The Black Lung Captain - By Chris Wooding Page 0,4
you could want. She was the only other person aboard who was allowed - or indeed able - to fly his beloved aircraft in his absence. That decision had taken a lot of trust on Frey's part. Trust didn't come easily to Frey. But she'd been on the Ketty Jay for over a year now and she'd never let him down.
In the end, it didn't matter what she was. She was crew.
Frey fired up the prothane engines and swivelled the craft, presenting her stern to the approaching planes. 'They really think they're going to catch us in those junkers?' he said. 'Let's show 'em what a real aircraft can do.' Jez braced herself against the back of his seat as he lit up the thrusters.
The expected acceleration didn't come. The boom of ignition was far feebler than Frey was used to hearing. At first the Ketty Jay didn't move at all, struggling to shift her own weight. When she began to push forward, it was like moving through treacle. The clearing full of angry villagers slid away beneath them, but not half as fast as Frey would have liked.
'Silo wasn't joking about the engines,' he murmured.
'You ever heard him joke about anything?'
'Suppose not.' He leaned back in his seat and bellowed out the cockpit door. 'Malvery! Get up here!'
The Ketty Jay was picking up speed, but far too slowly. There was a silver earcuff lying in an ashtray set into the brass and chrome dash, between the dials and meters. He snatched it up and clipped it to the back of his ear.
'Harkins. Pinn. Can you hear me?'
'Yes, Cap'n, I'm, er, you startled me a bit, I mean, loud and, erm, I can hear you, yes,' came Harkin's babbled reply.
It sounded as if he was standing right next to Frey, instead of sitting in his cockpit fifty metres away. He was wearing an earcuff of his own, as was Pinn. When one of them spoke, the others could hear what they said. It was one of Crake's little tricks. Sometimes having a daemonist on board came in handy.
'What's up with the Ketty Jay?' asked Pinn. 'Her thrusters are barely lit. Might as well strap a gas stove to her arse for all the acceleration you're getting.'
'Technical difficulties,' Frey replied. 'We've got incoming craft. They've a couple of rifles, that's all. No real danger, but the Ketty Jay isn't going to outpace them till she builds up speed. Keep them off me as best you can.'
'I'll keep them off you, alright,' Pinn said eagerly. 'I'll—'
'And don't shoot them down. I don't want them madder than they already are.'
'We can't shoot them down?' Pinn cried. 'What are we supposed to do? Hypnotise them with fancy flying?'
'It's a bunch of cropdusters and mail planes, Pinn,' Frey told him. 'They're not much of a threat, and I could do without the Navy coming after us. We've managed to stay beneath their notice since the whole Retribution Falls thing. I'd like to keep it that way. Let's keep the needless slaughter to a minimum, eh?'
'You, Cap'n, are a pussy,' said Pinn.
'And you're scared of water.'
'He's scared of water?' Harkins crowed eagerly.
'Don't you start, you jittery old git!' Pinn snapped. 'You're scared of everything.'
'Not water, though,' Harkins replied, with an unmistakable note of triumph in his voice.
'Everyone shut up and fly!' said Frey, before they could get into an argument. Pinn subsided, grumbling.
The Ketty Jay had picked up a respectable amount of speed now. Malvery appeared at the door of the cockpit, still red-faced from his run earlier.
'You bellowed, Cap'n?'
'I need you up in the bubble. There's planes on our tail. Don't shoot at them unless I give the word.'
'Right-o,' said Malvery. He returned to the passageway and climbed the ladder that led to the autocannon cupola on the Ketty Jay's hump. From there, he could act as Frey's eyes astern. Frey wished there was a better way to see what was going on behind his craft while he was airborne, but if there was, he hadn't found it yet.
'They're catching us up, Cap'n,' Malvery reported. 'You might want to go a bit faster.'
Frey swallowed his reply and concentrated on flying. The Vardenwood lay for hundreds of kloms in all directions. In the far distance he could see the grand city of Vaspine, a crown of lights on the highest hilltops. Below them was the forest, cut through with steep, sharp valleys that joined and divided haphazardly.