War Girls (The Juniper Wars Book 5) by Aaron Ritchey (best short novels .TXT) 📕

I hoped the peacekeepers would recall the Hindenburg and get scared. Not that theta-helium in the Heartbreaker’s air cells was flammable. Totally different technology but most humans were illogical when it came to something as logical as science. Most monkeys believe what they want to believe and damn the facts to hell.

Again and again, I willed Peeperz to overcome his fear and slide oh across. Regardless of what he did, I had to follow my plan.

Again, I thought of the countless times Mama yelled at us for not following her orders, and now I knew why. When you bring your kids into violence, the worst they could do is not listen, not follow along, to pause, to stop. Dammit.

In the end, if children acted like children during a fight they’d die. All of Mama’s yelling finally made sense.

The corridor led to a line of low doors set by the floor. Unlike the Moby, the Heartbreaker had numerous rooms built into the wide bay under the air cells that kept the huge ship afloat. Most likely, they were using the big Bobby as a troop carrier.

But I’d found one of the eight machine-gun nests.

I slid into a gunner’s seat not unlike the one I’d been in in the Moby. Thinking of the shrapnel I took, my hand went to my thigh, and it came away bloody, but the blood had gone tacky from coagulation. Well, it seemed I wouldn’t bleed to death. I could use my leg, and so I hadn’t severed a muscle. The pain was distant and stupid.

Checking the gauges, I saw I had pressure from the engines. They must be huge to be piping pressure all over the Heartbreaker. Spinning the machine guns, I locked my sights onto the bridges and opened fire. Fat bullets and brilliant tracers tore up the rope, severing us from the Moby. I then aimed at the mooring cables at the back and at the front of the Heartbreaker.

Down the line, I saw other gunner bubbles hanging empty. Looks like me screaming about the fire and the smell of the sulfur might’ve done the trick.

My guns clicked empty. I’d managed to get the back cable, but the front one still held us.

I climbed out of that bubble and moved to one nearer to the front.

Got in the seat. A bullet whined off the windshield. Troops from the Moby had opened fire. I strafed around the open doors, forcing them back in. Didn’t really want to kill any of the peacekeepers, but they didn’t need to know that. And I wanted them to read my note.

They’d soon know what I’d done to the auxiliary firebox. If they were smart, they’d get down to the grain elevator as fast as they could. Not sure how they’d get all the way to the ground since I’d blasted the ladder and scaffolding but that wasn’t my problem.

Spinning about, I fired and blew through the cable holding the Heartbreaker to the grain elevator. Free now, the Bobby whirled around, pushed by the wind coming out of the north, just like I thought. We started to gain elevation. If Peeperz hadn’t made it on board, if he wasn’t in the cockpit, I’d have to get up there and figure out how to fly a zeppelin. I’d tried before, failed, and ended up crashing into a tank. Say what you will, but my life wasn’t dull.

Hopefully the Heartbreaker had emptied out, and I wouldn’t have to fight my way to the cockpit.

Another spin and I could see peacekeepers descending the rope ladder to the grain elevator. Ha, they’d read my note.

I’d rigged the Moby to blow, shut off every valve in the engine and crammed ammo and explosives into the auxiliary firebox.

I smiled, recalling the wording of my note.

Dear Megs,

The Moby Dick is going to explode and there’s nothing you can do to stop it. I’d get out while you still can.

Prolly shouldn’t mess with the Weller family or their hometown.

Love,

The Weller Sisters

If Peeperz hadn’t found the courage to zipline over to the Heartbreaker, he’d be caught in the explosion and killed for sure. It was why he cried when I told him plan. We’d kill the Moby but save the day.

Which was another lesson I’d learned from Abigail Weller. Sometimes victory required sacrifice. To lose the Moby Dick was hard, even harder would be telling Sketchy.

The troops continued to abandon her beloved airship. Then, the fireworks started. The windows in the zeppelin flashed white-hot first. The air cells shredded, and the zeppelin started to sink. A teeth-rattling series of explosions followed as more of the ammo went off, tearing up the envelope in wide swatches of fire. Flames flared up to eat the sides of the doomed Moby. The smell of the burning neofiber was so familiar now, like the burning of a city, the odor of destruction.

Ash and fire and melting plastic rained down onto the elevator, to where women clung to the top. I’d blasted the walkways and the ladder so there was no place to run. If any of the plastic hit them, it would burn them bad. Couldn’t think about that. I’d done what I had to. I’d warned them. It seemed most if not all of the peacekeepers had made it out of the Moby.

But had Peeperz?

Or in killing the Moby Dick, had I killed him as well?

I watched the Moby fall past the grain elevators and in shadows of ash and in sparks of flame and the occasional spark of another explosion, it fell to the ground never to rise again.

But inside the Heartbreaker I didn’t hear a thing—no warnings, no shouts, no complaints, nothing.

For a long moment, I searched my heart for remorse or for sorrow. Nothing. I felt nothing, not even glee that my plan had worked.

What was wrong with me?

Feel, Cavatica, I forced myself to think. Feel sorry for killing the Moby. Feel bad for leaving poor Peeperz alone.

Nothing. My heart was cold. I was still a negative integer.