a pair of old muskets.
Sable eased the Galeskimmer into place beside us and shouted at me above the din. “Are you just gonna sit there, or do you want a lift?”
I didn’t think twice. I leapt onto the Galeskimmer and rolled behind a stack of crates as she idled past. Sable released the clinkers and took us straight up into the fog, the whole ship rocking and lurching amid a hail of disruptive gunfire. Then I heard something ping into one of the turbines and go clattering around inside it.
A thousand failing brakes screeched. There was a rush of heat, a fireball, and the sensation of being tossed around like pasta in a strainer.
When the ship stabilized, we were still rocketing upward through the fog. Something had hit me on the head, and I could see only blue-violet out of my unenhanced eye. The deck was a wreckage of bodies and burning wood, and when I tried to stand, the force of the ship’s upward momentum kept me on my hands and knees. Sweet merciful Leridote, how many shipwrecks am I gonna be involved in this month? I rolled onto my back and stared at the approaching heights, the mast and the furled sail flapping from the yardarm, until it all went from dark and foggy to nothing but black.
I dreamed at hyperspeed, so I knew I was still alive. I dreamed about Kupfer and Sable and Ma and Dad and Yingler and the shop, and all my kid friends back home in Atherion. I dreamed that Blaylocke was burning alive and Gilfoyle’s daughter was dancing around the flames, singing nursery rhymes, drinking red wine and wearing her bright yellow blanket as a cape. I dreamed my augments were coming alive and building mechanical spiders out of the synthetic tissues of my arms and legs. When my limbs were gone, Chaz was controlling the whole thing, orchestrating it with a remote control in his laboratory, talking to the spiders.
I dreamed the medallion was putting ideas into my head, making me paranoid and forcing me to believe I was a wanted criminal. But it was Sable’s Uncle Angus—Uncle Angus, whom I’d never met, but who my mind made an image of—plotting at Maclin Automation to commit my crimes for me and drop pamphlets over every floater in the stream telling people about how I ate children and stole loose change from old ladies and put embarrassing clothing on defenseless statues.
I was staring at the same mast and the same furled sail when I woke up. The sky above was bright and blue, and the fires I’d fallen asleep to had become smoldering pillars of smoke. I stood. We were very high up; the air that was filtering into my lungs was thin and cold and crisp. I was used to air like this. I’d grown up on a floater that was even higher in the stream. The medallion was burning on my chest, its frantic algorithms racing across my mind.
Sable was beside me, her hand on my back. “Are you okay?” she was asking. “I didn’t want to move you. I didn’t know how bad you’d been hurt, so I made sure you were breathing and I let you sleep.”
I turned to her. Her eyes were red-rimmed and her cheeks were flushed. “Where are we?”
“Somewhere above the Kalican Heights. It’s bad. The ship’s completely disabled. One of the turbines is blown to shreds. All the clinkers but one on the starboard side are ruined. Neale and Eliza were on that side of the ship when it blew. They’re both hurt bad, but I think they’ll be okay. But Landon is… Mr. Scofield…” She couldn’t get another word out.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “It’s my fault. You came back to get me. You should’ve left me on my own to face what I had coming. None of this would’ve happened.”
“Don’t,” she managed, holding up a hand. “I can’t.”
I took her into my arms, held her. The gesture felt awkward and stilted to me, but Sable didn’t seem to think so. She buried her face in my jacket and whimpered, the kind of thing a child does after they’ve been crying for a long time and there isn’t much steam left. We stood like that for a while until she pulled away.
“You’re glad we came back for you though. Aren’t you?”
I allowed myself half a smile. “I’m a little confused as to why.”
She gave me a weepy grin. “That makes two of us.”
I laughed. “It’s so you’d have someone to be mean to. That’s why you wanted me around.”
“I’m the captain. Being mean is what captains do.”
“Well then, Captain. I suggest you start giving some orders. The wind’s picking up. Just because we have one bad engine doesn’t mean we can’t set sail. We’re filthy rich now, you know. Getting this rig fixed up shouldn’t take more than a few days once we find ourselves a nice secluded floater.”
“Fine,” she said. “Then hop on the bluewave and start mapping me some coordinates. Thorley, get up on that yardarm and set the mainsail. Mr. McMurtry, take the controls. I’ll tend to the wounded for now. Move it, all of you!”
We would’ve sailed off into the sunset, but that’s not where the stream was taking us. I knew one day I’d have to face my parents again. I’d probably have to face Kupfer, and Yingler too. Chaz, who I’d liked, but now hated for betraying me—and Blaylocke, who I’d hated but actually started to like… before realizing I’d been right to hate him all along. I’d have to face them all again someday. But for now, the only thing that mattered was that I was a free man. I was a free man in a world that didn’t think I deserved to be. And despite all the terrible garbage I’d been through—that this crew and I had been through—we were sailing on driftmetal runners with the clouds in our hair. And that was a damned good feeling.
Afterword
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