Evan Currie - Heirs of Empire

“Is that what they call it? I thought she was just whaling on me.”

“I’ve seen people she ‘whaled’ on before, kid.” Kennick laughed. “They wind up looking a lot worse than you.”

Brennan shook his head, half wanting to disbelieve the man, but knowing damn well that it was true.

“We’re a few hours from anywhere in particular,” Kennick said casually. “No settlements in the area and certainly no legion outposts …”

“Yeah?” Brennan wondered where the man was heading.

“Captain suggested you might like to take your new skimmer out for a run.”

“We’re in the sky. Is she landing?”

“Hardly. You ever launch from the air before?” Kennick asked, grinning.

Brennan shook his head.

“Oh, you are going to love this. Come on, kid. Let’s go flying.”

Lydia sat across from Dusk at the small table afforded her quarters, watching as the other girl worked diligently on a local interface.

“You’re skilled,” Lydia said finally. “More than I’d expect.”

“I grew up with an interface.” Dusk shrugged. “It’s not so uncommon.”

“Maybe,” Lydia replied.

It was possible, she supposed. Lydia was well aware that her own experience, while quite rich in some regards, was also grossly disconnected from how the rest of the empire lived. She grew up with interfaces around her, of course, but she’d never had the need to master them to the degree Dusk apparently had.

That wasn’t to say she was incompetent with them, far from it. But she’d never learned to push the systems to their limits the way Dusk could.

There was a difference between being very familiar with an interface and being able to make it dance on command.

“What are you working on?” Lydia asked.

Dusk looked up, almost startled by the question, then ducked her head back down and mumbled, “Just making some improvements to the code for the Fire Naga. I wanted to do more, but the captain shut down access to the Imperial network.”

Lydia nodded. “There’s always a chance of being tracked if someone makes a mistake or lets something slip intentionally.” She smiled a little wanly. “Welcome to the life of an outlaw.”

Dusk smiled back. “It’s not so bad. Better than the camp.”

Lydia watched the other girl shudder, but didn’t feel it was time to push on that. Instead she leaned in and asked, “Can I help?”

“Remember what I told you, kid,” Kennick said as the pair sat in the cockpit of the Fire Naga with the canopy still sitting open.

Brennan nodded. “Wait a few seconds after the drop, and then angle away from the ship before firing the sails. Got it.”

“You’ve done free-fall maneuvers before, right?”

“Of course!” Brennan sounded a little insulted, though the question wasn’t one with an obvious answer.

Killing your sails in a skimmer was something only the most experienced and daring of handlers tried, and it killed more people than any other ten advanced maneuvers combined. If you misjudged your altitude, you could easily slam into the ground before your sails caught the wind, and that was just the most obvious of threats.

“OK.” Kennick accepted the answer, leaning back in the gunner’s seat and kicking the canopy pedal.

The armored clear-plast dropped down over them, and a hiss signified the pressure seal locking up. Kennick nodded to the deck crew out beyond the flyer, looping his hand around in the air a couple times. They nodded and strapped themselves in as the big doors at the back of the Andros slowly lifted on its hydraulics.

“Drop in three,” Kennick said.

The lights outside changed from red to yellow as the flyer shook a little and began to roll backward.

Brennan shifted, twisting in his seat as he tried to see what was happening.

“Settle down. Focus on the controls,” Kennick told him. “We’ll drop in two.”

The yellow lights went out, and green ones lit up as the hold was filled with natural light.

“One,” Kennick said in an almost bored monotone.

Brennan stiffened as the back of the Naga lurched, and suddenly he was pitched up and over as the flyer fell clear of the Andros . They were in free fall but flying backward . Well, more like falling backward, really. It wasn’t a comfortable feeling.

Brennan automatically began to work the instruments, getting the rear control surfaces open to put resistance on the tail. They wobbled a bit, and then the Naga rolled forward and put its nose down. Brennan breathed a sigh of relief, now in familiar territory as he began working the controls again to bank the craft to the right and away from the Andros ’s course.

Kennick checked his instruments, then eyeballed the receding vessel for good measure before nodding. “We are clear of the Andros . Deploy sails when ready.”

“Clear,” Brennan intoned. “Comply.”

The rockets flared, sending up the filament cable with the projectors attached. He’d set them to hook the second-layer winds and didn’t have long to wait. As the aquamarine sails snapped into place, the wind jerked at them, and the Naga was pulled aloft under wind power once more. Brennan’s heart slowed as he grinned. “Controlled.”

“Clear,” Kennick confirmed. “Watch for eddies. Get us some altitude.”

Brennan started looping the cable back in, drawing the stubby fighter up into the air. They passed the first wind layer with only a little turbulence, something Kennick appreciated. It wasn’t always easy to slip between layers without getting rocked around like a toy in a hurricane, since the different layers moved in different prevailing directions.

The boy is as good as his reputation. That sort of slick handling isn’t something you learn in classes.

“All right, kid,” he said. “I want you to bring us up to the third-level winds, smoothly if you can.”

“We’ll lose the Andros up there,” Brennan warned, even as his hands worked to angle the sails up.

“No worries,” Kennick said. “I know where they’re going to be, and we can catch them in this heap.”

He didn’t have to see Brennan’s scowl to know it was there. The boy clearly considered the Naga to be his own personal flyer—and, Kennick supposed, it really was. Not many people got to claim a fully armed Fire Naga as their own. In days past, such a thing would have fulfilled his own dreams too.

Brennan angled the sails back, losing forward velocity with the wind angling down off the projected surface and gaining altitude slowly as he checked the air currents.

There were two basic ways to transition between wind layers: The first was to redeploy your sails to the new layer, then pull the fight along with them. It made for a rough ride but was relatively fast. The second was to slowly transition by riding the shifting winds that existed between each of the layers. Those winds could be tricky; they didn’t follow the same prevailing directions as the primary layers, and an inexperienced pilot could have his sails blow in on him and easily get the lines tangled.

The Fire Naga made a steady climb, twisting with the winds as Brennan kept the sails full with an instinct that Kennick had rarely seen before. The boy was almost anticipating the wind as it shifted.

“Very nice,” Kennick said. “All right, bring us tight to the wind and let’s head up spin. The old seabeds are spectacular to fly over.”

Brennan confirmed the direction and then wound in the sails until the Naga was almost tucked right into the aquamarine projections, with just enough space below to let them see ahead and to give the Naga’s control surfaces something to bite into.