Chapter 46: The Outpost
The Salvation
A lot had happened since that night they'd broken into JSI, and Hidden found it almost hard to believe that they'd only been aboard the Salvation for about half a month. Cyberpunk battle arenas, magic challenge towers, zombie apocalypses, it seemed like they'd seen it all, and then some. The next timeline appeared to be somewhat tame, if Luna's words were true, but beyond that, who knew what else lay ahead on their long road home?
Hidden watched the metal doors of the elevator slide shut, the small chamber jolting as it lifted him up to the topmost level of the Salvation. Most of the others were already waiting for him in the bridge (aside from Darkstalker, who was still unconscious in his bunk). Krill and the other Ricky had offered to handle the refugees in the hanger, as they would be more likely to trust dragons from their own timeline over the ones that had barged in and wrecked their town.
How come Ricky gets all the cool doppelgangers? Hidden wondered, as the light humming of the elevator's motor slowly died away, its doors sliding open to reveal the wide hallways of the Salvation's upper level. He tried to imagine what other versions of him could be out there as he made his way to the bridge. There were so many possibilities: bulky meathead Hidden, mad scientist Hidden.
On second thought, maybe one of me is enough. Hidden concluded, grinning.
The Salvation's bridge soon came into view, the swirling blue vortex of the slipstream clearly visible through the wide window stretching across three of the chamber's walls. Xavier and Ricky both stood in front of the main control panel at the end of the central walkway, turning to Hidden as he entered. Luna stood to Hidden's right, leaning against the wall next to one of the side doors leading to the hull of the ship. Lin stood to his left next to the entry archway, the Reggie-tron laying just beyond her, Reggie and Maple sitting on its metal back.
"So, everybody's here then?" Xavier began, "Well, except for you know who."
"What, is his name taboo now?" Hidden asked sarcastically, "Actually, what should we call him? I mean, if there are so many Darkstalkers out there, then we'll need some kind of nickname to keep him from getting confused with the others."
"I don't see any reason to worry about that." Lin remarked, "He'll probably run off with one of the shuttles soon, and we'll likely never see him again after that. So why even bother?"
Luna sighed, an uncertain look on her face, stepping away from the wall. "He's not leaving until I am, and I'm not leaving 'till Lin and I can finish our fight." She eyed her bandaged leg, the bite wound likely having a few more days to heal.
"Guys, can we get back on topic now?" Xavier asked, motioning to the slipstream swirling before them. "We're going to be arriving at this Alliance base any minute now, and we need a plan for how we're going to deal with all of the refugees."
"Couldn't we just inform the guys running the place of our situation, and have them call in someone who can take care of refugees for us?." Hidden suggested.
"Yeah...about that…." Luna began, "You guys aren't a registered evacuation crew, so the Alliance will probably take you in for questioning when they come to pick up the refugees. And when they find out about this little adventure of yours…."
"What, we're not going to get into some serious trouble, are we?" Xavier nervously asked, casting a wary glance at the swirling vortex ahead of them.
"No, but there'll be a lot of formalities as they work out how to incorporate your timeline, and decide whether any of the others you've visited need to be contacted as well." Luna explained, Xavier letting out a brief sigh of relief. "Oh, and there'll also be mountains of annoying paperwork."
Hidden didn't like the sound of mountains of paperwork, but what troubled him more was the "incorporation" Luna had spoken of. Something about it gave off domineering vibes, though perhaps that was to be expected with a multiverse spanning government. Moons, they even appeared to have an insurrection on their talons!
Hidden's thought was cut short by the abrupt dispersal of the slipstream, a vast sea of rolling hills stretching out beyond it. Coniferous trees dotted the rocky slopes, and for a second Hidden wondered if they were back in the Claws. That was at least, until he spotted towering, rounded off peaks lining the horizon in the distance.
They were in Northwestern Pantala, nearing the mountain range that made up the continent's most striking vista. Hidden could just barely make out Earthworm River twisting its way through the smooth hills like a snake, slithering off toward the ocean to the north.
"The base is just down there." Luna mentioned, stepping over to the window and pointing to a large structure built into the side of one of the hills, "Though, it's really not much more than an outpost." The others gathered up at the end of the central walkway, staring down at the structure.
For an outpost, it was surprisingly large. A wide metal landing strip stretched between two of the larger hills, a large hanger connecting it to the main structure. The base itself seemed to consist of four wide, flat levels, gradually sloping up the side of the hill, and likely extending deeper into it. A large steel tower stretched up from the top of the hill, various pieces of communications equipment hanging from the crisscrossing metal beams that formed its structure.
"Most of it's underground, mainly storage and stuff." Luna explained. "I passed through here a while back, the operating crew seemed friendly enough."
Outpost my tail! Hidden thought, staring down at the structure, its bright white and grey surfaces contrasting with the sea of lush green grass surrounding it. The above ground portion of the base was already far larger than that of JSI, even if most of it was taken up by the landing strip, and who knew how deep underground it went.
Hidden winced at the thought of the tech lab he used to work for. There was no doubt that they'd face some serious consequences for running off with the Salvation. The ship would likely be confiscated upon their return, and they'd be placed under quarantine while the JSI staff ran various precautionary tests on them. Beyond that, there was the inevitable disciplinary action; Hidden had already given up on the idea of returning to his job, though frankly, he didn't quite care about that anymore.
Still, if they didn't play their cards right, he, Ricky, Xavier and Reggie might never be able to go to another timeline again.
Of course, there was also the more pressing concern of how the alliance could factor into all of this, and depending on how things turned out, JSI could become less of an issue. Hidden still preferred to deal with JSI over the Alliance, of course. At least the smoke-breathers in charge there were predictable.
The soft sound of talons pitter-pattering down the Salvation's upper halls dragged Hidden out of his train of thought. The whole group turned to see Krill darting into the bridge, breathlessly panting as he leaned against the archway connecting it to the hall.
"You...you guys…*wheeze*…gotta come...quickly…." the pale SeaWing gasped through heavy breaths, "It's the IceWings!"
Hidden and Luna shared a brief look of concern, before darting off after the SeaWing, Lin following close behind. The four dragons piled into the main elevator, Hidden groaning as Lin's wing jabbed into his side, and Luna accidentally stepped on one of his foretalons.
He briefly glanced back at his tail, carefully raised above the others to keep them from accidentally getting scratched by the poisonous barb at its tip. He'd left the barb bag he'd bought back in Moss Town in his and Ricky's bunk.
Thankfully, the elevator's doors soon slid back open, the four quickly squeezing out of the cramped chamber and dashing through the Salvation's lower level, Krill and Lin now leading the way. Hidden briefly glanced through the open archways leading to the hanger as they ran past, the mass of dragons gathered inside watching them in confusion and worry.
They eventually arrived at the med-bay, where Lin had dragged all of the unconscious IceWings for the time being. About thirty or so of the icy dragons filled the chamber, tightly packing it to near capacity. They were no longer unconscious, instead jittering and twitching violently, their chests convulsing as their heads whipped from side to side in a wild display.
"What in the Empress' name is going on here?!" Lin asked, a look of confused terror crossing her face as she stared at the squirming sea of white and blue.
"I-I don't know!" Krill whimpered, shaking his head, "They just started doing this when we arrived in this world!"
Luna sighed, taking a step through the med-bay door, before quickly pulling back as an IceWing's tail lashed across her path. "It's the enchantment." she explained, "It's probably not compatible with this timeline, and is going haywire as a result."
"So, what do we do about it?!" Hidden frantically asked, mentally scolding himself for not considering the danger of the IceWing's mind controlling enchantment breaking down between timelines.
"There are plenty of timelines out there that don't have magic, and some that remove any exotic magic upon entry. I thought this was one of those." Luna replied, wincing as she watched one of the convulsing IceWings roll off of one of the cots. An idea sparked in the back of Hidden's mind, and he quickly began rummaging through the polyester bag on his foreleg.
"If we take them to one of those timelines, will it stop...this?" Lin asked, gesturing to the IceWings.
Luna shook her head. "It would, but they'll probably be dead by the time we got there."
Hidden grinned, pulling out a small spherical device from his bag, a thin groove carved around its circumference. He pressed a button on the end of one of its halves, a holographic keypad appearing before him.
"Wait...is that…?" Luna began, noticing the device in Hidden's talons. "You had it on you all along!"
Hidden chuckled, briefly glancing at the skyfire bracelet that was still stuck around his left foreleg. Darkstalker's little gift had aided in their escape twice now.
"What's a code for one of those magic nullifying timelines you were talking about?" Hidden quickly asked, turning to Luna.
The SilkWing paused for a moment, thinking, before saying "03-485. I'm sure that's one."
"Here's hoping…." Hidden mumbled, as he punched the timeline's code into the holographic keypad, as well as a radius value that would easily encompass the entire med-bay. He tapped the button on the device's end, the keypad vanishing as he did, and squeezed the two halves of the device together, hurling it into the center of the mass of IceWings.
The device clattered onto the floor, and for a moment, Hidden wondered if it was a dud, before a transparent bubble soon began to spread out from it. Hidden felt an odd sensation pass over him as he slipped through the edge of the rapidly expanding bubble, a slight chill running through him as his body adjusted to the rules of timeline 03-485.
The IceWing's twitching and squirming gradually subsided as they slipped into the distorted reality within the bubble, their erratic breaths evening out. The four dragons standing at the entrance to the med-bay let out a collective sigh of relief, before noticing the confused stares they were receiving from the now awoken IceWings.
Less than a minute after the bubble had reached its maximum size, it rapidly began to shrink back into the device, soon disappearing entirely. A puzzled, half awake IceWing picked up the device, looking it over as he rubbed his sore neck.
"So, now that that's dealt with, why don't we go say hi to our Alliance friends down there?" Hidden asked, eager to offload the refugees before any more problems like this arose. The others nodded, Hidden and Luna heading back to the bridge while Krill and Lin stuck behind to deal with the IceWings.
It was finally time for them to meet the Alliance face to face, and Hidden could already feel himself growing excited at the thought of it.
Alliance Storage Depot 56
10:24 A.M.
The main hangar of the outpost was built just off of the side of its massive landing strip, stretching far back into the hillside, its roof extending up all four above ground floors of the structure. A small, automated transport trolley shot by as Hidden and Luna came in for a landing inside of the hanger, zipping off into a tunnel leading deeper into the outpost.
A few other ships were parked inside, none even half as big as the Salvation, Dragons walked to and fro as they loaded and unloaded cargo, and performed maintenance on the vessels. Hidden grinned, spotting another SteelWing amongst the workers, looking like a bulkier, more industrial version of the Reggie-tron, its copper colored plating stained with oil and grease.
A loud creaking noise suddenly reverberated through the hanger, and Hidden quickly turned back to see the Salvation, which had touched down nearby on the landing strip, slowly moving towards them. He looked down, and noticed that the metal floor plates that covered most of the hanger and landing strip were shifting about, gradually moving the Salvation into the hanger's interior.
"Moons, it's like the whole place is one giant omnidirectional conveyor system!" Hidden remarked, marveling at the technology on display. He started to grow transfixed watching the plates move about, his mind racing to piece together their pattern. They seemed to form a complex network of shifting square tiles, able to be manipulated in any way thanks to small slots along the base of the hanger's walls that allowed them to slide in and out of use on a whim. Did they run on magnets, or some kind of complex track system? Or perhaps a….
Luna nudged Hidden with one of her wings, snapping him out of his pondering. She nodded toward a MudWing making his way over to the two, rubbing his eyes as if he had just been awoken from a restful nap. Hidden shot a brief glance back at the Salvation, having stopped just before it could fully enter the hanger thanks to its immense propulsion ring, and turned to follow Luna to meet with the MudWing.
"Luna…? Is that you?" The MudWing yawned. He was a short, stocky dragon, with orangish brown scales and a dark tan underbelly and wings. A holographic PDA similar to Luna's was hooked around one ear, a large silver hoop earring dangling from the other.
"Yeah Flounder, it's me. And this is Hidden." Luna replied, Hidden lifting a talon to wave hello.
The MudWing squinted his tired eyes, staring at Hidden skeptically for a moment, before turning to the Salvation. "You've been busy, haven't you?" he asked, scratching behind a white fabric collar around his neck, a metal badge attached to it displaying his name and position as lead operator of the outpost. "What's this all about anyway?"
"Well, you see." Hidden interjected, stepping forward. "My buds and I are from one of those "non-interference" timelines, and…."
Luna quickly grabbed Hidden by the wing blade and pulled him back, whispering into his ear. "What are you doing?"
"Relax." Hidden replied, "It's not like there's any reason to hold back the truth here. We need his help, and telling him everything would build his trust in us. It'd be worse if there were some sort of misunderstanding anyway."
Luna sighed, but didn't argue. Flounder stood staring at the two, looking as if all he wanted in the world was to return to his slumber.
"So anyway, we found this ship here in our timeline." Hidden continued.
"Stole." Luna corrected.
"By accident. And we've been trying to find our way home. Though, along the way we rescued a bunch of dragons from the clutches of Darkstalker...well, a Darkstalker. There's actually another Darkstalker on our ship, but he's got these weird cybernetic implants and…."
"Woah woah woah, you what?" Flounder asked, interrupting Hidden's tangent.
"Oh, don't worry, that Darkstalker wasn't actually from that timeline, so it had already been "interfered" with." Hidden quickly explained, "Though, we did kinda bump him out of his own timeline when we passed through it about a week and a half ago. But we had to in order to escape his magic sitcom curse!"
Luna groaned, rubbing her forehead with one of her talons. She stepped between Hidden and Flounder, the MudWing looking completely lost.
"It's...a long story. One that's not exactly relevant at the current moment." she explained, turning back to Hidden as she said this.
The SandWing held up his talons apologetically, stepping back as Luna began to discuss their plan with the captain of the outpost. Admittedly, Hidden wasn't the best at explaining these sorts of things, but if Flounder just heard their story, then surely he'd be more than willing to help them, right?
"I don't know...your situation is certainly unique, but…." Flounder grumbled.
"Come on, remember when I helped with your scale-nipper problem last year?" Luna asked.
"And remember when I bailed you out when you were caught flying over that weapons depot?" Flounder retorted.
A sudden, monumental bang caught the attention of every dragon in the hanger, and swiftly ended the SilkWing and MudWing's argument. Hidden quickly sprinted out of the hangar, spotting a massive silver vessel making a beeline for the landing strip, small swirls of smoke seeping out of its banged up hull. The ship was even larger than the Salvation, by about seventy to eighty percent by Hidden's estimate. Long cylindrical canons poked out of various crevices in its angular hull, reminding Hidden of the numerous warships they'd seen on their harrowing trip through the front lines.
"Great, him again..." Flounder groaned, he and Luna stepping up beside Hidden, watching as the ship's bottom thrusters gradually slowed its downward momentum, its landing gear extending as it prepared to land.
"Who?" Hidden asked, as the giant wheels of the plummeting vessel's landing gear ground against the metal plated landing strip.
"General Spottail of the 42nd division." Founder groaned, sounding doubtful about the validity of the title. "This is the third time this month that he's come here in such a state. Moons only know how he got his position in the first place."
"Hey, Luna." Hidden began, staring at the massive ship as it slowed to a stop on the landing strip. "What are the odds that an Alliance general would know where to find our timeline?"
"It's possible." Luna replied, excitement welling up inside of Hidden at her response. "Generals generally have access to the Alliance's private navigation network, which has information about many of the non-interference timelines in the central and middle multiverse."
Hidden held back a snicker at Luna's statement, watching as a light blue SeaWing with bright red spots running along the sides of his body and tail glided down from the vessel's bridge.
If all went well, he, Ricky, Xavier and Reggie could be on their way home a lot sooner than they'd anticipated.
AN:
New cover! This is one I made all on my own, and it's the final cover of this story, specially designed to reflect the finale. I'm pretty proud of how it turned out, even if it's not as fancy and polished as other custom covers out there.
This begins the second to last episode, and the build up to the finale. Not sure if I'll be able to upload chapters every week or not, with school starting back up soon and me currently dealing with some mental health stuff. I want to try not to stress myself out too much, especially with the Reddit contest added to writing this story. I've already written most of the next chapter and a bit of the one after that, so hopefully that bit of a head start will help.
I'll be posting the info about the Finale Contest on the WoF Subreddit shortly after uploading this chapter, so be sure to check that out if you're interested!
Who is this "General Spottail", and will he be able to help Hidden and the others get home? Find out in the next chapter of Wings of Fire: Salvation! Stay tuned!
