Harry Takes Off: Astounding Stories of Adventure (Iron Pegasus Book 1) Read online

  The door at the end, unlike those we had passed, was designed to be air-tight and possessed a rotating locking mechanism. It took two of us, Ishar and me, braced against the walls to gain sufficient purchase in order to turn it.

  When it was fully unlocked we put our shoulders to it. It resisted our efforts for a long moment and then, after a particularly strenuous effort, it gave with a puff of air. The door flew open and struck the inner wall. If there had been atmosphere I don’t doubt it would have resounded with a tremendous clang.

  Then I jumped as another body floated out, no doubt driven by the flow of the thin atmosphere within the room. We watched it pass, and then the Captain brought out his pistol once more. This body was wearing a suit not unlike our own, but as the man’s chest came into view we saw three bullet wounds, and blood stains, in the strong rubberised fabric.

  Sept 3rd, 1874, 10:45

  The space we now entered was a short passage with a similar door at the far end with a rotating lock mechanism. The Captain approached it and gestured for Ishar and me to open it in the same manner as before. I noted Ishar was examining the wall next to the door and tapped him on the shoulder.

  He glanced around as I pointed to the Captain. I pushed against the wall and drifted towards this next obstacle. Such was my increasing confidence in this strange new world that, when my initial impulse caused me to rotate, I simply stretched out my arm and dragged my fingers along the wall to arrest the motion. I came to a gentle halt next to the Captain. He was still looking behind me and I turned. The thought that Ishar might be disobeying an order crossed my mind. The Indian Mutiny was not so long ago as to be forgotten. But, within his helmet, I could see him shaking his head, as he drifted in our direction.

  The Captain turned to face him, and I followed his example, as Ishar gestured for us to draw close. I was quite taken aback since Ishar was even less vocal than I. If he wished to originate a communication it must be important. We touched helmets.

  “Is there a problem, Mr Ram?” asked the Captain.

  “Excuse me, Captain. No disrespect intended. I have observation.”

  “Out with it then, Mr Ram.”

  Ishar paused as if gathering his words. “We close this door first. There is air beyond other door.”

  “And why do you think that?”

  “There is mechanism in wall for equalisation of atmosphere. There—” he indicated behind us “—and there.” He pointed at a place beside the next door.

  I pointed my helmet lamp at the wall, and sure enough, flush within the wall was a small door. I reached out and placed my thumb into a gap that allowed me to pull it. Sure enough the spring-loaded hatch door flipped open, revealing a lever. I realised I had lost contact with Ishar’s helmet and leaned back. “…old sea-going vessels.”

  “We will do as you suggest, Mr Ram.”

  The Captain indicated I should close the hatch by which we had entered. We had to assume, since we had had to fight against the atmospheric pressure to open the door, the valve mechanism must be in its closed position. I examined it briefly and noted it was in the same position as the one at the other end.

  This fact alone gave me pause. If both valves (and both doors) were in the closed position how was it that there had been almost no air contained within this room? Had it leaked out? Or had it been emptied and then air leaked from the farther door? It seemed likely that either one or other of the hatches or valves was not completely sealed.

  It made little difference. We were not intending to remain for any extended duration. Our task now was simply to identify the origin of this vessel and take that information back to Her Majesty’s Government.

  The Captain arranged things thusly: Ishar was given the task of operating the valve while I stood ready to operate the door mechanism. The Captain held his gun ready a short distance back, to give him a clear view and time to respond to any threat.

  It was not that I did not trust the Captain’s skill with a gun, but I did not relish being in his firing line. I resolved to push away from the door as soon as I had it opening.

  The Captain signalled to Ishar Ram who proceeded to pull the lever. For a long time it seemed as if nothing were happening, then I heard a distant sound. It was a constant hiss that grew steadily louder. It took me more than a minute before I realised the significance of the noise. It meant there was atmosphere to carry the sound. The room was filling with air. Ishar had been entirely right.

  The hissing sound diminished to nothing. I heard the Captain’s voice, muffled through two helmets, instructing me to open the door. I applied pressure to the wheel and it turned more easily than the other, even so each rotation was accompanied by an excruciating grind of metal. If there were any living person beyond this door they would doubtless be alerted to our presence.

  The locking mechanism reached its final turn and I glanced back at the Captain. I nodded, as yet unaccustomed to the fact that I could simply speak.

  “Open the door, Mr Finley-Blythe,” ordered the Captain.

  I braced my knee against the bulkhead and pulled hard. The door came free with only the slightest stickiness and then flew back. I let go and rocketed back across the room. My helmet struck the wall with tremendous force and the reverberating noise inside was deafening. The rest of my body thudded against the metal of the ship. I cursed the perversity of Creation in granting my wish to escape possible injury from gunfire and replacing it with indignity and bruising.

  When I regained my composure I found myself alone with only the shadow of Ishar passing through into the next room. The Captain must already have entered.

  I do not claim to be a hero. I have little in my personal experience to suggest I am a brave person but seeing my compatriots entering a possible dangerous situation energised me. I gathered myself against the bulkhead and launched myself the length of the room. Just as I had when I first flew weightless, I caught the top of the door and guided myself through. On this occasion I maintained my grip to absorb my speed and entered the room at a practical velocity.

  The room we entered was our hoped-for destination. We had reached the Bridge. There were chart tables and even a large Babbage analytical, though an old model. The forward wall boasted windows composed of thick glass and the light of the Sun was slanting through, moving across the room as the ship turned.

  Ishar and the Captain had made their way to the centre of the open space. They were looking back in my direction but they were not looking at me. The Captain was in the process of lowering his gun, his attention fully occupied by the man who hung effortlessly between wall and floor. And in this man’s hand was a large gun, the muzzle of which was pointing directly at me.

  Sept 3rd, 1874, 11:10

  I had received basic training when I joined the Navy. It had been six weeks of my life that I would gladly forget. My natural capacity for handling the mathematics and algebra required for the position of computationer, or navigator, did not suit the rough and tumble of combat. I did not excel; I was merely adequate.

  But in those few weeks I had become reasonably adept in the handling of the pistol and rifle, and which part of a gun could be considered safe. As good as that training was, it did not involve having the dangerous end pointing in my direction.

  “When did Lassiter get reinforcements?” the man demanded of me. His eyes were wide and I recognised a kindred feeling in him: that of fear. I could not place his accent. It was not British, though he spoke English without hesitation, it might have been Australian, or perhaps South African. His skin was tanned but his features marked him as a Caucasian.

  “Who is Lassiter?” asked the Captain calmly. The man jerked his eyes in the Captain’s direction, and the gun’s barrel moved out of direct line with my chest. With the immediate threat removed I took in the look of this man: on board a ship that should not even exist. He appeared to be wearing a uniform of sorts with a naval cut. It was grey in colour and where a uniform is usually cut tight around the limbs—just as ours were—h
is was loose to permit ease of movement. I deduced it was designed to be worn in an environment of constant weightlessness.

  But he did not have the look of a sailor. It is a difficult thing to put into words, but there was a softness about him, as if he were not used to the physical labour that running even a “Void ship” might entail. He had a ragged beard of several days’ growth and his clothes were not clean. I wondered how long he had been here alone.

  “Don’t try to be clever. That’s the door that leads from the engine room. When did you come on board?”

  “I remove my helmet,” said Ishar. I was once more astonished; I would wait for any cue from the Captain before making a move. I thought that would be Ishar’s first thought also. And yet, for a second time, he was acting with independence. I believe I envied him that strength of will.

  The gun swung away from me completely and pointed directly at our engineer. He raised his hands to his helmet without rushing and undogged the catches. He gave the helmet a twist and lifted it off. I saw him react with disgust as he drew in his first breath. It was at this point I realised his plan: our air was limited, better we used what we had around us to preserve our own supplies.

  The Captain had been watching him carefully. He stowed his gun in his pocket in an easy move that did not attract attention. Whoever this man was, he must be inexperienced in any form of armed combat since he had not demanded his potential enemy hand over his weapon. The Captain unlatched and removed his helmet.

  I followed suit. My movements attracted his attention until he determined I was simply doing the same thing. The outside air flooded in and I breathed in a sewer of scents. I almost choked, and considered what the sanitary arrangements might be on such a vessel. It must be a problem they had solved but if there were no water closet in this sealed area? I chose not to think more along those lines.

  “What’s your name?” asked the Captain.

  “What’s yours?”

  “Captain James Chingwell, RN. This is my engineer Ishar Ram; and that’s my computationer Lawrence Finley-Blythe. And you?”

  “What’s R-N?”

  “Royal Navy.”

  This response was met with confused silence for a moment as he mouthed the words the Captain had spoken. Then he laughed, though it came out as more of a bark and was entirely without humour.

  “Good joke,” he said. “But stupid.” He raised his gun and fired in the direction of Ishar. There was the sound of a metallic ricochet followed quickly by another. Ishar had twisted himself in an attempt to avoid the bullet but it seemed it had not been aimed directly at him. “Lie to me again, Captain Chingwell, and I will kill your crew. And then you.”

  There was the slight chink of metal on metal above my head and I looked up to see the twisted remains of the bullet bounce off the ceiling and float towards the window. The ship had turned again. The windows now looked out on a black sky filled with stars, with a quarter-moon hanging there. I watched the rotating fragment of metal as it headed away from me. Something at the edge of the window caught my eye: a shadow blocked a few stars at the corner of the glass, and then moved away again. I peered intently but saw nothing further. I must have imagined it.

  The Captain sighed. “What do you want to know?”

  “That’s better,” he shifted his position but kept his gun trained on Ishar. “What’s Lassiter planning?”

  “We’ve only just come aboard. He hasn’t confided in us.”

  I wondered if there was any way I could change the balance of power, whether I could distract him without putting anyone at risk. I was still by the door. The fool hadn’t forced us to move together so he could keep us all in view. I lifted my helmet slowly so as not to attract his attention and carefully unscrewed the air hoses from it. I kept my eyes fixed on the man so I could stop if he looked in my direction.

  “What was your plan coming up here?”

  “To see if you were alive, to parley if need be.” I was amazed at how the Captain kept to the truth and gave nothing away. The first hose came free in my hand. I saw the Captain glance in my direction. He did not shake his head but looked back quickly.

  “Perhaps someone new to talk to can give you a new perspective,” he continued. “What is it you want?”

  The second hose drifted away from the helmet. I took a firm hold of the top of the door and swung my arm back. I threw the helmet at our captor, the force of it swung me back, according to Newton’s First Law, but as I maintained my grip on the door frame the force pushed me back through the doorway, out of sight.

  The man gave a cry of surprise and the deck echoed once more to gunfire. Intent on assisting my fellow crewmen I pulled myself back into the room. Only to watch, in horror, as a small section of the outer wall, near the window, erupted inwards.

  The force of the detonation pummelled me backwards and the noise beat against my ears, only to be replaced by the scream of the precious atmosphere escaping into the blackness of the Void.

  Sept 3rd, 1874, 11:14

  During our training, the risk of a puncture to the hull had been a constant worry. We had drilled incessantly on the actions to take in such an eventuality. What one did depended on the nature of the breach. However we had not drilled on how to deal with such a situation when under threat from a third party, at whom one had just thrown one’s helmet.

  The explosion inwards from the hull was short-lived. Within moments the desire of the interior atmosphere to escape into the Void overcame the power of the explosion. The room was filled with the screeching of escaping air, while loose articles floated at increasing speed towards the rupture.

  Recovering my helmet was foremost in my mind as the movement of the air pulled me across the Bridge. As I tried to locate it, I saw the Captain pulling his helmet into position, and the feet of our adversary disappearing into the room behind him. He had not been wearing a Void-suit so I surmised he was intending to put one on.

  I spotted my helmet, drifting at ever-increasing speed towards the breach in the hull. In a moment of terror I realised there was nothing in my vicinity I could use to push myself off and achieve the velocity needed for me to catch it before it disappeared through the opening and was lost to the Void. I struggled against the air around me, trying to gain purchase on its very particles. To no avail.

  “Finley-Blythe!”

  The Captain’s voice cut through my panic and I turned towards him. His helmet was in position and he had launched himself from the table in my direction. He rocketed along a trajectory intended to intercept me, his arms outstretched.

  In times of emergency, any means will do. As he approached he twisted his body in the air so he impacted feet first, bending his legs to absorb the impact. Then he straightened his legs in a firm thrust that launched us in opposite directions, he towards the ceiling and I down into the corner. It was reminiscent of billiard balls careening off one another.

  The impulse he had imparted to me caused me to rotate in the air; however this was to my advantage as I came up against the wall feet first. Just as the Captain had done I allowed my legs to absorb the impact. I craned my head to see what I must do.

  The helmet was continuing to accelerate towards the hole. Those instant mental calculations at which the human mind is so skilled told me it would be a close thing. With the kind of strength only emergency can facilitate, I launched myself with as much force as I could muster. It did not matter with what velocity I struck the far side as long as I had my helmet.

  I miscalculated.

  It took me less than a moment of flight to see that my path through the atmosphere was changing. While I had become skilled at figuring straight-line flight in a weightless condition, I had not allowed for the rotation of the very ship itself, and how it turned the atmosphere within it. My mass, compared to that of the helmet, was significantly less affected by the air particles. As a result, the helmet did not maintain its straight course, but I did. In the short time it took me to traverse the distance, it moved just out o
f range. I flailed my arms in a vain attempt to reach it.

  I struck the window and turned to watch in despair as my life saver accelerated inexorably towards the breach in the hull.

  Seemingly from nowhere Ishar appeared. He was not moving fast but, like a rugby player, he intercepted my helmet, caught it in the crook of his arm, and held it tight to his body.

  A movement beyond the window caught my eye. My attention was pulled from Ishar as I realised there was a group of three men in Void-suits outside on the hull. Each had a gun in his hand and watched the escaping air and random oddments it carried with it.

  I could not conceive what kind of internecine conflict we had stumbled into but these men must be part of the “Lassiter” faction. As I watched, the flow of escaping air reduced sharply.

  Bringing my attention back to the interior I saw that Ishar had been carried to the breach and his body now blocked it. He had released my helmet and it drifted. I pushed off and grabbed it before it floated too far.

  Filled with relief I turned it to the correct position in order to put it on, and went cold. I remembered the gunshot when I distracted the crewman. A neat bullet hole punctured the glass with striated cracks leading from it.

  Ishar jerked and cried out. I stared at him in confusion. He was fumbling at the latches of his own helmet but he did not seem concentrated on the task. Again he cried out.

  “Take my helmet,” he said, his voice strained as if he were in agony.

  “No, you need it,” I replied, though my heart went out to him for such a noble gesture.

  But he was not listening. His eyes lost their focus. His hands ceased to work the catches of his helmet then a few drops of blood escaped from his mouth and floated from his face.

  Sept 3rd, 1874, 11:16