Lazarus Rising

1.16 The Mnemosyne

Jumping over the last of the Riser tenement blocks, they dipped into the wide panorama of Hope Fields and flew over open ground for twenty minutes toward the dark shapes that loomed over the skyline like a line of approaching sea tankers.

Cheyenne had often flown by the sprawling Ziggurat assembly fields, catching glimpses of the irregular forms of the colossal ships in the distance. But now, with the Metro Captain at the helm of the aero, she had the chance to see the works being undertaken at close quarters. The knowledge that they would soon be on one of the immense machines sent a buzz of anticipation surging through her.

As they approached, racing low over the sprawling space port, five monolithic pyramidal shaped ships in various stages of construction rose from the horizon ahead of them. Like the bobbing heads of an army of geometrical beasts emerging from the earth they climbed up until they reared high above them, blocking out huge swathes of the late afternoon sky.

With a thin wail of engines, the Captain pulled the aero up and swung in a long arc around the first Ziggurat.

Still in its earliest stages of construction, huge webs of scaffolding marked out the immense square of the ship's baseline. Down below they could make out hundreds of gangs of Risers toiling in the fabric of the metalwork. Crawlers bearing titanic plates, larger than the side of the building Cheyenne lived in, moved up the gentle inclines of long ramps to fit the pieces into an ever increasing jigsaw of rhombic shapes. Giant flares of arcing magnesium shot like clumps of volcanic magma high into the air around them as the workers welded the armoured sheets into place. Jigs and cranes swung sections of pipework, huge fan turbines and odd shaped sections of ducting high up into the air, to be guided into place by the sea of hands of the waiting Risers and their vigilant Gang Masters.

Leaving this first skeletal body behind them they flew up the line of ships. Each successive ship was more progressed in its construction than the previous. Reaching the far end of the strip they rapidly closed on the final, fully completed, ship. The huge ziggurat totally alien to the landscape sat like a brooding leviathan its black crystalline surface glimmering in the late afternoon sun. They rapidly gained height to flit over the pointed tip and quickly span around to land at its peak. Cheyenne was surprised to see that each ledge was not smooth at all, as it appeared at a distance but offered a short prominent shelf backed by a thick network of pipes and venting hoods.

The Captain put the ship down on the top platform of the ship expertly nudging it into the cyclonic wind whirling around them, to settle with a jolt on the level surface. Gathering their bags they struggled out into the frenetic gusts and stood looking back along the line of ships. Cheyenne strode to the edge and looked down. The dizzying height and buffeting wind made her fingers tingle as she struggled to keep her balance and peered over the almost shear drop beneath her. Far below the last few winding lines of queuing Litost disappeared into the open rampart doors. As the entrances began to close the sounds of the clanging of the sealing shutters echoed up to her and white streams of cooling gases began to spring along the base of the ship like a thousand steaming geysers.

Turning around she looked up. Above them was the small pyramid of the Command Centre that capped the Ziggurat. Standing at the end of a black nosed tunnel watching her stood an imposing figure, arms crossed over his barrel chest, wild locks of grey hair and beard blowing wildly in the wind, his heavy coat flapping angrily around his stout legs.

Charisa emerged from the aero, wrapping an arm protectively around Lazarus's shoulders she hurriedly ushered him into the shelter of the passageway. The Metro Captain joined the man in the tunnel, waved Cheyenne back from the edge and shouted over the tumultuous wind. "This is Shelvocke, he's the Captain of the Mnemosyne and he'll be the Archon of the Mnemosyne Bio once it's set up on Mars."