The Blue Spark

“Everyone has their specialties. Mine is everything haha!” Melo continued to keep busy for what felt like hours, working fast, asking only what she needed to ask about Skie’s ship, finally coming to a stop after about 6 hours.

The shop itself was closed by now, and she was nearly finished with her work, a few more adjustments, the shell having to be replaced, but with most of the parts organized and labelled, there wasn’t a concern with that.

If anything Melo was finally just going to take a break, a good chance to sit for a few moments and chat about the changes that were made.

“So how off were my plans for dealing with space flight? As is, I know it is capable of using the hyper lanes between planets. But not sure, if she was ready for combat. Of course, where I am from....There’s only one man that has access to a space fleet and that’s Medus of the Yellow Brothers Syndicate. Rich bois be rich bois and buy shit they don’t need.” Skie explained. 

Some nations had entertained the notion of colonies, galactic empires. Some had even tried. Most entirely failed, though some systems could claim a kinship with a nation, and had friendly ties. “I spent enough time fighting as pawn of empire. Yaouw likely wouldn’t like ter live as colonial. Where I saw myself as a pawn, sometimes the bints in command treated those lads like they were actual pawns.” 

“Something like that, nnnaaa,” was all Helena said in response to the medical comment. In reality, she would forever look twenty-one. “Right. Yaouw wanted ter give my girl a once-over, gadgie. My weaponry is nice and all, but let’s get that done. I’d like ter be off soon enough get so the job I’m here fer.”

“Hm. You have a strange verbal tic. Is naaa like a slang from where you’re from?” Skie asked innocently. 

Though, she decided to look around. This sort of airship would be something that was only in museums here. It would work, but the question was its speed and weapons. 

“Let’s fucking do this!” Scribe would be lying if he said he wasn’t getting pumped. Once all of his ….stuff…was ready, he would take the Grappling Hook and the strange black ball that wrapped around him, then he followed her. Of course as they rose higher and higher, the duo would get close to their Foe’s wing and when he was close enough Scribe would deactivate the bubble and shoot his Hook onto the enemy’s wing and pull himself in. 

Of course once on there he balanced himself and dug into his bag, somehow it seemed as though there were explosives in it and he began to wire them up, all the time he would glance back at Skie in concern.

There was a hatch that opened near the wing that Scribe and Skie had landed on. It was a Royalist Marine Trooper. The soldiers looked like something out of the First World War. A tin helmet and crude looking body armor. They wore long black fur lined leather trench coats and all had the sigil of a red phoenix of Queen Rane on their left shoulder.  

“Halt! You are ordered to surrender to the will of the Queen!” One of the officers shouted. He fired a blast out from his rifle, only for it to be blocked by Skie’s own powers. 

“Tell your queen to kiss my sparkling blue ass.” Skie said as gave the soldier the middle finger. It seemed that the rude hand gesture was still used on this world. 

She lifted her hand upwards, causing a large explosion several hundred meters up in the air. 

“Alright….do not worry about it, I do not need an SMG.” the Traveler had been following Skye’s instructions faithfully as she knew more about Airships then he did, despite the fact that he was learning. At her order as well as the realization that another mage like being was on the other ship, Scribe depowered his guns and got up from his seat, then the Blonde reached for his bag and put the strap around his shoulder. 

“So, tell me what we need to do, I assume it is something daring and dangerous?” He asked in a joking manner to try and lighten the tension a little bit.

“For now we still have to cripple the Aether drives. Two of the three are down. If we board, we can plant explosives on the proper wing.” Skie explained. 

She the lowered her airship to a seacliff, making it seem like she was on the retreat. The foe airship was still several hundred yards away. She then reached for something that looked like a round black ball. She had two of them. Skie handed the second to Scribe. There was also then something that looked like grappling hooks. 

“Terra ain’t one country,” Helena commented. “Attitudes and laws on guns change from place ter place. Haven’t been hired fer a job back home in a while, so I can’t rightly say. Not everywhere’s big on guns, all I can say fer sure.” An Austro-Hungarian descendant… Well, not everyone can be an English girl with Slavic roots who bonded with a magical Chinese lunar rabbit.

“Mad minutes were always fun,” Helena commented. “Except when the Krauts shot back, then it was exciting.” She tilted her head at what Skie went on to say, though. “Huh. I thought yaouw did have dyed hair. Seen it enough not ter comment anymore. My own changes colour anyways.” For much the same reason, actually, though it was nebulous whether it was an aether skill or not. “Guessing yaouw throw lightning bolts, judging by the name? A little Zeus in yaouw, hm?” Leave it to the daughter of a woman named Athena to know Greek Mythos.

“Honestly, gadgie, I’m glad yaouw don’t need a weapon. They’ve all got a lot of history with me. I’d hate ter lose one.”

“Terra is a confusing place, then. No wonder they let the colonies do whatever they want. Though, sometimes maybe having their guidance would be nice. But not too many people here are keen on a central empire.” Skie said. 

“So you fought in the 2nd Great War?” Skie asked. “Amazing, Terrian medicines must be on par with our own, if you can still be alive and looking so damn young.” Skie nodded.  “Ah. Yeah. I can show you how it works once we’re on the road. It’s a bit too dangerous to do it in port. I suppose, Zeus would be the right god. Though, I like Thor more.” 

Skie then pulled out her necklace, it was a cross combined with Thor’s hammer. It wasn’t religious in nature, though. It was the symbol of her husband’s noble household. 

“Well whoever she is, I’m better than her. I’m just saying that for marketing purposes of course.” Finally with everything stripped bare, Melo could start working on her adjustments. Following her own plans to the dot, she’d spend hours on it, never stopping even if the other took a break.

Only stopping finally when snacks arrived, but even then it was a short rest then back at it. Her dedication to her craft was second to none.

“You’re probably better than her , honestly. A lot of her research goes into Aether engines. Probably one of the few things that I don’t need updated. You got a strong rep among the traders. That’s how I was able to find this port. Once, I make up my mind, I go full in.”Skie said. 

“What matters is that, if you’re a pirate, you’re not punishing or stealing from people who’re just as worse off. That’s real scum, but I suppose a bounty hunter isn’t so bad.” Melo pulled off the last part of the shell and got right to work, moving her crane in to lift heavier parts up as she continued to talk.

“What can I say, its like incentive to come back with more projects. Not only do you get a cool ship, you get a ride in a battle mecha. Not many shops offer that huh?”

Skie sighed for a moment. “I wish that the pirates on my homeworld followed the Codes of Honor that Space Pirates do. Stealing from the rich and giving to the needy is always a just cause. Back home, they work for people that want to bring back the old monarchy. They are true scum, indeed.”

Skie ended up working on removing some parts herself. She knew her airship, like the back of her hand. Making sure everything was in the right place was a 101 to her.

“Yaouw remind me of Americans back home,” Helena said frankly. “Yaouw are real peppy, got a problem with authority,  ask a lot of questions… and you’re big on guns, too.” A little hypocritical, coming from the mercenary. “America used ter be a colony of the country I’m from. Colonials.” It was peculiar, but this wasn’t Helena’s first time dealing with somebody who had very little, if any, knowledge of the world humanity had come from. Sometimes it made Helena feel much older than she really was, though she was still older than any normal human. She moved to the small kitchenette aboard the ship, beginning to make the tea. She’d continue to speak as she worked. “Hell if I know what or who the tea’s named after. Probably. It’s my favourite though, and the only tea aboard.”

“Yaouw even asked about a yank gun first. No, I don’t have a tommy gun, though I fought in the war it was a part of. Maybe I should just call yaouw yankee, huh?” Helena pointed towards a bolt-action rifle on the far side of the wall of weaponry, with only a revolver above it. “The second weapon in my collection. Short Magazine Lee Enfield, No. 4, Mk. I. The standard issue rifle of my country in the same war the tommy was in. Same battles too, at least where I was.”

“The SMLE’s reliable, accurate, quick fer her day. No better friend, no worse enemy. At the time, at least.” Helena sounded fond of the rifle. “My favourite. Don’t use her too much, these days. Don’t have a lot of ammunition fer them, either. About a hundred rounds per weapon. Thing about aether or plasma rifles, every bloody one of the weapons here that shoot lead are outclassed, pure and simple. Best ter be as good or better than the enemy, instead of being a holdover from the days of gunpowder.”

“Aren’t firearms popular throughout Terra? That’s what I’ve been told. Not, that many people from Earth come this way. I’m pretty sure that I am not an American. My mother said that her ancestors came from some place called Austria-Hungary. Whatever, that means, right?” Skie chuckled. 

Skie looked around Helena’s “tank.” It looked like something out of the 1970s to her, back when airships were first being designed on Earth. She half expected to see faux wood paneling and some kind of epic space art on the sides of it. 

“That’s the mad minute rifle! Well, the 4th in her line. Were you able to get all 10 shoots off in that amount of time? I heard that the record remained something like 6.5 seconds for the longest of times. Gosh, the simplicity of them. That’s the one thing about the bolt action era.” She said. “Though, disappointed by the lack of the Tommy gun. Oh well, maybe I’ll see one some day.”

“Colonials,” Helena muttered under her breath. She shook her head at herself twice before grunting and leading the way into the ship. She usually had a thicker skin than this, but she wasn’t usually prepared to get a talking up, praising her ship, and then an immediate cutting down to size.

Perhaps her attitude was slightly off from the times - after all, most of the colonies weren’t British in origin - but it certainly felt fitting.

“Right, Skie, my girl’s free fer yaouw ter look at. Being a mechanic and all, I trust yaouw won’t break something without knowing how ter fix it. Also, if yaouw want a loan of a personal firearm, I’ve got a few.” A few, she says, motioning towards a bulkhead that was practically lined with them. Some were quite modern, one or two being top of the line, but the majority could be described as antiques. There were nearly twenty weapons on the wall. “Some ammunition fer them all too. If yaouw take one, do not lose her. There’s a lot of memory in there.” She paused before she took the time to explain that.

“Every major war I’ve fought, I’ve kept a weapon from, except the newest stuff. That wall’s basically my history. I’ll go brew up a cuppa fer us. Hope yaouw like Earl Gray, it’s all I’ve got.”

“Colonials? What’s that supposed to mean?” Skie asked. 

She had never been to Earth. Azar had always been her home. Outside of a few times visiting space ports, much of the culture of Earth and its nationalities were outside of her scope of understanding. She only knew of the ones on her own world. 

“I wouldn’t dare call myself a mechanic. More of a mad engineer. I just know how to take things apart and make something new out of them. A skill, I picked up while figuring out how to cheat the casino machines back when I was a kid. Everything else came from my year or so in the military academy. Got discharged because my dad was like no. Heh. “

Her eyes seemed to perk, after Helena mentioned guns. “Oh. Do you have one of those cool ones called a Tommy Gun? Everyone here always uses Aether or Plasma rifles. Nothing cool or old school like lead.” She said. 

Guns were about the only things she was aware of Earth. If she were on the internet, she would have been one of those people that always knew way too much about how they functioned. 

“That’s true, especially with so much to see and do. There’s no telling what you’ll be, one moment an explorer, the next moment the captain of a pirate fleet or something.” Melo shrugged, her life was quite grounded here, unless a position on one of the space crews that traveled the galaxy to repair stranded explorers opened up.

“Oh put these bolts over near that big shelf, let’s try to keep everything we pull off organized and accounted for. Maybe if you’re lucky and this is a timely thing, you can take that force mecha for a run, a back and forth in the underground dome I use for testing.”

“Not a fan of pirates, myself. I suppose that I ain’t much better than one, myself though. I’m a bounty hunter. I don’t normally travel off planet. But something big has come up. So, I need to upgrade for space battles.” Skie said. 

“That’s good-” The Blonde was cut off as Skye began to Zigzag the ship. Of course he knew why she was, hell he even spotted the Monarchist ship first. Quickly Scribe put the book he was reading down and got ready.

The Traveller turned the guns he was controlling around and began to give cover fire for Skye, of course he was braced and the Captain could tell by the way he was sitting. “So…do we blow them out of the sky?” He asked as he continued to fire, his shots missed yes, but this was on purpose, with how quickly he got into it…Skye would realize that this might not be the first time he’s been in an Airship.

“Aim for the things that look like giant orbs of blue light. That’s their Aether cores. Older designs are rarely armoured.” She said. “It’ll cause power shortages once they are down. Flawed designs, that’s why no one but Terrians use them any serious manner on this rock.”

Skie put put more pressure on the thrust, making the airship go faster than before. For anyone not used to the high speeds, it was going to be a dizzying affair. With a combination of her spins and rapid machine gun fire, the first of the orbs started to spark. But instead of being white, it was an almost purplish mist.

“Huh? Something’s weird...” Skie asked, as her eyes started to spark blue. 

“I see.” He said as he listened to her speak, he only understood a bit of what Skye had said but the main point was taken in and understood. He watched as the ship he had pointed out came into view and it was a small white airship, just as she said the Monarchists had. 

When she gave him the booklet, he took some time to breeze through it, it would be useful while he was here, who knows? Maybe it would be useful in other worlds as well. “So…you seem to know exactly where we are going, how long until we reach our destination?” 

“Yep. I know where we’re we are going. Anyways, hold on to your butt. Enemy spotted at 12 o’clock. Kid,I hope you know how to use that Gatling gun because you’re about to get into your first dog fight.” She said, after spotting the monarchist ship.

She did a lot of zigzagging at first, as if trying to bait the other ship. It seemed to fall for it. Skie fired several rounds from the forward machine guns. The machines were loud and could be overwhelming to those without pilot experience. 

“I didn’t know my mom, I just grew up around a bunch of scrappers and just kept getting into things, before I knew it, they surprised me with a gift lump of money to go to school like I was the junk yard daughter or something.”

Melo peeled back more things, keeping exact notes of literally everything than came off in the order it did, even drawing her own version of the blueprints of her own knowledge. “Don’t worry I’ll keep your snacks safe, uhh.”

“Let’s see, I did twice. I’m not a good pilot, I had a friend who was really good, she’s off exploring things now. So no more testing big mechas for me, just doing them for the force. They’re crazy to operate though.”

“Now that’s an interesting story. I’m always stuck saying I come from some important legacy. But out here in space, you can be anyone and make your way up the social ladder! Become someone that is cool and interesting! I miss that.” Skie sighed. 

“Yaouw could have had a little more tact before yaouw called me a bloody hag,” Helena said, the wind immediately taken out of her sails. She pouted heavily, crossing her arms.

“She ain’t a bloody antique, I got her used, but she weren’t built more’n seven years ago. Yaouw said it yourself gadgie, it’s a tank that flies. The heaters melt destroyers like it were nothing. What does a backwater like this have that threatens a Terran girl like that? Particularly when it’s me at the bloody controls. Damn thing’s so much of a tank, I can ram the pillock inter shit and she’ll be right.” In fact, if one looked closely at the paint, there was distinctly red and purple scraped upon it. Helena might not be joking about ramming other airships.

Helena was prideful in her choice of a ride. She was giving Skie a glare at the seeming transgression. Perhaps thankfully, it didn’t last long. 

“Fine,” Helena said with a sigh. “Yaouw can check her out. I haven’t skimped when it comes ter maintenance, she sees a good servicing every time I’m back home. Just because the paint were scratched don’t mean it’s a junker.” She just didn’t happen to mention how long it had been since she’d gone home. The merc would lead the way aboard.

“What’s a hag? Some kind of old lady? Not a word that we use here.” Skie chuckled. 

“Let’s see, a long history of developing high firepower, small scale airships that drove off the alien invasions early in our history. Then the evil queen made an airship that was powered by a girl similar to me.....Ended up having something similar to a nuclear explosion.” She said. 

“Though a tanker can indeed crash its way trough a fleet of monarchist fleets. They have older tech that some alien species sold them en mass.”

“So…we are going to take on a bunch of Warships…in this little thing?” Scribe spoke as he looked out over the ocean below him, he was caught up in the wonder of this other world, as well as listening to his new friend’s ramblings, she seemed like a fun person and despite what she said, he thought she was a hero. Maybe not in the traditional sense but she was still helping people in a way.

But those thoughts were shaken from his head as he turned to look at her, his eyes judging the woman next to him before a grin slowly but surely crept up his face. If they played their cards right then it might just work! Maybe..

“Let’s fucking do it! This is going to be a blast!” His eyes turned back to look out the windows when he saw it…an unfamiliar air ship, approaching them from the side. “Hey umm…Skye…what do these Pirate ships look like again?”

“The Fall of Calypso , It is a destroyer-class naval ship that features a solid, smooth, boat-like hull. Its prow is dominated by a large ramming horn. Resting beneath this is the secondary hull, which contains the lift Aether Unit .Unlike most of the Alliance’s engines on their airships, the Aether Units onboard the Calypso-class are powered by exclusively by Aether thrust and not a combination of steam and Aether . This can be seen with the large Aether “ball” towards the front of the ship.” She explained as she handed Scribe a booklet with outlines of various airships.