Wasteland of flint

The control panel flickered and a small new v-pane opened, showing a progress bar.

Gretchen continued with her preflight check, spinning up the engines and going through a pressure test on the wings. Despite all the time-in-flight the aircraft had endured, the pressure seals remained intact, without even appreciable leakage. 'Now that,' Gretchen said to her checklist with a grin, 'is some fine Russo-Swedish engineering.'

A beep announced the diagnostic download was complete.

Okay, Magdalena's thready voice echoed in her ear. I'm starting a local systems check. It'll take about thirty-five -

Gretchen jerked back in surprise as a gloved hand reached across her and slapped the system cutoff glyph on her comm panel. Hummingbird's muscular shoulder pressed her back into the seat and his eyes – barely centimeters from hers – were furious. The comm made a peculiar wailing sound as the system went into cold shutdown.

'Do you understand anything about being quiet?' The nauallis punched an override into the panel. Magdalena's voice vanished from Gretchen's earbug as the channel snapped off.

'What do you th – umph!' Anderssen tried to shove him away, but Hummingbird was much stronger than she was. His fingers tapped a series of commands, then he stepped back. Gretchen shivered, shaking off a clammy feeling. 'I'm running a diagnostic.' She said in a cold voice.

'I told you to ignore any strange sounds or readings.' Hummingbird was furious. 'There will be more auditory… phenomena. There maybe visual events as well. You will ignore them. We will observe complete radio silence unless I initiate conversation.'

Gretchen stared at him woodenly, trying to decide if she should speak her mind or not. Before she could say anything, he strode back to his ultralight and climbed aboard.

'Fine,' Anderssen muttered, beginning to regret her impulsive decision to follow the Imperial judge. The other Midge's engines coughed to life and the sand anchors released with a bang. Gretchen flipped a series of switches controlling her own startup. The wings stiffened and the microcontrol comps woke up, subtly altering control surfaces and airflow guides in preparation for flight.

Hummingbird's ultralight bounced across the sand, turning away from the wreck and into an intermittent, gusty wind. Gretchen followed, her hand light on the stick. 'Stupid ass,' she said under her breath. Then one eye squinted in concentration as she thought about what he'd said: 'Hmm. So, what could be listening for us?'

Mons Prion, Northern Hemisphere, Ephesus III

Sunlight blazed through the canopy of the Gagarin as the ultralight buzzed past a towering pinnacle of slate-gray stone. Gretchen squinted, waiting for her goggles to polarize against the brilliant light. They did, but slowly. The two aircraft had reached an altitude where there was very little atmosphere to diffuse the glare of the solar furnace. She was sweating – the heat load inside the cockpit was tremendous – despite the freezing wind roaring past outside. Both engines were honking fuel warnings and the wing edges had extended to try and generate as much lift as possible.

Hummingbird's insistence on reaching the peak as quickly as possible had resulted in a very dangerous approach. The late afternoon heat robbed them of colder, heavier air and the morning thermals had faltered and failed, so there were no updrafts to push them higher. With so little lift under their wings, both ultralights were burning fuel at a prodigious rate. The Gagarin wallowed between two more knife blade–thin towers of stone and the upper slopes of the mountain came into view at last. Prion loomed above a wilderness of ravines, plunging canyons, skyscraping cliffs and long tongues of shattered tumulus. Gretchen could make out the shining silver wing of Hummingbird's ultralight above and ahead of her, though the nauallis was having just as much trouble gaining altitude.

Broken dark rock slid past beneath her feet, glittering with streaks of frost. Anderssen had seen gloomy sections of canyon hidden from the burning white disc of the sun. Fantastic shapes hid in the shadows, glittering with quartz and garnet and amethyst. There were caves – yawning black cavities flipping past with dizzying speed – and sometimes she could swear strange lights gleamed in the inky depths.

The portside engine honked angrily and Gretchen's free hand danced across the control panel, manually adjusting the flow of hydrogen to the engines. Trying to climb through such thin air was burning too much fuel. The comp was overrunning safety parameters on a second-by-second basis and kept resetting, destroying the smooth microcontrol necessary to keep the Gagarin aloft. Ridges of jagged stone blurred past, talons reaching out for the ultralight's fragile skin.

'We won't be able to get down,' she muttered, sweat trickling down her nose. 'We'll be trapped on some Sister-forsaken mountainside – if we don't crash first.'

Unexpectedly, the comm warbled in response to her cursing and Hummingbird's flat, tense voice filled her ears. 'I see the ledge and the antenna. Forward and right three hundred meters. Follow me.'

The nauallis's craft jerked up and away, out of her sight. Gretchen swore violently, then squeezed a last gasp of power from the laboring engines. The Gagarin lurched skyward and Gretchen swung the stick lightly to the right. The arc-shaped wing of the other Midge appeared again. Hummingbird's craft swung sideways and then went nose-up, bouncing down onto an impossibly narrow ledge beneath a massive black cliff.

Anderssen tried to stay calm and not jerk the stick wildly as bone-chilling fear flooded her body. The Gagarin swept across the ledge and she pulled up, skimming her landing gear only a meter from the roof of Hummingbird's canopy. There was a startled shout on the comm and Gretchen – teeth gritted tight – rolled left, the Gagarin's outstretched wing jarring away from a wall of basalt jutting from the mountainside.

'Oh most gracious Virgin,' Gretchen chanted, her entire world focused down upon the control stick and the wildly gyrating view of mountains and sky and cliff flashing before the nose of the Midge. 'In thy celestial apparitions on Mount Tepeyac, thou didst promise to show thy compassion and pity toward all who, loving and trusting thee…'

Gagarin made a wide circle out into the rarefied air and came around on a second approach to the outcropping. Gretchen caught sight of the nauallis darting out from under the wing of his Midge and running toward the far end of the slanted, rocky ledge. There was just barely enough room to land one ultralight. Anderssen caught a glimpse of a tall silver and black pole rising up from a crevice in the rock.

Russovsky only had this one Midge to land, Gretchen realized, feeling her stomach crumple into a contorted, burning knot. And she was a really, really skilled pilot. Oh, good little plane, remember how to do this!

'Get out of the way,' she screamed into the comm mike. 'I'm coming in!'

The ultralight wallowed down – much too fast, she realized as the forward wheel bounced violently across shale – and she threw the engines into reverse. Grimly hanging onto the stick, Gretchen was slammed repeatedly into her restraint harness as the Midge jounced and slid across the ledge. Loose rock skittered away under wildly spinning wheels. The entire aircraft crabbed to the side, away from the cliff wall, and Gretchen was suddenly staring out the port window and into the abyss of a canyon with no visible bottom.

'Sister, guide me!' Anderssen goosed the starboard engine and the Midge spun away from the edge. The aft-starboard wheel slammed into a protruding rock and the Gagarin bounced up with a jolt. Gretchen's teeth cracked together like a hammer. She tasted blood. The stick wrenched itself out of her hand and Gagarin clattered through a complete circle. Anderssen grabbed wildly for the stick – overcorrected – and the Midge lurched over the lip of the cliff.

The ultralight dropped like a stone. Gretchen was flung back into the pilot's chair. Mumbling prayers in a constant, unwavering stream, she slammed the stick forward, trying to raise the nose and let the wings catch some air. The entire control panel flashed bright red and a honking noise from her earbug drowned out the distant sound of Hummingbird shouting in alarm.

Stone and sky rushed past.

Floating in unexpected freefall, Gretchen blinked her eyes clear and immediately became dizzy. For an instant it