The task on hand was to the sea as the royal siblings and Alex stood on the deck with Lucina along with them as Alex breathed in the salty air now coursing around them. "Ah, take it all in! Breathtaking... Somehow our troubles feel a lifetime away out here."
"Yet in truth, we're headed straight toward them..." Alex frowned with a nod as he pushed off from the railing to rejoin them in the center of the ship, most of the ships were of a skeleton crew, so that was an issue, if they tried to engage the troops from Val in full. "I should be grateful the Plegians delivered us this fleet, as promised. But it's my first time on a vessel, and my legs... I never fancied myself a sea captain." Alex nodded as, when he started to feel the sway and movement, the ship was a beast of itself, but he adjusted as Lucina joined.
"This is my first voyage as well. In my time, all ships were destroyed. Smashed to pieces, along with their ports."
"Lucina..." The time-displaced daughter looked to her father as he spoke. "Something I've been meaning to ask... After you stopped Emm's assassination... Why didn't you stay with us?" She grimaced with resting a hand on her blade as she spoke in return.
"I felt I had no other choice. I could not risk altering history any more than necessary. I sought only to divert events that directly led to Grima's return." Still, Alex knew that they were making waves from the future that she saw, so changing the future was in order at best as Lissa joined the conversation.
"Hey, so wait—what about the guys who tried to kill Chrom in the gardens? What would've happened if you didn't save him?"
"He would have been gravely wounded. And those wounds would have played a part in the tragedies to come."
"Whoa! Good thing you changed things, huh?"
"If indeed they have changed... The river of time always favors its original course." Alex frowned at that, was it time that favored her death? No, that Mad King was the one and that answered little to the Risen as Lucina spoke. "Take the exalt's death... I stalled it, yes, but in the end I was not able to prevent it." Alex hummed as the cause of death was different actually. If Emm had been slain at Ylisstol, that would have followed Lucina's doomed future, but she took her own life in Plegia, so she shouldn't have to punish herself for it.
"...You did what you could." Chrom voiced as Lucina started to beat herself up.
"I was so certain it was over. That I'd saved the world. But time simply found another way back to its course. Perhaps the task is simply too great... Perhaps if I'd done something differently? I replay events in my head, over and over..."
"Oh, for Naga's sake..." Alex groaned before he slapped the back of her head as Chrom yelped.
"Alex!" Lucina didn't voice it before Alex gripped her shoulders and spoke.
"You did something different than what was meant to be done, did Emm die? Yes, but she wasn't killed by Plegia, she took her own life in changing Plegia's views, we have got Risen gunning for Chrom to weaken him or harm him, but we have been keeping him protected, end of story." Lucina blinked in surprise as he spoke. "You keep running those events in your head, you are going to keep looping, so instead know how the story is told and how the change could be done, it is as simple as a word of warning or a note of caution, it can be as grand as a statement or a lecture, you didn't fail Emm or Chrom, you changed how the story is told, not kept in stone." He held on before releasing as Lucina blinked before she cleared her throat.
"...Right... this is the first time you lectured me like that..." Alex nodded as Chrom approached a more sensitive topic.
"...Do you know how I die?"
"Only rumors... I was told you fell in a great battle, fought to sway your destiny. ...And that you were murdered—betrayed by someone dear to you." A ringing pain echoed through Alex's head and he groaned to their attention as he spoke.
"That was... terrible timing... and I hate it..." He rubbed the bridge of his nose as he spoke. "Continue, Lucina, before I see if magical spells blasted into my skull will snap this headache out of commission." Lucina nodded as she had seen the spells and knew that, if he was interested in doing that to himself, then whatever was affecting him was dire, but it did silence the headache right quick as she spoke.
"After your murder and Grima's return, I took the name Marth and fought back. I prayed to the Hero-King for a small part of the strength he used to save the world." She withdrew the pieces of the mask as she spoke on before walking to the railing and tossing the pieces off the ship. "But I need this subterfuge no longer. I choose to fight as Lucina now. The name that reminds me of the strength in the man and woman who chose it."
"A strength shared by the woman who bears it." She nodded as the two headed off as Alex groaned with rubbing his skull as Lissa spoke.
"Are you okay, should I get Libra to help ease that headache?"
"Tharja is MORE likely to hex me clean of it first, Lissa." She chuckled with a small measure from him before he spoke. "I'll be fine, I'll tell you if it gets any worse, but for now, we have a foe to handle." She nodded as she headed in and he looked out to the sea, trying to take a look and see the coming ships as another pair of boots approached and came to a halt when he spoke. "I don't like it, nor should you, but it is clear that, during my continued existence, measures were taken to ensure my obedience, killing me should be enough to put that threat to an end, but should it be my death or the act of rejecting fate itself that breaks the cycle..." He hummed and turned back around to walk past Lucina. "Focus on Valm, we will deal with the other side later." He continued on, but Amirg relayed that Lucina loosened her grip on the Falchion and nodded while Alex relaxed in his quarters...
Fredrick soon had news and it was not good. "The Pegasus knights report the Valmese fleet matches ours, ship for ship."
"Your tone tells me this is not good news."
"Their troops vastly outnumber ours. Our vessels are half-full, at best. But every Valmese ship is packed from stem to stern with soldiers."
"If we attempt to board them in a straight fight, we'll be slaughtered." Chrom looked to Alex as he continued with a smirk. "...No matter how much the Shepherds are 'radiant avengers at the behest of Naga'." Alex groaned as he slammed his head into the map table to Basilio and Flavia's surprise.
"Chrom... you have been listening to Libra about our skills, do NOT listen to the Naga priest for one second about how strong we are nowadays..." Flavia changed the topic as she spoke.
"We've little choice but to try anyway. Plegia had no men to spare, but they were generous with other supplies... including oil." She glanced to the raising grandmaster as she continued. "Perhaps a clever tactician could find a use for that." Alex thought it through as he hummed.
"Hmm... Perhaps he could."
"If we can put their ships to flame, they'd have nowhere to escape to. We could—"
"You could roast us all like hams! Are you truly so eager to die, woman?!"
"Do you have a better idea, oaf?!" Flavia snapped back as she spoke. "...The problem is we have no catapults. Hmm... How to get the lit oil on their decks without our own ships getting caught in the blaze?" Alex stopped on that and spoke.
"Flavia... if I wasn't already married and was interested in you, I would have kissed you..." The trio looked at him in surprise. "Plegia gave us numbers in boats, but we don't have the manpower to fill those ships, but with the oil, we are going to turn the Valmese forces ablaze." He raised a finger as he spoke. "Problem, we need to find the central figure of command for Valm to sever their messages and give them pause of time, this is the part where I say 'Strongest team boards lead ship and kills general, optional head being Chrom, and pauses for interruption'..."
"Yes, I AM the prince, so no one can order me NOT to go. I will lead the assault!" He blinked before he exclaimed to the Khan's chuckling. "OH COME ON!" Alex himself smirked as he spoke.
"Then this plan WILL succeed, Valm trifles with the wrong company." Chrom chuckled himself after calming down.
"Heh... So much has changed since we found you that day, lying in the open field... Hard to believe you determine the fate of our entire army now...our entire people. Destiny has a strange way." Alex frowned before he spoke.
"...No, Chrom. Not destiny."
"What?" Chrom blinked as Alex spoke.
"We're not pawns of some scripted fate. I believe we're more. Much more."
"How do you mean?"
"There's something between us all. Something that keeps us together... Like... invisible ties, connecting us. Giving us strength... WE forged these ties. WE strengthen them. If we preserve them, or break them, it will be by our choices, not some 'destiny'..."
"...Alex..." Chrom chuckled as he spoke. "I think this salty air might have gone to your head, hah!" He rolled his eyes as he spoke.
"All right, all right—perhaps enough philosophy for one day... There are still details to discuss."
"Indeed there are! And preparations to be made! Oh, and, Alexander... If we are all bound by these invisible ties, I thank the gods it's with you." He nodded as Chrom spoke. "Now then, everyone! Look lively! We have work to do!" Alex detailed the plan and readied the selected ships, the Shepherds primed to take out the lead and the other ships would follow their lead.
But it was a slight battle with three ships supporting Valm against their one, but Valm was just a mass of bodies, in armor and on horse back, they were little match to the Shepherds as they cleaved through the numbers that swarmed from the decks and TRIED to kill them across gangplanks, but they were weak and fell into disarray once their 'mighty' command of a General fell before Chrom exclaimed.
"Alex! Their general has fallen! I'm giving the signal! All appointed ships, change course! Head right at them! Ramming speed!" The raised flag of red was the signal as a number of ships changed course to ram into the numbers as a soldier exclaimed.
"...Gods and thunder! Any second now!"
"Steady... Steaaaady..." They gripped the rope in reacting before the soldier shouted.
"We're right on top of them!"
"NOW! JUUUMP!" The forces jumped off as the ships formed a line of wrecked vessels against the Valm Navy, some of the fools laughing at the naivety of their opponents before Alex surfaced with a breath.
"Tharja! Morgan!" Both Sorceress and Dark Mage called forward a powerful fire spell as both shouted, from one of the spare ships.
"Arcfire!" The inferno surged and caught one of the ramming ships on fire, but it surged on and Valm realized too late as the fire caught life and the sea erupted into flames and explosions as Lissa surfaced as well in a shout.
"The sea itself is on fire!"
"It worked! It worked!" Fredrick shouted as the party that went on the run, all wearing light armor over heavy armor and on horseback, were quickly pulled onto the spare ships as Flavia laughed at the tactic done.
"Only you could hatch such a brilliant scheme, Alex. Who else would desert half our vessels and turn them into flaming cannonballs?" Alex snorted at the term as they were actually called 'fireships', but left it alone to snuggle with Tharja who groaned to the wet tactician. "And there was still enough room on the remaining ships for all our troops. It was so simple, and yet the Valmese never saw it coming. They never considered anyone might be willing to sacrifice half a fleet..." Chrom ran a hand through his hair as Sumia swooned over him as he looked forward as the sea blazed, but a path was made clear through and toward the great land.
"We may have won the day, but the war still looms. We must continue on and seize control of their main harbour."
"Aye, boy! I've had enough of the smoke and smell here for one lifetime, besides."
"Full speed for Valm!" With the waters cleared for them, the joint forces headed on to fight Valm on their soil, knowing that this war could be a great and devastating one in the end...