AN: I originally would have made this part of the last chapter, but 20k words was enough, and I was getting burned out, so I posted that. This feels a bit short to me, but 7k words ain't bad.
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Chapter 7.
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The moment Louise's body was struck by the surge of Void power released when Sheffeld died, was the first moment since Louise had kissed Joshua the day he arrived that the power within her was greater than the power within him. In that moment, the flow of magic between the two reversed, and if it had come months earlier, it may have aborted the transformation Joshua's magic had wrought upon her body, but now, it was too late. What it did do, was overcome Joshua's resistance to heat, and with the magic-shredding properties of the Void, tore apart not only the surface of his hand, but also a portion of his magical essence and re-formed it as that of the Gandalfr.
The sheer physical agony was such that Joshua screamed in pain for the first time since the day of his sister's rape. By the time he recovered, the surviving Dragon Knights had retreated into the air above the castle, removing the immediate threat to the Princess, and clearing the way into the keep.
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Louise fell, her large, pink, furred, bewinged body sinking gracelessly through the air, accompanied in its drop by a luminescent green disk. A green disk which suddenly suffered a violent spasm, then a distortion, before expanding abruptly to more than three times its initial size, with a sound like breaking glass. A moment later, a figure wearing extremely thick armor stepped through the portal, and began to fall as well. After less than two seconds of uncontrolled fall, thrusters on the back, heels, and toes of the armor fired, bringing the fall under control, then braking it. As its descent began to slow, the figure grabbed the falling pink Dragon by the base of her wings, checking her fall as well as its own.
A burst of electromagnetic radiation passed back through the portal, bearing a message for those on the other side.
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"There's an unconscious young Dragon-Blood here," The scout's voice said softly, her whisper unnecessary, but still present as a result of the psychology of stealth, "Portal seems to be anchored to her. I've got the Captain's beacon about eighteen clicks out; stressed but still combat-capable."
The inhabitants of the 'op room,' which was by force of circumstances simply one of the armories aboard the gunship Perjury's Ruin, all breathed a sigh of relief.
"Activate the relay," Jonas Quint, the Commander in charge of the operation said.
"Yes sir," The scout replied.
((()))
Eighteen kilometers from where Louise was, more slowly now, falling through the air, Captain Joshua N'bara was receiving the first radio hail since he had entered Halkeginia.
"N'bara," A familiar voice called, "This is Commander Quint. Sitrep."
"Hot combat zone," Joshua said as he rushed into the inner keep of Castle Valliere, "Rivaling factions in pre-industrial tech magic-based society in conflict, have allied with defending force."
"We've got reinforcements scrambling as we speak," Quint said, "Gate aperture is six meters, though stability may be an issue, and the war over here is over, tell me what you need."
"Start with a squad of VTOL spec'd for close air support and counter-gunship combat," Joshua said, breathing hard as he traced the bloody leavings of battle deeper into the keep, "Then as much of a full fabrication array as you can get, followed by Fast Assault, then Artillery, then Assault mechs in fire team strength as you are able. Local magical system has fundamentally different capabilities, such as water to healing, air to lightning, and is based on five elements, earth, water, air, fire, void. Same-element spell disruption techniques viable, and locals do not appear to be able to sense like elements without active spellcasting at short ranges."
"What are our relations to the locals?" Quint asked.
"Either war, or allies," Joshua said, "Depending on if I'm successful in protecting the Royal Heir."
"Reinforcements are crossing now," Quint said, "Final urgent issue, the gate appears to be linked to a pink-furred Dragon Blood. Who is she?"
"Louise Valliere, third daughter of a local Duke," Joshua said, jumping over the dismembered corpse of a Royal Guardsmen, "She accidentally initiated transformation when she came into contact with me, and is under my personal protection. Is the transformation complete?"
"Yes," Quint said, "We'll look after her. Check in as soon as the situation is no longer so hot."
"Affirmative," Joshua said, "N'bara out."
((()))
"Alright people," Quint said, turning to face the handful of officers in the room with him, "You heard him, let's get a fabber kit going, ASAP."
A few sharp nods were all the response offered, and more than was really needed, as his subordinates were already about their business. Commander Quint's gaze turned towards the hatch that the shimmering green portal now stood outside of, the pair of gate-mages forcing it to remain open, and the pair of slightly-inhuman girls sitting on the in front of the hatch, straining against its pull. It took only a few short steps to reach them, and he crouched down beside the pair to whisper into their slightly-enlarged and furry ears.
"Hey, Laura, Brianna," He said, "I just talked with your brother, he's in a fight, but doesn't sound like it puts him in any real danger. Been hobnobbing with royalty, apparently."
Laura was the only one of the pair to respond, which didn't surprise Quint, as Brianna appeared to be the gate's target, and was fully occupied with resisting its pull on her magic.
"Can we talk with him?" Laura asked sadly, looking up at the larger, and taller, officer.
"Not a good idea," Quint said regretfully, "He's in a pretty hot situation, wouldn't want to distract him. I told him to call back as soon as things clear up on the ground over there."
He paused for a moment, hesitating briefly before continuing.
"If you look out the hatch," He said, gesturing towards the translucent portal, and the VTOL gunship approaching it, "You'll see some of what we're sending in to support him."
Quint wasn't sure if his recommendation was ultimately a good idea or not, as the girls could either find the amount of firepower being sent to support their brother encouraging, or if they thought about what might cause need for such firepower, it could be worrying. When the first VTOL passed through the portal from the opposite side, and they could see the interior as it moved through, including the pilot's interior, he decided it was definitely a bad idea.
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When Joshua found Siesta's body, he came within a hair of completely losing control of his emotions. It took a great deal, however, to crack through a decade and a half of training in emotional control, and he clawed down the rising anger until he could confirm her condition.
He stood at the entrance to the knitting chamber, in a pool of blood that was still draining from the corpses littered about it. From where he stood, it was difficult to differentiate where the blood from those who had died outside the room ended, and where the blood from Siesta's body began. There was certainly enough for her to have bled out, but as he forced himself to a moment of stillness, he was able to see that she was still breathing. That was all the impetus he needed to swiftly cross the room, and inspect her body more closely.
That her forehead was not entirely present had been visible from the door, but from up close, he could see the interior of his head, and he lost control of his stomach. Unfortunately, he was too horrified by what he saw to physically or magically remove his helmet, and ended up vomiting inside of its sealed interior. Fortunately, ripping his helmet off and cleaning his face and mouth distracted him from what he'd seen, and once what little had remained in his stomach was expelled, he was able to focus and look back at the young maid's mangled head.
At least the cauterization has kept her from bleeding out, Joshua thought bitterly, What's left of her, anyway.
Little positive could be said about Siesta's condition, a wind/flame spell had been used on her, aimed slightly upward by the mage who had cast it, as seated her head was slightly higher than his wand-hand at waist level. Her head had been tilted slightly back to meet the mage's gaze, and consequently, when the spell had struck struck her just above her eyebrows, it had sliced off most of her frontal lobes, as well as cauterized her brain tissue, and seared off a fair portion of her hair. Between the parts of her head and brain that had been destroyed outright, and the damage done by the spell's heat, all higher brain functions had instantly been destroyed.
More simply put, most of her brain was cooked. Due to the placement and angle of the spell, however, apparently her brain stem and spinal column had been untouched, leaving most autonomic body functions intact, which meant that physically she was not dead, nor in any immediate danger, as the cauterization had stopped the bleeding.
His physical inspection of Siesta's wound complete, Joshua found himself again struggling for emotional control. He had seen worse wounds before, generally of the sort that split a body in half, but never on allies. In modern warfare, due to the degree of protection his people employed for all soldiers, anything likely to adequately penetrate combat armor left nothing but a corpse; seeing such a wound on a still living body, especially an unarmed non-combatant, was more than he was prepared to deal with.
So, for now, he didn't. He shoved aside the revulsion and grief, put his anger on a leash, and placed his left hand on the hilt of his sword. The runes of the Gandalfr burned to life on the back of his gauntlet, and Joshua felt power flow through him.
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For the first time since the battle had begun, Karin saw Joseph angry, something she took considerable personal satisfaction in. There had been no more words since she had killed his companion, just extremely rapid spellfire, and increasingly angry snarls from the king of Gallia. An unusually skilled square-class mage, Joseph was proving himself capable of holding an active defensive spell, and casting offensively at the same time. In Karin's experience, about half of square-class mages learned the control necessary to cast two spell simultaneously, and doing so generally put them well beyond the effective reach of most triangle-class mages.
Against Karin herself, his single-spell offensives were, literally, laughable. Especially as he seemed to lack Void-based offensive spells, as her own shield and counter-spell efforts were quite effective against his wind-based attacks. That she still could not pierce his defenses, and he had taken to the air to prevent a repeat of her earlier indirect strike was ultimately irrelevant to her, as she was confident he would exhaust himself long before she tired. Karin was far more worried about the Dragon Knights that had taken to the air above the castle, as even with their numbers reduced by half or more, there were more than enough to pose a threat to her, or simply wear her out.
Just as her thoughts were turning towards concern for the Princess's welfare, they were interrupted by the appearance of Joshua N'bara at her side.
"Duchess," He said harshly, his voice tight with restrained emotion, "The Princess is dead. Who commanded this strike?"
Karin gestured towards Joseph, and opened her mouth to speak, but Joshua was already gone.
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Joseph of Gallia was no fool, and was far from uninformed. When he saw the armored man at Karin's side leap across the gap between the outer and inner wall without enhancement from a spell, runes glowing on his left hand, he put two and two together. He knew what the four different Void Familiars were capable of, and that the Valliere girl had summoned a human familiar. What was approaching him could only be the Gandalfr, and he wanted no part in fighting both the Heavy Wind and the Gandalfr at the same time.
Already airborne, Joseph called out for his Dragon, and fled into the sky.
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Joshua reached the inner keep with inhuman speed, but Joseph had already fled beyond ready striking distance, and it would be near-suicide for him to pursue the man when he had more than eighty Dragon Knights moving in escort.
Instead, he hurled his sword at the retreating Dragons, and screamed.
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Louise woke with a snarl, emotions not her own flooding through her mind, and forcing her into unpleasant consciousness. Her body jerked as she instinctively tried to feel out her surroundings, and instead nearly fell. Taking a cautious breath, Louise stilled herself, and forced the emotions down, as Joshua had taught her. Then she turned her focus to what her senses told her of the world around her, and came to a startling realization.
For the first time in months, she was not experiencing pain, a drug-induced high, or the numbness a healer could grant her. Louise took a long moment to simply revel in the lack of pain, before opening her eyes and turning her attention to the outside world. The first thing she saw, was a brilliant green portal a dozen yards in front of her, with a flying metal construct emerging from it. Initially, it made little noise, but as more of it emerged from the portal, a pair of screaming pods mounted at its midsection emerged, visibly venting heat as they propelled air downward through them. Louise's eyes widened as the construct continued to close with her, before it cleared the portal completely, and rose away from her.
A voice sounded from behind her, and Louise tore her attention away from the shimmering green portal. She discovered, to some distress, that she was actually resting on top of another flying construct, identical in every way she could perceive to the one that had just come through the portal in front of her. Standing beside and slightly behind her on its metal hull was a large, armored figure that bore a passing resemblance to Joshua's armor, if it had been scaled up five-fold in bulk and weight. The figure spoke again, waited a moment, and then spoke again, though this time she could understand.
"Are you Louise Valliere?" The figure asked.
"Yeths," Louise said, then frowned and stared down her snout, trying to figure out why her voice had come out mangled.
Then she realized that the fact she had a snout was probably involved. A quick inventory revealed that her limbs were yet larger than they had last been, though her joints seemed to have regained full functionality. Also, her tail was longer than the rest of her, and she had wings now. Also, looking over her shoulder had become much easier with how long and flexible her neck now was. The transformation, Louise realized, was finished, and she was now a healthy, if rather small, Dragon.
"Ahem," The figure behind her said, and this time Louise paid enough attention to successfully identify the armored soldier as a she, "You are Louise Valliere then?"
Rather than risk an untrustworthy vocal mechanism, Louise just nodded.
"Right," The soldier said, "I've received word that you are under Captain N'bara's personal protection, and are the daughter of the local nobility. We're headed towards the Captain's position now, ETA is approximately four minutes."
Louise was not entirely sure what an 'eeh-tee-ay' was, but gathered the gist of the soldier's intent, and nodded again, looking around as she did so. In her continuing series of discoveries about her new condition, and the conditions of the world around her, she now found that the construct she was laying on was not simply flying, but flying at considerable speed towards the Castle Valliere. They were also flying low, barely clearing the treetops, and when an enormous cargo crate emerged and fell into the forest below, Louise saw why.
((()))
Feeling tired, far too tired, Joshua carefully and slowly sat down on top of the keep, and took a deep, precisely controlled breath. By the time the breath was fully exhaled, Karin had reached him, and was staring at him pointedly.
"The Princess is not dead," Joshua said roughly, "Siesta volunteered to play body double, and is now missing part of the top of her head."
Karin nodded sharply, then turned to watch the retreating forces of Reconquista as they slipped off into the night.
"She served honorably," Was all Karin said, but Joshua did not respond; he had cut off his helmet's external speakers, and was using his comm.
"N'bara here," He said, "Situation has cooled, enemy is in retreat."
"Roger," Came Quint's prompt response, "The VTOL's report a large group of airborns flying south south-west from your position, shall I order pursuit?"
"With extreme prejudice," Joshua said harshly, "This attack came with no declaration of war, was for the intent of assassination, and involved traitors."
((()))
Aboard the lead gunship, Commander Jaquelyn Chung received the order to engage, which she immediately passed along to her squad-mates.
The Hummingbird VTOL Gunship was a nuclear powered attack craft built around a doctrine of zero dependency on consumable resources. Towards this end, it mounted a pair of heavy anti-vehicle lasers mounted on either side of its nose as its primary armament, had a functionally unlimited fuel life, an extensive array of small point-defense lasers capable of killing unarmored humans or engaging small anti-air missiles, and an expectation of heavy enchanting for durability in its frame and light armor. In structure, it resembled a tablespoon, with the cockpit and lasers mounted in the head of the spoon, its primary engine pods mounted just aft of the join between spoon head and handle, and a third engine pod built into the end of the spoon's handle. Its name came from its extreme maneuverability, as the rotating engine pods had enough power and freedom of movement for it to move like its namesake. It required only a pilot to crew, though could also fit a weapons officer or passenger under cramped conditions. Four magnetic clamps were built into its ventral hull, and another six on its ventral, four of which were mounted along its spine. In case its laser mounts simply were not enough, missile and bomb payloads, or even gun pods, could be mounted on these hard points, as well as more mundane equipment such as cargo modules or construction equipment, though non-military modules tended to be heavy and non-aerodynamic, degrading its mobility substantially when mounted.
The seven free Hummingbirds of Chung's squadron had all of their dorsal hardpoints equipped with missile mounts, two of their dorsal hardpoints equipped with gun pods, and the final two equipped with small 'long deployment' cargo modules, containing commonly-needed spare parts, maintenance tools, and some spare ammunition for the missile and gun mounts. The spare cockpit space was filled not with a passenger or weapons officer, but the pilot's personal gear, equipment, and some of their personal effects, as appropriate for a deployment away from friendly resupply or support for a month or more.
To the Albion Dragon Knights and Joseph of Gallia, the only elements of the Hummingbird's capabilities that mattered, were their sensor packages abilities to track the retreating Dragons, their heavy lasers' ability to fire effectively at their given range, their targeting software's ability to split targets evenly between the seven gunships, and automatically handle the precision targeting control of both the aircraft and the lasers' firing aperture, smoothly moving them from one target to the next as targets were eliminated. It took less than ten seconds from the time the order was passed to Commander Chung for the squadron to acquire, designate, and divide targets, and for the targeting computers to formulate the most efficient coordinated firing pattern for the gunships.
Once Chung gave her firing computer the 'execute' command, it took less than two and a half seconds of pulsed laser fire to kill every Dragon rider in the retreating company. Few of the shots even did any substantial injury to the Dragons they were riding, who immediately began fleeing to their home territory of Albion.
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"Attack mission is under way," Quint said, "I assume from what you've asked for, you intend to stay for the duration?"
"Yes sir," Joshua said tiredly, "These people could use the services of a merchant-industrial fleet."
"You're the man on the ground, Captain," Quint said, "Is there anything else of urgent need?"
"I don't suppose there's a healer on hand?" Joshua asked.
"Not sure if we'll be able to hold the Gate long enough to get-"
His words were cut off by a ripple of cracks, as faintly visible lances of coherent light cut across the the sky from the West, towards the South, and Joshua felt a spike of vindictive satisfaction as the Dragon Knights died, and more particularly, their commander, died.
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Though certain components of the heavy lasers mounted in the Hummingbirds were enchanted to better endure the waste heat and other rigors involved in their operation, and the gain medium and other optical elements were enchanted to better focus and amplify the emitted beam, there was absolutely nothing magical about the produced beam of light itself. Designed for use against vehicles armored with modern composites, some of which could reasonably be expected to be enchanted, a Halkeginian earth mage of triangle or square class with warning could have conjured a physical barrier strong enough to resist fire from such weapons briefly. Firing from beyond the ranges at which the Dragon Knights could even detect them, and striking at literally the speed of light, no such warning was available.
Joseph's shield was a nigh-impregnable defense against magical attack; the Hummingbirds attack was not magical in the least. With no particular reason to be overly conservative, and possible unknown defensive enchantments, Chung's squadron left a healthy margin of error in the amount of power they put behind each micro-pulse of laser fire.
In this case, 'a healthy margin of error' translated to so much heat transferred to Joseph's head that the soft tissues were subject to a mixture of the water within them boiling away, and the more solid materials burning to ash instantly. Considering what had happened to Siesta's wound, Joshua would have considered the manner in which Joseph's head was destroyed, and the man was killed, to be an appropriate justice, if the body had ever been found.
With Joseph's death, another incarnation of Void Magic was loosed into Halkeginia, and with the distances both he and Louise had traveled since Sheffeld's death, this magic was released even closer to the pink-furred Void Dragon. The Void magic soared across the intervening space almost as fast as the lasers had, and poured itself into her magically absorbent body.
Louise roared with a mixture of surprise and euphoria.
((()))
From both sides, the green gate visibly flared with power, and the N'bara twins suddenly lurched towards it, stopped only by the instinctive, instantaneous reaction of Jonas Quint, latching onto the pair of slightly inhuman girls and using his earth magic to hold himself tightly to the deck.
"What happened?" He shouted at the gate mages.
"Whatever's grounding the gate on the other side," The senior of the two said, "Just got a substantial boost in power. We're-"
He cut off as the gate swelled again, and writhed as it struggled to pull Brianna N'bara through itself. Quint held dead fast to the pair of thirteen-year-old girls, and glared at the gate.
"How long?" He demanded of the Gate mages.
"Three minutes, tops," The junior mage said, the senior too focused to risk speaking, "Less if it does that again."
Quint thought furiously as he studied the again-enlarged gate before him, guessing it to now be roughly eight meters in diameter.
"If we put more power into your circle," Quint asked, "How much bigger could you make that Gate?"
"Big," The junior mage said, "At least big enough for a strike craft. I don't know if the other ground has a maximum limit. It's different than a normal Gate."
"Right then," Quint said, then turned to his communications officer, "I want every mage on this ship capable of joining a circle in this room now."
((()))
"What was that?" Kirche asked, staring in the direction of the still-echoing thunder.
Tabitha, riding in front of Kirche on Sylphid, just shook her head.
Augustus Zerbst, seated behind Kirche, on the other hand, did speak.
"Sounded like thunder to me."
"Well, obviously," Kirche said, "But there was no flash of lightning, so it couldn't have been natural, and it was too sustained for anything but the largest scale of combat spells. Knowing who caused that, and just what it is, might be very important when we get back to Castle Valliere."
"So what do you want me to do?" Augustus demanded.
"Ask the others," She said with an irritated jerk of her head, indicating the two dozen flying beasts following them, each with two battle-mages riding them.
Augustus rolled his eyes, even though his slightly younger cousin couldn't see, then turned to begin signaling the others.
((()))
The Perjury's Ruin was a gunship, a term used within the fleets to refer to any vessel that was primarily dedicated to combat capability. When Joshua's nation had been driven into a nomadic lifestyle by the mass nuclear bombardment of their land and subsequent fallout, they had taken lessons from both their own distant past, and more recent ethnic groups of nomads. Primarily, this meant that their city-fleets were armed to the teeth, more than 90% of their vessels with at least nominal armaments, and gunships dedicated entirely to the waging of war scattered throughout the fleet. Migrant peoples tended to be persecuted in many, if not most, of the places they traveled through, and rarely lacked the strength at arms to protect themselves; this was not a pattern they intended to be trapped in.
As gunships went, the Perjury's Ruin was of middling size, its envelope was roughly 400 meters long, a sixth that in width, and supported six ventral decks of troop quarters, armories, gun and missile batteries, and a small dorsal ICBM/counter-ICBM silo. Like all vessels of the fleet, its powered engines were capable of supporting it in the case of envelope failure; unlike non-military vessels of the fleet, it was designed to readily collapse its envelope and move at high speeds under powered flight for strategic deployment and combat purposes. It was also far too large to fit through the Void Gate, even after five dozen combat mages aboard ship had joined in a circle to lend the Gate mages their power, and the gate's subsequent enlargement.
The Perjury's Ruin, however, was but one vessel amongst the fleet, and Commander Quint had already compiled a list of available vessels, and ordered them to begin collapsing their envelopes in preparation for passage through the Gate. Nobody had ever sent a full-on fleet-vessel through a Gate before, but then, there'd never been the need before. A fleet could cross the globe in a few days, and if one already had sufficient force at a destination to create a gate that large, one would be better suited simply holding on to the position until reinforcements could arrive via a method other than tearing a hole through the fabric of space/time.
By the time the Gate had stabilized, Quint had already decided which ship he wanted to send through, and to his satisfaction, the stabilized Gate was indeed large enough for the Sky Tree to pass through, even if only just.
((()))
"What was that?" Karin asked as she glared in the direction the Dragon Knights had fled, "You know something of it."
"What makes you say that?" Joshua asked, his voice devoid of emotion.
"I've seen you fight enough to know you would have done more than just sit there if you didn't," Karin said harshly, "Now tell me."
"Reinforcements," Joshua said reluctantly, "Princess Henrietta sent Tabitha, Kirche, and your daughter to acquire reinforcements before the battle began."
"Where from?" Karin demanded, wishing she could see past his helmet to read his expression.
"The Zerbst," Joshua admitted.
Karin scowled. While she didn't bear her husband's hereditary animosity towards the Zerbst, she did have a healthy respect for the large clan's considerable martial prowess. The fact that they swore loyalty to a monarch from a line not ordained by Brimir did nothing to endear them to her favor either.
It did not even occur to Karin, after revealing that the Princess of Tristain had sent for reinforcements from Germania, that he might be redirecting her from a bigger revelation with a lesser. Her attention redirected, Joshua was on his comm again.
"N'bara here," He said, "What's going on over there?"
"Portal surge," A voice he recognized as Quint's comm officer said, "Other side amped up in power but large; we're stabilizing and enlarging over here."
"Roger," Joshua said, "Anything else I should be apprised of?"
There was a moment's pause before the other man spoke again.
"The portal's grounded to one of your sisters," He said, "It's trying to pull her through."
Joshua said nothing in response; he simply did not know what to say. Or what to think. Or what to do about that at all. After everything that had happened in the last few years, then the last few months after his summoning, then Karin capturing him, and now the events of this last night...
So Joshua sat amongst the ravaged battlements of the keep, and simply stared at nothing in particular, trying to think of what to do, and his mind coming up blank.
((()))
Henrietta also heard the roll of thunder, but she was far too busy patching up the grievously wounded, and far, far too few survivors of her Royal Guard to pay it any more mind than hope it didn't mean a renewal of battle.
Then the stretcher-bearers brought in Siesta's mutilated but still-living body, dressed up in one of her dresses, with her hair magicked to be the same color as the Princess' own. It was only knowing that if she did not keep at her work, some of the wounded would die, that kept her from falling apart on the spot. She still had to repeatedly clear her eyes repeatedly of the tears that silently fell. This wasn't the first time that she had worked on wounded Royal Guardsmen before, and she doubted it would be the last, but usually her tears didn't come until after she left the infirmary and had to deal with the corpses, rather than those who would survive. The Royal Guardsmen though, were soldiers sworn to the service of the Royal Family, trained and equipped for combat, and well-compensated for their services. Siesta...
Siesta had been a maid with no oath to her personally, no training, no pay proportionate to her risk, just a young woman with the courage to stare death in the face. And worst of all, Henrietta knew she'd done it because the maiden believed in her.
It always hurt the most when she knew someone had been injured because of their personal loyalty to her.
((()))
Louise's eyes, already roughly half the size of a human head in her fully-draconic form, widened. Rather than the long procession of metallic crates that had been coming through before, something massive was now moving through the portal. Even with the portal enlarged as it had been a mere minute ago. In shape, it was vaguely like a trough, tapering slightly towards the bottom, broader at the top, and far longer than it was wide. In composition, it was formed entirely of metal, with with portholes and mechanisms she both did and didn't recognize from her dreams dotting the sides, including some she knew were weapons.
When she recognized the airships, she made the mental jump to realizing what the object was as a whole; one of the vessels from Joshua's fleet, with its envelope of lighter-than-air gas collapsed to make it more maneuverable, not to mention capable of passing through the portal. All told, it still took a half-minute for the vessel to pass through, and Louise had to spend most of that with her head and neck firmly planted along the spine of the aircraft she was resting on, since the portal's position was anchored to her, and the distance between her and the portal was less than the total length of the vessel.
((()))
"Captain N'bara," Quint said, "You still there?"
"Yes sir," N'bara said, in what Quint immediately recognized as a voice that was too soft.
It didn't take much to connect the drastic mood shift to his request for a Healer earlier, as well as N'bara hearing about the Gate trying to pull his sister through. He didn't have the time to deal with that right now though, and trusted Joshua to be able to snap out of it when the pressure really came on.
"The Gate's breaking free of our control," Quint said, "Gate mages say once it's broken free of their control, it'll be picking up Brianna. We've just sent the Sky Tree through the Gate, and you've got a full fabrication complex. We're chucking a truncated company of mechs through, but as you're their legal guardian, you need to decide if one, or both, of your sisters will be coming through."
Joshua said nothing for precious seconds, and Quint knew he'd need more push.
"Your sisters need you," He said quietly.
"Put them on," Joshua said, purpose clear in his voice again.
((()))
Louise's eyes widened all the more as the titans of war she had seen from Joshua's memory began raining through the portal, moving not like the clumsy, or at best stolid, golems she had seen from earth mages, but like deadly avatars of war, their human pilots controlling them with deadly grace and finesse.
((()))
Karin heard a series of dull thuds resounding from the West, and turned her attention in that direction, before glancing at Joshua to see if he knew what was approaching. The Knight was standing now, and the dejection that had briefly entered his posture was gone, replaced with a purposeful, commanding pose that she had seen in few men before. She could tell he was speaking, but she could not hear, and then it did occur to her that his statements about possible Zerbst approaching may have been misdirection, especially considering the obtuse route they would have had to approach by in order to intercept the Dragon Knights.
((()))
"Josh," Laura said softly, "We're sorry."
Joshua nearly broke down and cried.
"We missed you," Laura continued quietly, "Our change has started, and it's been hard. Please let us both come."
"I Love you both," Joshua said, his voice hoarse with emotion, "Put the Commander back on, and I'll see you shortly."
((()))
"Joshua," Karin said forcefully, raising her wand meaningfully, but not quite pointing it at him directly, "What is approaching."
Joshua pulled his helmet off, and met her glare with blazing eyes.
"My people come," He said matching every bit of force in the older woman's voice, "Warriors and citizens both. Step carefully woman, as alone amongst all of your forces, you may pose a threat to them, and they all pose a threat to you."
Then he reached into his helmet, and adjusted something.
"Commander Quint," He said, maintaining eye contact with Karin, "My sisters will both be coming through. If you've got the time, I'm requesting the Perjury's Ruin's stealth team."
"Done," A male voice replied, emanating from his helmet, "And done. The Sky Tree's captain will have civil authority, I'm brevetting you to Lieutenant-Colonel, and giving you military command, as well as standard first-contacter diplomatic authority. Godspeed."
"And to you, sir," Joshua said, "Lieutenant-Colonel N'bara out."
He adjusted something within his helmet again, and continued to stare at Karin.
"Your daughter is with my people," Joshua said fiercely, "And under my personal protection, both as a Knight, and now as commander of all forces we have deployed to Halkeginia. I will not hold what you have done to me, personally, against your nation, or Louise, but let me make something clear, I know what was done to me while I slept, and there will be an accounting for it."
Karin simply nodded, waiting to see just what his people had brought, if they were in fact here, before she committed to a course of action.
((()))
In all, the Gate mages, backed by as many of the mages aboard the Perjury's Ruin that could afford to leave their posts, held the gate open for five minutes and thirty-seven seconds after Louise's void magic was augmented by that of the late king of Gallia, and increased the draw on Brianna N'bara. The final four people to pass through, were the two Gate mages, then Laura, and finally Brianna N'bara. The instant Brianna had fully passed through, the gate disintegrated and disappeared.
((()))
To her considerable surprise, After a brief delay following the last war machine passing through the gate, a pair of men in light armor came through, followed by a pair of girls. Girls with slightly altered features, and a light dusting of fur across their bodies; girls that Louise recognized.
One of them, she wasn't sure which, stared up at her in befuddled awe.
"Did big brother get married while we were here?" She asked.
That must be Laura, Louise absently thought, Brianna would never be so bold.
((()))
"Princess," Joshua said, and Henrietta looked up from the Guardsmen she was checking for further bleeding.
"Yes, Joshua?" She said.
"Please come with me," Joshua said quietly, very carefully not looking in the corner where Siesta's damaged body rested, "You should see this."
Henrietta gestured for one of the commoner attendants to take over for her, then nodded and followed Joshua out of the Infirmary.
((()))
On top of the keep, Joshua, Henrietta, and the two Royal Guardsmen who had remained within the Infirmary for the duration of the battle, joined Karin, who was watching the sky to the West of the castle.
"What is it Joshua?" Henrietta asked, glancing at the Knight before looking to the West as well.
"My people come," Joshua said, "You should see some of what Louise dreamed of."
Henrietta glanced at the Knight again, but his own attention was directed to the West already. She returned her attention to the western sky, and watched.
First came the sound; a low rumble steadily rising in volume, soon accompanied by a high pitched whining sound. Then a large silhouette began to overtake the stars over the western horizon, and Henrietta's sharp eyes were able to make out smaller shapes maneuvering about it.
Then Joshua raised his helmet, spoke a short phrase into it, in a language Henrietta was not familiar with, and there was light, everywhere. But more than anywhere else, there was light on the sleek metal hulls of the flying constructs approaching, and the massive balloon like airship that they were escorting.
Henrietta was glad that her mother had required her to undergo extensive training in always maintaining proper comportment, as the vessel in front of her was the largest airborne object she had ever seen, aside from Albion itself. Henrietta did a rapid comparison between the airship and the trees at the edge of the forest it was passing over, and concluded it was far too large for her to get an accurate estimate of its dimensions.
Then an enormous metal golem, not the largest she'd seen, but easily several stories tall, stalked out of the forest, moving more gracefully than any magical construct she'd ever seen. Or, she said, remembering Louise's words of Joshua's nation, possibly a non-magical construct. Then another humanoid construct strode out of the forest, then another, and another. Henrietta's eyes abruptly narrowed, and she turned to stare at Joshua.
"You arranged this spectacle on purpose, didn't you?" She said.
"Yes," Joshua said, "People are always more willing to treat you with respect when they know you are strong. Migrant peoples throughout my world's history were often persecuted, and when war forced my people from our lands, we determined we would never allow ourselves to be taken as the victims. First contact always involves a show of strength."
He turned to Karin, before continuing.
"Especially," He said, "For those who are proven threats."
Karin stared stonily back at him, but Joshua only met her gaze for a moment before turning to face the approaching aircraft again.
"And after the show of strength?" Henrietta asked.
"We help you build a new future," Joshua said.
((()))
End Chapter 7.
((()))
AN: This story may go on hiatus for a while while I work on Cameron's Legacy again; I'm thinking it'll be one to three more chapters before I complete this plot arc, depending on chapter length. After that, the story will either be finished, or waiting for enough plot advancement in the ZnT source material to come to light before I advance it further.