Aloft (Petronaut Tales) (13 page)

“It
would
be revolutionary.  A vehicle that makes you take your life in your own hands every time you strap yourself in?”

She felt the fingers at her back press a little harder.  It was no longer banter; she could sense the real pain behind his words.  She leaned her shoulder against his chest and looked up at him.

“I’m okay, Cooper,” she whispered.

He looked out across the crowd, keeping his face determinedly neutral.  “I’ll never forget what watching you in that machine was like,” he said.  “If no one else ever turns this thing on, so much the better.”

Drums and fanfare rang out from the Parade squad stage at the far end of the street.  They glanced towards the corner of the temporary bandshell that was visible from their booth.  Ensie couldn’t see any part of the stage, but the delight on the faces of the gawking civilians in the audience was clearly visible.

By contrast, the crush of Delians walking past them barely slowed, for the most part.  One in five would give the insectoid Flicker a glance, but only rarely would someone stop to read the plaque on its post at the machine’s nose. 
Let alone stop to talk to us
, she thought. 
So be it. I’ve got all the company I want
.

“It’s official, by the way,” Cooper said, stretching.  “Upforth Junior is on a forced leave of absence, and Skye is acting boss until the shareholders forgive him.  Or come to their senses and promote her permanently.”

“Wow!  How’s that feel?”

“Well, she hasn’t clapped in my face or insulted my weight yet, so I think I’ll get used to her management style.”

Ensie smiled sidelong at him, a little uncertainly.  “And did they have anything to say to you?”

“They’ve docked my pay for the next quarter, but I still have a job.”

She squeezed his hand, feeling oddly alone with him despite all the noise and bustle.  For all the interest the crowd had in them, they might as well have been taking an intimate walk through Galidate Gardens.  “It’s not fair that you’re getting blamed because he ruined the project.”

Cooper shrugged.  “It’s not fair that none of these people are ever going to know the excitement you went through, getting this defunct machine to this point.”

Excitement is one word for it
, she thought, feeling a twinge in her still-sore tailbone.  The words bounced through her head for a long moment, longer than she’d expected, and she found she couldn’t shake them.
You know…excitement
is
the word for it.

“Cooper.”

He looked down at her.

“I’m going to put in for permanent assignment as a test pilot.”

His brown eyes widened.  “You’re... what do you mean?”

“There’s a corps of Expert techs who specialize in taking new machines for a spin.  I think that’s what I want to go for.  That’s what I want do with myself.”

“After this?  After what almost happened to you?”

Ensie looked up at him, placing a hand on his chest.  Her eyes were clear.

“Yeah,” she said, quietly.

“Spheres, Ensie,” he said, lacing his fingers behind his neck.  A passing woman gave the two of them a curious glance as she walked by, but neither of them noticed.  “I mean, how dangerous can a job get?  Is that really—”

“You saw the landing I made on that roof, Cooper,” she murmured.  “I was scared, and beaten up, and the Flicker was falling apart under me, and I still managed to do something like that.  I got lucky, sure.  But I also think... I’m good at this.”

At the other end of the street, the crowd watching the Parade squad started to cheer.  Ensie grinned and lowered her eyes as she felt her cheeks pinking up. 
As if I don’t feel silly enough tooting my own horn.  Not something I’m used to doing.

“I don’t know anyone else who could have made that landing,” Cooper said, shaking his head slowly.  “I don’t know anyone else who would have thought to try it.”

“For the first time in my career, I felt like a real Aerial.”

He leaned over and kissed her softly on the forehead.  “You’re the best damn Aerial there is,” he said, keeping his mouth pressed to her skin.  She could feel his words purring through her body, and let her eyes fall half-closed.  “And I want to see you fly as far as you can.  I’ll just have to do my best to keep up.”

Ensie’s eyes were damp.  She lifted her chin to kiss him.

She cleared her throat instead, catching sight of the knot of Delians who were watching their tender moment expectantly.  She straightened up and put on a smile as an older man waddled closer, craning his head to look at the machine behind her.

“Hello there!  We call this the Flicker.”

“A revolution in personal travel,” Cooper said proudly. 

Ensie swatted him in the stomach with the back of her hand, keeping her face fixed in a pleasant smile.  He let his fingers brush against hers as she brought her hand away.

Their patter shifted to details about the Flicker, and their words wove a pleasant story of technology, power, innovation, and progress.  But the cluster of Delians watching them politely could tell there was another story unfolding behind it.  They could read it in the gentle pressure of her shoulder against his arm, and his hand on her back, and the airiness of their two voices, mingling and laughing and lifting up into the sunlight.

About the Author

“In [The Wizard That Wasn’t], Rovik demonstrates his skill... convincing and realistic multidimensional characters... rich drama and intrigue... the dialogue is witty and fast-paced.

I truly enjoyed Rovik’s work.”

—Indie Book Blog Database

“It's always a pleasure to discover a new indie author who knows how to tell a good story... If you want to see what it looks like when dieselpunk-fantasy is done well, get a hold of this one.”

—Mike Reeves-McMillan, author of
City of Masks

*****

Ben Rovik is the author of the
Mechanized Wizardry
series and the related short story collection
Petronaut Tales
.  Ben is also a published, award-winning playwright (writing as Ben Kingsland), and spent many years as an actor before finally deciding to settle down into a sensible career: steampunk novelist.  He’s one of ten people who graduated from Johns Hopkins University with no intention of becoming a doctor.  He lives in Maryland with his wife, daughter, two cats, and a great deal of wine.

Email:  [email protected]

Facebook: 
http://www.facebook.com/BenRovikBooks

Blog: 
http://benrovik.wordpress.com/

Twitter: @benrovik, #MechWiz

Other Petronaut Tales

Arm’s Length

Sir Roland of the Bulwark squad has a suit built to take enormous punishment so his comrades don’t have to.  When the Delian schooner
Granite
comes under attack from two corsair clippers, Roland and his tech are duty-bound to defend the sailors and civilians on board.  But keeping the pirates at arm’s length is going to take some unorthodox measures…

Ebook at
Amazon

Sample Chapter from The Wizard That Wasn’t

Book One of Mechanized Wizardry

Here’s what readers are saying about the
Mechanized Wizardry
series:

What if magic didn’t have to be chaotic and messy and unreliable, like the wizards who practice it?  What if it could be as simple as throwing a switch?  When an unlikely visionary brings magic and technology together, an adventure begins that will change the course of history—and his own life—forever.

Junior technician Horace Lundin doesn't believe in magic.  That is, until the Petronaut sees its power firsthand...

*****

“Behold— the disks!  The
disks
!”

All eyes in the pavilion turned.  The wizard was on his feet, gnashing his teeth, with tears pouring from his eyes.  His voice was booming with rage and fear. One long finger was stretched as straight as a pike, pointing above the Viscount’s table to the wizardly white disks hanging from the beams—

Lundin blinked.  The white disks were turning black.

Like a fire nibbling at the edges of a sheet of paper, blackness was spreading from the outside in on each of the four disks.  LaMontina looked up at the dangling circles, his eyes darting from one to the next.  “Wizard!  What does this mean?”  he snapped.

“Peril, oh Graceful One!” the sorcerer wailed.  “A spell approaches.  Close your mind and make the Sign of Warding!”

After a brief hesitation, LaMontina curled his second and middle fingers into his palm and raised his hand to his chest in the half-remembered gesture everyone learned in childhood.  One of his officers took him by the arm.

“Your Grace, we must remove you to safety now!”

“A courier horse has been waiting for this moment.  Ride fifteen kilometers distant and no magic can touch you.”

“No!”  bellowed the wizard, falling heavily to the ground as if his legs had been swept from under him.  He looked up, his face stained with the purple sand from his design, and raised two claw-like hands towards the Viscount.  Everyone stepped away from the man involuntarily.  “No time!  Graceful One, Man-Child, He of the Rearing Bull, your life now rests in my hands.  Room!  Room!”

In response to the wizard’s frantic gestures, and LaMontina’s confirmation, the officers stepped away.  Under the copper light of the whale-oil lamp, the Viscount stood alone behind his desk.  The four disks ringing him were no longer white, but halfway obscured by crawling threads of black.  Lundin stared at the transforming disks, mesmerized. 
What’s the trick? How’s the wizard controlling his little decorations?

A rough hand on his shoulder shook him back to reality.  The balding commander in black-and-gold was pointing a finger in his face.  “Technician!  Are your masters in position?”

Two other officers were towering over him, with the urgent menace of strong men who feel helpless.  “I—”  he stumbled over his own tongue.  “I haven’t transmitted His Grace’s order yet.”

The officers swore.  “Get the Petronauts to that island this instant.  We need to find and kill this flaming wizard before the spell finishes.”

Lundin threw a salute so sharply he almost brained himself.  He staggered to the cluttered heap of Petronaut equipment and, with a mighty heave, lifted the Communicator out of its case.  Lundin set the boxy device roughly onto the crate of paperwork.  Two fluted tin speech trumpets stood up straight from the box like daffodils, and a curled crank near the base rose up like a squirrel’s tail.  Lundin grabbed the crank with both hands.  He began turning it as fast as he could, seeing the dial spark with power.  “Thirty seconds, at least, until you can make a transmission,” Samanthi said, snapping her fingers as her mind whirled.  “I’ll get the booster antenna; this message
needs
to reach Kelley.”

Lundin just nodded as she began assembling the antenna, trying to concentrate on each turn of the crank.  But his eyes went back to the disks.  What was that blackness?

Across the room, the wizard screamed, and kicked his bare feet through each line of his diamond design.  Sand went flying in showers of black, crimson and purple.  He grabbed the sticks of burning incense and snapped them in two, and then in two again, seemingly unconscious of the smoldering fire pressing against his hands.  He flung the wooden shards to the ground and stripped off his vest.  Nearly naked now, he lay down on his back atop the splinters of incense and screeched, “Stay strong, Graceful One!”