Emily decides not to return to her room immediately, instead taking a stroll around the ship to calm down. She wanders around, lost in thought and listening to the light hum of the engine, ever-present while the ship is in motion.

She isn’t surprised when she looks up after a while and realises she has made her way to the engine room unconsciously. Feeling that no one is close, Emily approaches the door and opens it before stepping into the warmth and noise of the ship’s beating heart. She shuts the door behind herself, walking to the centre of the room and appreciating the suspended mass of metal pumping out steam.

“I wonder if I can scan the whole ship now,” she mutters to herself absentmindedly.

Emily sits down in front of the giant engine, cross-legged with her eyes shut. She releases a slow stream of machina into the floor, first flooding the engine room before guiding her energy to spread throughout the rest of the ship. Her cortex processes the vast quantity of information flowing in as her reach spreads, creeping out to encompass the whole ship and showing her every nook and cranny of the giant machine.

Emily’s focus drifts around the ship, watching the fine workings of the complicated craft as her tension slowly dissipates, the process relaxing her immensely. After a few hours of watching the ship work and analysing everything from the pipes to the rotors, she opens her eyes and lets out a breath of satisfaction.

“It’s incredible,” she says with admiration, looking at the system window floating before her.

¯¯¯¯¯

Machina scan complete!

Blueprint created: Calypso

[Calypso]

[Type:] Steam Airship

[Tier:] 1

[Rank:] E

[Description:] A medium-sized cargo airship built for the Mandrago family’s private transport needs. Designed for speed and stability while carrying a heavy load.

_____

“And yet it’s only E rank,” she says, standing up with a confident grin. “I can definitely improve it.”

With a new goal in mind, Emily stands up and leaves the engine room. She returns to her room, detaching the metal scrap that would activate the Screamer’s Surprise through the door before opening it and stepping in, not bothering to reset her trap behind her.

Settling down on her bed, she pulls up a new page in her system notebook and pulls in the blueprint of Calypso. However, as she starts to pull apart the propellers in order to tweak their design, she feels a light pulse of mana coming from her belt.

What’s that?

Uncertainly, Emily reaches into the belt, feeling about for the source and quickly pulling it out. Her heart drops when she sees the communication crystals sat on her palm, the very same one she first saw on this ship on the way to Chroni.

“Why are they trying to contact me now?” she hisses. “Did Anton tell them I was returning?”

Taking a single, deep breath, Emily regains her mask of absolute calm and sends a stream of mana into the crystal.

“Hello, girl,” Diego’s familiar voice flows from the crystal, igniting a spark of rage in Emily’s chest that she quickly suppresses. “Introduce yourself.”

“Emily Coldstone of house Mandrago,” she responds, narrowing her eyes in suspicion.

Why is he getting me to introduce myself?

“Report on your progress in The Covenant. How far have you progressed?”

Do they know I’m third circle? Did someone tell them? Have they been watching me?

Without hesitation, not even a quiver in her voice to betray her suspicion, Emily begins a falsified report.

“I’ve completed the basic etiquette, geopolitics, and English courses. I’ve also completed intermediate maths, and I’m the top student taking intermediate magic combat and theory,” she says, pausing for a moment to see if he reacts to her falsehoods before continuing. “I’ve reached second circle, and I feel my progress growing with each day. I believe I’ll make third circle before the deadline.”

“Good,” Diego responds, a pleased note in his tone. “We have heard great things about you. We’ve also heard you joined an expedition with house Salvia. Why did you not feel the need to ask us if you were allowed?”

He didn’t question me missing out all the extra courses I’ve been taking, but they have heard about my first expedition. They must not be watching me closely at all.

Relaxing a little, Emily quickly spins a reasonable excuse.

“I was never told to report to the family to ask for permission for anything. You told me to attain honour for the family and advance as much as possible. I thought entering The Glade to gather resources and experience there would help to that end.”

She hears a tongue click, and a quietly muttered complaint that mixes together into an unintelligible buzz through the crystal. A small vindictive grin creeps onto her face, satisfaction bubbling in her chest at his irritation.

“I understand. In the future, you must request permission before doing anything other than direct orders. Now, on to the main reason for my call,” Diego says, his voice overflowing with malicious intent that sends a shiver down Emily’s spine as a foreboding feeling of dread forms in her gut. “Return to Eimdon and kill your sister.”

The crystal in her grip disintegrates as her hand clenches and lightning explodes from her in an instant. A raging maelstrom of power and anger consumes her, melting lines into the walls of the room and causing the entire ship to shake.

Emily notices the shaking and takes a deep breath, forcing her anger down and drawing her mana back under her control as she falls into a calming state of meditation. Once the violent storm has reduced to a faint crackle dancing along her skin, Emily’s eyes open again, a simmering rage still buzzing within.

“Why do they want her dead?” she growls, standing up from the shredded remainder of her bed and pacing within the narrow confines of the blackened room. “And why are they asking me to do it? Is it just to torture me? I wouldn’t be surprised, the sadistic bastards.”

Unauthorized tale usage: if you spot this story on Amazon, report the violation.

She grits her teeth as lightning sparks between them, holding her anger under control.

It could be a test, or maybe they’re just trying to break me. Their brainwashing method has obvious flaws, and it’s probably easier to control their vassals if they break their wills as well. Maybe they saw me going on an expedition and decided that showed enough disobedience to warrant breaking me.

A loud bang fills the room as somebody slams their fist against the door repeatedly. Emily pauses her steps, turning her attention to the presence on the other side.

“Hey, Emily. You alright in there?” the captain of the night crew, Jon, calls from the other side.

“Yeah. I’m fine,” Emily calls back. “What was that shaking?”

“I don’t know. I’ll go check in the bridge.”

She feels him walking away down the corridor, none the wiser to her involvement.

I’ll keep lying about that outburst for now and reset tomorrow. I don’t want to relive my goodbyes, but I can’t show Diego anything is wrong, or they may execute Anna before I get back.

She restarts her pacing, bringing her hand to her mouth and biting down on her thumb.

Still, why now? It’s been a while since that expedition and even if news was slow to get to them, I doubt it took till now. Did Anna do something to annoy them? Do they already have her captive? Shit, this makes it so much more complicated. I should have come back sooner.

Emily drives her fist into the wall, denting the solid metal plating before turning around and placing her back to it, sliding down to sit on the floor.

“There’s no point thinking about that. Whatever’s happened to Anna, I can’t go back far enough to change it. I can only move forward. If they have her, I’ll just have to get her back when I kill them.”

With the lightning gone from her eyes, and her usual calm returned, Emily opens her notes again to pass the time.

***

The next day, she resets to moments before Diego’s call, returning to sit in a pristine room on her bed. She gives him the same lies as before, following the script until he brings up Anna.

“Return to Eimdon and kill your sister.”

The moment the words come through the crystal again, Emily grits her teeth, lightning flashing behind her eyes as she holds in her rage.

“Understood,” she responds with a carefully controlled tone, betraying none of her anger. “How should I get back?”

“We’ll send the same airship as last time to collect you. They should arrive in five days, so be prepared to leave then,” Diego says, sounding almost disappointed by her calm response. “You’ll be returning to The Covenant to continue your training afterwards, so only bring what you need for a few days. That will be all.”

The signal to the crystal cuts off the moment he’s done, giving Emily no time to respond.

“Haa,” she lets out a long breath, crackling with charge. “At least it seems like Anton never said anything to them: they’re expecting me to arrive in a week.”

She drops back onto her bed, staring at the ceiling as she puts the crystal back into her belt. She absentmindedly pulls out the bullet casing with the crystal skull carved into the side, rolling it between her fingers in a rhythmic pattern as her mind races, filling with different fears about what could be happening to her sister.

“Fuck it,” she spits, sitting up suddenly and flicking the casing into the air. “I need a distraction.”

She snatches the spinning casing and sends it away as she stands and leaves the room. Emily makes her way through the ship, returning to the engine room. She finds the heavy door unlocked, and steps in to see Podrick and Ash, the primary mechanic of the day crew with cropped black hair and a sturdy build, looking at one of the belts dropping coal into a furnace with a tool kit spread across the floor beside them.

“What’s up?” Emily asks, poking her head over their shoulders and making them both jump.

“Oh, Goddess, Emily,” Ash says, flinching away from her as they put a hand to their chest. “I didn’t hear you coming. It’s been a while. What are you doing in here?”

“I wanted to clear my head, and I like the sound of machines working,” Emily says, gesturing towards the belt in front of them with her head. “Anyway, what’s wrong? I may be able to help?”

Ash raises a brow, looking at Emily sceptically as Podrick watches their exchange with intrigue.

“Have you been working on airships in Chroni? Didn’t you say most of your experience is with clocks and the like?”

“I’ve dabbled with a few larger machines,” Emily says with a shrug, covering up her lack of experience. “It’s worth having another set of eyes if I’m here anyway, right?”

“Fair point,” Ash concedes with a nod. “I’ll never say no to free help. This belt here’s sticking. I’m not quite sure why though.”

“Hmm,” Emily hums with a thoughtful nod, stepping forward and inspecting the belt.

The bearings in the upper rollers are worn down. I saw it with my scan earlier.

She moves along the belt, pretending to look for issues at the bottom before grabbing a few sturdy pipes and pulling herself up to the hole a few metres off the ground where the belt enters the room.

“Here’s your problem. The rollers up here aren’t turning properly. The bearings are probably finished.”

“Really?” Ash asks, clambering up to join Emily with less grace and looking closely at where she’s pointing. “Damn, you’re right. That was fast. Kid, come take a look at this.”

Ash lets go of the wall, dropping to the floor with a thud, making way for Podrick to climb up. Emily does the same, landing without a sound and looking at Ash’s scattered tools.

“I’m assuming you don’t have any spare bearings in there.”

“Not for these belts,” Ash says with a nod. “We’ll disable this one for now and have a look at the bearings still there to see if we can get away with just some oil. If not, I’ll go grab some spares from storage. Wanna help?”

“Sure. I was looking for a distraction.”

With a nod, Ash turns and moves to a panel on the wall, grabbing a wrench on the way past. While they’re creating access to the valves to turn off the spinning belt, Podrick nimbly drops down from above and looks at Emily with curiosity.

“Are you a mechanic?” he asks, looking down at her armour. “I thought you were a soldier or something.”

“I’m certainly not a normal mechanic, but yes,” Emily says with a grin. “I made all of my gear.”

“Woah,” he exclaims, his gaze drifting to the pistol on display on her leg. “What’s that? I don’t think I’ve seen anything like it before.”

“It’s a gun,” Emily explains, proudly pulling the sleek black and grey pistol from its holster and pulling out the magazine to show the bullets within. “I call it the Spitter. It uses a magazine system to hold bullets instead of a cylinder like most other pistols. They allow for much higher capacities in a small form, and they’re very quick to reload.”

“That’s so cool! What’s that crystal for?”

“Decoration,” Emily lies, not feeling the need to explain the truths of magic to the boy.

“Oh,” Podrick responds with a bit of disappointment, quickly moving on to something else. “What are those arm guards? Do they do something?”

Emily drops the Spitter back into its holster and pats him on the shoulder as the belt beside them grinds to a halt and Ash starts walking back over to them.

“Maybe I’ll show you later.”

***

After fixing the faulty belt, and replacing the old bearings that had worn too much to be salvageable, Emily heads to lunch with Ash and Podrick. They enter the mess hall, a small room with a few tables to seat ten or so people, and see Anton and Angela already sitting with Eva, the daytime cook, a short, plump woman with wiry, brown hair.

“Hey,” Anton says, waving them over to join them at the table with a large steaming pot in the middle. “Didn’t expect to see you guys together. You planning to be more social on this trip, Emily?”

“Maybe,” Emily responds with a shrug, sitting down and grabbing a bowl to serve some stew into. “I went by the engine room and found these two doing some repairs, so I decided to help.”

“She’s good,” Ash cuts in, noticing the surprised look on Anton’s face. “She spotted the issue with one of the coal belts within seconds. She’d be a big help if she joined me for the rest of my repairs: she has better eyes than me.”

Anton nods, looking at Emily with a mixture of respect and a teasing grin.

“Have the Mandrago’s been teaching you to be a mechanic in Chroni?” Anton asks sceptically. “Last time you were onboard, you were excited to just look at the engine. You definitely weren’t up to repairing it.”

Emily looks back at him with a playful glint in her eye, pressing down the simmering rage threatening to rise at the mention of that name.

“Well, I am now, but if you’d rather not have an amateur working on your ship, I understand,” she says, reaching over to pat Ash’s shoulder. “I’ll just sit back and leave the work to the professionals. Sorry, Ash. I wish I could help.”

Anton chuckles, as Ash looks towards him, unamused. He holds up his hands in mock defeat.

“Sorry, sorry. Please do us the honour of helping to fix our puny ship,” he says, bowing his head in an exaggerated manner.

“Ha,” Emily laughs, joined by the others at the table, enjoying the show. “Fine. Since you asked so nicely, I guess I’ll have to.”

They continue eating and joking around, but Emily slowly withdraws from the conversation, the playful banter reminding her of mealtimes with her friends in The Dome.

Damn. I miss them already.