Charles Renek was a man who operated with and around secrets, while keeping some of his own from the other pretorians. As the Guard dropship entered D’s airspace and miles of damaged or destroyed towers began to pass by outside the window, many still with billowing smoke, he thought of his family, far away in City B.
“Landing in ten,” the pilot reported to his passengers: Charles and two dozen Guardsmen, four of which were already in heavy armor and looked like walking tanks. “Be ready for some chop.”
Even while passing over the west portion of D that the Guard was supposedly still in control of, there were spontaneous gunshots and flak cannon bursts originating from the tops of buildings, although the fleet of mostly empty carriers continued through it all unabated.
“Damn Devils, look what they’ve done…” one of the riflemen muttered, using an ‘alternative’ name for the Angels commonly used by lower Guardsmen. “Millions of lives, ruined by this insanity.”
“Charles, are you all right?” Kae’s voice spoke through his headset. “I believe one of our engines was just hit. It’s worse here than I expected.”
“I’m thinking about my family until we’re on the ground,” he replied. “Helps to keep my mind elsewhere, to manage stress.”
“I just finished meditating myself. But the others look nervous.”
“The men in my ship mostly look angry. It may be a challenge to keep them focused,” Charles said, locking eyes with the squad’s sergeant, a woman in her thirties. “But I have confidence in their commander.”
“Good. I don’t like retreats either, but when all of your attention is on saving men instead of divided between protecting them and attacking the enemy… It feels like in moments like these, we see how great we can be.”
“Be careful down there, Kae. We’ll have bullseyes on our heads.”
“Always. But I’m not holding back.”
After she went quiet, the sergeant looked at Charles again and asked, “You have a family, sir? That’s rare for a pretorian, isn’t it?”
“I suppose so. Ah… Wife and four kids.”
“That’s real heroism right there, sir. Just making that work in times like this. Have you raised an Aurrian family before? In a past life?”
Charles was about to answer verbally, but instead shook his head.
“It’s a wonderful thing, sir. I always go for it, just to meet the kids, you know? Find out who they were, where they came from. Wonderful thing. Was about to take a stab at it this run… when all this happened.”
“You’ll still have a chance. This war can’t last forever.”
“Hope so. And then we can take as long as we need handing out punishment. Don’t care if it takes decades.”
Charles sighed and looked at the floor. He didn’t want to say it out loud, but he knew that the Guard’s unending focus on punishment, and judgment, and marginalizing people was a major reason for the war in the first place. After so many years of studying Aurra’s judicial system and its laws, he only really wanted to see a better way to run everything.
“Descending onto Invernus Park,” the pilot reported.
The evacuation staging point, an old park close to the core of the City that was the size of New York City’s Central Park, was large and flat enough to accommodate all of the transports meant to take the remaining twenty thousand or so Guardsmen left in D to safety.
Renek’s shuttle was among the first to touch down, towards the south end of the park. D was experiencing a rapid snow melt brought on by a warmer trend and the sun’s new strength, turning the bombed and nearly lifeless park into a cold and wet marsh. The shuttle’s landing legs dipped into mud, and Renek had to work to keep his boots from getting stuck in it. Behind him, the large jet-powered carriers crushed what few trees remained as they settled down and a few small battalions of troops came running out.
“We’re five blocks from the sun,” Kae said to everyone with a headset. “We need these roads cleared. Take out all hostiles.”
“Should be mostly unorganized guerrillas just taking advantage, out to kill some Guardsmen,” Renek added. “Be watchful and return fire. Don’t expect professional organization, but don’t let your guard down.”
Kae’s shuttle had landed several streets away, placing her and her escorts on a parallel track to the City center. In their way were downed chariots, debris from buildings, broken roads, partially toppled towers, and individuals or small groups out for blood as the Angels fought elsewhere.
After a quick pep talk with her men, the sergeant and her squad readied their weapons, and she let Renek know they were ready for the run. Renek tapped on his storage disc and watched as his large shield formed, its straps rebuilding themselves around his left arm and the small visor already at his eye height. He took another look at Kae from a distance, towering over the others as she brought out her metal battle staff.
The pretorians charged ahead down two separate roads, dozens of men following both of them. Arrows, bullets, and rockets rained down at them, and the alchemagists in either squad worked to protect everyone with barriers of air and vector lines as their riflemen returned fire. If a projectile managed to get through, Renek blocked it without effort using the iron dust of destroyed buildings in the air, forming and deconstructing floating disc-shaped barriers within a second. As far as alchemagi went, he was known for his high-grade defensive spells and would leave the fighting to his men.
As they passed by an empty set of rairer armor and reached another block, Renek looked down the other street and caught a glimpse of Kae. She was keeping up with him, and had just created a diffusion dome around her escorts, making their alchemagi disappear—but also nullifying a sudden enemy barrage of lightning and fire from above.
“Almost at the center!” the sergeant told her men, while their alchemagists stopped for a moment and destroyed their attackers’ emplacements with accurate, explosive spells. “Keep clearing the way!”
After one of her squad’s rockets whizzed over his head and took out another enemy hiding behind a tower wall far above, Renek contacted Kae and asked, “How are you holding up? This is worse than I thought.”
“I think the Angels are letting these guerrillas run rampant in a City they’re trying to take,” she replied. “I’m reminded that most of them have little to no honor. I don’t want to lose anyone on these streets.”
When they got closer to the center of the City, the numbers of opportunist attackers dwindled, as they were too cowardly to directly fight the masses of Guardsmen holding a defensive position—and the last block before the field of battle was free of conflict. The hum of D’s sun became audible, and the power flowing out of the large globe was like a permanent static in the air, building up and discharging every time someone touched metal. Due to the interference, no one ever raised a building too close to a sun, so like in most Cities, a wide, multi-level concrete basin surrounded it. Built like an amphitheater and digging into the earth, the basin provided adequate defense, especially if further bolstered by synthesized structures.
With the snow melt, the basin was also fulfilling its second purpose as a central drainage area, so shallow rivers and waterfalls ran under the boots of all of the battle-worn Guardsmen in the area. The water fell into the cistern that the sun’s tower sprang out from. Technically called a totem, the sun tower was a large, solid pole coated in titanium that was reinforced with side supports to keep the sphere on top from ever falling. It could take a hundred direct hits from mortar shells and not even sway.
“Do you see Commander Terront?” Kae asked Renek once they had both stopped at the basin’s edge to look around. “Where is he…?”
Upon noticing their reinforcements, the thousands of Guardsmen spread throughout the basin’s steps and not currently fighting cheered and waved for them to join the battle. The looks on their dirty faces told Renek that they were at their limit, and no less than ten mortars and rockets were in the air above them or slamming into the steps every second.
Letting their escorts take care of the injured and get updates from those below, Renek and Kae rejoined and headed over to the concentrated mass of soldiers and barriers towards the other end of the basin, which was most likely the forward post where the Onasia Division’s leader was stationed. A dozen alchemagists, their arms out, were working together to keep the area impenetrable—as long as the casters themselves held out.
It took the pair nearly ten minutes to navigate one half of the basin, giving them time and space to pass by many gravely injured soldiers, empty food tins, and discarded, broken weapons. The closest buildings were in ruins or on fire, filling the area with so much smoke that the sunsphere was barely visible despite the real sun’s returning light. It was a scene from hell that should never have been witnessed anywhere in Aurra.
Terront had a personal bunker—an iron dome being maintained by two alchemagists that was just big enough to fit him, a chair, a table and radio, and his lieutenant. Around that dome was a larger, opaque one that was concentrated mostly forward and made up of barriers of plasma, lightning, an air vortex, and an outer layer of vector lines that cut down projectiles and spells before they hit the inner layers. But the lines were being maintained by a single and young alchemagist, both of her hands stretched towards the sky even as she was struggling to stand. Her barrier was losing its number of lines and complexity, becoming too simple to do much good. Seeing this, Kae ran up and touched her shoulder.
“Rest,” Kae told her. “I’ll help.”
“P-Pretorian Anneise…” the young soldier huffed, dropped her arms and tried not to collapse from exhaustion. “Thank you…”
Using two spells at once, Kae created both an additional layer of air and projected a large diffusion sphere further away from the barrier. After the combined protection defeated a barrage of mortar shells and rockets, the other wizards showed gratitude to the mighty pretorian assisting them.
“Are you all right?” Renek asked the young vector adept, helping her to her feet as he tried to wave over a medic. “You’re very brave.”
“More like stupid… My sergeant kept saying I shouldn’t push myself this hard, but what choice do any of us have? If the barrier goes down… we could be overrun in minutes…”
“Have you… lost anyone just from alchemagi exhaustion?”
She nodded. “Three or four, yeah… It’s a horrible way to go.”
“God. I’m sorry. The Angels are relentless…” Renek said as he handed her over to an overworked medic.
With Kae busy trying to take some of the load off of the soldiers, Renek hurried over to Terront, who was yelling at someone on the other end of the radio. He wasn’t giving commands; he was just trying to gather the most basic manner of intel from across the City’s last stronghold.
Blinded in combat only a year into the fighting, Terront, a grizzled man in his fifties, wore the traditional dark alchemagist goggles over his injuries—but he would never be confused for a wizard, as he also wore a rugged uniform which could have fit on an American officer from World War Two, along with a loaded bandolier for the rifle he kept on his back. He couldn’t see with his eyes, but as a strong mind adept, he had other ways of seeing everything around him, and remained a decent shot.
“Sir,” his young lieutenant said when Renek approached. “It’s one of the pretorians that just arrived.”
“Could I have a moment alone, Commander?” Renek asked.
Terront nodded and then dropped his headset in frustration after his junior officer left the iron dome.
“Damn tech is failing us,” he grumbled. “We need modern comms, not metal boxes of vacuum tubes and duct tape. Charles Renek, was it?”
“Yes, sir. I didn’t know the situation was this bad. I’m impressed you’ve managed to hold out for this long.”
“Well, my men tell me the sun is brighter again—and I could feel it on my skin. They took it as a good omen. But, apparently, so did the Angels and they started fighting even harder, too. Now it sounds like there are some fresh faces out there. Did you bring in the calvary?”
“I’m afraid not. Sir, we thought you had a few days left, but being here tells me you may only have a few hours. We’re here to aid in a full retreat before you’re overrun. Our escape corridor is narrowing.”
“Damn it,” Terront sighed and crossed his arms. “And here I was thinking we’d hold this City after we retook it a second time. It felt different. We were doing well. I understand the orders, but I’m disappointed.”
“It’s more important that all of these men make it out of here. We have a new operation in the planning stages. They’ll get their chance again.”
“We should fall back to N and recover. Is that the idea? I know they don’t like the Guard, but they’re close and they’ve remained neutral.”
“No. We’re to go across the ocean, to O for the time being.”
“Then we’re abandoning Onasia?”
“Not at all.” A rocket hit the totem directly, sending out a loud reverberating metal twang through the area. “Commander, I want to tell you everything, but first we need to get moving.”
Drides, Trinqit, and the newest pretorian entered City A’s only fibrocator station that linked to City Z. Almost like an embassy for Z that acted as a distant arm for the prison, the station was a secured, small, and ugly facility located in a hidden corner of A, and it was surrounded by stone and metal bars. Several guards were posted inside at all times, and three sliding gates made of three different materials separated the outside from the fibrocator itself. If any escapee actually made it through to A, they’d next have to manipulate or break through barriers of stone, metal, and compact, fireproof wood if they wanted a chance to fight the elite guards.
Once all three gates had locked them inside with the lone operator and the transport device itself, this model a reinforced metal box, Drides turned to his subordinates. Behind him, the various systems warmed up.
“Jenera, you’ve never been to Z, have you?”
“No. No reason I’d ever want to go there.”
“Just stay behind me and don’t talk to anyone unless questioned. You two are with me to escort Vermer. I’ll do the talking.”
“Vermer is in there for a reason, Will… He’s insane.”
“I would say unstable. But he’s loyal. He’s only in there because Jeryn’s predecessor was also a criminal and Vermer did his bidding. And he’s one of the few mind adepts who has ever summoned the owl without truly losing his mind. As long as he can still do that, he’s valuable to us.”
Trinqit crossed her arms and sighed. “If you had just killed those two when you had the chance and weren’t expecting it…”
“I won’t have this debate again. I let them live because they still had their uses to us. Now, I don’t believe they do anymore.”
Following some system checks, the link to Z was created, and the three stepped through one at a time. They arrived at a station that looked nearly identical and that was just as secure, and after leaving they emerged under a dark, cold sky with storm clouds on the horizon.
Z’s fibrocator station was on a small rocky island, with the “City” itself on the bigger island a few miles away and across rough seas. To get there, they would have to take an armored boat to the other dock. It bobbed in the waves, its sunlamp’s range small but enough to keep its hull protected from the acidic nature of unpurified Aurrian ocean.
Another guard, this one heavily armed and dressed in a sealed suit that kept him safe from the haze, welcomed them to the island and brought them down the rocky path to the boat, his personal sunlamp attached to his belt and under lock and key. It also looked like he’d be operating the boat. The security methods were plentiful, and no one had even escaped to the smaller island to test the last layers of the measures.
The confined and utilitarian confines of the shuttle boat a very far cry from a pretorians’ rooms in the manor, Trinqit let out a huff from her seat before sliding close the metal door to the helm room for some privacy. Drides simply shut his eyes and relaxed in his seat to endure the choppy ride, but Trinqit would have to put her mind elsewhere to make it to the other side without getting sick or complaining too much.
“So, Camryde,” she said turned to Phisa, “why don’t you tell me about the story you have with this place.”
“And why should I tell you that?”
“I just want to know why you’re morally superior to me.”
“I never claimed to be. I’ve yet to be a judge.”
“Seriously. Tell me. It’s going to come up, anyway. We’re heading to Z. I want to know what drove you to visit ‘Hell Island’ once already.”
“Fine. It was therapy. I had to get my power back.”
Upon hearing that Phisa seemed to be mostly willingly divulging something from her past concerning “power,” Drides opened his eyes.
“By ‘power’…” Trinqit replied, “Do you mean your confidence?”
“To simply exist and pursue a goal. I had that taken from me at the very end of my previous Earth life. My power had been taken.”
“And… to get it back, you felt like you needed to kill a prisoner.”
“Not kill. To kill would be to release them… I was a teenager in Wisconsin. And during a cold winter night, while at a sleepover at a friend’s house in 1988… A man broke into the house, through a window. He was a serial killer. So. A truly deranged individual with no future took away mine.”
“Oh. I, um… That’s… That makes things understandable.”
“But you want to hear more, don’t you, Ms. Trinqit? You want details. You want me to paint you a better picture. That’s who you are. I get it, you have a vengeful side, you want to know what I experienced.”
Looking at Drides, she replied, “That isn’t necessary.”
“He broke in, tormented us for two hours, tied us up, and stabbed us both before he fled the house. I can still feel the cold, sharp knife going into me several times, the warm blood pouring out… Then I slowly died on the floor, afraid. I dragged myself out into the living room before reaching the Christmas tree, where I could no longer move. I saw the flashing of lights just before I blacked out, my last thoughts on how they were too late. Have you ever been murdered, Jenera? You like a nice, slow kill, don’t you?”
Feeling disgusted, she could no longer look Phisa in the eye.
Phisa continued, “I assume my friend lived. I never found her in Hold. The judges took pity on me, being a young victim and everything. I went from V in my previous life to K. I was born and raised there, afraid. I couldn’t be in the same room if our maid had to cook with a knife.”
“I’m sorry. No one so young and innocent deserves that.”
“And how many people did you kill when you destroyed that train full of people in City I seven years ago? Weren’t some of them innocent?”
“You know about that? Phisa, they didn’t leave me a choice—”
In no mood to hear excuses, Phisa pressed on, “When I was five and had full recollection, I could barely function. The standard therapy I was receiving wasn’t nearly enough. Luckily… Father had his connections. And he found out that my murderer had recently been reborn into Z, right where he belonged. From my point of view, he should’ve been in Block 9 instead of 6, but of course, that’s only subjective. Father promised me that when we were both ready, I would get to see him. And I wanted to meet him again. But I wasn’t going to bring myself to the level of assaulting a child.
“So, until that day arrived, I kept pushing myself to achieve a high standard, and began learning how to handle a blade, as a sort of exposure therapy. I eventually began to wield perhaps the meanest looking blade, a scythe, when I was ten. Got into Evirtide. Got into the Guard. Learned to control my rage and turn it into strength. But I still didn’t have my power. I had to confront the monster hanging over me to get it back.”
“And… a year ago, you did just that…”
“Yes. And even in this new life, he recognized me. He knew who I was and what I had come there to do. He was already timid and broken by that point. He escaped his life sentence on Earth when another convict did what he did to me, so he had time to make up Aurra’s prisons. But it didn’t matter to me what everyone else had done to him already. I deserved my time, my five minutes alone. With my strength training, I was just as strong as any Z guard, and I… beat the ever-loving hell out of him. And not because I wanted to. I had to. He begged me to stop, and I only did so when I felt like I had finished ripping my power straight out of him. Then I left the cell, leaving him as a writhing mess on the floor. I was sated. I’ll never see him again or do that a second time in my life. I’ve moved on.”
Seeing that Trinqit was speechless, Drides spoke instead, “It takes a lot of courage to confront people who have hurt us, Phisa. The fact that you were able to even just do that… tells me that you were on the road to recovery already. I respect what you did.”
She breathed out and asked, “Have you been hurt, Mr. Drides?”
He merely responded with, “Who hasn’t?”
The boat’s engine quieted as it slowed to a crawl and reached the pier. Trinqit had yet to properly respond to the story by the time they were stepping out onto Z’s main island, a crescent rock with mountains on one side and a cold, gravel coast on the other. It was a small City but a massive prison complex, and searchlights were attached even to its sun totem.
The island was in a stormy portion of Tillethy’s southern seas, and though it wasn’t raining at the moment, a dense fog had covered the mostly lifeless rock, making it even grayer than normal; it was as if color didn’t exist in the City at all. The fog reduced visibility and turned the nine prison blocks into shadows, and their tall concrete walls loomed over the visitors as they stepped off the boat and onto a place where few ever left.
Waiting for the visitors at the prison security gate was the current leader of the reformation complex. Cities had all varieties of titles given to their government heads, and for Z, it was appropriately enough warden.
“Mr. Drides. Ms. Camryde and Trinqit,” the gray-haired, rather disheveled man in a black trench coat began the greetings. “It’s an honor having you here. I’ve always supported our apostle, ever since he was revealed to the public. Never thought I’d get to meet him.”
Unimpressed, Drides asked, “And your name?”
“Ah, right. Mesif Geirsten. I’ve had the pleasure to direct Aurra’s finest prison and reformation facility for nearly thirty years. We’ve never had better results. Oh, and I should add… Welcome back, Ms. Camryde.”
“Better results?” Trinqit wondered.
“We believe that those sent here should spend this life having their soul cleansed, by fire, before we send them back to Earth to hopefully live a better life than they did the previous time. Regardless of any justice they may have experienced before being reborn… what matters more is if they learned from their failures and crimes, and how much they actually want to put forth an effort to better themselves for the rest of their many lives.”
“I didn’t ask for a sermon. I was just curious how you’ve made things better. I thought Z has barely changed over the years.”
“Well. Under my watch, we’ve begun to use newer… techniques developed on Earth. Less physical and merely cruel, like what reborn inquisitors gave to us centuries ago. We’re now more psychological, and I believe we can come closer to touching the soul itself with such methods—getting results that will carry over, and last.”
“I’m so glad you’re proud of your new torture methods,” Drides sighed, “but this isn’t a performance evaluation. Just take us to Block 9.”
“Right, of course.” Mesif waved to the guards up in the two towers that flanked the gate, and working together, they unlocked and opened it—just a crack, enough to go in one at a time. “It’s a bit of a walk.”
An outdoor elevator made of rusting metal was past the gate, at the end of a corridor between two high walls. Once they were at the top, they stepped out onto a long, winding, and caged elevated walkway. As they traversed the path, they could look down into the different segments of Z on either side, all of them separated by the tall partitions of stone.
Beginning a tour of sorts, Mesif said, “To your right is Block A, for the workers. It’s a fully functional town designed like a small mid-tier City.”
“Looks like it’s emulating New York City from the early 20th century,” Phisa observed, noticing a few moving carriages on the tight streets below and the off-duty prison staff milling about.
“And past the left wall is Block 1, the village. No better than Y’s slums, but it gives the prisoners something to work for, if just to be able to live under the sky and… somewhat freely.”
“You can end up here just by being a repeat offender of living selfishly, can’t you?” Drides wondered. “You don’t have to kill someone to live a life in Z, am I right? I haven’t studied this City in detail.”
“Correct, my apostle. At some point, a Hold judge can declare that you’re going down a bad path and send you here. But you’ve got to be damn malicious to end up in the inner blocks, whether you’re born here or sent over for egregious Aurrian crimes.”
Phisa looked out at the ugly gray blocks pretending to be livable apartments and the people without hope that meandered between them.
She asked, “Does anyone leave here if they’re ‘reformed’ enough?”
“No. You can be rewarded, but you’re here for life.”
Drides explained, “It’s still believed, after a thousand years, that all the ‘progress’ of ‘cleansing the soul’ is lost if the prisoners don’t also die here. It’s all part of the punishment, the promise of never getting out.”
Misef added, “But few people have ever spent two lifetimes here, and across all of our possible lifetimes, having to live only one here, and remembering what it was like—well, it all makes for only a brief moment across eternity that we never forget. A deterrent, hopefully.”
The walkway bringing them to the center of the City where the sunsphere loomed over everything had a guarded entry elevator for every block, but without the time to visit any of them, the pretorians could only observe as the zones gradually became colder, smaller, and more soulless.
Mesif gave a summary for each block, but it was clear enough how they were changing just by seeing the exteriors. Block 2 was in the style of a minimum-security prison, with a spacious exercise yard and even a small garden. Blocks 3 through 5 looked more like typical Earthen lockups, each one slightly worst than the last. Blocks 6 and 7 took up very little space, and the kind of spiritual reformation they employed inside the gray boxes, Misef admitted, had to border on hard torture to get any results.
“And Block 8 here…” Misef spoke of a solid black, windowless cube as the tour was reaching its end. “This is where we’ve been keeping most of our captured Angels. We had to move our usual criminals out just to make room. The daily cleansings there keep us busy.”
“So, now we enter the ninth circle of the inferno,” Phisa remarked.
“Indeed. Past wardens have thought about adding a tenth block before, in the remains of the Administration complex below, but The Divine Comedy is so symbolically part of our culture here that it almost doesn’t feel right to. We even keep Block 9 cold just to emulate the deepest circle.”
“And how many people are kept there?” Trinqit wondered. “The number’s kept a secret, I know… but we are pretorians.”
Hesitantly, Misef answered, “About five hundred, at any given time. Though the average stay is less than six months. If a prisoner doesn’t reform enough to get themselves to a ‘better’ block, we still move most of them eventually before they break, completely. That doesn’t help anyone.”
“But how many never leave this place?” Trinqit asked again as an intentionally hideous metal ring-shaped building came into view. “How many of the worst possible scum of the Earth people are there, right now?”
“About a hundred or so, ma’am. And some of them are repeat offenders… Just, true misanthropes who seem to detest humanity.”
“The irredeemable at the bottom of the barrel, huh…”
Block 9 surrounded the base of the totem itself, meaning that its inhabitants were also subjected to the continuous hum from the sunsphere above. At some point, anyone inside was subject to losing their mind. Even so, there were always a few people so full of hatred that they took insanity and burying themselves deep into their own personal universes, over simply making any effort to reintegrate with society.
Or, maybe they only rejected the attempts of others to “fix” them.
The windowless ring, only two stories high, was surrounded by the innermost wall of the City, and lights kept the grounds between both of the structures illuminated at all times. Upon reaching the end of the walkway and using the elevator, it felt like all color and form was leaving the world.
“I caught glimpses of the Fragmented City when I would send people there…” Drides whispered to Trinqit as they headed down. “I’d imagine this place isn’t too dissimilar. Psychologically, at least.”
“How good is the local suppression here?” Trinqit asked.
Mesif replied, “Oh, very strong. We always had our own redundant system—probably kept us from a riot when global suppression went down years back. More recently, we added a secondary system just for Block 9. We can do whatever we want to the prisoners, and they can’t fight back.”
“You must be so happy,” Drides said as they reached the bottom.
“We don’t enjoy reformation, my apostle. To derive pleasure from it would betray our mission.” The warden took a solid gold key with a 9 on it from his belt, and used it to open a door made of granite decorated with engraved gargoyles. With a smile, he said, “Welcome to the end of Aurra.”
“I don’t like it, but I’ll follow orders,” Terront said, and knowing where his lieutenant had gone just by reading the mental signatures in the area, waved him back into the dome. “We’re falling back to the park,” he told his right-hand man. “Get on comms, get the word out.”
“Yes, sir. And Terront, our barriers here are about to fail. The remaining alchemagists are nearing exhaustion. We may have to retreat to the stairs until we’re in proper motion.”
“They can rest until we’re moving,” Renek said. “Anneise and I will provide the cover. Think we can pack up and be on our feet in fifteen?”
“Damn well try to make it happen,” Terront said and got right to finding and talking to his other officers as his lieutenant worked the radio.
“Charles, are you certain we can do this alone?” Kae fretted, in a rare wavering of her typical full confidence. “We’re facing an entire army.”
This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
“It’s about not letting anything through. As long as our reserves hold out… My barrier, so long as I don’t move with it, isn’t too taxing.”
Kae nodded, took a breath, and turned to the young wizards trying to keep a barrage of alchemagi and ballistics from decimating their division.
She spoke, “Brave Onasian Guardsmen, lower your shields and assist in the evacuation. We will take this burden off of your shoulders.”
“Are you certain, Pretorians?” one of the men shouted back. “This is… what we were all… prepared to do.”
“No more deaths today. Release your alchemagi, and survive.”
One by one, they followed orders until there was a brief moment where everyone was without any protection at all. Kae created another floating diffusion dome, far larger this time, which evaporated several incoming fireballs. Renek’s barrier would take a few seconds to form, and the rifle rounds and arrows making impact nearby didn’t help his efforts to concentrate as he placed his left hand on the ground. With his right, he brought up three fingers. If he survived the next several seconds, he could put up what was currently known as Aurra’s strongest defensive technique.
It was something only a talented silver, balanced in all of the base alignments, could pull off. The urban ground in front of Renek cracked and rose, as he used the metals within the earth to form a lattice; only the strong bones of the barrier. Rock and ground water mixed together, and before he froze the liquid, he took out the pouch at his side and showered the wall with seeds. Hardened vines that were resistant to the vertical tundra sprouted and wrapped around the iron honeycomb to reinforce it. Once the rock and ice had filled the lattice, the defense was complete, having taken under ten seconds to form and reaching the incredible size of a football field, taking the shape of one half of a dome.
Renek had intentionally left a horizontal sliver of the lattice empty at eye level so that they could still see the enemy. Able to get his first good look at them, he saw fifty or more Angels on the block ahead, most of them taking cover behind a hill of debris. Their mortar and riflemen continued the assault against the barrier, chipping away at it, as their alchemagists, unable to get through Kae’s diffusion sphere, instead focused on protecting their comrades for the time being.
“This isn’t right,” Renek told Kae. “How long have they been at this, just wearing us down? Why aren’t they advancing?”
She replied, “Charles, have you noticed? The snow melt water going into the cistern has all disappeared.”
He hadn’t been paying attention to it, but saw that she was correct. He looked to the south, scanning the ruins in that direction. The damage was so severe, that every block was packed full of the remains of buildings, making those roads inaccessible. But the north side was still relatively undamaged, with three of the streets leading to the totem clear.
“Commander!” Renek called out, before seeing that Terront was a distance away, still talking to one of his officers. He instead looked over at the young vector adept, resting nearby, and asked, “Is the north side protected? Do we have any defenses set up?”
“The enemy gave up on it back when we still had two schutz and four combat rairer in that area…” she breathed out.
“And do you still have those defenses?”
“One of the schutz was so badly damaged that it broke down after the Angels ran off, and all the combat rairer are already dead. We armored up our last rairer, but it’s a beast of burden, not bred for combat…”
“Damn it.” Renek turned to the officer in the dome, working the radio and shouted, “Lieutenant! Hey, this is important! We’re about to be flanked from the north. Move all able-bodied men there until we evacuate.”
The officer heard him, finished his conversation, and turned the dial to change frequencies. As he did so, the remaining iron adept keeping his dome up fell to his knees, gasping for breath, and the shell disappeared. Fully exposed, the lieutenant began to look around from his chair nervously as he spoke. With the hunk of metal out of his way, Renek was also able to see the entirety of the north side. It was barely defended, but now several dozen men were heading to the top steps in that direction.
A nearby sensitive mind adept, whose job it was to sense troop masses, suddenly picked up on incoming movement.
“L-Lieutenant…” he said anxiously. “I’m picking up some very strong alchemagi sources getting closer from the north.”
“Commander!” Kae shouted. “Eyes north!”
Terront heard her, and turned to get a mental read of that direction just as a charge commenced. Coming down the three streets was an army of Angels, with armored shieldsmen in front, riflemen between them, and alchemagists farther back providing support. Renek saw a patrolling schutz near the outer steps identify the threat and come to a stop. Its warning chirp then went off—its announcement that it was about to open fire.
It unleashed its chain gun on the center street, but the powerful rounds only collapsed against the approaching and sturdy titanium shields. The schutz launched its remaining four stinger missiles from its side compartments, which flew into the air above the shields so they could slam into the crowds behind them. But all four were detonated early by vector lines and a lightning bolt. The heavy mech was then pummeled by the might of an entire battalion, and already in a beaten state, it didn’t last a minute before it collapsed into a scrap heap.
“Anyone who still has ammunition, defend us until we can move the injured out of here!” Terront ordered.
Guardsmen swarmed the top step, taking up every available space as they used it for cover and prepared for what was essentially trench warfare. They opened fire, but ceased moments later as the last rairer leapt down from the tower it had been clinging to, where it kept watch. Despite being smaller and not trained for combat, it managed to bite into two separate armored Angels with its puncturing razor teeth and tossed them away, while its own tough armor protected it from gunfire.
“Anneise, go assist them!” Renek told her. “I’ll hold the barrier.”
“But any vector lines will get through it without me here.”
“My wall’s strong enough to at least slow them down. Just go.”
She nodded and before rushing off, told him, “Be ready to run.”
“Damn it…” Renek muttered again as he closed his barrier’s viewport and began an effort to create a second wall behind it.
Arrows, slugs, mortars, rockets, and alchemagi of all colors filled the space in between the two armies, while a few Angels on the other side put their efforts towards the rampaging rairer causing chaos on their front line. It had become surprisingly aggressive and was putting up a fight, having taken out five, maybe six enemy troops already and opening up a gap in the shields that left a few dozen Angels fully exposed to weapon fire.
Once Kae arrived, she created her diffusion sphere higher up to neutralize any arcing fireballs and alchemagi-infused boulders, but she otherwise felt uncharacteristically useless on such a large-scale chaotic field. Looking around for some better way to help, she noticed that the Angel battalion from the street on her right was now moving in—and crawling on the side of a crumbling mason tower, a rare sight: a rairer rider.
“Okay, girl, our target is that pup down there,” the fully armored rider told his stead, as he held on tight from between her shoulder blades.
Able to speak telepathically to her mind adept, animalect partner on the field, the large rairer replied, “I see him now. Hold on.”
The rider raised his spear, just in case he needed it, and the rairer turned the corner of the building, positioned herself, and leapt down with pinpoint accuracy. The smaller, younger rairer had no idea what hit him. In one swift move, the larger of the two beasts brought its jaws around his neck, twisted him into the air, and slammed him into the street just in front of several armored Angels. The soldiers moved forward with their own spears to finish off the creature, before seeing that there was no work to be done; the smaller rairer was already dead and shedding smoke plumes.
The victor let out a mighty roar that garnered some cheers from her nearby human friends and a pat from her rider. On the enemy’s side, looks of astonishment and panic could be seen from many Guardsmen.
“Sir,” the rider spoke into a headpiece from inside his helmet. “We only have foot-soldiers left to contend with. You’re free to move in.”
“Copy that, Major.”
With most of the Guardsmen attention on the center and now the east street, where the remnants of Guardfall’s berserkers were charging in and being led by Harken, the west thoroughfare became safe passage for the attacking army’s commanders and other high-ranking Angels.
The assault was bigger and more coordinated than the Guardsmen had expected, and fire from their side almost ceased entirely as they felt the rumbling of airship engines and looked up. Cresting over the damaged towers ahead, five vessels emerged, the Red Tenor guiding them. Each had been scarred in battle and not all of their propellors were running, but their cannons and bombing bays were intact and imposing sights. Distracted by their lumbering appearance, the Angels coming from the west were able to cover more ground before they were finally seen as a threat.
Terront ordered concentrated fire upon the reinforcements, and Kae exchanged her diffusion sphere for two concentrated beams, drawing lumens from the area and dimming the local sunlight. She used the solar rays to threaten and push back the enemy to the north and east as most everyone else focused on the key personnel rushing from the west.
A barrage of arrows and gunfire soared over the road before any spells went out. The fire paradigm, Viktor, in full armor and riding a black horse, fed powerful alchemagi through his active blade. He cut into the air, sending out an intense wave of fire hot enough to vaporize all of the incoming ballistics. Tabi, riding on her elemental—a cluster of vines taking the shape of a giant wolf—prepped her wrist-mounted crossbow.
Once she became among the first to reach the end of the block, she gracefully leapt off her wolf and sent it jumping into the air. With a howl, it deconstructed into its hundreds of vines that stretched out and reformed before digging into the broken street with their spear-like tendrils. They formed a rugged barrier of plant life at the edge of the totem’s circle, and once their brambles sprouted to bolster the vines, the battalion had an adequate forward defense. One of the Angels’ very few solar adepts stepped up, a girl wearing an Evirtide robe that showed loyalty to the school—but defiance to its current headmaster’s support of the Guard. She projected a diffusion sphere above the barrier, completing the protection.
Their safety assured, and as a smaller airship hovered nearby, Osk and Masayuki, both in light armor, made their way through parting Angels, acting as the escorts for a man that never burdened himself with heavy protection. Supreme Commander Rivia, his age and battles quickly catching up with his vigorous spirit, stepped forward with three fingers at his side.
“Colonel,” Rivia said as they arrived at Tabi’s barrier, where Viktor’s restless horse was bucking impatiently. “Please proceed.”
Osk hit the ground with his palm, sending out a pulse through the earth which would map out the bombed urban landscape for him, with the return pulses showing any hidden dangers in the field.
“Mines, sir,” Osk reported. “Hundreds of them.”
“Of course,” Tabi sighed. “Now the Onasian army can’t abide by the treaty, either. When do we start deploying the messy weaponry?”
Masayuki replied, “Perhaps when we become as desperate as the Guard.” He listened as a few other officers spoke to him through his earpiece, then told the others, “The two battalions are holding in place, and the Guard has ceased fire, probably waiting to see what we do.”
“Xin, be ready to clear that the field,” Rivia said, exhaled, and concentrated. “Wait until the water reaches the stairs.”
From their vantage point, the Guardsmen couldn’t see that a thin layer of snowmelt water, pulled away and gathered elsewhere through a wide-reaching spell, was now flowing upward through a tower where the north and west streets met. After another minute or so, Rivia commanded it forward, and a torrent suddenly crashed through the fifth-floor windows, turning the fa?ade of the building into a waterfall. It spread out and slowed down enough to not pose a threat to the onlooking Guardsmen themselves; Rivia had command over a small lake’s worth for another purpose.
The moment he saw the water reach the edge and flow down towards the totem cistern, Masayuki leapt over the vine barrier and dug his blade into the ground, where it just barely touched the flowing water. He then sent a powerful jolt of electricity throughout the temporary river.
He kept the current going, and soon the water was saturated with lightning that triggered every partially buried mine in the area, detonating them and sending out shock waves, smoke, and debris—and a necessary smokescreen that was also part of Rivia’s plan. Adding to it, Viktor produced a streaming, blazing hot beam of bright plasma. The water it hit turned into a cloud of steam, further obstructing the field.
In the tower, one floor above where the water had flowed, Pip, Dak, Kyler, and several other riflemen used the cover to knock out the windows and take up proper firing positions. As the steam cleared, the cousins took the moment before they were noticed to line up their shots on the three VIPs below: Commander Terront, and the pretorians Anneise and Renek, who was further off still maintaining an under-fire barrier.
All of this coordination and set up still wasn’t quite enough for Rivia, so he and his pretorians had also used the smokescreen to leave the safety of the bramble barrier, positioning themselves closer to the central plaza. The general put much of his remaining energy into his next attack, which he paired up with Osk’s rendition of a powerful technique.
A wave of earth manipulation burst out from their palms, and the urban concrete and asphalt liquified. The Guardsmen’ focus was mostly on relocating their enemy past the dissipating smoky veil, making them easy targets. Before they understood what was happening, the hundreds of soldiers taking cover behind the top steps suddenly found themselves sinking into the concrete up to their knees. In seconds, over half of the surviving Onasia division’s infantry were unable to free themselves.
Terront and Kae, who had noticed what was happening in time, had both managed to climb on top of a broken-down tank and used it as a boat of sorts to avoid sinking—but that did nothing to change the fact that they were now hopelessly surrounded by the Angels’ strongest fighters. She wasn’t even aware of the new sniper nest above until after she had already surveyed all the other forces, once she saw the flare against a scope’s lens.
“Commander…” Kae spoke to Terront, “We have rifles on us.”
“It’s over,” he grumbled. “All we can do is wait to hear the demands. But we can use that time to think of something.”
Renek, still maintaining two barriers against ongoing fire, suddenly noticed the increasingly bright outline of a vector mandala cutting through his secondary, weaker wall—it must have gone through the first without him noticing. Another few seconds, and there would be nothing left to stop it. But just as it appeared and began to close in on him, the pattern vanished and the torrent of weapon fire finally ceased. He kept his walls up and filled in its wounds. Looking around, he saw that the Angels had stopped any further aggression. He assumed that an order had just gone out.
“Charles…” Kae spoke into his ear from her position at the front. “Don’t move. Someone likely has you in their sights. Snipers, in the tower where the water came from. Rivia and the paradigms are approaching now. Most of the men are trapped. What do we do?”
As he looked at the grounds and above at the towers for a possible means of escape, Rivia, flanked by his highest officers, came a little closer and was handed a megaphone that must have come from Earth. Terront gestured to his men to make sure none of them futilely opened fire.
“Brave Guardsmen,” Rivia’s amplified voice spread through the air, as the paradigms and Osk covered him and watched for any threats. “You have fought courageously these last three months. I commend you. And I am willing to allow all but a few of you to finish your retreat. All that I ask is that Commander Terront, and the pretorians Kae Anneise and Charles Renek surrender themselves. Do this, and your men will be spared.”
“Don’t you dare, sir,” the sergeant who flew in with Renek said to Terront, from her spot by the tank treads where she was ensnared.
“They were waiting for pretorians to show up,” Charles told Kae. “We’re the reason why they gave it everything just now…”
“Do you think their bargain is genuine?” she asked.
“If it’s straight from Rivia, I unfortunately have to believe it is. But we can’t make that trade. Even just losing Terront…”
Rivia continued his efforts to pressure the commanders to surrender, while offering the rest of the Guardsmen respect for holding onto D for so long. Charles kept his concentration on thinking of a way to save as many people as possible, without having to give themselves up. He even considered agreeing to the generous proposal, but painfully recognized how important he and Kae were—not as pretorians or leaders, but just to help maintain whatever opposition to Drides remained in the capital.
His eyes settled on a tower, one of a hundred that he could see. But this one was close, bordering the plaza, and it had potential. It was tall and badly damaged. Its sides were fully glassed, and so many windows had been blown out and left most of its floors exposed, which revealed that one of its lower corners was already partially collapsed. With a little pull in just the right spot, it was possible that the entire building could come down and stretch across two of the main avenues filled with Angel soldiers.
“Kae,” he spoke to her after two very tense minutes, with another shootout just a hair trigger-pull away. “The large tower to your right—if you take out those corner supports, could you fell it?”
Eyeing it, she replied, “If I do it… those airships will open fire. You’ll have to be ready to defend us, as best you can.”
“I’m coming to you. Carefully.”
She looked to see him approaching, his hands in the air, knowing that two or three rifles were probably following his every move, their wielders hoping—but uncertain—that he was trying to be amicable.
“Is the tank hatch open?” Renek asked.
Kae eyed it without moving and replied, “Yes.”
“On my mark, travel inside with Terront and use the cover while you create the spell. I can make the viewport larger if I need to.”
“This might get bad the moment they see us trying something.”
“I know. But I think this is our only chance.” Renek placed his hands on the back of his head, one of them with three fingers out.
“Charles Renek!” Rivia’s voice echoed. “Show us your hands!”
“They’re not taking any chances…” he told Kae. “We have to do this now. Ready? Three… two… one… Go.”
Still a distance away, Renek manipulated the side of the tank and bent the steel into a malleable shape, raising it into a thin barrier capable of taking a few hits. They came right away, with six rifle shots impacting the metal as Kae teleported herself into the tank via burst of light. She pulled Terront down and inside by the legs, redirecting him to the operator seat as much as she could. The barrier quickly failing, Renek broke it down and then used its remnants and the loose metal around the vehicle to create another layer of protection around the broken, but still sturdy war machine.
Two warning shots hit near his feet as he worked, but they didn’t break his concentration and there was no follow-up. The Angels didn’t want to risk hitting him, and must have only believed that two of their targets were in cover but trapped and not much of a threat. Rivia returned to his demands as if nothing had happened, and Renek held his position.
“I can see fine in here, Charles,” Kae reported.
“Good. I’ll keep you safe when the real shooting starts.”
“Keep yourself alive, too. This will take a minute.”
At first, no one on either side noticed the change in the light. After several seconds, it was just barely darker across the plaza. Then it reached the level of an overcast sky, but with so much smoke in the air, it still wasn’t anything too unusual. Once it became even darker, people took notice, looking up at the sky and seeing that the air itself was tinted. Rivia stopped speaking, and he and the paradigms looked around cautiously.
There was one remaining bright spot—a sphere of blinding light in the corner of one of the towers. It was drawing in all nearby illumination, bathing the plaza in darkness. Realizing that Kae was creating a powerful solar spell, the riflemen again opened fire on the tank, and this time, out of a sense of desperation, several other Angels joined in with gunfire and alchemagi. In seconds, an all-out battle recommenced.
The paradigms and Osk created an impenetrable defense for Rivia, who still had to maintain his earth spell to keep the Guardsmen trapped. As they were unable to move, they made for easy targets and several were picked off. Knowing she had to complete her spell to prevent a massacre, Kae put everything she had into her sphere of light.
Any photons that escaped the sphere and became visible to the eye were wasted, so as the air continued to dim, she put more crushing power into the burning ball of plasma forming that she kept an eye on through the tank viewport and behind her adaptive-tinting goggles. Renek kept up the machine’s layer of protection until he started taking fire, and had to release the armor so he could create a barrier for himself. But he had bought Kae enough time—he saw the sphere itself begin to darken, and knew that the most powerful solar technique ever conceived was almost complete.
The sphere turned solid black as all light became trapped inside, and the plaza became, for a moment, as dark as midnight and all spells and weapon fire ceased. Though she was unable to see her sphere, she still had control over it, and finished the spell by compacting it down to a tenth of its previous size. With all of that light crammed into such a tiny space, a special black hole known as a kugelblitz was created, and it functioned just as any other similar stellar object would behave out in the cosmos; by destroying anything nearby. The plaza filled with light again as the small black hole did its work, floating in the air and violently pulling in all nearby matter. The area of effect grew in size, and soon the corners of a dozen floors had been consumed, core supports and all.
The black hole hit capacity and released its mass, converted into energy—resulting in a large explosion that did further damage to the tower. The building groaned and began to fall. The angle was perfect; it would slam down onto the ends of two of the three avenues. Seeing this, Rivia, his officers, and anyone else in the collapse zone were forced to retreat out of the plaza. As he fell back and lost control of his earth spell, freeing all of the Guardsmen, Rivia issued an order to the airships above. Their cannons already on their targets, they began to pummel the area in an attempt to decimate those briefly promised safe passage.
Renek covered himself with a floating iron barrier as he tried to make his way to the tank that sheltered Kae and Terront. He attempted to deflect or detonate incoming shells to save those around him, but it had all become too chaotic and destructive to effectively defend against.
Somehow, he made it across the steps and to the war machine, the sergeant he flew in with still huddled against it. Just a few dozen meters away, and far too close for comfort, the glass and steel tower hit the outer plaza with a thunderous crash, spraying debris and dust in all directions.
Renek used the remnants of the tower to create a sprawling lattice of honeycomb-shaped metal above the plaza. He forced it to grow so quickly that the steel was molten red as it formed, but the canopy that swept overhead to intercept the shells fired from the airships remained just as effective. The impacts destroyed segments of the barrier, which Renek recreated where he could. He was saving lives, but knew he wouldn’t hold out for long. The tower had taken out the front of the building where the Angels’ snipers were posted, leaving the only current threat the artillery up above. Kae helped Terront out of the tank, who ordered an official retreat.
“Move!” Kae shouted and used her height to help guide the soldiers. “To Invernus Park, form pairs and carry the wounded!”
The female sergeant found Renek and joined him to act as an escort, which he needed as his concentration on the metal umbrella kept him from putting much focus on weaving through the stampeding masses.
“I’ve got you, sir,” she said as she held his free hand and guided him through the crowds. “Thank God you and Kae are here.” She then spoke into her earpiece, “Warm up all the engines, we’re on the way!”
“Copy,” the reply came to both of them. “Our three interceptors are launching now to take some of that fire off of you.”
“There’s still…” Renek breathed out. “An open avenue…”
The sergeant turned around momentarily to look, and saw the battalion that had assaulted Renek’s first barrier were now charging towards them. They were out of attack range of most of the fleeing Guardsmen, but did put further pressure on the pace of the evacuation.
When the Guard reached the edge of the plaza, where they were almost in relative safety if they could get back onto the street and between the buildings, the available aerial fighters took to the sky and engaged the airships, drawing some of their fire off of the ground. But Renek was at his limit, and he knew if he held onto the massive barrier for any longer, he would be placing his own life at risk. He had to drop it. It looked like eighty percent or more of the Guardsmen were out of the plaza; the rest would have to rely on luck to escape. With a heavy heart, he released his grip.
The fragile honeycomb broke apart and rained onto the plaza, but fortunately for everyone still below it, the pieces were small and mostly harmless. As Kae and Terront ran past him, Renek spotted the young vector adept from earlier, running alongside two of her alchemagist Evirtide graduates. They had made themselves stragglers after stopping several times to use the last of their reserves to protect the others as they fled.
Taking a moment to rest against the side of a building, Renek and the sergeant waved them forward. The vector girl turned around, and knowing she was about to see a warm meal and bed, gave him a tired smile.
Then the three of them took a direct hit from an airship cannon.
There was nothing left but a smoldering crater and scraps of burnt robes adrift in the wind. Just like that, they had disappeared from the world.
In shock, Renek only managed to exasperate a faint, “No…”
“Sir, they’re gone,” the sergeant said, tugging at him. “I’m sorry.”
“They were… right there.”
“They fought bravely and their deaths won’t be in vain—but only if we make it out of here. Please, sir. The Guard still needs you.”
Renek nodded, tried to shove out of his mind what he had just seen, and returned his focus to making it off of the battlefield alive. As they made their way down the streets, the sounds of the cannon fire and the impact tremors faded, replaced by the rumbling engines of the carriers.
They arrived just as a fully loaded transport took off, and the next closest one was quickly filling up, the crews guiding the men up the ramps under the carrier bellies. Renek and Kae both saw the full scope of the retreat, the thousands of Guardsmen that they had saved being lifted into the air and taken to safety. She and Terront rejoined him, the commander taking a moment to catch his breath before the sergeant escorted him away.
“Are you okay?” Kae asked her fellow pretorian and friend.
“I… I couldn’t save enough of them,” he murmured. “If had just held it for a minute longer…”
“Charles, this division is still going to exist tomorrow because of what we did. Bad as this was… we saved most of them.”
She caught him before he collapsed from exhaustion, and after it became clear that he could no longer stand—and really had pushed himself to his limit—she helped him into the smaller shuttle they had arrived in.
“The vector adept… was the same age as my daughter,” Renek explained once they were flying over the City. “I’m sorry. I may have lost the appearance of professionalism back there.”
“No, it’s understandable. We’re still human.”
“So, ah…” Renek fell back into his seat and tried to calm himself. “What was it like sheltering in that tank with the commander?”
“Cramped. But he didn’t complain.”
Mesif led the visiting pretorians past a “rehabilitation chamber”, its window putting on display the process being used on a seated prisoner by a Block 9 administrator. The patient had several IV lines carrying fluid in and out of his wrists, and appeared to be in an induced trance. The older man performing the procedure had his palm on the prisoner’s forehead, and was concentrating as he mouthed some kind of mantra.
“Low-level alchemagi works in these rooms,” Mesif explained.
“Is that a mind adept?” Trinqit asked. “What’s he doing to him?”
“This is… one of our ‘softer’ procedures. He’s delving into the prisoner’s mind, changing the emotional imprint of certain memories, so that he may see what he believes are injustices against him in a different light. The fluids you see help stimulate and rebalance biological chemicals.”
“But sometimes you just beat someone up because it’s part of the punishment aspect of being here, right?”
Mesif laughed nervously. “I, ah, don’t think… With all due respect, Ms. Trinqit, Z’s reformation regimens can’t be summarized so easily.”
“I’m just saying, depending on the person I’d be dealing with, I wouldn’t mind putting in some extra hours here sometimes.”
Drides gave her a look suggesting that now was the time to keep quiet, which she obliged to. Mesif, keeping one hand securely around his key ring, continued to guide them deeper into the cold, dark, and circular prison. Every section of the ring only held ten cells, before another gate cut the segments off from each other, for added protection and in case a riot ever broke out. Given that it was Block 9, filled with some of the most dangerous criminals in either world, no amount of security was too much.
“So, Vermer…” Mesif said as he opened another gate. “What did you hope to glean from him, if I may ask? He isn’t the most stable of our prisoners, and it’s difficult to tell when he’s lying, even when medicated.”
“That’s between the two of us,” Drides replied. “But it’s important that I’m able to leave this prison with him, in whatever restraints required. He’s been summoned for questioning in City A. It’s classified beyond that.”
“Tall order. The things that man can do with his mind… I would not allow him to leave here unless he’s fully, well, tranquilized.”
Following four more gates, they stopped at Cell 348. Like all of the doors in the block, his was made of thick, soundproof metal, with only a handle and food slot. Phisa and Trinqit stood behind Drides, both of them a bit anxious that they were meeting a former pretorian known for creating nightmares and his borderline insanity. Mesif opened the outer door, leaving only the secondary inner door of prison bars separating them.
Vermer was a short man in his fifties with poor posture and dark rings around his eyes that had been there long before he arrived in Z. Upon seeing his visitors, he left his bed and approached with an ominous grin, his white prison robes in tatters yet also surprisingly clean.
“Oh, oh… What do we have here?” he asked and rubbed his chin. “You look strong. And the two lovely ladies behind you… Pretorians?”
“I’m the current head,” Drides replied. “And an apostle.”
“You don’t say. Hm. Mm-mmm… I see. A lot must have changed while I’ve been locked away. They tell us so little. What of Draqium?”
“Your former superior didn’t go quietly. He chose to pay for his betrayal against the Guard with his life, while resisting arrest.”
“No surprise! That’s just like him. And who replaced him?”
“Jeryn. But he died some years ago taking down Palar.”
“Ah. Too bad. I liked him… But a fair trade. Palar deserved such an end. The muscle-headed narcissist. Did Breen kick the bucket yet?”
“Same time as Palar. Also went down fighting. You were eventually replaced by Ms. Trinqit here. I’d like you to come with A with me.”
“Oh? And what makes you think I’m not just having the time of my life here? Why would I ever leave? They’re so kind. Such good people.”
This segment of the prison was one of several that had a small side room for officers, also guarded by a locked door, which held a terminal, emergency gate control, and a phone. Today, it happened to ring, which was a very rare occurrence. The warden showed some surprise, and Drides displayed a moment of doubt and concern that Trinqit could just barely see.
As Mesif unlocked the station’s door to answer the phone, Trinqit asked Drides, “Are you doing okay? You haven’t been yourself in here.”
“It’s cold and I hate this place.”
“I get that, but there’s also something else going on…” she said even more quietly, so Phisa could no longer listen in.
After he eyed Mesif listening to something intently on the receiver, he answered, “It’s these cells. I have something of a fear of prisons. It’s hard to shake the thought of getting captured, placed in one that I can’t escape, and then just… killed over and over again.”
“Oh. Well, damn. I can understand that.”
“I haven’t… died enough times to know for sure, but I assume I’ll age like those Holdians if I reconstruct over and over.”
“But you needn’t worry. Surely you could easily escape even this place. The most powerful apostle to have ever lived.”
“I’ve asked you to not say things like that, Jenera…”
“I see…” Mesif said from inside the station. “An unfortunate situation, but I’ll do my best to handle it. Give the queen my best.”
“Queen?” Drides nearly gasped in sudden frustration. “Damn it.”
Trinqit’s eyes widened a bit. “Will? What’s going on?”
Mesif hung up the phone, breathed out, left the room and locked the door, and then simply stared at Drides while finding the words.
“My apostle, I’m sorry, but… a sudden call came in from A. This wasn’t my decision, and I fully trust your judgment, but… I’m afraid there have been new orders from Pristil herself. I can’t let you take Vermer.”
“You’re disobeying me?”
“That is not my intention, sir, but the queen… She still…”
“Aw, what now?” Vermer groaned. “Even if a few nobles wanted to torture some more information out of me, that’d still be more interesting than one more day in this place. And I was just getting my hopes up.”
Drides argued, “He’s a very important piece of plans vital to—”
“Pristil’s retainer Cadius has informed me that you intend to reinstate Vermer as a pretorian. And, sir, while I… strongly disagree with such a decision, I would still obey you, if I hadn’t just gotten word from your only superior. I am terribly sorry, sir.”
Idiot, Drides thought. Don’t say that out loud!
“Ha!” Vermer laughed and shook the door’s bars excitedly. “What a crazy world! You hear that, Warden? Someone still needs me!”
“Will nothing convince you to truly demonstrate your alleged support and respect for me?” Drides asked Mesif.
“If it were anything else, but I can’t… disobey the queen.”
“Of course not. I suppose that is the correct answer.” Drides then sighed and turned to look the warden straight in the eye. “You’ve done good work here and for the Guard, Mr. Geirsten. Take that with you.”
“… Sir?”
Mesif had no time to react. Drides had opened his eye cover in a split second, and Mesif’s body-spirit link was severed nearly instantly. The heavy key ring hit the stone floor with an especially loud, rattling thud.
“What did you just do?!” Phisa exclaimed. “Mr. Drides!”
“The need to take out the Nollands outweigh the warden’s life, I’m afraid. This wasn’t something I wanted to do.”
“Haha!” Vermer laughed again. “Amazing! What amazing power! Even in a place where alchemagi is prohibited. How did you do that?”
“Another time.” Drides reached down and picked up the keys. “Vermer, I’m placing my faith in you.”
“I’m always loyal! I only live to serve, and please. If you let me out of here, I’ll be forever in your debt. Drides, was it?”
“How do we get out of here without coming back to A looking like traitors?” Trinqit questioned. “I hope you know what you’re doing.”
Drides cycled through the keys until he found a pair of silver twins. He handed one to Trinqit and led her into the service room. On opposite facing walls, two emergency gate-unlock boxes waited to be used.
“I did my research on Z before we arrived,” Drides said as Trinqit mirrored him from her side. “We will want to move quickly after this.”
“Are we placing the blame on Mesif?”
“Somehow. That’s the idea. Three… two… one…”
They turned the keys at the same time, and every door and security gate in Block 9 opened. Vermer stepped out of his cell with a wide grin.
“Shall we go?” he asked them after giving Drides a clumsy bow. “I can’t wait to enjoy a nice steak in the manor again.”
As other prisoners steadily began pushing open their doors, Drides emphasized that they really needed to get moving before a full-scale riot began and every guard in Z was summoned to quell it. Vermer had a wobble in his steps, but was able to keep up as they fled. Drides’ actions, as he expected, would have consequences. He knew that, but couldn’t begin to think about the specifics while still stuck in Aurra’s hell.
On the other side of the Block 9 ring, a tall haggard man with black hair emerged from his cell and made the halls were safe. A few prisoners were meandering about, but didn’t seem to have any violent intentions yet.
Uncertain of what was happening or why, he cautiously went through an open gate and into the section next to his, where he pushed open the third door. She was inside, just emerging from a meditative state. The two had barely ever seen each other over the past six months of their stay in Block 9, but were sometimes able to send a few whispers to one another’s minds. She seemed to have held onto a stronger mental and emotional state than he had. Surely, she must have still known the plan.
“Vadaka…” Bired murmured from the entrance. “What is this?”
She opened her eyes and stood from the cold floor. “I believe the warden is dead. There was a strong concentration of alchemagi in the block. There’s a strong likelihood that Drides was trying to free someone.”
“You’ve always been the more intuitive one.”
She turned to him—her small, shifty eyes still sharp under the black hair that nearly covered them. “This will be our only chance.”
“I didn’t think… something like this is what we were waiting for.”
“But you know we can’t leave without him.”
“Are you sure? We’ve no idea how… healthy he is.”
“Klayson escapes with us, no matter his state.”
“Very well. I won’t argue. I know where his cell is. Let’s go.”
It was a short walk to the place where Colonel Klayson had spent his nights on and off for seven years. But when the twins arrived, they saw that an unfamiliar man was already waiting by Klayson’s open door, his arms crossed as he stared into the wall. A white eyepatch covered his right eye, and though prison had aged him, he still seemed too young to have the gray hair on his head. When he noticed the twins, he turned and grunted.
“You two are the erasers, aren’t you? Heard you got yourselves tossed in here. Klayson’s in there, trying to get himself steady.”
“And who would you be?” Bired asked.
After a breath, he answered, “The idiot who shot Drides, then got his eye plucked out and lost a pair of claws. Just call me Corus.”
“Haven’t heard of you…” Vadaka replied.
“You wouldn’t have.” Corus looked around to make sure there were no other prisoners nearby before adding quietly, “I never let it out, and they never suspected, even after over a year of torture… I’m from the burrow. I’ve been trying to get back there for a while.”
“Then you may be our way back to a couple of kids we know. We have to pass on some important information.”
“We know where to get a demirriage scroll,” Bired added. “We’ve been plotting an escape. Getting into the block was part of the plan.”
Corus replied, “Huh. Really. Suppose your idea is as good as any.”
Klayson emerged from his cell, having become an old and beaten man who only wished for his freedom. He was gaunt, his legs weak and his beard long and unruly. The time since his capture in D had not been kind.
“You two may have to take turns carrying him,” Vadaka told them. “Come on. I sense a swarm of prison guards about to arrive.”
With Corus being the first to keep Klayson on his back, he placed his trust in the strange eraser twins, following close behind. He knew the odds of escaping Z, even just Block 9, were scant. But he did very much enjoy fighting the Guard at every possible moment.
“Closer!” the war photographer shouted a second time. “I have to get a closer shot if you want any of your faces to actually show up.”
“Come on, then,” Rivia said, gesturing to his commanders to pack in more tightly at the edge of the totem’s steps. “For the sake of effective propaganda, pack it in, my friends! And smile, for God sake!”
With the totem and D’s damaged skyline in view behind them, Rivia held the staff for the Angels’ flag, its emblem—two wings surrounded by a halo—waving in the wind. Viktor and Masayuki flanked him, with Tabi kneeling in front, reaching the height of Sasoire and Menin, who had come down from the Red Tenor for the sake of an important image. Osk, Xavier, Pip, Dak, Kyler, and several other higher officers filled up the remaining space, but Rivia still wasn’t quite satisfied.
“We need more,” he told the photographer, and then looked around. “Where’s Major Finx and Zalatrya? Join us, there’s room!”
Hearing their names being called, the rairer and her rider took a break from hauling a supply wagon and came over.
“Ah, Zala, I suppose you’ll have to fit in the back,” Major Finx told her. “And do look at the camera. You remember what those are, right?”
She chirped and got in behind everyone, where she took a seat on the top step and lowered her head until it was just above Viktor and his horse. The older paradigm looked up at her, still a little nervously.
“Finx, your helmet,” Rivia said.
“Right, of course,” the major replied, then removed it and held it at his side. “Wait until Izae sees this one. She’ll be quite jealous.”
“Your sister doesn’t envy you as much as she used to, Poret,” Xavier informed him. “I do wish that my team could be here, though.”
“Clean-up is important,” Sasoire replied. “We need to be rid of the opportunists before they start taking potshots at us next. And you’ll need to rejoin your squad as soon as we’re done here. I’ve heard the west is infested.”
“Y-yes, ma’am…”
“Room for one more, I think,” Rivia continued, and then waved to Harken, who looked surprised by the invite. “Yes, you, Harken. Get in here. Today we celebrate our unity. This is your victory, as well.”
The former leader of Guardfall strode over, his large gauntlet-claws perhaps the most imposing sight in the photograph, even more so than the rairer snorting behind everyone. On cue, they gave their determined smiles for an image that would be passed around to millions as propaganda for many months to come. A loud shutter opened and closed, and it was done.
“And that’s that…” Rivia said and handed the flagstaff over to Osk, who would make sure it was properly planted. After he looked around at the efforts to clean up and establish an operating base in the area, and as the officers went their separate ways, he looked at Viktor and sighed. “We were so close to capturing those three. The damage we could have done…”
“Still a tremendous accomplishment,” he grumbled back.
“I had no idea that Anneise could even use the kugelblitz spell. I don’t believe it’s been seen since… Ah, hell, enough statistics and numbers. I need to sit down. Mr. Wulf, I’ll leave things in your hands here for now.”
“I’ll make sure we don’t lose this City again. Rest easy, sir.”
Observing the historical moment from her place near the photographer, now folding up his tripod, was the young solar adept who fought for the Angels. After she watched Sasoire and Masayuki shake hands, she decided to take a stroll around the battlefield, to see what there was to see before it was all fixed up and the Angels took their foothold.
She wandered past the tables serving stew, the just-established medical tents, and a cleanup crew moving rubble, and soon found herself on the outskirts of the plaza. It was here that she noticed a scrap of clothing below, inching across the street every time a gust of wind blew by. Seeing an emblem patch that was very well known to her, she picked it up.
Charred by a blast, she tried her best to clean off the soot so that the Evirtide insignia was a little more visible and respectable. What a tragedy, she thought, that it had once belonged to one of her peers.
