The Fog Diver by Joel Ross Page B

the slipway’s mooring mast, a tottering tower of rusty automobile engines and bathroom fixtures. A stringy-haired vendor shouted her prices for rat kabobs, as a frenzy of trading started around her. Almost nobody used coins in the slums. Real money was tucked away for special occasions. Instead, we bartered lengths of wire for plasteel buttons, a bag of potting soil for a bone needle, a skewer of crab apples for some grilled squirrel.
    At first, I didn’t understand why they were trading. Then I almost laughed. “They’re gambling, ” I called to the others. “They’re betting about us reaching the slipway.”
    â€œWish I could throw down a little something,” Swedish said.
    â€œMe too!” Bea chirped. “We’re going to get there for sure!”
    Hazel grunted. “That’s not how Swedish would bet, Bea.”
    â€œHe’d bet against us?” Bea’s voice sharpened. “Swedish, you’re horrible!”
    â€œListen to the engine,” he said, his fingers dancing over the steam organ keyboard. “The gears are snapping. There’s no way we’re staying in the air.”
    A series of loud pops shook the raft. Gray smoke puffed from an intake valve.
    â€œWe will reach that slipway,” Bea said, her green eyes narrowing as she spliced cables together.
    A hundred feet from the slipway, sparks started shooting from the propeller. Hazel’s grip tightened on the prow and she leaned forward. “We can’t sink now,” she said. “Think of Port Oro!”
    Seventy feet away, the forward balloon began flapping and hissing. “C’mon, c’mon,” Hazel muttered. “Stay in the air.”
    At fifty feet, the deck was shaking like a rattlesnake’s tail, and Hazel yelled, “Almost there, Bea! Almost there!”
    Forty feet, and I grabbed a mooring strap and raced for the prow. I needed to hitch us to the mooring mast before the engine died.
    Hazel shouted commands and Swedish muttered dire predictions. Bea clamped a valve shut with her foot andcrooned to the engine, which answered with a screech. Catcalls sounded from the crowd, the odds of our survival falling fast.
    Only I remained silent, twirling the mooring strap overhead. Not close enough. Not yet. . . .
    â€œBea!” Hazel yelled, running toward her. “Abandon ship, abandon ship!”
    â€œNo! She needs me!”
    Hazel grabbed Bea’s wrist and dragged her forward. “We have to jump! Swedish, run ! Throw the strap, Chess.”
    â€œNot yet,” I said.
    The rear balloon exploded into scraps, and the deck tilted crazily. “Now!” Hazel shouted. “Now, now!”
    â€œNot yet—”
    â€œThrow it now!” she screamed, and I did.

15
    T HE STRAP SPUN IN the air, a loop of nylon and wire.
    Time slowed, freezing the faces of the shouting crowd, freezing the snarl on Swedish’s lips and Bea’s horrified expression as Hazel shoved her toward the prow.
    The mooring mast—the target of my throw—glowed in the light of the setting sun. The loop twirled closer and closer . . . and fell three feet short.
    But one thing a tetherboy knew was tethers, and a strap wasn’t all that different. Three feet short? No way.
    I whipcracked the strap, and the loop flicked higher. It still missed the mooring hook, but it snagged a fender that jutted just below it. The fender was crimped and rusty, definitely not strong enough to keep the raft in the air. Still, it might hold the weight of the crew, so I screamed—“Grabthe strap! Grab the strap!”—as I pulled the hacksaw from my leg sheath.
    Ten feet away from landing safely on the slipway, the raft engine died.
    The world moved in slow motion. The raft tumbled downward. The rigging snapped, the pistons screamed. The deck angled crazily as I furiously slashed and hacked at the strap.
    The raft fell five feet. My breath caught and my boots