Far
below the forward lookout point, suspended beneath the vast envelope of
the mighty Asperatus, hangs the bridge, the nexus of all that happens
in the airborne community that now carries its name.
A
Thunderhead class vessel, that last known of its kind, the Asperatus
was built to convey the cream of society; the engineers, the scientists
and their entourages on research missions of scientific and mechanical
discovery. When the dusting came, many of her class perished in their
moorings, those in flight perished soon after as fuel diminished and
inevitably brought them back to the ground. By pure chance of timing the
Asperatus had been on a research flight testing the latest discoveries
in the natural sciences that held great prospects for the future of
manned flight; discoveries that would become ever more important as
events unfolded.
The purple cloud formation filled sky now, golden lights arcing through the eye of the storm.
“Steady now, hold our course. The turbulence of the confluence is written as legend. Last time it came to us an entire flotilla of research balloons was lost and never seen again.”
“There ain’t a storm that the Asp can’t master, sir.”
“That may be so, Pilot Anderson, but...” The captain had no need to conclude his sentence as all those in the cabin looked out to the smaller factory vessels ranked alongside them, factories and warehouses that doubled as homes to their families. “Fleet Engineering. Report please.”
A distant voice leaked from the brass tube drowning in the howl of multi dimensional winds that curled about them.
“Everything is holding sir. We had a harvester break loose but the maintenance division were on it right away and it is securely chained back in place.” The captain nodded.
“Hold our course, Pilot, hold her steady. It’s about to get rougher.”
----------------------
The Fantasy Faire opened today at 9am SLT. In what has almost become a tradition of the Faire, the preceding day was blighted by systemic issues and the Faire teams of builders and merchants worked long hours to finish as best they could.
The opening hours are always turbulent. What would you expect when 11 worlds are torn from their own dimensions and slammed together in ours? But the turbulence is always secondary to the excited hoards that run from land to land seeking the new and shiny, or perhaps rusty. Don’t miss your opportunity to explore these amazing lands that will only be available to us for 10 short days.
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