The crew was sworn to secrecy. No mention of the upcoming trip was to be made until further notice. Those who could not make this promice were released from the ship, after their knowledge of the mission was magically erased from their minds.
After two days of preperations, the ship was ready. It was raining again, and the locals were becomming openly opposed to the bright blue ship in Compact's harbor.
"Go away off-worlder!" one voice called, as Yearth, the Hadozee operations chief, decended to the deck, using his flaps to slow his decent.
"All systems are ready," he growled. Bagath nodded and rubbed some rain water off his forehead.
"Prepare the crew for takeoff," the druid said. "We are going to do this the theatrical way."
"Yes sir!" Yearth said with a smile.
With all the jeering and jibing the crew had encountered in the last few days, they wanted to get the last laugh by causing a commotion when they left. On the ship, the crew secured themselves for launching. The helm, a prototype Great helm, made the ship move extremely fast, even in an atmosphere. Since they would be launching right away, everyone was preparing for a very choppy liftoff.
After a few minutes, everything was ready.
"At your discression, Tempest," Bagath called.
Tempest slowly strapped herself into the great helm and bonded with the ship. A few seconds later the squid ship backed away from the pier and rose straight up into the rainey sky. The people on the docks were very startled at how fast the ship moved, and some were even frightened. The ship moved out over the city of Compact, gaining altitude as it went. Very quickly the city vanished behind the clouds as the ship rose higher and higher. Shortly, even the clouds became dimmer, and the sky became darker. The squid ship had barely cleared the gravity plane of Crescent when it went into spelljamming speed.
Like a tiny fragment of blue light, the Call Maraine darted through the black Wildspace of Heartspace, on a straight line for the spherewall.
"Sphere wall in fifteen minutes," Yearth called out.
"Engage portal opener," Bagath returned.
Two crewman, lesser magic users, began to read the incantation on a small, black marble cube that was imbeded in the wall near the planetary locater, itself located on the small bridge of the Calla Maraine. When the two were finished casting the spell, the marble block began to glow.
Above, on the forecastle of the squid ship, a surge of blue light came through the floor and ran the length of the piercing ram, where it collected into a large sphere, and darted off into the distance. A few seconds later, a blinding flash appeared as the portal opened.
"Portal ready," Bagath said to Tempest. "Proceed at will."
"Flow stations!" Yearth called. All around the ship, candles and torches were extinguished as the craft prepared to enter the flow.
As the portal grew closer, the squid ship turned on it's side slightly, to facilitate going through the portal. The ship was less than three miles from the spherewall when it dropped from spelljamming speed, and it sailed through the portal without a moment's thought. The blackness of wildspace was quickly replaced with the chaotic flotsom of the phlogiston, as Heartspace fell behind them.
"Continue course for Crystalspace," Bagath called.
"Aye" a voice answered. The crew of the Calla Maraine had been very quiet since leaving Compact. Most of them were concerned about where they were going. Many were openly frightened, but all of them admitted a certain appeal of visiting a world that had not seen a spelljammer in perhaps a millenia.
"Estimated time to Crystalspace?" Bagath called to Skot, the navigator.
"Eighteen days," Skot replied.
"I'm still suprised at the speed of this ship," Djan said to Skot. "You traversed Heartspace in record time."
"It's mainly the helm," Skot explained. "It's an arcane prototype, able to travel at almost twice the speed of a standard helm, even at spelljamming speed."
Skot shuffled through some charts for a moment before continuing.
"The ship itself is also laced with a special metal that acts as a receiver for energy that travels around it, and directs it directly into the helm. As a result, this lady really flies!"
"Where did this metal come from?" Djan asked, curiously.
"Somewhere in Ringspace," Skot answered, "and there isn't any more of it available. It occured on a small moon in the outer ranges of the sphere. During a recent war with the Rama T'Alain a lot of magic was exchanged nearby. The asteroid absorbed more than it could hold, and exploded."
Djan continued to look on. Of all the ships he had ever been on, this was one of the most amazing, but the great Spelljammer had that honor in his mind. Every so often Djan would look into the sky and wonder what had become of the great ship, and its captain. The chances were that he would never completely know for sure. He had seen the ship vanish after the Battle of the Broken Sphere, but something told him that the Spelljammer was still out there somewhere. Legends said that the ship can be re-born. Djan chose to believe that it had done so again.
Elsewhere on the ship, Gaye was sitting cross-legged on the floor of the tiny cabin she shared with Tempest. Notes, scrolls, and books were scattered about in disarray. She had been studying the psionic formula that Cherry had obtained from the crew of the Eternal Wanderer a few weeks earlier. She was becomming increasingly jubilant, as the odd forumla began to make sence. She heard a knock at the door.
"Come in," she called.
Cherry walked in, trying not to disturb the various papers on the floor.
"Any luck?" she asked.
"You bet," Gaye said, beaming. "This isn't really a disipline or science, but a procedure. Some of these skills are new to me, but I'm sure I can figure it out."
"You say it's a procedure," Cherry said. "Please explain."
"Instead of using one single surge of psionic power to open a portal, you use a series of lesser skills in the proper order, and in the proper amount. What's more, it doesn't really open a portal. It changes the structure of a small section of a spherewall, allowing a ship to pass through."
"Sort of like an etheral door?"
"Exactlly! You go through this procedure, and a tiny section of the spherewall becomes like a mist that you can fly right through!"
"Do you think you can have it all figured out by the time we reach Crystalspace?"
"You bet!"
"Very good, keep up the good work, but don't overdo it," Cherry said with a smile.
"No problem here!" Gaye said, beaming.
Everyone on the ship was somber except the kender, Cherry thought. Gaye always seems to be jubilant. Perhaps having a kender on board isn't so bad after all. If nothing else, she was making this trip more bearable, just by being cheerful.
