PART 1: A PUPPET'S FREEDOM
CHAPTER 7: THE PILOT
18th of Quintember, Year 3378, Third Age
Hyrule, over the central Hyrulian plains
Hylian Alliance ship, Captain Link Forester's Flit
The princess, however, was not alone.
Link stumbled back in the resting area, exhausted. He'd flown over a good part of the fields of Hyrule on their southbound trip, adjusting his course and speed regularly because Colin had calculated they'd need to restock on fuel soon.
The Flit could only contain enough fuel for six hours of flight. As a result, Link had planned a flight towards the south, at the border between Waker and Hyrule, where they'd find a cheap seller to refuel and rest before continuing their flight. It was the only option, and it was likely they'd stop in Windfall for a medical check on the princess, before heading further south to Outset Island.
It was early morning, and the sky had cleared the more they headed south. A bleak sun was peeking over the horizon, casting greys and whites on the surface of the sky. Fluffy white and grey clouds had replaced the ominous storm.
Link had ultimately decided to leave the controls to Sheik and Colin and get some much-needed rest.
He collapsed on the bed opposite the princess'. Shad was tiredly watching over her, hypnotically brushing the back of her hand with his thumb, eyes circled but unwilling to let her out of his conscious sight. Wulf was lying on the floor with his muzzle between his front paws, quiet.
Link removed his mud-covered boots, movements imprecise and jerky, and he looked at the picture the aristocrat made, leaning over the princess whose pale face was now tinged with pink, her breathing regular and peaceful from sleep. Shad had summarily cleaned her face of mud and grime, and her hair had dried in a mess of blonde hair on the pillow. She still looked beautiful, to the captain's unease.
Link pushed his boots to the side of the bed so they weren't in the way, removed his jacket, and asked, "Haven't you gotten any rest?"
Shad seemed to snap out of his concerned mothering and glanced back at the captain, apparently surprised that he wasn't alone contemplating the monarch's resting face. Defensively, he said, aristocratic lilt forcing him to be articulate, "I am not tired."
Link blinked slowly at him, feeling his own eyes shut of their own accord. "Right," he mumbled. "Suit yourself."
Shad Knowing looked back at the captain as Link reclined on the cot with a loud, relieved sigh. If his blue-grey eyes felt any envy, he quickly dissimulated it. "What are your plans for trajectory?"
Link yawned. "We're headed towards the wooded coast near the Wake-Hyrulian border, on the way to Windfall. There's bound to be some air-carrier with fuel to sell there."
"You sound uncertain."
Link shrugged and took a deep breath, relaxing quickly. "Fuel carriers are wary of the coast ―aerial turbulence and all. If they're carrying excitable material, the consequences could be unpleasant. But some of them are headed into Hyrule, so we might be lucky and catch one." He didn't mention that the war made fuel expensive and hard to obtain.
Shad seemed pensive for a moment. "Why not…" He hesitated then continued, "Why not head for the City in the Sky?"
Link furrowed a brow. He seemed to be mentally comparing courses and locations. "Celestia? But that's off our course, and it'll elongate our flight time by at least an hour."
Shad nodded. "Perhaps, but I'm concerned for the princess. The City in the Sky is known for its excellent medical and technological knowledge. At the very least we're certain to find fuel and decent food."
Link's brow rose at the comment. Shad had been quite picky about their pre-packaged goods. He crossed his arms behind his head and closed his eyes. "Well, you're probably right, but I doubt they'll let us in. The City in the Sky is reputed to be pretty elitist." He peeked under one eyelid at his passenger. "Even if they looked beyond our muddy, beat-up Flit, I doubt they'll grant us access to their elegant premises, assuming we keep the princess' identity a secret as we said we would."
Shad seemed to consider this for a moment. It was true they'd sworn to keep the princess hidden from authorities. To enter the City in the Sky was a risky venture. Still, the aristocrat said, "We can announce me instead."
Link snickered a little, until he realised the bespectacled man was serious. "Wait. What?"
Shad pushed his glasses up on the bridge of his nose. "My father…" He took a deep breath, glanced at the princess. Apparently considering there was no other option, he said, "My father's name is well-known there. They will allow his son in without question."
Link pursed his lips. "Who was your father again?"
The aristocrat hesitated, then grudgingly mumbled, "Again? I've never mentioned it, but... Thaddeus Knowing."
This time, the captain was truly impressed. He sat up and stared incredulously at his passenger. "You mean Thaddeus Knowing... Hovercraft-inventor Thaddeus Knowing? Lord of Celestia? Chief Engineer of the City in the Sky? The man who perfected anti-gravity devices? The guy who tapped into quasi-perpetual motion?" He shot a look up into the cockpit, but Sheik hadn't overheard. Looking back at Shad with visible excitement, Link continued, "When Sheik hears this, he's going to geek out hard."
Shad seemed wryly amused by the pilot's enthusiasm. "Yes, I am the son of Lord Thaddeus Knowing, inventor of the hovercraft-based airship." He sounded annoyed and disdainful when he added, "Lord of Celestia, if one must."
"Why didn't you say so earlier?" Link asked, excited, sitting up. "That means we'll get treated like kings!"
Shad did not seem nearly as enthusiastic, however. "If my father hears we have the princess in our guard, he will be hooting about it to Castleton. I'm sure the war has cut his supplies and he'll take any perk he can get."
That killed Link's enthusiasm fast. "Well then," he grumbled, "why did you suggest it?"
Shad examined princess Zelda's face pensively. "We need to have her examined. She hasn't eaten anything in at least twelve hours and we don't know when she will awaken. I know a way into the city through someone that will reveal nothing of her presence to my father."
Link sighed, coming to a quick decision. "I hope you're right. Alright then." He stood and left to wander into the noisy cockpit ―the hovercrafts right under the floor were nearly deafening―, where Kidd was asking Sheik all numbers of questions regarding Flit maintenance and Colin was trying to focus in spite of the noise.
"Colin," Link said, speaking into a headset. "Change the trajectory. We're headed towards Celestia."
Colin frowned and looked up at his captain. "But that's―"
"Apparently we've got our passport sitting in the back."
Colin shook his head. "But Link, Celestia is much higher and farther than we can afford to take this Flit. With the fuel level as it is, we won't make it with any margin at all."
"But we can make it?" The captain asked, slowly seeing his precious hours of sleep vanish before his eyes.
"If we don't push the propeller and hovercrafts beyond seven FGU, we could make it," Colin begrudgingly relented. "But it's a close call and I don't think it's a wise attempt."
"But we'll do it anyway," Sheik said, easily reading Link's enthusiastic gaze. "Something tells me Link has been dying to see the City in the Sky for himself."
"You've got that right."
Colin adjusted the course with a sigh. "We're two hours away from Celestia." He looked vaguely alarmed. "And I wish to repeat how we might run out of fuel before then."
"We'll manage," Link said, adjusting the course with a gentle nudge to the commands. The Flit executed a graceful arch in the morning sky. "If we don't, we'll just blame Sheik."
The mechanic rolled his eyes. "I'm only the one who refills our tanks. You're the nitwits who spend it all the time."
Colin cringed, but Link laughed.
Kidd sat beside Sheik. "How does a Flit work, anyway?"
The mechanic turned his attention to their youngest passenger. The pickpocket hadn't stolen anything of theirs so far, which was a vast improvement over his previous behaviour. It was probably because there was nowhere he could run to at the moment, though.
"That's a vague question," Sheik said. "A Flit is more than just a button-pushing engine. It doesn't run on tracks or anything."
Kidd fidgeted in his seat and readjusted his headset. "I mean, how come it goes anywhere you want?"
Sheik pursed his lips, pondering his answer. "Well, there are two forces that keep a Flit ―or any airship, really― going: the hovercrafts and the propeller. The hovercrafts decide vertical lift and incline, like thrusters. The more or less strength exerted by the hovercrafts, the higher or lower the Flit stays. It's the propeller that decides direction, along with the rudder."
"Those big fleet ships must have a huge number of hovercrafts," Kidd mumbled. Sheik smirked and shook his head.
"Not at all." He shot a glance at his gauges ―everything was in order― then out the window at the clouds that zipped past them. "A Flit's hovercrafts are amongst the smallest in existence. You have massive hovercrafts too. A main airship generally has from eight to ten hovercrafts. But they're huge."
Kidd frowned. "But don't they weigh the ship down and keep it from getting off the ground?"
Sheik shrugged. "It's a matter of fighting gravity."
Kidd's eyes lit up. "Yeah, about that. What's a fighting-gravity-unit?"
"It's the unit of strength exerted by any engine on an aircraft," Link supplied before Sheik could reply. "One standard FGU is defined by the amount of power per second needed to lift and keep any object at a stable altitude just off the ground, squared. Add an FGU, and it's that power squared twice. Three FGU is eight times the power, and so on."
Kidd frowned.
"Most FGU limits," Colin continued, taking up where Link left off, "are engine-specific. Different hovercrafts have different fighting-gravity-unit capabilities that are proportional to the particular craft's purpose."
Kidd did not reply, trying to make sense of what they'd said.
Sheik sighed, then simplified it for the boy. "In our case, an FGU is the indicator of strength output by an engine, be it a hovercraft or a propeller. One FGU is the minimum we can attain and is the strength at which gravity is nullified. After that, two FGU, up to fifteen, are good for positioning the Flit vertically in space."
"Then," Kidd said, after a long silence of assimilation, clearly working with the gist of what the pilot, navigator and mechanic had explained, "we could attach bigger hovercrafts to this ship and make it go higher and faster?"
"If we had the necessary fuel," Link laughed, glancing back at their passenger, impressed by the boy's fast synthesizing.
"Oh." Kidd looked disappointed.
"It's all right if you don't understand the math," Link continued with a grin. "There are full scholar groups dedicated to the notion alone."
Kidd just mumbled something no one could make out.
"Don't regret asking," Sheik said. "Flying is the best thing we've come up with in centuries."
"So," Kidd continued, apparently deciding to stay away from technical terms, "do they teach you how to fly at the Academy?"
Link shrugged and smirked. "Well, not if you already know how to fly."
Kidd seemed vividly interested by the notion. "Really?" He held on to Link's headrest and asked, "Where did you learn?"
Colin settled into his seat comfortably and smiled. He enjoyed the stories. They were always colourful and filled with a subdued sense of adventure that Link seemed to communicate naturally.
"Well if you must know," Link said, smiling as the Flit skimmed against clouds and dragged tendrils of cold vapour with it, "I built my very first Flit at fourteen. It was back in the peaceful days, on Outset. That's my home island in Waker. I had salvaged the pieces from Old Orca's scrap yard and I'd built it in the storage hangar next to our house."
"You lived with your parents?" Kidd asked, envious already, and Colin knew the feeling.
Link shook his head. "It was my grandmother's house. I lived with her and my younger sister. She's around your age, or a little older. You'll meet them both once we arrive on Outset."
"And they let you build a Flit?" Kidd inquired.
Link laughed. "You might say that. I had to beg my Grandma to let me do it. She was afraid I'd get into an accident and hurt myself. But I was a stubborn kid, and eventually she couldn't stop me, so she just kept an eye on me and made sure I knew what I was doing."
"How long did it take to build it?"
Link smiled. "Perhaps a full year of trial and error. By the time I had an engine that was deemed functional, everyone on the island was involved into the project in some way or other." He seemed lost in fond memories. "I felt a lot of pride from that."
"And it flew?" Kidd eagerly questioned.
Link looked slightly offended. "Well of course it flew. That day, the wind was blowing towards the west, and we pushed and pulled the Flit up onto the small mountain of the island, and on a tiny landing platform that Aryll and I had built. I was so nervous I nearly cancelled the whole thing. I had never really flown it for real. Only made it hover a bit."
The sky was bright, and Colin kept an eye on their fuel gauges. They were pushing it. Still, no sense interrupting Link.
"But," Link continued, "I sat in that little engine and knew I would be alright. So I started the hovercrafts. I remember hoping that they wouldn't give out on me during the flight. Just in case, Rose and Sue-Belle had sown a parachute for me, and Abe and Mesa were already in their canoes to fetch me out of the water should the Flit crash."
"Optimistic fellows," Sheik commented with a grin.
"You can't blame them," Link snickered. "The craft was certainly dangerous looking. Anyhow, the conditions were ideal. My little craft lifted off the platform without a hitch. Everyone was watching and they cheered. I had to test it out fully, so I pushed my Flit to six FGU, the maximum I could attain, and it zoomed off the mountain at a speed I had never imagined. It was like I was part of the wind itself. I flew for a few minutes, feeling the wind in my hair and on my face, seeing the water and waves zip by under me, like I was the only one in the world."
Kidd and Colin watched the pilot with constant interest.
"Eventually," Link said, watching the sky, which had turned blue as the morning slowly progressed, "I returned to the platform, unharmed and hooked."
"So you kept on flying," Kidd prompted.
"So I did," Link softly said, a wistful smile etching itself on his face. "I improved my Flit and my piloting skills over the next few years, not without a few hitches, of course, but overall, I was slowly making a reputation for myself."
"And then there was the Headstone Island Annual Race," Sheik said, smirking.
Link squinted at his mechanic. "Yeah, thank the skies you became my friend that time because I'd have beaten you dead otherwise."
Sheik rolled his eyes. "Apologies, but I won that race fair and square. And besides, you're one to resent me. You came in fourth."
Link scowled. "Shut up."
"Out of fifty contestants," Sheik deadpanned.
Kidd looked impressed, and Link's frown softened into a smug grin.
"Yeah," the pilot said, "I did kick a few hides at the time."
"So you met each other during a race?" Kidd asked. Sheik and Link nodded.
"Yeah. After that we kept competing for first place in all the regional races," Sheik said. "We were unstoppable; it was almost scary."
Colin cleared his throat. "Uh. Link."
Link laughed aloud. "Remember the Diamond Steppe Island Race? Where I knocked your Flit into a small cliff and won by a few milliseconds?"
"Link."
Sheik growled. "And the time in Needle Rock where you nearly got pushed into the water because you'd antagonized that tiny guy Tingle?"
"How was I supposed to know the guy had a posse?" Link replied with a laugh. "Did you see his ship? It was red and green, like some freakish fairy-lover's abomination."
Sheik couldn't hold down a tiny smirk. "Which is exactly what it was."
The men laughed, when suddenly the Flit hiccupped. There was a short second during which the engines stopped humming, then strained to start again. Link and Sheik looked down at the gauges.
"Oh damn."
Colin turned a pale face to Link. "I don't want to sound like I foresaw this omen, Link, but we're soon going to be in trouble."
The captain looked uneasy, but he finally shook his head. "She can hold it," he nervously said, holding onto the controls tighter.
No one bothered to argue. They'd find out soon enough whether or not the captain was right.
