EDGE chronics: FanFics

     Preface:
      The cruel world, ripe with envy and lies, makes a difficult existence for a man of many talents.
      I always knew that the Sky is my calling! 'How does the Earth even hold you down?' even my mommy would ask. Yes, I'm made not for The Earth, but for the destiny of a free-flier! I want to fly into the wide open spaces of the air. Some day I'll be the most famous sky pirate, I swear!
      Well, finally, my dream about the sky comes true. I found a job as a cabinboy on a skyship. Hurrraaah!
      Captain was surprised by my impressive service record, because this is my third job on a skyship. To tell the truth, the first ship threw me away before we took off, and I ran myself from the second as fast as I can... errrm... for many reasons.
But here I'll have better luck!

      Day 1:
      Today I flew for the first time! I don't mean on a ship or with parawings. The helmsman kicked me so hard, I flew all over the bridge.
      I flew so beautifully! . . But I have to work on my landings because mine hurt pretty badly.

      Day 2:
      I understood that a cabinboy is the most necessary man on the skyship. They can't do anything or even find anything without me. 'Where you put this?' they're always saying. 'And who was poking around with this? And who left a mop out on the passage?!' What a bunch of losers!!

      Day 3:
      Yay! Today we embark on an actual voyage for ironwood. The entire deck was rolling everywhere at first, but the true sky dog sets aside such trifling nonsense! Somebody spread a rumor that I barfed all over the deck, but that's a barefaced lie!

      Day 4:
      These men! There is no pleasing them! I tried to do something nice for them I polished not only the wheel, but the levers too! I used the best oil I could find. They shone so much, the dust couldn't stick! But captain was displeased for unknown reason. He uttered a lot of strange skyship terms and referred to my parents (especially my mother). Wooooh, such a capricious man! But now I understand that I definitely have to study the terminology.

      Day 5:
      Today our captain complimented me at last. He said that I was sent to him by Sky Above! But after he added that he can't understand and wanted to know what he did to deserve it...

      Day 6:
      I'm proud of myself, and not without reason! Today I corrected our clumsy stone pilot. He was being so careless with the rock, resting it when I could see it was still hot! The fire could be cooled yet! Well, I didn't lose my head. I emptied a bucket of cold water over it. I'm a good boy! Ow... But why'd we fly up so fast?

      Day 7:
      I looked over the side and saw some unknown crud dangling from the bottom of the ship. Well I never! When we took off we must've hooked a rock, and it's been hanging in the ropes until now. Nobody has any time to establish order. Huh, but I'm no coward! I climbed out and removed it. The rest of the crew started making a big deal about it. Oh, look, they're all running over to me. They must be coming to thank me...

      Day 8:
      My left eye can be opened, but not my right eye quite yet. The conclusion is that the captain is right-handed, but the stone pilot hits the hardest.

      Day 9:
      Day passed without any incident. The evening was beautiful. I stood out on the deck and admired the sunset. It was so moving that I began to recite a poem: "A storm approaches/with great peals of thunder/and whirlwinds of cloud/and lightning to sunder..."
      It turned out that the team is far from artistically inclined. They were alarmed at first, and they beat me up for a long time after.

      Day 10:
      .............................................................

      Day 11:
      I woke up in the morning with philosophic questions popping into my head. Who am I? Where am I? Some man came to me and promised when we'll return back he'll present me to Sanctaphrax for the experiments .Namely to the Professors of Foolistics and Idiotology. Because, they said I'm an uncommon specimen! And they have to take care of that sort of man, of course.

      Day 12:
      Now that I have some free time, I decided to compose the Sky Pirate's Dictionary. But my work pushes forward slowly because of my team. They have no enthusiasm to my scientific research.
      Dictionary:
      Hands off!!! (sky term.) = skyship control levers.
      Move quickly, you stupid cow! (sky term.) = 'Would you be so nice to bring my food?'
      Damn! (sky term.) = Any unusual situation on board.
      Ah, f**k! (sky term.) = The Great Storm comes.
      The Great Storm! (sky term.) = It's really "Ah, f**k"!
      Foresail, topsail, skysail, staysail etc - I have no idea about the meaning of these words. To all appearances as our captain frequently uses them. I think they're very obscene profanity."

Copyrights:
All EGDE copyrights belong to their authors, Paul Stewart and Chris Riddell. The copyrights for russian edition belong to publishing house "Azbooka". All materials and pictures publishing in this site work as information and reclam of our beloving book serie.
(с) "The EDGE Chronicles", Paul Stewart, Chris Riddell, 1998
(c) "Воздушные пираты", "Azbooka" publishing house, 2003
(с) Site design: Xanth Filatine (Dilandu)

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