Decollage
Here follows a piece of SlipWays flash fiction.
Many are the dangers of the Nexus, even if one discounts pirates. Let me tell you of one such danger I came across a few years back.
Our ship had landed on one of those vast floating platforms that one often finds around wealthy expansive spheres, or around Spider-Kings.
Here ships can take in provisions or have repairs made in something resembling a neutral zone. Penetrating a sphere, or landing on a Spider-King means that you have to subject yourself to the laws and customs of the locals, not to mention their customs officials.
On the platforms no questions are asked, but the prices are frighteningly steep.
We were making our way back to the ship with overpriced hard-tack, salted pork and oranges, when we saw that another ship had landed near ours.
It was a small vessel, egg-shaped and hastily painted black. The crew were standing outside the ship . Several of them were leaning against each other for support. Two were missing a leg, and all looked like they had been torn or ripped by something furious.
”They look so solemn” said one of the young cadets, struggling with several slabs of meat. ”do you reckon it's a funeral ship?”
”No” said the first mate. ”That is a plague ship. Damn them for landing here!”
One of the men had made his way closer, and our crew hurried back to our vessel, giving the man a wide berth. I stayed behind, intrigued.
”What has happened to you?” I whispered.
His tattered uniform told me that he was an officer of some distinction. It was his face that held me transfixed though.
The right side of his face had been stripped bare, somehow beyond even the bones themselves. His cheek and his eye-socket had been ripped away, exposing frond- or feather-like organs in all the colors of the spheres.
”A great wind came upon us when we were off the surface of Mahalia. It stripped everything from us. Like it was...”
”Hungry?” I suggested.
Some of the other sailors had drawn closer, and I stared, fascinated. One had lost a leg, but gained a continuous wellspring of wonderful color from the stump. Another had lost lips, teeth and tongue, but behind these he had found a row of tiny grasping infant's hands.
”Curious” the officer finally decided. ”It wanted to see.”
With his hand it beckoned me to follow him, which I did. If one shies away from wonders, one does not deserve to be a SlipSailor.
We stepped into the vessel and through a small where the crew's protective suits hung. In the middle of the room sat a creature.
It had all the colors of all exotic birds you would care to name, and innumerable limbs like flailing fern-leaves. In the centre was a circle of eyes like petals around a vast beak. It squealed and whooped as though it was overjoyed with being alive.
”That is our captain” he said. ”The wonder behind him”.
I ran out the ship and back to where our ship had been. As I stood on the platform, I could see it getting smaller in the distance. Of course they would not let what they thought was a plague-carrier aboard the ship.
I never saw them again.
Many are the dangers of the Nexus, even if one discounts pirates. Let me tell you of one such danger I came across a few years back.
Our ship had landed on one of those vast floating platforms that one often finds around wealthy expansive spheres, or around Spider-Kings.
Here ships can take in provisions or have repairs made in something resembling a neutral zone. Penetrating a sphere, or landing on a Spider-King means that you have to subject yourself to the laws and customs of the locals, not to mention their customs officials.
On the platforms no questions are asked, but the prices are frighteningly steep.
We were making our way back to the ship with overpriced hard-tack, salted pork and oranges, when we saw that another ship had landed near ours.
It was a small vessel, egg-shaped and hastily painted black. The crew were standing outside the ship . Several of them were leaning against each other for support. Two were missing a leg, and all looked like they had been torn or ripped by something furious.
”They look so solemn” said one of the young cadets, struggling with several slabs of meat. ”do you reckon it's a funeral ship?”
”No” said the first mate. ”That is a plague ship. Damn them for landing here!”
One of the men had made his way closer, and our crew hurried back to our vessel, giving the man a wide berth. I stayed behind, intrigued.
”What has happened to you?” I whispered.
His tattered uniform told me that he was an officer of some distinction. It was his face that held me transfixed though.
The right side of his face had been stripped bare, somehow beyond even the bones themselves. His cheek and his eye-socket had been ripped away, exposing frond- or feather-like organs in all the colors of the spheres.
”A great wind came upon us when we were off the surface of Mahalia. It stripped everything from us. Like it was...”
”Hungry?” I suggested.
Some of the other sailors had drawn closer, and I stared, fascinated. One had lost a leg, but gained a continuous wellspring of wonderful color from the stump. Another had lost lips, teeth and tongue, but behind these he had found a row of tiny grasping infant's hands.
”Curious” the officer finally decided. ”It wanted to see.”
With his hand it beckoned me to follow him, which I did. If one shies away from wonders, one does not deserve to be a SlipSailor.
We stepped into the vessel and through a small where the crew's protective suits hung. In the middle of the room sat a creature.
It had all the colors of all exotic birds you would care to name, and innumerable limbs like flailing fern-leaves. In the centre was a circle of eyes like petals around a vast beak. It squealed and whooped as though it was overjoyed with being alive.
”That is our captain” he said. ”The wonder behind him”.
I ran out the ship and back to where our ship had been. As I stood on the platform, I could see it getting smaller in the distance. Of course they would not let what they thought was a plague-carrier aboard the ship.
I never saw them again.