SECTION 013
TO THE LAST BATTLEFIELD
The battle was going well.
Every able pilot was deployed, the enemy scattered in their wake. Fires raged, energy and plasma were exchanged with bullets and shells and for the first time in centuries, Beskar'ad, the machines the Humans called Dragonoids, filled the skies and blotted out the sun.
And to Zearaan, watching it all unfold from the command centre aboard the Ruus beh Tsad Droten, it was glorious.
The appearance of the Human's fleet was unexpected, but not unwelcome. To crush the enemy forces away from their home ground spoke well for the operation as a whole. Below the Ruus, the Humans were scattered across the beaches, the sands littered with the twisted remains of their warships and pale beskar'ad imitations. That they had managed a defence at all might have been admirable, had it not been for the sheer futility of it all.
"Are we in position?"
"In time, High Superior,"his aide simpered at his side. "As we are not within visual range, compensations have to be made for gravity and planetary curvature-"
"How long?"
"N-not long, High Superior. A few moments more and then we can deploy."
"A few moments more…" Zearaan pondered, then sent the aide away as he turned back to the battle. He could wait a few moments more, he decided. After all, what were mere moments compared to the three hundred Earth years he had waited already?
DATE: JANUARY 15, 251 A.D.E.
TIME: 1422 HOURS
LOCATION: ENGLAND, NEWQUAY RUINS, CMF SAINT GEORGE, COMMAND CENTRE
He was dreaming. He had to be. He must have fallen asleep at his desk again, that had to be it. This was a dream, or a nightmare; memories of Dauntless' fall plaguing his mind. It had to be a dream. He couldn't be watching his ship burn again, it just wouldn't be fair!
But life wasn't fair, and Stoic knew he wasn't dreaming.
Saint George had been grounded under the weight of the first barrage; her prow crushed into the muddying waters of Newquay's beaches, her powerful weapons disabled. It was a gentler fate than that of Beowulf; exploding into a fireball of heat and shrapnel before her Assault Frames could even be deployed. The rest of the fleet was faring no better. Mobile fortresses were scattered and devoid of formation, their Assault Frames struggling to find cover amidst the ruined buildings and skeletal wreckage of their fallen brethren, all the while trying to return fire against an unrelenting enemy.
Even with the command centre in flames and darkness; lit only by sparking consoles and flickering fire and many of their comrades dead at their stations, the remains of Saint George's command crew tried to regain control, both of the battlefield and the dying ship around them. And in the middle of it all, Gergorio sat alone, the shouted reports and screams for orders falling on deaf ears. For what could they do? They couldn't push forward, and they certainly couldn't fall back. Even if they somehow made it back to home turf, nothing in The Dome's arsenal would be able to scratch the Ruus beh Tsad Droten. Even if the mass drivers had been repaired, Stoic knew they would have been torn to pieces by the sheer numbers of Dragonoids before their carrier had crested the horizon.
It was hopeless. They were all dead man walking. Even the people of The Dome wouldn't be safe. It was merely a matter of time.
"Gregorio!"
Heavy hands latched onto his shoulders, Gobber's soot and scarred face dominating his view.
"Fergus…" he could barely hear his whispered words over the destruction around him. "Fergus, what have I done?"
"Not gonna lie, ye've fooked up real good, boyo," Gobber's words stung less than they should. "At least if we were 'ome, we'd 'ave gotten a warning they were comin'. But now's no' the time ta be moanin'. We need ta retreat n' regroup-"
"Retreat?" Stoic laughed hollowly, "retreat to where? There's nowhere to run, Gus. The Dragonoids would beat us to The Dome before we could even get halfway home."
"Better ta die tryin' than stickin' round 'ere to be slaughtered," the grip tightened, the flesh and blood arm crushing his arm just as hard as the cybernetic one. "The Dome's lost, fine, but it's people ain't! The Dome is just a mess o' machinery and flexi-steel. Tha' means it can be rebuilt! The lives within it can't. We 'ave ta try an' escape ta warn 'em, fer their sake-"
A roar from beyond the broken windows drained his friend's face, Gobber's form slumping with a defeated sigh as he turned towards the intruder.
"Or we could all die tagether, I guess tha' could work too."
Gregorio couldn't find it in himself to be afraid. A Gronckle hovered before Saint George, its wings filling the air with heat and noise, its plasma mortar bathing the command centre in a brightening purple glow.
Some faced death with dignity. Others tried to run, for all the protection the bulkhead doors would provide. For Stoic, he just stared the Dragonoid down, refusing to give the monster the pleasure of screams or begging. Gobber, to his credit, stood at his side, a meaty arm around his shoulder and a wry smile creasing his scarred face.
"Death by Gronckle," he muttered, "what an embarrassing way ta go."
The noise became deafening, the light blinding him from seeing his own death. And yet Gregorio McKrillen stared his death down to the very end…
Until the plasma mortar exploded.
He heard it, rather than saw it; the clattering of a hundred energy pulse bolts slamming into alien metal. Light dissolved into spots on his vision in time to see the Gronckle stagger back, its' plasma mortar dripping slag and trailing smoke as it struggled to face its' attacker.
Its' enemy never gave it the chance. A green blur screamed past it, the Gronckle's port side wings practically splintering under the pulse bolt barrage, sending the Dragonoid crashing to the ground in a crumpled heap while it soared into the sky.
"Wha' in the world?" Gobber rubbed his eyes as Stoic stared at the battlefield quickly starting to change. "Report, someone! Something tha' isn't terrified screaming!"
"We've got incoming from the rear," Ernest Kingston coughed from somewhere behind him. "Ten, fifty…two hundred and fifty-seven units, all airborne…"
"What? What is it man?" Stoic felt Gobber leave his side. "Ye reading off a screen, it cannae be tha' hard!"
"These units are airborne, and they're generating Dragonoid-type engine signatures, but sir…they're broadcasting Military Police IFFs."
The silence might have been palpable, had the sounds of war not been so close at hand. On any other day, when the command centre wasn't ablaze and the last bastion of Humanity was fighting its' final battle, Gregorio might have laughed and had the sensors recalibrated. There was no way in hell Humans had taken to the skies once more. Two and half centuries of Dragonoid suppression had seen to that. And yet, the vehicles that soared overhead were not of Human design.
They had all been doused with military green paint, no doubt to distinguish them from their brethren. Even now Stoic could see streaks of each machine's original colour breaking through the coat and the hastily stencilled symbol of The Dome emblazed on their sides. They were the same machines though; the same machines they were fighting, or had been fighting in the past.
Dragonoids roared overhead. Dragonoids with what must have been Human pilots at their controls. They aimed their guns towards The Dome's enemies, the land units deployed with turrets facing away from the mobile fortresses. For a moment the guns were silent, Humans and Dragonoids alike united in a moment in their confusion. It gave Stoic all the time he needed to look up to the heavens, where his saviour now circled overhead.
It was a Nadder, that much was obvious. Blue armour already streaked through the green paint, no doubt from the speed the craft had taken to get here. But it was what was attached to the fuselage that got Gregorio's attention.
Bodies. Live ones. Black Human-sized smudges each fastened to a side of the Nadder's head.
No, one was Human-sized. The other was a little taller…
Without thinking, Stoic snatched his binoculars from around his neck. The Nadder wasn't moving at top speed, making it easy for his eyes to track. He could see the bodies clearly now, both connected to the Dragonoid by a safety harness attached to the embarkation ladder. The Human sized one was encased in an old military HALO jumpsuit, a relic of the times before the assault frame was even a dream in its' maker's mind and the nations of Earth still knew how to fly the skies. The kit had been stripped down to the heat retaining jumpsuit, its helmet, life support and manoeuvring units strapped and sealed to the AF pilot's armour the body wore over it. That seemed to be more protection than their companion, their loose black jumpsuit flapping in the wind between heavy armoured plate across their lanky frame, a hurried patch spread over most of their helmet's visor…
"No…he couldn't have…"
It was a trick, it had to be. And yet, anger welled in the pit of his gut the longer he stared. He knew that body, too tall and lanky to be any kind of Human being. He knew it was supposed to be chained to a chair in Central Tower's detention centre, just as the armour and helmet it wore should have been sent to the Research and Development labs to be picked apart by his engineers when they returned victorious.
The Dragonoid pilot. There was no one else it could be. The Dragonoid pilot was roaming free once more, which meant the Human hanging from the Nadder's side could only be one person.
"Alexander."
LOCATION: ENGLAND, NEWQUAY RUINS AIRSPACE
"I was right! I was so right, Astrid! This is exactly as bad as I thought it would be! Maybe worse!"
Everything was noise and pressure, the wind roaring past my helmet even as it tried to rip me from the Nadder's side. At least the suit made it warmer than the last time I was flying a Dragonoid on the wrong side of its' armour.
Above and below, the battle was starting up again. The forces of the Rock of The Assembled, no doubt ordered on by Zearaan, continued to fire on the Human forces, the Military Police having no choice but to fight back. Now, however, they had another problem to worry about.
We'd scavenged every Dragonoid we could from the Arena hangers. If it could walk or fly, fire a weapon of any kind and had the power to do most of the above, it had been drenched in green paint from the military stores and assigned a pilot with a crash course in flying alien mecha and a Human build AI for backup. From Nadders to Nightmares, Gronckles to Zipplebacks, even older models like the Thunder-drum and the Timber-jack flew in our ranks. No one was perfect; even Astrid needed the AI just to fly in a straight line. But we didn't need to be good. We just had to be distracting.
And didn't we have the right people for the job?
Snotlout led the charge, of all people, his Nightmare leading squadrons of our fastest flyers across the skies in hit and run attacks. Behind him, Fishlegs led anything with a plasma mortar or equivalent on bombing runs across the beaches squeezed into his Gronckle, keeping the Dragonoid's land forces separated from our own and clearing the way for the Thornston twins leading the ground attack in their Zippleback and cackling madly over any open frequency they could find.
And high above, watching it all through a Nadder's all-seeing RaDOME, Astrid brought order to the chaos we'd created.
Orders were sent, and the children of the Military Police's mandatory service program responded. Slowly but surely, we were pushing the Dragonoids back and creating a rift between the opposing forces.
This was why she'd been picked for squad leader. This was what the brass had wanted to mould her into after her father's death. This was why she would have been top of our class if I'd never shot Ruusaan down. I wish I could have seen how she did it, and not just because I wanted to be inside the Nadder's cockpit rather than strapped to the side of it. I certainly couldn't have been able to adapt the way she had.
Not with the appearance of the Rock of The Assembled anyway. The plan had been a work in progress from the start. Pilot Dragonoids, catch up to the Saint George fleet, recapture the Night Fury and answer the question. That we'd found Dad fighting Dragonoids was bad enough. That he was fighting their now-flying home was beyond anything we could have prepared for.
And yet somehow, Astrid was turning the tide-
"Stow your whining, Hiccup! It'd be hard enough trying to pilot this thing without two extra pairs of elbows in my way!"
…when she wasn't being so incredibly supportive.
"Stowing it, Valkyrie."
"See that you do. The plan hasn't changed, right? You have to stay focused unless you want to be a red stain on Saint George's windshield."
"What's left of it," Snotlout snickered from somewhere.
Yeah, incredibly supportive.
I risked another look down, at Saint George burning on the beachhead, one of her bows stuck pathetically half submerged in the water. I suppose it could have been a comfort. After all, the waters were far deeper around Washington Crater.
"Hallex."
I glanced over to Ruusaan, or at least where she'd be on the other side of the Nadder's head. "You okay? Copaani gar jate?"
She'd been quiet since she'd seen the Rock. It had been months. Maybe she'd thought she'd never see it again.
"Dalyc nuhaatyc ar olar."
Can't be here? No kidding! The Rock had barely looked like it would fly again back at Washington Crater. Now it looked like the slightest wind would knock it out of the sky. And while it was armed to the teeth, not a single turret or missile launcher was firing. Was it using all that power to stay in the air? Then why bring the Rock at all? It wasn't as though Dragonoids needed a carrier to get here. Then there was the population. Had they been dropped off before departing, or were they hiding in their homes and waiting for the battle to be over? We couldn't know for certain. That's why we'd stayed clear of her so far and put an emphasis on keeping the Dragonoids and Humans separate while we freed the Night Fury and answered the question.
The question that, with almost the entire Dragonoid population possibly within hearing range, might just bring an end to this war.
"You can stay, you know," I said quietly. "Gar liser k'oyacyi. I won't force you to-"
"Hy vant it to end."
…
"What?"
"Var. Fightink. Hy vant it to schtop." I wish I could see her face, help her convey what she wanted to say in her own language. "Tsad Droten. Hwumans. Ve vork together. Hallex und Ruusaan schow dat. Ve...prosper?"
"I'd like to think so. Staabi redo." As good as word as any.
"Prosper…iz gud. Ben gud fer us." I could almost see the fond smile on her face. Schould be gud fer everyvun."
"Should be good," I felt a grin of my own spread as I gripped the safety cord, "bar tome, mhi mav gotal'ur bic banar. Valkyrie, we're ready to depart."
"Copy that. The rear AF hatches are still open, so that will be your best entry bet. You drop in sixty. Rho Flight, Lambda Flight, let's make sure they get down in one piece."
This was it. Around us, Dragonoids in military green paint swarmed, clearing the way down to the burning wreck below. I steeled myself, ignoring the butterflies in my gut as my heads-up display counted down.
And yet, I felt I had to ask.
"Ruusaan?"
"Elek?"
"Are you scared? Err…Copaani gar chaab?"
To my surprise, a soft laugh crackled over my helmet's speakers.
"Aht ar chaab la aht kar'taylir gar copaani oyacyir."
"W-what?"
"To be scared iz to know hyu are alive."
I don't know why, but I think Ruusaan took comfort in those words. And because of that, in some small way, so did I.
"Aht te kyrbej diende, Hallex."
I grinned as the countdown hit zero and I released the safety clip from the Nadder's side.
"Aht te kyrbej, Ruusaan. To the last battlefield."
LOCATION: ENGLAND, NEWQUAY RUINS, CMF SAINT GEORGE
"Attention all hands, attention all hands. Abandon ship, abandon ship. All hands to the airlocks and emergency craft. This is not a drill. Repeat, all hands abandon ship."
Stoic barely heard the sound of his comm. officer shakily relay orders over Saint George's intercom. He barely heard the alarms overhead, just as he'd barely heard Gobber shouting after him as he'd left the command centre. All he could really hear was the thud of his own footsteps against the deck, and the pounding of his heartbeat in his ears.
Dragonoids in the air and a Dragonoid at his side, and Alexander was in the centre of it all. Now he was aboard Saint George, and it could be for only one reason.
That was why he strode towards the cargo bay, pushing through anyone who got in his way. He had to beat him there, had to stop Alexander's madness before it spread beyond the mandatory service units.
He had to stop him, by any means.
The Night Fury's cargo bay was located in the bow section now half sunk in Newquay's bay. Personnel were non-existent by the time he reached it, his boots slogging through a river of saltwater that rushed down the now sharply tilted deck. And yet, for a section that should have already been abandoned, Stoic could hear voices echoic in the empty corridors.
The words were distorted, both by the emptiness and the occasional rumble of the battle beyond the bulkheads. But Gregorio would recognise his son's voice anywhere, and he knew that it came from the cargo bay door forced open ahead.
With pistol raised, Stoic stepped through.
Most of the bay was a flooded mess. Crates and stacks of boxes had been torn from their moorings, the lighter ones floating in the pool that submerged half the slanted room. The Night Fury itself had only made it halfway across the deck, its' rear barely touching the water below the thrusters assembly. And standing before it, helet under his arm and looking at this monstrous machine like an annoying car that refused to start, was the last person that should ever be near it.
"ALEXANDER!"
To his credit, Stoic had to admire his boy's fight or flight instincts.
Alex dove for cover rather than turn around, his father cursing his own soft headedness as a bullet meant to disarm cracked through empty air.
"Did you really just try to shoot me!?"
"Did you really expect anything less!?" the general crouched his mass behind cover, his pistol aimed at the crate where Hiccup hid. "You're a traitor, Alex. I can't treat you any different!"
"Why, because the alternative is better?" Brown hair bobbed up above the crate, only to duck back down as a bullet pinged off the metal container. "Is endless war really what you want? Is it going to solve anything?"
"IT'S BETTER THAN THE ALTERNATIVE! Peace!? With these monsters!?" Eyes stung, his chest throbbing painfully with every heartbeat. "After everything they've done? They've killed so many of us-"
"And we've killed so many of the-"
"IT'S NOT THE SAME!"
"HOW IS IT NOT THE S-"
"THEY KILLED MY WIFE!"
Silence. Stoic glared at Alexander's hiding spot, pistol aimed, ready for the next sighting of his son. In the quiet, the Night Fury thrummed to life, steam rising as the Dragonoid pilot warmed up the thrusters against the water. A smokescreen. It had to be.
"They killed my wife. They killed your mother." the words were softly spoken, yet they seemed to carry across the bay. "Can you really forgive them for that? Of all the deaths they've caused, all the damage they've done, can you honestly side with her killers?"
"Ruusaan didn't kill Mum-"
"But it serves those that did! You say that its' different, but can you really be so sure? Look at our history; look at what they did to Humanity, to us! How can you forgive what did, what they took away from us!?"
More quiet, filled now with the sound of the Dragonoid's engines and the bubbling of boiling water. Stoic aimed high, ready for Alex and anything that his boy could do…
"Except they didn't kill her, did they?"
His heart stopped, his blood turned to ice as eyes widened at his boy slowly standing up from his hiding place. He stared stonily at his father, unarmed yet defiant.
No…no, no, no. He couldn't know…
"You know, Astrid hated me for years. Did you even notice?" Alex looked towards the Night Fury almost thoughtfully, the gun aimed at his chest ignored. "I still remember the fight, the look of sheer disbelief when I told her what I knew. What I'd seen in your reports to the brass."
"A-Alex-"
"She shouted and screamed, called me a liar among other things," his son laughed hollowly, the sound clenching at Stoic's heart more than any Dragonoid ever had. "She would tell me later that it was because it was easier to hate Dragonoids then believe my theories and things I'd said I'd 'heard'," He turned back to his father, and to Stoic's horror he felt himself flinch back under his gaze, "but I think, at the time anyway, that she couldn't imagine why I'd say those things. These terrible stories of conspiracies and cover-ups that I'd read in my father's reports."
"Alex, stop-"
"Valka McKrillen was the Control Officer for the Paladin when she left the docks. Arthur Hofferson chose her because she could make a mobile fortress dance if she had to. She was there, in the Command Centre, when it was torn apart from the inside out. A reactor breach, from the bomb the insurgents planted, remember? Human insurgents, Dad!"
Gregorio's mouth was dry, his throat closed up. Alex kept talking, spilling secrets he had no right to know.
"I mean, it's hard to swallow right? To try and convince someone that it was Humans who killed her father and the Military Police covered it up, when my own mother was killed in the same attack and my father was leading the investigat-"
"ENOUGH!"
His hands were shaking, eyes wide with fury and madness as his pistol rattled in his grip. And Alex, he just stood there, no fear or challenge in his eyes. If anything, he looked…disappointed.
"Don't judge me!" Stoic spat. "Don't you dare judge me, Alexander! I did what I had to for peace within The Dome. It's bad enough we have the Dragonoids breathing down our necks, but if word got out Hofferson had been set up by his own kind-"
"They'd what? Think we're not so different? Give peace a chance?" Alex snapped back. "That justifies everything, does it? The secrets, the lies, the things you said to Astrid…" his eyes narrowed, "your promotions?"
"It had to be done, and I made sure it never had to be done again!" A strained smile creased Stoic's face. "I worked my way up the ranks to stop the cover-ups, to stop the manipulations-"
"But not to stop the war?"
The smile disappeared into a scowl. "There can be no peace. Not with those monsters."
"So you're no better than them, are you!?" Alex threw his hands up in exasperation. "The brass before you wanted war, to keep the status quo, and now you're just following in their footsteps!"
"You can't parley with these-"
"BULLSHIT! I've been to the Ruus, remember?" his eyes became soft and distant, a quiet smile playing across his lips. "I've seen them, Dad; normal people living out their lives. I didn't see a single pair who were exactly alike. Sure, there were some who still wanted to fight, but there were so many more who wanted peace-"
"LIAR! THEY'RE NOTHING BUT MURDEROUS MONSTERS!" Blood pounded in Stoic's ears, his rage aimed solely at the traitor before him. "THEY KILLED MY WIFE! THEY KILLED YOUR MOTHER! THEY'VE KILLED BILLIONS BEFORE HER AND THEY'VE KILLED THOUSANDS SINCE! THEY ARE DEMONS! A BANE OF OUR EXISTENCE! AND HUMANITY WON'T BE ABLE TO THRIVE AS LONG AS EVEN ONE IS LEFT ALIVE!"
"And that's what you want is it!?" the traitor thundered back. "A fight to the last man!?"
"IT'S THE ONLY WAY TO SURVIVE! THE ONLY WAY TO MOVE FORWARD!"
"The only way?"
"The only way."
"You sure?"
"Yes."
"Positive?"
"Yes!"
The traitor smirked. "Absolutely certain?
"Will you li-"
"YES! YES! A THOUSAND TIMES, YES!"
…
…
Why was he still smiling?
"Acknowledged, and thank you."
The Night Fury's voice cut through his anger.
Horror and realisation crashed down on him. "No, wai-!"
Blue light erupted from the Dragonoid's cameras, Gregorio crying out in pain and alarm as it reflected off the steam and blinded him into a hazy white world. Stoic howled in equal parts raw fury and despair, firing blindly at the sounds of footsteps that clattered around him.
The cargo bay was filling with new noises; Roars from the Night Fury, sparks and bangs from Saint George's electronics, his own half-crazed screams as he fired blindly until his gun emptied its' magazine.
And then, silence.
He was on the ground, water up to his torso, one finger still twitching against a useless trigger. Stoic blinked furiously to his vision of spots and splotches of colour…
And yet, as his sight cleared and his hearing returned, a part of Gregorio wished he had stayed in the world of shade and silence.
A Dragonoid stood shrouded in the mist, one of the aliens themselves rather than their damned machines. It appeared to be male, its' lean body made of the blue light projected from the Night Fury's cameras and sized to be the largest thing in the room. It looked almost Human. The design of its' suit and turtleneck might have seemed eccentric, and his dark pony tailed hair might have looked a few centuries out of fashion, but still, a figure easily mistaken for a normal, albeit large and lanky Human being. It was its' face, however, that betrayed its' true nature. Slit pupiled eyes, sunken into his head just enough to be noticeable, ridged of bone where his ears should have been, and of course, a mouth full of knives when it smiled.
And yet, when it smiled, it smiled warmly. It held its' arms out to an invisible audience before the Night Fury's head, where the person who had answered its' infernal question was supposed to stand. Then it bowed, hands coming before its chest to clasp together in greeting.
"My greetings to you," it spoke in perfect English from both the Night Fury and Saint George's speakers. "I am High Superior Gadarrl, Child of Hevaan and Miiraal. This I give freely to you. Once, I led my people. And now, I beg you, listen to their story."
Dragonoid Translations
"Copaani gar jate?"
(Are you fine?)
"Dalyc nuhaatyc ar olar."
(She can't be here.)
"Gar liser k'oyacyi."
(You can stay.)
"…Staabi redo…"
(Right word)
"Bar tome, mhi mav gotal'ur bic banar."
(And together, we will make it happen.)
"Elek?"
(Yes?)
"Copaani gar chaab?"
(Are you scared?)
"Aht ar chaab la aht kar'taylir gar copaani oyacyir."
(To be scared is to know you are alive.)
"Aht te kyrbej"
(To the battlefield.)
Author's Notes
Not much to say today, mostly because the battle's spread out over three chapters and I sort of want to see people's reactions without any potentially spoiler-y input from me (I believe "Death of the Author" is the trope I have in mind. Not "Author Existence Failure" though, that's something entirely different.)
It's kind of scaring me that I've only got three more chapters to upload. This story has been a part of my life for the best part of a decade, so to see it nearing the end is exciting as well as daunting.
Anyway, See you next week!