Chapter 6: “New Engines, New Enemies”

  Scene 1: Homeroom Begins

  —-: Ren Kisaragi

  Morning light slanted through the tall classroom windows like the sky itself was trying to stay awake. Hinode Academy’s mechanical homeroom buzzed with steam-kettle chatter and the smell of oil polish, copper ink, and someone’s aggressively over-toasted breakfast.

  Ren sat in his usual seat — third from the back, near the open pane — forehead resting on his arms, eyes half-lidded. He hadn’t meant to stay up until 2:00 a.m. re-wiring the Dart’s thrust diverters… again. But “one last calibration” had turned into “just five more tests,” which turned into Grandpa convincing him to test pressure seals using a kettle and an old pair of socks.

  Now his brain was mush and his hands smelled like burnt wool.

  At the front of the class, Ms. Shiraishi tapped a long pointer against the chalkboard.

  CLACK. CLACK.

  “Eyes front, racers.”

  She unfurled a scroll and slapped it onto the wall. It hissed and snapped into place — a fresh sheet of the Hinode Academy School League Schedule.

  A ripple ran through the room. Someone gasped. Someone else dropped a wrench.

  Ren squinted at the scroll. His name wasn’t even visible at first glance… until he followed the lower bracket. There it was:

  Silver Dart vs. Crimson Gale

  Date: Ten days.

  Match Type: Three-lap qualification.

  Weight class: Sub-350kg.

  Pilot: TBD (Ren Kisaragi, provisional)

  Engineer: Hana Minase

  He sat up straight so fast his chair squeaked.

  “We’re going up against them?” Jiro whispered beside him, chewing on the sleeve of his uniform. “That’s like racing a steel pigeon against a military hawk.”

  A soft cough from behind them. Then Rin’s voice — calm, tight, precise.

  “We aren’t doing anything.”

  “You are.”

  Ren turned slowly. Rin sat with arms folded, eyes locked on the schedule. Her lips were pursed. Her jaw tense.

  Not mad.

  Not yet.

  But something simmered beneath the surface.

  Ms. Shiraishi turned and pushed her glasses up with one clean finger.

  “Congratulations, Kisaragi. You’ve been given a chance.”

  “Try not to explode.”

  Half the room chuckled.

  The other half just stared.

  Ren swallowed hard.

  Ten days.

  Against one of the school’s top teams.

  Against Rin’s old team.

  No pressure.

  Scene 2: Team Showdown in the Hangars

  —-: Ren Kisaragi

  The hangars always smelled like intent.

  Polished brass, burnished rubber, hot metal and that faintly electric scent of crystal vapor bleeding from charging stations — the whole place buzzed with potential. Most students treated the hangars like a sacred space. A temple of torque and turbine.

  Crimson Gale treated it like their kingdom.

  Ren stepped inside and immediately felt it — the shift in the air. The temperature dropped by a metaphorical ten degrees.

  Three of them were there already: Kaito, the second-year pilot with engine grease in his veins and the expression of someone who hadn’t smiled since the Treaty of Sendai. Mika, co-engineer and rumor assassin, stood off to the side sharpening a tool that didn’t need sharpening. And in the center, tuning their signature ship’s primary prop gear with surgical precision…

  …was Ayane Mitsurugi — current Crimson Gale captain. And Rin’s former flight partner.

  The Crimson Gale ship, Rōketsu, gleamed under the skylight like a sleeping predator — dual side propellers, a quad-blade rear stabilizer, and a shimmering red liftbag that flickered like it had fire running through its veins.

  Ren had only seen it in the air twice. That was enough to know its reputation wasn’t exaggerated.

  He wasn’t trying to spy, exactly. Just… observe. Strategically. Quietly.

  Too late.

  Ayane didn’t look up.

  “Need something, Kisaragi?”

  Ren froze mid-step. “…How did you—?”

  “You’re loud. Also, your left boot squeaks.” She finally turned. Her expression was all polished steel and paperwork: flawless, impersonal, and very much unimpressed.

  Mika clicked her tool shut. “Scrap-ship curiosity tour?”

  Ren raised his hands, palms open. “I was just—”

  “You’re not just anything,” Kaito cut in, not looking up from the propeller mount. “You’re the joke they scheduled against us.”

  Ayane stepped forward, hands in her coat pockets, eyes sharp enough to cut sheet metal. “Let me guess. You think you’re special because your relic rattled into the air for five minutes without killing you.”

  Ren’s stomach tensed, but he forced a smile. “Actually, I think I’m special because I rebuilt it myself, and it didn’t crash. That’s two points above average.”

  Ayane didn’t blink. “You’re a provisional. We’re ranked.”

  Mika added with a smirk, “And we don’t race charity cases.”

  That one stung.

  Ren bit back a reply. The best comebacks were always thirty seconds too late. His mouth opened—and then, behind him, another voice rang out:

  “Didn’t you used to say Rin was a charity case, too?”

  Hana.

  She walked in carrying a crystal housing module, grease on her cheek, ponytail half-loose and eyes sharper than Ayane’s smile.

  “Guess you were wrong about her.”

  A pause.

  Then Ayane’s smile curled. “Some pilots outgrow their training wheels. Others just build new ones out of trash.”

  Ren stepped forward, but Hana placed a hand on his arm. Steady. Warm.

  “Let’s go,” she said softly.

  As they turned to leave, Ren glanced back once — at the crimson ship gleaming in the light, at the perfect crew, and at the girl who once flew beside Rin.

  Ayane watched him without blinking.

  Game on.

  Scene 3: Airship Science Class — Combustion & Crystal Theory

  —-: Ren Kisaragi

  The lecture hall wasn’t made for comfort.

  Rows of bolted stools. A chalkboard half-blackened from decades of exploded theory. Steam hissed softly from the copper-lined heating pipes under the floorboards. On the dais, an old crystalline prism spun slowly in a containment ring, refracting light across the ceiling like a kaleidoscope of voltage.

  Ren fidgeted in his seat as the guest lecturer adjusted his goggles.

  Dr. Ibaraki was a walking combustion engine himself — built like a boiler, bald as a pressure dome, and twice as loud. His vest barely contained his enthusiasm or his belly. A tattoo of a piston looped his forearm.

  “We do not fly because we wish to defy gravity,” he bellowed. “We fly because we harness crystalized vengeance against mass and drag!”

  Half the class jumped.

  Jiro whispered, “This guy once blew a hole in a stadium during a demo race.”

  Ren raised a brow. “And they let him teach?”

  “They invited him back.”

  Dr. Ibaraki grabbed a pointer rod and stabbed the crystal model at the front.

  This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

  “What is the nature of a Class-IV triple-state crystal, hmm? Three phases. Three powers. Three dangers.”

  He spun toward the board and chalked up a diagram so aggressively it squealed:

  [CRYSTAL] → [LIQUID] (×600) → [GAS] (×9000)

  Lift = 9× lighter than He

  Warning: Combustion + Impurities = BOOM

  He underlined BOOM three times.

  “Sixty cubic centimeters in your chamber! That’s all you get! Heat it with care, or your gasbag becomes a funeral balloon!”

  The room snorted. Even Rin cracked the edge of a smirk.

  Ren leaned forward. “What happens if the crystal shifts to gas before it reaches the combustion stage?”

  The chalk paused.

  Dr. Ibaraki turned, blinking.

  “…Before?” he repeated.

  Ren nodded. “Say it’s under fluctuating heat. What happens if it vaporizes without a burn cycle? Like, in the bag first.”

  The room fell oddly quiet.

  Even Rin looked over.

  Dr. Ibaraki adjusted his goggles. “That’s… not standard protocol.”

  “Yeah, but what would happen?”

  The old engineer scratched his head. “Well… you'd still get expansion. But you'd also have unstable lift. Very unstable. Liftbag bloom. Pulse-lift oscillations. That could—actually—yes, yes, that’s… very interesting…”

  He trailed off into murmurs.

  Rin glanced sideways at Ren. Again. Longer this time.

  Saki leaned over to Hana, stage-whispering, “The boy broke the combustion doctor.”

  Hana smiled, just a little.

  Dr. Ibaraki turned back toward the board, muttering equations. “...oscillation dampeners… reactive throttle modulation… hmm…”

  Jiro elbowed Ren. “You just invented a problem. That’s basically extra credit.”

  Ren smiled.

  He hadn’t meant to cause a stir. But maybe… maybe that question had been in his head all along.

  Scene 4: Hana’s Brilliance

  —-: Hana Minase

  Hana hated attention.

  Not disliked. Not mildly avoided. She despised it — the way voices curved around your name, the way heads turned like gears on a clock, all staring at you as if you might explode if they watched hard enough.

  Which was deeply ironic, given how often she worked with explosive materials.

  So when Dr. Ibaraki gestured vaguely at the board and said, “Of course, this assumes your stabilizer timing isn’t suffering from a lateral yaw lag — though, frankly, only the ranked teams would ever encounter such precise issues—” and then nodded meaningfully toward Crimson Gale…

  Hana should’ve stayed quiet.

  But something twitched in her brain. A gear slipped. A number clashed.

  Her hand went up.

  Everyone turned.

  Ayane Mitsurugi, captain of Crimson Gale, froze mid-sip of her crystal water ration.

  “Um,” Hana began, softly but clearly, “actually, your yaw correction algorithm has a silent loop delay built into the front-left stabilizer logic. It cycles four milliseconds late.”

  The room blinked.

  Ayane’s expression didn’t change — but Mika’s brow furrowed, and Kaito’s jaw twitched.

  Dr. Ibaraki, to his credit, paused.

  “…You’re referring to the adaptive drift sync on the stabilizer bloom layer?”

  Hana nodded, more confident now. “If the ship banks left under 40 knots, it initiates a secondary dampener loop. Which is… redundant. And slow.”

  A beat of silence.

  Then, from behind her — Rin’s voice. Dry. Amused.

  “She’s right.”

  Ayane looked straight at Hana. “That’s classified tuning.”

  “It’s also… inefficient,” Hana said. “No offense.”

  Ayane’s smile was like cold glass.

  Dr. Ibaraki chuckled. “Brilliant catch, Miss Minase! And precisely why engineers are the spine of any airship team. Pilot without an engineer? Just a skydiver with more parts.”

  Jiro leaned over to Ren, whispering, “You know, if she ever turns evil, we’re all doomed.”

  Ren, eyes wide, just whispered, “I know.”

  Ayane said nothing more. But as she packed her bag, her shoulders were stiff. Her eyes flicked — not at Hana, but at Rin.

  For the first time since the schedule was posted, Hana Minase had changed the game.

  Scene 5: Ren Pulls Mei Aside

  —-: Ren Kisaragi

  Ren found Mei exactly where he hoped she’d be:

  At the far end of Hangar 3, seated cross-legged beneath a disassembled cargo runner, surrounded by bolts arranged in perfect concentric rings on a faded cloth tarp.

  She didn’t look up as he approached. Only said, without glancing his way:

  “You’re casting a shadow on the 5mm calibration bolts.”

  Ren shuffled to the side.

  “I need help,” he said, voice low. “With the Dart.”

  She picked up a rivet, turned it twice between her fingers, and set it down between two others like placing a bishop in a mechanical chess match.

  Silence.

  Then:

  “I thought you had Hana.”

  Ren scratched the back of his neck. “She’s better with internals. This is… directional thrust tuning. Outer venting. High-speed trim.”

  Finally, Mei looked at him. Her eyes were dark, unreadable. Not unkind — just hard to measure, like the depth of a still lake at night.

  “I’ve seen your work,” she said softly. “You guessed half of the tuning by instinct. Not bad.”

  Ren smiled. “That’s either the best compliment I’ve gotten this week… or the most polite insult.”

  She tilted her head slightly. “Why come to me?”

  He hesitated. “Because you watched my test flight. From the tower. And because you’ve sorted more bolts in ten minutes than most engineers do in a semester.”

  A faint quirk of her lips. Almost a smile. Almost.

  She stood.

  “Fine,” she said. “I’ll help.”

  Ren blinked. “Just like that?”

  Mei brushed off her hands on her skirt. “On one condition.”

  He waited.

  “Don’t ask me why I stopped racing.”

  Ren nodded without hesitation. “Deal.”

  A flicker of relief crossed her face, almost imperceptible.

  Then she turned back to the bolt rings and began rearranging them into a new pattern — this one in the shape of a Dart’s venting arch, precisely to scale.

  “You’ll need to realign the forward fins by 2.7 degrees,” she murmured, “or you’ll shear your lift bag at 80 knots.”

  Ren grinned. “You sure you don’t want your own team?”

  “No,” she said quietly. “I just want the sky to forget me.”

  He didn’t press.

  But somehow, he knew… the sky wouldn’t.

  Scene 6: Saki Drops a Bomb

  —-: Hana Minase

  Hana should have known better than to stop by the bulletin board before homeroom.

  The crowd was already forming — a messy clot of gossip-hungry students clustered around the freshly posted SkyWire, the student-published newsletter that was part journalism, part tabloid, and all Saki Tanemura.

  Saki, of course, stood dead center, grinning like a magician about to pull a scandal out of a silk top hat.

  “Read it and weep, my romantically constipated classmates!”

  Hana slowed her pace. A terrible sinking feeling curled in her stomach like a too-hot coil of pressure tubing.

  Saki turned, saw her, and beamed.

  “Ohhh! The engineering enchantress herself!”

  Hana’s steps froze. “What… did you do?”

  Saki dramatically held up the latest edition — printed in smudged copperplate, slightly off-center, and stamped with a sketchy ink rendering of a certain silver airship.

  HEADLINE:

  "Silver Sparks Fly: Are Ren and Hana the Academy’s New ‘Engineering Soulmates’?"

  Beneath the title, a mock-up of a crystal heart… made of bolts.

  Hana’s face went full combustion chamber red.

  “W-What—!? That’s—! I—!”

  “Oh come on,” Saki said sweetly, draping an arm around her shoulders. “You two practically radiate tension. It’s like watching a slow-burn romance with circuit diagrams.”

  “I was just helping him not die!”

  “That’s the most romantic thing you could possibly say at this school.”

  A loud clank echoed from behind them.

  Ren, just arriving with Jiro, had stopped mid-step — half a donut in his mouth, expression frozen.

  Jiro leaned in. “Dude. You made the front page.”

  Ren blinked, chewed once, swallowed wrong, and coughed violently.

  “Soulmates!?”

  “Technically,” Saki said, flipping to page two, “I also included a sidebar on Hana’s stabilizer correction that humiliated Crimson Gale, but let’s be honest — that’s not the drama people want.”

  Rin appeared silently at the edge of the circle. Her eyes skimmed the headline.

  A pause.

  Then a quiet, “Hmph.”

  She turned and walked away.

  Hana watched her go. Felt the tension snap into place like an overtightened bolt.

  Wonderful.

  Now she was the star of the school’s gossip page and about to be in a love triangle she never signed up for.

  “…I’m going to rewire my nerves into the nearest fan.”

  Ren coughed again. “I’ll—uh—help?”

  “Please don’t.”

  Scene 7: Bathhouse Blow-Up

  —-: Ren Kisaragi

  There was a very specific kind of silence that only existed beneath a bathhouse. A damp, echoing stillness filled with soft drips, faint creaks, and the constant thrum of pipes pretending not to be rusted.

  Ren didn’t mind it.

  Mostly because he was crawling through the utility crawlspace beneath Sakura Spring’s hot baths, holding a crystal-powered inspection light in his mouth, trying to find a leaking return valve that Grandpa swore he didn’t tamper with.

  Which meant, of course, that Grandpa had definitely tampered with it.

  “‘Quick job, Ren. Just a ten-minute fix.’” He muttered around the light. “‘Totally safe. Definitely won’t end up in the girls’ bathhouse again.’”

  He bumped his head on a copper pipe.

  Twice.

  His fingers brushed along the coolant line. Ah. There it was. The leak was hissing like a disappointed kettle. He twisted the emergency shutoff valve. It clicked…

  And then the access panel behind him slammed open.

  “YOU AGAIN!?”

  Rin.

  Steam rolled in around her like a goddess of wrath emerging from a volcano.

  Ren froze mid-crawl, still on hands and knees, light beam illuminating his completely innocent face.

  “…Hi?”

  She was wearing her bath robe. Her hair was up, dripping slightly, skin still flushed from the heat. The expression on her face could curdle liftgas.

  “You have two options, Kisaragi,” she said, stepping closer.

  “Option one: you explain this with a degree of logic that makes me believe you’re not a pervert.”

  “I’m fixing a pipe!”

  “Option two: I throw you out this hatch and into the koi pond. Again.”

  “I didn’t even see anything!”

  “I DIDN’T ASK WHAT YOU SAW.”

  Ren held up both hands like they were surrender flags. “Okay! Okay! Ask Grandpa—he’s the one who—”

  “—Is mysteriously nowhere to be found,” she finished coldly.

  Ren’s heart sank.

  She turned, arms crossed, steam rising around her like judgment personified.

  “You’ve been here two weeks and you’ve walked into every forbidden zone on campus. And somehow, you still think you’re qualified to race with the rest of us.”

  He winced. “I don’t think I’m qualified. I just… can’t stop trying.”

  That gave her pause.

  Just for a second.

  Then she shook her head. “Get out of there.”

  Ren did — carefully, slowly, covered in pipe grime and shame.

  As he climbed out, she shoved a towel at him.

  “Clean yourself up. Next time you break into the crawlspace, I’m not saving you from the student council.”

  Ren blinked. “Wait. Did you just save me?”

  She flushed.

  “Shut up.”

  And walked off into the steam.

  Scene 8: Late Night Steam Talk

  —-: Ren Kisaragi

  The sky above Hangar 4 was a velvet sheet of navy blue, pinpricked with stars. The wind had quieted. The pressure pipes had stopped their groaning for the night. Even the cicadas had the decency to shut up.

  Ren sat on the edge of the catwalk just outside the hangar’s upper gantry, legs dangling over the darkened airship bay below. The Silver Dart rested quietly in its berth, crystal core dimmed, liftbag folded tight — sleeping.

  He was mid-way through regretting everything about his life choices when he heard the soft creak of boots behind him.

  Rin.

  She didn’t announce herself. Just walked up and dropped a warm bottle of barley soda beside him.

  Ren glanced over, surprised. “Uh… thanks?”

  She didn’t answer.

  Instead, she sat down beside him, keeping a solid meter of distance, arms wrapped around her knees, eyes fixed on the stars.

  A long silence.

  Then, quietly:

  “You’re going to embarrass us.”

  Ren blinked. “...Thanks?”

  “I’m not trying to be cruel,” she said. “I’m trying to be honest. Do you even know what Crimson Gale meant? What it still means? We don’t lose. We set records. We win nationals. Our ships don’t just fly, they define the sky.”

  He took a breath, bottle still unopened in his hand.

  “Then why aren’t you flying with them anymore?”

  That made her flinch — just barely, but it was there.

  She didn’t answer.

  He turned to her. “You left, Rin. You gave up that record-breaking ship and started flying solo. Why?”

  Still no answer.

  Then, softer:

  “Because sometimes winning isn’t the same as flying.”

  He looked at her.

  She was staring down at the hangar now. At the Dart.

  “I watched you come within five degrees of liftbag detachment last week,” she said. “You held the pitch by instinct. You don’t fly like you were taught. You fly like you believe the ship will catch you. That’s stupid.”

  Ren grinned. “Thanks.”

  “And rare,” she added quickly.

  Pause.

  “I just don’t want you to crash and burn before you’ve even earned your wings.”

  He leaned back, staring at the stars again.

  “I’d rather crash trying than spend my whole life in the pit lane.”

  Another long silence. This one softer. The kind that came right before something changed.

  Finally, Rin stood.

  “I’m still going to beat you.”

  Ren smiled. “You can try.”

  She turned, stepping back into the shadows of the hangar.

  But before she disappeared, her voice drifted back:

  “Try not to die, idiot.”

  And then she was gone.