Edward Lane's Argosy Ch. 04

They were a motley group, mostly recruited from the gin-joints of Tallasi or Guthrie, but they were adept at their trade. Mostly Choctaw and Cherokee braves, with a sprinkling of Creek, and plenty of half-breeds who found themselves more comfortable in the ranks of a mercenary than serving the squabbling Great Houses of the tiny kingdom. There was even a white man or two. They were dressed similarly to Gideon, though none affected the white scarf that he had made his sole prerogative. Their own colorful native gorgets peeked out of their heavy sheepskin garments, and native symbols were often prominently embroidered into their garb. But they knew their trade. Each man there carried a carbine, a pistol, a knife and a cutlass, at minimum, and some nearly bristled with weaponry. They looked nervous and excited while attempting to appear stoic and bored. These Okies really did have a talent for warcraft.

"We're in position, Captain," Miller called down to him. He nodded to Wolf Rider, the sergeant of the marines, and two young braves began lowering the gondola on thick hemp ropes strung cleverly on pullies for the purpose.

Just before the hatch closed, however, an arm thrust itself in the doorway prohibiting the maneuver.

"Wait up, Cap!" the familiar drawl of one of his fighters called. "Don't leave me here whilst you have all the fun!"

"Get in, Bonney!" Gideon chuckled. The other braves in the cramped compartment looked stoic, but Gideon knew they were pleased. Despite his short stature and slight build, boyish face and tenor voice, Bill Bonney was a crack shot and an adept fighter who had traveled all over the West of America, from the American settlements in Ohio to the frontiers of Louisiana to the outskirts of the great Sea of Grass that was the home to the most savage warriors ever in Creation. Gideon had hired the man on a whim after witnessing him shoot the center out of a cork in a tavern, propelled through the air for the purpose, and had not regretted the decision since — even when he had discovered his illicit sexual affair with his sister Tayanita recently. He wasn't particularly inclined to object, of course, but that was far more out of fear of his sister's temper than Bonney's skill with a revolver.

As the diminutive man settled between two much bulkier braves with a grin, the other marines nodded to him stoically — but Gideon knew they were very pleased by his inclusion. He was as a white mascot for the corps, as well as being respected as a warrior in his own right. He had the advantage of knowing the strange Atlan language that had incorporated large portions of Dutch, not to mention several major Indian tongues, French, and a smattering of German and Celtic, too. He grinned broadly the entire hellish descent, as if he were a child being condemned to a week in a candy store.

It was a scary ride. The well-oiled hemp ropes creaked outrageously as the carriage lowered in the winds, twisting uncomfortably. When the great red expanse of the foe's balloon was well underneath, two more braves repelled from the open doorway onto the gasbag and secured the guide lines that brought the boarding gondola to rest on top of the foe. Securing it quickly, they released the lines that tied the ship to the Victrix, lest the foe be lost in the battle and plummet, dragging the Victrix to doom with it.

The wind was savage on the open expanse of the balloon, but Gideon reveled in it. He'd spent most of his life in gentlemanly repose, suffocated by tradition, social expectations, and the other burdens of aristocracy. For the briefest moment he imagined his dull, boring life following in his father's footsteps, working behind a desk, never hearing a shot in anger. This was the antithesis of that. This was adventure, danger, excitement! A man felt alive doing this! He tied his safety line down to a hook and followed Wolf Rider to the dorsal hatch that led down to the bowels of the ship.

Just before the Okie could open it, however, the wooden hatch sprang open and two dark-skinned, mustachioed Atlans emerged with carbines in hand with sinister intent. Wolf Rider was caught by surprised but quickly kicked at the men, who responded with hastily wild shots. Then the half-savage marine drew an iron tomahawk from his belt and brained the first Atlan soldier, while five shots from William's pair of revolvers took the top of the head and a goodly portion of face off of the second Atlan before Gideon could even draw his weapon. Gideon's appreciation at the little man's facility with six-guns grew, as the marines tossed the corpses over the side before disappearing through the dorsal hatch themselves, cutlasses and tomahawks in hand for the grim work below.

Bonney, on the other hand, had holstered his pistols and was in the process of untying his safety line and retying it to a long rope he carefully measured out. Gideon was mystified by the man's actions, and finally had to tap him on the shoulder to get him to explain.

"Simple!" Billy shouted into the wind, his wide grin combined with the brass goggles under his leather flight cap making his face appear laughably cartoonish. "Figure them Injuns ain't hardly gonna leave me any shootin' to do, as fast as they can take a ship. But there's one whole battlement pod on the starboard side ain't been touched at all – I figure I can go ahead and take care of that, so they can't hit us on the flank!"

"But you can't go alone!" Gideon protested.

"Shucks!" the insane American laughed as he cinched the line and re-drew his guns, replacing the spent cartridges – not an easy task, considering the ship was listing badly to port, now, and the winds whipping across them were strong. "This ain't hardly worth even me goin', Cap'n! But it surely will be a bit o' manly fun!" With that he took a breath, drew his pistols, and took a running plunge over the ship's horizon to the starboard side. Gideon's heart was in his throat as he watched the coiled line pay out and then finally go taut. At least his corpse would be dangling, then, he thought, somehow relieved by the idea. Every airman feared plummeting to their death — only a crazy American would risk such a dangerous stunt. There was living a life of adventure . . . and then there was spitting in the shadow of Death. A gentleman knew the difference.

Gideon descended into his prize like a gentleman, a pistol in his right hand, his rapier in the other. As he went down the narrow stairs he passed three corpses – all Atlan soldiers – who had gotten caught in the onslaught. He stepped over or around them as gingerly as possible, and finally came to the Engineering room, where two of his men were busily taking control of the engines, shutting down the crude alcohol burner and releasing huge gouts of steam from the boiler. Two more corpses decorated the hatchway, he saw, both brained with tomahawks. His men gave him a wolfish grin as he congratulated them, and then went even further below.

There was a stark contrast between the interior of this airship and his own British-made Victrix. This Atlan-constructed ship was far more wood and fabric than steel, and he saw how liberal they had been with copper and even gold. But the design was archaic, the type of thing that had flown in his grandfather's day. The tiny gondola was half the size of the Victrix's, and the general condition was shoddy, at best. Gideon could spot a dozen places where maintenance had been ignored to a point he would have dismissed a crewman — if not consigned him over the side — had it occurred on his ship.

By the time he made it to the control room, his men had herded the dozen or so disarmed prisoners who remained into the shabby dining room at the point of a gun and locked it. All the shooting was over, now, thankfully, and he could steer his prize back to port. A few of his men insisted excitedly about telling him the result of Bonney's mad dash over the side. Wolf Rider – who went by Charles, when they were on the ground – pointed to the battlement through the wind glass and explained.

"Damndest thing I ever saw, Captain," he admitted in his slow, deep, rumbling voice. "We were under fire from their position – which we expected – and I had deployed snipers to counter them when – out of no where – Bonney suddenly crashes into the battlement from behind them, boots first, pistols blazing. He made a wild war cry when he did it," Wolf Rider admitted, a grudging token of respect to the white man. "He must have killed two coming in, and shot two more before the survivors surrendered. But after that . . . well, the others were ready to go quietly."

"Excellent show!" Gideon said, happily, clapping the big Indian on the back heartily. "And you as well, my mighty red warrior! Strike her colors and raise the prize flag, if you would, and then let's get her out of this battle and head for port!" In truth, there was not much battle left to leave, he saw when he glanced out a porthole.

"Aye, Captain," Wolf Rider said, snapping to attention. Rumor was the man had been one of the feared Louisianan Imperial Marines before he had sold his sword to the Okie Kingdom. His professionalism in military matters supported that. "And what shall I do with the prisoners?"

"Leave them . . . bide, how many?" Gideon asked.

"Ten, all together, including their coward of a captain who was hiding in the privy. We did find . . . a woman aboard, too. She was well-dressed in civilian garb, and we know how you feel about raping captives . . ." Wolf Rider said, rolling his eyes indulgently at the white man's rules of civilized warfare, "so I had her put with the others. She keeps chattering in Atlan. Could be a noblewoman," he guessed.

"What would an Atlan noblewoman be doing in the middle of an aerial assault?" Gideon asked himself, mystified. He dismissed Wolf Rider with orders to get the ship under power again, and then signaled the Victrix to request a tow, as soon as convenient. As he surveyed the burning skies over Oklahoma, he could see only one Atlan ship still aloft, limping back to the frontier trailing smoke. The Victrix alone seemed unscarred by the fight, but the Hobgoblin and the Star of Baton Rouge were both listing or smoking as their crews struggled to put out fires from the combat.

"It looks as if we've preserved the Kingdom once again," sighed Gideon. "And secured quite the prize as well. This ship looks bigger than the last one we captured . . . how much did we get as bounty for that?"

"We sold it to the Crown for a hundred thousand guineas, Captain," Wolf Rider replied. "A princely sum, with which you were most generous."

Gideon shrugged. He had no desire for money, save for what it might buy him. A hundred thousand was roughly four months pay for his ship's services, all taken in one day. But what he could invest that money in . . .

Gideon's grand strategy involved leaving the desolate Kingdom of Oklahoma with a massive bounty of Helium stored – enough for his own liberal use, as well as plenty to be sold on the market in Paris at a vast profit. His privileged position as one of the Prairie Realm's defenders also allowed him to purchase the noble gas ahead of the commercial enterprises and foreign powers who had orders stretching far into the future. Already nine massive steel canisters of the rare and powerful gas were stored within his hanger, and with a similar prize for his capture, today, he could safely count on four more – perhaps even five – joining them. On the Parisian market, that would fetch him ten times what he invested – provided he could deliver the gas safely to Paris. But fourteen canisters put him well within range of his objective, and therefore limited his tenure as mercenary.

These thoughts entertained him on the long, slow journey back to the hanger – so much so that he barely noted the ominous cloudbank to his port side until it was nearly on top of them.

"Great Jupiter's Balls!" Gideon shouted, springing from the command chair when the first peal of thunder could be heard. "From whence came that storm?" He was speaking mostly to himself – the token pilot, a marine who possessed the rudiments of airship flight experience enough to manage to pilot a ship at tow – barely spoke English. But when his captain indicated the direction of the storm he, too, leapt excitedly to his feet.

The Okie Kingdom was almost ideal for airships – except for the storms. No place on Earth that Gideon had ever had chance to hear of seemed more prone to sudden, violent outbreaks of atmospheric excitation than this utterly flat realm. He had witnessed huge spires of pure mindless force descend from the skies, wreck havoc on the ground like something from the Old Testament, then leap again into the air. The Spanish explorers who were the first white men to witness them called them tornados, but they were more commonly known as Borealis. And they could form in an instant, like the Hand of God itself, at any time on these barren plains. On the ground they were horrific enough, flailing wagons and cows and even whole houses around like toys – but aloft they were hellish.

"Cut us loose," Gideon whispered, when Wolf Rider heard the pilot's chatter and came forward. "We're better off that way."

"What?" the marine asked, incredulous. "We have almost no engines, Captain," he reminded Gideon. "We won't be able to outrun the storm."

"We might be able to out-wit it, then, my lad," Gideon said, reaffirming his decision and standing upon it. "If we stay in our current configuration, we imperil both ships. Apart, even if we are adrift, then we increase our individual chances. Consider," he said, breathlessly, as he sketched the scene in the air with his fingers, "if the Borealis hits one of the ships, then the other will flail about like a whip cracking. This way, with luck, only one of us will be hit and plummet to our doom."

"That is comforting," Wolf Rider said, unconvinced.

"So go and cut the bloody cable, and have the signalman tell the Victrix to head for port, full speed!"

"Aye, Captain," Wolf Rider said, clinging to military discipline in the face of disaster by snapping an open-palmed salute and hurrying off to relay the orders. Gideon was well satisfied with the result – in less than five harrowing minutes the tether that connected his prize to his flagship was loosed. He and the pilot were busy, after that, attempting to steer the damaged airship with only minimal engines at his disposal.

As the tempest bore down on them, he watched his azure ship and his new half-sister, whom he had come to love more than all of his others, speeding dutifully towards the hanger – but still not expediently enough to avoid the looming storm. Worse, the spires of Borealis began appearing in the distance, yet moving ever closer. Gideon himself took the wheel when the storm was nearly upon them, much to Wolf Rider's dismay.

"Are you certain that is wise, Captain?" he asked, as he watched the Englishman, stripped down to his shirtsleeves, wrestle with the massive wheel in the face of such a brutal wind. Gideon had a poor reputation as a pilot.

"No!" Gideon agreed, when he could spare a moment from his titanic effort to keep the ship on course, "But do you want to be responsible for smashing us all to bits? Or will you cede that honor to your captain?"

"As you wish, Sir!" Wolf Rider snapped back. While as brave as any man alive in the face of enemy guns, most of the Indians he'd encountered had a respect near to worship of the wild winds of the plains. Even the civilized Cherokee still retained a superstitious cast about such matters.

"If you want to do anything, see to our prisoners. Make sure they all have tie-downs, lest they get . . . more of a chaotic ride than they expected!"

It took every ounce of Gideon's strength on the dual wheels to keep the ship heading cross-wind against the face of the storm. Ordinarily, that was a job for a steersman for each wheel, but her had to suffice alone. Nor was his prize the only ship having difficulties – the Hobgoblin was already lagging behind the rest of the mercenary fleet, even the damaged prize, and when Gideon spared a moment to look he saw that the airship was dangerously close to the stormfront.

Then, to his horror, one of the Borealis formed all too near in proximity of his ally, and within the blink of an eye, she was caught.

Gideon and the rest of the makeshift prize crew, who had crammed into the control room to see, witnessed out of the portholes the brutal destruction of the green airship in near silence. The Hobgoblin had been captured by its portside stern section, and while the entire ship was quickly drawn within the ferocious storm, the tail section did so without the necessity of remaining intact. The framework and fabric, the aerolons and stabilizers, the miles of rope and steel cord and lastly the envelope, itself, was chewed up by the force of the wind. The debris from the ship whirled within the cone of destruction so rapidly that it made a full circuit, crashing into the sides of the ship and tearing it apart with added force. Small shapes that all who watched knew were men lept from the gondolas and battlements, willing to plummet to their deaths rather than endure one more moment in that hell in the heavens.

Gideon and his men were helpless to prevent it, but worse, they saw an omen of their own destruction, should they not out-run the storm or be struck by capricious Fortune so. When the last quarter of the Hobgoblin was flung nearly a mile away by the storm, tossed like the core of an apple once the flesh has been consumed, Gideon ordered them all back to work with renewed purpose.

"Here, take the wheels!" he hollered to one of the corporals. "Just hold them steady – we're on course, more or less, and I'm winded! I need to take stock!"

The man reluctantly did as he was ordered, and with a mix of physical relief and foreboding at the continuing risk posed by the storm, he went himself back to collect his thoughts, marshal his resources, and plot his next move. A bit of tea would have been ideal, but he settled for the thick, bitter coffee that the Atlan crew drank. Or at least that was his plan, before he stumbled across one of his men engaged in an activity less suited to the dining room as some.

Bonney, his wild white man, had his trousers pulled down mid-thigh, exposing his muscular buttocks to Gideon's gaze. He was in the act of lustfully pounding forward into some maiden – and with a sick sensation in his stomach, Gideon realized that there was only one candidate for that position aboard.

The "Atlan noblewoman" Wolf Rider had told him of, and his heart sank — should Bonney have raped the woman, he would likely be forced to hang the man himself as a warning to the rest of the men. Best not to leap to any conclusions, under the circumstances, Gideon concluded, noting how lustily the woman was shouting during their vigorous course. Instead he circled the table where the couple was performing their rite, and confirmed his suspicion.

"Bonney," he said in a pained tone as he witnessed the woman's face contort again in ecstasy, "if we weren't in danger most dire and likely be dead in the next half-hour, I'd have to reprove you for violating my dictum against raping the prisoners," he chided, as gently as he could.

"Ain't rape, Cap'n!" the young American said, unwilling to break his erotic momentum one bit, even in the face of discovery and censure. "Or if it is, it's me what's losin' my virtue! I know a bit o' Atlan Dutch, so Papa Wolf asked me to see to the prisoners," he explained. "I was trying to comfort 'em best I could when Wolf came back, said we were headed into a nest o' twisters. This li'l lady was terrified at the thought. I was trying to comfort her, but then next thing I knows my pants are down, my willy's out, and she's a suckin' on it like it's the last piece o' peppermint at the candy store!"