstacles.
Todd – HA! Paved with Shit if you ask me. What I want to know is why us? Why were we involved. Why Mr Thomas? He knew nothing of this.
Racket – Exactly, don’t you see? We needed someone of brains on board, we couldn’t trust you bunch of imbeciles with the importance of these mission.