Airship Stowaway

Joanna ran across the deck like a little grey mouse. For a moment all of the hustle and bustle on the main deck of Aeropolis seemed to be taking place elsewhere, and no-one noticed her sneaking up the loading ramp of the ancient airship, and on board.

She paused just inside the cargo hold door, crouching against the wall, waiting for her eyes to adjust. But there was no-one else in the cavernous space. Satisfied, she edged deeper into the hold, looking for something to steal.

Most of the cargo was tightly wrapped in hessian and secured with rope, but she could read the bills of lading, and the names stencilled onto the few crates. She moved purposefully through the narrow gaps between the cargo pallets. She had just started reading the label on a bale of tea when loud shouts from outside made her jump. She shrank back in between the bales as footsteps hammered up the ramp, followed by the appearance of a tall, shambling figure in a long leather flying coat.

The man stopped just inside the door and turned to look back out over the deck.

"Come on!" He gesticulated urgently at someone she couldn't see. "Let's get going!"

Joanna didn't like the sound of that at all. She moved further back, until she was against the wall of the hold, and then started to sidle towards the open door. But before she could get very far, a young lad of about sixteen came skidding into the hold. He was panting, and as he bent over to catch his breath his greasy brown hair flopped over his eyes.

The shabby man grabbed his shoulder and raised him up roughly. "No time for this! You get door closed while I start engines, yes?" Without waiting for an answer, he ran deeper into the ship.

The boy had in the meanwhile moved towards a long chain which extended from the ceiling of the hold and disappeared through a hole in the floor. He started to pull down on it, and as the rattling chain turned an unseen wheel, the ramp began to slowly rise up from the deck of Aeropolis.

Joanna could only watch in dismay as the door rose up to seal off the hatchway. Just before the last sliver of sky disappeared the engines of the airship roared into life, and she felt the cargo deck move beneath her feet. She was leaving Aeropolis and she had no idea where they were going.

Joanna had lived on Aeropolis her entire life. She had never set foot on the earth below. All she had ever known was the giant airship city. Sometimes, when she had a moment to spare in her scurrying and darting, she would find a porthole or an open deck, and she would look out at the world.

When Aeropolis was over the ocean, or the desert, or the endless forest, she would soon grow bored, and return to the hustle and bustle of the lower decks, where she would try to pick pockets or find an unattended bag.

But when Aeropolis hovered over New York, or London, or Paris, or another of the great cities, she would spend hours staring down at the streets below, trying to imagine what it must be like being one of the tiny figures she saw moving around.

She knew Aeropolis so well, knew every inch of every deck and gantry (well not the upper decks so much, where Mr Hughes and the posh people went, but she had sneaked up there a few times, even all the way to Top Table once) and she wondered what it would be like to go to another city. To explore something completely new and unknown! Just thinking about it had been thrilling.

But now that she was actually off into the unknown, all she felt was fear. Of course she hadn't intended to leave the safe confines of Aeropolis at all, but it was more than that. Idly thinking about something was very different from actually doing it.

Her heart was beating so hard it was actually painful. She felt short of breath, and as she slumped against the wall of the cargo hold, she felt tears prickling in the corners of her eyes. Her thoughts went to her poor Mama, waiting in the little cramped hidey-hole under the emergency stairs on Deck 59, and then the tears did come, hot and stinging, and bitter.

She stifled her sobs on a ragged sleeve, because for all she knew the greasy boy might still be there in the hold with her. Presently the storm of emotion passed, and she started to think about what she would do.

The most important thing, she decided, was to find a way to get back to Aeropolis, because her poor Mama depended on her. Once Mama had been able to get around more but these days she hardly left the hidey-hole, and was entirely dependent on Joanna for food.

Of course, this airship she found herself on was probably a trader, and would in all likelihood return to Aeropolis in the fullness of time. But that might take days, weeks, months even. And then there was the manner of their departure to consider. The shabby man had been in a tremendous hurry to leave. Perhaps he hadn't wanted to pay the docking charges, and was leaving before he was arrested by Aeropolis Security?

Joanna wasn't particularly bothered by this, she had no love for Thornton's men and was often enough running from them herself. But it did mean that the shabby man might not return to Aeropolis for some time-- if at all.

It was becoming increasingly obvious that she would have to take some sort of action. She crept slowly forward between the crates, moving deeper into the hold.