DISCLAIMER: I DO NOT OWN ANYTHING OR ANYONE IN THE SPYRO UNIVERSE. ONLY MY OCS.
Chapter 37: Brother Against Brother
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Joshua angled his wings and fought the air currents to try and catch up with his brother. Though Bertram was inexperienced on the wing, he was smaller than his brother and thus faster. Plus, the fact that his wingspan was absolutely incredible. Had he been at a higher altitude, a mere glance would have made people on the ground think he was an airplane. The fact that all his life his wings had been tucked at his sides had only added to the appearance that his wings were stunted.
He spared a glance towards the Gigantic which had finished surfacing and was now readying its weapons. He was amazed to see armor plates lifting up and revealing not only an enclosed room, probably for observing, but also revealing turrets that slid forward to ready their cannons. The enemy patrol boats below had aborted their runs and instead had retreated to the side of the Gigantic and began firing their anti-air weaponry upwards at both him and his brother.
Bertram, oblivious to the AA fire directed at him continued his westward course. It wasn't until he had a flak shell burst several feet above him that he finally growled and then looked down at the patrol boats. Then he decided they weren't worth the effort and corrected his course to simply avoid them. This turn allowed Josh to catch up to him.
"Bertram! Bertram! Grr...BERTRAM! I know you can hear me! Change course now and return to the carrier!" Bertram acted like he didn't hear him but he could see an annoyed tick at the end of his tail. This was Bertram's tell. Whenever he was a child, and got mad, or caught in a lie, his tail tip would start twitching. In human form, he was impossible to read but in dragon form he was akin to an open book.
A right twitch meant he heard but was intentionally ignoring you, a downward twitch meant he was lying, and left twitch meant he was thinking of something else and an upwards twitch...well...if the tail twitched upwards, that meant Bertram had reached the end of his rope and was about to fly off the handle.
Josh closed with his brother, watching his tail tip for a tell of what he intended to do. So far it was twitching right. Then suddenly, it twitched up and Josh prepared to go on the defensive. Bertram twisted in midair, eyed wide and glowing fiercely as he used his forward momentus to fly at his brother.
Josh remembered one time when he had been in an accident when he was at the Academy. He had broken four ribs as well as his right arm. The pain had been excruciating.
Being speared mid-air by his own brother hurt three times worse and involuntarily made Josh gasp as the air was forced from his lungs.
The two brothers were a tangle of claws, wings, tails and fangs as they fell until Josh finally managed to disengage and counterattack. He didn't intend for his attacks to draw blood but in the spur of the moment he struck without restraint and felt his right forearm caught Bertram on the left shoulder, splitting the scales and carving grooves that started bleeding. Bertram roared in pain and retaliated by trying to bite at his brother's neck. Josh ducked and twisted to avoid the bite and swung his long tail around like a whip and tried to wrap it around Bertram's neck.
It was his hope that if he could cut off blood circulation, he could force his brother into unconsiousness and thus make him easier to carry back to the carrier.
That was not the case.
Bertram surprised Josh by letting go, falling, then with a strong wingbeat, brought his maw up and bit down on Josh's tail hard. He grimaced at the pain but then used his hind leg to kick Bertram off his tail. Gazing back, he was shocked to see a fang still lodged in his tail and then looked back to his brother.
"Bertram! Get a hold of yourself! Do you realize what you're doing?!"
Bertram didn't answer but instead he snarled angrily and launched himself at Josh again who dodged the attack and came back around and slammed Bertram from behind. He watched as his brother righted himself, then took off towards Peninsula City. Not skipping a beat, Josh changed course and followed. A siren made him look back and saw the first of the rockets launch from the submarine and start angling towards the city.
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Dieter had just gone up when he saw Bertram turn and start attacking Josh and he couldn't help but worry. Most stories he'd heard about dragons fighting one another either ended with one or both of them gravely wounded or even killed. Then moments later, he heard the radio come on with Anne's voice.
"This is Commander Anne Roberts, Executive Officer of the Leviathan. In the Captain's absense, I am in command. Our priority is the enemy submarine. Major Muntz, while the bombers are readying on the deck, you and your fighters clear the skies so that they can attack unhindered. Our own fighters will be in a CAP over the fleet to prevent any aerial torpedo attacks."
"Black Knight copies. Alright First Wing, we're going after the 11th. Weapons hot."
Dieter saw the enemy formation coming in. The shield formation was a tough formation to break through but not impossible. He knew how bomber crews were trained and how Captain Kronan would react to the attack. He keyed the radio.
"All fighters, we need to split the formation. The only way to break a shield is to go around and come at it from all sides. The enemy escort will stress themselves to intercept everyone and the bombers will panic and seperate but try to continue their run. SOP for bombing runs is ignore the attackers, push the raid." Suddenly, the radio came on with a panicked alert.
"This is the destroyer escort, RNV Clipper, the enemy submarine is launching rockets! Looks to be four airborne! They're on a course for the city!"
"Black Knight to Bishop and Rook, break formation with me and we'll go after the rockets. Snowman, you're in command of the formation. Remember, come at the shield from all sides and the defense will splinter."
"Snowman copies wingleader. Good hunting!"
Dieter pushed the throttle of the jet as far forward as it would go and felt the now familiar lurch as the speedometer shot past the 400mph mark and then steadied near the 540 mark.
"Rook, Bishop, there's a chance these rockets might detonate when fired upon, so for safety's sake, lead them from a safe distance and make sure you don't get caught in any potential blast radius."
"Bishop copies. Same goes to you boss."
"Rook here, don't you try that shit you pulled when you were fighting Bertram in Concurrent Skies."
Dieter chuckled then gazed as the closest rocket came into the maximum range of his cannons. The rocket looked to be going about the same speed as the jet. He eased the rudder into a right yaw that brought the rocket in line with the extreme edge of the target sight. He clicked the safety off of the cannons.
(Please don't let this blow up in my face...Josh...I hope you can bring Bertram back before this gets any worse...)
He fired the cannons.
The rounds sped true and impacted the rocket all along the length of the fuselage. To Dieter's surprise, he saw sparks start flying from out of a broken panel and saw a mysterious object inside spinning wildly as if trying to steady and correct itself. He fired another burst into the rocket, this time striking the object in the body as well as the engine.
The gyroscope, damaged beyond all hope of repair, was shattered by that last blast, destroying the rocket's stability. The engines, also damaged, gave one last burst of blue-white flames, sputtered, then died. The rocket, now without guidance or propulsion, fell from the sky like a large bomb, impacting the sea below and detonating with the force.
Dieter spared a glance and saw Wolff and Voss down their targets as well and then gazed around for the last rocket. He saw it and paled. As he and his group had been engaging the other three, the fourth one slipped by and was now almost on top of the city. More frightening, Josh and Bertram's brawl had taken them to the edge of the city.
Right in the path of the rocket.
Another siren blared and Dieter looked back to see the rockets start firing off like crazy from the sub.
"Oh shit..."
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Josh had managed time and again to catch up with Bertram only to have him slip through his claws and go out of range again. He strained his wings, pushing himself forward through the air with all his might and was almost on top of his brother when he heard a roaring and looked down under him and went absolutely wide-eyed. Hurriedly, he flapped upwards and dodged just in the nick of time as a rocket from the sub came roaring past making a bee-line for the city.
Josh had just enough time to shout a warning to Bertram when the rocket sailed over the wall, much to the horror of the defenders who had been manning their positions, and then dove and came down almost vertically into the old part of the city.
Time slowed to a crawl as Josh looked on, a sick sense of dread and horror growing in his chest, also a feeling of what was going to happen.
What kind of weapon was that?
What kind of explosive was it armed with?
How much damage will it do to the city?
How many people will it kill?
Time returned to normal and then a loud explosion rattled Josh's teeth. Then he gasped at the location of the impact: Dalon's Tower.
After the Dalon Conflict, the people who had been outside the city when it was gassed, moved back in, buried their dead, and then debated as to what to do with the eyesores that had been Dalon's factories, his facilities, and lastly his tower. The factories had been torn down and replaced with other, less poluting industrial buildings, the facilities and offices became commercial buildings and Dalon's Tower had been repurposed into a large, free-standing, residential tower.
Sirens in the city blared as fires burned where the rocket had impacted near the base of the tower. The large double doors had been blown off their hinges and people were running, screaming, from the tower. From his vantage point, Josh could see the cracks that ran along the streets and also saw a large fissure near the bottom of the structure.
Bertram had also stopped and watched the rocket impact the ground and growled angrily.
"Do you see brother?! Why are you trying to stop me from ending a war in which the enemy can do this to our people and cities without consequence or remorse?!" Josh thought the answer was obvious and roared back at him.
"Because your plan is to abandon the war where you are needed and go off to your doom! Do you honestly think you can make it across occupied Schildhaven, Tellanos, and then fly across Rotiart with all the griffon eeries between the border and Shadowfell, and then land in the middle of the city, fight your way through the entire city, then the capital building, and then confront Mechanos? Brother, have you also forgotten about the bounty that was placed on your head? You'd only be flying to your death!"
Bertram was about to reply when a rumbling noise was heard. The two brother stopped long enough to glance at the tower and saw the foundation break open with an ear-splitting CRACK! and then the tower started shifting. It was almost like watching a tree fall.
The foundation continued cracking and the weight of the building pushed it down and as it became unbalanced, or listed, more and more to the side until finally there was nothing stopping it. Bertram's mind snapped back to clarity as the tower fell and he hastily eyed the streets and saw people running in all directions. He watched along with his brother, transfixed in horror, as the tower ruptured mid-fall, raining metalwork, masonry, glass, furniture, and worse of all people, on to the streets below.
As the tower came down, it left a trail of destruction stretching from the foundation across the western part of the old city, flattening a section of the outer wall, with the top eleven floors breaking from the tower and crashing into the sea at the bottom of the cliff. Bertram then turned and started west again, only to be intercepted by Josh.
"After witnessing that, you're going to abandon those who have been hurt to go off on a suicidal mission? What are you trying to do?"
Bertram abruptly turned and came at Josh again, this time, by the look in his eyes, he had decided to leave his humanity behind. He tackled Josh, bringing him down, growling as they fell.
"What do I care about people too weak to protect themselves? I have no tie to them, no one I care about is down there. Why should I put everything on hold to protect them?"
Josh, hearing this, did a midair reversal on Bertram just as they came down against an intact section of the wall, Bertram's body leaving a large impression in the stonework. Josh eyed his brother who glared back at him.
"You want to know why you should protect them? How about this, you are Bertram de Launces, the youngest son of James de Launces, King of Syllia. You are a Prince of Syllia, you are a Major in the Syllian Royal Air Force, it is your duty to protect them! They are your people! Every one of them would lay down their lives for you if you were in danger! Tell me brother, what exactly did Flaire see in you to make her come all the way from Avalon to be with you? I sure as hell know it wasn't this side of you!"
Bertram struggled and tried to avoid his brother's gaze but Josh kept him locked on him.
"Tell me...what are you afraid of most?" Bertram eyed his brother but then looked past him in shock as more rockets came barreling towards the city. Josh looked back just in time to see them and curse before two rockets struck the wall and the section they were at fell inwards onto a part of the city.
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(moments later)
Bertram came to with a large, heavy weight on his chest. He blinked his eyes to clear the dust from them and found he was looking at part of a ruined building. The stench of fear, the sound of sorrow, and wails of the bereaved pierced his senses. His eyes cleared and he saw, near the edge of the building that had broken his fall, he saw a woman cradling a small child in her arms, wailing to the skies and pleading for anyone to help her. His eyesight narrowed on the child and he saw that, no matter how much help arrived, it would do no good.
A piece of glass from the tower had pierced the child's chest like a spear, likely cutting the heart in half. His nose was suddenly filled with the scent of human blood. Looking about, he saw people lying in the rubble of the wall and the building that the wall had come down on. To his growing horror, he realized that people had tried to take shelter in the building from the collapse of the tower and had been unable to flee when the wall came down, crushing those unlucky enough to be directly under the section.
All around him, people were crying out in pain, trying to tend to the wounded, and trying to save as many as possible. He tried to breathe but then felt the weight again. Turning his head, he came snout to snout with his brother, unconscious, resting atop him, with a nasty wound to his head and his forelegs. Bertram suddenly remembered Josh seeing the rockets and hugged himself closer as to shield him from the worst of the blast and the debris.
Josh had intentionally put himself in harm's way to protect him...
Tears stung Bertram's eyes as he tried to shift his weight and get out from under his brother's form.
(You wanted to know my fears brother? I was afraid that the longer the war went on, the greater the risk that I may lose you, George, Mom, Dad, or even Flaire...) Bertram bowed his head and cried freely.
"Curse me for a fool!" He shouted, drawing the attention of the people with him. Then, he felt a hand on his foreleg and saw a young child standing with him. The parents of the child eyed him with wariness and fear. He gazed at the child who looked on with fear in his eyes.
" ...W-Why are they doing this? Why did my big brother have to die?" Bertram was taken aback and gazed again at the parents to see them craddling the still form of a young boy, maybe nine...ten years old. Bertram looked back to his brother and sighed, finally coming to his senses. He turned to the child, fear and sorrow replaced by determination.
"I don't know child...But I intend to put a stop to them."
Bertram rose, and breathed deeply and looked at his brother and then looked about.
"Can anyone here take care of my brother?" An elderly man came forward.
"I can. I was a dragon surgeon in the Dracocorps in my younger years. May I ask his name and rank?" Bertram nodded.
"Captain Joshua de Launces." The man's jaw dropped as Bertram took off and angled himself towards the submarine, just as the siren that heralded the rockets firing wailed, and Bertram saw six rockets take off and fly towards the city.
(You were right Josh...I know where I'm needed. Right here.)
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Dieter had watched several rockets impact the city and was angling to try and attack the sub before it could launch again when suddenly his student, Captain Hans Kronan, dove from out of the sun firing wildly. He gazed at his ammo counter and groaned that he only had a few dozen rounds left. He was in no shape to shoot down more rockets or get in a dogfight with his former student. He was simply evading the attacks and trying to keep an eye on the sub below.
Suddenly, the siren blared again and he saw six rockets take off from the sub and aim at the city. He keyed the radio expecting to have to order the rest of the group to attack the rockets and ignore the torpedo bombers but then he saw something almost impossible.
From out of the dust and smoke of the fallen wall, Bertram de Launces rose, eyes burning with anger and he hurled himself that the rockets.
"Attention, all vessels and planes! Captain Joshua de Launces is down! I repeat, Captain de Launces is down! Bertram is up but he's headed towards the rockets!"
"This is Commander Roberts. Do you see the Captain?"
"Negative. I lost sight of him when the wall came down and now Bertram has come up. I...I think he's back to normal." Then he saw Bertram do something absolutely crazy and he keyed it again.
"Then again, I have been wrong before..."
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Bertram closed with the group of rockets, his mind racing to come up with a way to stop them when suddenly he saw Voss dive and rake a rocket with cannonfire. The attack damaged the stabilizers, knocking the rocket off course and made it plow into another rocket which detonated both in mid-air. He then had an idea. It was crazy but it was all he had.
With a roar, Bertram slammed into the last rocket in the group and started raking it with his claws, easily tearing through the weak plating and damaging the innards of the explosive device. When he was sure he'd done enough damage, he forced himself off the rocket with a leap, sending the weapon tumbling through the air and crashing into the sea.
Using momentum from the rocket, he leapt and landed on the next closest rocket and liekwise rended it to scrap and sent it down to the sea. Then he leapt to the next one and once it was falling, he jumped to the next one. Ahead of him, Wolff took out the last rocket but at the last moment, he heard the guns on Wolff's jet click, meaning he was zeroed.
(They've exhausted their ammo...There's got to be something I can do to stop that sub but what? It's not like I can fly back to the carrier and return before the city is destroyed, nor can I fly there, pick up a bomb and drop it on the...)
Had he not been hanging onto a rocket, he would have slapped himself. He didn't need to grab a bomb he was literally hanging onto one right now. All that he needed to do was to change the course, aim the rocket at the sub, and let go.
Simple, right?
Bertram sank his claws into the rocket and started flapping like mad to get the rocket to rise. Yet, as it rose, the fins rotated, returning the rocket to its previous trajectory. Bertram tried again and again it countered his change. Finally he pulled so hard he ripped a panel off revealing the gyroscope. Bertram experimentally tried to change course again and saw the gyro click and return the rocket to course. He smiled, having discovered the source of the accuracy of the weapon and ripped the gyro out and let it fall away.
Without the gyroscope to correct it, the rocket was amazingly easy to maneuver. Well, somewhat easy. Bertram growled and bared his teeth in a snarl as he tried to lift the rocket up and force it to loop around. Slowly but surely the rocket started to turn upwards until it was upside down. A few more flaps and the rocket was now flying straight again.
Only now it was aiming at the submarine.
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The Captain stood dumbfounded on the observation deck as the dragon latched onto the rocket and then had it turning around and coming back at the sub. The XO was with him and saw it also and hastily ran to the PA system.
"All hands, emergency dive! One of our rockets has gone rogue and is coming back towards us!"
Almost as soon as he said the words 'rocket', 'rogue', and 'towards us', the sirens on the sub blared as the hatches that were open started to close and the sound of the vents opening echoed. Instantly, water started flooding the ballast tanks and the sub began to dive. The deck went under just as the last rocket hatch sealed but then, the XO felt a tilt to the ship and realized the bow section was actually rising out of the water. He keyed the PA again, unable to keep the panic out of his voice.
"Alert bow compartments! Your vents are still closed! This is an emergency dive, open the vents immediately!"
"This is compartment three, we've suffered an electrical short from firing the rockets! We're trying to open the vents manually but it's slow going! Bow compartments one through six are in the dark!"
A moment later, a cannons volley impacted the water just beyond the sub. The Captain manned the periscope and swore.
"One of the enemy battlecruisers is advancing on our position! We also have destroyers closing on us readying depth charges!" Then the PA system came back on.
"Bow vents are open! We are diving!" The XO turned to the Captain.
"Sir, recommend we shut the O Deck and return to the control center." The Captain nodded.
"Make it so. Also, alert Weapons Officer Illya to prep the Launchers." The Xo turned to him and paled.
"Captain, the Launchers are only hooked up to the Klasse 2 missiles! You are disobeying orders by using them!" The Captain turned as the armor plates came down.
"If we don't do something, we will sink and our forces will fail to hold the flank. If we cannot bombard the city, we will obliterate it. The radiation from all ten Klasse 2 rockets alone will make the city and peninsula unapproachable for decades. Either way, we have secured our flank and our forces can proceed to Royalis unhindered." The XO was still unconvinced.
"Sir, they are untested. There is a chance that..." The Captain rounded.
"I am well aware of the risks! Ready the Launchers once we reach eighty feet!" The XO, unsure, still relayed the orders and alarms filled the sub."
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Bertram cursed as the sub began diving and then decided that, no matter what, he would sink that sub. He pushed the rocket down hard as he could, aiming the rocket at where he believed the deck and rocket chambers were. He released the rocket moments before it impacted the water, his momentum carrying him forward at such speed, he ricocheted off the surface of the water, plowed into one if the enemy patrol boats, capsizing it, and then splashed to a stop.
He didn't hear the rocket explode upon hitting the water, that was a good sign, but still he didn't know if the rocket's engine had stopped upon sinking.
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Inside the submarine, the lights were red. The Captain stood at the charts, his pocketwatch ticking steadily as the crew went about their duties readying the Launchers. He heard the Weapons Officer say something about the Launchers being ready in thirty seconds. The Captain looked down at his watch but then noticed something.
He'd had the watch for forty years, and it had never done this...
The second hand was slowing...
Slowing...
Slowing...
The second and minute hands stopped on the twelve. The time was 2:00 P.M.
Just as he picked the watch up to wind it up again, he heard a dull thunk on the hull outside. He gazed up to see the crew around him frozen in fear.
It was then he realized...
...
...
...he had failed.
He had only a moment to lament his failure when the hatch leading to the rocket chambers was blown off its hinges, and the following fireball incinerated everyone in the room. The gold pocketwatch, dropped from the skeletal hand that held it, hit the floor of the compartment, and burst apart in an explosion of glass, metal, and gears.
The Gigantic exploded underwater with such force the collossal submarine was torn in half. The bow half with the remaining rockets exploded and disintegrated underwater, spreading debris and rocket components across the sea floor. Water flowing into the stern half of the sub extinguished the fireball before it could reach the extreme ends of the sub, but that was of little comfort to the crew still alive.
The submarine had a crush depth of nine-hundred feet. It was currently at one-fifty and sinking slowly. The preparations for the Launchers had exhausted what remaining power was left and subsequently the batteries failed, plunging the stern section into darkness.
Before they had surfaced to launch rockets, the sonar operator had done an estimation of the depth of the sea in the area they were firing from.
The depth was one-thousand, five-hundred feet. At the rate the stern section was sinking, the surviving crew would be doomed.
Doomed to eternal darkness...
...the sub would reach crush depth within the hour. Until then, the crew would be driven mad by fear. Every creak, every groan, every noise as the sub descended. The rocket that had sunk them damaged the O Deck, compromising its integrity. At three hundred feet, there was a great sound like someone crushing a tin can. The survivors knew that the O Deck had been crushed.
For a submariner, there was no greater fear.
For a submariner, there could be no worse fate.
For a submariner, this was Hell.
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Josh came to surrounded by people who were glad to see him awaken. He hurriedly looked about for his brother and, fearing the worst, leapt up to the wall and looked out to where the submarine had been. He was greeted with a shock.
He saw his brother, clutching a rocket, drop it into the sea, then careen into a PT boat before splashing to a stop. Moments later, the sea heaved and whitecapped as a tremendous explosion came up from the depths, parting the waters with a large fireball. For a moment a rainbow formed in the water as it rained back into the sea. Then, he saw the PT boats encircle where his brother has splashed.
Fearing for him, Josh leapt into the air, beating his wings frantically to reach him before...
...
...
...before the enemy boats...struck their...colors?
The sound of a PA system coming on was the only sound he heard.
"Attention, Syllian vessels. This is the Patrol Boat Icarus, we do hereby surrender and request a ceasefire."
Josh eased his flight and slowed over the group of boats and saw them helping Bertram out of the water. He looked up and saw the relief in his brother's eyes and then did something absolutely incredible.
Bertram started laughing. Josh hovered above his brother, relief evident on his face. A noise got his attention and he gazed up to see the enemy air cover retreating to the west at full speed. He gazed back down at his brother who was just floating there, belly up, without a care in the world, and smiled.
"So Bertram, still thinking about heading west?" Bertram shook his head.
"Nah, I guess the quickest way to end the war is to make sure our people are safe before we do anything else."
It was then that Josh allowed a smile to crease his muzzle as he too began laughing.
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(Launces)
The Rotarian soldiers marched through the ruins of the Tower, the bastion that had once been the outer fortress that shielded Launces from the west. Now, its ruins were used to trap those captured when the city fell. Work crews worked frantically to keep the ruins from collapsing onto the Grand Central Avenue.
From her small cell, Zafra wondered if her mother and father knew that she had not been able to escape the city, having arrived not two days before the Rotarian forces attacked. She had been caught trying to help the citizens who had been wounded in the attack. She had been made to watch as the Rotarian soldiers lined up the soldiers and civilians she had been tending and executed them. She had then been clapped in irons and sent outside the city to await transport to somewhere in Rotiart.
The soldiers all said that tomorrow would be the day. Zafra made a vow as the sun set, she would not be taken to be used as a hostage in Rotiart. If she got the chance, she would shift, and take as many Rotarian soldiers down as she could before she was slain.
Still, she hoped it wouldn't come to that.
(Mother...Father...Please...save me...someone...)
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Next Chapter: A Race Against Time