"Actually, our gyro-flyers are powered by electrochemical batteries and powdered fuel volatiles," replied the adjutant. He frowned, clearly caught between his orders to obey Sheppard, and his Halcyonite ideas of decorum. But his mistress wasn't here, so he had to go with the colonel's demands. Linnian opened the hatch and ushered John into the wide cockpit.
The pilot and co-pilot both started as they realized they had company. Like Linnian, they wore the black of the Fourth Dynast, but their uniforms were cut differently, with less in the way of medals and sigils. Sheppard threw them an easy grin. "Hey guys, don't mind us. Just looking around."
The pilot gave Linnian a confused look and the adjutant returned him a shrug.
John leaned forward. The design and structure of the cockpit reminded him of the pressed-steel interiors of old warbirds from the 1940s, but more ornate. Etched brass and turned wood detail was on everything. Bright sunlight filled the cockpit from curved greenhouse windows. Back along the streamlined fuse lage he could see the sweeping arc of two interlocked, counter-rotating helicopter blades on stubby winglets. "Hell of a lot different from a Huey or a Pave Hawk…"
The co-pilot blinked at him. "You… You are an aviator?" The very idea appeared to be absurd to him.
"Lieutenant Colonel John Sheppard, United States Air Force. If you can catch sky with it, I'll fly it."
"But we were informed that you are officer nobility on your own world. Do you not have subordinates for the work of piloting?"
"Some do. Frankly, though, the day I don't get to take the stick anymore is the day I'll retire."
Linnian frowned again. He was doing a lot of that. "Our command cadres do not sully themselves with such labor, Lieutenant Colonel. Frankly, I am surprised your people do otherwise."
Sheppard threw the co-pilot a wink. "Well, I guess I can understand you boys not wanting to let the senior ranks fly this baby. They'd find out how much fun it was and then you'd be out of a job, right?"
The other man smiled briefly, and John knew that he'd connected with him; they shared a moment of mutual respect, and a flyer's passion for the open skies. "Perhaps… You might like to take the controls for a moment, sir?"
"Oh yeah," Before Linnian could complain, Sheppard had swapped places with the co-pilot and gave a nod to the aircraft commander. "Thanks."
The pilot seemed wary and somewhat alarmed at being spoken to directly. Sheppard ran his eyes over the console. Most of the usual dials and controls were there, but labeled in the Halcyon semi-Ancient-style text. Still, he picked out the artificial horizon, what looked like airspeed and engine temperature. There were foot pedals for the rudders and a complex set of gear and throttle levers behind a butterfly-shaped yoke. He'd seen something similar on the wheels of formula one racing cars. "I have the aircraft," he announced.
The pilot nervously relinquished control, and there was a slight flutter as Sheppard settled in; but then he got it, leaning into the motion of the gyro-flyer and letting the craft tell him how it wanted to move. "Sweet," he said. "She handles real well."
"This flyer has been in service to His Highness for nine cycles," said the co-pilot, a hint of pride in his voice. "We've ferried the Lord Magnate himself on no less than four sojourns."
His eyes locked on the horizon, Sheppard kept his voice level. "Seen any combat? She's pretty nimble, I bet."
"Not in this vessel. I was once a Shrike pilot," said the other man. "They are rocketplanes with gun capacity. I served under Lord Daus's cousin Kalyn before his holdings were annexed."
"Rocket, huh? If we get the chance, I'll show you something that could leave that in the dust. We call it a Puddle Jumper-" Sheppard's words died in his throat as he caught sight of something in the distance. His seasoned aviator's situational awareness took his eye to it immediately. Sunlight glittered on metallic white spheres and a large silver cylinder was moving ponderously over a hillside; but what made him alert were the flickers of cannon fire and the plumes of black smoke rising from the valley. The distant rumble of shell detonations reached them seconds after a string of orange flares.
"Take the controls!" snapped Linnian, and Sheppard found himself jostled out of the seat by the apologetic co-pilot. "Lieutenant Colonel, I think we should return to the passenger cabin."
"In a second," John said firmly, placing himself behind the pilot's chair. Blinks of white from a spotlight atop the cylinder-which was quickly resolving into the shape of a huge airship-reflected off the windows. The co-pilot used a device like a flashlight to return another series of blinks, Morse-code style.
The gyro-flyer climbed as they crossed a stand of high trees and then abruptly they were over a war zone. The pilots guided the aircraft around thick tethers holding the fat balloons in place at the borders of the valley. Sheppard saw ringed decks dangling from the gasbags as they passed them by. He looked down.
There were no trees or brush of any kind on the ground, the space beneath them just acres and acres of cracked and broken earth, marred by impact craters and the broad, long scars of trenches. He spotted the stone domes of pillboxes, snarls of barbed wire and shallow bunkers. Wrecked ground vehicles were dotted randomly, mired in the rust-colored mud. Here and there were pillars that were strangely untouched by the battle, with large wooden placards hanging off them on chains. The flyer turned away and then back toward the airship in a long loop, coming in toward the far side of it. Through streams of smoke he saw a column of men in tan-colored uniforms rise up in a wave from a trench and surge out across the no-man's land, rifles barking and spitting vapor.
"We won't be fired upon," said Linnian, pre-empting the question forming in Sheppard's mind. "The combatants know that their exercise would be forfeit if even a single shot were to strike a neutral unit."
The rotordyne slowed to a hover over the spine of the airship and settled on to a flat landing platform across its back.
The opulent design of the monorail carriage was repeated inside the massive zeppelin. The design of the airship, even down to the scrollwork on the iron girders, made the craft look more like a flying basilica than a vehicle for transport.
"His Highness has several of these ships for duties of state," explained Linnian as they walked down through the wood-paneled decks. John led the group with Teyla, Ronon, McKay and Hill following. Despite Staff Sergeant Mason's misgivings, Sheppard had ordered him to remain in the city with Bishop and Clarke.
Linnian was still speaking. "This vessel serves as his personal air-yacht."
"More like air-battleship," murmured Rodney. "It's got gun turrets all over it. All it needs is Hindenburg written on the side…"
Hill went a little pale. "You saying this blimp is full of hydrogen gas?"
"Yes," sniffed McKay, "that would be the faint fart smell in the air." He shot Sheppard a lethal stare. "How I let you talk me in to coming aboard this death-trap-"
"Stop talking," grated Ronon. "Or you can get off."
"Believe me, I'd love to, but we're a hundred feet above the ground!"
"That's right."
McKay fell silent for the moment.
The adjutant nodded to a pair of soldiers as they approached, and the men opened a wide oval hatchway. Linnian directed them through, and they emerged into a broad observation gallery with a low ceiling, situated at the bottom of the main gondola below the airship. Sheppard had wondered about leaving his weapons behind in the palace before coming here, and in the end he had opted not to take the P90, but kept the pistol. Now he felt positively under-armed, as everyone in the gallery, from the officers in their over-decorated uniforms to the gossamerdressed companions on their arms, had some kind of weapon on them.