Chapter 18: Repairs

The next few days flew by for Jake and others. On the second day, all the airships were flown out of the cave. The Karenna came out last. It wasn’t the smoothest sailing. The lift controller had never been zeroed. They had no way of calibrating it in the cave. They learned just how crucial lift controller calibration was when they nearly crashed into the roof of the cave. Then almost bounced off the floor. The Karenna was light compared to a ship of her size made of steel. She was still a heavy lass. Once they started moving, they learned she was longer than the canyon was wide. They had to stop and back up. Then turn and bring her out at an angle. Jake’s nerves were shot by the time they had her in the canyon. It had taken them all morning just to do that.

They got her aligned in the canyon with room on all sides. The other airships took their positions on her decks again. Looking at the Val and Shoe Jake had a new worry. They would have to be flown back or strapped to the deck somehow. He brought the matter up with Marie and Gran that evening. Neither had any alternative. The five light freighters could be squeezed into the cargo and craft hold. Bruce offered to return with the two and ferry back their crews. Even with skeleton crews he couldn’t fit them all though. Gran decided they would park the Shoe just outside the mouth. She hoped they could retrieve it later if she chose to do so.

That was when Jake decided to show her the vault. He got the keys from the Captain’s desk. Then Gran, Marie, Catherine, and Jake made their way to the vault. It was located just off the craft hold. He unlocked the first set of double doors. Then walked down the small hall. There were two secured rooms here. He opened the first and stepped back. Then he explained what they were looking at. “What you see here is five tons of gold, two of silver, and a ton and a half of copper. All in Imperial currency.” Marie gasped the same as he and Catherine had on hearing the sums. Gran had to lean against the wall. Jake went on. “Ten percent of this is the Crown’s for taxes. Then ten percent of what is left goes to Gran and the Kennedy clan. I thought since you offered to abandon the Shoe, you deserved to see this.”

“Jake that is not funny,” Gran scolded.

“No joke Gran. Those are the figures in the Captain’s journal. I swear.” Jake promised.

“I believe you. Look at all that gold. Just remember I’m an old woman. Things like that can cause heart trouble,” Gran said with a smile. “The Shoe stays here. If you want to move it to the mouth fine by me. I don’t care. When we get back I’ll buy a brand new heavy freighter. Maybe a whole fleet of them.” She was laughing.

“Want to buy the Val. It’s for sale as soon as we get her back to port,” Catherine offered. “I would say your credit is good.” She giggled at her comment.

They helped Jake close up the doors and relock them. “Why is it all just piled like that?” asked Marie.

“The wooden cases rotted away. When I first opened them, it spread in the hall. Funniest thing I’ve ever seen. I had to relock the outer doors and go find a shovel to get it all back in there,” Jake said.

Gran was laughing so hard she was clutching her side. “The man is so rich he needs a shovel to clear it from his halls,” and she laughed until she cried.

Catherine wasn’t much better; she got another of her giggle fits. Once the outer doors were locked, Jake left the three of them standing there laughing. Catherine tried to call him back, but the giggles robbed her voice of the volume needed. Or so he pretended.

It was decided, shortly after the trip down to the vault, that Marie would captain the Val back to port. She would take a skeleton crew and Bruce would fly them back. He was sure they could do it in under four days. Jake checked with everyone and got a firm schedule of when the Karenna would be ready to lift off. Catherine was adamant that it wasn’t going anywhere until every room was cleaned.

Jake rolled his eyes at her. He was smart enough to do so after she had left. Luckily the engines were being difficult. They only had one of them installed. The other three were lying on the ground near where they would be installed. The biggest problem was the braces. They were made of Dithorium. Kevin and Tyler had planned to drill new holes in the braces to install the new engines. They learned that was not an easy task. The bits they had for their drills barely scratched the braces. Bridget came to the rescue. She made a lance that would soften the brace enough for them to drill the holes. The only trouble was it took three hours to soften an area to drill. Then they had to work fast before it hardened again. They had all the top holes done and half the bottom on the port-side. They had the top and bottom holes on the starboard side done. The last of the holes would be finished by noon tomorrow. Or so they promised. Then a day to install each engine.

He told Marie and Bruce if they were going, they should go that day. He gave Bruce a shopping list. Bruce looked it over and nodded. When Jake tried to give him money, Bruce said, “We’ll settle up when we get her to port.” Jake gave him one more task. He was to make sure they used the wireless to contact them when they were returning. Jake set a time and frequency for the calls. Then he gave Bruce a duress word.

Nathan was going with the Val, but his wife was staying. Marie took the cook off the Shoe. The kitchen staff had refused to go back. Catherine agreed with them. Without the rest of the convoy to slow them they made great time. The Val went nearly as fast as the Lady could have made the trip. Bruce was back three days later. He hadn’t wasted any time in port. He flew to the yard and loaded the purchases. He said, “I told them either they had it all or they didn’t. If I was loaded within the hour, they got my business and a bonus. If not, I would go elsewhere. They got me loaded, barely,” he laughed.

Marie couldn’t stop talking about how nice the Val was. It was clear, she had fallen in love with the big ship. Catherine smiled and told Gran she had the papers drawn up and waiting in Innis. Gran just laughed.

Jake had kept his word and sent a message on the wireless to Admiral Teller. The first day he was politely told he was using a military frequency, and to please move civilian traffic off the military’s frequency. Jake used his new account and sent Teller a private message. The next night the wireless operator was eager to take his message. He gave Jake a message from Teller as well.

To Harrow: Will be on station in three days. Will rendezvous with Bulldog near Mouth of Old Man’s Teeth for training exercise. Hope to see you. Teller

Jake almost laughed at the message. With Bruce, having picked up the needed materials, they enclosed the new envelopes two feet from the original corridor ceilings. Patrick and half a dozen of the Kennedy children moved the wiring into the Karenna’s access panels. The Panels came off with a special wrench. Once off, they had access to the inside of the wall. By the time the engines were installed, the wiring was safely hidden in the walls and the lift envelopes were hidden behind sheets of wood that were getting their second coat of stain.

While Marie and Bruce had been gone there had been a small stirring at the ship. Bridget and Paul flew off in one of the launches. About an hour later the entire canyon shook. Then a wind blew hard through the canyon. Jake took a second launch up and found the two back near the mouth of the Teeth. Paul hurried to join him then they both dropped through the mist. When Jake demanded an explanation Paul just pointed to Bridget.

“We were disposing of some of the old munitions. I didn’t mean to blow up the mountain,” she said.

“You blew up a mountain?” Jake asked incredibly.

Her reply was, “Relax, it was a small mountain. The Teeth has plenty more.” Jake was speechless. He wanted to yell. He wanted to scream and pull his hair out. Then Bridget said, “With the stuff Bruce is bringing back Bookend and I will be able to make some amazing rockets. They should be able to fly several miles at least. When they hit their target, well, just make sure you really don’t want that target around,” she said and then walked off. She was just out of sight when she yelled for Bookend to hurry up, they had a lot of work to do. Paul shrugged and jogged off after her.

Jake thought he should keep an eye on those two. It didn’t work out though. They had been moving the old munitions out of the Karenna. He found out she had commandeered the Song. Nobody was quite sure where it was. All anyone knew was they were glad it wasn’t near the Karenna. Gran’s only comment was, “She had better not blow up my boy. If she does, I’ll drop her from a cloud. Don’t care about the Song. She can blow that old piece of junk up but not my boy. I just learned to tell the two apart.” She was still grumbling when she walked off.

The day after Bruce returned, he was invited for a demonstration. The two had moved one of the guns off the Karenna and onto the Song. Paul flew the old freighter up and then the three of them got on a launch. Bridget kept a close eye on a pocket watch. Jake was beginning to worry when she frowned. She looked at the watch then at the Song. Then back and forth several times. Her frown increased then there was a loud bang. A rocket shot off from the Song and hit a mountain over two miles off. The explosion was impressive. The mountain didn’t disappear as Paul said the other one had. Jake was glad to see that. When they returned to the Song the gun was in the same place. Bridget smiled.

“These old guns load from the rear. They were the first guns designed to do so. The nice thing is that makes them perfect for firing rockets out of. Open the back put in the rocket. We had to make the hole a little bigger for the fuse. Then you just aim and light the fuse. Notice the gun didn’t even move.” She kept talking about the gun and rocket the entire way back. She told Jake to give her four men and she’d show them how to modify the guns while she and Bookend made more rockets. She smiled at Paul and said first we have another experiment to do. Jake was about to ask. Paul’s face glowing bright red told Jake he probably didn’t want to know.

During the repairs, Jake learned Catherine had planned for everything. She hadn’t just brought cleaning supplies and light bulbs. She had bought out every mattress she could find. Then the linens to go with them. The pillows and all kinds of other stuff Jake had never considered. The kitchen for the Officers’ Mess got a bunch of new things. Catherine had spent time getting all the pieces to make sure the cold closet would be able to be fixed as well as the ice closet and stoves. She told him she came prepared to replace everything but the hull. She brought so much, the cargo hold had crates and crates of unopened items.

Finally, the engines were installed. When Bruce started asking questions about the reactor, Bridget decided he would be the reactor engineer. She told him everything she knew, then walked away. When Jake called down to the reactor for more power to test the engines, he was surprised to hear Bruce reply to him. He didn’t learn of Bridget’s decision until dinner that night. Bruce and three of the Kennedys were the reactor team.

Bruce said, “Other than all the output meters, it’s fairly simple. More power. Push the lever to lower the crystal. Less power pull the lever for the crystal. That’s it.”

Jake just shook his head. He was sure there was more to it. He would have asked Bridget, but no one could find her or Paul. The Song was missing as well. Jake hoped they were being safe, in more ways than one.

Jake spent the first two days trying to help wherever he could. On the third day, Catherine intervened. “Jake love we have a problem. One of us is getting in the way. They’re trying to be productive, but they just slow down the work. I don’t know what to do?” she said.

“Is it an adult or one of the children?” Jake asked.

“An adult. He really is trying to help. I don’t want to hurt his feelings,” she told him as he stood with a partial roll of wire. He had been helping Jared and Patrick wire the lift envelopes.

“Hmm, you should try to find a job out of the way for him. If possible, a job that needs doing. Make work will probably upset him.” Jake thought a minute, then said, “I know we have six Scouts. They have to be stripped down. Everything is under the deck of those Scouts. We can’t replace anything until they get stripped down. Will that work?”

“I think so. Jake there is one other thing. Um, Jake, I love you. Would you please go work on the Scouts? It is a perfect job for you. If you are there everyone will know where to find you, when we need to ask you something. The job needs to be done. It’s not make work. I promise. Maybe you could take Uncle too. He’s kind of wandering from place to place,” Catherine said.

Jake started laughing. He looked around the corridor he was working in. They were the only ones standing in it. “I guess you’re right. I start working on something then some comes to ask me something. Whatever I’m working on gets put on hold to answer the question,” he sighed. “Ok, send Uncle Tomas to give me a hand. Maybe a couple of the kids too.”

She smiled and gave him a kiss on the cheek. “Thank you for not being mad. I was worried you would be.”

“I want to get done as much or more than anyone else. If I’m holding everyone up, I need to get out of the way. Thank you for bringing this to me,” Jake told her.

He made a quick round through the ship checking on projects. As he made his rounds, he realized Catherine had been right. Every time he got near a group, they slowed down in case he needed something. He told each group he’d be in the craft hold. Then made his way there. He found Uncle Tomas and Cali standing with one of the teens from the clan.

“Ok, I have been sent here to keep me out of the way, so everyone can get their jobs done. You’re here to make sure I stay out of the way. We are going to start working on the Scouts. They are bad shape. Cali you’ll fetch anything we need. I’m sorry I don’t remember your name?” he said to the boy.

“I’m Kenneth sir. Off the Song. Everyone calls me Ken.”

“Ok Ken it is. This is Tomas, and I’m Jake while we’re working. Too confusing otherwise.”

They started tearing apart one of the Scouts. The outer hull was panels. They bolted on like the panels in the corridors. They even used the same tool. Jake and Ken unbolted them, and Tomas and Cali numbered them with chalk. Tomas was keeping notes on a writing board. Removing the outer hull gave them access to the batteries and lift envelopes. The envelopes fell apart in their hands when they tried to pull them out. Cali and Ken went and fetched new envelopes. While Jake cleaned out the old ones. The old batteries were removed and set to one side.

Jake had to laugh when the two returned. Ken was carrying a wooden box with several envelopes. Cali was only carrying one. That one though was piled higher than her head. Her legs and arms were all that was visible from the front. Jake helped her set her burden down and told her they would use that one first. Then he and Ken went and fetched a crate of batteries from the cargo hold.

Cali proved her worth when it came time to run the wire for the envelopes. She was small enough to climb in the tight space and run the wires to the cockpit. Jake would have loved to replace the controls in the Scout. He didn’t have a replacement for them though. The same was true for the large propeller on the rear of the craft. The Scouts were much like a runabout. It was an enclosed craft with windows on the front and top. The thing took two people to fly. One controlled the steering and thrust. The other controlled the lift and planes. There was only room for four people in the craft, and not much else. The two pilots sat in the back, with the lookouts in the front. They had never been designed to operate longer than a few hours at a time.

Jake thought the design was very limiting. The new lift gas and envelopes would mean the craft could have some extra storage. It wouldn’t need nearly the lift they had just put in it. A single envelope would easily work. The problem was it needed multiple envelopes for stability. Jake and Tomas were discussing this fact when a runner came to get Jake. Patrick needed him on the bridge for a few minutes.

Jake returned to find that Tomas and Ken were busy in the cockpit. They explained as they worked that Ken had got some of the spare parts for the Dancer and Song. The clan had learned to keep stuff for the younger crew members to tinker with. If they didn’t then the airship got tinkered with. Ken had come up with a controller from an old launch and a helm from an antique runabout. Cali was sitting with an envelope in her lap. She was pushing a needle and thread through a large roll at one end of the envelope.

“We decided to make the envelope smaller. So, Tomas rolled up one end. I’m just making sure it stays rolled up. Then we’ll use the patch glue to seal it,” Cali smiled and told him.

Jake decided he would help her with the other envelopes. As the two sat and stitched the new envelopes. Tomas and Ken pulled most of the inside apart. The two were still jerking things out when the group was called for dinner. They cleaned up and went to eat. All four were hard at work the next morning. They finished their modified Scout just before dinner the next night. All except for the putting the hull skin back on.

They had powered it up in the craft hold. It handled surprisingly well in the enclosed space. Jake raided the Lady’s supply of backup solar sails. Jake’s plan required Cali to climb through the frame again. As they reinstalled the hull plates, they covered them with pieces of solar sail. The job wasn’t easy. Each sail had to be wired to the battery controller. Cali crawled all through the little craft. They knew the sail wouldn’t last long. A few months at best. While it lasted though, the sails would provide the little airship a way to recharge its batteries.

Catherine laughed at their hard work when she brought them lunch. Jake was saved being offended when Cali stomped her foot at Catherine. “I’m sorry Cali. It just looks. Well, it looks kind of different,” she said placatingly.

“We have been working really hard on this. I had to crawl all inside to get all the wires where they needed to be. And you laughed.” Cali looked on the verge of tears. Catherine went to the young girl and tried to comfort her. Cali was hiding her face in her hands. Her little shoulders moving up and down. It looked like she was trying not to cry. When Catherine knelt to hug the child, Cali gave her a raspberry on her cheek. Then ran behind Jake laughing.

Catherine was so stunned she just stayed there kneeling on the hold floor. Everyone was laughing now. Tomas was laughing so hard he was holding his side. Cali was giggling and hiding behind Jake as she teased Catherine about getting her good. Catherine was smiling and shaking her head. “We know it looks funny. It is the best we can do. We had to scavenge parts from a bunch of places. But she’ll fly. We had her in the air earlier,” Cali said.

Catherine had an odd look on her face. “Why did you have to scavenge for stuff?” she asked as she handed out the sandwiches.

“Because the controls were ancient. It took two people to fly this thing. Ken here found some controls for an old runabout on one of the clan airships. That’s what we put in it,” Tomas explained.

Catherine started giggling. She looked from her uncle to Jake and giggled even harder. “Jake,” she giggled and then went on, “Remember our bet?” he nodded. “There are several creates with parts for launches and runabouts in the cargo hold. I thought you knew.”

“How was I supposed to know?” he asked.

“You were teasing me about buying out all of the Innis shops. You said I had bought everything and the kitchen sink. We talked about the Scouts. Of course, I bought controllers and parts to fix them up. I even bought replacement engines for the launches. I think there are a few different sizes. I wasn’t sure what size would be needed,” Catherine said.

“I don’t know if I should kiss you for thinking of the parts for the Scouts or swat you for waiting until we were nearly finished before telling us,” Jake said.

“Again with you trying to get your hands on my innocent little bottom. Uncle protect me from this brute,” she mocked complained.

“Protect you. I’m going to hold you for him,” Tomas said. Cali thought that was funny, and giggled blowing crumbs out her mouth.

After they finished the four went looking for the crates of parts Catherine had mentioned. They found them. More than two dozen crates. Catherine had bought everything to rebuild a launch or runabout many times over. The only thing missing was a hull. When they got the last of the crates in the craft hold, the four decided to leave their first effort as it was. They started stripping a second Scout. This time they had everything they needed to do the job right.

It still took them two days to get the Scout finished. Their second attempt was a much better looking airship. Ken had the idea to stretch the sail across the entire hull. Only fastening the edges. Catherine contributed a keg of the sealant for the Val. It had been unloaded with everything else. The stuff smelled horrible. They had to bear it though. They considered taking the Scout outside, but were afraid the mist would mess with it sealing properly. Once they had calibrated the Scout’s lift controller in the craft hold, they went to open the door to the hold.

Jake and Ken opened the latches. Then he walked to the large wheel. Before he got there the door started to open. He looked up at the door then down at the controls below. Cali stood there with a grin as she pulled a lever, opening the door. He shook his head all the way back to the floor of the hold. There were several jokes from Tomas about children and such.

The four loaded in the Scout and smoothly rose through the door. The Scout was fast. They had put the largest set of engines they had on it. Jake was piloting it and watched as the batteries drained. He backed down the engines until he was slowly charging the batteries. It was still pretty quick. It handled nicely as well. They flew up high and scouted the area around the Teeth. Then flew back to the canyon. They had launched a buoy before they left and had no trouble finding the canyon again.

With the little Scout in the craft hold, and the buoy secured, they closed the door and began working on the next Scout. As people finished other projects, they came and helped with the Scouts. When they were ready to take the Karenna up, they had four of the Scouts finished, Jake decided the Scouts needed their own wireless systems.

The night before the launch of The Karenna, Jake held a final meeting. He was in the captain’s cabin when there was a knock at the door. He called out, “Just a minute. I just got out of the shower.

The door cracked open, and Catherine said, “Put on your robe we have your new uniform.”

Jake sighed and donned his robe. Then said, “Ok, I’m decent.”

Catherine and Rebecka came in, closing the door behind them. The two women were dressed in what Jake assumed was the female version of the ship’s uniform they had created. They both wore a forest green pleated riding skirts, except, their skirts were gathered at the ankles over their black boots. Each wore a white blouse with a forest green vest buttoned below their breasts. A burgundy silk scarf tightly held the blouse’s collar. Jake thought the uniform quite remarkable on the two women. Catherine was carrying a leather jacket over her arm as she walked in. Rebecka was carrying an armload of clothes.