Nicholas Smith - Allegiance

The whir of the turbofans rose to a high whine as they eased the airship’s mass down onto its final resting place.

X glanced at Rodger.

“It’ll hold,” Rodger said without taking his eyes off the Hive.

Samson slowly lowered the belly over the top of the rig. Cranes swung over from the anchored ships to clamp on to the hull. Long steel arms filled the deck of one of the large ships. Eventually, they would support a platform that the cranes would place over the top of the airship.

The distant clanking and clanging began as workers started bolting the Hive to the rig’s steel superstructure.

Rodger stepped closer to the railing. “ Please hold,” he said. “Please…”

Wynn held his radio to his ear, listening to a transmission that X couldn’t make out over the noises. A smile broke across his craggy face.

“Alfred confirms that the ship is secure on the pad, sir,” he reported.

The crowd burst into applause, and X joined in the celebration. More clanking noises sounded as beams were bolted and welded into place. But that was just the first part of today’s decommissioning.

X raised the sword again. “Today, with the official decommissioning of the Hive , we reflect on our past and look to the future,” he said. “A new generation of Hell Divers has been training to ensure a safe future for Cazadores and sky people alike.”

X nodded at Rhino and the other Cazadores who had helped, including Imulah. The scribe stood in the crowd with his hands clasped behind his back. He had proved to be a valuable asset in helping the sky people understand how the Cazador culture worked—a key factor in peacefully assimilating the two societies.

Others, too, had helped, including Sofia Walters, the happy widow of el Pulpo. The feisty raven-haired woman was one of a dozen rookie Hell Divers preparing to jump through the clear sky with the vets.

She wasn’t the only Cazador to volunteer. Hector Rivera and Alberto Ortiz, two former soldiers who had served as mechanics on wasteland missions, had also joined up. They had assimilated well so far, thanks to Sofia’s help.

Many new divers came from the ranks of the sky people. Ted Maturo and Arlo Wand were Hive mechanics who had received Samson’s blessing now that the Hive was being decommissioned. Lena Clayton, a young militia enforcer, had also stepped up. She was fast and agile, but without the snarky attitude that Magnolia had at her age.

“They dive so humanity survives!” X yelled.

A team of Hell Divers leaped out of the belly of Discovery. They pulled their chutes almost immediately and flew their canopies toward the roof of the Hive.

He spotted the red glow of Magnolia’s and Michael’s battery units. They were the first to land on the smooth top of the airship. The ceremonial dive was Michael’s idea—a fitting tribute to the home that had kept one of the last bastions of humanity alive.

After all that had happened, X never thought he would see two dozen divers aloft at the same time. He smiled and swallowed to fight back the emotions.

But not everyone appeared to be impressed by the sight.

Across the water, Cazador civilians had gathered on the decks of other platforms to watch the ceremony. Unlike the people here and on the airship rooftop behind X, they didn’t appear to be clapping or cheering. Many of them surely saw the Cazador Hell Divers as traitors.

It was another reminder of just how fragile the peace was at the Vanguard Islands. The job he had inherited was, in some ways, even more difficult than his former job of keeping the airships in the sky.

X looked past the Hive and the other rigs to the darkness beyond. It wasn’t just the tensions of two vastly different societies learning to live together that had him worried. Far more concerning were the threats that lurked behind that swirling black wall.

The biggest threat to humanity wasn’t other humans or even mutant monsters—it was machines.

Two hours after the decommissioning ceremony for the Hive , Magnolia was taking the elevator to the top deck of the capitol rig with Rodger. She was more nervous about the council meeting than about the low-altitude dive.

As the cage rattled upward, she looked out at the workers securing the Hive onto the rig in the distance. From here, in their new yellow jumpsuits, they looked like bees at work on a comb.

All the banging and construction noise had attracted a pod of spinner dolphins, which were jumping playfully and doing barrel rolls in the air.

She smiled, soaking in the magnificence of nature that she had never known during her life in the air. This place was a miracle that humans might not deserve after what they had done to the planet.

A dolphin leaped out of the water, spinning on its axis, and splashed back down.

“Pretty awesome, right?” Rodger said. But he wasn’t paying attention to the dolphins. His eyes were on the second phase of construction.

“Those cranes are securing vertical beams to support the platforms we’re adding,” he said. “In time, the people living there will be able to open hatches to balconies for a view of the water, and soon we’ll add an entire new platform above the curved roof, for a garden and rain catchment system.”

Magnolia leaned in to give him a kiss on the cheek.

“Nice work, Rodgeman,” she said. “Color me impressed.”

“Color you… what ?” Rodger tilted his head, then chuckled.

Magnolia realized he was checking her out. “It’s a phrase from the Old World, you know?”

“Not that one, but I do like the hair.”

Magnolia pulled on a strand to look at the new color. A major change from the old blue and purple, the fiery red streaks matched her new Hell Divers battery unit.

“I wonder what that’s about,” Rodger said.

Across the rooftop, near the grove of trees, a small group lingered. X, with Miles beside him, stood in the shade with Rhino, Michael, Layla, and Les, listening to Ada. The young XO used her hands to emphasize whatever she was saying.

X saw them over Ada’s shoulder and waved for them to join the group, moving to the stairwell hatch as they approached. Miles’s tail whipped when he saw Magnolia.

“Hey, buddy,” she called out.

Imulah walked up the interior stairwell and stepped through the open hatch. Seeing Magnolia, he moved his hand behind his back. She still hadn’t apologized for sticking a knife through his palm, but he hadn’t exactly apologized for helping imprison her, either.

The tension between them was still palpable, and months after the battle for the islands ended, there were still plenty of problems from fresh wounds, both real and imagined. As a member of the new council, she was about to hear many of them.

“Meeting starts soon,” Imulah said. “Everyone, please follow me.”

They took the stairs down through the residential levels, one of which had served as Magnolia’s prison.

Sofia was waiting outside the large chamber doors on the fifth floor. She too had changed out of her Hell Diver jumpsuit, and wore a thin white cotton dress that clung to her slender frame. She was in her late twenties—older than Magnolia had thought, though her features showed no signs of aging. With mild annoyance, Magnolia thought of the crow’s-feet that she herself was getting now that her skin had been exposed to the sun.

“What a rush, Mags!” Sofia said with dimpled grin. “I can’t wait for the next dive.”

“They aren’t all fun like that,” Rodger said.