A Barbaric Yawp

"The Sky: The World" is due for release by Reliquary Press in Fall 2010!!!

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Consciousness found its way through the darkness of oblivion like the morning sun breaking through a nightmare. He could hear before he could see, and what he heard terrified him but not as much as it should have. The sound of the wind was ordinary, but recognizing the seat he was strapped into, he knew the rushing wind was a forebodingly bad sound. A soft, strange tinkling accompanied the blasting air, like coins falling on mirrors beside an animated ocean. His body felt weightless, but his head felt heavy with pain. It was as though he was waking up from a week-long bender, but not one vice had passed his lips since he'd found out about the baby. It was thinking of the baby that made him open his eyes and finally behold what should've terrified him long before. The instrument panel was beyond broken, whirring and squealing with violent impairment and sparking in such wild abundance that ash would've been snowing down upon him if not for the gaping holes in the cabin. Imagining the gentle grey snowfall made his gaze widen to see his wife Sarah still unconscious and buckled into the co-pilot's seat. Her hands were resting on her swollen stomach and dreamingly clutching at the child within as if worried about its safety even in her unconsciousness.

He shouted her name, but it only emitted as a dry whisper, and because of the roaring wind she couldn’t hear him. He tried to reach for her, but his hands were tethered to his seat. The yoke shifted and spun wildly as if desperately trying to work itself into his hands, but even it remained out of reach. Everything seemed so far away, except perhaps for a repeat of his recent insentience. The sky twisted as he'd never seen before, the accompanying nausea was like nothing he'd ever known, and the fear, normally diluted by exhilaration, was pure in every thump of cold blood through his veins. The metal whined as it melted beneath the heat of malfunction, and Toby knew that at the speed of descent and deterioration, it wouldn't be long before he, his wife, and their unborn child were so much deeper than six feet under. With his summation, the sky fell to a fatal black and as he watched the world warp within the deadly dive, he lost himself in wondering whether they were crashing to the earth or the earth was rising toward them. A series of sudden jolts threw Sarah's head from side to side and roused her, but when her eyes fluttered open, she smiled at Toby as if they were lying in bed, safe and warm. But the terror in her husband's eyes made her open hers a little wider and beheld the antithesis of their safe, warm bed. She didn't scream; she didn’t think there was any point in it. Her mind was racing, and it was actually racing with the same thoughts as Toby's: their childhoods, their first meeting, their wedding, their happiness at hearing the doctor tell them Sarah was pregnant. It all seemed so long ago and so far away, but no matter how focused Toby was upon those blissful memories, he never stopped reaching for the hidden lever beneath his seat that would engage the Emergency Pilot System; it was their last and only hope. When he hooked his finger around a slippery piece of metal and felt the sweet click of the gear engaging, he looked to Sarah with a hopeful smile. He knew that within seconds of the system engaging, the picocrystals embedded within the plane's hull would reconstruct the fissures, and although it wouldn't be able to fly, the crystalline emergency wings would allow the Begonia to sail safely back to earth. Despite being unable to touch, Toby and Sarah truly felt together in their hope. However, following that click and their shared moment of peace, the connection was abruptly severed by the inferno that swelled around them and the screeching metal that twisted them even farther apart. He didn't have the time to ponder the reason for the EPS' malfunction as his capability for speculation had been obliterated when the sky caught fire, but it was obvious that he hadn’t expected it. The ground welcomed the Begonia with a hard “hello” and rolled the burning plane across its face in an almost condescending fashion, deceiving the wreckage into thinking that perhaps the true crash was still imminent.

Somewhere beyond everything, three souls left flesh, but from the top of his ivory tower, Doctor Azaz witnessed the ball of flame fall to earth before all others and only felt two souls depart. He knew that the pilot had been different from his wife and unborn child; different and special.

Farther than the good Doctor’s tower, in a house on Newhall Street in Birmingham, Captain Jack Racine was wondering why his brother, who was usually very punctual, was so late for supper. It had been several months since they’d seen each other following the circulation of a nasty bit of gossip about Jack and his brother’s wife, but Toby had to have known how preposterous the notion was; at least, that was Jack’s hope. But as he waited, struggling with the sobriety he had promised his brother he would keep, he couldn’t help but wonder if Toby’s truancy had anything to do with the rumor.

It didn’t.