Chương 31: Chapter Thirty-One: Observation

In the skies above Kenhoro and Tanhae, Faren gripped the ship's railing with white knuckles, forcing himself to take deep breaths as the upper-sky island came into view. Of all his friends and acquaintances, he didn't know anyone who got more airsick than he did. He felt queasy travelling on a tiny ship like this, especially as the storm season winds meant he was constantly off balance.

"Ready with the rope, Mister Faren!" yelled the captain, struggling to keep the ship's wheel from spinning out of control.

"Look! They're waiting!" The captain gestured with his chin at the approaching island. Faren squinted to see a pair of demons waving from a small jetty. Faren braced himself as the ship approached, holding the hefty rope in one hand while trying to keep himself steady with the other. The winds battered the ship, tilting it this way and that. He groaned silently to himself. He'd been assured his career in sensors and communications would mean a dull but stable life in an office somewhere.

Unfortunately, things hadn't turned out so easy for Faren. Sure, he'd finally got the position in an office… One floating six thousand metres above the continent.

"Going to be a bit of a bump!" yelled the captain over the wind as the island rushed to meet them. They were probably breaking more than a few sky laws coming into dock like this, but what could they do? If they didn't dock now, who knew when they would be able to? In the last few metres, the captain flipped a lever, and the ship spun so Faren's side aligned with the jetty.

"Throw it!" the captain shouted. Faren threw the rope with all his might at the two demons. They caught the rope and, a moment later, Faren was almost thrown off the ship as it collided with the jetty. The ship listed slightly before lifting up and over the structure.

"Easy, easy!" the captain fumbled with the wheel before locking it in place. A second jolt went through the ship. Faren bent over the side to see that the two men had firmly secured the rope around a metal post.

"Good work, Mister Faren!" the captain called.

"I'll reduce the lift, jump down and help them pull us in!" Credit to the captain, he was skilled at operating his station. Despite being battered by the winds, the ship slowly lowered in a controlled manner. Faren clambered off the side of the ship and dropped onto the jetty. He rushed over to take his place next to the other two, gripping the rope and trying to find somewhere to dig his heels.

"Heft!" called one of the demons, and Faren pulled with all his might.

"Heft!" Faren pulled again.

"Heft!" The ship became level with the jetty.

"Heft!" A final pull, and the slack in the rope was wrapped around the metal pole. A second rope was used to fasten the ship against another pole further along the jetty.

"Get the supplies off first!" one of the demons shouted.

"Quickly!" Faren nodded and with the captain and two others they began getting the cargo off the ship. They formed a line running crates back and forth into the small wooded area that was the island's key feature. Once they were done, one of the demons turned to the captain and asked, "Do you want to wait until the winds die down?"

"No! I'll ride it back down!" replied the captain.

"See me off!" He clambered back behind the ship's wheel and gave the signal. The other two demons unwrapped the holding ropes and soon the ship was pulled by the winds away from the island.

"Woohoo!" Faren heard the captain's cheers and mad laughter as the ship sailed away, soon disappearing below the cloud layer.

"Crazy bastard!" the demon exclaimed.

"Can't say I blame him! Who'd want to be stuck here for months!?" The man gestured to Faren.

"Come on! Help us get these inside!"

"Inside?" Faren asked. The island was small. There were perhaps two dozen trees. He couldn't see any sign of a building or structure. His question was answered as his new colleagues opened a rusted door built into a raised mound. Peering in, Faren discovered there was a path that, judging by the way it curved, spiralled down into the island itself. Eager to get out of the wind and its constant howling, he helped the others carry the cargo through the doors and down the spiralling path.

Aetherlights lit his way and soon he arrived in a small room where someone was waiting for him.

"You're the new sensors analyst?" The man puffed on a cigar, his three horns making him look a little like a trident.

"Welcome." He shook Faren's hand.

"I'm your boss for the foreseeable future. Call me Mangs."

"Uh, yes, Officer Mangs!" Faren recognised the name and gave a quick salute.

"We don't bother with that shit here," Mangs said, waving a hand dismissively.

"This isn't the bridge of a ship. Don't bother with titles, either. Save that for when the upper brass comes knocking."

"Ah, sure."

"This is Goren, our steam mechanic." Mangs gestured to one of the demons.

"And this is Ladis, our aethersmith, although we all call him by his family name, Longhall." Goren and Longhall took turns shaking his hand.

"You're Faren, right?" Longhall asked with a grin.

"It's been quiet since Urlan left. Must have been a shaky ride to get up here."

"Sure was," Faren said.

"Thought the damn captain was going to flip the ship."

"Any captain sailing in these winds has to be mad," Goren said, shaking his head.

"They've stopped civilian traffic now. We received the notification only a few minutes ago."

"No one is leaving the island for a while," Mangs said, banging on a large metal door. He turned to Faren as someone on the other side moved a series of heavy bolts.

"Try not to piss anyone off. Not a lot of space around here. Best we all be friends." Before Faren could communicate his agreement, the heavy iron door was thrown open, and he caught sight of a flash of red. That flash of red belonged to a crimson-haired woman who darted past him and, using her bare hands, practically ripped one of the crates apart. The subtle red glow of the woman's skin clarified Faren's thoughts. An aura user. From the North, if the red hair was any indication.

"Gimme!" the woman cheerfully announced as she filtered through the crate.

"Seven hells…" Goren mumbled. Longhall laughed and Mangs rolled his eyes before disappearing through the now-open door.

"Ah, my beloved! My child!" The woman held up a package of rations in the air before clutching it tightly to her chest. Faren saw the black lettering on the package: COFFEE. Wasn't military coffee the worst? The woman recovered and turned to face Faren with a quizzical expression.

"Oh? Finally, a handsome face around here." The woman put her hand out and Faren shook it while introducing himself.

"I'm Finella! A fellow analyst! So, you'll be taking Urlen's shift then? Rabbie's sleeping, but I can kick him awake if you want to meet him."

"Uh, no. That's okay," Faren said. He was a little taken aback by the liveliness of the woman.

"What made you become an analyst? You're a warrior, right?" A demon who could manifest even the first aura would have an easy pathway to squad commander or even higher.

"Ha!" Finella put her hands on her hip and threw her hair back dramatically.

"Damn right, I am! I used to be Officer Bright. Got me a fancy position on a light-cruiser. Only it turned out…" A forlorn expression appeared on Finella's face.

"It was not to be…"

"What she means to say is she got in a fight with her captain," Longhall said with a smile on his face.

"Who was someone important. A Speaker. Their father was…"

"A Highlord," Finella groaned.

"She was so uptight all the time. Thought if I pushed her buttons a little, she would open up. Instead, things escalated…" Finella rubbed the back of her head.

"Gave her a little tap and now I'm here!" Faren swallowed.

"You struck your superior officer? Why didn't they hang you?""' Cause while she was beating me black and blue, I made a breakthrough and hit orange! Captain said hanging someone of my talent would be a waste, so instead they demoted me and put me here on this island!" Finella leaned in and whispered, "I'm supposed to be training rigorously. If anyone asks, tell them I'm doing that, alright?" She gave Faren a wink and bounced out of the room.

Faren looked after her for a moment before turning back to Longhall and Goren.

"Interesting colleagues," he said with a raised eyebrow.

"You get used to her," Longhall said, shrugging.

"Come on, let's get you settled in." Faren was led through the door, and as he took in the room beyond, he couldn't help but exclaim in awe.

"Biggest one you've seen?" Longhall asked.

"Yes. This must be bigger than one on a battleship," Faren said, leaning over the walkway and looking down at the enormous aetherscope. Its bulbous silvery structure made it appear stationary but he knew enough to know about the heavy and complex moving parts inside.

"What's the diameter?"

"Sixteen metres," answered Longhall, smiling as he saw Faren's reaction.

"We can detect a lift engine throughout most of the Sabanis Channel and as far south as Shimashina. Anything bigger than a fishing vessel disturbs the aetherfield and we hear it." Longhall crossed his arms, looking proud.

"And this baby runs quiet, thanks to my maintenance."

"How much power does it draw?" Faren asked. An aetherscope of this size would require significant amounts of both crystal and steam to function, especially if it operated day and night.

"The engine's down that path there," Goren said, pointing at an opening in the wall down below.

"It's a propulsion engine ripped from a scrapped battleship. It's loud, but reliable. There's a second failsafe engine, but we haven't had to use it yet. Steam runs through the red pipes, so don't touch them unless you want your skin burned off."

"Down there is our living quarters. Try and be quiet if others are sleeping," Longhall added, pointing down to where the walkway became a set of stairs spiralling down to the floor below. A case of content theft: this narrative is not rightfully on Amazon; if you spot it, report the violation. They slowly circled the gigantic aetherscope towards a communal area where Mangs and Finella were drinking coffee.

"To build this all underground…" Faren muttered.

"Wait, doesn't the crystal content in the earth interfere with the signals?"

"There are none," Longhall explained.

"The entire island is artificial."

"The entire island?" Faren's mouth fell open.

"That's right. The earth was purified. See the metal slabs making up the floor below? They run through the island. It's a ferro-crystal alloy. Generates lift against a matching set far below on the mountain range. Keeps us stable against the storms as well. Aetherlocking, they call it. Not practical for a ship, but for something stationary? Perfect."

"Crazy, ain't it?" Finella said, blowing on her cup of coffee.

"All this used to be ore and raw crystal sitting around doing nothing. Then we've harvested it and somehow made it into things that can detect other things."

"You hungry?" Mangs asked. Faren shook his head.

"Well, have some coffee at least, before this one drinks all our rations."

"Hey!" Finella protested. Faren smiled and poured himself a cup of coffee. He'd been frustrated when he found out about his assignment up here, even complaining to his superiors. Now, having met everyone, it didn't seem too bad. Maybe a bit cramped, but he was sure he could manage the six-month shift. The group of them sat and chatted for a while. Faren explained how he used to manage land-based wired communications for the rear-line before cross-training into sensor work.

He shared his goal of eventually becoming a sensor officer on a bridge and was delighted to hear Mangs say if he didn't, in his superior's words, fuck up, he'd get a glowing referral at the end.

"Let's show you the work station then!" Finella piped up after she finished her cup. Goren and Longhall had work to do, so only Mangs joined them. Finella led them into a neighbouring room filled with desks, tables, and familiar equipment.

"Here's the listening station! We have headphones to listen in on the aetherfield." Finella lifted up a pair of wired headphones.

"It'll automatically start recording a paper trail if there's a peak or lull, but if you want to do it manually, then just flip this lever." Finella flicked a lever and a metal arm began scratching black ink on a continuously moving piece of paper. Finella flipped the switch back and pointed out a row of instruments along the wall.

"Magnitude, frequency and pitch of incoming signals are displayed there. Log books are here. At the moment, we're focused on traffic in the Sabanis Channel, but log any ship you detect that isn't also broadcasting its identification. And this…" Finella spun around to a large flat metal table dominating the centre of the room.

"You know what this is?"

"An aethermap," Faren said.

"Ever seen one before?"

"Only on paper."

"Well, check this out!" Finella pressed a button and suddenly the metal table became alive as hundreds of thousands of tiny needles rose up to form a topological map of the continent below them. Valleys and mountains formed and Faren quickly found himself identifying familiar locations.

"That's Kenhoro," he said, pointing down.

"And Tanhae. That must be the Sabanis Channel, right?"

"That's right, and see those little peaks pulsing? That's the lift engines of the perimeter ships. When the needles move fast like that, it's a lift engine. However, when it… hmm…" Finella peered around the map for a moment before pointing at a location.

"See that peak! See how it's pulsing like a heartbeat?"

"I see it."

"That's an arcwhale! A lot of them migrate during storm season here in the East! This one's alone, but in a few weeks, they migrate in swarms. It's awesome to see!"

"When we're active sensing," Mangs piped up from the door, "never point the aetherscope at an arcwhale. A brief sweep on low power is acceptable, but a focused one will cause it pain, and if we cause it pain, we're a problem for them."

"Yes, if that happens, Rhaknam will come and kill us all!" Finella said with a grin.

"Well, maybe you lot. I'll jump from the island!"

"Right, no pinging arcwhales." Faren nodded.

"I've never seen one in person. Can you see them from the island?"

"On the right day, you can!" Finella said.

"We have some telescopes we use for visual identification of close-range ships. When I'm not on shift, I like to try and spot them. Some of them are absolutely massive!" Her enthusiasm made Faren think that perhaps Finella was in the wrong career.

"So, traffic along the channel. Avoid arcwhales… anything else?" he asked.

"Yes!" Finella dug a leatherbound book from a shelf.

"This is the log for Spoken Words. Extremely important!" She shook the book in front of Faren's face.

"If you pick up a Word, record it first, then wake everyone up. Mangs has a bunch of protocols he needs to follow when it happens. Like here…" Finella flipped open the book before showing Faren a page.

"A few weeks ago, three Words were Spoken down below in Kenhoro. Did you hear anything on the broadsheets?" In answer to Finella's inquiry, Faren shook his head. He focused on the logs that recorded the magnitude, pitch and frequency of the Spoken Words." Narean, Salinas, and…" Faren paused in concentration as he tried to remember the tables he had spent so long memorising.

"... And Taruna."

"Oh, you know your stuff!" Finella exclaimed.

"We've got the cheatsheets for reference, but it doesn't sound like you'll need them. But look at this…" Finella showed him some further records from the next few few seconds after the initial Words were Spoken.

"See this? It's a Taruna chant. Must have been a big fight. And then this…" Finella pointed to some further logs.

"The aetherfield went wild for a moment. One of the Speakers did something really weird. Rabbie was on duty then and said the aethermap went crazy. We still don't know what it was!" Faren examined the logs but found his memory didn't help with a clear answer. Such things could be expected. They didn't have reliable logs of every Word, spell, or chant that existed.

"Want to give it a go? Just so I know what you're doing?" Finella asked.

"Sure. What do you want me to do?"

"See that signal?" Finella pointed at the southern portion of the aethermap.

"What's that?"

"A lift engine," Faren answered, identifying the fast pulsing of the needles.

"Running fast. A cutter, maybe? Going south to Shimashina."

"Now take the controls, focus the aetherscope on it. Don't ping it, just get records of its frequency and pitch. Then we'll write out its identifier and see if we can find it in the tables of known ships!" Faren sat at the table of controls and began fiddling with the knobs that controlled the various mechanisms of the aetherscope. The desk was slightly elevated and overlooked the aethermap.

Faren manipulated the controls and the aethermap responded as he directed the machine to turn its artificial eye towards the small slice of the aetherfield the ship was sailing through. After a few moments, instead of the thousand-klick-wide map, they were zoomed in on a small section tracking the moving ship.

"Anything interesting you want to start recording. We have the paper to waste." Finella leaned over and flipped the switch and the metal arm began scratching away.

"What's the frequency?"

"Ten point five, high."

"And the pitch?"

"Minus fifteen."

"Classic lift-engine." Finella pulled a chair alongside Faren and opened another logbook.

"We might be able to match it to a known engine brand. What's the magnitude?"

"It's–whoa! It spiked!" For a moment, the line on the screens burst into life before settling back down to baseline.

"Where's it gone?" He looked down over the aethermap which was now devoid of any telltale peaks.

"Zoom out, let's see if we can find it," Finella said. Faren played with the controls until the aethermap now displayed a piece of the wilderness a hundred klicks across. No peak could be seen.

"You said it spiked?" Mangs said, appearing beside him.

"Finella, get me that readout." Something in his tone changed the atmosphere to something less playful. Finella obediently fetched the paper readout the metal arm had scratched. She passed it to Mangs, who laid it over the desk.

"There!" Mangs exclaimed, pointing at a section of the readout where the arm had inked a sudden rise of magnitude before settling down.

"Is it…" Finella began before trailing off. Faren felt himself swallow. He had seen diagrams of a readout that looked exactly like this in the training manuals.

"A catastrophic aether reaction. Their lift engine blew," Mangs said with a grim expression.

"There might be survivors. I'll call it in! Finella–" Mangs was cut off as a siren burst into life. Red aetherlights began flashing and the lines on the paper went wild.

"What the fuck!" Finella yelled.

"What's that shit!?"

"H-hang on!" Mangs yelled back over the noise. He scrambled to a wall and flipped a switch, silencing the sirens.

"I didn't know we had fucking sirens!?" Finella exclaimed, rubbing her ears. A moment later, Goren, Longhall and another demon Faren assumed was Rabbie, appeared at the door.

"Mangs!" Rabbie yelled, pushing through the group and reading the readout on the paper. The demon looked up at his superior officer with wide eyes.

"Is it…?"

"Looks like it," Mangs grunted.

"You got the key?"

"Yeah, yeah! Here!" Rabbie produced a key and threw it to Mangs. After catching it, Mangs produced a second key from his person and walked over to a wall safe. With the two keys inserted, Mangs turned them both at the same time and opened the safe from which he pulled out a small blue book. He pulled a chair against the control desk and began to flip through the book with a grim expression.

"Rabbie, magnitude?"

"It's… one–" Rabbie shook his head.

"Christ. One hundred and five. Is that possible?"

"Pattern?"

"Type C."

"Does it flare at the end?"

"No." Faren desperately wanted to ask what was going on, but decided to keep his mouth shut. While Goren and Longhall seemed to join him in a pensive silence, Finella had other thoughts.

"Mangs!" she hissed.

"What the fuck's going on? What were those sirens?"

"They're set to go off when the aetherfield reports an event of magnitude eighty or higher," Mangs explained as he flipped through the blue book.

"Finella, what's the typical magnitude of a First-Word?"

"Sixty-five. Maybe seventy if Spoken by a talented Speaker."

"And a Second-Word?"

"Umm…" Finella stumbled.

"Eighty-five," Faren said.

"Is that why the alarm was set to eighty?"

"That's right," Mangs answered.

"Rabbie, frequency?"

"Eight point two, high."

"Pitch?"

"Ah… shit," Rabbie mumbled.

"Sorry, Mangs. It's far into the blue. Thirty-six."

"Blue?" Finella said, her voice taking on an element of nervousness.

"Does that mean…"

"A possible human Second-Word," Mangs grumbled.

"On our territory." For a moment, everyone was silent and the only noise that could be heard was the scratching of Mangs' pencil and the metal arm recording the aetherfield.

"It's weird," Mangs said while tapping his pencil against the blue book.

"The closest match is Asclepius, the Second-Word of divinity. But this is strange. The pattern matches, as does pitch, but the frequency suggests it was Spoken like it was a demon word. It's like it was Spoken by a…" Mangs shook his head.

"Never mind. I need to report this. Finella, Rabbie? Log everything. Faren, stand by." Mangs stood up, turning towards Goren and Longhall.

"Double-check the aetherscope and the stability of the steam. Make sure it's operating right."

"Mangs." Faren couldn't help himself.

"The magnitude was one hundred and five?" Mangs didn't reply, instead giving a slight, sharp nod.

"The scale is logarithmic. A typical Second-Word is eighty-five. So this Word is a hundred times more powerful than average?"

"... That's right." Mangs locked eyes with Faren, an indescribable expression on his face.

"Could it be… a Third-Word? The Empress?"

"No." Mangs shook his head.

"Even this doesn't come close to a Third-Word." Faren swallowed nervously.

"What's… the magnitude?"

"That information is on a need-to-know basis," Mangs said pointedly.

"But… Third-Word or not…" He looked over the group, taking in their drained faces and eyes of worry.

"The war is about to get a whole lot more ugly."