Boson walked around the boiler room gathering up tools and tchotchke. After a while, two large wrenches, as long as a grown man's forearm and a drunken man's boast, were tossed into the cabin's center, landing with a thud and clang. Then, like a Morris Dancer, he spun around to the left and right, spinning once more and twice more, pointing to a different part of the boiler room and mumbling, "No, not there!".

Pointing a finger at the corner of the room, a dark canvas tarp caught his attention. "Oh yes, yes, yes," he said to the room, rubbing his hands together. Hobbling over to the unused corner, groaning and holding the small of his back as he bent over to pull at the oil-soaked tarp, whipping it away like a bawdy performer revealing a near-naked assistant. Underneath were two oversize rings about the size of a dinner plate of brass and two more grey steel shackles.

Boson lay one of the steel rings flat on the deck, placing the brass on top, then he erected a device that looked like a small child's seesaw and covered it in the canvas tarp.

"Bugger me sideways. Lad! Get about helping an old man get this ready." Boson said.

"Oh? Right, you are then," Kincade said, straightening his back, ship-shape, and ready-for-action posture. "For what?" Kincade asked.

"What is this for?" Kincade asked.

"Back-up if it goes wrong and we have to pump for them," Boson responded.

"You've talked about your time in the Navy. You cannot be ignorant of the basic operations of the steam engines we use to keep this ship warm, wet, and moving." Boson said.

"Of course not. I have read all of Babbage engine operations manuals, and Charles Baird's works were required reading at the academy. There is James Brindley's work, of course." Kincade was counting names on his hands.

"Academy? Academy! A-bleeding-cademy!." Boson said before continuing. "Don't tell me. You were an officer?! Know how to tell someone what to do, nowt idea how to do it. I am right! Anit I?" Boson peppered Kincade with a broad grin and finger-wagging.

"Yes. I was an officer. And that has nothing to do with it. I maintain that I am as capable as the next person. It's just that I did not have anything to do with airships, and I don't know how they work. " Kincade stated flatly, holding up his hands and tapping at the air with his fingers.

"It is easy enough to know that something must be done. But it is also true that I don't have all the experience in the world in everything. But I am, shall we say, proficient in the skills and talents you apply to a broader knowledge domain." Kincade continued.

"Which is officer speak fore... bugger all other than...." Boson trailed off.

"You are topping off the water tanks. We keep the water superheated so that it transforms into steam. Head steam is built inside a closed system and is used to drive the propellers, moving a series of pistons. As the steam cools, it is returned to the water reservoir as pure distilled water. But I will wager, my current opulent lifestyle, that this airship also uses steam and water for heating and several other uses. We are outside the ship hanging low and heated by these fires, the rest of the crew are on the inside of the ship's balloon, and I would say in a small number of areas above," Kincade finished.

"Hmmph, maybe it is that you know a small thing or two," Boson said.

"Then gets off yer arse and help me," Boson said, turning his back to Kincade, and pulled out an ammunition box and lifted it onto the ever-present bench.

The wooden box lid had been long ago separated from the box itself. Rummaging around in it for a moment, Boson pulled out a pair of eye goggles made from dark-tanned leather with silver accents around the outer rim of the rounded glass. Boson fastened them around his head. His eyes were partly obscured by the tinted glass. Kincade would have almost said that the whole look made Boson somewhat dashing.

Leaving the box, Boson moved over to the mechanisms that open the cabin doors inset into the floor.

"Errhum," Kincade said as he gestured to his own eyes.

"In the box. I really need to spell it all out for yer, don't I?" Boson replied.

Kincade moved towards the box with a bit of a hop. Then plunged into the chest, he could see the end of a strap, but the thing it was attached to was, for the most part, buried beneath varying odds and sods, old rags with new rags and small nuts and a single bolt. Quickly moving these aside, Kincade unearthed his own set of protective goggles. Examining them for a moment, noting that leather was old and what an estate agent would call well-loved. The cynical would call them worn out or knackered.

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Each eyepiece was rectangular in construction with two sides pieces that joined to make a single lens to allow them to wrap around the eye, giving a maximum angle of vision. Kincade reached up with his new goggles to wrap them around his head. Pulling at the straps, two things came to his eventual attention. As he tried to buckle them in place, and noticed for the first time that the buckle was missing. Dropping his chin to his chest, he tied the ends in a small knot.

"Now that you are all pretty, like, get over here and help," Buson bellowed.

Kincade made a beeline across the room, then pulled up short just before the doors in the cabin floor and edged around the closed opening.

"They won't open on you, lad," Boson said

"I don't want to risk it," Kincade replied.

The hatch in the ceiling opened, "Make way!" yelled an unfamiliar voice.

"Right, you are lad on the other side attach the wheel." Boson gripped the wheel with one hand, slapped the brake handle, and pulled the lever over.

"Don't feel like I am imposing on yee. I don't mind doing it all." Boson said. Taking the queue, Kincade wrapped both hands around the bottom of the wheel and lifted as Buson pulled. After several turns of the wheel, the doors opened. The winds stabbed into the cabin wave after wave.

The sounds of the winds were deafening; the rack of hung ropes and chains started to beat against the hull as the wind picked them up and slammed them down. The coal dust, caught in the swirl of the winds, painted the cabin, and everything in its dust touched black.

The maelstrom whipped at Kincade's, and the coal dust storm pelted him. The goggles, his only protection, had a second problem, and it made itself known. Kincade screwed up his left eye, unable to see as the wind found a small tear in the leather and started to force coal dust behind the lens.

"Hold tight to the wheel. The winds will fight us to close the doors. Wallace will kill us both for sure, if'n they do!" He yelled. Kincade moved his hand and held tight to the wheel, his eye closed fast.

A crewman jumped from the above deck and pulled through a one-foot-wide hose. Holding on to the hose for his life's worth, the man walked forward, arms wrapped around the canvas hose. "Feed more." The man yelled, and from the opening above, more and more hose was lowered.

From where Kincade stood, he saw the roaring seas as the storm below met the storm above in the cabin. The coal grit covered the tan hose as it was fed inch by dark inch after 10 minutes. The call was made, "Pump. Lads. Pump." the interloper yelled, and the hose dropped from his grip, and the waters were pulled through the line the ship drank.

For an hour more, they held a wheel, endured the winds, and the hose was pulled back and back again when the time was called. Time stood still for Kincade; his forearms burned, and his hands ached as he held the wheel.

Buson sang to himself.

Molly May, hold my day.

Molly May, hold my day.

Let me last. Hold me fast if I stay

Molly May, hold my day.

Molly May, hold my day.

I am on my way, and there I will stay.

I stay till the end of the day.

Molly May hold my day.

Molly May hold my day.

The hose went slack and rose back through the portal into the deck above. A voice from the deck about called down. "Ready and full." He called. The mysterious new crewmen left with the last of the equipment.

* * *

"The hose is gone, lad. Let go when I say." Yelled Boson. Kincade nodded back. Boson reached down and lifted a wrench, jamming it into the wheel the both of them were holding, and he let go. The wheel jerked out and pulled at Kincade, and he yelled out in pain as he fort to hold on and the winds pushed at the bay doors.

"Now, Boson?" Called Kincade into the ripping winds. His hands shaking against the storm below.

"No! Lock the wheel like I did with that wrench." Boson called back, kneeling before the open bay doors.

"What? How?" Returned Kincade.

The Ravens Claw lurched to starboard and lifted its nose, taking as the propellers took the load and pushed it into the sky. Kincade stumbled, losing his grip. The one wrench locking the wheel in place pulled free and struck Kincade in the chest, putting him on his arse. Like the local town tuff taking on prizefighter at the traveling fair. He dropped fast and hard. The winds pushed on open bay doors, and the wheel spun as the doors were forced to close. Flat on his back, Kincade heard Boson's scream of terrier. Rolling over onto his front, Kincade put his hands and knees under him to get up. Looking towards the doors, he could only see Boson had slipped through the opening in the decking and was now hanging by his elbows, desperately attempting to climb back in with his chin. His legs akimbo and flapping in the wind.

"In the name of Davey Jones. Help! Someone help us!" Kincade yelled out.

"Are you seeing your childhood, Boson?" Kincade called out.

"No…." Boson replied.

"Then you are not going to die... yet," Kincade grunted.

"Stop your yelling, and how's about you help me," Boson yelled back. Kincade scrambled over to him, hands and feet slipping on coal dust with each reach but finally reaching Boson. Grabbed the back of the Boson's shirt and heaved. Boson's feet kicked against the decking door. Each kick scraped against the wood as he tried to climb back into the engine room. Kincade pulled the man hand over hand, grabbing and pulling. Boson's hand shot out and pulled on Kincade's shirt. The weight shifted, and Kincade down towards the opening. His body reacted by striating up, pulling on the cotton shirt. Cursing, "Don't you rip! Damn you," Kincade yelled.

Frantic, Boson's eyes wide climb into the cabin, and the doors slammed shut.

"Lad, I have kept you alive so far. I want you to know the debt is paid in full." Boson said, panting, searching for breath.

Both men lay where they landed, breathing heavily for several minutes. "Well, lad, it's not often that you get to do that," Boson said

"It's not often that you want to do that!" both men broke out into a raucous laugh.