The Black Lung Captain - By Chris Wooding Page 0,65

him. for what it had shown him, he wanted to tear it apart. If he leaned on this lever for long enough, it would be shredded to pieces, dashed by the flux.

He wanted that. He wanted it so badly. But he had a job to do. He had people relying on him. So he took hold of the lever, and he pulled it back. The wind dropped, and there was silence. Several of the electric lights came back on, flickering and crackling uneasily.

Crake brushed sweat-damp hair back from his forehead, panting.

'Are you alright?' Plome asked, from where he knelt by his controls.

'I'm alive,' he said. 'You?'

'Yes, yes, quite unharmed,' he said, his voice wavering. He brandished the pistol he'd brought at Crake's request. 'No need to shoot you, then?' he joked weakly.

'I should think not,' said Crake. He threw the lever again, out of spite, and listened to the daemon shriek for a few more seconds before he turned it off. Then he walked round the echo chamber, and stood in front of the porthole, looking in.

'Now,' he said to the daemon. 'Let's begin again, shall we?'

Fifteen

Pinn, Lost In Thought — Jez Takes A Walk —

A Fortress — Frey Has A Plan

Artis Pinn lay on his bunk, fingers laced behind his head, and stared at the metal ceiling. It was possible to see shapes in the ancient grime, if you looked hard enough. But today he wasn't playing his usual game. Today, he was thinking.

The quarters he shared with Harkins were narrow, cluttered and dirty. He had the top bunk, due to Harkins' unfortunate tendency to spasm out of bed several times a night. A square vent high up on one wall let in cool air from outside, wafting away the stench of unwashed bedding. There was a small storage cupboard crammed with their meagre possessions, but space for little else. The Ketty Jay wasn't built for luxury.

Pinn had lain there for hours now, trying to make sense of things. He didn't know what this empty, listless sensation was, but he didn't like it much. He didn't want to get up. Didn't want to sleep. Didn't want to do anything, actually. The thought of flying his Skylance failed to excite him. Even the prospect of booze had lost its charm, and he'd often said that when that day came, he'd eat a bullet. But he didn't feel much like shooting himself, either.

Lisinda, he thought. My sweetheart is marrying another man.

Was it even possible? He wasn't sure. After all, she'd said she loved him. Hadn't that meant anything to her? It had certainly meant something to him. It had inspired him to be a hero. It made him want to be a better man. It even made him want to stop cheating on her, although the gap between the desire and the reality was vast indeed.

How could she do it?

A sudden thought struck him, that hadn't occurred until now, even after hours of contemplation. If she was marrying another man, that must mean she'd been fooling around with him for at least a couple of months. Maybe longer. A flood of rage swept through him, and he gritted his teeth. How he'd like to get his hands round that other bloke's throat! Messing with another man's woman! Didn't he know she was taken? She'd already made her choice. Hadn't she said she loved him?

But killing her husband-to-be would surely make Lisinda a bit sad. He'd never do anything to make her cry, and yet honour demanded he stamp his rival's face into the ground. How to solve a problem like that? It was all very confusing. He wished he had half the Cap'n's brains. The Cap'n would have known what to do.

No matter how he turned it over in his head, he couldn't conceive how Lisinda would want to marry anyone else. It just wasn't possible. She must be an innocent victim in all this, somehow. Her heart had been swayed by some sleazy charmer from out of town. Women couldn't help themselves sometimes, that was just a fact. She couldn't be blamed. She was powerless to resist his influence.

Or maybe she was being forced into it. Yes, that was it! She'd said in her letter that she was very happy, but that clearly couldn't be true. Not when her heart was with her absent hero.

His blood boiled at the thought. His Lisinda, married off to some scheming aristocrat three times her age! The kind of man who coveted her beauty