Skykeep (28 page)

“And be quick about it,” Gunner added. He
checked his watch. “This bomb is going to go off in twenty-two
minutes.”

Nikita and Wink scurried up the anchor, onto
the chain, and onward toward the prison. Despite the jerking of the
chain, the intensity of the wind, and the hammering of the rain,
they moved surely and steadily. Conditions like these were what
they were bred for. Gunner slapped a lump of putty onto the wall.
It was the size of his own head and had a grainy scattering of
black mixed in with an otherwise uniform gray color. Once it was in
place, he pulled out a clockwork contraption with enough exposed
gears and incorrectly sized fasteners to have the appearance of a
clock that someone had attempted to repair while blindfolded.

“You sure that’s going to be enough?” Coop
asked.

“It is in point of fact
far
too much,
but this is not a situation in which frugality is advisable. Now
please be quiet. I need to concentrate on the timing mechanism, or
we’ll learn just how excessive the payload really is. Keep an eye
on the gun operator.”

Gunner twisted and clicked his
cobbled-together mechanism while Coop watched, but no matter how
much of a threat the gun operator might have posed, Coop couldn’t
help but feel that Gunner’s workmanship was the greater threat. He
was grateful when Gunner clicked a final switch and signaled for
them to return to the cart to grab the next charge.

#

Nita lay in bed. These were the worst times,
when Lil was in the box and she was in the cell. She had no one to
talk to and nothing to occupy her mind but concern for how her
friend was handling matters. Today was worse, due to the storm that
Lil would have to endure. Nita had taken to staring out her
fug-choked window, squinting at the stormy sky in the distance and
trying her best to remain strong in the face of a creeping
hopelessness that gripped her more with each hour.

She was therefore in an excellent position to
notice when a soaking wet form skittered past her window, then
skittered back and peered inside with a single eye. Nita tried to
keep the surprise and joy from her face. Without Lil to split his
attention, their designated guard tended to linger directly in
front of her cell, and the less he noticed, the better.

Nita,
Wink tapped out on the window,
producing a sharp and highly noticeable sound that Nita frantically
motioned for him to cease.

“What are
you
so jumpy about?” the
guard said. He glanced at the window, then back to Nita. “It’s just
the inspector. About time the damn thing got down off that pole and
started actually
inspecting.
”

Nita stood, eager to take advantage of his
dismissal of Wink for as long as it would last. “I know… I know but
it was startling… It’s been so long since I’ve seen one.”

She stood and stepped up to the window,
coughing lightly, and tapped on the wall in reply.

The crew came, Nita tapped.

Wink had a mask for Nita. Knife and gun for
Nita. Nikita had same for Lil. Soon Gunner cut chain. After, all…
Wink began to rattle off.

Wait. Wink helped Nita. Wink came inside, was
not seen, tapped when close, waited for guard to leave. Wink
understood.

“What are you doing with that thing? Stop
distracting it. Do you want the wall to rot out because you
wouldn’t let it do its inspection?”

Understood. Nita told Wink where Lil was,
Wink tapped.

In the box, hung from the pole, on top of the
prison, Nita tapped.

“What did I just say? Back away from the
wall,” the guard growled.

“I’m sorry,” Nita coughed again. She moved
back to the bed and shut her eyes, plotting out what she needed to
do and how it would be done.

#

Wink scrambled sideways along the
wind-scoured exterior wall of the prison, quite literally as though
he was born to do it, and found his way to where Nikita was
searching as he had been.

Nikita found Lil in box hanging from pole on
top, he instructed.

Nikita darted up the wall toward the surface
while Wink climbed downward. He’d been searching from bottom to top
and had passed some open and unbarred windows along the way. When
he reached the nearest one, he slipped inside. It led to a
currently vacant guard quarters.

He shook away the rain drenching his fur and
moved quickly and surely along the ground, not giving a thought to
stealth. He didn’t have to. Anyone who had spent any time on an
airship or in the fug was perfectly accustomed to seeing an
inspector scurrying along the ground or up a wall in any part of
the ship at any hour. They had free rein in any vehicle and seldom
warranted a second thought. As a species they had effectively
become invisible. The only thing that earned him so much as a
second glance from the inmates and staff was the bundle of gadgetry
on his back, but Wink moved quickly enough to give them no time for
a second thought.

He skittered up the stairs and found his way
to Nita’s cell, stopping just before the final turn that would take
him face to face with her.

Here now,
he tapped.

“What was that?” muttered the unseen
guard.

“I think it was just the inspector again,”
Nita replied.

The guard grunted. “I’m getting damn sick of
tapping. Between you girls drumming your fingers and the inspector,
I’m going to be hearing tapping in my
sleep
,” he
complained.

Nita began to speak, but it quickly
degenerated into a bout of coughing that was a bit more dramatic
than those the guard had been accustomed to hearing.

When she was through, with a rough voice,
Nita spoke. “May I please have a glass of water? This air… it’s so
thick with the fug today.”

The guard grunted again and stepped past Wink
to a pitcher of water in the corner beside his seat.

Here. Quickly. Now,
Nita tapped
urgently.

Wink darted to her and squeezed through the
bars. Nita picked him up, found the knife among his things, and set
him on the top bunk.

“Stay hidden,” she whispered, stepping up to
the bars again, and holding the knife behind her back.

The guard stepped up to her, mug of water in
hand. “This is the last time I bring you any extra water. Drink
what you need at meal times,” he instructed, handing the mug
through the bars.

“Thank you, I assure you, this is the last
time I’ll ask. And I apologize. About that, and about this.”

She grabbed the water and threw it in his
face, then reached through the bars and grabbed his shirt, pulling
him toward her. In a lightning-fast move, she flicked the knife out
and pressed it to his neck.

“Don’t scream or I’ll cut your throat. Don’t
struggle or I’ll cut your throat. Just drop the keys and kick them
through the bars,” she demanded.

He reluctantly complied.

“I really am very sorry. Under different
circumstances you would have found me a much more pleasant person,”
Nita said. “But too many people are counting on me. I can’t sit
idle in this cell and hope that it all works out. As it is, my
back’s in a corner. I hope you understand.”

“I’ll see you hang for—”

Before he could finish his threat, Nita
withdrew the knife, shifted her grip to the back of his head, and
gave it a good firm smash against the bars. He looked at her,
dazed, so she gave him another smash, which was enough to send him
to the ground.

“Wink, if there’s anything else you need me
to know, tell me, because in a moment we’re both going to be very
busy,” Nita said. She pulled the mask from his back and strapped it
on, allowing herself three deep, clean, and long inhales followed
by painful coughs before stowing the weapons and snatching up the
keys.

Nita and Lil needed to find a way. Took care
of the guards and snipers.

“Nice to know they’ve got such a high opinion
of our abilities. Two knives and two guns against an entire prison
staff. If I’m going to do that, I need help. Did you say something
about Gunner cutting the chain before?”

Yes.

“Would that be
all
of the chains?”

Didn’t know.

“… This is going to be exciting. How
soon?”

Soon.

“Well, then let’s get moving,” Nita said,
finding the proper key and unlocking the door. Wink climbed onto
her back as she brandished the keys in one hand and the gun in the
other. “I’d like to have Lil free and the guards outnumbered before
things get
too
out of control.”

#

Lil braced her legs against one wall of the
isolation box and her back against the other, doing her best to
avoid being thrown around its interior as it swung and spun in the
breeze. Years on the
Wind Breaker
had immunized her to the
motion sickness that plagued Nita, but that didn’t make the
experience any more pleasant for her. The rain was pouring through
the upper mesh, and wind spritzed it through the sides.

“This is another bad one,” she said to
herself. She had to yell just to hear her own voice over the
wailing wind. “I sure hope them fuggers are good with knots,
because I’d hate for this thing to come loose.”

Something thumped down onto the top of the
box.

“What now? Hail? That’s just about the only
thing left that can make this worse,” Nita bellowed.

If the rain and wind hadn’t been so
deafening, she might have heard a rattling sound on the top of the
box, but as it was she didn’t know that she had a visitor until a
set of chisel-like teeth began to gnaw a hole through the box’s
roof.

“What the…?” Lil remarked.

The dim light of the storm filtered through
the new hole along with copious amounts of rain. It only took a
moment for Lil to realize an inspector was paying her a visit, and
it barely took a minute for the powerful teeth and jaws of her
would-be rescuer to widen the hole enough to squeeze through. A wet
and frazzled Nikita then tried to dive into the relative shelter of
the box and immediately got her harness snagged, leading to
full-scale panic as the creature realized she was stuck.

“Calm down, let’s get you in here,” Lil
said.

Another person might have been startled by
the sudden appearance of a soaking wet, not terribly friendly
creature like an aye-aye. After even a short time in isolation
under these conditions, though, Lil was happy for the prospect of
having someone to share her plight. A few good tugs at the front of
the harness got it free, allowing the drenched creature to slip
inside and instantly crawl up under her shirt.

She yelped. “Getting awful friendly in a
hurry there,” Lil squealed at the sudden cold of a creature
shivering against her bare skin. With another mighty pull, she got
the rest of the harness inside and peered at it in the weak light.
“But you brought gifts.” She pulled out the knife, then the gun. “I
can tell you and me are going to be
real
good friends.”

Lil strapped on the mask, secured the gun in
her waistband, and began widening the hole with the knife. It
didn’t take long to hack away enough material to almost make an
escape hole, but doing so weakened the anchor point of the support
rope. When a powerful gale caused it to splinter and crackle, she
clamped the knife in her teeth and reached through the hole to
grasp the rope itself tightly.

“Hold on tight, whoever you are. This isn’t
going to be easy,” Lil said.

Nikita held tight, which wasn’t the most
comfortable thing for Lil, and the deckhand began kicking and
shoving at the floor of the cell. Another gust and a few more kicks
caused most of the box to tear free and crash to the ground,
leaving Lil and her temporary partner hanging from the rope and
dangling in the breeze. A large chunk of the box’s roof was still
attached to the rope, making it a bit challenging to haul herself
up the first few feet, but once she was past it, she scrambled up
to the boom as quickly and easily as Nikita would have. She made a
slight miscalculation once she reached the top because, without the
box as a counterbalance, as soon as she grabbed the rope on the
opposite side of the pulley, it reeled in the slack and sent her
swinging toward the pole. Ever the quick thinker, she used it to
her advantage, swinging her feet out to meet the pole and then
wrapping her legs around it to steady herself. Using a combination
of her legs and the rope, she slid quickly down the pole and came
down hard upon the roof of the sniper’s nest at its base.

Now on reasonably steady footing, she hooked
an arm around the pole and looked to each of the four towers around
the upper deck. The horrid weather had chased the primary snipers
down from their relatively precarious perches. That meant if there
were any gunmen left, they were directly beneath her in the most
stable of the towers. She crept to the edge and looked down to find
that two sharpshooters were against the railing, peering down at
the wreckage of the box. She couldn’t quite make out their words,
but Lil assumed they were arguing about who should go down to see
if she’d survived the fall. It seemed cruel to keep them
waiting.

She jumped down from the roof onto the
catwalk surrounding the sniper’s nest and crouched down between the
gunners. Before they could make sense of what was happening, she’d
hooked an arm around one leg each and stood up, throwing them off
balance and sending them tumbling over the railing to smash through
the roof of a shack at the base of the tower. Now standing, Lil
looked into the sniper’s nest and discovered, to her dismay, that
all three of the remaining snipers on duty were armed and ready.
There were now three high-powered rifles either pointing at her or
shifting toward her. She ducked down and darted below the low wall
of the sniper’s nest as two shots punched fist-sized holes through
the catwalk where she’d been standing.