DeathWatch No. 58 – You’ve Got To Hang On

Posted on June 3, 2015 by Catastrophe Jones

This is Issue #58 of DeathWatch, an ongoing Serial. Click that link to go find ‘A Beginning’ and read from there, if you need to catch up.

Happy Reading!

PREVIOUS

* * *

The first thing to hit the topmost netting was rolled up in canvas. Rather than tangle in the ropes, it bounced against the main envelope, and on its arc, the canvas flapped loose. A ragdoll body dropped to the next level, nearly missing the netting entirely, but its arm and leg got tangled, and the descent stopped there, with the Jacob’s Quartermaster laying unmoving out over open sky, hammocked in the netting constructed from the fin tips to the tail of the ship.

“Bennett! Li! GET HIM DOWN HERE!” the Captain shouted, even as the second body fell. This one tucked and turned, grunting in pain as she came tumbling past the swell of the envelope and hit only the edge of a top net, then went spinning and was caught up by another net, wheezing as she clutched at the ropes to try to hold still. The Captain called “Brody! Get Jules!” and turned to head for the rail to see if Bennett and Li were having luck getting Nathan.

Kieron already had a rigging harness on and was tying it off when the call came.

“Captain! We have to go, NOW!”

“Three minutes, ‘gator! I got the Quarter on the wing!” She was off and running for the rail already, snapping down the buckles on her harness and threading a line through.

“You don’t have three minutes!” the navigator was insistent, panicked, almost.

“Two minutes!”

“In two fucking minutes, we’re going to be sucking Ilonan cannon, Captain! It’s go now, or every airman on the Jacob dies!” But the Captain of the TS Jacob threw the rope to Bennett, who tied off the end and held the slack while a wide-eyed Li came in off the wing whose gears had engaged, ready to pull in.

“Thirty fucking seconds!” Sha shouted.

“DAMNIT, Captain! Your fucking count is thirty!”

And with that, Sha Onaya jumped, tallcoat and all, for the netting, and her First Mate. Kieron was climbing the rigging, and had almost reached Jules, when he saw her go over.

“Count is twenty!” shouted the navigator.

Kieron lifted himself up onto the netting, where he saw a white-faced Jules clutching the ropes, and braced himself so he could curl her up and bind her, to help lower her back down. “We’ve got you,” he said, shouting over the sound of the wind, and the fire getting louder.

“Nate?” she asked, lifting her head up, looking around.

“With the wing. Captain’s getting him,” Kieron promised her, reaching up to touch her forehead, to gently urge her to lay her head back down.

“Count is ten!”

“On the wing?” Jules said, tensing, trying to sit up. She groaned, wincing, and laid back down, clutching the ropes, panicked. “He’s on the wing? We’re gonna bank. He’s gonna fall!”

“Count is five! Four! Three–”

“Captain!” Jules cried, forgetting she didn’t have Nate’s comm. No one below could hear her. “SHA!” She writhed against Kieron as he struggled to buckle her into a harness.

“I got him! I’ve fucking got him! Pull us in and get us the fuck out of here!” the Captain called. The wing began to pull in, while Bennett and Li hauled the Captain and the Quartermaster back up on deck. The whole ship rocked, turning to the side, and Kieron wove an ankle through the rigging and pulled Jules close, holding on to the yardarm.

“It’s going to get rough,” Kieron said to Jules. “You have to hold still, all right? Sha’s got Nate. They’ll be all right. You stay with me, and we’ll hang on right here while we get away.”

“Fucking Abe,” Jules said muzzily. “Can’t believe he did it,” she said, laying against Kieron. “Locked me in my own fucking cabin,” she said and then she put on her best ‘pretend-Abe’ voice, saying, “Is being done, Yana. No more talking. Just doing.” She switched back to her own voice, mournful, and whispered, “I’ve known that man for half my fucking life. How could he just do…” Her voice trailed off, and she sagged in Kieron’s arms.

Kieron gave her a shake, holding her tight against his body as he clung to the yardarm while the TS Jacob came about and its aether engines spun up. “Hey now. Wake up, Jules. Jules!” he called sharply, looking down at her as she stared off glassily.

“Mmm?” she wondered, lolling her head toward him. “Whattisit, Brody? Ain’t got time t’dance,” she slurred, her skin gone a greenish pale.

“You’ve got to hang on,” he said. “I’m gonna tie us in. No way we can get to the deck before they spin up and get us out of here,” he said, decisive.

The sound of the aether engines spinning up was comforting; they would engage with the props momentarily, and the ship would run — and hopefully, the Ilonan ships would stay back with The Maxima. The Jacob rumbled, and every bit of chain and rigging began to hum; the throb of the engines reached a critical peak, and it began to accelerate away from The Maxima even before it had finished turning.

Not a moment too soon, as massive projectiles began to rocket past The Jacob. The Ilonan ships were firing on them as they reached closer to the Maxima. Kieron watched as, even though the enormous ship was on its way to falling out of the sky, the Ilonan airmen appeared as if they were going to board it.

The Jacob picked up even more speed, and Kieron remembered the Captain telling him (before he knew she was the Captain) that her ship could do ten kliks in three minutes. “Now would be a good time for that,” he said aloud. Another missile keened past them, and two of the airships docked as far from the fire as possible. Soldiers swarmed the deck, while the other ship provided cover, the shining metal and polished wood of its skin gleaming against light of the the blue fire.

They ran about for a bit, perhaps to find salvageable materials, or a Captain to apprehend, or to see if they could fly the ship away from the village, so no other people would die when it came crashing down.

All at once, however, the soldiers filed back to the ships; Kieron watched, his eyes watering in the wind, as they hastily both attempted to uncouple from The Maxima. The covering ship began to pull away from the area — one ship turned away and began to hurriedly fly, while the third was still dealing with its rigging-lock.

And then the Maxima finished what it had begun, and with a howling, rending roar, it tore itself and the ship still attached to it to shreds, pieces of it sailing far and wide.

* * *

NEXT

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DeathWatch No. 57 – Our only chance is outrunning

Posted on June 2, 2015 by Catastrophe Jones

This is Issue #57 of DeathWatch, an ongoing Serial. Click that link to go find ‘A Beginning’ and read from there, if you need to catch up.

Happy Reading!

PREVIOUS

* * *

“Scramble their signals,” she told the comms crew. “Hana — use whatever you used on the Maxima. Get me time, people. We want our Quartermaster’s wife back, don’t we? And he’d be a bonus,” she said, biting off the words with as much confidence as she could muster. Kieron watched the way she strode the room, checking over the shoulders of her crew, a hand on them now and then, to let them know she was there. Beside them. “Jules! Are you moving yet?”

“Yep,” Jules said, sounding giddy, or perhaps just half delirious, shouting from far off. “My boy here’s a fucking drag, though. You sure you need me to bring him?”

The Captain drew a shaky breath and said, “If it’s just to bury him, we can mourn him with the Maxima. But if he’s breathing, see if you can get him up.”

Jules voice became clearer, suddenly, and Kieron had a sudden picture in his head — she was dragging him along, talking aloud, but when she got down to deal with him, her lips were near the comm device. Her heavy, pained breathing could be heard, out of breath and gasping. “Hey,” she said, sounding sweet. “Hey, you. Hey you, Nate,” she said, choking on irrational laughter. “Baby, it’s time to get up. You gotta get up, because I can’t get you up the stairs, okay? Don’t leave–” And here, Kieron could feel his eyes sting with sudden tears as her voice broke. “–don’t you leave me, little bird. C’mon.”

The sounds then were of determination. Force. Sheer will.

Time dragged on, sped up, and those in the comms room stared at the screens and waited to hear about the incoming Ilonan ships.

Jules could be heard swearing softly, and the sound of distant shouting was growing closer.

“Come on you fuck,” she shouted at one point, sounding exhausted. “Stop bleeding and walk!”

Then came the sound of a slap, hard and ringing.

A wheezed groan shuddered through the comm, and Nate’s voice was only a slurred mumble.

Hana said, “Three Ilonan ships. Evorsor-class. Our only chance is outrunning.”

Jules’ voice came through clear again, the sound of her straining against something.

Silence, for a few moments, listening to the sound of Jules breathing heavily, and the groan of the ship.

Then came steps. Boots on boards. Jules’s thicknailed soles, the ones that clicked, when she walked, but sounding impossibly heavy. Boots on boards, going up stairs. Unsteady steps, an aching eternity of them, and then the roar of the ship was suddenly less muffled.

“Port?” Jules asked, her voice a thready whisper. “You gotta catch us, Sha. I can’t rappel. No time. Not enough strength.”

“We’re under you, yeah, port,” Sha said, pacing back and forth, her heart in her throat for all the fear in the room. “I’ll catch you, Jules. With my own fucking hands, if I gotta.” She grabbed a device on the same channel and ran out, to head up. “Brody, with me.”

Kieron followed her, breathing heavily, sweating in his light uniform shirt, hurrying along, heart in his throat, ready to stand on the deck and just… hold out his arms, if that’s what it took.

“Jules, you gotta… you gotta get as much of a running start as you can so you clear your rail and ours. We’re almost rigging-locked with you, but the fire’s getting too close. Boatswain! get the technics to put out the fins and every net we got — canvas the rigging. Break every bone in his body if you gotta, but get ’em on the ship. Surgeon can fix ’em afterwards, so long as they’re breathing when we get ’em!” Sha shouted, calling out orders, running to handle ropes herself, doing anything and everything she could to feel like she could affect the outcome one way or another. “Brody, you check every fucking knot and then doublecheck!”

From somewhere far above, the roar of the fire redoubled, and there was a horrifying shriek of rending metal, the cracklesnap of splintering wood.

A massive piece of the Maxima’s keel fell, dropping right past the Jacob, raging blue fire singing out of the sky, plunging down to the blackened farmland below. With it, tumbled several crewmembers, airmen who had already been dead for some time, burned beyond recognition, bodies tumbling out of the heavens, cast down from on high, muscles still jerking from the electric current of the fire, their mouths open in silent song all the way down.

Kieron moved faster than he ever had, quiet, determined. Nate and Jules were just going to fall out of the sky, and hopefully land within the rigging nets and canvas. He knew it had to stretch to accommodate them, but not be loose enough that they could fall through. He and the technics shouted back and forth, tossing lines and running pulleys that stretched out as far as possible. They didn’t want to catch any falling pieces of the Maxima, but they wanted to catch Jules and Nate — had to catch Jules and Nate.

Had to.

“Captain! We can not stay here long,” came a cry over the com. The navigator’s voice sounded worried, rushed.

“Aye, ‘gator, we know!” answered the Captain.

“The wind’s changing. The fire’ll get our sails and main envelope if we don’t get moving!” he cried.

“I hear you!” Sha called.

“Sha! There’s fucking Ilonans in the sky!” Jules shouted down.

“Well if I’d known you were inviting them, I never would’ve come to your stupid party!” the Captain yelled back.

“Maybe we should get out of here and let them have it, huh?”

“Sounds good to me! Get your asses over here!”

“Here goes nothing!” called Jules, and then came the sound of her whistling through the air — Nate’s comm device was still open, shrieking in the wind as their bodies fell from the Maxima.

Only a few seconds —

–but they seemed to Kieron like the longest seconds in the world.

* * *

NEXT

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But Once, Years Ago

Posted on June 1, 2015 by Catastrophe Jones

You are the taste of vomit
on the back of my tongue;

the peculiar sour sting
I must gag upon

as I go through life,
choked to be constantly reminded

that I am all of nauseousness,
that I make you sick,

that I disgust you.
You told me this but once,

years ago,
but I have never since

been able to spit it up
or swallow it down.

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Put Me

Posted on May 31, 2015 by Catastrophe Jones

Put me in the ground
if you must;
my body is already rotten.

Put me in the furnace
if you like,
and then put my ashes
on the mantle.

I was already at eye-height,
but now you will never
look at me again,
even if it means you never
lift your eyes
from the ground, or never
bring them back down
from the heavens.

Put me on a bier,
and light a fire;

I am not really here —
I have been gone
for a very long time.

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DeathWatch No. 56 – She’s Done For

Posted on May 30, 2015 by Catastrophe Jones

This is Issue #56 of DeathWatch, an ongoing Serial. Click that link to go find ‘A Beginning’ and read from there, if you need to catch up.

Happy Reading!

PREVIOUS

* * *

“I’m in the clear,” came Nate’s voice over the comms, clear as a bell. So clear, in fact, Kieron could hear the tremor in the Quartermaster’s voice, even over the sound of the wind rushing by him as he flew through the clouds. “Coming around her port s–ohh, fuck–” Nate breathed. Silence then, or just the rushing of the wind, as though the comm unit had fallen off his shoulder and dropped out of the sky.

“Nate. NATE,” Sha snapped, loud and clear.

“Sorry, Captain, it’s just… The Maxima… she’s done for. I can see her coming apart at the seams. They’re loading the escape planes, strapping on chutes and just… trying to not die,” Nate said grimly. “Whatever’s below will get hit by the whole thing, with whatever aetheris is still on board.

Kieron stood on the deck, listening on the comms, listening as well to the sound of the static roar that was the aetheric fire consuming the mighty ship below them. He looked down and couldn’t see through the vast white of the clouds, but he could smell the lightning-scent, the strange wire-burning taste that clung to everything now.

“If you can’t land, try to at least slow your descent. I can’t get below you fast enough if you don’t slow down,” Sha said, sounding tense.

“I can land,” Nate said, his voice low, rough, determined. “I’m gonna fucking land. I can’t get Jules if I don’t land.”

Everyone who could hear Nate clenched their hands into fists and stood at the ready, listening attentively. Even the pilot who had to prepare to haul ass away from the falling Maxima was waiting, listening, straining to hear if their Quartermaster would get out of the hell he was diving into.

There was a blast, a burst of static, of feedback, but then Nate’s voice, tight and choked. “On the deck,” he called. “I’m on the deck. I’m good, Jacob, you read?”

“I got you,” the comms officer called. “We read you, Quarter, you’re on the deck.”

Something, maybe the aetheris, maybe the fall to the deck, caused the comms to lock open, so now everyone in the room could hear him running, breathing heavy, talking to himself quietly as he ran across the deck, looking for a way to find Jules.

“Jules, Jules, Jules, gotta find Jules, gotta find–WHOA–”

“Th’FUCK?”

“–sorry, no, g’head, yeah, hi–”

“NATE!?”

“–just dropped in, where’s Jules?”

“…”

“Where the fuck is she?”

“Below?”

“WHERE below?”

“I don–I, uh–I dunno?”

“Fucking hell get out of my way then!”

“Sorry, sorry!”

“Jules, Jules, Jules, Jules–” His feet on stairs, his breath still heavy, his clothes rustling. “Jules, JULES! JULES, WHERE ARE YOU?”

The sound of Jules’ voice could be heard over the comms, just then, half-covered by the aetheric static, by the roar of the ship’s other engine grinding. “Jacob, this is Quarter. Target’s in Maxima’s comm room–”

There was a pause, then, and in the distance, it sounded as though Jules and Abe were shouting. What they were saying couldn’t be made out; the sounds of their voices were obscured by the cacophony of the dying ship around them. Nate could be heard rattling the door, banging on it, trying to let himself in. While he was most likely pressed to the wood, it became momentarily easier to hear the voices of those inside.

“Nate!”

“Do not be coming in, Natan!”

“Going to have to break down the door, comms,” he said, panting, out of breath. And then — the sound was of Nathan’s running feet, boots hitting the boards as he ran down the hall with all speed.

Everyone on board the Jacob who could hear Nate held their breath, flinching at the moment of impact.

The thunderous crash that came next was punctuated with Nathan’s grunt of effort. Boards splintered and clattered, and then Nathan could be heard, panting.

Then came the sounds of gunfire, of shouts and punches thrown, and gunfire, and gunfire again.

It was a radio show from hell, and Kieron realized he had his eyes squeezed shut as though it would help block out the images he had of Nate being shot to pieces by Abramov, who had somehow lost his mind.

It did not help that what followed was silence. The comms line was still open, but all that could be heard was the groaning of the ship, and the static sound of the aetheric fire.

“Quarter, this is Jacob,” shouted the Captain. “SITREP!”

No answer.

“QUARTERMASTER!” yelled the comm officer.

“Nate,” whispered Kieron, using his own speaker. “Nathan, do you read?”

After a moment, there is a ragged breath over the comms, and Jules’s voice can be heard, sounding uneven. “He’s shot. I’m shot. Abe’s dead. We’re out of emergency planes, and last I heard, I had maybe ten minutes til the fire reached the rest of the aetheris. That was about twelve minutes ago. I’m gonna pull the charger off this thing so you don’t have to hear us fry or fall, yeah? You gotta fly, Sha, okay? You seriously have to get out of the way. He had so much left,” she said, sounding shaken.

“Get to the deck. Get to the deck and fucking jump. We are UNDER you, Jules,” Sha called out. “Push, pull or drag him, and throw him over with you. Use your wakeboard. Don’t you dare just fucking give up on me,” she yelled.

“Hey, you remember that night back in –” Jules began.

“NO! This is not a time for reminiscing,” Sha shouted back. “Jules, damnit, get moving.”

“Captain,” one of the officers called, obviously reluctant to interrupt. His expression made it look as though he believed it completely necessary.

“What,” the Captain snapped.

“We’re not alone in the sky,” he called.

“Of course fucking not. There’s hundreds of emergency planes and chutes fallin out of the heavens, you ass,” she said, sounding exhausted. “What are you–”

Comms sounded half-strangled in their worry; Hana blurted “It’s… it’s a ship, Captain. Three ships. Three Ilonan ships — coming in fast.”

* * *

NEXT

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