The Leviathan's crew was firing back now, air guns chattering from the dorsal ridge and engine pods, searchlights guiding the strafing hawks out into the darkness. But what the ship really needed was more fléchette bats in the air.
When she reached the bow, Newkirk and Rigby were already there, wildly casting handfuls of feed. A few riggers had joined them to make up for the missing middies.
The bosun glared at her, and Deryn spat the words, "Tending to the boffin, sir!"
"Thought as much." He tossed her a feed bag. "They caught us napping, didn't they? Didn't know these blasted Clankers could fly so high!"
Deryn scooped out grain and fléchettes as fast as she could. Most of the bats were already airborne in all the ruckus.
"Get down, lads!" someone cried. "One's coming in!"
An aeroplane was roaring straight toward the bow. Deryn dropped, landing hard on a stray fléchette. The main air gun fired, and she felt the whoosh of bolts flying overhead. A host of startled bats streamed up in the bolts' wake.
Deryn glanced up. The air gun had hit home. The aeroplane shuddered, its engine coughing once. Then it twisted in the air and began to spin out of control, crumpling like paper in a giant hand.
Triumphant cries rose up across the airship's topside, but Mr. Rigby didn't pause to cheer. He scrambled to his feet and ran to Newkirk, snapping their safety lines together.
"Come on, Sharp!" he yelled. "Link up! We're going forward."
Deryn jumped up and ran after them, clipping her safety line to Newkirk's. The bosun led them off the dorsal ridge and onto the downward slope of the bow. The last few hundred bats always malingered in the nesting coves, and tonight the Leviathan needed all of her beasties in the air.
The bow skin was tougher than the flank, designed for plowing through storm fronts and squalls. Deryn's boots skidded on its hard surface, the heavy feed bag pulling her off balance. She swallowed - ropes and ratlines were few and far apart here on the airbeast's forehead.
The slope grew steeper. Soon Deryn could see all the way down to the blinders stretched across the whale's eyes, shielding them from distractions and the sting of bullets.
Another aeroplane roared beneath them, its machine gun firing at the port engine pod. The sound of shrieking gears rang in the cold air. In answer, two searchlight beams swept to follow the plane, full of dark and fluttering shapes... .
Deryn watched with horror. The searchlight crews weren't bothering to turn the beams red, the signal for the bats to release their fléchettes. They were guiding the flock straight into the path of the Clanker aircraft. The bats themselves weren't very heavy, but the metal spikes in their guts were enough to shred the aeroplane. The sickening shrieks of the poor wee creatures carried over the noise of ruined engines and tearing wings.
As Deryn watched the aircraft fall, her feet slipped. The ground was shifting beneath her.
"We're diving, lads!" Mr. Rigby shouted. "Get hold of something!"
Snow-covered mountains tilted into view ahead, and Deryn's stomach twisted. The airship had never dived this fast! Deryn dropped flat, fingers scrabbling for purchase. The feed bag skidded away, spilling figs and fléchettes into the night sky.
She was still sliding ... falling.
Then the safety line jerked, bringing Deryn to a halt. She looked up to see Newkirk and Rigby settled in a nesting cove, bats swirling around their heads.
She pulled herself up into the warmth of the cove. It was full of bat dung and old fléchettes, but there were plenty of handholds, at least.
"Glad you could join us, Mr. Sharp," Newkirk said, grinning like a loon. "This is brilliant, isn't it?"
Deryn frowned. "When did you get so brave?"
Before he could answer, the world rolled beneath them again.
"We've lost an engine," Mr. Rigby said.
Deryn closed her eyes, listening to the pulse of the airship. The ship sounded weak. It flew at an odd angle, the airflow turbulent around them.
Clanker aeroplanes still rumbled out there in the darkness - two of them, by the sound - and the Leviathan's searchlight beams looked almost empty of bats. The beasties were uselessly scattered across the night sky, too scared by gunfire and collisions to reform.
"We need more bats in the air!" Mr. Rigby shouted, and swiftly unwound a rope from his belt, replacing the line connecting Deryn and Newkirk with a fifty-foot length. "There's a big cove below us, Sharp. Swing down and see if you can scare up a few more of the little blighters." He shoved his own feed bag into her hands. "Make sure the beasties are stuffed before you boot them out."
"What about me?" Newkirk complained. Battle seemed to agree with him, but Deryn just felt airsick from it all.
"When I've got a longer line on you," Rigby said, still working his ropes. "Don't fancy losing my last two middies."
Deryn climbed over the edge of the cove, trying to ignore the mountain peaks rising steadily toward them. Had the airship lost too much hydrogen to stay aloft?
She forced the thoughts from her head, carefully making her way down toward a dark rift in the airbeast's skin. The growl of a Clanker engine was building in her ears, but Deryn didn't dare look away from her feet and hands.
Only a few more yards ...
Chapter 17
A machine gun erupted behind her, and she pressed flat against the Leviathan, closing her eyes and whispering, "Don't worry, beastie. I'll get these bum-rags sorted for you."
Searchlights flashed across her closed eyelids, and the machine roared away, leaving the foul smell of its engine fumes mixed with leaking hydrogen.
Deryn let herself drop the last few feet, her boots barely catching the lip of the cove. She clung to the rope and swung inside, skidding onto her knees.
The cove was empty. Not a single bat remained to take the air.
"Barking spiders," Deryn swore softly.
The floor shifted beneath her, and she turned and looked back out. The horizon tilted. Then the mountains disappeared, replaced by the cold and starry sky... . The Leviathan was climbing again!
She pulled herself out of the cove. The slope she'd descended was almost level now that the ship was climbing again. Rigby and Newkirk were out in the open, their harnesses joined by a long rope.
"No luck, sir," she cried up. "I think they're all gone!"
"Come on, then, lads." Mr. Rigby turned and started back up toward the spine. "Let's get off the bow before she dives again."