As the message concluded, Alex put his hands on the two orbs in front of him. The moment he touched them, his vision blurred, and he wasn't in his body anymore. It was an odd sensation to describe. It was like he was part of the ship.

When he looked out in front of himself, he could see outside of the ship. If he tried to turn his head left or right, he could see the dark lakebed all around the ship's sides. He ripped his hands away from the orbs, and the sensation faded as the ship's bridge returned to his vision.

"The hell is this," he whispered.

"It's like the ship's speaking to me," Erin whispered as she tapped at the screen in front of her. "Are you feeling the same thing?"

"I've never seen anything like this before," Li Wen said, ripping off her coat and throwing it to the side as she leaned back in her chair. "It's like the ship wants us to pilot it. It's giving us a crash course on what to do without even speaking to us."

"That is my purpose as the navigation system," Mari's voice came over the speakers. "I am here to assist in piloting for the crew of the Nighthawk. Until you are familiar with the systems, I will help you learn them."

"Kali." Alex turned to the reporter. "Can you tell Sayed to help Jean detach the ship? With that message done, I think it's time to leave. Thinking about this all can wait for later."

Kali's eyes were wide, and she had clicked a few more photos during the message, but she nodded and headed down the ramp and into the ship's interior. Alex turned back to his controls, looking them over and tapping the metal of the chair's arms in front of them.

"We should be able to get this ship out of here," Alex said. "I think we can blow past the Military Police's ship if we just focus on escaping."

"There might be a problem with that," Erin said. "One of the captains turned into a dragon."

"A what?" Alex understood the word, but it didn't stop his heart from skipping a beat in his chest.

"He transformed while he was fighting us," Erin said. "Runa said she would try and delay him, but the second they're out of the keep, they'll be on us."

"Hopefully, the message delayed them," Alex said. "Mari, can we get this ship started?"

"They are just finishing decoupling now," Mari said. "Take control, and I will help guide you through the process."

"Let's do this!" Alex said, retaking hold of the orbs and embracing the feeling of the ship around him.

He could see Sayed and Jean climbing up the ladder on the ship's side, both hurrying as Kali yelled at them to hurry. Again, it was like he was experiencing everything the ship was through his own senses, and his stomach churned as he focused on the engines.

Hrm.

With but a thought, he willed the ship to rise. With a shake, the tubes on the sides of the ship hummed in his ears, and the ship lifted from where it had floated, rising higher and higher until he could see the vast expanse of Diamond Peak's plateau around him. In the distance, two figures exited the keep, mere black specs against the grey stone walls.

"Those are the two captains," he said.

"The screen changed," Li Wen said beside him.

The image of the world around him zoomed in on the two figures in Alex's mind, and he recognized both. Captain Drake, in a shredded uniform, stood at the entrance to the keep, and Captain Grayson was beside him in an unkempt uniform. Even as he watched through the zoomed-in vision, Captain Drake's form bulged and changed. Wings snapped out of his back, growing like long finger bones before webs of leathery skin stretched between them. In moments where the captain stood, a dragon rose, flapping its wings hard as it took to the air.

"That's a problem," Alex said, pulling the ship up higher into the air and climbing as fast as he could.

His best bet to escape was to exit the island from the topside. He wasn't sure if a dragon could fly in the nightsea, but it was better than trying to take it on in a fight with a weaponless ship. He paused at that thought.

"Mari, what can this ship do?" he asked.

"The ship adapts to you," Mari said. "Open your gate, and you will see."

Alex did as she bid, opening his gate and embracing the flow of electrical energy that streamed from his chest and through his limbs. This time, however, it wasn't just his body that he felt the energy flow through. The ship itself surged with the rumbling pulse of the energy.

This story is posted elsewhere by the author. Help them out by reading the authentic version.

Thump. Thump.

"Strap in," Alex said as he felt Sayed and Jean enter the bridge. "We're about to get in a fight."

"Go somewhere safe," Jean said to what Alex thought was Kali. "Find a handle to hold onto."

"Alright."

Alex didn't focus on the conversation; instead, he threw more energy into his gate, took a deep breath, and drew in as much air as he could. The ship's engines roared as power flowed into them. To Alex, it felt like the ship was gathering in aether from the air around it.

"Rail Gun," he whispered, forming the image of a long steel spike in his mind.

Blue electricity sparked in the air to the ship's left side, and a long line of blue balls bounced off each other. Afterward, a long metal spike appeared in the glow, not too dissimilar from the kind that appeared when he used the technique.

With a nudge, Alex sent the spike flying off into the distance, right toward the approaching dragon's head.

"Did you see that?" Erin said.

Click.

"Don't think about it now; just focus on surviving," Jean said.

Alex watched, the image zooming in again as the spike approached Drake's dragon form. Drake reached up with one hand, batting the spike to the side and out of Alex's range like a twig.

"Damn," Alex said before he noticed the second figure rising into the air.

From the north, a long brown form circled as it grew larger. Alex's vision adjusted as he focused, and he recognized what it was immediately. Mister Foley had an evolution of his curse, and he had escaped the frozen binds Li Wen had used on him.

"We've got a second problem," he said, trusting the others on the bridge could hear him. "Weasel to the north."

Erin gasped to his left, and he assumed something inside the ship was changing the display for the rest of them. For the moment, he didn't want to see what would happen if he released the controls mid-climb up into the island's sky. He could try that kind of thing out after they escaped.

"Why don't you make them each other's problem," Li Wen said.

"Charge at them," Sayed said. "Bring one into the other, and in the confusion, we escape."

Alex pulled on the orbs, intuitively judging the ship's angle as he stopped their upward climb and angled the ship down to the north. The ship immediately went into a dive, and the ground rushed toward his vision.

Piloting the ship was proving to be a surreal experience. His senses were tied to the ship, but his movements and thoughts were all tied to his body. He would think about what the ship needed to do, and his body would move automatically to use the right controls to make the ship move.

The truth of the situation was obvious. It was the same thing Alex felt when he operated an island core. The ship was related to the same technology, which meant that Mari was also involved in that technology. There was so much he didn't know about these things yet, even though he used it like an expert.

It was almost like how normal people used cell phones. They did not know how cell phones worked; they just knew what taps and clicks to do in a particular order to get what they wanted. Again, it was something he had to file away for later as the massive weasel whirled up in the air in a spiral toward the ship.

Mister Foley's weasel form was easily as large as Captain Drake's dragon form. While the man had comically tiny feet sticking out of his furry body, the real danger Alex could see was a massive bone scythe, easily the length of half of the long weasel form. It flicked around in a circle as Mister Foley spiraled closer.

"Rail Shot," Alex said, focusing on his gate, thinking of the coins he had used for the technique.

Again, the ship took a massive intake of air into its engines, and sparks of blue light lit up the sky around the ship. Round silver disks popped into existence in those flashes, and Alex shot them all forward in a clump toward Mister Foley.

Mister Foley's form spun to the side as Alex ran the ship straight toward him. In less than a second, the ship blew past the flying weasel, engines burning hot in his mind as he pushed it to go faster. Foley immediately began to turn to chase, but as Alex looked back, he saw that Captain Drake had caught up.

A red-scaled meteor of a dragon slammed into Mister Foley's fur, the two clashing with scythe and claw as they hit. Captain Drake wouldn't have known anything about Mister Foley, and the giant weasel form would hopefully throw him off even more.

"Keep going," Mari's voice echoed over the speakers. "Do not stop."

Alex leaned forward in his chair, pushing on the two orbs as hard as he could.

Beep. Beep.

Red and yellow lights flashed in the side of his vision, and a computerized whine echoed through his head. Alex leaned back on the controls, and the ship slowed with him. Again, he checked behind him, and the two titanic monsters were still fighting.

"The engines are overheating," Erin said. "Looks like there are several problems across the ship."

"That's what happens when you leave one to sit for decades," Jean said, coming from his right. "We'll have to be careful until we can get this ship to a port; otherwise, we'll end up with the fates of castaways."

Alex definitely didn't want that. Whatever the Nighthawk was when it came to ship designs, he wasn't about to lose it because he was a lousy pilot. Keeping his eyes on the fighting behind him, he focused on moving the ship toward the horizon. So long as Captain Drake and Mister Foley occupied each other, there was no need to break the ship to escape.

"There's a ship rising to the south," Jean said. "Looks like the Military Police vessel that was in the sky earlier."

"Can they catch up?" Alex asked.

"I don't think so," Jean said, chuckling softly. "They'll give it a good try, but we'll need to find a way to lose them once we exit the island. Unless they want to leave their captain behind, we should have a good chance at that."

"Good," Alex said, taking a deep breath and leaning back on the controls. But how long do I have to stay like this, Mari?"

"Do you wish to exit ship combat mode?" Mari's voice crackled over the speaker.

"Will the ship keep going if I do?"

"Yes."

"Alright, do it," Alex sighed, leaning back and letting go of the orbs.

His vision flooded back to him as he did so, and the bridge was restored around him. Sayed and Erin sat to his left, strapped into their chairs with screens in front of them. Sayed was very clearly keeping his hands to his side while Erin tapped away at her own screen. Jean and Li Wen sat on his right, both equally occupied by their own screens. Kali, the reporter, knelt at the ramp that rose to the bridge, her arms hooked in a loop around a side as she held on for dear life. With one hand, she held up her camera and took a photo.

Click.