Chapter 43: When Death Comes Calling
Glimmer stood inside her intake station and tried to catch her breath. A particularly large family of Scavrians had come through, and processing them had taken far more effort than she had to give at the moment. Things were dire, and trying to instill even a modicum of hope into those passing through to the Megaliths beyond felt like an impossible task. At least she had a few seconds' break in the monotony before those next in line reached her, so she glanced out at Tir in the distance and let her thoughts overtake her.
Aratoth had died a few hours after Kyle and Lonnie had gotten him to the field hospital, and a few days had passed since then already. Only been a few days had passed since then and already Tir's cityscape on the horizon looked transformed. Many of the spires and skyscrapers had collapsed, tumbling in heaps of noise and smoke periodically across the hours, the sounds of explosions and of nightmarish screams in the distance dogging the refugees and Enclave staffers like specters. Warbirds flew at all times of the day and night, a constant fixture in the sky now as they patrolled the skies and near-space orbit between Tir, the Megalith compound, and the fleet high above. Moans and screams of thralls in the distance echoed out constantly, weirdly harmonized at times, and always accompanied by percussive gunfire.
The compound itself was abuzz in martial activity. Refugees whispered to friends and loved ones and any who would listen about their suspicions surrounding the Empire's ability to retake the city. If Tir fell, all of Scavria would likely fall with it within a matter of months. Would evacuations from other major cities and continents have time to complete? Would those in the countryside be saved, or were they essentially dead men and women walking if Tir wasn't resolved? This and many other questions came hurling out of the mouths of the refugees at all times of the day and all through the night as they crowded the administrative centers of the compound scrabbling for answers, driven forward in a frenzy by fear and uncertainty.
Not even Glimmer had been able to avoid scrutiny. In fact, as the famed 'Angel of Archanas,' she probably had it worse, unable to count on both hands twice over how many times she'd been accosted by angry and scared refugees for answers. Yet she and everyone else with working knowledge of the Empire and Enclave's efforts couldn't say a word, and it had driven her nearly to despair over the past few days.
All knowledge of operations were classified, never to be disclosed to the refugees themselves in an effort to keep from setting false expectations or instigating further unrest. Glimmer's earlier stunt in the central square, sharing her personal thoughts about a successful incursion against the Beast, had spurred the operational heads to issue an ironclad gag order on everything. So much as speculating aloud when the Megaliths themselves might lift off was not allowed.
Not that it mattered, though. The situation was plainly evident no matter how silent Glimmer and the rest of the Enclave and Empire were in the face of ceaseless pressure: things were not looking good. They would likely lose the city within a matter of weeks, now.
The next set of refugees up for processing reached the side of her station and sighed, breathing deep in preparation to dive back into the work. When she turned to address the newcomers with the best smile she could muster, she instead found Lonnie standing there with a mildly disturbed expression on her face. Glimmer's smile dropped the moment she saw.
"What are you doing here?" she asked, feeling put out.
Lonnie leaned away from the station and made a show of craning her neck to the side to inspect the refugee staging area behind her. A violent bruise had spread across the bridge of her nose, and Glimmer and could tell it had been broken and splinted.
"Doesn't look like you have very many left to process," Lonnie said, sweeping her eyes over the near-empty expanse. "And there's at least twenty others like you lined up in the stalls to help process them. Stealing a few minutes from you specifically won't be too big a deal."
The ache in Glimmer's jaw flared with her irritation. Lonnie's blow to the side of her face wasn't anything to scoff. The swelling had largely gone down, but ugly bruises that had throbbed constantly through the preceding days still marred the side of her own face and had only recently started to shrink.
"The point," Glimmer said, putting ice into her words and leaning over the countertop to get into Lonnie's space, "is that you're keeping me from doing my job. You're lucky they decided not to charge you for fighting outside the hospital, in front of all the refugees. Are you trying to get in trouble?"
"You fought back, last I remember," Lonnie said. "And even landed the first blow—"
"Yeah, after you goaded me."
"—so you're just as lucky as I am we didn't get reamed."
Glimmer hands crept toward Lonnie's throat and she forced them to still. Instead, she closed her eyes, pinched the bridge of her nose, and took a breath, deep breath. "Did you just come to pick another fight? You won't win a second time now that I know how fast you can move, you know."
Lonnie put both hands up and shook her head. "I'm not here to fight, actually. I came to apologize."
"What?" Glimmer wanted to tell her to lead with that next time, but held her tongue.
"I'm serious," Lonnie said. "I'm sorry for what happened. It was my fault for starting it."
"Well…you did goad me into fighting back."
"I'm not just talking about that." Lonnie blinked. "Although, yes, I did do that."
Glimmer frowned. "What are you talking about, then?"
"I'm talking about how things between us have been tense ever since getting to this planet. That's my fault and I'm sorry."
"You were upset about me not taking the team on."
Lonnie smirked. "Are you justifying my behavior? Now you're just being nice, you don't really think that."
Glimmer frowned. Lonnie was right, she didn't particularly feel forgiving and nice about the whole situation, but she was just trying to be polite. She forgot how forthcoming and blunt a person Lonnie was. "Well—"
"I punched you in the face and blamed you for Aratoth's and everyone else's deaths," Lonnie said. "It wasn't fair to you, and I'm sorry."
"You lost your whole team," Glimmer said. "You lost them after thinking I was going to be there because we were matched without me knowing. I'd feel resentful too, if that happened to me, even if I understood why things happened the way they did." She leaned back and out of Lonnie's space. "I appreciate the apology, and I don't hold it against you."
Lonnie shook her head. "It's not just that."
Glimmer raised both eyebrows, and Lonnie sighed, fidgeting under her gaze in an uncharacteristic show of discomfort.
"My expectations were too high before our paths even crossed again on the Omen-Kador," Lonnie said. "The first time we ever saw each other, years ago when we were still back home and not even out of Despondos yet, you were just another Princess in my mind—another enemy to fight. I wasn't exactly thrilled with what Shadow Weaver did to you after we grabbed you from the Princess Prom, but I admit, seeing you go through that and come out the other end still strong left an impression on me.
"And then we left home, and you…well, you know what you did. What you've been doing. How fast things spread in the galaxy." She laughed. "Time lag for non-ansible messages is a thing, and the outer rim is only a few days behind the core Heartlands in terms of news. I'd already heard too many stories about you by the time we met again on the Omen-Kador. I was expecting to reunite with some mythical being, and I didn't take it well when that didn't happen."
Glimmer bit her lip. She'd disliked how her name had spread through the galaxy before, how pressured she felt by it, but she had never considered how it impacted her personal relationships. She'd never seen it have an impact on her personal relationships. Now, she absolutely loathed the name 'Angel of Archanas,' both for how wildly inaccurate a portrait of her it painted in the minds of those who heard it, and especially for how it damaged potential friendships before they could even begin.
"Lonnie, I…" Glimmer didn't know what to say, and she trailed off.
"They almost deployed us there, you know," Lonnie said. "Kyle, Rogelio, and I. To Rinne. If it weren't for the fact the entire planet fell so fast, we very well might have been.
"I'm glad you weren't."
"Sometimes I wish we did make it there," Lonnie said, surprising Glimmer. "Everyone else only remembers how horrible it was, seeing how many 'lost souls' were reported scrolling across news tickers day after day. Me, though? The thing that stuck out to me—the thing I remember the most—was hearing about the survivors. Sometimes I catch myself wondering how many more might have made it out if we were there with you, helping."
"I would have mourned at an empty grave for you three, or stared at your names on the monument they put up in the capital."
"Maybe," Lonnie said, before repeating the word again, quieter to herself. "I was amazed that anyone at all made it off that planet, though. It gave me hope. And when I saw you again on the Omen."
"You thought your chance finally came to be part of that legacy—to be there the next time shit hits the fan so you can help, and maybe more people would be saved."
Lonnie swallowed and nodded.
"And when I turned around and said no," Glimmer said. "When I chose to stand here in this processing station instead of be out there, and then when people still died and, worst of all, you had to pull the trigger?" Glimmer bit her lip and looked away. "Yeah. I get why that would be upsetting to see."
"If you're thinking about apologizing to me now, then stop," Lonnie said. "I sacrificed seeing you as an actual person so I could live in my little fantasy world about serving with a Battlemage that can save people from certain death. I'm apologizing for how selfish that is and that's the only thing anyone should be apologizing for."
"But—"
"You saved hundreds of people, Glimmer. Don't apologize for all those you couldn't. I'm sorry I ever asked you to, even in an abstract way."
Glimmer pressed her lips together and thought. One moment she was loathing her nickname and the next, the very person that got mislead by it was telling her how much hope it had given them? Maybe being the Angel to so many people was a curse, but maybe it was also a blessing. Maybe it could be both.
"They really should have called me the Angel of Rinne," she said, cracking a tentative smile to break the tension. "I've never even been to Archanas."
Lonnie grinned in response and, for the first time since reuniting, Glimmer felt they were on the same page. "I doubt you'd ever want to go, even if you could get special dispensation to visit it. Empire made it a protected site for a reason."
Glimmer laughed. "Yeah, it's just a joke Catra and I have whenever it's brought up—that I've never even been to the place they call me an Angel of."
Lonnie's eyes widened. "Catra's still around?"
"Yep, she came with me off Etheria. Taline sponsored both of us. She's a cop, now."
"Lord above is that the last job I'd ever think she'd be fit for."
Glimmer laughed. "You'd be surprised at how much she's changed. We all have." A beat passed between them, and she said, "Thanks for coming to see me. And apologizing. I'm glad we're on the same page again, I hated being mad at you, even if we saw very little of one another."
Lonnie's expression turned melancholy. "I wanted to come and say something before it was too late."
Glimmer froze. She hadn't known Lonnie well back on Etheria, and although she had hoped she was the type of person to naturally dig deep, understand the root of a disagreement, and make peace, this whole about face in their relationship felt surreal. Now it made sense: something was wrong. Something that had spurred her to face what was really bothering her and make amends.
"What's going on?" she asked.
"We're going on one last deployment into the city," Lonnie said. "Fleet command doesn't think we'll be able to save it and wants to nuke it from space, but we're to do one last incursion before that."
"One last attack to try and get a foothold, huh?" Glimmer asked, trying to keep the knot of worry in her stomach from growing larger. "Sounds dangerous, but nothing you haven't done a hundred times over already. Who are you serving under now that Aratoth has…?"
Lonnie's expression turned cloudy, and that was all Glimmer needed to infer the answer.
"They're sending you out there without a Battlemage commander?" she asked, the knot in her stomach quickly forming into a boulder. "They can't do that. That's practically suicide, you said so yourself. There are other commanders out there, why haven't you been assigned under one of them for the assault?"
"Technically, we are," she said. "We've been attached as an augment to one of the existing squads, but the Battlemage in charge has made it pretty clear they don't intend on really overseeing us. At least, not how they should. I guess they heard what happened to Aratoth's squad and assumed it happened because he spread himself too thin trying to command too large a group."
"That's bullshit!" Glimmer said. "He was stretched thin, sure, but I reviewed the action report. You guys were ambushed. It wouldn't have made a difference if he had the right sized team or not, almost everyone would still be dead!"
"Yep," Lonnie said, speaking in a defeated tone of voice that Glimmer absolutely hated hearing from her of all people. "But our orders are clear. Tag along, provide back up, stay out of the way and don't expect further orders. That's what Rogelio and I are working with."
"And Kyle?"
Lonnie shrugged. "They split us up for this one. Our guy 'in charge' put us on a different warbird and Kyle is reinforcing another wing that lost a pilot recently."
Glimmer cursed. She wanted to ask who the new commander was, but also knew that Lonnie likely wouldn't say and it wouldn't make a difference if she did. Battlemages were in charge of their own teams, and it would be supremely hypocritical for her to try and influence another person's command after she turned down her own.
Lonnie looked down at the PDA on her wrist. "I have to get going," she said. "It's almost time."
They locked eyes a moment. Glimmer wanted to say something. Maybe wish her luck, maybe tell her things were going to be okay—something. But in the end, she could only nod and watch Lonnie walk off back toward the compound.
The terrified faces of a fresh set of refugees took her place and she processed them in. Then another set came, and then another, and soon time passed in a blur once again, as it always had. At one point, a flurry of warbirds took off from the nearby staging area nearby and flew overhead toward Tir. Glimmer watched, having never felt more helpless before, standing on the ground inside her station, watching them go.
Not even Rinne, as hellish a landscape as that was, felt this foreboding.
The liftoff call came several hours later, after Glimmer had already finished her shift and was in the middle of forcing herself to eat something despite her nerves.
No one seemed surprised when the alarm started blaring. Everyone in her immediate vicinity looked up and around at one another, and all bodies jumped up to execute what they had drilled for: emergency evacuation.
Soon, a voice came over the compound's PA system, accompanying the siren.
It told the refugees that evacuation procedures were underway. Told them to immediately return to their assigned megaliths. Told them that the city had been lost and that orbital bombardment would commence immediately to buy as much time for the megaliths stationed around the rest of the planet to pull out too.
Abject panic broke out in the compound then, as was expected. The refugees hadn't drilled for anything, not like the staffers had, and it was their training that would salvage what they could from the botched operation.
Soldiers and general security rushed to their duty stations, yelling and commanding everyone into their assigned megaliths. Refugees abandoned whatever they were doing, leaving behind personal belongings to scoop up children and meet with loved ones, scrambling to follow orders. Within minutes, giant crowds had formed at the mouths of each of the great starships, and security worked diligently to funnel them inside as fast as they could.
More warbirds screamed overhead as they flew in formation toward Tir, likely to support whatever evacuation efforts that had been put into effect for those still fighting in the city. Additional soldiers scrambled out of nearby barracks, yelling and hollering as they ran toward speeder bikes idling outside the compound exit, waiting for whoever needed to use them.
The announcer rattled off a one hour timeline until liftoff and began folding that into their other instructions. One hour, and those inside were safe while those not yet on a ship would die.
A chime sounded at her wrist and Glimmer answered the notification on her PDA. Kyle's face appeared on the holo-screen that projected in front of her.
"Glimmer!" he said. "Oh thank god, you answered."
"One hour until liftoff," she said. There was no time for idle talk.
"We were told ninety minutes until orbital bombardment." From the feed, it looked like Kyle was still flying, the stars and ships of the fleet tumbling and twisting outside the canopy of his cockpit."
"I'm looking at the live feeds right now," Glimmer said, scanning through the data while she kept a line open to him. "It looks like there are still tens of thousands of soldiers in Tir, fighting. Are they going to be able to get out in time?"
"We're scrambling practically every available transport to get as many out as we can, but fleet command has made it explicitly clear the bombarding begins after the clock runs out, regardless of whoever is still down there. They can't wait much longer than that or they'll risk losing the whole planet faster than the other sites can get out."
Glimmer cursed. "This is way more aggressive a timeline than what anyone's trained to. It sounds like they set something off out there." she said. "Did they stumble across the Abomination? Was it just hiding how far along it was from our mages?"
"I have no idea," Kyle said. "They may have lost a Battlemage to it and now there's two, who knows. I wouldn't be surprised, given that Aratoth was nearly taken right then and there." The background spun faster and Kyle paused as he hooked through the g-forces. "Listen, I can't get ahold of Lonnie or Rogelio."
Glimmer felt her blood go cold. She had been afraid of hearing those words, and yet there they were. "What do you mean you can't get ahold of them?"
"Nearly everyone else is answering the evacuation calls and we can pick them up, but the team those two in particular were part of went dark. None of them are answering their pings and I can't pinpoint their exact location."
Shit, Glimmer thought. If they didn't answer their pings then they won't get picked up for evacuation at all. She had left people behind before—left the people of Rinne behind. Left Taline's Battlemage Narre to die by the Emperor's hand aboard his citadel. Left Bow and Adora and the other princesses behind to activate the Heart despite them pleading with her not to, so many years ago now.
Those memories, those realizations, came back one after the other as Kyle's words echoed in her head. She was about to lose two more people, and there was one thought that came of that realization—the one thought that stood clear to her amid the panic:
Never again.
"Send me their last known location," Glimmer said racing the other soldiers to the speeders at the edge of the compound. "Whatever is recorded for their last valid ping, give it to me. I'm going."
"Are you sure about this?" Kyle asked. "We're already at tremendous risk considering how many Battlemages are still down there. You're going in without a team to take care of you if you get oversaturated. If we lose you...we could bombard the city with twice the armament from space and even the megaliths in our compound won't have time to get free then, let alone the ones around the rest of the planet."
"They'll have time," Glimmer said. "I know exactly how long it takes one to take off. We pushed the absolute limit on Rinne. They'll make it, even if I don't."
"Fuck." Kyle breathed the word to himself, but Glimmer heard it come through clear as if he had shouted it at her.
She didn't tell him that, if the Beast took her, she'd likely eat the whole region and start bleeding past the Kaloshi border, she'd be so powerful. They'd probably reinstate Taline just to put a stop to her. The thought made her laugh, privately, in a perverse, morbid sort of way.
"Keep an eye on my own tracker," she said instead. "I'll ping you when I've located them."
"You have a ride in?"
"Working on it."
Glimmer had reached the idling speeders outside the compound right as he asked and she mounted one, grabbing the helmet slung to its side putting it on while her PDA and its onboard systems integrated. The moment the speeder registered her rank, it roared to life. She pushed the throttle to max and shot off across the steppe, heading straight for Tir in the distance.
