Emily and Anton make their way through the passageways of the ship with Anton giving an animated introdu to the facilities they pass, including the bathrooms, guards’ quarters, and cargo hangars.

  “Why do you have a separate guards’ quarters and no guards?” Emily asks as they tiheir tour.

  “Calypso is a ship sponsored by your family; sometimes we get asked to carry valuable cargo that we aren’t allowed to interfere with. So, we have to keep the guards separate from the crew and closer to the cargo because they don’t trust us.” Anton responds with a tinge of sadness in his voice.

  “I see.”

  An awkward siletles over the two of them as Emily starts to uand a little about the Mandrago family’s treatment of their servants.

  I guess they only brainwash the es they bring into the family, but we’re sidered members of the family and trusted more than others because of it. It’s no wonder he was cautious when he was first introduced to me if they set guards against him on his own ship.

  The silence tinues until they reach a heavy metal door with a rge wheel in the tre and the word ‘Engines’ etched into the metal. Emily hears a low hum emanating from behind the door. Anton walks up to the door and turns the wheel terclockwise several times until a loud g is heard.

  “Wele to Calypso’s heart!” he decres proudly as he pulls the door open.

  Emily steps into the room and gasps in surprise. Suspended in the tre of the room is the rgest and most plicated steam engine Emily has ever seen. Dozens of pistons and gears are delicately woven together to form a beati of power. The hiss of steam and grinding of well-oiled metal py a symphony of life that drowns out Anton’s expnation. Multiple belts move coal through gaps in the walls into several rge furnaces feeding the engine, and a rge tube extends out of it into the ceiling.

  Emily slowly walks forward, ented by the massive struct, and reaches out a hand towards it. Her trance is broken as Anton grabs her wrist and pulls her back.

  “Woah, careful there! This mae is incredibly delicate and quite dangerous for straying hands. Wouldn’t want you to lose a finger now, would we?” He chuckles but doesn’t release his grip on her wrist as he pulls her bato the hallway and closes the door behind him.

  “Sorry, I’ve never seen such a beautiful engine before.” Emily blushes and looks at her feet.

  “Haha, it’s all right, no harm no foul. Are you an aspiring meic? I haven’t heard of your family doing mugineering work.”

  “Yes, my father was a aker before the Mandragos cimed me, and I learned a bit from him,” she answers with a wistful smile, notig some of the tension in Anton’s shoulders slip away.

  “I see! We better hurry to the bridge then. I’m sure you won’t want to miss what es .”

  He begins walking away from the engine room and Emily casts o longing gnce back before following him.

  I o e back here alone.

  On their way back through the ship, they pass a few more core facilities, including the galley and mess hall, but they don’t stop to look at any of them. They soon arrive in an open room with a plethora of dials and gauges, along with several wheels and levers, all surrounding three rge seats. The wall in front of them is mostly reinforced gss, allowing for a clear view.

  A burly man and a thin scruffy woman are already settled into two of the seats, and Anton moves to sit down ihird. The two crew members turn their heads and cast curious gazes towards Emily.

  “This is Emily, our passeo the capital. These are Tony and Ange my crewmates and copilots during the day,” Anton introduces them as he starts cheg the dials around him and adjusting a few levers.

  “o meet you both.”

  Tony gives a light nod and silently copies Anton.

  “Yo!” Ange chirps with an amused smirk as she pulls down a rge metal traption from above her seat, pg it against her face.

  “What’s that for?” Emily asks while gesturing towards Ange.

  “That’s a periscope. It uses a series of mirrors to allow us to check all our blind spots,” Anton responds without looking away from his trols.

  “All clear, they’re asking for the go-ahead to start the track,” Ange chimes in as she moves the periscope away from her fad looks towards Anton.

  “Tony, give the signal,” Anton ands as he sits bad grins up at Emily. “Yonna love this.”

  Tony pulls down on a handle hanging above him, and a loud whistling horn sounds outside the ship.

  Emily waits with bated breath as silence falls upon the bridge. Suddenly, a loud grinding whir echoes through the hangar. The wall in front of the ship shakes and slowly splits down the middle to reveal a long winding el through the building.

  “Woah!” Emily gapes at the gigantic sliding door.

  “Hehe, we all react like that the first time,” Ange giggles.

  The ship shudders, then slides forward as the floor underh it shifts. Emily looks down through the gss and sees a segmerack trag its way through the tre of the hallway ahead.

  “The track carries ships outside the walls so we don’t have to fly within city limits. Most major cities will have a simir system, with a few smaller ones opting to have their docks outside the city if they ’t afford the rge-scale stru,” Anton expins as the ship makes its way through the el.

  After moving a few hundred metres, the narrow el, only wide enough to fit the ship, opens up into a wide hangar with dozens of simir tracks on the floor. Only a couple of the tracks have a ship on them, some moving into the docks and some moving out. All the ships are fag towards the exit of the hall, where the early m sun shihrough the wide mouth of the hangar.

  “Do you have to nd the ship backwards?” Emily asks in fusion.

  Ange bursts out in ughter, causing Emily to blush as she wonders if she asked a stupid question.

  “Quiet you!” Tony growls while gring at Ange, catg Emily by surprise.

  “Ah, sorry kid. It’s the first time anyone’s asked about that, and you caught me off guard,” Ange manages while regaining her breath and wiping tears from her eyes.

  “You see those circles on the floor over there,” she says, gesturing towards the edge of the hanger where Emily sees a series ears around the end of each track, “those turn around all ships that nd, before moving them inside.”

  Emily nods her head in uanding while iing the plicated mess of gears c the floor, w how long the stru of the docks took with so many rge maes ied.

  The ship slowly slides over the tre of one of the gears and es to a halt. The three pilots begin cheg their instruments again and pulling on an assortment of levers and handles.

  “Hey kid, e over and look through this,” Ange calls to her while tapping the periscope above her.

  Emily cautiously approaches and looks at the rge periscope with slight fusion.

  “My little apology for being rude,” Ange says after notig her apprehension. “Put the gss part there to your eyes and rotate the right hao switch between views. I’d reend the top view right now and the bottom as we take off.”

  Emily follows her instrus and looks through the gss eyepiece, seeing the back side of the ship clearly through it. She flips through the different views until she sees the rge balloon above the ship quickly increasing in size.

  The volume of the balloon swells as it rises from its resting point on top of the gondo, and a plethora of metal cables e into view holding it down. The balloon grows to its full size within a few minutes, and Emily switches to a view underh the bridge looking back along the length of the ship.

  “Detag es now, prepare for lift-off,” Anton announces with glee.

  The ship shudders lightly, and Emily sees the metal struts below the ship slowly lift from the floor and fold into hatches on the hull that close behind them. Emily watches in awe as the ship quickly gains altitude and within a few minutes, she sees the ey of Eimdon city sprawled across the sand behind them.

  “Woah!”

  “It’s a pretty impressive sight, isn’t it?” Anton asks proudly.

  Emily pulls away from the periscope and looks out of the window ahead of her, seeing the vast desert stretiles ahead of them.

  “It’s incredible!” Emily nods her head in agreement.

  “Sure is, kid, I never get bored no matter how many times I see it,” Ange agrees with them, and Tony silently nods his head as well.

  “That’s the maiacle fihough I'm afraid.” Anton turns his seat to look at her. “You’re wele to stay here and watch the view with us if you want. But if not, feel free to have another look around the ship, just stay away from the engine room.”

  “I think I’ll have a waheurn to my room for now.”

  “Sure, oh and food will be served at 8am, 12pm and 8pm so be sure to visit the mess hall on time unless you like cold food.”

  “Got it, thanks.”

  Emily takes o look through the periscope at the shrinking city, then turns towards the exit while wiping a few tears from her eyes.

  Bye Anna, I’ll be back soon.

  ***

  Emily spends the wo days following her routine of Spellweave, meditation and exercise. She meets the other two members of the day crew at mealtimes and spends a bit of time chatting with them all about their travels, but her mind remains on the engine room throughout.

  So, at midnight on the sed day, she leaves her room. She quietly moves past the crew quarters and quickly makes her way through the narrow passageways of the ship, knowing most of the night crew will be gathered for their midnight meal for the wenty mi least.

  The heavy metal door offers ao Emily’s increased strength, and she easily slips into the engine room. She approaches the rge throbbing core of the ship, reag out to touch the hummial. After pg her hand on a smooth metal sheet, clear of any moving parts, she closes her eyes and follows her instincts, slowly pulling upon her maa reserves aing the cold electricity flow into the engine.

  Emily draws in a sharp breath as she feels a deep e form between her and the engine. Her senses expand over the rge mae as if it were a part of her body, and a detailed image of it forms in her mind. The image of the engine in her head splits apart as she focuses on it, expanding to show every facet and e inside. Detailed calcutions are performed in an instant, telling her everything she could o know from the exact materials and measurements to the maximum throughput.

  itting the image to memory, she opens her eyes and sees a system message h in front of her.

  ˉˉˉˉˉ

  Maa s plete!

  Blueprint created: Calypso’s Heart

  Sub-system unlocked: Blueprints

  _____

  She blinks away the system message and focuses her gaze on her hand and Calypso’s heart.

  I’m currently using a small amount of maa to make a e with the engine, what if I try p more in?

  With a sihought, streams of azure-blue electricity shoot along Emily’s arm and quickly spread across Calypso’s heart. The entire ship shudders as the heart beats into overdrive, increasing its output of steam. Emily watches the ges with fasation but quickly feels her mind begin to slow down and ache.

  ˉˉˉˉˉ

  Skill created: Overdrive (active)

  _____

  Ign the new skill, she quickly stops elling her maa and then checks her status page.

  ˉˉˉˉˉ

  [Maa:] 19/345

  _____

  Seeing the sharp drop after only a few seds of overdrive, she frowns.

  Damn, that’s expensive. Maybe it’s reted to he the mae is. I wasn’t even able to make a e with the whole ship, only the engine. Also, why do I always stop using mana and maa around 20 points? Is it a mental safety to not fully drain myself?

  Emily massages her temples while thinking, trying to relieve the pain, but it’s to no avail. She hears hurried footsteps rushing through the corridor towards her and decides it’s time to leave.

  “Well, I’ve got a lot more stuff to look at now,” she mutters to herself with a grin as she pulls out The Clod presses rewind.