"Boarding pods inbound!" Zephyr shouted, pointing through the slats of the maintenance deck.
Outside the Titan, the sky was darkening—not with storm clouds, but with iron. The Imperial Sky-Fleet descended like a plague of locusts. Massive dreadnought zeppelins cast shadows over the canyon, launching swarms of Vulture-Class Fighters and drill-nosed boarding craft.
CRASH. CRUNCH.
The first boarding pods slammed into the Titan's outer hull. The sound of metal tearing echoed through the station.
"They aren't knocking," Lyra racked her carbine. "They're drilling right into the command deck."
"We can't hold this room," Julian said, looking at the main doors. Sparks were already flying from the hinges as Imperial plasma-cutters went to work on the other side. "We need to leave. Now."
"The Chimney," Zephyr gestured to the massive central shaft above the spinning gyroscope rings. "The Titan intakes from the bottom and exhales from the top. The updraft is currently clocked at 200 miles per hour."
"That's not an exit," Isolde argued. "That's a meat grinder!"
"It is a cannon," Zephyr corrected. "If we deploy our wings after we clear the lip, we will be above the fleet. We can dive back down to the ledge where your ship is grounded."
BANG.
The main door buckled.
"I vote for the cannon!" Julian yelled.
The Launch
They stood on the edge of the central shaft. The air rushing up was deafening. It tugged at their clothes, threatening to suck them in.
"Link up!" Zephyr ordered. "If we separate in the tube, we'll be scattered across the desert!"
They clipped their harnesses together with carabiners—Zephyr, Julian, Lyra, and Isolde. A human chain.
"On three!" Julian shouted.
The door behind them exploded inward. Imperial Stormtroopers in void-armor poured into the room, weapons raised.
"Halt!"
"One!" Julian screamed.
"Two!"
"Three!"
They jumped.
They didn't fall; they fell up.
The massive pressure of the Titan's exhaust caught them instantly. It felt like being hit by a freight train made of air.
WHOOOOOSH.
They were shot vertically through the shaft. The world became a blur of grey metal and screaming wind. The G-force pressed Julian's eyes shut. His stomach dropped into his boots.
Five seconds. Ten seconds.
Suddenly, the grey blur vanished.
They shot out of the top of the Titan, launching high into the blue sky.
"Deploy! Deploy!" Zephyr screamed over the comms.
They pulled the rip-cords on their Song-Wings.
SNAP.
The glider wings expanded. The sudden drag jerked them violently, nearly snapping their spines, but the harnesses held.
They leveled out, thousands of feet above the canyon.
The view was terrifying.
Below them, the Titan floated like a brass jewel. Surrounding it were six Imperial Dreadnoughts and hundreds of fighters.
They were tiny specks floating right above the enemy armada.
"They see us!" Isolde yelled. "Flak cannons tracking!"
The top turrets of the nearest Dreadnought swiveled.
BOOM-BOOM-BOOM.
Black clouds of flak exploded around them. Shrapnel pinged off Julian's Abyssal Suit.
"Dive!" Julian commanded. "Head for the canyon wall!"
The Dogfight
They tipped their wings and went into a steep dive, plummeting toward the red rocks below.
A squadron of Vulture Fighters peeled off from the fleet to intercept them.
"We can't outrun jets in gliders!" Lyra shouted, firing her carbine one-handed at a passing plane.
"We don't need to outrun them," Julian said, the wind tearing at his mask. "We need to out-fly them."
"Canyon run!" Zephyr ordered. "Follow me! Into the needles!"
He led them toward a cluster of jagged sandstone spires that were too tight for the planes to navigate safely.
The gliders wove through the stone needles effortlessly. The Vultures tried to follow.
One fighter clipped its wing on a spire. It spun out of control and slammed into the canyon wall in a ball of fire.
SCREEE.
Another fighter came up behind Julian, machine guns blazing.
TAT-TAT-TAT-TAT.
Bullets stitched holes in Julian's left wing. The glider lurched.
"I'm losing lift!" Julian yelled.
"Julian!" Lyra swung her glider closer. "Grab my hand!"
"No!" Julian looked at the fighter closing in for the kill.
He raised his Resonance Gauntlet.
I can't hit a jet with a sonic lance. It's too fast.
But the pilot... he's wearing a headset.
Julian aimed at the plane.
Focus: Feedback.
He sent a piercing electronic screech on the Imperial radio frequency.
Inside the cockpit, the pilot screamed as his headset erupted with 140 decibels of static noise. He grabbed his ears, letting go of the stick.
The plane nose-dived, missing Julian by inches, and crashed into the rocks below.
The Landing
"There!" Isolde pointed. "The ledge! The Raven!"
The White Raven was sitting on the sandstone shelf, engines idling. Skid was standing on the open ramp, waving franticly with a flare.
"Come in hot!" Isolde yelled. "Cut the chutes!"
They swooped down. One by one, they flared their wings to kill their speed and dropped onto the rocky ledge.
Julian landed hard, tumbling in the dust. He scrambled up, unclipping his harness.
"Go! Go! Go!"
They sprinted for the ship.
Skid grabbed Julian's arm as he ran up the ramp. "The engines are patched, but the intake filters are still at 80%! We can't reach max altitude!"
"We don't need altitude," Julian ran to the cockpit. "We need cover."
He threw himself into the co-pilot seat as Isolde slammed the throttle forward.
The White Raven lifted off, sand blasting from its thrusters.
Above them, a Dreadnought shadowed the canyon, blocking the sun. its main cannons—massive railguns—were charging up, aiming directly at them.
"We're sitting ducks!" Isolde yelled. "I can't dodge a railgun!"
Julian looked at the Titan in the distance. The rings were spinning perfectly now.
"The Titan," Julian whispered. "It's the Gale-Warden. It controls the air."
He twisted the Black-Iron ring.
He didn't need to touch the Titan. He was still linked from the alignment.
Wake up, Julian projected. And take a deep breath.
COMMAND: PURGE.
The Titan obeyed.
The massive intake fans at the bottom of the station reversed.
Instead of sucking air in, the Titan blasted a compressed sphere of air outward in all directions.
The Atmospheric Hammer.
BOOOM.
A shockwave of air pressure, visible as a white distortion ring, expanded from the Titan at the speed of sound.
It hit the Imperial Fleet.
The Dreadnoughts were tossed like toys in a bathtub. The massive zeppelins rolled sideways, their envelopes buckling under the pressure. Fighters were swatted out of the sky.
The railgun shot from the lead Dreadnought went wide, carving a trench into the cliff face a mile away.
"Hold on!" Julian yelled as the shockwave hit the White Raven.
The ship was thrown forward, surfing the blast wave.
"Ride it!" Isolde screamed, wrestling the yoke. "It's boosting us!"
They shot out of the canyon like a bullet, carried by the Titan's breath. They punched through the dust cloud and into the clear sky, leaving the chaotic, tumbling fleet far behind.
The Open Sky
Minutes later, the turbulence faded. The White Raven cruised at high altitude, shaking but intact.
Julian slumped in his chair. His left arm was completely numb. He couldn't feel his fingers.
"We lost them," Skid confirmed, watching the radar. "The fleet is in disarray. Half their ships are grounded."
Zephyr walked into the cockpit. He had taken off his skull mask. Beneath it, he was a young man with wind-burned skin and bright, intelligent eyes.
"You speak to the machines," Zephyr said, looking at Julian with fear and respect. "You made the god sneeze."
"It cleared the air," Julian said weakly.
"Where to now?" Isolde asked. "We have a full tank of fuel and a very angry Empire behind us."
Julian pulled up the map. The red light in the East turned green.
"Four Titans awake," Julian counted. "The North, the South, the West, the East."
"The cardinal directions are secure," Lyra noted. "We've built the perimeter."
"Now we go to the heart," Julian said.
He pointed to the center of the map. The Imperial Capital.
Titan 01: The Gilded King.
"We can't just fly into the Capital," Skid said. "It's the most heavily defended city on the planet. Anti-air fields, Silence legions, the Emperor's personal guard..."
"We aren't going to the Capital yet," Julian corrected. "There's one more stop."
He pointed to a blinking coordinate in the Wastelands, north of the Capital.
"The Scrapyard of Giants."
"Why there?"
"Because," Julian looked at his corrupted arm. "If I'm going to face the Emperor... I need a new hand. And that's where the old War-Mechs go to die."
He looked at Zephyr.
"Welcome to the crew, Wind-Walker."
Zephyr smiled. "The wind goes where it pleases. I will go with you."