BETWEEN THREE ROGUES
By Eric 'Erico' Lawson
Forty-Seven: Where Darkness Lives
Princess Moegi Tokugawa had experienced a great many things during her time with Captain Vyse, Prince Enrique and the rest of the Blue Rogues. The wrecking ball of change that came with them had brought pain, yes, but there was so much more that had made it all worthwhile. For the first time in her life, she had real friends who didn't care about her station as much as the woman behind the title. She was part of a crew of misfits and cast-offs who had never quite belonged until they came together. She had responsibilities that challenged her and gave her a sense of fulfillment.
In spite of every snide remark she'd heard in passing and a disappointing lack of talent in blue magic, she had learned and grasped hold of power, enough that it had saved a ship full of all her friends and her hopes. She had learned the truth of her ancestor, the lost Princess Kikue. Highest of all, she had fallen in love, and was loved in return.
It tore at her that her beloved Enrique grieved and mourned for his surrogate father Gregorio in solitude. She was glad when Vyse spoke to him and pulled him back. She was gladder still when he fell into her arms and promised that he would start sharing his doubts, his hurts, and his dreams with her. He'd done the same for her, after all. After that Enrique was himself again, if a little quieter at times, and helped Vyse and his two lovers work to reunite Piastol with the broken fragments of her family. As they sailed away to return to Crescent Island, Enrique held true to his promise that he would share his troubles with her. In words whispered before slumber in his cabin aboard the Delphinus while the world passed them by, Enrique spoke to her first about a thought and an action that had been brewing in his mind since Dangral Island.
Moegi was the first to learn that Enrique thought it necessary to return home, into chains if it came to that, to let his mother know about Galcian's coup and the Armada's treachery. It pained her to hear his plan, and though nothing was said publicly, it was an argument that they went back to every night. During the course of the 10 days that the Delphinus spent in drydock as it suffered its third major refit in a year, they spoke with hushed words and angry whispers and more tears than either of them wanted.
Did you stand idle when Yafutoma was threatened, my dark-haired dearling? How can I do any less now? Those had been the words which won him the argument. It ended with her weeping into his chest as he held her and stroked her hair, and when the refit was finished and the crew poured back aboard to depart, Enrique took the opportunity to let Vyse, Aika and Fina know of his coming departure. For better or for worse, Valua was his country, and he could not let Galcian's treason go unrecognized.
The mission to the Deep Sky would be his last as a member of the Delphinus crew under Captain Vyse. He intended to do his level best by everyone and to leave on a high note.
Moegi had tried so many arguments to keep him from leaving, and all of them had failed. She had even tried to reach into herself and pull from that strange wellspring of power that she had touched once - once - in a moment of pure desperate instinct, but it had kept silent and still, as it had been ever since Bluheim. Like it had never existed to begin with. Whatever power she had, it refused to bend to her will to make him stay.
There was one approach that she hadn't used - could not have used - and for the first time since she had begun her love affair with Enrique du Valua, Moegi mourned that she had been so rigorous in following Dr. Ilchymis's birth control regimen. If she had been with child, against all the better angels of his nature, Enrique might have stayed.
Greedy though it might be, Moegi hoped that their latest mission would be a long one, if only so she would have more time with her prince. It was doubtful, but hope and the intemperate present was all she had left.
They were little better than the nightmares she had where she lost him forever.
The Great Vortex
The Silver Sea, Mid-Ocean, Lower Sky
353 Days After the (First) Grand Fortress Escape
Mid-Morning
The mood on the bridge was understandably tense. Moegi watched from her place behind the captain's chair as Vyse rose from his seat, his black tricorn hat with its blue, red, and silver ribbons woven into the brim and looking particularly sharp.
"All right. Let's play this one by the numbers, shall we?" He said. "Communications? Any telegraph reports of our presence in the area by the Dangral scouts?"
Enrique looked up from the newly installed radio station, his hand clasped to a bulky earpiece pressed to the side of his head. "Negative, captain, just normal wireless traffic, no alerts from the Dangral pickets. Our wide-sweep maneuver paid off."
"Credit where credit's due." Vyse chuckled, nodding to Domingo by the wide map table. "Excellent course directions, Navigator."
"A pleasure, captain." The former explorer answered, grinning through his goggles. "It's nice to know that we can blast through sky rifts even at Lower Sky altitudes. The real challenge is still ahead of us."
"We've done what we can to prepare for it." Vyse exhaled. "Aika? How are we looking?"
"The air-conditioning units are all installed and ready to go, captain." The redhead answered from her own station. "Nice to know that they can pull double duty once we swap out the red moonstones for purple and blue. I got the final green-light report from my boys down in engineering on the moonstone reactors as well on the cooling system upgrades. The Abyss can throw its worst at us, but our engines won't overheat long as they hold out. I've got no interest in dealing with a steam explosion."
"None of us do." Vyse agreed. "Go ahead and start it up. It wouldn't hurt for things to get a little chilly before we start our dive."
Aika nodded and flipped a switch, then reached for the intercom panel at her station. "All hands, rig for Deep Sky dive. Set all air-conditioners and coolant lines at full power and make it frosty."
Waiting for the ship's cooling systems to build up gave them all plenty of time to look out of the windows on the bridge to the strange and chilling sight waiting for them. The Great Vortex was a terrifying sight, a feature of the Silver Sea unlike anything else in Mid-Ocean. Or anywhere else in the world. Only here, when the clouds between the central and Lower Skies were cleared, could one perceive a storm with an enormous dark eye that pierced the murky covering over the Abyss.
"I can't believe we're going down into that." Domingo said, shivering as he pulled back from the port window. "You know, back before Daccat's time, some people threw their worst criminals into that maw in the sky. There were some pirates that did the same thing with captives they got tired of. They stopped doing it, thankfully."
"Merciful Moons." Moegi breathed. "Why? What was the purpose?"
"People used to believe that the Vortex was the gateway to hell." Enrique answered, drawing every soul's attention on the bridge. The prince stroked at his chin, not looking away from the aperture like the others had. The whole of his gaze and his focus was on the obstacle ahead of them. "And yet, the Great Vortex is our best chance at reaching the Deep Sky and finding Fina's skyship. You're certain, Fina, that there's ground down there?"
"Yes." The Silvite said firmly. "There is a bottom of the world, and it's hot and it's dark and it's uncharted. But it's there. Why do you ask?"
"The people of Mid-Ocean have always wondered what really rested beneath our feet. When the age of Reason came and we began to put aside superstition, there was still a strong contingent that believed the Abyss was where the unhallowed and the sinful dead were sent. So many other things were explained and rationalized, but that one facet remained. It got to the point that my great-grandfather sponsored an expedition proposed by one of the most brilliant scientists of his time, Sir Charles Thomassen."
"Oh, shit." Vyse swore, and Moegi looked over in time to see the captain go pale. "I've heard about this, I think. Thomassen's Folly."
Enrique's answering laugh held no warmth. "Yes. I believe that's what the Challenger Expedition is commonly referred to as. Suffice it to say, Sir Thomassen wanted to disprove the myths of the Abyss and expose it to the hard light of scientific truth. He climbed into a sealed, pressurized metal sphere with its own lighting and a depth gauge and his ship lowered him down with a steam-powered winch. The Challenger held position in Valuan territory, at the lowest depth that they could safely fly while maintaining integrity of the moonstone condensers. The only means that he had of signaling them to pull him back up was a primitive version of the speaking tubes used aboard most ships today. Three and a half hours after he passed beneath the clouds separating the central and Lower Skies, they received a garbled, nigh incomprehensible message on the speaking tube that they couldn't make out. By then, the line had begun swaying wildly, and they quickly began raising him back up. In the official reports, none of the crew present at the winch stated that they understood what he was saying, only that Sir Thomassen sounded terrified. That he was screaming."
"He didn't make it back up." Vyse added quietly.
Enrique shook his head, and finally stepped back from the window to look on the rest of the bridge crew with hollowed out eyes. "There was a tremendous shudder and then all the tension on the line went slack. A few hours later, when they finished hauling up the line, there was no sign of the diving sphere at the end. No sign of Thomassen, just a burned, frayed rope with the speaking tube dangling uselessly beside it. The superstitious members of the crew spread the word quickly once they made port, regardless of the orders by their superiors to say nothing about it. They said that the Abyss took him, that it takes the life of anyone foolish enough to try to delve into the depths. There was even a poem that got published in the newspapers afterwards, famous in its day, that immortalized Thomassen's Folly."
"It slowed down exploration for decades." Domingo rumbled.
"For a while." Don agreed from his spot at the helm, rubbing his knuckles. "Explorers were more conservative in their quests for a while after that. Less daring. Thomassen reached out to see the world, and the world bit back."
"What poem?" Marco wondered aloud, and everyone stopped talking. The boy flinched, but looked around. "Seriously. What poem?"
"I only remember the ending stanza." Enrique said to him, and took a deep breath before speaking in somber tones.
"Where darkness lives and death abides,
Here the great Abyss resides.
What secrets be kept, no one can tell…
We dare not venture into Hell."
Moegi turned and stared back into the swirling storm of the Great Vortex, and felt a knot of tension begin to build in her stomach. Nobody said a word for all the tense seconds that followed, until a chime at Aika's station broke the moment and made the Chief Engineer clear her throat.
"Air-conditioners up and running, captain. It's positively chilly down in engineering and the modified amidships hold."
"Are the diving suits ready?" Vyse asked solemnly, and Moegi recalled the cobbled together outfits which had been modeled after Yafutoma's very own water diving suits. Aika nodded, and the captain reset his hat. "All right. Engage pressure shutters. Switch the engines over to submergence mode, ready the sonar sounder, and sound the shipwide alert."
Moegi went over and stood by Enrique as the klaxons went off. She took his hand when the pressure shutters began to lower down into place over the windows of the bridge, knowing that others did the same for the other exposed windows elsewhere on the ship. The crew quarters, the dining hall, the captain's cabin. A low humming noise started up, the sound of the vibrations as the engines moved to submergence mode and the moonstone converters were pressed to more demanding pressure, rang in her teeth. As darkness filled the ship, eerie green lights flickered on, bathing them all in eldritch luminescence.
Vyse sank back into the captain's chair and gripped the armrests tightly before reaching to his ship's intercom, punching up a direct line to the lookout's tower. "Tikatika? We're running visually blind here with the shutters down. Guide us in."
"As you command, captain. Would you care to come up and have a look for yourself? I have never seen the like of this before."
"And you never will again." Vyse hummed. He glanced over to Enrique and Moegi, noting their clasped hands. "Enrique? You have the bridge. I'll be up in the lookout's tower for a bit."
Enrique didn't speak, he just nodded. With the mood on the bridge tense, Vyse rose and departed while Tikatika called out navigation directions. The Delphinus turned towards the eye of the Great Vortex and began its descent, holding level attitude while it dropped slower than a stone into the dark.
After that, there was nothing left to do but wait.
And wait.
The Eye of the Great Vortex
90 Minutes into the Descent
In her role as ship's diplomat, Moegi would often spend time with the so-called 'morale officers' aboard the ship. She had spent the whole of her life in an insulated existence, one spent behind the walls of the palace or the curtains of a palanquin, surrounded by ladies-in-waiting and subservient guards. She'd never gotten to know anyone, not like Laurette did with her people. Moegi hadn't told the red-haired Foreign Minister (that she was certain, after their visit home just before the Lands of Ice expedition, that her brother was sweet on) but Laurette would make a better ruler of the Yafutoman people than she ever would. Moegi did not know them like Laurette did.
She had resolved to change that with the Blue Rogues she sailed with. To a large degree, she felt that she'd succeeded in it. It was why, after the first fifteen minutes of the ship descending down into the Deep Sky she excused herself from the bridge where Enrique and the others were busy running the ship and keeping a steady stream of chatter between engineering, the lookout's tower where Tikatika and Vyse were, and the bridge. In that moment she was of little use to them. But elsewhere?
The eerie green lighting on the bridge had been installed in the critical areas of the ship alone. Elsewhere, the ship's normal lighting was still in effect, though there was the addition of flashing red strobes in the corridors that were kept running after the alert klaxons had been turned off. Not even the dining hall was unaffected, Moegi saw as she walked in. The cookstoves were cold and everything that could be strapped down was, including all the seating benches to the dining tables (which were already bolted down). Even the great chandelier in the ceiling was drawn all the way up and tied off to the securing hooks. Miss Urala came over, minus her usual serving tray, and bowed slightly, while Mrs. Polly Carusoe and her husband Robinson were at their usual posts at the counter and barstool respectively.
"Your highness. What can we do for you?" The youngest daughter of the Setsu family asked.
"I'm just trying to be useful." Moegi said, glancing around and trying not to breathe hard. Her usual dress did not agree with the temperature. The kitchen fires were cold, but it was as stifling in here as if the ovens had been baking at full blast all morning and afternoon. The air conditioning units spread throughout the ship were already struggling to keep up as the temperature shifted to uncomfortably, perhaps dangerously warm. "Is there anything I can do for you all?" She glanced over to where Mistress Kalifa and Osman were stationed aboard the vessel, not surprised to see the rubenesque merchantwoman fanning herself rapidly and sweating even through her thinnest yellow dress. Kalifa, who dressed in thin garments that only just hid her modesty, had thrown off her headpiece. The fortuneteller had a thinner line of sweat on her forehead as she spun the hovering prism of crystal between her hands and studied her visions with untold solemnity. Neither of the women was without their glasses, and Moegi was reminded that she'd never seen the Maramban soothsayer's eyes.
Urala considered the question. "We are fine for now, but we are limited to cold foods only, and Miss Polly was hesitant to open up the cool box or the frozen one once we began our descent." She gestured to where platters of pre-made sandwiches and small paper bags that were marked in the Mid-Ocean language as containing dried fruit and nuts were. And jug after jug of what was likely brewed, chilled tea was ready and waiting for delivery. "When the sailors come through for their meals, we will only be able to give them what can be eaten standing up."
Moegi laughed. "I do not believe anyone will complain too much in these strange, interesting times." The two Yafutoman women shared a commiserating look as they thought of the old saying, and then Urala gave Moegi a sly smile.
"How is your prince doing, my lady?"
"As well as can be expected. He leads on the bridge of the ship while the captain is up in the domed lookout tower, observing the darkness as we dive through it."
Urala shivered a bit, and spared a glance to the large windows of the dining hall that were now covered with enormous pressure shutters. "I do not think I would want to see what is out there. The captain must be without fear."
"No." Moegi said, shaking her head. "No man is without fear. What makes Vyse strong is that he does not let it control him." A trait that both Vyse and Enrique shared, she reflected, and smiled when she thought of how lucky she was. How lucky Aika and Fina were.
"As you say, my lady." Urala bowed her head, and then a shout from Miss Polly had them looking over.
"Princess Moegi, good to see you up and about. Have ye come for a nibble? You're early, but we can give you a sandwich easy enough." Polly said, motioning to her husband. "Robbie, pour the girl a glass of cold tea while it's still a little chilly."
"Oh, none for me, thank you." Moegi cut them off, then paused. "But could you prepare a bag for Tikatika and Captain Vyse? I was going to check in on them next, and neither one of them will be leaving the lookout tower anytime soon."
It was the work of but a minute with Polly, Robinson, and Urala all working in unison, and Urala handed Moegi a bag of sandwiches and snacks as well as a pair of large insulated thermoses of tea. "Give the captain our regards, dearie." Polly said cheerfully, smiling in spite of the stress of where they were, and where they were headed. Moegi accepted the lunches with a forced smile and another bow, then turned and walked away.
Everyone was putting on a brave face, everyone was trying their best to stay optimistic. But Moegi felt the truth of everyone's feelings as she passed by them in corridors filled with spinning red light, a mood as thick as the steadily increasing balmy air.
The crew was afraid.
Lookout Tower
Opening up the hatch that separated the rest of the ship from the now domed and enclosed space of Tikatika's favored posting felt like walking from a dry sauna into one steamed so full that it almost hurt to breathe. Moegi coughed and blinked her eyes against the tears, and only started moving again when strong hands helped her up.
"Easy, Moegi. I've got you." The captain reassured her, and she blinked again, wondering what was wrong with the lights. They kept flickering on and off. It took her a moment to realize what was actually going on. Up here in the lookout tower it was as dark or as light as the outside environment was. The reinforced and insulated dome offered them protection from the elements but gave them clear views of their surroundings. It would have to for Tikatika to do his job and guide the targeting for Belle's torpedo girls.
Moegi stared out into the Abyss, nothing but swirling black stormclouds illuminated by angry, hissing bolts of lightning. She didn't realize that she'd frozen up until the sound of the hatch going back down had been snapped back into place with the grind of metal on metal and someone snapped a light on, a pale green orb glowing faintly in the dark. She whirled in time to see Tikatika, sweating in spite of his loose garments of hempen cloth and stitched feathers, offering her a thin smile behind the decorated mask he always wore. "It makes you feel like a Crylbeast pup needing to hide from the Kanezl, looking at all of that." He said.
"It's a hell of a view." Vyse agreed. Moegi did her best to focus on the captain and failed, as the miasma outside of their protective dome loomed over everything. The captain had stripped down to his undershirt but had kept both his pants and his black captain's hat on, and he tapped a pencil against his sailor's journal from his viewing bench as he smiled reassuringly. "What brings you our way, Ambassador? Something to do with that bag you're carrying?"
"Ah!" Moegi flushed and quickly handed it over. "Lunch, courtesy of the crew."
"Ooh. Sandwiches. And...trail mix?" Vyse examined it under the glow of Tikatika's small magical light. "Well, I think we'll appreciate the tea the most. Just sitting up here is thirsty work, and we've nearly gone through the jug of Garpa juice Tikatika brought up with him this morning. Thank you, Moegi."
"It is…" Moegi started to bow, but her throat clenched up into a wheeze when another flash of lightning lit up…
...something. Even though the burst of lightning seemed burned into her eyes as she blinked, Moegi still saw it. Something terrifyingly large, a mass that could have swallowed the whole of the Yafutoman mainland and Mount Kazai with room to spare. And having seen it once, she couldn't unsee it. She almost felt it.
"You saw it too, didn't you." Vyse said, not really a question. Her voice still lost, it was all the Yafutoman royal could do to manage a nod. "Yeah. You're scared, aren't you?"
We should all be terrified that such a thing is beneath our feet, Moegi thought, and nodded again.
"Yeah. Well, we've been keeping an eye on it for close to half an hour now. Whatever it is, it's there - and it isn't moving." Vyse said, tapping his pencil on his journal again. "We've also noticed at least three distinct weather bands so far. There's layers to the clouds between Lower Sky and the Deep Sky."
"How…" Moegi finally found her voice, and even then it came out strangled. Vyse offered her a thermos of tea that she'd brought up, and she gratefully took a swallow before handing it back. "How far down are we?"
"Last report from the bridge?" Vyse mused. "Two, two and a half lunaleagues. We have to go slow to keep in the eye of the Great Vortex and keep the ship level." In the glow of Tikatika's light, Moegi looked at his journal upside down, seeing the careful drawings he'd made of the cloud striations on one page. A drawing of the chillingly ominous mass looming just past the eye of the storm was drawn in greater detail on most of the other, or as much as could be made out from shadows and silhouette. There were jutting spires around it that she hadn't seen. The added detail didn't reassure her. Neither did what she saw just outside of the dome when she could think a little more clearly. There was a gauge installed that she was sure hadn't been there during the original dome construction for the Lands of Ice expedition. It read a terrifyingly high temperature. Not close to the point where water boiled, by Mid-Ocean measure, but well past human tolerances. If things were any indication, they would only get hotter the further down they went.
She swallowed, her head swimming from more than the heat, and looked back to Vyse. "How much farther?"
"To the bottom?" Vyse clarified casually. "If the sonar pulse sounding is correct, we're halfway there."
Five Lunaleagues down.
Merciful Blue Moon. Moegi shook her head. "How do you do it?" She asked, getting a puzzled look from Vyse. "How do you face this and still function?"
His face hardened. "Because we can do this. Because I'm the captain. And because I have to."
"No, not that." She shook her head. Of course he would say that, she wasn't questioning his courage or his ability to keep going in spite of his fear. He was not a lesser man who was paralyzed by it. She jerked a hand to point outside of the dome, and her breath caught when another flash of lightning illuminated the hidden thing in the dark clouds that shrouded the Abyss. "How can you stay up here and look into this madness? Why do you not come belowdecks with the rest of us?"
Vyse blinked, finally understanding her question. "Oh." He seemed to give it a great deal of thought, then glanced over to Tikatika. The Ixa'takan scout and sentry looked back from behind his mask, inscrutable as always. "The easy answer is because I'm not leaving Tikatika up here to face it alone. Because Fina's skyship is down there waiting for us, and we can't save the world without it. Because nobody's ever been down here before, and I've always wanted to see everything this world had to offer." His face went even more severe as he took a long drink from the thermos. "Besides, Moegi. I've been staring down the storm all my life. It's just never been this literal before."
Moegi shivered in spite of the heat as she took in the sight of Vyse again. A man who inspired and led others, who moved without his fears holding him down. This was a man who stared into the darkness, and didn't flinch when it stared back at him.
"I'll have someone bring you up some more water." She whispered, and reached for the hatch with a trembling hand.
"You might want to put on something thinner too." Vyse said over his shoulder as she opened the hatch and a blast of comparatively cooler air welcomed her from below. "It's gonna get warmer before we're done."
Moegi was not one to discount sound advice, and one of her Ixa'takan dresses, meant for a balmy climate, suited the conditions inside of the ship far better. Comfort aside, she at least matched the sparse dress of the gunnery crew when she led Marco and Pinta through the corridors of the ship to the bow, bringing refreshments with them.
Khazim was shirtless, true to form, but the chief gunner had removed his usual headpiece. The men on his crew had stripped down as well, and even Belle and her torpedo girls were wearing less than usual. They all eagerly drank down the slightly-above body temperature water that Moegi and the two boys brought to them, taking off their thick gloves as they did so. Moegi wondered at them, but Belle must have seen the question in her eyes.
"It's so hot in here that anything metal can burn you if you touch it for too long." The brown-haired girl rubbed the back of her forearm above her eyes. "I know why we put more cooling capacity in the engine room and around the moonstone reactors, but we're close to crawling the walls in here."
"It could be worse." Marco pointed out. "You could be on the salvage team." That notice made everyone shudder and look towards the hatch that led one compartment astern.
"Daniels and a few others of the Esperanzan crew are braver men than most." Khazim said solemnly. "They are taking the greatest risk in this mission. I just hope that the suits that were made for them work as intended, your highness."
"They will." Moegi said, not letting a trace of doubt leak into her voice. In the amidships keel hold, a salvage crane had been installed on a ceiling-mounted gantry. It had cost them one of their existing drydock cranes from Crescent Island, but the payout would be worth it. Still, the moment that they began salvage operations, the compartment would be sealed off and the salvage crew would be stuck within their pressurized cooling suits. On their own with only a tenuous and jury-rigged cable on spools to give them access to the ship's intercom and keep them in touch with the bridge. Exposed to the full brunt of the harsh atmosphere of the Deep Sky with only the modified Yafutoman diving suits to keep them alive.
Moegi suspected that the reason the most rugged of the Esperanzans had volunteered for the job was because most of them had nobody waiting for them. They had all been dead men walking once before. If death was to come, better it be them, Daniels had argued before Vyse and Enrique. Enrique had been stunned into silence afterwards.
"Will they be able to see anything down there?" Belle asked, too hot and sweaty to properly appreciate Khazim's rugged masculinity. "We're descending through the storms of the Abyss, is there even a ground beneath us?"
"Yes." Moegi said firmly. "We have Fina's assurance of that."
"I know I believe her." Marco said, daring anyone to argue with him. None did.
"Do not worry, Miss Belle." Khazim reassured the girl. "Remember what our good Captain Vyse once said. No matter how bad the storm is, there's always a way through it. He brought us through the Dark Rift, he'll get us through this."
Both gunnery crews straightened up at that. Funny how even the mention of Vyse's name and a few words could have such an effect on people. Moegi wondered again if he was aware of it, if he knew just what his name and his reputation was worth. What he could take if he asked for it.
The ship's intercom came on with a warning beep. "All hands, we're five minutes from the bottom at our rate of descent. Get to your stations and prepare for salvage operations."
Khazim finished his second glass of formerly cold tea and handed the mug back to Moegi. "Duty calls. Back to your posts, everyone. And Belle?"
The girl paused in her third step away and looked back over her shoulder. She raised an eyebrow, wondering what her love interest might say.
"Please be careful." Khazim asked her. Belle's grin was wide, and she gave him a nod.
"You too, muscle man. Come on, girls!"
Moegi looked to Marco and Pinta. "We should be off, too. Where are your stations?"
"Fire teams." Marco told her. "Vyse says it's one of the most important jobs there is on a ship."
Vyse was correct about that, Moegi thought as she turned and headed for the bridge again.
She prayed that Marco and Pinta's services wouldn't be required.
Bridge
There wasn't a soul that wasn't soaked in sweat, and Vyse had finally given in to common sense and removed his captain's hat, letting it hang off the back of his chair. Like everyone else, he was holding a great deal of tension in his body. He'd stayed up in the enclosed lookout's tower with Tikatika before Domingo had gone to relieve him, and in the last leg of their descent, when they'd cleared the bottom edge of the clouds and true darkness without movement had set in, there had been a moment Vyse had told them about where it seemed endless. Then the exterior spotlights had come on, casting what Vyse had described as 'shining beams that got eaten by the dark' and it was only when they were pointed down that they didn't just vanish.
Moegi had shivered when Vyse had told them all that there was a bottom of the world - an endless sea of hot, grayish and pale brown mud that seemed to go on endlessly. It had been something long debated by scholars and the philosophers who dabbled in thought experiments, if the skies beneath their feet went on forever or if it had a definite end. In Yafutoma, the majority opinion was that there was an end to it, because theirs was a people who had long been protected by, and hidden by walls. A wall of black howling wind to their west, a wall of endless floating stones to the east, and the ancient, crumbling walls that marked the borders of their civilization. Surely, there was a wall at the bottom of the world as well.
The reality was somehow both more logical and more terrifying than anything her people's thinkers had ever dreamed of.
"We're coming up on the first hit that the ground sonar picked up, captain." Enrique called over, manning the mapping table in Domingo's absence. A rough, rough hand-drawn grid map of their surroundings in Domingo's flowing pencilwork had been the work of ten minutes during the last leg of their descent. Between that and the sonar station and the spotters in the domed lookout tower that could only see close targets they were running on an imperfect understanding of their surroundings.
"We're sure it's down here?" Don asked warily. "In our immediate vicinity? Not lunaleagues away in the dark and the heat?"
"It's a reasonable guess." Fina answered, looking between the pressure shutters sealing the windows and the dark screen that gleamed green from the sonar returns. Fina, unlike everyone else besides Aika (whose outfit was already loose and breathable) was still wearing the same silvery dress and veil that she always did, though the fabric of it seemed to be doing an admirable job in wicking the sweat away and keeping her cool. The low echoing ping of the sonar sounder was a constant reminder of their situation, an alien noise that made Moegi feel more like a sardine in a can than anything else had so far. The Silvite seemed remarkably unperturbed, now that they were in the silence of the Abyss. "I was shot down and captured in the vicinity of the Great Vortex. My ship would have been caught in the pull of the storm and dragged down. The strength of the winds should have kept it close to the eye we came down through. But," and the Silvite shrugged, "it's my best guess."
"We can't stay down here forever, though." Aika added from her station, grimly watching several of the gauges. "The cooling systems are pulling down a lot of power and straining the purple moonstones we picked up to their limits. Eventually, they're going to give out and when they do, it's going to get hotter in here. A lot hotter."
"Salvage team to bridge, slow it up a little. I think we're coming up on the first echolocation mark."
"Slow us up, helm." Vyse ordered, punching the intercom squawk by the captain's chair before steepling his fingers and leaning forward. "What do you see, team?" Moegi felt the mood on the bridge turn even more intense as everyone waited for the report. It was a pause that went on endlessly.
"Negative." Came the disappointed reply, and Moegi watched as Don slumped at the helm a little. "It's just a rock with a sparkly bit of ore stuck in the mud. Was about the size of what you told us to expect for your skyship, it threw us for a bit."
"Understood, team. Go ahead and -"
"Wait!" Fina shouted out, cutting Vyse off. The captain blinked a few times and righted himself.
"Stand by, salvage team." He cut off his squawk and turned his head towards the Silvite. "What is it, Fina?"
"Vyse, if I'm right, we're going to want that ore." Fina told him steadily. "Can I talk to them for a bit? I know time's of the essence, but this could help us."
Sweating and worn out as she was, Moegi could still pay attention to the looks between her three friends. Fina's face was one of earnest pleading, Vyse seemed dubious but trusting, and when he looked over to Aika for confirmation, the red-haired chief engineer gave him a nod. They both trusted Fina to the hilt, as someone from Mid-Ocean might say.
"Go ahead, milady." Vyse said, gesturing to the intercom next to his chair and turning it back on again. Fina gave him a warm smile and stepped over, offering a small 'excuse me' before settling into and across his lap, putting an arm over his shoulder and behind his head to anchor herself. "Um..."
"Shh. I need to talk to the men." The Silvite quieted him, and there were a few snickers that Moegi heard at that, including Aika, and at least two dirty looks. One of those came from Don, who shook his head slightly before uttering 'you lucky bastard' under his breath. Fina ignored them all with a beatific smile as she focused on the intercom, the only connection that they had to the men working the salvage crane. "Daniels? Can you get a closer look at the ore sticking out of that chunk of rock for me? Safely?"
"Maybe. And don't worry, Miss Fina, me and the men aren't disconnecting from our safety lines for anything. Standby." There came more waiting and the sound of labored breathing while Daniels worked his way to the rock, likely still dangling above the open mud of the bottom of the Abyss. "Okay, I'm here."
"Do you have a hammer? Something hard that you can strike that sparkling bit of ore with?"
"I've got a pipe wrench."
"Good. Now when you hit it, I want you to tell me what kind of a sound it makes." Vyse's eyebrow went up above his eyepiece at that, and Fina just smiled and mouthed the words, 'trust me' in return. They heard a muffled clang and something higher pitched that the intercom's crackling couldn't quite pick up on, though Fina seemed pleased by it if the widening of her eyes and the sudden inhalation of breath were anything to go by.
"It...it, uh, kind of sang?"
Fina's smile turned blindingly bright at that. "Daniels, if it's at all possible, please try and recover that piece of ore for us before you release that boulder back to the mud."
"Aye-aye, Miss Fina. Give us a bit, I don't think this metal has a lot of give to it."
"It wouldn't. You'd be better off pounding the stone around it to pebbles and prying it out." The Silvite said.
"Right, we'll give that a try. This ore's pretty good, then?"
"You just wait until we get that back to Ryu-Kan, Daniels, and then you'll see what it's capable of." She muted Vyse's microphone pickup and looked at him. "I'm about seventy percent sure that we just stumbled across a piece of Velorium." Moegi blinked, having never heard of such a thing, and she wasn't the only one. "Velorium is a naturally occurring metal ore, but you can only find it in the Deep Sky. The conditions for its creation don't exist anywhere else. It's incredibly durable but also very light compared to other steel and moonsteel alloys, and unlike other metals, it can absorb energy to a degree. My ancestors made frequent use of it in their work, and in the historical records it was sometimes referred to as 'the singing metal.'"
Moegi finally made a noise at that, because that last reference was something she was familiar with. When Vyse and Fina turned to her, the princess had to take a moment to calm her nerves. "In our ancient legends, we also had stories of great ships made with the-metal-that-sings. Could it be the same?"
"Probably." Fina agreed readily. "Before the war of the Gigas and the Rains of Destruction, the Old World was much more tied together, and trade flourished. Chances are that some of your ancestors got some Velorium goods from my ancestors. If there's anyone capable of working with it that we know, it would be Ryu-Kan."
"A prize worth keeping, then." Vyse mused in a low, satisfied growl. With his eyes burning, he took Fina's hand and brushed his lips over her knuckles. She let out a little gasp that was felt more than heard and more than one head perked up at what might be construed as something else to alter the odds of Kalifa's betting pool. Vyse let go of her hand and Fina pulled it back to press it against the bare skin of her upper chest in the cutout of her dress.
"You've gotten pretty smooth there, Vyse." Aika remarked, grinning after that little display. "You gonna try kissing my hand next?"
"I'd better wait until we're out of here before I do that." Vyse countered in an easy drawl. "You tend to run hot, Aika, and we're baking already."
"Promises, promises." Aika rolled her eyes, but with a smile that showed she took no offense. Moegi nearly giggled. Did the three of them plan these little scenes of romantic persuasion the night before playing them out? Surely they had to, nobody could create such entertaining diversions so readily as they did. It had to be scripted.
"We got it!" The cheerful, if somewhat garbled voice of Daniels crowed over the ship's intercom. "Decent chunk, about the size of a skiff's outboard engine. A fair bit lighter than I expected, though."
Fina made a happy noise and hit the switch off of Vyse's armrest. "It's Velorium! Thank you, Daniels!"
"Yeah, glad that we found something useful on this drop. By the way, these suits are holding up all right so far. We've got a temperature gauge and it's about, oh, thirty degrees short of water's boiling point outside right now. We're just a little bit warmer than it usually is down in the engine room right now. Hang on, everybody! We're going to drop the rock and it might be a little bumpy!"
The Delphinus was a massive ship, the best that Valua's admiralty could design and build. It took on shear force winds with just a bit of a rattle and had flown through Typhoon Alley nearly unmolested. But there was a shudder that ran through the ship that made Moegi, and everyone else for that matter, stumble a step.
Vyse was all business as he gently pushed Fina off of his lap, giving her time to get her feet underneath her again. "Right. That's one possible lead we can cross off." He announced, bringing everyone back to heel. "Aika, what's the heading to our next closest sonar hit?"
"Zero-eight-five." The feisty Chief Engineer responded effortlessly.
"Helm?" Vyse said, a single word that carried the weight of an order. Don turned the wheel and put them on course towards their next stop.
3 Hours Later
Their search area was a messy open-ended semicircle arranged around the start of a mountain range that jutted up in the center and rose as a wall of ominous stone to the south. In their quest to investigate every possible marker, they found several other things of interest- and lack of interest. A nest belonging to a set of burrowing skyfish that had pale white eyes, jagged maws full of teeth and a dangling glowing antenna in front of their faces that must have served as a lure, which flew off after scaring the daylights out of Daniels and the rest of the salvage team. The rusted ruins of some other vessel, or at least the metal portions of it, the wooden parts having rotted away long ago. One rock after another, disappointing lumps of stone that denied them their prize Keeping on a continual track eastwards with various turns north and south as the sonar returns demanded, they worked their way around the spine of that ominous mountain that jutted up from the bottom of the world and pierced through the first layer of dark and roiling clouds above. Taking a chance, Vyse had Don fly them to the most easterly return and was rewarded by the discovery of a second, larger deposit of Velorium that was about the size of an entire skiff instead of just the engine. For that they actually raised it up into the converted salvaging hold and closed the keel doors so Daniels and company could smash it out of the rock encasing it without fear of falling out of the ship, and once the Velorium ore had been rolled away and the remnant had been picked up tightly by the crane again, the bay doors were opened and the rock was dropped away.
All the while, Aika fidgeted and watched the gauges detailing the ship's internal temperature, the temperature of the moonstone reactors and the engines and everything which kept them from crashing into the mud and dying of heat exhaustion and got more and more nervous. After the second batch of Velorium was safely aboard, she reached a tipping point.
"We've got time for one or two more searches before we need to seriously consider getting the hell out of here." She hissed quietly to the conference of herself, Aika, Vyse and Enrique huddled by the cartography table. On a bridge that was silent aside from the gentle but weakening ping of the sonar it still carried far too effectively, and Moegi heard it as clearly as everyone else. "If we include travel time back to the surface, our purple moonstones are going to be completely drained of their power by the time we're just a little bit shy of the Great Vortex's entry point." Moegi watched at a distance and caught how Aika tapped a pencil on a hastily done diagram of numbers and curved lines covered in hatchmarks and expletives. "On second thought, Vyse, one's our maximum. Or is there a chance I can convince you to start us back up now?"
Vyse sighed and rubbed the back of his neck. "There's no good answer here. Aika, if we left now, how long would it take us to get the ship ready for another dive? Including replenishing our purple moonstone stores?"
"...Days." Aika admitted.
"Days we might not have." Fina murmured. "De Loco was converting his ship for Deep Sky dives as well, and there's the matter of the elevator at Dangral."
"Aika, can you guarantee enough time for one last salvage attempt before we start back up again?" Vyse asked.
"One. Maybe. But how many possible sites do we still have left to check?" The redhead demanded.
"Twelve." Vyse told her readily. "It's not a great chance, but it's still a chance. And maybe there's a way to narrow it down even more."
"How, Vyse?" Enrique questioned him carefully.
Vyse pushed himself away from the table and started pacing. Moegi paid attention to his eyes, unfocused and wild as he talked through it. "We've been approaching this methodically. We started west of here and tried every possible hit. Time-consuming but effective...if you've got the time to spare. Which we don't. We're looking for the proverbial needle in the haystack, right?" He joked, getting a few uneasy chuckles from the bridge crew that was very much needed. But the joke must have stirred something loose in his mind, because his steps paused and he blinked rapidly. "A needle that came crashing down from lunaleagues above." He added, moving back towards the rough map of the bottom of the world beneath the eye of the Great Vortex. "And I'm not so certain that a needle the size of Fina's skyship wouldn't leave a mark. We're looking for a needle, but maybe what we ought to be looking for is the mess that the needle crashing down here would make. Fina's ship is small, but I'll bet the crater it made when it landed in this mud ought to be might be a little bigger."
Everyone was quiet while his suggestion percolated, and it was Fina who spoke first, tapping on the map. "It's very possible that it might not have struck the bottom of this valley first. There are mountains to the south of us, an entire range, and the storm might have sent my ship tumbling into the side of one of them. At speed." She drew in a breath and pointed to the southern edge of the grids, which ended just shy of where the undersky mountain range jutted up as a wall. "And if it impacted on one of the slopes, it would have…" The Silvite looked up, and in the eerie green light of the bridge, her eyes glowed blazing emerald. "It would have started a landslide."
From there, everyone and everything moved quickly and with a strange mix of the undercurrent of their dwindling survival rate and the excitement of a real lead to follow. They sailed along the southern ridge of the mountain range and had every available exterior spotlight point towards the side of the muddy slope while Tikatika and Domingo put their keen eyes to their ultimate test, looking for signs of a disturbance that was now a year old, as Vyse told it. And all the while, Aika fretfully watched the gauges from her station on the bridge, called down to the engine room almost every minute, and only calmed (And even then, briefly) when Fina came over and held her hand tightly.
Vyse's crazy idea and Fina's hunch were proven right twenty-five minutes into their search when Tikatika called down from the domed lookout's tower and gave them a course that put the ship on course for a small, but noticeable mudslide that rolled down the slope and kept going into the flatlands. With Daniels and the salvage team watching carefully from their positions above the again-opened hold, the Delphinus kept following the sludgy mess of moisture-thick, gray-brown mud in its agitated path until…
Until Daniels called up to the bridge to raise the ship up another ten meters as the mudslide's path came to an end at a hill that hadn't been there before, the far edge of its top distinct for the gleam of reflected light that shone up at them. The salvage claw was lowered from the crane, aimed around the salvage team's best guess of the metallic mass's location, and the ecstatic voices of Daniels and company rang through the bridge half a minute later with a report that all of them had been praying for. They'd located Fina's skyship, and had pulled it up on the first grab. Not just that, but in spite of the damage it had taken from the Armada's attack so long ago and its precarious journey to the deep, it was remarkably pristine.
"That isn't too surprising, honestly." Fina told them with a relieved smile. "Velorium manufacturing, after all. Hopefully we won't have to do more than a few patches and maybe a few circuit bypasses for…"
Whatever Fina had been trying to say was brought to an abrupt end at the sound of an explosion and the shudder of a blow that rattled the entire ship.
Vyse leapt to his chair and triggered the intercom. "Bridge to engineering! What happened, did something explode?!"
"Captain!" Tikatika's voice cut him off, calling from up above. "It's an attack! We were hit by a cannonball!"
"What?" Enrique blurted out. "From where? Another ship? Down here?"
"It's the Chameleon! It's Admiral De Loco!" Tikatika kept on hurriedly.
Moegi wondered what it must have been like for Tikatika, to be in the tower seeing the ship of the man who had tried to burn down his entire forest come looming out of the darkness, ready to take its revenge. Small wonder he seemed so frantic.
"Salvage team, get that skyship on board and close up the hold!" Vyse ordered over the intercom.
"It's already done, captain!" Daniels reported.
"Vyse, you can't seriously be thinking about trying to fight down here!" Aika protested. "We're pushing the ship to the ragged edge to begin with. If we take it into combat we aren't going to survive this!"
Vyse shook his head, a pained look on his face. "I know. But this is De Loco. He's insane. He's not going to give us the choice. If we try to get out of here, he's going to follow us. He'll follow us and sink us during the climb."
When they had fought Bluheim, Moegi had found a wellspring of power strong enough to protect the ship from the fury of the great Gigas. She'd wondered on it afterwards, had tried to extend it to other pursuits. In spite of her best efforts and the aid of Fina and Aika, that powerful barrier had not extended to a talent in magic. Her brother was a terrifyingly effective warrior who had gained a title in the aftermath of the invasion and Bluheim as The Sword of The East, a title that the crew of the Delphinus had been quick to spread upon their return to Mid-Ocean. It had been a source of frustration to her, one that was only tempered by all of her other successes as a crew member, as a lover, as a friend. Why did she have such a great power if it was something she could never use? Why did so many others command great magics, powerful battle spells and attacks that burned spiritual power like candlewax?
As everyone else on the bridge contemplated fighting a battle that would end in defeat no matter the outcome, Moegi felt that power, dormant for so very long, begin to thrum in her heart and her belly again. She drew in a breath of the too-warm air that made everyone sweat and made the engineers and the gunners wear gloves to keep from burning themselves on metal made uncomfortably hot to the touch. When she breathed it out...she breathed out the cold air of the upper stretch of Yafutoma.
"Oh." She said, and the power dwelling in her pulsed stronger still, pleased at its summoning. Her brother was a warrior, his strength evident in his body and his katana, and he was a leader who attacked his enemies.
Moegi was not her brother, but his counterpoint. Now, here at the bottom of the world with an enemy closing on them, she understood. Daigo attacked his enemies with his power. Moegi's power, though, defended against them. The strength within her pulsed again, pulling in a direction, and when she turned and looked, she…
Of course, she thought to herself, and took a step towards it.
"Moegi?" Enrique said, looking over to her with worried eyes. Moegi took another step to her goal, to the instrument by which she could wield her power. Not for herself, never for herself.
Only, always, for them. For him.
"Prepare to counterattack." Moegi said, and somehow kept from blinking in spite of how strange her voice sounded to herself. She set her hands on the twin pedestals of the moonstone reservoir's feeder lines, and her power rose up to the surface, encasing her hands in a blue light so pale that it gleamed with white, icelike flecks. "You will not need to fear the heat of the Abyss."
"Moegi?!" Enrique got her name out again, but she closed her eyes and ignored him.
I am Moegi Tokugawa, daughter of the Emperor. Sister of the Sword of the East, child of the Blue Moon, and all these are precious to me.
I am the lover of Enrique du Valua, the Hope of Valua, son of the rightful king.
I am the friend of Vyse of the Blue Rogues, the friend of his lovers Aika and Fina. I am friend and diplomat to the crew of this ship, of all who vowed fealty to their flag.
I am a child of the Blue Moon, and they are all precious to me. Wind and wave, answer my call...Let the power of Yafutoma shield this ship.
Let the Abyss fear the power of the Dragon.
She felt her power fluxing, felt it flow out of her hands and into the ship. It wrapped around the whole of the Delphinus like a delicate silkworm's cocoon, trapping the air within, blowing it through the ship's ventilation like a bellows and touching every cooling unit running flat out. She did not know how she was doing it, but she felt them, felt those purple moonstones flag and wane as they gave their all. Into them she breathed the air of Yafutoma's bitter winds, the cool waters of its flowing rivers and gentle rains. Enervated by the power of the Blue Moon, the stones of the Purple Moon flushed with newfound vigor and grew strong again. With the whole of the atmosphere of the Abyss held at bay, they needed only work on the hot air within the wind barrier around the vessel.
This, they could do.
"Vyse! Temperature readings from engineering just...dropped! By a few degrees! And they're still falling! There's a massive output spike from the cooling units!" Aika's voice was startled and amazed, and Moegi wondered at that. How many miracles had these Blue Rogues wrought on their own? Why should another be so surprising now?
"We've got a chance now." Vyse declared, and there was a creak of metal that Moegi thought might be him settling into the captain's chair. "Moegi, whatever you're doing, keep doing it."
She couldn't risk speaking again, the barrier she'd erected was nowhere near as strong as the one she'd thrown up to stave off Bluheim. But it required maintenance, and she dreaded that she might run out before the battle was finished.
Strong arms and a familiar warmth wrapped around her, a strength brimming with electricity flowed into her from behind. Moegi gasped, knowing the source and welcoming that flow of power into hers without hesitation.
"I am with you." Enrique vowed, nuzzling his cheek against her hair and the back of her head, his breath teasing her ear. "I'm right here, my love. I'm not leaving you."
But you will, Moegi thought. After this, he was going home to an uncertain fate. But here, now, he stayed with her and let her drink his power in an endless stream. She defended all that was precious to them, a dragon guarding the hoard of its heart, and Enrique was there to defend her.
"All hands!" Vyse shouted, and the intercom rattled in the way it did when he initiated a shipwide broadcast. "We just got a little breathing room, and Fina's skyship is aboard. General quarters, combat footing! Admiral De Loco and the Chameleon are down here to try and finish us off, and I'm tired of dealing with his nonsense. For Arcadia!"
The crew roared, and Moegi let Enrique cradle her even tighter as she kept the bubble of slowly cooling air around the ship as tight as she could manage. In her head, she chanted the one part of the Code of the Blue Rogues she needed to hear the most, used it as a focus in keeping her atmospheric ward strong.
Blue Rogues Never Give Up.
Author's Note: There was a Challenger Expedition in real life; it occurred in 1874-1875. The Challenger was a British naval vessel converted for scientific purposes that sailed around the world collecting sounding depths, temperature readings, and even samples of undersea life. It was this expedition which gave the lowest point of the Marianas Trench its name; Challenger Deep. It was incredibly successful, and is wholly responsible for the creation of the scientific field of Oceanography. We stand on the backs of giants, and the only way we can honor them is to keep learning and keep exploring.
The Deep Sky mission was one of the scariest parts of the game for me. It's the equivalent of deep sea diving, which is a very approach/avoidance topic for me. It's been nothing but fascinating ever since I was a kid. I grew up reading books about finding and exploring the Titanic that were way above standard reading level. And yet the thought of actually being on one of those submersibles, actually going down into the ocean where you're so far down that light doesn't touch it and the pressure is so great that it could crush you in less time than it'd take you to blink is terrifying to me.
This is the chapter is a love letter to all the deep sea explorers who dared to try and touch the bottom of the world- Don Walsh, Robert Ballard, even James Cameron. I'll freely admit that they had and have a courage that I don't. They stepped into tiny vessels in cramped quarters, dropped into the open water and sank like a stone for hours upon hours. Cameron made his dive to Challenger Deep solo. Imagine the kind of courage, the control over their fear that it takes to do that.
You leave the world behind you, a world of air you can breathe, a world of light and blue and green things, and you sink into the black. A world where you're the only human life present, where help will never be able to reach you in time. And you do it because it's there. Because you decide that it's worth exploring. That it's worth going. In our world, diving into the black is a cold, a bone-chilling cold experience. But for Vyse and the crew of the Delphinus, it's the opposite. Beneath the clouds, things aren't just warm. They're hot.
