SAILORS OF THE SKIES

by

Mike Chinn

Mike Chinn has recently had short fiction published in Dark Horizons, Dark Valentine, Doomology: The Dawning of Disasters, Morpheus Tales Urban Horror Special, Null Immortalis (Nemonymous 10), Kzine and Postscripts. As well as scripting comics for DC Thomson (including an 8-week “Billy the Cat” adventure for the Beano) he has published two books on how to write comics: Writing and Illustrating the Graphic Novel and Create Your Own Graphic Novel. Previous Damian Paladin stories appeared in The Paladin Mandates and he is currently working on a further Paladin collection, Walkers in Shadow.

“Sailors of the Skies” copyright © 2009 By Mike Chinn

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Cover illustration copyright © 2009 Arthur Wang

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This edition copyright © 2011 The Alchemy Press

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Originally published in

Dark Horizons issue 55 (2009)

Also published by The Alchemy Press:

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The Paladin Mandates by Mike Chinn

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Where the Bodies Are Buried by Kim Newman

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Shadows of Darkness and Light by Jo Fletcher

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Swords Against the Millennium edited by Mike Chinn

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Beneath the Ground edited by Joel Lane

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Rumours of the Marvellous by Peter Atkins

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http://alchemypress.blogspot.com/

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THE CLOUDS CAME in fast, reducing visibility and ceiling in a nightmarishly short time. Heavy and black, they must have stretched miles up into the atmosphere. Premature night fell across the countryside, leaving the New York bound Lockheed Electra looking very small and lost.

In the passenger plane’s cramped cockpit, pilot and co-pilot craned forward, squinting through the cabin’s small windows. Somewhere below there had to be a safe place to land – before the storm hit.

“I guess it’s too far back to Manchester,” the co-pilot commented.

The pilot slowly shook his head. “That stuff looks like it’s coming down from the north – we’d likely be headed straight into it.” He took a glance at his co-pilot: the man’s normally tanned face was turning grey. “Don’t sweat it, Greg,” he said carefully. “We’ll make it.”

Greg smiled back – unconvincingly. “Just like the old days, huh?” he said.

The pilot nodded. Both had met up in the Great War, American volunteers in the British Royal Flying Corps. They’d survived, leaving as experienced pilots – but Greg had suffered with his nerves for years after.

He picked up the microphone and flicked on the radio. He was rewarded by a screech of static – like a giant dragging fingernails down a chalkboard.

“This is Empire State Zero Four out of Manchester, New Hampshire, calling New York. Can you hear me, New York?” The static howled back – rising and falling in waves that made his teeth itch. “Come in New York…!” Still nothing. He hung up the mic.

“We’re on our own, Greg,” he murmured. “Must be one hell of a storm brewing to create that much interference.”

“Maybe I should have taken that desk job, after all,” Greg was saying, his smile weak.

“The only thing you’ll ever a fly is a plane,” the pilot replied. But even he was wondering if they were getting too old for the job. Twenty years ago he’d have relished the danger; the unpredictability. Now all he could do was worry about the ten passengers in his care.

“Check outside, would you?” he asked Greg. “See how close the blow’s gotten.”

Greg glanced up and back out of his side window. “Still coming up fast,” he said. “Black as hell.” He collapsed back in his seat.

The pilot checked both compass heading and odometer. He did a quick calculation in his head. “Just passing Providence, I reckon” he said.

Greg laughed. “That’s what we need: a touch of providence!”

And, just as though his words had summoned a divine intervention, the blackness abruptly lightened. A thin, dissolute light filled the air and, far below, the pilot could see ground again. He dipped the nose – no finesse: he was getting the kite down before the light went again. If that panicked the passengers, too bad. They could complain when they were in New York.

Greg craned his head towards the windows. “This is crazy, John,” he said. “There’s a hole in the clouds – perfectly round, looks like. Opened up – just like that!”

“Then let’s hope it doesn’t just close up again!” the pilot muttered. He was searching the approaching earth, looking for somewhere – anywhere! – he could safely land the Electra. “Eyes open, Greg – let me know if the light’s about to go again!”

“Looks to me like it’s getting bigger,” Greg said. “For all the world like an invisible hand’s pushing the cloud apart…!”

“There’s your providence!” the pilot said, almost to himself. He hoped somewhere on Rhode Island there was a couple acres of unbroken, flat land. That’s all he wanted: two flat acres and no trees or fences…

“It’s still— Jesus Christ!”

The pilot almost took his eyes off the nearing ground to stare at Greg. “What? What is it?”

“The hole … it’s… Jesus – I don’t believe—!”

“What? Is the light going? Greg! For God’s sake, Greg…!”

“It’s going, all right!” Greg said. His voice was suddenly brittle – likely to crack any moment. “It’s gone…” He began to giggle. The sound of it drenched his friend in an ice-cold sweat. He’d never heard Greg go to pieces like that before. Never.

The light was still there – but it looked wrong, somehow. Diseased, was how the pilot thought of it: unhealthy. And it seemed to be moving. For a confused moment, he imagined the plane was under water, with diffracted sunlight flickering all around. He forced the nose down steeper; he thought he heard screams from the cabin. They made a hellish chorus with Greg’s horrible sniggering, clawing at the pilot’s brain until it was all he could do not to join in.

The Electra shuddered, almost wrenching its controls from the pilot’s hand. He kept his eyes on the ground, ignoring the light, ignoring the way it wriggled and coiled beyond the cockpit windows. Lightning, he told himself. The plane shook again – battered by the storm that was breaking all around them. It had to be a storm – what else could it be?

Then the Electra was lurching upwards. The ground spun away. the light squirmed and writhed through the glass until it was blotted out by something far blacker than storm clouds. Something darker than any shadow. Something that squirmed in time with the diseased light.

And finally the pilot began to scream.

…

THE DUESENBERG ROYALTON cruised slowly along a road that was just one notch above a dirt track. The limousine took every bump and hollow in its stride, barely shaking its passenger, finally rolling to a halt under a peeling billboard. A cloud of pale dust settled gently around it.

After a moment, an immaculately-dressed chauffeur stepped out of the limo, walked unhurriedly around the cooling hood, and opened the right rear door. A tall, well-built figure in a perfectly-fitted, dark striped suit got out – moving with the grace of a man who knows he owns most of what he looks at. As he stood, brushing at an invisible speck on a lapel, the chauffeur handed him a grey, wide-brimmed hat. The man slipped it on his head, brushing the brim just so.

“I don’t expect I’ll be long,” he told the chauffeur.

“Very good, sir.”

The man glanced briefly at the old billboard. It was advertising a trucking company that had been around some time back before the Depression. He looked about: behind them was the skyline of New York City, its angles softened by distance and an early-morning haze; in front was a run-down airfield, no different from a hundred gimcrack barnstorming outfits that had thrived ten years earlier. Except this one still had airplanes – around a dozen, it looked like – and not so run down, either. Every one had recently been given a new paint job, in brilliant red and gold. The place was a regular flying circus.

Must be the place, he decided.

He walked towards a gap in a link fence that might have held a gate in better days. As he passed through, it seemed to grow quieter – though that was clearly nonsense. Some accident of geography. The place looked deserted, though, and he began to wonder if he was, after all, in the right spot.

Then he spotted two figures working on a small biplane. They had the engine cowling off and their blue coveralls were smeared with oil and grease. He stepped closer.

“Hey there,” he called. “Is this Chaykin Field?”

One of the grease-monkeys looked up. He got quite a shock when he realised it was a dame – and quite a looker, too. Her blonde curls and diamond-blue eyes shone against the layer of grime.

“It might be,” she replied, suspiciously. Her voice held a hint of New Jersey.

“Well now, it either is or it isn’t,” he said. “If it is, I’m looking for a Mr Damian Paladin. Is he here?”

The second grease-monkey peered around the plane. Hair and eyes as black as the grease that coated his coveralls, he looked the kind of guy who’d lead with his fists – keeping the questions till later – if a gun wasn’t handy. “Who wants to know?” he demanded.

“His name’s Garrard Graves,” the dame said before the first man could so much as open his mouth. “He’s the president of the Empire State Lines commercial flight company. You remember them, Damy? They bought out McDonagh Airlines last year, after that little banshee affair…”

Graves belatedly removed his hat. “How did you—?” he began, before the rest of her words sank in. He stared at the black-haired man, who was now wiping his hands on a cloth even oilier than his coveralls. “You’re Damian Paladin…?”

“Got it in one, colonel. I’d shake your hand, but…” He shrugged, holding up his grimy hands. “And the princess with the photographic memory is named Leigh Oswin, in case you were wondering.”

They stood side by side – Paladin resting a hand on an engine cylinder, Leigh leaning against the propeller. Graves felt like he was looking at a crazy pair of bookends: positive and negative.

“So, Mr Graves…?” Leigh began.

“Exactly what kind of monsters do you have…?” Paladin finished with a grin.

…

ONCE PALADIN AND Leigh had changed out of their work clothes, all three sat in the tiny wooden shack that served as the airfield’s office. They drank molten hot coffee that was strong enough to blind, served from a pot on a Dutch stove. Paladin had his booted legs resting across a worn tabletop, listening carefully as Gerrard Graves outlined the three disasters Empire State Lines had recently suffered.

“Three planes?” he asked when the man had finished. He’d seen nothing in the papers about it. Graves obviously had some leverage.

Graves nodded wearily. “Two on the weekly Manchester to New York flight; the other on the Boston hop.”

“Whilst I sympathise,” Leigh said. “I don’t see what that has to do with us.” She echoed Paladin’s thoughts precisely.

“All three went missing at the same spot,” Graves said. He was staring at his coffee but didn’t seem to have touched it. “Close as we can tell, anyhow. The weather was fine, the planes brand new. None of them left any radio message, and—” he took a deep breath, “—there was no wreckage. Nothing. Not so much as a doorknob.”

Paladin swung his booted legs off the table and sat upright. “I don’t want to tell you your job, Mr Graves – but you sure you were looking in the right place?”

Graves lifted gaunt eyes and stared at him. It was clear he’d wondered the same thing – over and over. “Sure as I can be. All three were spotted near the area we thought … we guessed they got lost. They were on course. It’s highly unlikely any of the pilots could have drifted so soon – so … so completely!”

Paladin got up and crossed the shack’s floor. Reaching inside a tiny cupboard, he produced a quart of bourbon. Returning to Graves’ side, he poured a generous slug into his coffee. “You know any of the crew?”

Graves nodded jerkily, and then took a mouthful of coffee. He winced – Paladin wondered if it was the heat or cheap booze that got him.

“The pilot on the first plane we lost. John Theaker. We’d known each other since the company’s early days. Him and his co-pilot – Greg Howard – were on staff practically from the get-go; when we just flew mail in beaten-up warplanes…”

Paladin just grunted and sat down. He thought Graves was taking this more seriously than a plain old company president with a cash crisis.

 “About where did all three planes go missing?” Leigh asked. Paladin noticed she avoided the word crash, too. They were all walking around that little word: tiptoeing on eggshells.

“Somewhere just north-west of Providence.”

“Not so far from the ocean that a tiny slip…” She left the rest unsaid.

“Pretty flat land,” Paladin said. “Not even hills to speak of. Not the kind of place to get localised pockets of weather.”

“No…” Graves hunched back over his drink again.

“But…?” Paladin prompted. He could almost hear the sizeable but hanging at the end of that no. Graves’ sudden reluctance told him it was probably central to the whole deal.

“Nothing.” Graves gulped more coffee; his wince was less noticeable this time.

“Except you don’t think it’s nothing – or you’d tell me.”

Graves leaned back and stared at the low ceiling. “Some locals reckon they saw storm clouds. Massive thunderheads, they said. A couple even claim to have seen lights of some kind…”

“Lightning?” Leigh suggested – not unreasonably.

“There were no storms!” Graves twisted his head to stare at her. “Each day the weather was fine: clear and sunny. There were no storms for miles!”

 Paladin leaned forward. Suddenly he was all attention. “Level with me, Graves,” he said quietly. “There were no storms?”

The airline president shook his head.

“And your planes were A1?”

“Look – I already told you…!”

Paladin closed his eyes, blotting out Graves’ desperate expression. After all these years … had it come back…? Could it be the same one…?

“Look here, Paladin.” Graves’ voice brought him back to the present with a jolt. “I hear you’re good at explaining the inexplicable – and that you’re discreet…”

Paladin opened his eyes. “Been talking with Julius Eberhard?”

Graves pursed his lips. “We spoke. Nothing of that McDonagh business ever made the papers.”

“People’s dirty laundry is nothing to do with me,” Paladin said, resting his boots back on the table. “I just investigate and eliminate.” He turned to Leigh with a grin. “Hey, princess – maybe we could use that slogan…?”

She stared patiently at the ceiling and groaned softly. “Give me a break…”

Graves stood, reaching inside his suit coat. His hand came out clutching a thick envelope. He dropped it on the table.

“That’s two grand, Paladin,” he said. “I’m good for much more if you need it.”

“I’ll bet,” murmured Leigh.

“Just get me answers. Something that’ll keep the stockholders happy.”

Paladin eyed the stuffed envelope. “Well, the P-12 does need a new engine…” He looked up at Graves. “You understand what I find out might not be what you want to hear?”

“Just do it, Paladin!” Graves grabbed his hat and strode out of the shack, leaving Paladin and Leigh staring at the open door.

Leigh whistled softly. “Pretty ballsy,” she commented. “We find out his planes are haunted, or something—.” She left the words hanging. Paladin knew what she meant.

“He’s not doing it for his company.” He got to his feet and stared at the pile of bills, thumbs hooked through his belt. “It’s about revenge.”

…

ONCE HE’D FINISHED making some phone calls, Paladin walked towards the shack’s single window and peered out. Leigh was waiting by the planes, looking suitably impatient. He grinned: a couple more minutes wouldn’t hurt her.

He went to the cupboard, opening the door and kneeling down. Pushing the bourbon aside, he reached to the back and pushed gently against the rough plywood. It gave with a soft click. Paladin slid the false back away, reaching deeper into the cupboard. Identifying the various objects inside by touch alone, his fingers eventually closed around a wooden box – the size of a table-top cigarette box – and drew it towards him. He glanced at the box briefly, eyes carefully avoiding the grotesque relief that had been carved all around the sides. Even though he’d seen it many times before, the inhuman images still disturbed him. Quickly, he slipped it into a pocket in his old leather coat, replaced the false cupboard back, shut its door and stood up.

Making for the door, he quickly buttoned the battered, sleeveless flying coat, and cinched a gun belt around it. Not only were there two heavy automatics holstered to the belt, but a mixture of pouches and loops: an exotic variety of tools and weapons he’d found useful over the years. Outside, Leigh greeted his appearance with sardonic relief.

“It’s about time!” she muttered. “I thought it was us girls who were supposed to take ages getting ready.”

“I want to look my best for you,” he smiled back. She flicked a disdainful glance at his clothes.

“If that’s your best…” she said.

Paladin said nothing. So the sleeves from his flying coat were missing – lost in an adventure a year or two earlier – and his riding pants and boots were equally battered, they were comfortable. He felt happy in them.

“I thought you liked it.”

“Yeah…” She spared him one more look, before giving her own getup a significant once over. The one-piece overalls she was swamped by was obviously meant for someone several sizes bigger: it was turned up at both wrists and ankles. “Beats this for fashion, I guess…”

“You look cute as a button.”

“I feel like a kid in her dad’s clothes!” For a moment she pouted – then a grin wiped the sour look away. “Maybe I should get my own hero suit – like yours…”

“Maybe,” he said, not really listening. He turned his attention to the two biplanes that were standing nearby – resplendent in red and gold livery, fully gassed-up and ready to roll. One was a Curtiss P-6E Hawk, the other a Boeing P-12E – both single-seat pursuit planes; both types still in use by the Air Corps and the Navy. Leigh had never asked him where he’d got a couple of current military planes, and even if she had, he wouldn’t have told. He enjoyed a bit of mystery now and then.

“I’ll take the Boeing,” he said. “The Hawk’s faster, but not so manoeuvrable. If we get in a jam – a serious one – I want you to hightail it out of there. Got it?”

Leigh said nothing for a moment – just giving him a look he knew so well. Eventually she asked, “What’s the plan?” already heading for her plane.

 “Head up to Rhode Island, fly a recce – starting at Providence and spiralling out over dry land until fuel gets low. Refuel – I’ve arranged for extra gas to be ready at a small airfield just north-west of Providence – and try again. If we don’t get lucky before the sun starts going down … well, you ever stayed in New England?”

“All sounds kind of vague – as usual.” She sprang easily into the Curtiss’s cockpit and settled herself. Paladin walked to his own plane and mounted up. Looking back at Leigh’s head – just visible above the cockpit sides – he grinned widely and gave her a thumbs up.

It was a good performance, he knew. He’d never let on what he was really feeling; not even to Leigh. Especially to Leigh.

Both planes roared across the field, lifting effortlessly into the calm sky. Leigh adjusted her heading to north-east, and Paladin followed suit – content to let her take the lead. In just over an hour, they’d reach Providence.

…

FLYING AT JUST over a thousand feet, they separated, quartering the distant ground in lazy counter-clockwise spirals. Leigh stayed on Paladin’s starboard wing, flying in a greater circle – but the faster Hawk kept pace easily. They saw nothing other than abandoned textile mills, small towns, panicked livestock – along with their curious owners – and trees. Lots of trees. If any of the lost planes had attempted a landing there, it would have been fatal. And obvious – scarred tracts of woodland; pieces of airplane scattered through the burned-out clearings… But the place was pristine.

They refuelled the planes once, landing on the matchbox-sized airfield where Paladin had arranged for spare gas to be dumped. As they filled up the planes, they were watched by a bunch of locals straight out of L’il Abner. Probably the most excitement they’d had in years, Paladin figured.

Then they were airborne again, quartering the sky, crossing and re-crossing the route that all three planes should have taken, if they were on course.

Sitting in his cockpit, occasionally glancing down at the patchwork ground as though it interested him more than the clear sky, Paladin couldn’t help thinking back to the days – over twenty years ago – when he’d flown smaller planes in skies much colder than this. Gazing down on miles of mud – slashed through by trenches, gouged by an infinite number of craters – at heights that made the men dying below invisible. Back then he’d felt the same warm flush of guilty pleasure – an abstract shame that he was looking down on endless destruction, but untouched by it. A cold angel that passed by the horror – noting it absently – before moving on.

Whilst his thoughts were back in the skies of France, a shadow rolled over Paladin’s airplane. He glanced up – dreamily expecting to see the predatory silhouette of a German Albatros; but it was just a cloud. A huge thunderhead boiling up from the west, masking the sun and leaving a thick layer of purple-black cloud in its wake. From the colour, Paladin figured the cloud layer had to be miles deep. A nasty storm was on its way – or maybe something a whole lot worse.

He waggled the P-12’s wings to attract Leigh’s attention. Throttling the Hawk back, she drew in closer. Paladin pointed up into the darkening sky, and then towards the ground. She glanced up, nodded and raised a thumb. In perfectly choreographed turns, both planes changed course back towards the tiny local airfield.

It wasn’t long before Paladin knew they weren’t outracing the storm. The light was getting darker, the distant ground harder to see. He glanced back: the clouds were almost over them. Black and ominous, their edges glowing with an unpleasant sour yellow, inner light. Worse, they were moving against the prevailing wind.

Both he and Leigh were being hunted.

His stomach did a slow roll, and something bitter rose in the back of his throat. His hunch was on the money – and boy, did he regret being right this time.

He opened the throttle and edged the nose down – hoping Leigh took the hint. If they hit a real jam, she could outrace him anyway – get back safely to the airfield – but he knew she wouldn’t. Too stubborn.

The high, electric whine started at about that time. Paladin could feel it in his teeth, worse than any toothache: needling, pulsing. He looked around for the field – but it was getting too dark. He was losing all his landmarks.

The whine was growing louder: now it was the roar of ten-storey breakers endlessly smashing into a cliff-face. He glanced towards Leigh: she was right on his wing, matching his speed effortlessly.

The roar became the ravings of a demented giant. It pounded through his skull, blurring his vision. Surging from a growl to deafening howls, Paladin thought he could make out words in the fury: words in no tongue known on Earth – but with the rhythm and cadence of language, no matter how bizarre.

He risked another glance back. The sky was a single, festering bruise. Swirls of green and purple eddied slowly through the mass. To Paladin’s tear-blurred vision, the patterns kept time with the booming, almost-words.

There was a gap opening in the blackness: perfectly circular. It widened with what seemed leisurely grace – but what he knew was awful fast. Size and distance confused perception. Inside the gap it was bright and clear – too clear to be the open sky above. And he saw movement.

He pulled off his goggles and palmed tears away. Blinking to clear his vision, he looked again. No mistake: there was movement in that widening, bright circle. Slow, oily pulsations; faintly dimmer patches that undulated against the brightness.

There was no time to find the airfield. They had to put down now!

He waved towards Leigh: little more than a pale blotch in the gloom. Hoping she could see him clearly enough, he drew his thumb across his throat in a vastly exaggerated movement, then gestured ground-wards so violently he felt like he was pantomiming hurling thunderbolts. With a quick prayer that she’d seen and understood, he pushed his stick forward – sending the P-12 into a punishing dive.

Keeping an eye on the altimeter, he kept the stick forward until the gauge told him he was less than fifty feet off the ground. He yanked the controls back – it felt like he was trying to raise the whole airplane by his fingertips. It howled at the brutal abuse. He was in luck – the ground was open and looked pretty even. There was a stand of trees just off to his right – he could ignore them.

Cutting the engine, he dropped the flaps and allowed the plane to glide down. Even so, he was coming in too fast. He felt the wheels hit dirt. The landing gear shrieked, and then the P-12 lurched back into the air. It crashed down again; bounced, bounced once more – then was down.

He was out of the cockpit before the plane had come to a halt, watching for Leigh. She’d come down slower than him – maybe not guessing just how urgent he’d been – and was circling his landing spot. He waved as the Hawk roared overhead. It pulled a tight left turn that had Paladin’s heart in his mouth as a wingtip clipped treetops; then Leigh straightened, cut the engine, and came down in a textbook three-point landing. Paladin figured it was time to start breathing again.

As he walked towards the slowing Hawk, he glanced up at the sky. There wasn’t a cloud to be seen.

…

LEIGH TOOK ANOTHER sip of her coffee. Letting it go cold hadn’t improved it one bit. She set her almost full cup down next to the remains of dinner and watched Damy silently. He’d barely said two words since they’d found this diner – empty except for an ancient waitress and an old guy sat at the counter – not even to order. The waitress had been plying them with jonnie cakes and a local version of chowder from the moment they’d sat. Leigh figured it was the only thing on the menu – that, and coffee which tasted like it’d been brewing since the Revolution.

Damy hadn’t touched his food, just gulped down the coffee the waitress was all too happy to keep him supplied with.

Eventually, Leigh took a pack of cigarettes from her purse. As she put one between her lips, Damy looked up from whatever he’d been seeing in his coffee.

“Can I have one of those, princess?”

Leigh offered the pack and he shook one out. “I’ve never known you smoke a cigarette before,” she said, pushing matches across the sticky table.

He struck a match, lighting first her cigarette, then his own. He took a deep pull, exhaling the smoke slowly. As the blue cloud dissipated, he seemed to find something fascinating in it.

“Well?” Leigh prompted. The broody silence was starting to grate.

Damy’s dark eyes twitched away from the last wisps of smoke and focused on her. “Well what?”

“You’re making me nervous, Damy! What’s the big deal? Give already!”

He slipped a hand into a pocket in his leather coat; it came out holding a box so dark it was almost black. He placed it carefully on the table. Leigh stared at it a moment: it was just a simple wooden box – except for the carvings that ran all around its sides. The design was abstract as far as she could tell – at least, she couldn’t make anything of the wriggling, swirling shapes. But it made her nervous, for some reason: there was something unpleasant about it – but she couldn’t say what. Maybe it was the way the shapes seemed to move when she wasn’t looking at them dead on.

“A cigarette box?” she asked.

He shook his head. “There’s a powder inside … or at least, something like powder…”

“Powder…?” Leigh felt herself growing annoyed. She hated when Damy tried to be all mysterious.

He sat back, his coat creaking against the shabby leather seat. “You ever wonder why New England’s got so many legends about witches and magic, princess…?”

Leigh shrugged, puffing on her own cigarette. “The European settlers brought across their own superstitions, I guess.” It wasn’t something she’d thought about much.

“Maybe. But this part of the world has a—.” He stopped and gazed out of the diner’s grease-stained window. He took another deep pull on the cigarette before mashing it out. “Let’s call it a weakness … a place where the walls of reality are thin. There are several across the world, some worse than others. Here—” he gestured up at the evening sky “—is particularly bad. Things can bleed through – both ways…”

“Wow.” Leigh sat back herself. “You mean those planes fell through some kind of hole in the sky…?”

“No.” He looked back at her; the haunted look in his eyes scared her silly. “They were pulled.”

“That storm having anything to do with it?”

“That wasn’t a storm.” He started tapping the dark box with a forefinger. “Least – not the kind you’re thinking of, princess. But it’s a neat parallel.” The tapping became fiddling as he began to slowly rotate the box. “Storms are created by colliding weather fronts – I guess you could say this one’s made by colliding worlds…”

Leigh ground her burned-out cigarette into the ashtray. “This has happed before…?”

He nodded. “Back before the Great War, there were several cases in Europe: England, France, Bavaria… Planes went missing: sometimes just the pilots. A couple of times machines came down, and the pilot’s injuries couldn’t just be explained by the crash. One was missing his head…”

“You were there…?” Leigh was slowly coming to accept that over the years, Damy had an uncanny talent for being where the trouble was. He nodded. “So – since I’ve never heard of anything like that happening in Europe since, I guess you fixed it…”

He smiled – kind of sad and strained, but it was an improvement. “No, princess – but thanks for the compliment. I just helped. The guy who did all of the work, he—” he faltered and withdrew his fingers from the box “—he gave me this…”

“The box.” Leigh glanced at it again. Dammit! The shapes were moving! “That’s it? We fly up, and when the storm-thing reappears we throw a box at it? What is it – some kind of magic itching powder?”

Damy made a noise that could have been a kind of laugh. “That’s not a bad description, princess. It sure irritates the hell out of what we’re after. Sends it back to wherever it came from.”

“Really does take a powder, huh?”

Damy picked up the box and slipped it back in his pocket. “I won’t lie to you, princess: it’s going to be dangerous.”

“Isn’t it always?”

“This time, more than ever.”

“Hell – you kicked its butt last time. You and your pal.”

“Yeah…” He stood, tossing a handful of dollar bills on the table. “But last time—”

Leigh waited for him to finish; when it was obvious he wasn’t going to, she did it for him. “He got killed. Am I right?”

“Not—” He paused, and then nodded. “Yeah … he was killed.”

Damy turned away – asking the waitress if there was a phone. As Leigh got to her feet, it occurred to her that Garrard Graves wasn’t the only one looking for revenge.

…

THERE WAS A misty start to the day. The grass was carpeted in a heavy dew, and wisps of low-lying vapour drifted around the airfield, softening the two airplanes’ silhouettes and deadening any sound. Above, the sky was already a luminous blue. It had all the makings of a good day.

Paladin watched Leigh as she happily directed the fitting of under-wing tanks to his biplane. With her charm turned up to full, blue eyes wide and fluttery, it had taken her around five minutes to turn a bunch of surly locals into eager grease monkeys. She hadn’t even needed to toss her platinum curls at them – not once. He had to hand it to her.

Last night it turned out they’d landed less than a mile from the airfield. Even though it was dark once they had the planes turning over, Paladin had figured a flight was worth the risk. They’d hedge-hopped the distance, and the fires he’d called ahead and ordered lit guided them down fine.

But he’d spent a lousy night, barely sleeping. The few minutes he did grab were choked with dreams of screaming clouds and what lay hidden above them. He was up before the sun, looking for coffee, checking over the tanks that had been delivered from New York the day before, and preparing what was left of the powder in his dark box. His head felt thick and his eyes were gritty. He wished he’d taken a few drinks last night – he hated feeling so low without a decent reason for it.

He also felt bad about lying to Leigh – well, maybe not actually lying. But he hadn’t been totally honest, either. The last time he’d been up against something like that which hid behind the sky, no one had died. It had been much worse. Just the two of them, in a balloon, against God knew what. They had no chance of success – but they’d gone up anyway. Paladin was going by the name of Dexter Phillips at the time, and his old friend was calling himself James Morton Stanley. Professor James Morton Stanley – since he’d just talked himself into a visiting professorship at the University of Ingolstadt. They’d known each other for more years than either could remember; fully expecting to be around each other for many more. Jim had taught Paladin a lot in that time – about life, and death, and the alternatives.

Armed with just Jim’s boxes of strange powder and a few other trinkets, at an altitude so high the cold and low oxygen would have finished normal men, they’d taken on things that had never come from a sane universe. And beaten them; or at least driven them back.

They actually saw the gap in the worlds shrink – heal was the word that had come into Paladin’s head – dragging the thing, or things, back. Dexter Phillips and Professor Stanley had leaped about in the balloon’s frail basket, punching each other’s shoulders and shaking hands. Now it was all over they could admit that neither had ever expected it to work. But it had. They’d won.

At which moment a pallid, gelatinous limb of some description had uncoiled out of the thinning cloud. Jim was engulfed in a second – dragged out of the basket and hoisted towards the shrinking rift. Before Paladin could react, his old friend was gone. Sucked into a vanishing black and oily whirlpool. The sky above him was clear and blue.

But he hadn’t died. Not then. James Stanley Morton was almost unique – one of a few men who measured their lives in centuries. An immortal, almost; indestructible, as far as either if them knew. He couldn’t die – not like an ordinary man.

In all the years since, Paladin had hoped the laws of whatever hell Jim had been drawn into were different. Different enough that he could find death – sooner rather than later. The alternative was too terrible.

Paladin pulled himself together. Unbuttoning one of the larger pouches on his belt, he slipped his hand inside and drew out a palmful of small objects. Crudely shaped chips of stone, like tiny, star-shaped arrowheads, the centuries had lent them a mirror-like polish. He turned them over with a thumb before dropping them back in the pouch.

From another he took out something that looked like a flower bud. Small, dirty-white in colour, hanging from a length of pale, shrivelled stem. For all its resemblance to a plant, it felt cold, damp, unpleasantly soft. He dropped it back quickly, wiping his hands on his pants.

“We ready to roll?” he called.

Leigh glanced up from her supervising. She snapped to attention and gave an exaggerated salute. “Aye, aye. Tanks filled and the cannons loaded, cap’n.”

One of the locals glanced Paladin’s way. “Strange time o’year for crop dustin’,” he drawled.

“Isn’t it, though.” Paladin took a deep breath and walked around the P-12’s port wingtips. He swung himself up into the cockpit. “Time’s a-wastin’.”

Once in the air they climbed quickly to four thousand feet. Paladin didn’t even pretend to be interested in the ground – his full attention was on the clear skies over them. For an hour they just circled, with the airfield the centre of a ten mile radius. The blue sky remained cloud-free. The sun rose higher – though the chilly air didn’t warm noticeably.

Eventually, Paladin knew he was going to have to force the issue. He couldn’t guess what had summoned the cloud in the past, and assumed yesterday’s appearance had been a fluke. But they couldn’t spend all day wasting gas flying round and round in the hope that something might happen.

He took some of the tiny star-shaped stones out of the belt-pouch, muttering bizarre words to himself. One by one, repeating the same phrase each time, he threw the stones into the void. Each flared with a dazzling, violet light as they arced into space. Rather than fall, they hurtled upwards like tiny, brilliant missiles. Glancing across to Leigh’s plane, he could see her head poking out of the cockpit, watching him with curiosity; but not, he guessed, surprise.

He waited several minutes before repeating the process. Almost fifteen minutes later, there was still nothing: the sky was as clear and cloudlessly blue as ever.

“Well, they do say third time’s the charm,” he said to himself, drawing out another handful of stones. He began the invocation again, reciting every phrase carefully; none of the alien words were easy to pronounce.

As the last bright stone shot heavenward, small clouds began to form to the north. Starting as wispy tendrils that writhed slowly across the sky, they thickened with unnatural speed. In minutes vast thunderheads were bearing down on the two biplanes: high and purple and black, edged with a sour yellow light.

Paladin bit his lip. Pulling back on the stick he aimed his P-12 towards the clouds, easing the throttle forward, coaxing as much speed from the engine as she could. Glancing back, he noted Leigh’s Curtiss was holding position, as agreed. If anything went wrong, the P-6E’s speed would be the only thing that could save her.

A gap in the cloud was opening. As he flew closer, Paladin thought it looked more as if the cloud was rolling back – like something inside was peeling it apart. More of the pallid yellow light glowed inside the opening – and there was movement. Slow, oily waves of something huge and opaque, uncoiling. He cocked both of the plane’s .30-calibre cannons: they wouldn’t kill what was up there in the clouds, but they could slow it down – confuse it. Just a little time was all he asked.

Tendrils the length of an express train were unfurling from the gap. They glowed with the same acid light, and Paladin was reminded of the stinging tentacles of jellyfish. They probed the air with intent, moving with a misleading slow grace that Paladin recognised too well.

One swept towards his plane. The moment it was in range, he fired a short burst. Incendiary shells raked the viscous mass; flames erupted in several spots. The limb flinched back – a vast, opaque slug sprinkled with salt – and retracted into the gap. It was instinct; Paladin knew it wouldn’t stay up there long.

He banked the P-12, heading for the mass of waving tendrils. Opening up the cannons in short, careful bursts, he raked the undulating limbs with fire. They all withdrew, like a frightened sea anemone.

“Now for the clever bit.”

Pulling back hard on the stick, he sent the P-12 into a steep climb – right towards the centre of the writhing, glowing gap. If he could, he’d have flown above the cloud mass, but the Boeing’s ceiling was just above 26,000 feet – the towering thunderheads soared far higher than that. For his plan to work, his only choice was to fly into the cloud. Right up to what was hiding behind the yellow light.

By his estimation, he was less than a hundred feet below cloud base when the dark flecks appeared against the glow. Hundreds of shapes dropped out of the gap: things that looked like wriggling sacks of black guts hanging from leathery wings. From somewhere, an edgy screaming began – rising and falling. A dull pain grew in Paladin’s stomach, even his bones began to ache.

He pushed the throttle as far forward as it would go, and climbed to meet them.

…

LEIGH WATCHED AS Damy’s Boeing opened up on the glowing tentacle-things. She saw the brief blossom of fire, and for a moment allowed herself to hope it was all over. They’d done it. Then the shrieking noise started – a giant trying to shout above deafening radio static – and the hideous black things appeared.

She lost sight of the P-12 as swarms of the horrors began to swoop around her plane. Masses of black worms hanging off wings – all of the worms wriggling and stabbing. Some seemed to have eyes on their tips; others had mouths or claws of some sort. It was hard to tell – everything was moving so fast.

She dived to the left, cocking her guns, then yanked up the P-6E’s nose and raked the things with a burst of incendiary shells. They writhed and shrivelled under the flames – but didn’t die. She wondered just how many shots it would take to destroy just one – blown apart, probably; each fragment burned to ash.

She dived again, evading bat-wings and snatching limbs. At least she could out-fly them: they didn’t seem to have a turn of speed to match the Hawk. One drifted across her sights, and she fired quickly; flames licked across its glistening body, cooking one skeletal wing. It began to drop, thrashing vainly with the remaining wing.

“That’ll be a talking point tomorrow,” Leigh muttered, watching it tumble.

The plane shuddered, and she looked up. One of the things was attached to the upper wing – wriggling towards her like an ink-stained octopus. She reached down inside the cockpit, fingers closing around the hilt of a Very pistol. Reaching up, she pressed the wide muzzle right against the thing’s crawling centre, and fired. The distress flare blew it clear; it struggled to stay aloft, coated in burning phosphorus.

“Bye-bye, blackbird,” she sang to herself.

Leigh banked left, firing in short, calm bursts at anything that crossed her sights. She wanted to glance up – see how Damy was managing above her – but she couldn’t afford the distraction. She’d learned that lesson.

Instead she kept firing, and prayed.

…

PALADIN FELT LIKE he was surrounded by movement. The air glowed, and hidden inside the sour light a vast shape slowly throbbed. Clear as a jellyfish, its pulsating mantle hundreds of feet across, it filled the hollow cloud. Countless huge filaments drifted on a breeze the aviator couldn’t feel. Each one was thicker than his plane’s wingspan; it took all of his skill to avoid being crushed or swatted from the sky.

The noise was beyond deafening. A deep, anguished howl that echoed off invisible walls. It surged in crescendo after crescendo, dropping to a volume that was almost bearable, before building to another agonising peak. And all the while, at a pitch that flooded Paladin’s throat with bile, the black-winged things shrieked mindlessly – swooping at the biplane in a nightmarish dogfight. He fired the cannons economically – just enough to clear a space in front, trusting in the P-12’s manoeuvrability to keep him out of trouble.

He was still climbing – making for the roof of the cavern in a cloud. For his plan to have any chance of working he needed to be above the pulsating titan – but the engine was beginning to labour. A glance at the altimeter confirmed he was already at 25,000 feet. In theory he had another thousand feet – but the motor wasn’t in the best shape.

He pulled back on the stick. The throttle was already wide open; he was risking a stall.

“Come on, baby,” he coaxed. “Just for me.”

The whole plane shuddered; the engine howled, faltered for a second, spat out a thick plume of oily smoke, then smoothed out. Things weren’t going so well.

One of the black things crashed into the starboard wing struts, its writhing limbs anchoring it in place. The Boeing dipped to the right as the extra weight threw it off balance. Paladin clung on to the stick with his left hand – desperately keeping the plane level – unholstering one of his automatics with his right. A heavy Mauser 9mm – already set to rapid-fire: at a squeeze of the trigger, the entire clip emptied in a second. The black thing was almost cut in two. Both parts slid off the wing; leaving a few shreds of itself hanging from the struts. The stringy black remains fluttered in the slipstream like a flight commander’s ribbons.

With an uneasy feeling, Paladin also noticed they were leaving a trail of blood: blood, or something like it. Glancing back, he could see an oily wake as the stuff vaporised in the cold, thin air. Like airborne sharks, more of the black fliers were homing in on the trail.

…

LEIGH CHANCED A quick look up. The gaping, lurid hole was still there, but the flying black squid things didn’t seem to be falling out of it any longer. Just that god-awful noise. It was starting to blur her vision – not something she needed when her sky was still full of bug-uglies.

And they were tough little sons of bitches. Even after getting toasted with incendiaries, they’d tumble a while – then come screaming back, even half-crippled. And she’d swear that they started to heal after a while – grow back shrivelled limbs and shredded wings. Maybe it was just her messed-up vision.

Another one tried to crash land across her top wing. She side-slipped crazily, almost losing the Curtiss, but the thing clung on. Tentacles snapped out like whips: claws, eyes – parts she didn’t even have a name for – strained across the wing surface for her face. She flinched instinctively, and the P-6E pitched. It plunged into a spin and Leigh forgot all about the thing above her as she fought to control her plane. The spin slowed, and she pulled back in a shallow climb. A quick glance at the top wing showed her ugly was gone – lost somewhere in the dive. It had left several smoking rents in the surface, though.

She figured it probably wouldn’t be such a good idea to get splashed by whatever came out of the ugly bastards…

…

PALADIN’S BOEING LURCHED sickeningly as another of the black things lashed itself onto the port wing struts. That made five, all clinging on to the biplane in various spots. Their combined weight was slowing the P-12, and the plane was starting to lose height. A moment later a sixth swung by. It spewed out a bunch of tentacles, found purchase around the root of the lower starboard wing, and started to reel its winged body closer.

He no longer had a choice. Nowhere near the top of the cloudy cavern, it was pretty clear he was never going to make it. He’d have to release the contents of his tanks now. Much longer, and it wouldn’t make any difference.

As he reached for the jury-rigged release wires, the P-12 shuddered violently. He was thrown back in his seat, the release wires pulled out of reach.

Glancing up, he saw something huge and glowing sliding across his top wing. As thick as the P-12’s fuselage, barely opaque, the massive tendril crawled along the wing like an endless, colourless slug. Reaching the trailing edge, it dipped, slid underneath. Paladin knew it intended to wrap itself around the whole wing – bring his plane to a halt. And once he was stopped – hanging like a bug from flypaper – it wouldn’t be the last.

He reached forward again, gripped one of the wires firmly, and pulled. From the tank under the bottom port wing, a fine spray trailed back: fanned by the propeller’s wash. Glistening in the sick light, almost frozen by the frigid air, a mist of Morton’s strange powder suspended in brine began to spread out behind Paladin’s plane. Buoyed up by air currents, the mist coiled everywhere – a cloud within a cloud. The black things hanging off the P-12 were the first to be touched – and the effect was instantaneous.

Where the mist reached, the black flesh erupted into boils and running sores. Pale violet pus oozed through crackling skin. Smoke as black as the things themselves boiled away in the slipstream. As tentacles disintegrated, the collapsing things fell away – leaving gaping holes in the plane’s structure.

The P-12 reacted immediately. Now the weight was gone, it leapt forward – soaring upwards. The huge tendril – engulfing half of the upper wing – tore apart like Jell-O. The stench that instantly washed over Paladin made him gag – but it took his mind off the gut-pounding noise.

He opened up both cannons, careless if there was anything in range or not. Small blazes flared at the periphery of is vision – so he must be hitting something. As his P-12 climbed, he pulled on the second wire, and the starboard tank sprayed its contents.

He pulled a sharp left – wings almost vertical. He wanted to spread as much of the suspension in the direction of the squirming thing as he could. And it seemed to be working.

The crushing noise grew even louder. He hadn’t thought that was possible. Squinting against the tears which flooded his eyes, he brought his plane round in a complete circle. Even hidden in the sour light, he could see the titanic, opaque thing was squirming. Tendrils the size of office blocks writhed in ponderous agony, shredding the enclosing cloud. Beyond, vast peristaltic waves slowly distorted the main body of the thing. Rents bigger than the Empire State Building split its surface, and blackness poured out.

Paladin began to laugh. It wasn’t a pleasant sound: it had nothing to do with pleasure or amusement. It wasn’t the kind of laugh a normal human made, and he was glad Leigh couldn’t hear him.

He reached inside a pouch for the pallid bud. He drew it out, blinking back tears to see it better. In the sour, deep-sea light the strange bud began to open. The flower it revealed was like no earthly blossom: perfectly round, wet and glistening, it looked more like some kind of eye. For a moment, Paladin and the flower stared at each other – then he stretched his arm and threw it towards the agonised colossus above him. His question had been answered.

He pushed the P-12’s nose down, diving away from the noise and madness. Around him, the briny suspension still swirled; decaying winged things tumbled earthward – disintegrating as they fell. He began to chant – words even less comprehensible than before – screaming them at the boiling inferno overhead. They tore at his throat; he tasted the blood. But that was good – some things required blood. Better a little of his than anyone else’s.

His plane was vibrating as he dived. A quick check showed bits peeling away; wing-struts splintering. Those flying black bastards had really done a number on his kite; if she didn’t hold together, he’d be reaching the ground faster than he’d like.

He glanced back over his shoulder. The clouds were thinning, shrinking; it looked like they were being sucked away. The nauseating light was slowly fading. A clean New England sky showed beyond it. Paladin nodded triumphantly. Notch up another for the good guys.

There was one final blaze of sour yellow, and the last wisps evaporated. For an instant, the vast entity that had been hidden deep in the cloud was revealed. Paladin could think of no words for it; even looking directly at the thing, he couldn’t begin to describe it. Then it was gone – and he couldn’t even remember it.

He also realised that it was blissfully silent.

A moment later, with a lethal crack, both sets of wing struts parted.

…

LEIGH WATCHED AS the boiling thunderheads collapsed in on themselves and vanished. From her vantage point, that horrible light seemed to dance and radiate out from the dwindling clouds – like it was too big and trying to escape its prison. Then, with a last glaring flash, the sky was clear.

And she could hear, again.

The black flyers disappeared, too – if not so quickly. She wished she could say they collapsed into dust – but it wasn’t as clean as that. Melting was the best she could describe it, melting and then boiling slowly away in the clean sunlight. If it wasn’t for all the smoking holes in her plane, she could believe they’d never existed.

But where was Damy? Panic grabbed at her throat; she remembered what he’d said about his old pal. Somehow, she didn’t think his end had been as quick as Damy had tried to make it sound. She scanned the sky, looking for his plane. For far too long she didn’t see anything – then she spotted the silhouette of a biplane, falling a mile or so to the south of her position. And it was falling – there was nothing controlled about that dive.

She pulled the reluctant P-6E around, opening the throttle, and aiming the nose towards the tumbling airplane.

She caught Damy up as he was around a hundred feet above the ground. It wasn’t a good place to try a landing under any circumstances – too many trees and ditches – and she could see how beat up the Boeing was. The top wing was flapping like a bird’s, half the tail was missing, and the tailplane looked like Swiss cheese. She couldn’t see if the landing gear was okay.

The Boeing slipped between two trees – missing them by inches, it looked – and dropped towards a half-ploughed field. Leigh brought her plane lower – hoping for the best; knowing she was about to see a fatal plane crash. She maintained a parallel course, watching Damy fearfully. He was focussed on the ground in front of him – Leigh wasn't even sure he knew she was so close. He brought the P-12 within feet on the field and cut the engine; Leigh guessed he was going to try and pancake: drop flat onto the uneven ground other than risk a normal landing. The Boeing was slowing, gliding to a halt, when the top wing folded.

Instantly the nose dropped. The P-12 dived engine-first into the rough ground, flipped over, and came to a halt upside down.

Careless of the ground, Leigh brought her Curtiss down. It lurched and bounced alarmingly, the landing gear creaking and snapping, but she kept it upright. Leaping out of the cockpit while the plane was still moving, she ran towards the wrecked Boeing. She couldn’t see any movement.

“Damy!” She fell to her knees, scrabbling under the grounded fuselage. “Damy godammit! Talk to me!”

“Can the shouting, will you princess…?” came a muffled voice from somewhere under the plane. “I got a lousy headache…”

His head appeared in the gap between the ground and the hump formed by the headrest. He was pale, streaked in mud, blood and Christ knew what else, but there was a battered smile on his face.

“Any landing you can walk away from, princess…”

“You’re going to have to crawl away from this one, wise guy…”

She dragged him out from under. Once he was free, he got shakily to his feet.

“What was that slogan again?” he muttered. “We investigate and eliminate…?” He stiffly pulled off his helmet and goggles. “Remind me to be a bit more particular about who gets eliminated…”

Leigh threw her arms around him, ignoring his wincing and complaints. “Jesus, you scared me!”

“I scared you?” He turned to look at the wrecked P-12. “Guess we won’t need that new engine after all…”

Leigh rested his arm across her shoulders. “C’mon, hero – it’s a long walk to a phone.”

…

“WHAT YOU GOING to tell Graves?” Leigh asked. “Not the truth?”

They were back in the deserted diner. It was less than five minutes from where Paladin had crashed. The same old guy was still nursing his coffee at the counter; the same waitress still bringing them more chowder and jonnie cakes than they could eat. Paladin was starting to believe the place just popped into existence right when you needed it. Wouldn’t be the first time. He’d check on it when he passed by again.

“Who’d believe it?” he replied to Leigh, wiping out his bowl with a piece of jonnie cake. He felt really hungry – unlike the last time he’d been here. There was nothing like crashing from thousands of feet to give a man an appetite. “Maybe you were right about them ditching in the Narragansett, after all…,” he added with a smile.

“I’m always right, Damy. One day you’ll realise that.”

“In that case I’ll leave you to figure out what to tell Graves.”

Leigh lit up a cigarette. “Did you get rid of it? For good, I mean…”

He took a sip of coffee – instantly regretting it. “I sealed the breach. Whether it’ll stay sealed…” He left the rest unsaid.

“So maybe it wouldn’t be such a bad thing if Graves lost his license… At least, if there are no planes flying by, if it opens up again…”

“Did I ever tell you you’re a hard woman?”

“Only as nails.” She stood up. “C’mon boss – somehow we have to get two of us back to New York in a single-seat plane…”

“Cosy.”

As Leigh wandered over to the counter to pay the check, Paladin allowed his mind to replay the last moments before the breach had closed. How the pale flower had bloomed – a flower that blossomed only under the diseased light of a certain world. A breach to which he’d last helped seal off back in 1908.

Oh, he’d be passing by again – and soon.

“Found you, Jim,” he said to the empty air.