Valerios
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Chapter 54: A Majestic Bird
🕑 Added 2022-05-07 15:59:01 +0000 UTCHey, everyone. We're approaching an important deadline at work -- I'm submitting my research to one of the largest AI conferences, actually -- and I need to bust my ass off for a week to get everything ready, so the story will go on break until 6/27.
On the bright side, work will probably calm down after that, until mid-July when my contract is over.
Sorry for the cliffhanger, enjoy your week, and see you on the next-next Monday!
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Jerry rubbed his eyes. It didn’t help; he could still see a whale flying in the distance.
“That’s a whale,” noted Marcus.
“I would rub my eyes too… if I had any,” said Boney. Axehand grunted in amusement.
“What are you talking about? Everyone knows there’s flying whales,” Laura replied, narrowing her eyes. “The question is, why is one here?”
“Where are they supposed to be?!”
“Wait a moment!” exclaimed Jerry, suddenly excited. “Maybe it’s an undead!”
“Of course it bloody is, we’re in the Dead Lands!”
As soon as they saw it, the whale saw them too. It turned with a flick of its tail, suddenly moving directly at them.
Boney’s jaw clacked nervously. “...It’s friendly, right?” he said.
“Maybe?” replied Jerry, cupping his chin. “You know what? Maybe we could befriend it. I’d love a pet whale.”
“I don’t think we can.” Laura narrowed her eyes, taking a step back. “Wild undead go berserk at the sight of the living.”
“Wait, you don’t mean…”
“I do. I think that whale is going to destroy our airship.”
It took them a moment to process this. Axehand was the first to react, letting out an intrigued grunt, and Marcus erupted right afterward.
“MEN!” he shouted, running to the steering wheel. “Pull up the sails! we must turn the ship around AT ONCE!”
The Billies sprang into motion. Two climbed up the masts like monkeys and two pulled at ropes tied on the deck, quickly making the front and back sails of the ship crease and begin to fold in on themselves.
Marcus reached the wheel. “Everyone grab on to something!” he yelled, turning the knobs with all his strength. A flat block of wood rose from the ship’s starboard side, going from stuck to the hull to perpendicular against it, and blocked the wind, making the entire ship creak and moan as it turned sharply to the right. Checkerboards and chairs slid to the railing, some even raining to the Dead Lands below, and everyone grabbed on to whatever they could find to remain standing; Jerry held his chair with one hand and an upraised floor plank with the other, struggling to save his most precious possession.
“You’re going to kill us all!” screamed Laura, hugging the front mast.
The ship finished its turn and Marcus straightened the wheel, letting the airship rock from side to side before calming. “Men! Open the sails and blow into them if you must, we sail at full speed ahead!”
The Billies obeyed—they somehow hadn’t been flung off the masts—and the sails opened again, but this time, the wind was diagonally against them, and the airship was slow. Marcus grit his teeth as he noticed.
“Manna damn it!” he cursed, letting go of the wheel. “Hold her steady, someone!”
Boney rushed to the wheel, reaching and holding it tight with both hands as Marcus dove for the center of the deck, where the fuel barrel was. Latching on to the valve, he yanked it. “Careful!” he yelled, and the very next moment, the entire ship rattled as its nose turned downward.
“We’re falling!” shouted Jerry. “Marcus, we’re falling!”
“I goddamn know!”
“We’re going to die!”
“Silence!”
The airship descended, and as it did, it picked up speed. Everyone’s stomachs protested, and they suddenly felt lighter. The ship’s prow, which used to overlook the horizon, was now pointed directly at a grassy hill. A zombie turned to look at them, tilting its head.
“Marcus!”
“Now!” he shouted, yanking the valve in the opposite direction. The ship creaked as its descent slowly came to a halt, and suddenly, they were flying straight again, but much faster than before.
“You madman!” Boney cried out. “You did it!”
“I’m your goddamn captain, of course I did it!” shouted Marcus, looking back over his shoulder. He paled. “Shit.”
Everyone turned. A colossal, majestic beast was chasing them, its tail flapping against the wind with terrifying force as it closed the distance. From its side, a terrifying red eye—they couldn’t see the other one—was pointed directly at them.
“Why the hell is it chasing us?” Jerry complained. “We didn’t do anything!”
“It’s a wild undead!” Laura grit her teeth. “It won’t rest until it gets us! Marcus, can we outrun it?”
“Unlikely!” he shouted back. The airship was steadily, if slowly, losing speed. “We can’t repeat the same trick or we might crash. Goddamnit!” His eyes flitted from side to side as he thought. “Men!” he shouted again. “Raise the sails again! We’re turning around!”
“Right at it?” asked Laura as the Billies hurried to once again raise the sails.
“Do you have a better idea?!” Marcus thundered. “We can’t escape, but it looks fat as fuck! If we outmaneuver it and get behind it, we will have the wind on our sails and we might be able to escape!”
Axehand, who hadn’t budged during the turning and tossing before, grunted in excitement. He took a swig of wine.
“Hold on, everyone!”
The ship turned sharply again, prow now facing the whale. It was still some ways away, but with the two parties heading straight at each other, the distance was quickly evaporating.
“Billies, at the sails! Boney, at the wheel! You must obey my orders the second I speak them! I’ll be at the balloon, and everybody else… just do your best!” Marcus gave his final commands, preparing the ship for battle.
Axehand walked to the tip of the prow, steady beyond doubt, and grunted as he took another large swig from his flask. Headless, Boboar, and Foxy took up positions around Jerry, while Birb fluttered overhead, ready to assist as needed.
Jerry himself took a few deep breaths, preparing to use his soul against the whale’s. “An aerial battle…” he said, chuckling. “I never thought this day would come.”
“This isn’t a game!” replied Laura, taking up position right beside him, where his undead would protect her too. The stopper of her iron flask popped out, releasing a large amount of water, and even more seemed to coalesce out of thin air in front of her. “Try to strike hard and fast,” she instructed Jerry. “Wild undead have frail souls. This one is too big to sever outright, but the more you can distract it, the better.”
“How do you know this stuff?”
“Just do it!”
They were going with the wind now, and their ship was slowly ascending as they advanced, forcing the whale to fly upward too. “Slightly port side!” ordered Marcus. “That’s left, Boney! And when we reach the whale, prepare to turn sharply to the right.”
“Your right or my right?”
“We’re facing the same direction! Just shut up and do it!”
They angled the ship to the left, forcing the whale to follow suit. They were rapidly approaching the point of impact. Everyone prepared themselves, and the closer they got, the better they could observe the whale.
It was a large hulking beast, a mixture of black and white; this beast was probably longer than the entire airship! Its underbelly was wrinkled as it gracefully slid through the air, and its throat seemed to bulge out from below, ready to devour them all. It didn’t seem particularly injured, but at this range, there was no way Jerry could miss such a towering aura of undeath.
None of them had seen a whale before, and they were lost in staring for a short moment.
“Look!” said Jerry. “There’s something on it!”
Pieces of rotten wood were tied to the whale’s back, interspersed on the slick skin. “What is that?!”
“Is that a mast?” asked Laura, her eyes going wide.
“That’s—it’s a mast! And that one’s a piece of hull, and that piece of cloth is the remains of a sail. Holy shit”—Marcus’s eyes went wide—“was someone riding the whale?!”
“Who the hell could be that awesome?” asked Jerry, eyes going wide.
“I’ve heard of flying whales, but riding them…” Laura grit her teeth. “I… I have no idea what’s going on.”
“Can we please focus on not dying?” Boney asked from the steering wheel. “Mount or not, the whale is about to ram us, and the ground is very far away!”
They closed the distance. The whale loomed larger and larger as they approached, much larger than Jerry had imagined. The wooden remains on its back were obviously a shipwreck—once upon a time, someone had turned this whale into an airship much like their own.
But that detail was insignificant as the giant form towered over them. It was definitely larger than the airship, and its red eyes were filled with fury as it opened its mouth to roar outlandishly, revealing a dark, bottomless abyss.
“It’s going to eat us!” said Jerry.
“Marcus!” Boney cried out, hands trembling on the wheel. “We must turn!”
“Not yet!” The captain commanded. The whale approached. A collision seemed inevitable.
“Hold!” he repeated. Boney clenched his jaw. Jerry closed his eyes, feeling out with his soul. Suddenly, a large, angry, misshapen thing entered his range. His eyes snapped open.
Now!
“Now!” Marcus cried out, and Boney was already turning the wheel with the strength of every bone in his body. The wooden air stopper snapped open and the ship turned much sharper than before, its deck reaching such a steep incline that it seemed about to tip.
The Billies held on to the masts as everyone grabbed whatever was stable for dear life. Headless’s one arm was wrapped around Jerry, whose hand was tight around the heavenly soft chair’s leg as his mind was elsewhere. A black aura escaped Jerry’s body as his eyes grew dark, and in his mind, the entirety of his soul slammed against the zombie whale’s with every bit of force he could muster.
In that single moment, time seemed to freeze, and Jerry sensed a large lump so chaotic and irrational that he knew there was absolutely no way for them to communicate. This being wasn’t like his undead—it was a mindless beast of destruction.
He was then flung backward.
The whale roared in pain, and Jerry’s eyes saw stars from the recoil; the sheer size of its soul had overwhelmed him, but he wasn’t defeated yet, and the whale’s mind went blank as its entire being struggled to push him back. Jerry held on for dear life; they were still too close, and if the whale saw them now, it would smash them to pieces—but no matter how hard he tried, his power was waning.
The sound of splitting wind came from above as a small shape darted down through the air. With an enraged chirp, Birb nosedived into the whale’s red eye, making the lumbering beast thrash and twitch, momentarily losing control and letting them escape. Jerry’s soul was ousted by its rage—undead felt no pain, but the instinctive shock and aversion to injury remained.
“Birb!” he shouted, opening his eye, but the little bird had already flown away, drowned in black blood but safe and sound.
The airship was still turning sharper than it ever had, and it had almost escaped the whale’s reach, but in its mad thrashing, a colossal fin was coming straight for them. “Master!” yelled Boney, pulling harder, but the wheel was already at its limit.
Just as the turn stabilized and the ship stopped inclining further, Marcus yanked the fuel valve so hard it broke. A hissing sound escaped the pipe, and the balloon above them deflated as the ship dropped like a rock, narrowly missing the fin that flew overhead.
“No!” Marcus grabbed the pipe with both hands, struggling to turn the valve to the other side, but he couldn’t stop the escaping air. A bubble of water could. And as the water formed a tight grip around the broken valve, the fall stabilized, and the ship managed to maintain its altitude.
“We did it!” yelled Marcus, looking at the beast that was helplessly flying past them . “We’re past the whale! Laura, hold the bubble! Billies, lower the sails so we can—”
He looked above. And, where he expected to see clouds, he only saw a dark tail slapping towards them, hiding the sky. He hadn’t accounted for such flexibility.
The ship was stuck. They couldn’t dodge. Everyone blanched.
And as the tail turned to fall on them, slapping down with all the strength of an enraged whale, the entire ship shook as a lone figure jumped up with tremendous force.
Axehand flew through the air, a challenging grunt escaping his mouth as his entire body expelled red steam. He was burning, overcharged to the limit; and in front of the whale’s tail, he looked minuscule.
The flap fell. And Axehand, with a tremendous roar, placed his two axes together and slashed them down as one.
The following sight engraved itself on their memories forever. As the giant tail fell upon them, the sky was revealed. Before a tiny, axe-wielding form, the massive tail, several times thicker than Axehand was tall, was cleanly sliced off, its twin tip flying off by itself.
Everyone’s jaws almost dislocated from dropping, and their eyes threatened to pop out of their sockets. In mid-air above the balloon, between the two halves of the severed tail, Axehand let out a cocky grunt.
The severed tip was launched away by sheer momentum, missing the airship, while the tail stump whooshed past the airship, ushering a massive wind gust as it almost scratched the hull.
