They were following him.
Lemborg gasped. His mind overloaded with a thousand unspeakable terrors, the white-bearded gnome grabbed the yellow lever at his side with both hands and tugged back sharply. Metal clamps unlocked with shrieks and groans along the Spirit’s stern; warning sirens and alarm bells raised deafening cries in protest. With a jolt that ran the length of the Spirit and shook Lemborg right down to his teeth, the entire hydrodynamic maneuvering assembly came free of the ship’s fuselage, just as Krynn’s vast, white-streaked face drifted back into view from Lemborg’s right.
At the very moment the assembly was jettisoned, Lemborg released the yellow lever and reached up, grabbing an overhead handring attached to a thick pin. He jerked down. Metal screamed as a huge spring shot sternward along a track, pulling on the rope to the primary gyroscopic stabilizer. The rumbling whine of the gyro immediately went through the Spirit, and the ship’s tumbling ceased.
Lemborg fell back into his wool-padded seat, his breath shallow and his wood-brown face pale and streaked with sweat. Glorious Krynn was straight ahead again, a beautiful blue-and-white ball that filled his window and stretched beyond. Sancrist Island and the safety of Mount Nevermind were minutes away. He was almost home. The loss of the maneuvering assembly, which had cost 17,406 steels, weighed two tons, and took three years to perfect, meant nothing. If they caught him-only that mattered. The burst tank rendered the assembly both useless and dangerous. It would also slow him down, and speed was Lemborg’s only friend.
A flicker passed to starboard, very close by. Lemborg saw the dark streak flash ahead, barely visible against the white clouds of Krynn before it vanished.
They’d missed. That was unusual. It would not happen with the next shot, he knew. It was time to chuck his last cow chip, as his cousin in the Agricultural Byproducts Disposal Guild liked to say.
Lemborg adjusted the gyro using a steering bar, reducing the angle of his dive into Krynn and orienting the ship toward Sancrist Island. He then mumbled a traditional gnomish engineering prayer (“Great Reorx, please do not let this device blow up in an inappropriate manner!”), stood up in his seat as far as the restraining straps would allow, and kicked down with his right boot.
His boot heel thumped down on a metal plate, which gave way slightly. Lemborg heard a scraping sound far behind him. He shut his eyes, gritted his teeth, and forced himself back in his seat as far as he could go.
There was a BOOM! louder than the maneuvering-tank explosion, louder than lightning in your own living room, louder than Reorx’s Hammer against the Anvil of Creation, forging Chaos into the Stars, the Five Worlds, and Universal Order-or so ran the crazed thought through Lemborg’s mind as a beyond-tremendous force slammed him back into the overstuffed pilot’s seat and tried to pull the skin off his face. Hot needles seared his eardrums. He couldn’t breathe. He passed out.
He involuntarily opened his eyes again to a mad, whirling scene. Wind blasted through the cabin and pummeled his face, snapping the straps against his chest and arms. Clouds raced by the shattered command window, titanic cotton balls and lacy streaks of white hurling overhead against a bright blue sky. The air stank of roasted metal, wood, and paint.
Lemborg lay limp and unmoving in his seat. A headache burned like lava throughout his skull. His orange coverall suit was filthy, his body felt like it had been pounded by giants, and he thought he would soon throw up.
He remembered the emergency button. May as well, he thought through the boiling pain in his head. Be interested to see what happens if it fails. The fingers of his right hand crawled down to the end of the armrest, curled under the knob at the end, and fumbled with the button there.
A shock rumbled through the ship, throwing Lemborg forward into his straps. The chaos of passing clouds slowed down as the ship decelerated, then flew straighter. Lemborg imagined the Spirit’s emergency wings cranking outward and locking into place. The drogue chute had likely been torn instantly away, but it had at least slowed the ship down to make it more maneuverable.