The Graveyard of Empires - Chapter 2

Chapter 2

The Unjust Imprisonment of a Misunderstood Gentleman

As prisons went, Captain Blackburn thought to himself, this one was dreadful. He had not, despite rumors, been in that many, but the pleasures of this one were decidedly meager. Here he was in a cage made from bamboo hardened over smoke until it was like iron. Even if he could break loose, there was nothing below him but a drop of at least two hundred feet. This seemed to be the Spanish method of imprisoning pirates until their executions could be arranged. He expected that to take perhaps another few hours, and then they would come in the morning and he would hang.

One would think that being stuck in a cage in the open air was not so bad. But this was the Philippines in high summer, and so it was murderously hot. All day the sun came down, and the mosquitoes swarmed so thickly they hung heavy as smoke - heavier, to tell the truth. There was nothing to eat or to drink - why feed or water men you were just going to execute? The floor of the cage was just hard bars of bamboo that hurt his ass to sit on, and there was not room in this cage to lie down. The cage hung suspended from the airship dock high over the Manila market district, and the slightest attempt to change his position made the whole thing wave and swing vertiginously.

His was one of two dozen cages hung from the lowest landing platform on the airship landing complex. Most of the cages were occupied by locals, but he and a half-dozen others were foreigners, and furthermore what remained of his crew. Blackburn himself was dark-skinned, as were several of his men, but there were a few palefaces and he pitied them a day in the unforgiving sun, as well as the well-known preference of biting flies for white skin.

Closest to him was his first mate Zheng, who sat with his legs dangling out of the cage, not caring how this made the whole thing tilt. Like Blackburn, he wore only a loincloth, as they had not been left anything resembling a sharp tool or edge that might sever the tough cord that bound the cages together.

"It looks like we are really screwed this time," Zheng said, peering down. Before dark he had amused himself trying to spit on the people who passed far below. Now they had only the light from the landing platform above and could not see the ground. Above them the work of unloading cargo went on with much thumping and bumping.

"Easy for you to say," Blackburn said. "When they hang you, you'll just be dead. They'll have to get creative with me." He gripped the bars and pulled hard on them. He was very strong, and they gave under his hands, but they were thick as his wrists and fully dried and smoked, so there was no way he was going to break them. Iron would have been better, because he could bend them until they took a set, rest, and then bent them farther, but the bamboo sprang back as soon as he stopped applying force to it. He dug his fingers at the cord again, but it was as dried and set as steel cable, and he could not even get a grip on it. "Fucking fuck hell. If I could jet get one of these loose."

"And what would you do then?" Zheng said. "Our ship is over at the fort under guard. We would never reach the Rocketer, even if we had a hundred men."

"I'm not talking about the Rocketer," Blackburn said. He pointed up. "Did you see the ship that came in above us?"

"I was not paying much attention, pengyou," Zheng said.

"For a third-generation pirate you are not very dedicated," Blackburn said.

Zheng hawked as if he were going to spit, then shook his head. "I have no spit left, my friend. I have not had anything to drink all day, and I am not like you."

"Right, sorry." Blackburn looked up at the underside of the platform. "It was a military ship, or it used to be. Looked like a Conquistador class. We could crew that with a dozen men if we could get loose."

"Do we have a dozen men?" Zheng said.

"We do if we let all the rest of these poor bastards out," he said. He shook the bars again. "What I would give for a knife."

Something went thunk against the top of the cage and he jumped, leaned back as a curve-bladed knife lowered into the cage from above, as if by magic. It spun in the air and he realized it was suspended on a very thin thread of some kind. He took the hilt in his hand, gentle, and tugged on the line. A second later the line went slack and fell down onto the cage. It was a fine but very strong thread, and he gathered it up and coiled it, turned the blade and cut it loose from the dagger.

"Bugger me," he said, holding up the blade. He tried to peer upward but saw nothing but the shadowed underside of the sky dock.

"What?" Zheng said.

"We're getting out of here after all, it seems," Blackburn said. "Give me a moment."

---

The knife was sharp, and it only took him a moment to cut one of the bars away now he had something to cut the cords with. He reached up and cut the ones above him until he could pull two of them down with him and there was a space big enough for him to crawl through. He had to be careful, he did not want to drop them to the earth below, someone would surely notice that.

He crawled out onto the top of the cage and steadied himself - now was no time for him to fall. He put the knife in his mouth and climbed the rope his cage hung from, then went hand-over-hand across the beam and then shinnied down to Zheng's cage, careful not to make it swing too much.

"Here," he said, passing the knife through the bars to his friend. "Get loose, then start freeing the rest of them. I'll see about transport."

"You take the knife, you will need it," Zheng said. "Just get me out and I will come with you."

"You get us a crew, I'll get us a ship." Blackburn climbed the rope up again, toward the dock. "That's how this works. Just give me a bit."

The underside of the platform was all wooden bracings and iron bolts, and so it was not hard to climb up into it. There were trapdoors cut for the raising and lowering of cargo, but he did not want to risk being spotted, so he crawled out and pulled himself over the edge and up onto the wooden boards of the dock. He crouched there, afraid of being spotted, but it looked as if the cargo loading was winding down, and the longshoremen were all crowded down at the other end of the platform, finishing a last net full of goods.

Beside the dock stretched the massive, steel-plated form of the ship he had spotted before. He had some worry that it would pull away now that the goods had been unloaded, but it was after dark, so the operation would likely be more trouble than it was worth. He saw she was made fast fore and aft, a crane looming overhead for the off-loading. Along the side he saw the name Fiero Estrella painted on the riveted plates. Wildstar. He liked it.

He kept low and made his way across toward the gangplank. He saw she was a Visitador class rather than a Conquistador. Smaller and faster, but not as well-armed. She looked to mount about ten guns on a side, or had ports for that many. She was a ten-year-old design, with an open upper deck and an enclosed envelope. Still, if he could get her in the air, they could be well away before anyone was able to come after them.

Nobody stood watch at the gangway, and he crept to it, trying to avoid the pools of light from the electric lamps. If there was a full crew on board there might be as many as fifty men, but if they were offloading cargo and not heading out, that meant the crew was likely ashore, down below in the city enjoying the fleshpots. That meant there would just be a skeleton crew aboard.

He slipped up the ramp and onto the open deck. Not ten feet from him were two men working to crank the cargo hatch closed, and the sound of it helped cover his approach. They were not properly armed, but they were sailors, and sailors always have knives. He crouched down and waited for them to get the hatch shut, and then he slipped up behind the nearest one and hooked an arm around his neck. It was easy to lift him off his feet, choking off his cry. Blackburn groped for his belt, drew his knife, and stabbed him in the kidney. He felt the telltale rictus of the man's body and knew he was done.

The other man blinked, then jumped back and opened his mouth to yell. Blackburn ripped the knife loose and threw the dying man on top of the other one, sending them both crashing to the deck. He pounced, thrust the dead man aside and then clamped his hand over the other one's mouth and stabbed him in the chest. He missed the heart by a finger, so he gave the bloody knife a wrench and the man under him twitched and then lay still.

The knife hilt was slick with blood, and it almost came out of his hand as he yanked it free. He stood up and then gasped as a sword blade punched through his chest from behind. He looked down at the red handspan of steel and felt his heart stagger in him. The blade ripped loose and he felt a bit dizzy, fell to his knees, then sagged to one side.

"Spread out and search," said the man with the sword to his two companions. "There could be more of them." He stepped over Blackburn and looked down at the fallen men. As soon as his back was turned Blackburn got back up. He rubbed away the smear of blood on his chest, revealing the bare place where there was no wound. He grabbed the swordsman by the hair and yanked him back as he rammed the knife through his temple and into his head. The bone crunched in a most satisfying manner.

He took the sword from the dead man's hand and lunged as the other two turned. They were sun-darkened and leathery, with ponytails and jutting beards - the image of Spanish sailors. He speared one through the heart as he turned, the blade bowing as it passed from one side of the ribcage to the other. He whipped it out and the other man was trying to bring his pistol to bear. Blackburn slapped it out of his hand, but it went off even as steel rang on the barrel. The bullet plowed through the meat of Blackburn's arm, leaving a bloody hole with the edges smoking from the powder.

The pistol flew aside and Blackburn stabbed the man through the shoulder, drove him back until he crashed into the rail. He realized the man was staring at his shoulder, and he looked down. They both watched the bullethole in Blackburn's skin close itself up, growing smaller and smaller until it spat out the bullet. It made a small sound as it fell to the deck.

"Madre de Dios," the sailor gasped. "What are you?"

Blackburn smiled. "It's a bit complicated, mate. Sorry I don't have time to explain it." He ripped the sword free and then threw the man over the rail, listened to him howl as he plummeted to his death below.

They had to hurry. Zheng came aboard with ten men, all of them some kind of starved and staggering, but it didn't matter. They were all pirates, and so they all knew how to run a ship, and that if they didn't it was the noose. They ran to stations and Blackburn jumped to the helm. He ran up the drive while Zheng got them unmoored, and then the ship swung away from the dock.

It was just in time, as the platform suddenly started to flood with angry sailors and stevedores. They rushed for the gangplank Blackburn had not yet retracted, and he bellowed as he worked the trim controls and spun the wheel. The ship came up just a little, and then he swung the bow across the dock like a man clearing a desk with his arm. Men screamed as the hull scraped across the boards, either crushing them under or sending them hurtling into the night. The armored bow struck the cargo crane and snapped it off, sent it crashing down after them.

There would be ships, observers, and lights on the seaward side, so he turned the ship inland and shoved the drive controls all the way forward. The men aboard staggered and he held onto the wheel desperately as the ship lurched and then surged forward under full power. He had perhaps a half turn of the clock before navy ships were chasing him. He would stay low and lose them in the green hills of the interior, and then slip out to sea before dawn. he gripped the wheel with bloody hands, and hoped he could keep from flying into a mountainside in the dark.

---

By dawn they were far out to sea. The drive hummed along, driving them forward at a steady thirty knots, and the last shadow of land was far behind them save for the innumerable islands that dotted this part of the Pacific. Blackburn turned them north, and then gave the helm over to Zheng, who had taken time to rest during the night.

Starving, Blackburn raided the galley and found it poorly-stocked, but there was enough to feed them for a little while. He ate dried fish and biscuit like they were nectar and ambrosia, then staggered aft to the captain's cabin. He wanted a bath, and then about six months of sleep. Still chewing a mouthful, he kicked the door open and found the cabin already lit.

He heard the ring of glass on glass and turned to see a stunningly beautiful blond woman pouring a second glass of wine at the table to one side. She set the bottle down and offered him the glass, one corner of her mouth turning up in a sort of predatory smirk. "Captain Lancelot Blackburn, it is so good to finally make your acquaintance in person." She took a long sip from her own glass. "Won't you sit down so we can talk business?"

Continued in Chapter 3

---