Terrestrial Undead

Chapter 35

Faith had been in utter turmoil when she had decided to escape. The old captain's words echoed in her mind: everything you have done, you have done for yourself. It seemed truer than ever now. How could she have run off on 003 like that? At first, she had done it to save their life; but to hand the vampires over like that? She had thought she didn't have much choice, that it would be best in the long run. She barely knew what was true inside her own mind anymore.
She did know that despite the fact that they had essentially kidnapped Faith and the entire crew, what 003 had pulled off was impressive. 003 was fiercely intelligent and determined, and now Faith was ashamed of herself for taking it upon herself to sell the vampires out to make a life for them. They had taken control of her entire airship— they were more than capable of making their own life. Faith found she wasn't angry; on the contrary, she loved 003 all the more.
That said, Faith could still make decisions for herself. Being tied up in her own airship wasn't becoming for a captain. What would 003 have done?
Why, escape of course, instead of sitting still feeling sorry for themselves.

Now as they faced the stern together, Faith laughed to herself over their private battle of wills. It had been quite something, now that she thought about it; they had both manipulated the will of His Majesty and the Air Brigade in their own ways, she had single handedly caught the vampires (still an impressive feat although she blushed at the recollection), they had both in turn taken control of Airship 11, they had both acted out their own plans and schemes that had gone off without too many hitches. But Faith couldn't be more glad they were working together again. Together they had escaped an airship, taken on the Gaze, escaped prison, surpassed a captain and taken complete control of the same airship they had escaped, changed the fate of the vampires and quite possibly Terrestria. All in all, perhaps it wasn't so bad that 003 had chosen not to declare Orla defect that day; if they managed to take on the King without disastrous consequences. That was a very big 'if'.
Faith snapped out of her reverie to feel over the pulsing of the navigation panel.
"We should shut off the engines," Faith muttered "we'll get to Sect 1 too early at this rate. A random airship floating around above the city will raise suspicion. We should strike at night."
Juju and Emlyn had been enthusiastic for blowing up the royal palace, but Faith had been against it, and was relieved when 003 respected this. In the end, none of them were killers, and they would hold more leverage with the king alive. Instead, they would wait for nightfall, and get up enough momentum to propel them to the palace and then shut the engine off, hopefully getting close enough to infiltrate the palace without being noticed. It seemed a ridiculous notion in such a big airship, but it moved silently without engines, and hopefully the darkness would provide enough cover. Faith smiled to herself. If she could pilot an airship into the middle of a city and steal the King, nobody could say she wasn't a good Captain.
They stopped the engines behind a mountain range separating them from a large plain, the last stretch of the journey before they reached the city. Dropping anchor, Faith and 003 left Juju and Emlyn in charge to go and check on the crew again. Hand in hand, they took rations to the hold, where 001 and his cronies were waiting. 003 slid open the hatch and they both stood to the sides to let a barrage of abuse and spittle fly out it past them. Faith slid the food in and shut the hatch with a snap.
"Just imagine if he had wound up captain."
"He never would've. Nobody listens to 001. All the same, I'm pretty glad it was you in the end. Hey, do you still have records on everybody in your quarters? I remember Orla saw it once. 001 was the first file she saw."
"Yes. I've never looked at it." This was true. Faith found the idea somewhat voyeuristic., and said so.
"What if you just looked at your own?"
Faith smiled at her love.
"Go on, then. If you're that curious."
003 was. They sat on Faith's bed looking for their file to pass the time until nightfall.
"There I am. It still has 'to be punished' stamped on it. Oh, and 'defect'. I thought that was just a cyborg thing."
"It's for serious crimes as well. Like escaping."
"Oh."
As they sat together, Faith felt 003's body tense a little.
"Are you alright?"
"There's a note here. 'Origin: Sect 1. Special care to be taken to prevent defection. Youngest of criminal family: Bell'."
"Bell? Like Dr. Bell... Tesla's aunt. Didn't she say she had a sibling that was taken?"
"There's a footnote. 'See prison log.'"
"There's a copy here somewhere," Faith said, rifling through the desk drawers. Feeling over the cover, she handed the prison log to 003.
It was thinner than the one Orla had stolen; it was a copy of the relevant files for each crew member.
"'Bell family. Dr. Ella Bell, to be incarcerated for defection. Relations: Celia Bell, deceased. Charlie Bell, deceased. Tesla Bell, to be incarcerated. Pax Bell, inducted onto Airship 11.'"
Each name had a small picture, with 003's below the name Pax.
The pair looked at each other, speechless. Faith found herself tasting the name:
"Pax."
Pax smiled a little. "I guess I'm not just a number any more."
They hugged, and then Pax began to flick through the pages again.
"Let's find you! maybe we can find something else—"
Faith stopped them.
"Wait." She wasn't immediately entirely sure why, but something inside her curbed her curiosity. She didn't know where she'd come from, but what did it matter? She'd come far, and she'd done so as Faith. Now Faith was sitting here, with Pax, in their own airship, about to take on the King.
"I don't really want to be anyone else just now."
Pax paused and then nodded, closing the files. They put it away and they sat alone, pressing their foreheads together.