Chris Wooding - The Black Lung Captain

'Cap'n,' said Malvery, a warning in his voice.

'I've dealt with these Imperator bastards before,' Frey said, as if that was an explanation. The truth was, he was angry. This was the second time he'd been unmanned by an Imperator, forced to cower in fear like a whipped dog. He wanted to see the face under the mask. Somehow, he thought it would lessen his fear of them.

He was wrong. When he pushed the mask aside with the barrel of his revolver, the face beneath was enough to make him recoil with a shout. The cheeks and eyes were sunken, irises yellow like a bird of prey. The mouth was stretched open as if in a scream, showing sharp, uneven teeth in receding gums. White, dry skin; the septum of the nose rotted away. It looked like something you'd uncover in a grave.

'Blimey,' said Malvery. 'Someone needs to eat their greens.'

Frey screwed up his face in disgust and looked closer. A stump of a tongue, cut out at the root, showed between cracked lips. There was only a spotting of blood on the floor, despite the brutal nature of the Imperator's death.

'That,' said Frey, 'is not natural.' He turned away and looked at Jez, who was hanging over Silo's shoulder. 'Can anyone enlighten me as to what in buggery just happened to my navigator, by the way?'

'She's a Mane,' said Crake, coughing. 'Partly, anyway. I suppose she wasn't fully infected.'

'You knew ?'

'I guessed. Not long after she first came on board. No heartbeat, no need to eat, all of that. There've been other half-Manes, you know. They've come up in daemonist texts. Like I told you, there's always been a school of thought that said Manes were daemons. And really, what other explanation was there?'

'I was trying not to think about it too much, to be honest,' Frey said. 'I didn't think she was a Mane, though.'

'Because you lot don't know anything about them, outside of the drunken tales you hear in bars.'

'Fair comment,' said Malvery. 'We are a pretty thick bunch, all in all.'

'You're supposed to be a doctor,' Frey accused. 'That makes you smart.'

Malvery shrugged. 'I bring up the average. It still ain't great.'

'You do have Pinn on board,' Crake pointed out.

Frey waved his hands. 'Alright, alright! We'll sort this whole bloody mess out later. Malvery, you're with me. Crake, stay with Silo and Bess. Make sure nobody comes up behind us. Let's get what we came for and hoof it before Grist gets wind that we're planning to rob him.'

Beyond the barricade were scattered heaps of debris, and beyond them the corridor was aflame. Slicks of inflammable fluid sent up hazy curtains of black, foul-smelling smoke. Frey could dimly make out a doorway through the debris, uncomfortably close to the fire.

'You think that's where our sphere is?' Malvery coughed.

'One way to find out,' said Frey. He hurried through the steaming debris, his arm over his face to shield him from the heat. By the time he got to the doorway, it was too painful to be cautious, so he just ran right in and hoped nobody would shoot him.

The heat lessened to a tolerable degree once he was inside. It was a small store room, with shelves of chests and rolls of documents that were getting dangerously close to bursting into flame. A large lockbox in the centre stood open and empty.

Malvery hurried in after him, swearing as his moustache singed. He looked around the room, then grabbed Frey's arm and turned him.

'Wakey wakey, eh, Cap'n?' he said, pointing.

There was an elderly man huddled in the corner of the room, propped against the wall. Frey hadn't seen him. He was wearing Awakener robes, but they were not the white of the Speakers or the grey of the Sentinels, but crimson. That made him an Interpreter, according to Crake. Only one level below the Grand Oracles in the Awakeners' organisation. An important man, then.

A long brown beard tumbled over his chest, almost concealing the sphere he held in his bony hands. Blood ran from his nose and stained his lips. His eyes focused in and out uncertainly beneath the Cipher tattooed on his brow.

'Doesn't look good for him, Cap'n,' Malvery murmured. 'Probably got knocked around in the crash. Broke something inside him.'

'How did . . . ?' the old man said. 'The Imperator . . .'

Frey crouched down in front of him, arms crossed over his knees, looking him over. He tutted. 'You shouldn't play with daemons, you know.'

The Interpreter's eyes widened. Enough to tell Frey that Crake's theory was right. Frey put his hand out expectantly. 'I believe you have something of mine.'

The old man clutched the sphere closer to his body. His gaze became baleful. 'How dare you? Damn thieves!'

'You stole it first,' Frey said.

'You don't know . . .' the Interpreter began, then dissolved into violent coughing. Something rattled inside him with every breath. Blood glistened on his beard. 'You don't know what . . .'

'Alright, alright,' said Frey, holding up his hands. 'Easy, old man.'

'You're meddling with forces you don't understand!' he snarled.

'That?' asked Frey, looking at the sphere. 'I understand a lot of people want it. That makes it valuable.'

'It's more than valuable, you fool! Do you know what would happen if it fell into the wrong hands?'

'Far as I'm concerned, it's already in the wrong hands,' said Frey. He grabbed the sphere and pulled it out of the Interpreter's feeble grip. The old man spluttered in outrage, and then he began to cough again, more violently than before.

'Hey!' said Frey, backing off. 'Calm down, eh? You're not in great shape there. Think of your health, or something.'

'Thousands . . .' the old man said, clawing at Frey's trouser leg. 'Thousands will die!'

Frey didn't like the sound of that at all. "What does that mean?' he demanded.

The Interpreter had gone red in the face, his eyes bulging like they were going to pop out of his head. His coughs had become long, painful wheezes, horrible to hear.

Frey grabbed him by the shoulder and shook him. 'Hey! Hey! What did you mean, thousands will die ? What is the sphere?'

'Thousands . . .' the Interpreter whispered. Then he gave one last, rattling breath and slumped to the floor.

Frey let out a little scream of frustration through gritted teeth. Malvery squatted down, felt for a pulse, lifted up the Interpreter's head and looked into his eyes. Then he let the head drop unceremoniously to the floor with a dull thud.

'Dead,' Malvery said.

'Oh, really?' Frey snapped. 'Is that your professional opinion?'

'Don't get ratty with me. I'm just doing my job.'

'Couldn't the old bastard have hung on for a few more sentences before he croaked?'

Malvery slapped him on the shoulder. 'Tough luck, Cap'n. We got what we came for, at least. Let's get going. All this smoke can't be good for us.'

Frey stared at the body of the Interpreter, hearing his final words over and over again. Thousands will die.

He had the unpleasant feeling that they'd drifted far, far out of their depth.

When they got outside, the Storm Dog was waiting for them.

She'd put down on the moors, a short distance from the All Our Yesterdays. She was scarred and battered, bearing signs of heavy cannon damage. Her crew were busy rounding up the evacuating Awakeners, who were surrendering without much resistance now that the Delirium Trigger had abandoned them. The prisoners stood in a loose group under guard, miserable and sodden in the rain.

Frey cursed at the sight of Grist, who was striding towards them with a few of his men. He'd hoped Trinica would keep Grist busy long enough for him to make a break for it with the sphere. In fact, he'd rather hoped they'd blow each other out of the sky. He belatedly realised that he should have kept his earcuff in, so Harkins and Pinn could keep him informed. He'd been relying on Jez to relay information, but she was in no state to relay anything right now.