Author's Notes:
A long long time no see! I recently got back into writing, and with the slight lull in my exam schedules, hopefully I'll be able to write out the engagement before I go on hiatus again. I still care a lot about this and my other stories, so I'll get around to writing them as well.
"I really wish you hadn't came up with that idea," Kate said wistfully, panting as she broke away from his lips. "We could've been halfway to France by now."
"Poor Dylan sounded so distraught, I thought we had to save his ship somehow," Matt said, touching his forehead to hers. "The Aurora isn't even alive, and I care a lot about her; imagine what Dylan must be feeling for this beastie. It's a good idea though, isn't it?"
"No! Not if you're going to fly."
They were in some secluded corner of the Leviathan, busily making up for about three months of kisses — or the lack thereof. The meeting had taken much longer than anyone had expected, with all parties involved arguing back and forth about things like strategy and the chain of command, and they slipped away at the earliest convenience.
"I'm only co-pilot anyway," Matt said, quietly, enjoying the way she felt pressed against him. "I'll fly safe, I promise."
"I don't like that Hemmingfeld," Kate grumbled. "Doesn't seem like he'll fly safe."
"He reminds me of Shepherd, actually. Before we got to know him."
"A little bit. Shepherd was never so arrogant though."
"That's true." He sighed. "I just wish there was a little more time."
Kate kissed the tip of his nose and smiled. "I do too, airhead."
"If we're quick —"
"No. Don't you even think about that. Snogging will have to do for now."
Matt laughed. "I didn't even finish!"
"Oh shush," she replied, burying her head in his chest.
Of course, both of them wanted to do quite a bit more than snogging — what did anyone expect of a newly-married couple, who hadn't even had their honeymoon yet, seeing each other for the first time in months? — but it would only be a few more minutes before they were missed. Matt had an unpleasant hunch that Dr. Barlow knew exactly what they were up to, anyway. The lady scientist had given him a slight wink as he'd left the salon.
It was Kate who broke the silence.
"I — I have something to tell you," she said, sounding somewhat tentative.
"What is it?"
To Matt's surprise, she pulled away a little and put her hand on her belly.
"Are you fidgeting?" he asked, cocking his eyebrows.
"Oh shush," Kate said. "I suppose there's no way — Oh dear, I really wanted this to be more romantic."
"Anywhere with you is romantic," Matt said with a cheesy grin.
She glared at him. "I originally planned to tell you on our trip! On a rose-petaled bed or under the stars or something."
"Well fancy that! Never thought you'd be the one to care about rose petals and —"
"I'm pregnant."
"— candle-lights and all that…" he trailed off and just stared.
Kate nearly doubled-over laughing. "I wish I had a camera! You should see your face!"
"Can you say that one more time?" Matt said a little faintly.
"Preg-nant. I'm pregnant."
"Oh," he said. He was then silent for a few moments, feeling dizzy — the announcement had caught him completely off-guard. He smelled her hair, the same lavender scent as always, and felt her fingers draw anxious circles on his back, betraying how nervous she was really feeling. Her light touch tickled.
"You're not happy," she said, and he snapped out of it instantly. He pulled back so he could face her, and looked into her eyes, the lively grey that could brighten his day anytime.
"No no," he said hurriedly. "You just surprised me, that's all. How could I not be happy? I'm really happy. I'm just — I'm…"
And then the emotion of the news overwhelmed him and he leaned forward to touch his nose to hers. He would've kissed her, but that meant not being able to see each other's eyes. She smiled then, and he did too, and her grip at the sides of his shoulders trembled slightly, and so did his hands on her waist. They didn't speak, just looked and looked, and smiled again. Suddenly, he pulled her over, and with arms at her sides he lifted her up and spun around in circles. Given their present location in a tiny storage closet, this knocked over a lot of bits and pieces and caused a ruckus. Matt didn't care.
Kate squealed like a little girl. "Stop it, Matt!" she said. "Let me down!"
"I will not. You deserve it for not telling me! How long ago was this?"
"I found out in June, I planned to tell you on our trip! Now let me down, you airhead!"
"That is just cruel! Two months! That's like, five letters! How could you hold it in?"
"And you say I can't keep a secret."
He spun her around one last time and set her back down on the floor. They stood there, panting, smiling stupidly at each other like the idiotic teenagers back on Szpirglas' island who had just shared their first kiss. Matt felt a warm happiness in his chest, gaining power every second, slowly and slowly building and building, as sharp as pain and as incredible as flying, and his throat felt tight and he wanted to yell in joy and cry at the same time. It reminded him of the first time they'd made love, but this time it was a more distilled kind of emotion, with experience and responsibility behind it — a love that wasn't as much about lust and togetherness and the newness of sensations, but more about the intimacy and wonder that, right there under the skin and still-flat abdomen, a life of their own was growing; half of her, half of him.
"You shouldn't have volunteered for this," he said, breaking the calm comfortable silence that they'd fallen into.
"I wanted to," she replied. "I honestly thought we'd get there before we got caught up in war."
"You should've discussed it with me first, at least!" He nudged himself closer to her and laced his hand through hers. "Did you have any idea how painful it was — when I heard the Leviathan was shot down, I —"
She laid her other hand on his neck, caressing the skin. "Shh," she said. "I'm sorry, Matt. It really was an emergency. None of us expected situations to move this fast."
"I don't know what I would've done if I lost you," he said honestly. "I just don't. And now you're not just the one person I love most, you're the two people I love most, there's no way in hell I can bear to —" He shook his head, a little embarrassed. "Sorry, that sounded very sappy."
"I know, you airhead. I'll be more careful from now on, I promise. Although no one really thought those aeroplanes would just come out like that. And we haven't even received a declaration of war!"
Matt shrugged. "There can't have been time for one to reach you. What matters is we're here now; maybe it's meant to be this way after all. I'm just glad I was close by."
"Sometimes I think you're always close by," she said with a light smirk. "Not a big problem for someone lighter than air to fly around, is it?"
"Hmm," he said, and his fingers went over to her belly. "Do you reckon we can feel it? Can you feel it?"
"Oh please. It's only been three months. Quickening won't start until much later."
"Quickening?"
"It's when you start to feel it move."
"Oh. That's a nice name for it."
"Yes, I like it too."
"But when will you start to show?"
"When would I get fat, you mean? I don't know… but I already feel a little chubby."
"Really? I can't see any difference."
"Another month or two and the tummy should definitely be visible." She laughed in her usual delightful way. "Goodness, can you imagine Marjorie's face when we show her?"
"No, but I'd like to see it. She still thinks she's your chaperone sometimes."
"Ha! Very true." She cupped his face and kissed him on the lips, and then the tip of his nose. "I guess this could count as our little trip, since we wouldn't have made it back in time anyway."
"Most likely not," he agreed. "But I certainly have no qualms with this arrangement."
"I'm sure you don't," she said, tickling him. "Provided we can get out of it alive, that is."
He shook his head. "We're not going to die. We're going to make it. This plan will work."
Kate sighed. "Just… just stay safe, okay?"
"I will," he replied, and kissed her again.
They left the storage locker in a serious state of disarray, but all the way to the Valkyrie Matt had a spring in his steps.
ooo
"Gunner stations commence target practice, you must have good aim and good judgment —"
"Strafing gliders to the aerie, we need to get the beasts familiarized —"
"An extra hand or two in the cargo bay!"
"Bring those bombs here, and careful with the bullets!"
"Need two more crates of bolts on the second starboard cannon!"
Cries like these echoed in the air, and the soft green light of worms glowed everywhere on the snow. The entire crew had been whipped into a frenzy. Crates upon crates of air ballista bolts, high explosives, and air gun bullets were being ferried in an almost continuous stream from the Leviathan to the empty cargo holds of the Valkyrie, and the snow between the two ships had long since been stamped into a path of ice. The airmen had already divided into groups by duty, and were about familiarizing themselves with the ship they had never seen before.
It was the middle of the night now, the alpine stars and the full moon hidden behind a thick layer of clouds.
The chain of command had been vigorously debated, but it was finally settled that Captain Hobbes, who had never piloted a Fenrir class vessel before, would remain back on the Leviathan to command her hawks and bats, with a fraction of the crew and the scientists to assist him.
Matt knew, however, that there was a more ominous purpose to their staying; should the German offensive be successful, and the Valkyrie overwhelmed, the plan was to abandon the Leviathan like previously suggested, and make immediately for France. It was for this reason that the Valkyrie now carried most of the important cargo and personnel, including the two fabricators, as well as the Austrian boy and his 'family'. Captain Hobbes and the few left behind will then go deep into the Leviathan's head and set an explosive charge to her hydrogen bladders, before going out to make their surrender. To keep the crew from panicking, this information had been kept secret, but most of them probably guessed anyway. The anatomy of one of Britain's greatest weapons was too valuable to give away, even if guarding it meant ending the beast's life.
"Cruse!" shouted Hemmingfeld from somewhere on the bridge. "Stop dawdling, we have a ship to run!"
"I'll be up in a minute," Matt called out wearily, checking over the gauges one last time.
Hemmingfeld had refused to let him pilot this time, believing a night action too dangerous to entrust to a civilian, no matter how talented at aviation he might be, and Matt was stuck being co-pilot.
The bridge was crowded, much more so than before. With the Valkyrie now fully manned, it was no longer just Matt and the two Lieutenants at the instruments; six now stood at various posts, from the echolocator to the ballast boards to the rudders, and all were acquainting themselves with the setup.
"There you are, Cruse," said Hemmingfeld. "Take the helm; we have time to do one practice flight, and then we need to hide."
It was a classic decoy and ambush. The night was a cloudy one, so the Leviathan will douse her lights and hide her beasts, while the strafing gliders try to flank the Germans through the clouds. The Valkyrie will cut her own engines and remain invisible behind cloud cover.
The Leviathan's crew members have spent the past hour making the ship appear as if it'd been abandoned; they smeared fake blood over the beast, scattered instruments of all kinds in the snow, dumped a lot of the furniture, and mussed up the area enough to look like a hasty retreat. Hopefully the Germans will think they were all gone, and some of their ships might land and check the damage.
And once they do, the Valkyrie will strike, together with everything the Leviathan had left to offer, and try to deal as much damage as possible in that window of opportunity.
"Alright," Matt said, looking around at the people all around. "When do we take off?"
"There's not a moment to lose," said Hemmingfeld. "As soon as the crew's ready, we'll up ship. We need to be in the air at least an hour before the Clankers get here, and hopefully squeeze in a drill or two."
However, as It turned out, getting everyone ready was not as easy as they'd assumed. Many of the Valkyrie's features were so new and experimental as to be more or less alien to the Leviathan's crew, being as the men were from the oldest 1000-foot class airbeast in service. And if familiarizing took time, figuring out where to get your commands from took more. By the time everything was shipshape, Hemmingfeld was thoroughly convinced the operation was likely to end in disaster.
It was with this foul spirit on the bridge that the Valkyrie at last took to the air, all her guns loaded and manned. A few simple aerial drills were all that they had time for, and before long the glowing form of the Leviathan on the glacier below gently dimmed out. Without moonlight, the airbeast's impressive bulk looked to be a hill of shadows, just like any other snowy mound.
"Alright, it's time," Hemmingfeld said. "Douse the running lights. Engines off, gunners at the ready, and dump two percent of ballast."
As the orders were carried out, Matt felt the Valkyrie rise ever so gently. They maneuvered until most of the ship was nestled nice and deep into a cloud; only the bridge poked out at the bottom. It was quiet with the ship's hums gone, and the light wind produced little more than soft whistles.
Matt counted his heartbeat. He thought his hands were trembling a little at the helm, so he closed his eyes and took a few deep breaths.
When he opened them, three tiny pinpricks of yellow electrical light had appeared, floating far-off and silent in the darkness.
The Germans had arrived.
Matt nudged Hemmingfeld, and wordlessly pointed. The man scowled before noticing what he was pointing at.
"Our Clanker friends are here," he said. "Steady!" he bellowed as a rustling wave of unease broke out. "Two o'clock starboard bow. Try to see how many they brought."
The men quickly became still again, each one straining their eyes to glean just a little more information.
"I'm not sure they'll be in formation," Trenton said. "Scan the other areas as well."
He proved right when a moment later a rudder man called out.
"Another group to the right!"
"Five center, three right," said Trenton. "Anyone see more?"
"Is that two on the left?"
Matt squinted towards that direction, and sure enough, another two spots of light had appeared.
"That makes ten in total," Trenton said finally, when the ships were almost close enough to make out by their dark shapes, and it was clear there weren't going to be more. "Sizable, too, judging from the distance they have between them."
"That's a bloody lot of zepps," someone else said under their breath.
"And we still don't know how many aeroplanes there are."
"Quiet," snapped Hemmingfeld. "There's not so many that can't be fought. The Polaris won a five-to-one in Afghanistan, and that was decades before we had a ship like the Valkyrie. We can do it."
"But when do we engage?" Matt asked. "They're close enough that they'll notice the Leviathan in a few minutes."
"They shouldn't see through her disguise just yet," Trenton said. "We wait to see if they land a ground crew. If not, we launch an acid bomb at the largest ship, and fire on the rest."
"The bastards will 'ave artillery," someone said darkly. "Almost sunk us."
"It will not be easy to aim in this dark," Hemmingfeld said.
"The Leviathan was shot down at night," another crew member retorted.
"Not by artillery," the Lieutenant said sharply. "By grenade. And I assure you, a grenade will not pierce the Valkyrie."
The bridge settled back into a tense silence, as six pairs of eyes tracked the movement of the lights across the canvass of black. It was a slow business, the Germans scanning every direction before moving forward. Most ships had their search lights on by now, and it was somewhat eerie to see half a dozen yellow beams jet down from the vague dark masses in the sky to the ground.
"I mark six Kondors," Hemmingfeld said, peering through a spyglass. "Those will most likely be used to make a landing."
"No, two of those are Harpies," said Trenton, himself armed with a spyglass. "The tail is different."
There was a sigh of relief from many of the crew. Both Kondor zeppelins and their smaller cousin the Harpyien Air Assaulters specialized in air-to-ground combat, and weren't too difficult to deal with, especially with a ship of Valkyrie's calibre.
"What about the other four?" Matt asked. He hated being useless, but he knew nothing about the models and capabilities of German zeppelins. The airmen all around him were squinting their eyes, trying to make out the four bulking forms at the very back of the whole fleet.
"I do believe…" Trenton began, a second later. "But I thought they only had one at Constance?"
"Apparently," Hemmingfeld said angrily, "they had three."
"Three what?" Matt asked. All he could see were the huge, elongated forms, still shrouded by night and clouds, probably around 600 feet — twice the size of the Valkyrie. And the monster behind them was even more massive, close to 800 feet in length, almost rivaling the Leviathan.
"Albtraum-class sky destroyers," answered Trenton. "Two of their prototypes wiped out the French air fleet back in the 70s, and nearly leveled Paris itself. And the one you see behind them? That's the flagship of the Lake Constance air base, the largest airship of the Luftstreitkräfte — the SMS Ragnarok."
Author's Notes:
For those of you wondering, the night of August 5, 1914 was indeed a night of full moon.
Albtraum means Nightmare in German.
"The 70s" of course meant the 1870s, which saw the Franco-Prussian War (a war that France had fought over nothing, really, and some now think it was all Bismarck's plan to provoke the French into declaring war). Paris was captured by Prussian forces after a 3-month siege, forcing a French surrender.
