Twila glared at the coin sitting on the [Long Five]. She’d replaced it with a wheel, her least valuable coin. Not that it mattered what value coin she used–she wasn’t going to hit anything anyways. She’d been practicing for half an hour by her pocket watch’s time, and she hadn’t even gotten close. And she had no idea why.
She could use a hammer just fine, or any other tool in her kit. Why should a sword be any different? She dropped into another lunge. Her practice sword clinked against the gun’s brass. Again. And again. And again. Leaving her with one burning question. Something she couldn’t answer.
Why couldn’t she hit the coin?
Maybe she just needed something to be different. Anything. She’d been able to hit the cup out of Vayne’s hand. A still coin was easier than that.
A still coin.
Tossing her practice sword on the deck, Twila grabbed the coin and pulled [Anton’s Paired Pistols]. Then she hesitated. She needed a hole in the wheel, but shooting it with a shipful of skywrights on board the Hourglass would scare people. An awl or a hand drill could punch a hole in the tin wheel, though. And she had some of those down below, in the engine room.
The engine room, though, was crawling with skywright’s apprentices. Twila watched as they bolted the hulking starboard engine into place–with twice as many bolts as they’d pulled free–and started welding pipes into place with purple-red myst. Others fiddled with the gears running from the engines up to the ship’s wheel mount. The machine wasn’t shiny, though a dull layer of grease encased every moving part. Twila walked through the only empty space in the room–the empty port engine’s mount. Something was pounding on the ship’s hull. She hoped it was the armor plates.
The tool cabinet needed some serious organization. It was always a mess, and as Twila dug through it, looking for an awl and hammer, she told herself she’d fix that. The Hourglass was looking to be every bit the fine ship she’d always known her could be. Having the storage neat would help keep her that way.
At last, she found the awl and hammer and returned to the deck. In the fresh air, she hammered a hole into the coin’s center. Then she looked for a place to hang it. The Hourglass’s bowsprit hung over the skywright’s work floor, so she shimmied onto it and tied the coin to it with a bit of string.
With her work finished, she headed to the work floor. She dropped back into the first guard–again–and lunged at the coin. Another miss.
She screamed a wordless sound at the coin. Swinging her sword, she whacked it, sending it penduluming through the air. As it flew, her eye followed it.
Maybe the coin by itself was too easy.
As the coin swung one way and then the other, Twila watched it. It was just another machine. If she could change a turbine belt while the engine was running, surely she’d have the right timing for this.
She dropped back into the first guard. Her eyes followed the swinging bit of tin. Then, suddenly, she lunged.
Another miss. The string wrapped itself around her sword and then untangled. Twila started to scream again, but stopped. It was the closest she’d gotten. A victory of sorts. She dropped into the first guard, tapped the coin, and lunged again. And again.
And again.
----------------------------------------
Rosie
“Alright, Carter’s probably out, um, scouting a likely shipyard or something. Or maybe he went back to the ship to warn Tw…the skipper and quartermaster,” Rosie said. The words sounded hollow to her, but the other ship rats nodded. She shrugged. If it was good enough for them, she guessed it was good enough for her. “So, with him gone, what do we do?”
“You said we were breaking into a shipyard? Why?” Rojir asked.
Rosie nodded. “We have to draw attention away from Twila and Auntie Charlie. If…” she trailed off. Hopefully, no one in the nearly-empty inn had heard her. She glanced back and forth. It didn’t seem like anyone had.
“We, uh, have to draw attention away from them. Especially Gibson Company attention. The best way I can think of is to cause problems somewhere else. I think a fire would be best because if we did it right, we could leave before it was obvious. Then, lots of people would come to put it out, and it’d be chaotic. It could take them a few days to decide if someone did it. We’d be gone by then. Hopefully.”
Sam stared at Rosie, a confused look on his face. “I just told you that Vayne tangled with the Company, and they never stopped hounding him. And you’re already in trouble with them. Why would you want to make it worse?”
Rosie groaned, her hands up to her eyes. “I don’t want to make it worse, but this poster’s bad already. That’s 10 months of pay for a ship rat if they turn in the Hourglass. I trust you lot not to do it…I think…, but if anyone else catches wind that she’s here, they won’t hesitate.”
“Yeah, but why Gibson?” Ellie shook her head and took a drink from her glass. “This stuff’s worse than the filth we had on the Endeavor! Couldn’t we start trouble somewhere else? Anywhere else?”
Stolen from its rightful place, this narrative is not meant to be on Amazon; report any sightings.
“But we’re trying to distract the Gibson Company, not someone else!” Rosie said loudly. A touch too loudly, in fact. Two men at the bar, way down the lava tube near the entrance, stood up. One whispered something to the other, who headed for the door.
“Okay, I think those two heard that. Sorry,” Rosie said quietly. “Let’s get out of here. We can, um, split up or something and meet up back at the Hourglass in an hour. Does that sound okay?”
The ship rats nodded. Soon, everyone was heading for the door. As they did, the man drew a rust-covered sword. “No, yer not goin’ anywhere, rats. Not until my friend gets back. He’ll have some men who’ll want to question you lot, fer sure. Now, sit down.”
Rojir went for his sword, but before he could draw it, another blade clattered to life in a ticking barrage of myst and [Chain Cutlass] teeth. Someone stood in the tavern’s doorway with a sword drawn and pistol in hand.
“What are you threatening our ship rats for? I’m right here if you’re looking for a fight. If not, throw it down and get out of my sight, you yellow-livered land-crawler!”
----------------------------------------
Twila
First guard. Lunge. Miss. First Guard. Lunge. Miss.
Twila thrust away at the coin with newfound determination. She’d actually hit it, a few minutes ago. It had spun off and almost hit the bowsprit, and for a second, she thought she’d had it figured out. But she hadn’t hit since then.
First guard. Lunge. Miss again.
“You’re never going to hit it like that,” a morose voice said from the deck above her. “It’s a matter of timing and distance.”
She looked up at the voice’s owner. “How do you know about swordplay, Will?”
The voice’s owner dropped from the deck onto the workshop floor. His purple-lit eyes glowed with myst as he extended an arm filled with tubes, pumps, and brass gears. He opened his hand. “The sword, please,” he said in the same morose voice.
Twila handed the practice sword over. “Did you know about the skipper? About Anton? He taught you how to fence, huh?”
“Yes.” Will dropped into the first guard, his legs’ pistons squealing and pumping to bob his body up and down slightly, and the sword extended. His other hand clenched into a fist, a dozen hex wrenches replacing his fingers. “I’ve been listening to your lessons with Miss DeWalt. She’s right.”
He tapped the coin, sending it into its pendulum swing. “There’s a line between the two points of the swing. If you put your sword on the line, the coin will bump into it.” He did so, and the coin tapped the sword’s side repeatedly.
“That is the distance you need to have. Try it.”
Twila took the sword and held it out. Sure enough, the coin bounced against it. “But how do I hit it?”
“That’s timing.” Will grabbed the sword again. “I’ll wait until the coin is at the top point of its swing. Then I’ll put my sword where I was for the distance. It always hits. Fencing is all about time and distance, just like Miss DeWalt says. Knowing the distance between your sword and your opponent, the distance between their sword and you, and the distance you need to move to attack or be safe. And knowing how long it’ll take your sword to strike.”
Twila grabbed at the sword. “Alright, I’ll try again. Thanks, Will.”
The automaton handed the blade over, nodded, and gathered a tangle of tubes that had draped over the ship’s rail behind it. “I’ll be in my quarters as usual, skipper.”
Twila nodded and dropped into her stance. First guard. Lunge. Miss. But every miss got her closer to figuring it out. Distance and time.
[Twila Tighe, Ship Rat Mystgineer, Equipment Level 1.33 (Myst 1/12, Hit Points 1/1)]
[Head - Empty]
[Eyes - Myst Lens (lvl. 1) Myst Sight (passive) See own status block and others’ classes]
[Chest - Ship Rat’s Harness (lvl. 0)]
[Waist - Apprentice Mystgineer’s Bandolier (lvl. 1) Deep Pockets (passive) - Equip an additional Gizmo]
[Legs - Canvas Overalls (lvl. 0)]
[Gizmo #1 - Loaded Dice (lv. 2) - Roll the Bones (active, 1 myst/roll) - gain a random myst enhancement; Skill - Trickery]
[Gizmo #2 - Anton’s Pocket Watch (lvl. 4)] Redo (active, 5 myst/5 seconds) - redo the last five seconds of time, with knowledge of what’s happening (1 minute to reset); Skill - Piloting]
[Gizmo #3 - Empty]
[Gizmo (Belt) - Mystwork Lantern (lvl. 2): Mystlight (active, 25% failure chance, 1 myst/attempt) - start the light; Adjustable Light Aura (sustained, .5-2 myst/tick) - light a variable area; Skill - Perception]
[Myst Battery - Condensing Battery Mk. 2 (lvl. 1) Myst Storage (passive) - 12 myst maximum, requires condenser to refill; Condense Myst (passive) - Condenses 1 myst/6 ticks]
[Weapon/Pair - Anton’s Paired Pistols (lvl. 2) Smoothbore Myst-Shot (active, 1 cartridge/shot) - fire a ray of heated myst; Rapid Shots (active, 2 myst/shot) - fire twice/tick; Skill - Marksman]
[Weapon #2 - Heatblade (lvl. 2) Heat (active, 1 myst/tick) - cause the blade’s edge to superheat; Skill - Acrobatics]
[Weapon/Pair - Empty]
[Skill #1 - Trickery 2]
[Skill #2 - Perception 2]
[Skill #3 - Piloting 4]
[Skill #4 - Marksman 2]
[Skill #5 - Acrobatics 2]