by C J Timms
‘Open water?’ Gale said. ‘What about fathomless?’
Ironchurch rolled his eyes. ‘Don’t be a negative nelly. Even with one damaged the other statues will keep the fathomless out…I’m pretty sure.’ He gestured to the still shining reefwall in the harbour.
‘Pretty sure!’ Gale said.
‘Like a good eighty percent.’
Gale’s breaths started coming faster, and his chest tightened. His initial enthusiasm was fading. He’d leapt at the chance to hand off the baby and get a squizz at some beacon tech. That though, was a lot of open water. What would his dad have done?
He sighed, his dad would have volunteered to fix the statue, probably wouldn’t have even asked to get paid. Besides, this was his only chance to get a look at the beacon-tech too. That would come in handy. Sooner or later the Rust Knight was coming for him.
He needed to know how to keep out the Deep.
‘You fix this Gale, and you gain respect and maybe…gain Iron to your name.’
‘What like Iron-Knott, or Ironsquall?’
‘Perhaps I name you Iron-water…or Ironpuff, with these twigs for arms.’ Ironchurch said and slapped his thighs at his joke. ‘Actually…Ironpuffs, that great name for new breakfast cereal.’ He scribbled this down on his ‘ideas pad’.
Frank came to stand beside Gale and gave him a set of tools.
‘Remember Gale, don’t overdo the Deep Script.’ Frank pointed to the side of the airship Gale had rusted through last week.
Gale wandered the junkyard and eventually picked a battered windsurfer and started making adjustments. Gale was not a mechanical genius, but he’d often had to fix things rather than buy them new. He’d even worked on a windsurfer before. Ashley had chipped in with a few of his friends and hired one for his birthday two years ago. He, of course, had managed to break the rental. They’d had to do a sneaky run to Bunnings to try to fix it.
Hours later, Gale pulled the windsurfer up in the last of the afternoons light. Gale grabbed his tools and readied the board to take off. He lowered himself onto the water. The ocean stirring something in his core. The board caught the wind, and he started slowly moving forwards.
‘Come on, water-boy. You slower than grandma Ironladle.’ Ironchurch roared and nudged Frank. Franks eyes darted from side to side. ‘Don’t talk about grandma like that. You never know when she’s listening.’ Ironchurch’s smile faltered.
Gale grinned, flipped Ironchurch the bird, then channelled his Script into the windsurfer. His magic poured into the windsurfer, and he lurched forward, kinetic force propelling him into the bay. He caught a fleeting glimpse of Ironchurch’s stunned face before he lost sight of the dock.
The wind cut through his hair. Dusk still gave plentiful light to navigate by, and the waves were gentle. He could see the statue out in the bay marking the fallen ship. He could make out one other windsurfer in the bay, bright red, showing there was at least one other crazy bastard out here. The light started to escape beyond the horizon, the light atop the statue and the ring of signal fires became beacons in the darkness.
The waves went from rolling to crashing, now over a metre and a half. Gale pushed himself harder, letting his Script flow into the board. He grinned, this was going to be too easy, he thought. He skimmed along at fantastic speeds, gulls flitted by beside him along with a sole albatross. Ironchruch’s training had helped build up his stamina and his raw Script.
A song flitted past his ears. Over the roar of the wave and wind, he caught the notes of the haunting song he’d heard the night he came to Ionhome.
His windsurfer launched from the top of a two-metre wave, soaring through the air. Rising high in the air, he saw a dark shape rise beneath him. Two long arms exploded out of the water, followed by the snapping jaws of a fathomless.
His board crunched into its head, acting like a shield beneath him. He twisted the board to land it in line with the next wave. Skating over the crest of the next wave, he lost sight of the beast. The reefwall still glowed in the distance. How bad was the damage to the lighthouse that a fathomless was in the bay? He wrenched his board around, looking for the beast.
Cold sweat started to drip down his neck. He hadn’t seen these things since the night Ash had disappeared, since the Rust Knight changed his life. His chest got tight, and he still had no idea how to fight these things. He rose up the next wave, the swell building, nearly three metres high now. Gale flared his Script and pushed his board faster. He strained his eyes in the darkness for the fathomless and dared to hope it had been knocked unconscious by the collision.
The water erupted in front of him and a giant Maw rise out of the ocean. The Maw’s mouth lined with piercing spikes. It snapped out of the water like a twisted, aquatic, venus fly trap. Gale slammed his magic down beneath the board and skated off a wall of water over the Maw.
‘Mother-frakker.’
Dozens of spiked back ridges cut through the water. Salt was heavy on the breeze, his chest starting to feel tight, his shoulder aching where the tattoo lay.
‘No..not frakking now,’ said Gale.
He heaved his windsurfer around a four-metre wave that threatened to topple him. He looked for land. For a port in a storm. The shoreline was a flickering light in the distance. The beacon statue, though, was close.
Gale pushed his board forward with everything he had, now turning into the waves for a boost. A dark shape moved parallel to him in the wave, a hulking outline of a body, monstrous, as long as a semi-trailer. Dark blue eyes, cold as the grave, stared at him, measuring him from the wave beside him.
He could’ve reached out and touched them.
The fathomless launched out of the wave, crashing into the windsurfer, tangling itself, Gale and the board into the water.
Gale went down into the icy cold waters of the bay, his chest clamping down like a vice. He could see perfectly clear underwater for miles, and the bay was alive with beasts. Hundreds of fathomless, multiple large Maws, all illuminated by swarms of phytons with their strange iridescent blue, green glow.
The creature rushed at him underwater, and his Script spiked. It flared into a large harpoon in his outstretched hand. Gale barely had time to bring the harpoon to bear in front of him before the beast rammed its head into the point. The shock numbed both his arms. The beast wrenched its head around and tried to dive, shaking its head, trying to dislodge Gale.
The depths rushed up to meet him, swarms of phytons attracted to the blood from his wounds. He clamped his thighs to either side of the beasts neck. He wrenched upwards on the harpoon, forcing the beasts head back up. It bellowed and began swimming towards the surface. Gale’s arms strained, his chest screamed for air.
They broke back through into the dim light of the surface. The beast breached the water, rising high into the air and threw Gale from its neck. Gale took a ragged, sweet breath of air. His harpoon flew out of his hands, dissolving into particles of raw Script. Gale flipped through the air, and his eyes spotted a giant Maw below him.
Time slowed down.
He felt his raw Script exhausted, his Deep Script surging wildly, like a tempest. He could feel the hot, stale breath of the Maw. Taste the salt breeze on the air. He tried to shield his body with his arms.
A hand grabbed his. A red windsurfer shot from the top of a nearby wave and struck him midfall. The rider grabbed him and pulled him horizontally past the mouth of the Maw. Gale was hauled onto back of a windsurfer by a woman with burning red hair. She had bright green eyes and pale white skin. A purple port-wine stain tracked down the left side of her face, running from her left forehead down onto her left cheek.
The woman cursed at the added weight.
‘Hold the frak on,’ she yelled and snapped the windsurfer to the left. Gale reached out and snagged the mast with one hand. With his other, he grabbed the woman’s waist.
They raced across the waves, the woman pushing hard with her own magic to propel the board. The blood in the water, however, had stirred a feeding frenzy. Fathomless closed in. A phyton swarm’s grasping tentacles broke the surface in front of them.
The woman grinned and wrenched back on the windsurfer. A column of water, like a living tendril of water three metres across, smashed into the phyton swarm and scattered it. The red-haired woman drove the windsurfer around the tendril of water. She circumnavigated the column and flipped them upside down. Then the water pillar wound up like a major league pitcher and hurled them. The windsurfer flew through the air.
The cold air roared past Gales face until, with an almighty crack, they jerked to a stop. Nearly dislodged, Gale gripped hard at the windsurfers frame. His torso lurched forward hitting rock.
The faltering light of the statue poured down on them, the usual calm reassurance that rolled off it faltering. Golden sparks fled from a dissipating network of light woven into coral. They had crashed into the beacon statue in the harbour. The windsurfer jutted out of the vertical column like a barnacle. The woman took off climbing up the windswept platform, Gale followed her, his exhausted muscles pulling him up the clifflike face of the statue. As he rolled onto a service platform, taking ragged breaths, the woman moved to stand at the centre of the platform.
‘We’ll never make it through that’ the woman said ominously looking out across the waters.
Gale pushed himself to his feet and stared. A swarming mass of fathomless had darkened the bay, the signal fire lighthouse dimmed to a paltry flickering thing above them. The reefwall beside them was ridden with holes and patches, the usual integrity it radiated was gone, replaced by a patchwork quilt straining under the weight of an antiquated system.
‘Well I hope you’re not just a pretty face,’ said the woman who moved to place her back to Gale’s in the middle of the platform. ‘What are you waiting for, recall your weapon?’ she hissed.
Gale hesitated, then reached out and felt the same pulse as his Script formed into a harpoon in his hand. He gripped it tight as the swarming fathomless converged on the platform. The first started to climb the cliff below with their vicious clawed hands. Phyton swarms stretched upwards from the water like the tendrils of a Kraken.
‘For what its worth, thanks,’ he said, facing the oncoming tide of fathomless. ‘My name’s Gale.’
‘Blush,’ said the woman. ‘I hope you’re more than just a pretty face.’
Gale grimaced and prepared himself, his chest finally starting to settle as a clawed hand reached onto the platform.
A colossal spotlight sliced through the darkness. Multiple airships lit up the sea and fired a barrage of fixation nails into the waters. The barrage cut the phyton swarms to pieces and pinned the Maws, to slow-moving to dodge. The fathomless roared in disappointment and retreated into the waters with one last hungry look at Gale and Blush.
‘Well, care to explain?’
The cop had the look that night shift workers get. The look that said why didn’t you frakking wait till morning to cause a hassle. The sort of look that said he’d rather be sleeping, but if you were going to keep him awake, you were going to regret it.
Gale and Blush sat opposite two cops. They hadn’t offered their names so he’d named them Tired and Hangry. Their interview room was three metres by three metres with drab white paint, four uncomfortable chairs and a table.
Tired began the same series of questions he’d asked all night.
‘What were you doing out at night attracting a tidal swarm?’
‘Who are you working with?’
‘Are you in league with the Unbroken?’
‘How did you shut down the signal fires?’
‘Wait,’ said Hangry, breaking the routine flow of questions and really examining Gale. ‘You’re the kid who punched the boss’s son. Oh, she’s going to love this.’
Tired however gave Gale a conspiratorial wink before returning to his regular disgruntled face.
‘Oh, you’re going away for a long time, trenchwalker.’ Hangry said with vicious glee.
Blush had been silent to all of the questions so far. Finally, she growled and kicked her chair backwards, standing up. ‘I think the real question…gentlemen, is how the public will react to finding that a pack of fathomless made it through the reefwall.’
‘Now hold on,’
‘No you hold on,’ said Blush cutting him off with a raised hand. ‘We’ve been held here for eight hours, which means you don’t have anything to charge us with. You’re pissing about. You’re trying to contain the news that a fathomless swarm got through, what I can only assume, was a poorly maintained harbour net, a failing beacon and the regular police water patrols.
A fathomless swarm got within striking distance of residential apartments. Now that sort of news getting out could cost someone’s boss their job and everyone down the chain.
Now I’ve been here for six hours without food, coffee, water or a chance to fucking piss. I’m walking out that door unless you want the front page of the paper to be the story of Ionhome’s incompetent police force.’ said Blush slamming her hands down on the table.
‘Sit down, miss,’ said Tired, also standing, driving some authority into his voice. Tired grabbed for her arm and Blush twisted, driving Tired’s face into the table.
A knock came from the door, interrupting them. A stern-faced woman entered, her raven black hair and cold eyes both built a presence about her that dominated the room. She wore the same uniform as the cops, but her cheek had a tattoo of a winged sword in crimson, very similar to Alisdair’s. Almost identical in fact.
‘Chief,’ Hangry stuttered. ‘We were just about to…’
‘They are cleared to go, let them out Gerald’ she said speaking to Tired.
‘But miss, this one assaulted me,’ said Gerald/Tired from the table, where Blush had still not released him.
‘Let them go. There is to be no charges.’ She said.
Blush released Tired and moved towards the door, Gale following her.
‘Master Knott,’ Police Chief Devina said. ‘Don’t worry. I’m sure I’ll be seeing you again. Don’t leave town.’
They exited the police station into the early morning light. Everything hurt. Gale’s skin was burnt and raw. ‘Don’t suppose you want to tell me what that was about?’ Gale said.
‘My employer is a bit of a bigwig.’ Said Blush.
In the light of day, Blush cut a sharp figure. Blush was in her mid-twenties, a few years older than Gale. She carried herself with the confidence that you gained somewhere after high school in the transition to real adulting. She had vibrant red hair that flowed down to her shoulder, emerald green eyes and pale white skin, lightly freckled. The port-wine stain down the side of her face still looked good in the morning light. It gave her an exotic look rather than marring her face.
‘Thanks for saving me…can I ask? How did you do that with the water column?’ He discretely scanned her Script. A sphere of water obscured the Script locked inside.
Blush slapped him. ‘That's not polite. Also, you owe me a windsurfer. Pay me back for the windsurfer, show me you’re not just a pretty face, and maybe I’ll consider it.’ Blush walked away with a swagger.
‘How will I find you,’ Gale called out.
Blush turned her head back over her shoulder. ‘You’ll work it out pretty-face.’
Gale - The entrance exam
‘Don’t frak around with the College, they own your sorry hide for seven years of training.’
Spur’s Primer for fracturesmiths* (*First edition only, removed in second edition.)
Temperamental spring weather gave way to balmy summer afternoons. Afternoons made for lounging on a deck, for having a cold beer with your mates and cranking the Triple J Hottest 100. Afternoons for surfing and lazy floats down the river with an esky full of beer on an inflatable mattress. It was not an afternoon to be working.
That afternoon, the summer bree
ze filled the Iron Church Bar. The gentle hum of the early evening crowd had settled in, getting comfortable. Glasses clinked, chips crunched and extended lunch breaks turned to half days off. Gale would miss this.
Gale had learned many things working at the Iron Church bar. He’d figured out how to tell who didn’t need another drink. He’d figured out how to tell when someone was reading his resume, his Script. Their subtle eye movements, the turning away of eyes and the sneers.
He’d learned that a complimentary serving of beer nuts could be the difference between blackout drunk and being carried out by your mates in a happy mood. He’d learned that many of the myths and monsters of Earth had come from breaks in the realms. The forge world of Locomotyr, the mental dimension of Tangentius and even the cloud islands of Celesta Firma. Creatures that broke between realms lead to legends of Gods, sea monsters and cataclysms. Even Earth occasionally broke through to others. He’d chuckled when he’d first heard a folk tale in Ionhome about a sinister ghost light that would capture your soul. They called it a Sel-Fae.
He’d worked out that his Script healed him but didn’t make him immortal. It was hard to use his Script to treat others, not impossible but massively inefficient. It took ten times as much Script to heal someone else as it did to heal him. Not many people had a significant sized Script in Ionhome, maybe one in a thousand.
He’d worked out that limited tech did work in Ionhome although his old phone was still useless. Older tech was better, radio for example could work through the Penumbra at times.
Finally, he’d figured out that customer service jobs were still customer service jobs. Like most jobs, he had to look busy even when not, smile at people’s bullshit and listen to the boss.
Maybe he wouldn’t miss it too much.
‘Gale, more chips.’ Called Ironchurch from the back. In the kitchen, Ironchurch sweated over a hot stove with a constant smile. With an enthusiastic madness, he directed the flow of staff.
‘You work hard, Gale. I was right to give you job. Many wouldn’t do business with a trenchwalker. Ironchurch, however, is man of opportunity, he sees potential in all, he is…bold entrepreneur.’ Ironchurch tapped his nose.