Free-Wrench, no. 1 Read online

  He led the way to another ladder and brought Nita to deck three. By virtue of the shape of the ship, this deck was somewhat shorter than the one above. It was primarily an I-shaped hallway running past six rooms, three on each side, and two larger rooms at the far ends.

  “The fore and aft rooms hide the workings of the cannons. The ammo hoists and such. If you’re to be my assistant, you’ll spend much time in there, so no need to open those doors for now.”

  “If you don’t mind, I would love to get a look at them. I’ve always been fascinated with machinery.”

  “I was asked to show you around and introduce you. I prefer to get my orders out of the way as quickly as possible, so I can return to more worthwhile diversions, if you don’t mind.”

  Nita eyed Gunner. Lil and Coop were kind enough at first blush to make her wonder if she’d been misinformed about the overall attitude of outsiders. Gunner seemed determined to even the balance.

  “The primary powder magazine is up this way, just ahead. The secondary powder magazine is back that way. Over here is the boiler room, water tanks, and immediate fuel supply. No need to take you downstairs. Just the gig hoist and the fuel, water, and gas storage. Oh, actually, you’ll find the head there as well, when nature calls. With that, I believe that fulfills my orders. All introductions, and a quick tour.”

  “One moment… Lil, Coop, Captain Mack, Butch, and you. That’s five crewmembers. Where is the sixth?”

  “Sixth? We don’t… oh, Captain Mack was counting our inspector. Since he wasn’t in the galley or with the captain, he’ll probably be in the boiler room.”

  He took a few strides down the hallway and pulled open one of the few solidly shut doors in the ship to reveal baking heat and a sooty atmosphere that was almost like a taste of home for Nita. She found herself strangely excited to finally see something the she was confident she would know inside and out. After all, a boiler is a simple mechanism. Surely one design could only differ so much from another. This one would be smaller than the boilers back at the steamworks, but all of the components would be the same. When she got a glimpse of the thing, she realized how very mistaken she was. The scale was the least of the changes. This contraption bore little or no resemblance to any such device she’d seen, even the wood-fired ones she’d seen in ships. It almost looked inside out. There was a firebox, steam and water pipes, and a chimney. All parts she’d expected to see, but joining them was a bird’s nest of tubes both large and small, twisting over themselves in a brass, copper, and cast-iron nightmare.

  “This is your boiler?” she asked, waving off a particularly strong whiff of the odd-smelling fumes that hissed from the firebox door.

  “Of course. Technically this is also my responsibility, but it isn’t as though there’s much to do.”

  “Not much to do?”

  “Just shovel some fuel into it now and then, refill the water tanks, blow out the brine, and swap out the bits that wear out. And we’d better hope there’s not much of that, because we’re down to just the one spare.”

  “I’ve been working as a free-wrench in the largest steamworks in Caldera for years, and I haven’t come close to mastering the different trades. Boilers need constant upkeep and inspection. I assumed that’s why your inspector would be in here. Where is he, anyway?”

  “Oh, he’s probably up in the dark corner over there. He likes it warm,” Gunner said. He leaned down and tapped the floor. “Come on out, Wink. There’s another one.”

  Nita raised an eyebrow, then took a step back when something stirred in the darkness. When it revealed itself, slinking into the glow of the fire, getting a good look did little to clarify what it was. It was a creature with wiry, ghostly gray fur. At a glance she might have thought it was a cat based on the size, but the illusion didn’t last long. The ears and nose were batlike, and as it moved toward them it demonstrated the awkwardness of something more at home in the trees than on land. A few short hops brought it to their feet, where it flicked its long, fuzzy tail and looked at them with a perfectly round red eye. The other eye was hidden beneath a cloth sash tied about the creature’s head. It turned to Nita and crouched down, drumming its spidery fingers without taking its eye off her. Nita took a step back, not sure what to make of it, but quite sure she didn’t want to be touched by it.

  “What is that?” Nita asked.

  “That’s our ship’s inspector, Wink. The fug folk require at least one of them to accompany every ship. They tap along the planks looking for wood grubs, which we can pick up from time to time when we make landfall. They’re also trained to identify and mark planks that are succumbing to rot. Mack says this ship would have fallen apart years ago without Wink here, so he usually considers him a crewmember. Rather silly sentiment, if you ask me, but captains all have their quirks.”

  “But what manner of creature is it?”

  “Some sort of jungle creature. They come from an island on the far side of Rim. At least that’s where they came from. Now they mostly come from the fug, and who knows how the fug folk get them. Enough of that, though. The captain’s order is followed to the letter. I’ve got to rest up for my watch. Get yourself sorted out. I suppose I’ll figure out what to do with you in a few hours.”

  Gunner ushered Nita out of the boiler room. Wink lingered in the still-open door. She stared down at the creature, and it stared right back. Its face had a stern, almost distrustful look as it met her gaze. With a final jittery tap of its thin fingers, it slunk into the shadows within and shut the door. It was astounding how ominous such a small creature could be.

  Chapter 5

  Nita fidgeted uneasily in her freshly installed hammock. Space was the most precious thing on the ship, and as such there were few places where she might find a corner to call her own. She’d settled on hanging her hammock in the room they called the gig room, the room through which she’d entered the ship. Despite the piled boxes of their less valuable merchandise, it had the most free space. Within minutes of setting down to rest she regretted her decision. Though the dinghy was winched tightly to the bottom of the ship and the other hatch was shut, they didn’t create an airtight seal. As such, she was treated to the whistling of wind all night long. The constant motion of the ship had a habit of swinging her hammock so violently that at times she was worried she would fall out. They’d provided a blanket, and a second one to roll up as a pillow, but for someone so used to tropical climes it was still a bit chilly even in her heavy work gear. By far the worst part of those first few hours of rest, though, was the time it gave her to think.

  There was no aspect of this journey that sat well with her. It was uncomfortable, but that much she could stand. The air had a strange smell to it, either from the fuel they burned in the boiler, the gas they filled the envelope with, or the particularly lax approach to hygiene shared by certain members of the crew. Rather than the shower she’d unwittingly come to rely upon to relieve the stresses of her day, the best this ship could offer was a bucket of clean water, a cake of soap, and a sea sponge, all tucked into a small room at the stern of the ship. The added presence of a washboard suggested that the room doubled as laundry facilities. In the opposite corner was the bathroom, or “head” as they called it, though even that seemed to be too extravagant a name for what turned out to be a bench mounted over a hole in the bottom of the ship. Using it was an unpleasantly breezy experience that made her feel sorry for any fishermen or sailors who might be below. It also served to remind her of the one fact she could never come to terms with; she was hundreds of feet in the air in a none-too-sturdy vessel.

  Such thoughts had been churning in her head for three or four hours, making sleep all but impossible, when a tapping sound drew her attention. In the doorway was Wink, or rather on the doorway. He was crawling up with ease, tapping with his middle finger and cupping his ears toward the sound. Nita tried to put him out of her mind and get back to sleep, but something seemed odd. The tapping had slowed and stopped. She turned, but as soon as she
moved, Wink started tapping again with renewed vigor. Twice more she looked away and twice more the tapping trailed off. She pulled the goggles from her bag, buffed the lenses a bit, and pretended to drift to sleep once more. When the tapping began to slow, she tipped them enough to see Wink in the reflection. He was staring at her.

  At that point, it became clear she would get no more sleep today.

  As it turned out, it was just as well. Not a minute after her brain finally gave up on being rested, the flared tube beside the door echoed with a bellow that she could just barely hear through the walls as well. It was Butch, shouting in whatever language she spoke. Though she couldn’t understand the announcement, she assumed a trip to the galley was called for. She dislodged herself from the hammock and stumbled her way to the nearest ladder. At the top, she encountered Lil.

  “There you are, Greenhorn. I was just coming down to fetch you. Supper’s on the table. Or lunch. Or breakfast, I reckon. Just depends how long you been awake. You sleep okay?”

  “Terrible.”

  “I did too, my first few days. Nowadays I can’t hardly sleep without my hammock rocking in the breeze. Being a greenhorn is rough. I guess that’s part of why most of you don’t last more than a day.”

  “Why do you keep calling me that?”

  “What, a greenhorn? Because that’s what you are! A newbie, a tenderfoot. Wet behind the ears and all that,” she explained. “Better get used to being called that. Round here, everybody’s a greenhorn ’til the Cap’n decides otherwise. Life on a ship ain’t all bad, though. Once you learn to look it in the eye without feeding the ducks, the view’s a thing to see. Plus, on this ship you get to eat what Butch makes, and that stuff’s fit to make your tongue kick a hole through your teeth to get at the spoon.”

  Nita grinned. There was something disarmingly charming about the way these people spoke. In Caldera, the desire to create ran so deep that people of distinction spoke with an almost literary formality. Thanks to the status of her parents, she dealt with such people every day. The clumsy but colorful manner of speech employed by people like Lil and Coop, whether purposefully or not, had an undeniable life and poetry to it. To ears trained from birth to seek out uniqueness and creativity in all of its forms, it was a joy. It was like finding a whole new set of colors to paint pictures with.

  Lil led the way onto the galley, where all but the captain were already present and seated. At one table lounged Gunner. At another perched Coop. The third was empty.

  “That there’s the captain’s table. You don’t sit there unless you’re invited. Anywhere else is up for grabs.”

  “Where is the captain?”

  “He’s getting the ship set to guide herself for a while. Once he’s set a course, he can’t leave her for more than a few minutes at a time before the wind sets us off in the wrong direction again, but a good look at the wind gauge and some careful figuring can usually get him time enough to come down and have a meal. Of course, that’s assuming he hasn’t got that feeling he gets when he decides he can’t leave the deck, which is as often as not. He’s a mite skittish about not having at least a lookout up there.”

  “Me bein’ a mite skittish is what’s kept this bucket in the sky instead of in the drink, let’s not forget. And it’s hazy out there. Low clouds. Let’s make this quick so I can put someone out there on lookout,” Captain Mack said, marching in through the doorway.

  Nita took a seat at Lil and Coop’s table. A shallow notch cut into the table formed just the right size to fit the bottom of a bowl, and another was sized for the bottom of a mug. When the captain was seated, Butch emerged from the kitchen with a pile of tin bowls, mugs, and spoons stacked precariously in one arm. She fitted them into the table in front of each of the crewmembers, never once so much as allowing the pile to teeter despite the motion of the ship. She then fetched a heavy pot and spooned out their dinner.

  After Lil had bragged about it, Nita had to admit she was curious and a little excited to see what sort of exotic food these strange people ate, but what she got was a far cry from the irresistible feast the younger Cooper had described. It was a stew, or, at the very least, that was the closest word in her culinary lexicon that might describe it. What poured out of Butch’s ladle was a wet mound of ingredients that had been boiled far beyond the point of recognition. The mixture probably included some vegetables, and possibly some meat, but each had given up and dissolved into a mush with the texture of mud and the color of paper pulp.

  “I’m sorry but, um… what do you call this dish?”

  “That’s a bowl,” Coop said.

  “She means the food in the bowl, dopey. That there’s slumgullion. Don’t let the looks fool you. That’s about as close to heaven as your tongue is gonna get.”

  Nita gave the bowl another doubtful look as her mug was filled with what smelled like ale. Never one to appear ungrateful, and with little recourse for anything better, she dipped her spoon into the runny mush and gave it a taste.

  “It’s… it’s actually quite good!”

  “You’d best get some of that shock and wonder out of your voice before Butch’s feelings get hurt,” Coop said.

  “My apologies,” she said, bowing her head. “It really is delicious.”

  “Like I said, one of the good bits of working on this here ship,” Lil said.

  “Let’s just get down to business,” the captain said. “As you all know, Ms. Graus here has a relative who is in a bad way. Needs some medicine that Glinda says the fuggers will have. She’s offering the biggest payment we’re ever likely to see in exchange for getting her some, so we’re going to be spending a few extra days in port at Keystone while we try to get some out of those tightfisted beanpoles.”

  “Suits me. I got a pretty lady back that way who’s probably staying up nights waiting for me to spend more’n a few hours in town.”

  “Sure you do…” Lil jabbed.

  “If we’re going to make it where we need to go, we’re going to need to find a way for Ms. Graus here to pull her weight. So…”

  “Do we really need to go through this again?” Gunner snapped suddenly.

  “Gunner…” the captain said sternly.

  “Let’s just pitch her over the side now. The longer we wait, the harder it will be to do it when the time comes.”

  “What?!” Nita cried, jumping to her feet.

  “Settle down, Nita,” Lil said, putting a hand on Nita’s arm.

  “Settle down?! He just threatened to throw me overboard!”

  Her hand clamped down harder, and the other revealed a cocked pistol. “Wasn’t a suggestion, Nita.”

  Across the table, Coop pulled a pistol of his own, as did the captain. Gunner unholstered two things which might have been pistols as well, though they seemed to have more optics and barrels than could ever reasonably be called for.

  “Have a seat, Nita. I’ll explain what this is about. Gunner, on deck for lookout, and we’ll discuss this little outburst later.”

  An angry sneer on his face, Gunner eased the hammers down on his weapons and stalked out the door. Nita looked to Lil and Coop. They still had their weapons steady, and most worrisome of all, their faces remained as chipper and friendly as ever. As there were few other options, she lowered herself to her seat.

  “Are you going to kill me?” Nita asked.

  “Not necessarily,” Lil said. “All depends on how good of a job you do.”

  “Am I a prisoner?”

  “Of course not. You’re a greenhorn,” Coop said.

  “Ms. Graus, what you need to understand is this. You grew up in Caldera. I can’t speak for your upbringing, save to say it had to be a darn sight better than ours. Things out here… well, they’re rough. We run ourselves on a shoestring, and not just because it’s all we can afford, because it’s all we can get. A bad bit of weather puts us more than a day behind, and we start going hungry. A piece of equipment fails, and we can’t be sure we’ll make it at all. What we have on board is enough
fuel and supplies to get five humans and Wink to the next port without much room to wiggle. And what we have right now is one human too many. I can get us through, all of us through, on what we’ve got, but only just. And only if everything goes right that can go right, and nothing at all goes wrong. That means if you show yourself to be a liability in even the smallest way, you aren’t just a nuisance, you’re a threat to our lives and our livelihoods. I can’t allow that, not on my ship.”

  “How many times have you taken someone on board like this?”

  “Oh, what is it now… seven? Including Nita here?” Coop said.

  “No, no. It’s nine, right? There was that couple who wanted to go from Westrim to Circa, and we got blown off course,” Lil said.

  “Right, right. Nine then.”

  “And how many have made it?”

  “Well, there’s still just the five of us on the crew,” Lil said. “Plus Wink. So it’s safe to say that none of them turned out to be worth their salt as airmen.”

  “But I think… well, I guess it was… nine take away…” Coop struggled with the math for a moment. “Cap’n, help me out here.”

  “The last two people are the only ones we had to take care of personally. One got himself killed, and the rest got back to shore, at the very least. Gunner had to do the deed for the ones that were more harm than good. He didn’t take it well.”

  “But you did kill two people.”

  “We ain’t killed nobody. Them folks just didn’t turn out to be handy enough to keep themselves alive,” Coop said.

  “You people are monsters!”

  “We’re survivors. Sometimes being a monster is what it takes,” Captain Mack said.

  “Why didn’t you tell me that if you decided I wasn’t worth the risk you’d just kill me?”