Chapter 7

Don't mess with Sky

Coro stood looking over the damage on Sky.

"Boy what a mess." she muttered to herself as Harrow nailed the mast back on to its stumpy base.

As Harrow finished nailing on the mast, he turned and tripped on the dents made by her feet when she stopped the tree.

"Oh Come on!" Harrow cried in despair as she snickered in amusement.

While Harrow began to pound out the dents, Coro turned and saw Asbel and Nausicaa coming with their bags on their back.

"Ready for your cabin assignments?" Coro asked rhetorically as she helped them onto the ship. Coro lead them to the cabins and opened on of the doors.

"This is your bunk room Asbel." Coro said and closed the door behind him before turning to the opposite door and pulling it open and noticed that it was the same room.

As Nausicaa gave a questioning look to Coro, with a shrug Coro told her, "I didn't chose the room."

…

After they had dropped off their stuff, Coro lead them to a large room with padded walls.

"Ok, it's time for you to officially join the crew." Coro told them.

"I thought we already did." Asbel replied.

"Nope." Coro said as she pulled out the steam ball, aimed at Nausicaa, and fired. Asbel suddenly stepped in front of Nausicaa, and the ball hit him in the chest, went through, and hit Nausicaa in the chest.

'Not good.' Coro thought, remembering her dad's experience with Kirito and Asuna, as Asbel and Nausicaa fell to the ground.

'This could be a useful teaching tool for San.' Coro thought before ordering a second later, "Sky, please tell San to report to the training room."

…

As San entered the training room, Coro woke Asbel and Nausicaa.

"San, do you remember when you could hear Ashitaka's thoughts?" Coro asked as Nausicaa sat upright and Asbel wiped his face.

San nodded and Coro continued, "I wanted you here to see another possibility could have been, had you both gotten hit by the same ball."

"Asbel, you stepped in front of the steam ball intended for Nausicaa, there are extreme consequences for doing that." Coro informed the trio, letting it sink in for a moment, "Because you were hit by the same ball you both have the same powers, wings, and abilities. But you also have a curse. You both are able to switch bodies with each other if you have the exact same thought, emotion, or feeling."

Suddenly, both straightened and looked at each other with distress.

"I'm guessing you just had that happen." Coro replied with a slightly amused grin.

"Unfortunately, yes." Asbel said from Nausicaa's body.

"Another part of the curse is that one can control the other's body if the will is stronger than the other's. And, San pay attention to what I'm saying next; all of your emotions, feelings, thoughts, and senses are shared. San, they don't have a barrier like you and Ashitaka have." Coro ended and saw the look of distress on all three faces. Again, Nausicaa and Asbel froze and looked up at the same time as they switched back to their original bodies.

"Coro Ca-"

"If your going to ask me to switch you back next time, the answer is no. It's a power you have to learn to control on your own." Coro interrupted, "Now let's get back to work on repairs."

…

Several hours later, Coro sat in the crow's nest and watched the villagers work on all the fields, while Harrow and Asbel worked tirelessly on the aero- pods below.

Suddenly, Coro heard a deep thrumming sound began to grow from behind the sea cliffs.

"Coro! Do you hear that?" Nausicaa shouted up to her.

"Yeah! What is that?" Coro shouted down.

"It sounds like an airship. But we are at peace with the Dolomites, so it must be Tomikian." Asbel called up from beside Harrow.

Coro turned to the entrance they had come in and saw four huge airships flying low over the ground.

"Harrow! Get inside Sky and stay hidden!" Coro ordered as people rushed for the castle.

'I can almost fly, why do you want to hide him?' Sky asked Coro as the ships landed in the grassy plane.

'So he can come after us.' Coro replied as she scaled down to the deck and watched the approaching soldiers and tanks.

Coro, Asbel, and Nausicaa stood calmly as they were surrounded by soldiers.

"Halt! Dont move! You are now prisoners of the Tomikian empire." One of the soldiers cried as they raised their weapons.

An hour later, after they were taken prisoner, the trio stood at the base of a ramp that led into the belly of one of the large airships. As they stood there, surrounded by guards, a lady in golden armor and cape walked out of the airship and stood facing them.

"Well, well..Nausica, we meet again." The woman said and looked at Coro before turning to one of the guards and asking, "Why is she still armed?"

"Ah, her weapon is a dull iron sword, it can't do any harm to our silicone armor and we can easily cut through it if need be." One of the guards replied nervously, as Coro saw Call and Meco being frog marched next to them.

"Take off for Tomikia and take them with you." the lady said as she walked away, towards the castle.

"So, how are you settling in princess?" Meco asked them as they were shoved into seats in the top of the airship.

"I'm not the princess, she's in my body." Asbel replied apparently in Nausicaa's body.

"Eh! What happened to you?!" Call cried in disbelief.

"Coro, Could you please change us back?" Nausicaa asked from Asbel's body as the airships took off.

"The answer is the same, I won't change you back, it's a power you'll have to learn to control on your own." Coro replied sternly.

"Will someone please tell me what's going on?!" Meco cried in near hysteria.

"Fine, for…" Coro calmly explained to them for several minutes.

…

After about an hour of sitting on the airships, Coro suddenly turned to her companions and asked, "Shall we escape now?"

"What do you mean escape?" Meco asked, worried about the answer he'll get.

Coro replied, "Watch out the windows, Five….Four….Three…" and counted down. Exactly when Coro said zero, four tall masts full of sails, followed by Sky burst through the cloud layer they were flying over, and dwarfed the airships.

"Whoa~!" Everyone in the cockpit said, except Coro, at the sight of the massive ship.

"I suggest you find a place to land." Coro told the pilots.

"Open fire!" the commander yelled at the gunners.

"Bad choice." Coro said as machine guns sprayed bullets over Sky.

Suddenly, the steam whistles bellowed loudly, "Oh~ boy, he's mad now." Coro muttered as six massive cannons swiveled out the side of the ship, each the height of a deck.

"Come on, we're getting out of here." Coro said as she guided the others out of the cabin in the confusion.

As Coro walked along, she pulled open a door and entered the cargo bay in the nose of the airship.

"So how do we get out of here?" Meco asked Coro.

"We fly." Coro replied as she opened her wings and Asbel and Nausicaa did the same.

"But how do we get out?" Call asked after he got over the shock of the wings.

"By flying!" Nausicaa replied as she pulled out a glider and tied a rope to the bottom.

As Call and Meco settled into the harnesses, Coro thought aloud, "Now all we need is a door."

With a deafening boom, the front doors blasted open and Coro saw Sky directly in front of them.

"Jump! Everybody jump!" Coro ordered as she ran off the edge of the deck and fell several hundred feet before opening her wings.

As Coro climbed in altitude, she checked to make sure that everyone escaped safely from the cargo bay. With amusement, Coro watched as Nausicaa and Asbel flew like the wind, while dodging the hail of lead from the damaged airship and hauled the loaded glider.

'Those two are great flyers.' Coro thought as the party landed. But, as Coro came in for her landing, one of the men got a lucky shot and hit her wing tip. Coro cried out in pain as she fell to the ground below.

"No!" Asbel yelled as he watched Coro fall.

"What's wrong, Coro can take a fall like that." Harrow told the group as he walked on deck.

"Yea, but she might fall in one of the cursed springs." Asbel replied worriedly.

"Cursed springs?" Harrow asked confused.

"We are above several hundred cursed springs in the mountains of Pejite, if she touches the water that curse will fall on her." Asbel explained quickly.

Suddenly, Sky banked downward and quickly dropped altitude.

"What the heck? Nobody is at the wheel, it must be Sky doing this." Harrow said as everyone fell to the ground as Sky dropped even faster.

…

Coro opened her eyes and saw a tired old man with a long white beard staring into her face.

"Ugg, what happened?" Coro asked as her head reeled in dizziness.

"You fell in the cursed pool of machine." The old man replied.

"What does that mean?"

"It means that if you come into contact with cold water, you might turn into a machine. It's a fifty-fifty chance and the only remedy is hot water." The old man replied as he looked at Coro's hurt wing.

"My, my.. you have great healing abilities. I just removed this bullet, and the wound is already half way heald, you'll be able to fly again in a day or so." the man said after a moment of looking at the wing. The man turned and walked off saying, "Good luck guardian."

'Well that was weird.' Coro thought as she saw Sky break below the clouds and begin to land on it's feet.

"Coro! Are you alright?!" Nausicaa yelled down to Coro.

"I have something to say when I get on, and I won't be able to fly for a few days." Coro said as she raced up one of the massive legs.

As Coro got on deck, she explained to the group what had happened to her.

"I was afraid that you fell into one of the horrible ones." Asbel told the group as Harrow sailed Sky back to the valley of the wind.

"They get worse?" San asked in disbelief.

"The most notable one changes you into the opposite gender if you come into contact with cold water, someone of the opposite gender, or if you are extremely stressed." Asbel told them as the group sat at a card table set up on the bridge.

"One of my friends fell into the one Coro did, he turned into a machine, a different one for each situation, when he was at the limit of his energy, or touched ice water." Nausicaa told them.

"Oh yeah. I remember Jimbe, he'd turn tomato red in the face before he transformed into a pink machine! Ha!" Meco laughed as he remembered.

Suddenly, the floor shook as Sky set down in front of the castle.

"All ashore, who's going ashore!... Or is it below?" Harrow said as he opened the door to the bridge and guided the party to the deck.

"Be good Nausicaa!" both men yelled as they stepped off and Sky began to take off.

As Coro watched the somber event, Nausicaa and Asbel suddenly looked at each other in surprise before smiling at each other as they walked to the bridge.

"What's with the goofy grins?" Coro asked as they entered the bridge and Sky began to jump.

"If Asbel and I are in the same room, we'll have to get married before long. It's quite hard to do something on your own if you switch to somewhere else." Asbel said, signaling to Coro that they switched bodies again.

"Well, get some rest. I'll take first watch." Coro told everyone as she took the wheel after Sky finished the jump.