Journal of Miyara Kyosuke (postscript 1)
Sun is driving the engine. Slurk is talking to
Carimera, who is crying. Miyara is standing by Hosei, who is
holding the wheel. The ship is flying badly, and they have no
idea where they are in these clouds.
The ship continues to shake and rattle, feeling like
it's coming apart. Hosei calls to Sun to slow them down more, and
goes into a shallow dive. Pieces start falling off, and it looks
like the wings are going to shake themselves off.
As they clear the clouds, they are about a hundred
yards up in a relatively shallow dive. Hosei looks for a place to
land, while Sun yells something to him, something about the dwarves
fixing it.
Hosei levels out, which is does, and looks around.
There are ghostly shapes of dwarves all over the
ship, fixing it. As they look closer, they see Zokri, Yazeran,
Friethoff the Astute, Holdgrod the Odiferous, Engmeld, Bergmal
Cleft-Palate, Wizmag the Sagacious, Garnok son of Hadrian (the first
dwarf skeleton we found). They patch it up, but don't add a
balloon. When it's back together, they wave and disappear.
Slurk manages to get Carimera to point the right
direction to East Egg, as the others also get an idea of where they are.
The trip to Yetsin is uneventful, but they carry on
to East Egg. The dwarves there might at least be mollified a
little to be handed the gyrocopter, which is probably repairable.
Back in East Egg, remaining are Goldrim, Peter, the
four Chaos Warriors, and Pietra. Angry accusations fly after the
Leatherhawk is stolen. Goldrim tries to explain that the ship
will be brought back, even if he believes the world will end
first. The standoff continues for a long time.
The storm clouds begin to cross over the valley,
becoming darker and darker.
About two hours after they left, Goldrim begins
screaming in pain for no apparent reason. He stands up, and
freezes like a statue in pain. Moments after that, the clouds
begin rolling back at a completely unnatural rate.
While the standoff continues, there is increased
hope among the villagers. Once again it becomes a sunny day in
East Egg valley.
Peter tries to diagnose Goldrim. He's a statue
in dry clay. The villagers think that's rather freaky.
About three hours later, the ship returns. It
crests the mountain, with of course no balloon. Hosei realizes
that just like birds he should land upwind. He makes a large
circle, then makes a low and slow approach. He calls to Sun to
cut power and idle, while Hosei himself tries to keep it level.
The ship drags itself along the ground, scratching
and tearing itself apart and it scrapes along. The wings tear
off, but it doesn't flip over. It comes to a sudden stop,
throwing everyone forward violently. The gyrocopter hurtles off
the deck and crashes into the ground.
Miyara cannot kill herself yet. The statue
must be returned to Nippon, and she now has responsibility for Pietra.
The dwarven engineers who spent their lives building
the machine come and stare with tears in their eyes. Slurk, Sun,
and Carmella are conscious. Sun carries Miyara over to Peter,
while Slurk brings Carmella and then goes back for Hosei. The
villagers ignore them, this time the complete opposite of the
happy-go-lucky ignoring they did before.
The conscious people tell Peter what happened at the
hole, while he does what he can to help the others.
Within an hour or two it is clear that they are not
welcome and must leave immediately. There are four Chaos Warriors
and two unconscious, with two wounded. Pietra is better, although
Carmella is not. They leave town, and spend a cold and miserable
night in the wild.
It takes them months to get back, until they arrive
at the druid's temple, with no idea how they got there. Hosei
believes he's producing fish, but no-one can see them. They
arrive in very poor shape, starving and delusional. The druidess
heals them for several months.