Half a Soul Apart, page 14
Inside was a red village clustered with brick huts. The wall was to keep out the Half-Souls, no doubt.
It quickly spread through the village that Hessy was some sort of found pet. Kids without tattoos or spears danced up to stroke her messy red hair, some of whom gave it a good pull.
She didn’t like the over-hyped attention they showed her. She was swiftly led through the built-up village to where the largest hut stood at its center. More guards were there, unmoving, next to the hut’s brown door.
“Sun King! Sun King! Sun King!” the natives chanted.
A large, beefy man emerged, with effort, from the hut. He was so different from the villagers. His bald, brown head was clinging onto its last tufts of thinning black hair. When he spotted her, his black beard and double chin wobbled in laughter.
“Well, well, well.” He spoke in a familiar accent. “Welcome, to Red Kingdom! I’m King Sunny, this is my Tribe of loyal jungle hunters! And you are?”
“Lost.”
King Sunny boomed out a laugh at that. “And your name?”
She didn’t know where this was going but everyone seemed in good spirits now.
“Hessy,” she finally said.
King Sunny repeated her name loudly to his villagers.
“HESSY! HESSY!” they all chanted back at the same time.
A couple of kids swung her arms like she was a sock toy.
“I’m glad to have you in my village. You have no idea how glad. I bet you crash-landed here, am I right?”
“Yes,” she said. “And then attacked by a Half-Soul.”
She had already suspected that it was these natives who had dug out the pit Raphael fell into. Gaging by their reaction, she was right.
The villagers released her with petrified whimpers. Mothers shielded their children and a few brave warriors lifted their spears.
The king however just stared at Hessy.
“What do you know about Half-Souls?” he asked quietly.
In one sweeping motion he took Hessy under his heavy arm and swept her into his hut.
“Not much,” she confessed.
King Sunny shut out the noise of the tribe as he slammed his door with a snap. Hessy leaned back from him as he turned his head to grin at her.
“We’re safe inside this village; the fence is too high for them,” he assured himself under his breath. “They never come.”
Hessy frowned. “They don’t come anywhere near the village. Why?”
King Sunny gave a dark look. “Because …”
“Is there an Alchemist here?”
“You don’t sound surprised?”
“I’m starting to think that they are everywhere.”
King Sunny took Hessy into a circular room with downy bags and rolled out grass rugs. He gestured for her to take a seat in one of the bags. Hessy sat cross-legged on the floor, her muscles stiff from tensing so much.
“Are you from Craggen?” he asked.
“How’d you know?”
“Your accent. Besides, one of us falls here by accident sooner or later. Myself included. And we never leave.”
“How long have you been here?”
He waved that off with his beefy arm. “No matter. Nice, hidden little jungle isn’t it? Are you a pilot?”
“Engineer, sir.”
“An engineer you say?” he said, his eyes lighting up. “How good of one are you I wonder? I actually have a small airship quite close.”
"Really?" Hessy said, leaping to her feet.
King Sunny chuckled. "Don't get too excited. It hasn't flown for about twenty-five years or so. It's sitting in the field opposite the village."
"Twenty-five years, that's okay."
"It was old when I bought it. Let me just show you. If you can fix it, you can have it," he promised, waddling out his hut.
She couldn't believe it, all this time there had been a ship here just waiting for Hessy to get her hands on it.
The sun was slowly settling into an orange dusk, shadows from the jungle stretched towards the village like long claws. Hessy passed by a cooking pot and tethered to a post next to a woman was Maps. He was hissing louder than the pot being boiled. Hessy tried not to panic as she thought about shoving the woman into the pot instead.
“Umm, King Sunny? That’s my tiger cub. Can I ask that they don’t eat it?” Hessy said. She had to be careful. In a tribe like this she didn’t know what the rules or laws were, and she didn’t fancy going in a cooking pot herself. She had to stay on the king’s good side.
King Sunny raised his eyebrows. "Oh? But tiger is a delicacy for us." “Very well,” he said. He approached the cub and sliced it free of the rope.
Hessy snatched up Maps before he changed his mind.
King Sunny went outside the fence and only Hessy and ten warriors followed.
"It's just over the other side of this hill here," the king wheezed as he struggled up the slope. The warriors chanted his name in encouragement.
Hessy climbed ahead of the rest. She had a good view at the top. To her right was the Jungle of Death, a canopy of green lush trees stretching out seemingly forever. Ahead of her rose a red cliff, like a wall preventing them from leaving. Directly below was a small rusty, black airship. Roots and vegetation were beginning to encase its belly and it was clear the jungle was starting to claim it. Despite her studying, she couldn’t identify the model though.
King Sunny had finally caught up to her.
"What model is it?" she asked.
"An old Cloudtail. I bought it off a pilot buddy of mine way back," he said proudly. “Shall we?”
Hessy led the way down the tricky slope while King Sunny followed, his warriors supporting him in case he fell.
She jogged the last bit of the slope and made her way onto the flatter ground where the Cloudtail rested. It was indeed a small airship, yet it looked solid. She could tell that it had been made from some sort of dense black metal that was no longer used on today's airships.
"Beauty, isn't she?"
Hessy nodded in agreement. Everything was surprisingly still intact. The cockpit windows were dark and fogged up and even though it was starting to rust she could tell that it was built for speed.
"Very beautiful."
"Wait until you see the engine," King Sunny said.
Hessy’s fingers were itching.
“What happened to it? Apart from it sitting here for a while, obviously.” She scraped her frizzy hair back into a tie.
King Sunny blew out his lips. “Let’s see. I guess there was a seized piston, I remember hearing the back rattling followed by a loss in power just before the rudder in my hands jammed. I hit those cliffs over there and down she went.”
“Let me take a look,” Hessy said.
King Sunny smiled. “Have at it. I’ll leave some guards here to escort you back into the village when you’re done.”
***
There wasn’t much space inside the Cloudtail as Hessy explored its basic interior.
The airship felt cramped inside, and the ceilings hung so low that even she had to duck through the passageway. The engine room lay in a fine layer of red dust and she was slightly worried to see that some of the copper structures had started to oxidize and turn green. If she was getting this to fly, she had a nagging feeling it wouldn’t be for long. Getting a hold of coal or something to burn hot enough might prove a challenge as well. She knew, without even looking, a place like this will be fresh out of compressed blue coal which fueled every airship for the past decade.
The first thing Hessy did was map out a plan of repair on a parchment which wasn’t easy as her charcoal stick was down to its last centimeters.
She worked until she was disturbed by banging from outside. The guards were calling her name. Clearly, they were impatient to return to their village before dark.
She crawled outside. The two tribesmen were waving at her impatiently. She left with them, climbing back up the hill. They had just gotten to the other side, the village coming into their sights, when both of the tribesmen fell one by one on each side of her, their spears and shields clattering uselessly to the ground.
Thoughts of a Half-Soul made her move quickly towards the village.
"Hessy!"
She turned around.
Raphael was there, like he had never left her.
He stood in the middle of the two men. “I’ve been looking everywhere for you.”
The Cloudtail
Luckily, the tribesmen were just unconscious. King Sunny was all a bit creepy but Hessy really wanted to get her hands on that Cloudtail.
“What were you doing with them?” Raphael asked.
“They got me safely out the jungle and I’m on good terms with their local king. They all live in that village over there.”
“Hessy …” Raphael began, looking guilty, but she cut him off, not ready to forgive him in that moment.
“Just help me get them back into the village. We shouldn’t cause trouble here and it’d be better if we stayed on King Sunny’s good side.”
“King Sunny?”
“Their leader. We’re safer in that village than in this Jungle of Death.”
“I leave you alone for a few minutes and you’ve already blessed this place,” he said, trying to keep up.
“There’s an airship Raphael, on the other side of that hill, it might be our ticket out of here, if I can fix it up.”
He weighed their options, which was just about zero. “I wanted to avoid that village.”
***
As expected, King Sunny wasn’t happy about two of his tribesmen laying out-cold at his feet.
“Did you do this?” he demanded of Raphael. He lifted a beefy hand. A spear whittled through the air, straight for Raphael. Hessy screamed but he spun hitting the shaft with the back of his hand and redirected it towards the ground.
“Stop!” Hessy said to King Sunny. “He’s my friend.”
King Sunny stared at Raphael with something like repulsion and even a little fear.
“He’s my fellow engineer – I need him to repair the craft,” she added quickly.
King Sunny relaxed his hands. “Lower your weapons.”
The order was followed instantly.
Hessy could tell that Raphael was suspicious of the leader’s image as he narrowed his eye at the fat, King Sunny.
“Who the hell are you?”
"W-what? I should be asking you that, boy!" King Sunny spluttered.
The warriors tensed in defense of their King.
King Sunny looked beyond furious. “So, he’s a friend of yours Miss Hessy?”
“Yes,” she said.
“Most peculiar,” King Sunny said. “Do what you wish with my Cloudtail. You are welcome into my village, whatever you need.”
Once the king had disappeared into his hut and the villagers had dispersed, Raphael turned to her.
"Are you sure we can fix this airship of his?" he asked.
“Hundred per cent,” Hessy said with so much confidence that Raphael actually, finally smiled.
As they returned to the Cloudtail, a group of village youths trailed curiously behind them. She could tell they feared Raphael, their eyes would shift uneasily to him, but she could also see a creepy kind of awe there too.
Hessy climbed back into the Cloudtail and wriggled to the back of the engine room for a closer inspection. She worked through the night and well into the morning, spending hours trying to undo the damage from the seized piston. As the morning turned to afternoon Raphael came into the tight space.
“How’s it coming?” he asked, looking around at what he found was a lack of progress.
Hessy crawled out from underneath the main boiler and stood up to face him, wiping her dirty hands on a piece of cloth.
“I'll get on a lot better if you'd help,” she said to him.
“I don't know a thing about fixing engines. Just have it in the air as quick as possible," he told her.
"I know; I know," Hessy sighed. "Trust me, I don't like this jungle any better than you do."
She ducked back beside the engine, putting all her strength into turning the spanner in her white knuckled grip. Her wrist gave a twinge making her wince.
"We have to go to Scerah," he said.
"I know.”
“It’s been too long already.”
“I’m working as hard as I can.”
“Work harder,” he snapped.
The spanner slipped from her sore hand and clattered onto the metal floor.
Hessy gave him a furious stare. “Hell, I think I liked you better when you were the charming, corrupt lieutenant.”
He clenched his jaw but didn’t say anything.
She thought of the Caelum Militia and her face lit up with excitement as it dawned on her.
“This is a Nordvestur Federation airship, I remember now. The first ever, two manned air assault craft! We barely scraped the surface of Cloudtails, but now I remember studying them in my second year in the apprentice program! Isn’t that great, an actual ancestor of Federation crafts today!” Hessy exclaimed.
“That doesn’t help us fix it any faster,” Raphael said popping her happy bubble. “Does it?”
“Probably not,” she said, picking her spanner back up.
With Raphael’s unhelpful company, she missed Nattie and the boys, even Arky would have been better company. Raphael’s epic mood swings were getting tiresome. He was going to have to get over the scarring he had. True, Lieutenant Raphael Halcrow had been handsome, but she had never expected him to be so vain about his loss of looks. There was no denying he looked a little different.
But to her, he looked more than fine. She felt heat and goosebumps spread across her whole face as she secretly confessed it to herself. She didn’t know why she was fighting so hard against her growing feelings for him. Maybe it was fear of ever finding out he would never feel the same way about her. Not the way she wanted.
"Gineer Hessy!"
She jumped, accidently hitting the spanner into her eye.
“Ow! Bleeding Jupiter! Stop creeping up on me!” she scalded a pair of weedy children for the third time that morning.
They giggled and scampered back out the room, no doubt to play with the controls again. Raphael showed little patience for the kids. She could hear him scaring them off outside.
Hessy wiped her brow, smearing a greasy mark across her skin. She was hot and bothered, working up a sweat being squashed between metal.
The study on Cloudtails had been brief during her early academy years before moving on to newer airship engines. To Hessy’s knowledge, there wasn’t a working Cloudtail left out there. They had been most useful during the late Caspadian Air Wars. Their light handling and speed carried the military pilots safely from the bigger Crusade Ships. And towards the end of the last war they had been used for close range battles, the thick black metal proving sturdy against cannons.
“Don't worry old lady, you'll fly proudly again. I promise.”
This craft was nothing but a flightless bird but Hessy was determined to get it working once again, even if twenty-five cold years of neglect were against her.
***
Late in the afternoon, Hessy surfaced into the hot sticky sunlight, parched and desperate for a drink of water. She left the Cloudtail and made her way back into the village. It wasn’t a long walk from the craft to the village, maybe ten minutes, but unshaded from the burning sun it felt like longer.
The kids immediately swarmed her again when she entered the village.
“Water,” Hessy said to them, a little out of breath.
She mimed drinking. They pulled on her tired arms almost unbalancing her. “No, I need some water-”
“Here you go little miss,” a slurred voice hiccoughed. King Sunny staggered up to her, sweat dripped off his fat nose and into his smiling mouth. He pushed through the village kids and handed her a wooden cup. “Thirsty? Drink this.”
“Thank you.”
She took the cup and quickly gulped down the entire contents in two massive swallows.
Suddenly, Hessy’s mouth, throat and chest burned so intensely it made her eyes water. She had just swallowed fire. She dropped the cup in a panic and coughed violently.
The king roared with laughter, holding his fat belly for support.
Had he just given her poison?
In a panic, Hessy stuck her fingers down her throat and forced herself to vomit the liquid back out her body. She bent over double, spraying the brown grass in a bright green. The village kids leapt back from her.
“Careful!” King Sunny cried. “That’s precious stuff.”
“What’s going on?”
Raphael’s voice cut through the chaos. He gave King Sunny a distasteful glare.
Hessy turned to him, her eyes stinging with the heat from her body. “He poisoned me!”
“Calm down, it’s just their local liquor. Like whiskey or rum.”
“That’s even worse,” Hessy said, gagging again. Someone brewing their own spirits might as well be poison. King Sunny continued to laugh, completely drunk, his black beard dripping with the green liquor.
“Why have you stopped working?” Raphael asked her.
Hessy raised her eyebrows high at him. Everything that had happened recently rushed together and she balled her hands into fists, feeling tears rush into her eyes out of anger.
“I just wanted a drink of water!” she screeched; her voice very high pitched.
Raphael took her above the elbow and dragged her away from the drunken king. “Alright, here.”
He led her to the center of the clustered village to a dug out well with a wooden crank and bucket. Raphael gave her fresh water from the bucket which she gulped in large mouthfuls, soothing her parched throat, spilling some down her shirt.
He sat down next to the well and ran his fingers through his tangle of dark hair. Hessy splashed more water onto her face and neck, cooling off the burning sensation. Raphael watched her until she was starting to feel self-conscious.
