Hammer of the Witches Page 4

  “The helium conversion is complete,” she said. “Our next milestone is integrating the new electronics systems into the gondola.”

  Kalypso was originally a hydrogen airship. Hesperia was, and still is, the world’s primary supplier of helium, and during the Cold War it was reluctant to sell helium to nations behind the Iron Curtain. The Soviets responded by developing a line of airships that utilized hydrogen. Kalypso was the latest model, built right before the Third World War.

  Today, the world had reluctantly accepted hydrogen airships, partly due to the legacy of Soviet innovation and power, partly because of helium scarcity. There were only a handful of natural helium reserves in the entire world, and helium had other industrial uses beyond inflating balloons. Hydrogen airships tended to be cheaper than helium ones and could carry greater payloads.

  However, Hesperia was still extremely reluctant to adopt hydrogen airships. Only recently did commercial pressures finally force Hesperian airports to handle hydrogen airships. Even so, the military still insisted on helium-only airships. No one in our talent pool had any inkling on how to safely handle the Kalypso’s hydrogen lifting system. The engineers and the bureaucrats eventually got their way and wasted no time rebuilding the airship to accommodate helium and to seal off the atmospheric reclamation system from the gas bags.

  In exchange, I got the rest of what I needed.

  “What about the engines?” I asked.

  “Installation is complete. We just need to test them, but we don’t foresee any difficulties.”

  We had swapped out the civilian engines with mil-spec ones. Faster, hardier and more powerful, they were the first upgrades I had pushed for. With these engines, the airship could cross the ocean with a full load in a day and a half.

  “How about the mission module system?”

  “We’ve altered the cargo holds to your specs. The cargo and sensor modules are ready to go. The rest are still in the design phase.”

  From the outside each cargo hold appeared to be a seamless construct. In reality the engineers had split them in half. The bow end was unchanged, but the stern module could be swapped out on short notice. Nobody could tell unless they stepped inside the hold. The engineers had proposed a wide array of mission modules: cargo, sensors, drone launch platforms, weapons. Kalypso could never compete with a purpose-designed military airship of course, but as a Q-ship, she could go where military vessels could not and conceal her fangs until the right moment.

  “Any trouble with the other modules?” I asked.

  “It’s going to be impossible to prevent Customs inspectors from accessing or detecting their contents.”

  “That’s fine,” Pete said. “If we’re mounting those, we won’t be in places where we need to worry about Customs.”

  Her lips twitched into a wry smile. “All right. The other major issue is with asymmetrical loading. The modules don’t weigh the same. So if, say, you mount a cargo module on the port side and a UAV platform on the starboard, her starboard side will be much heavier than the port side. It could lead to adverse flight characteristics.”

  “Any way around that?” I asked.

  “The simple answer is to mount the same type of modules on the airship. But that won’t always be possible, right?”

  “Right.”

  “Captain Harding thinks we can resolve the issue simply by carrying ballast to even out the load. If there’s still a significant weight difference, we can adjust the engines to compensate. Our experts believe that that would place too much strain on the engines mounted on the heavier side and pose an unacceptable safety risk.”

  Kalypso was a hybrid airship. The lifting gas would zero out her weight while her four engines handled propulsion.

  “It wouldn’t do for our engines to redline in mid-flight,” Pete said.

  “Exactly.”

  “How can we solve this?”

  “We can run simulations, but…” she shrugged. “At some point we have to run air trials. We have no in-house knowledge to draw from.”

  “Not even the Navy?”

  “Navy airships have a single cargo bay integrated with the gondola. It makes flight ops less complicated.” She smiled with lips chapped by wind and sun. “The Rhosians might know, but I don’t think we can ask them.”

  “Guess not,” I said. “Let’s see the gondola.”

  Lisa led us to the neighboring hangar. Here, the gondola lay in two pieces, the A deck closer to the exit, the B deck at the rear. Workmen and robots scurried about them, inspecting them, tearing them down, building them back up.

  “I could give you a virtual tour on your holobuds,” she said.

  “Please,” I replied, switching my Clipcoms on.

  “Pete? Do you need a pair?”

  He smiled and tapped his head. “I’ve got in-heads.”

  “Excellent.”

  She switched hers on and set up a local area network. Within moments, she had invited us into a joint virtual reality tour.

  The Clipcoms projected an opaque full-view screen at eye level, blanking out the real world. Now I saw a stylized representation of the airship interior.

  The tour began in the drawing room, right past the gondola’s access ladder. Fahad had spared no expense in transforming the former military vessel into a luxury air yacht. The parquet flooring, made of shiny wood the color of dark chocolate, was covered in intricate designs. Paintings dating back to the Renaissance were hanging on the walls. The couches were made of genuine leather, the table smartglass laid into a wooden frame.

  But the room was noticeably smaller than the last time I had been aboard.

  Past the drawing room were the control room and crew quarters, occupying the center of the gondola. This section seemed much larger than before. The control room had been expanded to accommodate the airship’s new capabilities. Other cabins had been modified for our peculiar needs.

  She walked us through the improvements: encrypted communications, state-of-the-art sensors, upgraded computers, secret holds built into the hull to store weapons and other sensitive kit.

  “Thus far, we’ve hit every project milestone on time and budget,” Lisa said. “In half a year, we expect Kalypso will be able to do anything you need from her.”

  “Great work,” I said.

  We left her to her work and headed for the last hangar. Hangar Three held the Cibola, a training airship on loan from the Navy. She was ancient by the time WWIII broke out; today her highest and best use was for inducting fresh aviators into the art of operating airships. Or, in our case, re-familiarization operations. I didn’t know what strings O’Connor had pulled to obtain the airship, but Pete’s friends in the Navy said that the wheeling and dealing involved was the stuff of legends.

  We spoke with the technicians maintaining the airship, checked its status and then headed to the dorm. Along the way, I sent a couple of messages to alert people I was coming.

  The dorm was a miracle of modern technology. A squat, ugly structure made entirely of construction waste, it had been 3D printed from the ground up, its design inspired by humanitarian housing templates.

  The biometric lock let us in, and we made our way to an office on the second floor. Inside, Captain John Harding awaited at his desk.

  Like the guards, Harding was an old-timer. His sparse hair was shot through with white, his limbs were thin and bony, and heavy lines ran across his face. But his eyes still sparkled, and his mind remained sharp.

  Harding was one of the few men in the Confederation who had the experience we needed. He began his career as a junior officer aboard a cargo airship. Shortly after that, he wrangled a transfer to a gunship. That gunship was later selected as a platform to launch and handle unmanned aerial vehicles, and he was among the pioneer batch of aviators who wrote the manual on airship UAV operations. For his efforts, he was promoted to captain of an experimental airborne aircraft carrier during WWIII just in time for both sides to learn how particle beams had forever ended the age of non-
stealth combat aircraft. The hard way.

  The rest of his career was murky. O’Connor said he joined the National Intelligence and Security Agency, specifically the Air Branch of the Special Activities Division. Following his induction into the SAD, his dossier was completely blank.

  He was just the kind of man we were looking for.

  “Good morning, boys,” he said. “How can I help ya?”

  “Morning, old-timer,” Pete said. “Snap inspection. You know the drill.”

  “Of course. Anything you have in mind?”

  “How’s our crew doing?” I asked.

  “Bored, but they’re up to speed. Our core crew is ready for flight operations any time. Now we’re just honing the edge.”

  Harding had reached deep into the airship community, recruiting far and wide from retired veterans and the services—especially from the SAD. O’Connor told me that every service, including NISA, had lodged an avalanche of complaints, which his superiors had promptly ignored. Being in a black program had its benefits.

  “We’ve got at least six months to go before Kalypso is ready for prime time,” Pete said.

  “That’s six months without an airframe for my guys to train on,” he said. “We’re still stuck with simulators.”

  Hesperia and Rhosia had dramatically different airship design philosophies. Cibola’s cargo hold was situated under the gondola for ease of access. Kalypso’s, back when she flew for the Soviet Air Forces as the Pobeda, was integrated into her hulls to reduce her target profile. Cibola was a single-hulled ship; Kalypso’s dual hulls meant the loadmaster had to carefully balance her payload. Most importantly, Cibola ran off diesel while Kalypso used a combination of photovoltaic cells and an aetherium reactor.

  “And our reactor crew?” I asked.

  “Going bug-house crazy from sitting on their butts in the simulator all day. But they’re up to speed.”

  The aetherium reactor was a miniaturized pebble bed design. It was extremely safe, highly efficient and unlikely to give Customs officials kittens. As a bonus, it had a thirty-year service life. By the time it needed refueling, I fully expect to be retired. Or dead.

  “Is there anything you need?” I asked.

  “The mission module crew,” he said immediately. “They won’t be full-timers, right?”

  “Right. They’ll be deployed only if the module is attached.”

  “So where are they going to come from? And how can we ensure they will be available when we need them?”

  “We’re still in discussions about that one.”

  He pursed his lips in thought.

  “Way I see it, we’re going to have the Kalypso deploy men and materiel where they may not be welcome eight, maybe nine times out of ten. Why can’t we have regular airships take care of the remaining one or two edge cases?”

  “It’s an option if it comes to that,” I allowed.

  “I’m concerned about economies of scale. It’s one thing to have a fleet of modular airships. It’s another to have just one airship. With a fleet it becomes cost efficient to have a pool of specialists floating about. But if you have just one airship, the regular services aren’t going to place their crew on permanent standby for those edge cases. When we need them most, we won’t have the manpower to man the military modules.”

  “So you’re saying we should scale up the Project?” I asked.

  “Sure. Maybe make it a joint project with Air Branch.”

  I tapped my chin. “That’s food for thought.”

  “Speaking of food… we still don’t have a cook.”

  Pete groaned. “Really? Why?”

  “Ever heard of a cook who needed a Top Secret clearance, much less held one?” Harding asked.

  “No,” I said.

  “Me neither.” Harding shook his head. “I don’t know any cooks with a TS clearance. Either we—that is, our boss of bosses—lower the classification requirement, or we bring in an outsider and get him a TS clearance.”

  “We can’t just take turns cooking or something?”

  Pete moaned, even more loudly than before.

  “Luke, if there’s one thing the Navy does right, it’s chow. Hot, delicious, mouth-watering chow. It’s the only thing that kept me sane while I was in the Navy.”

  “Were you ever?” I asked.

  He ignored me. “We need a cook. He’s mission critical. Life is gonna suck so hard without one.”

  Harding laughed so loudly his voice reverberated in the room.

  “We’ve got a world-class galley aboard,” I said. “We can whip up something ourselves, right?”

  “It’s not the same. I swear, Navy cooks are the best. We gotta have one, ya hear? And if we can’t, we’d better hire a Michelin star chef. Nothing less.”

  I shut my mouth. Some things just aren’t worth fighting over.

  ***

  We spent the rest of the day gathering technical and performance data and the rest of the night drafting our report. When Pete had approached me about joining the Program, he talked a good game about fighting the good fight and also making bank out of it. He never mentioned how much paperwork I would have to do.

  “Why am I writing the bulk of the report?” I muttered.

  “Hey, you’re the officer. You were trained for this sort of thing.”

  “You were a senior chief petty officer. Didn’t you do reports, too?”

  He grinned. “Nope! That’s what ossifers were for.”

  I groaned. My head felt stuffed to bursting. And there was still one more person I had to speak to.

  Well, one more being I had to speak to.

  Retreating to my room, I took a cold shower, dressed in clean clothing, opened my holophone and accessed my ebook library.

  The Wahi canon had three sacred texts: the Book of Illumination, the Book of the Law and the Book of Life and Death. I picked the second book and opened it to a verse I had bookmarked.

  I was and am now and will be into eternity the lord of the world. I reward and punish the progeny of Adam in all the different ways of which I have knowledge. I give, and I take, I make rich, and I make poor, I make happy, and I make wretched, according to the deeds and misdeeds of the progeny of Adam. I will fulfill my covenant to those who put their trust in me and to those whom I have chosen to do my bidding.

  I read the verse out loud, letting the words flow into and through me. Here was al-Hakem al-Dunya addressing the principal prophet of the Wahi faith. Here was a malak laying out his threats and his promises. Here was the Judge of the World speaking directly to me, a man he chose to do his bidding.

  “Al-Hakem al-Dunya, I wish to speak with you,” I said out loud.

  No response, of course. But I wasn’t attempting a summoning; I was getting his attention.

  Lying on the bed, I held that thought and closed my eyes.

  Darkness faded to light.

  Light resolved into color.

  I sat in a warm, comfortable leather sofa in the middle of an expansive wooden room. A fireplace crackled merrily in a corner. The light of countless stars streamed in through the windows on my right. Bookcases lined the wall to my left. Next to the fireplace, rifles, shotguns, machine guns, rocket launchers and swords hung from wall-mounted racks. In the other corner of the room, knives and handguns rested inside a massive glass cabinet.

  Seated across from me in a leather sofa was Hakem Dunya.

  “Here I am,” he said. “What business do you have with me today?”

  Today the archangel wore a sharp gray business suit and a tie. He almost resembled a human, but his straw hair was so pale it was almost white, and his eyes were glowing pools of radiance. And perhaps it was just the firelight, but he radiated a soft, golden aura.

  “Thanks for coming,” I said. “I want to speak with you about Eve.”

  “You wish to know if she can be trusted.”

  The great thing about speaking to a malak who can observe all possible timelines and all events around the world is that there’
s no need to bring him up to speed.

  “Yes.”

  He steepled his fingers.

  “She is a psion no less powerful than you. And psionic talent is positively correlated with mental illness. The greater the gift, the higher the chance of going mad. And she does not have your temperament.”

  “So you’re saying she’s crazy.”

  “Not yet.”

  “Yet?”

  “In some futures she remains sane. In others she will be committed to a mental hospital. Or worse. What happens next is up to her. And you.”

  “Me?”

  “You know she is a headstrong woman. She is far more likely to take advice from you than me.”

  “What about Sol Invictus then? Isn’t she his covenanter?”

  “He may help, but I have no influence over him. It is best not to leave everything to him.”

  “So let me get this straight. I have to hide the fact that she and I are covenanters and stop her from going mad. Am I right?”

  “To whom much is given, from him much will be required; and to whom much has been committed, of him they will ask the more.”

  “That’s not from any of your holy books.”

  He grinned. “Indeed. What of it?”

  I shook my head. “Never mind. What can I do to help her?”

  “You know the nature of a covenant. You burn your soul in exchange for power. It is a tool with a time and a place, not an instant-win device. Eve, however, spends her soul freely. You must convince her to moderate herself lest she irrevocably hollow herself out.”

  “She doesn’t have a powerful organization backing her, and she doesn’t have a safety net. All she has is Hexenhammer, and they’re amateurs. Her powers are the only reason she’s survived so long. I can’t ask her to give them up just like that.”

  “You can.” He smiled again. “The only question is whether she will listen.”

  I sighed. “You know she won’t.”

  “And if you give her the tools and support she needs to prosecute her war? Or if you help her transition into a less combative role, one in which she no longer needs to use her powers so much?”