The weapons bay is a shambles. Steamer trunks are strewn about the floor. Many are broken, lids gaping wide. Most of the trunks are empty, the ordnance they once carried having long been delivered to their respective targets. A few, however, remain packed and secured, containing elongated devices that look less like bombs and more like ceramic decanters filled with liquid death.

In one corner of the bay, one such trunk lies shattered, packing materials scattered on the floor. The bombs it once held are now piled haphazardly beside it. It is a small wonder that none have exploded.

The seals inside the bombs have dried and become brittle, and one now weeps a blue-grey fluid onto the floor. It is a form of enriched Nightmare, quickened by means of an alchemical process that none are alive now to remember. It is dense, non-evaporative, highly toxic — and deeply unstable after so long in storage. Sooner or later, it will detonate, but for now it just puddles, waiting for a catalyst.

Drip.

Drip.

[Originally posted at Ficly]

The dirigible floats a hundred fifty metres above red dust and twisted metal. Engines that haven’t fired in a dog’s age are corroded and quiet, and the craft wanders the sky aimlessly, the shifting air currents the only thing now to give it direction.

The giant airship’s envelope ripples and billows, the airbags contained within filled with barely enough gas to keep it aloft. It floats lower in the sky now, and soon enough the dirigible will find itself on the ground.

The craft carries only a fraction of its original payload. The remaining ordnance is tetchy and volatile after lying dormant for so long, and the dirigible’s inevitable landfall will be a sight to behold — were there anyone left to see it.

A lone mechanical voice from the burned-out husk of a city below is all that heralds the airship’s passing.

“Greetings, Loyal Customer™!” it calls out — but only for a short while. Soon, it too falls silent.

The wind howls, blowing red dust in heavy clouds.

The dirigible sails on, indifferent.

[Originally published at Ficly]

Grotesque.

That was the only word Georgette could think of to describe the mountain of a man standing before her. The blacksmith-turned-airship-captain was a disfigured hulk, made all the more repulsive by the stub that was all that remained of his left arm.

But she had to admit that the man had talent commanding a crew. Especially when they were trying to outrun one of the fastest trains in the Northern Territory.

“What’re you gawping at, lass?” he barked. “Back to it. No time for woolgathering!”

Georgette turned her attention back to feeding the furnace, reaching up periodically to wipe the smoky haze from her goggles.

They were running way hotter than normal, and she just hoped that the airship’s envelope wasn’t glowing too much as a result of the overtaxed engines.

We’re dead if anyone on that train spots us, she thought. We’re most likely dead, anyway, even if we get there before they do. She was surprised the volatile gas above them hadn’t already ignited.

Maybe we’ll get lucky.

Maybe.

[Originally posted at Ficly]