Meanwhile, in London

...

The newspaper headline nearly took up the entire front page. The black typeface was a daunting gothic print that was bold and brash in its full capital letters.

ROMANOFF DYNASTY ENDED IN RUSSIA: BLOODY CIVIL WAR CONTINUES. MILLIONS PRESUMED DEAD.

Deryn sighed and pushed the paper away. She didn't feel compelled to read any more about the brutal assassination of Czar Nicholas II and his young family. Nor did she want to know any more of the thousands of people being slaughtered for what she considered a foolish reason.

So much for the war to end all wars. She thought. Not for the first time she wondered if The Great War she had participated in had been nothing but a gigantic, deadly and miserable waste of time. Thinking about war was something she did a lot lately and, as Dr. Barlow had pointed out, it was quite normal for a war veteran to think about.

I'm a war veteran. She thought gloomily. She was also a decorated soldier, a commanding pilot of The Royal Air Force and an assistant for the Zoological Society, but it sounded a lot worse when she thought of herself as a war veteran.

Annoyed, Deryn stood up from her desk. She couldn't let a war half a world away ruin her day. There were a lot of important things to do and she didn't have time to waste pondering about Russia.

So she went back to her job, which much to do with war seeing that she helped fabricate battle beasties, and continued making her morning rounds about the laboratory.

The eggs were all doing fine in their incubators. She marked down the temperatures and recorded that a few had started to crack. The microscopes were all lined up as they should be and all her bacteria specimens were put away on their shelves. Lastly, she went to check on the aquarium to see if her new amphibious fabrications were ready to eat their breakfasts. She was halfway through separating the rations of mealworms when there was a soft knock on the laboratory door.

It was rare for someone to take the time to knock. Curious, Deryn walked over to answer the door and was greeted by a faceful of white fluffy fur. It took her half a second to discover that her face had been engulfed by a small creature.

"Mr. Sharp!" Exclaimed the little creature. It then giggled uncontrollably as Deryn tried to wrench it off of her head.

"….Bovril?" She stated with confusion. "Blisters, I haven't seen you in ages! You're supposed to be in Prague with Alek." After freeing the beastie from her face she gave it a strong hug. There was a sound from the door of someone clearing their throat and Deryn put together that it would be very strange for Bovril to turn up at her laboratory door by itself. Her nerves started firing as she realized who must have brought Bovril here from Austria-Hungary.

"Good morning, Dylan." Came a horribly familiar voice. Standing before the threshold of her lab was none other than Aleksander von Hohenberg, his Serene Highness and Emperor of Austria-Hungary. Deryn gave a loud gulp. She should have expected him to be there along with the loris but it still was a nasty shock.

"Do you mind if I come in?" He asked politely after she didn't say anything for several moments. Deryn made the effort to nod and stand aside so the Emperor could walk into the room.

For the most part Alek hadn't changed a squick since she last saw him. He was maybe a tad taller but still shorter than her and his shoulders had filled out, but either than that he still had the same physical presence. Her own appearance was much different than when she had last seen Alek. She recalled that their parting had been rushed yet heartfelt.

"You'll have time to write me, won't you? Not going to be too busy being a barking emperor I hope?" She smiled as she tossed his small suitcase onto the tiny aircraft.

"I'll make the time, Dylan, I promise! However, as future emperor I have every right to command you to respond to my letters with effortless speed." Alek said, a grin spreading on his face. It helped him keep away the tears that were threatening to fall.

Deryn snorted. "Aye, your majesty. And you better come visit me soon. God knows that Glasgow needs some more Clanker emperors around."

They both laughed then. It was an awkwardly quiet laugh for them. Neither would look at the other due to their approaching separation. Alek decided he was fed up with the stale goodbye and closed the space between them by leaping at Deryn and surrounding her in tight hug.

"Goodbye, Dylan. I'm going to miss you terribly."

Deryn's eyes had gone misty but she hugged Alek back strongly. "Oh, aye, me too. And I'm serious about you writing me. I don't want you disappearing into that huge empire of yours."

"I won't, disappear that is. I will write to you though, I promise."

Deryn had been a tall skinny lad in Alek's mind. That no longer was the case. Her body had not allowed her to keep her hidden identity so Dylan had become Deryn after a few months in the Zoological Society. It had been a huge issue at the time but the boffins got over it rather quickly. It wasn't like she had been the first girl to hide her sex in order to increase her standing.

However, Deryn decided that it would be best if Alek never found out her secret. He had written to her religiously after the war and she had been glad to respond. Their friendship had even seemed stronger than before as she gave what advice she could through letters to young emperor. He had needed her friendship, she knew, and Deryn worried that if she told him the truth by letter he would hate her. He may have also wanted more than a pen pal if he discovered that his best friend was female. An emperor could never court a common Scottish lass who worked at the London Zoo.

It had been hard, but Deryn had decided it was best to stop writing to Alek. Instead of coming up with a bumrag excuse as to why she couldn't write, she just stopped altogether. Alek had continued to write, of course, but slowly he had given up after several months. It broke her heart but she had forced their friendship to grow apart.

Never had she expected him to show up at her door years later. And by the way he was looking at her he hadn't expected her to look the way she did when he showed up at her door.

"You…..um…..I beg your pardon, but you…"

"Ma calls it 'filling out a bit'." Deryn laughed. Her mother had been delighted that her daughter had finally acquired curves. True, Deryn would never be called voluptuous, but she no longer could get away with wearing men's clothes. She still wore pants and pilot's boots but that was only because they were much easier to work in than a skirt. Her hair was kept short but she had given in to some simple hoops in her ears and a woman's blouse. While working in her lab the warm temperatures allowed for her to wear a rather tight blouse that she had unbuttoned a squick at the top. She realized immediately that Alek was gaping at her bare neck and upper chest so she quickly tossed Bovril on the desk and replaced the creature with her jacket.

"Sorry, your highness, I suppose it isn't very funny. I guess I should explain."

Alek bit his lip and frowned. "Some explaining would be appreciated." He said solemnly.

Deryn didn't know where to start. Thankfully Alek didn't look too angry, just really barking confused. She couldn't blame him. What could be more of a shock than finding out your old war buddy was a girl?

"Um…Well, you remember my Da died about two years before the war?"

Alek nodded and took the initiative to sit down on one of the stools by the microscopes. It didn't appear he would be leaving without her explaining everything.

"I guess this all started after that. I never was much for wearing dresses and doing girly things, and I really wanted to fly. So Da used to take me up in his hot air balloons. After his accident, I wasn't allowed to fly anymore. It was really boring living with Ma and not being able to train for the air force like my brother. One day I just woke up and decided the heck with it, I would just become a boy and join the military like he did." She sighed, recalling how Jaspert had been so excited to help her with her plan. She wondered if he ever realized what he ended up putting her through.

"You know the rest of it." She continued to Alek. "With a squick of nasty luck I ended up as a middy onboard the Leviathan. The rest is history."

Alek narrowed his eyes. "And you never thought to tell me?" He asked.

She gulped. "I was going to!" She admitted. "But it never seemed like the right time. There was always something getting in the way. You were either trying to escape, or the Germans were attacking or Volger was threatening me. I didn't really have the chance."

"You had four years to tell me." He stated. "Why did you stop writing to me?"

Deryn could've started crying right then. But she stood tall and continued talking.

"You're the Emperor of bloody Austria, Alek! And I'm just some silly lass who pretended to be an airman. It wasn't a friendship that could continue!"

For the first time Deryn realized how hurt Alek looked by what she was saying. He wasn't completely looking at her and appeared to be focusing on the floor tiles so she couldn't see as clearly how red and splotchy his cheeks were getting.

"You really believe that would have mattered? You could have been a leper for all I cared, at least you were kind to me! Not many people were during that time, Dylan. It shocks me that you would think I'd care what gender you were."

Flabbergasted, Deryn gaped at him. "You would have hated me! You should hate me!"

"On the contrary, I would have been in awe of your bravery."

She snorted. "That's a load of clart! Look at you; you're practically crying you're so angry at me!"

He stood up and finally faced her eye to eye. "ANGRY? I'm not angry! I am a bit upset. You would be too if someone disappeared off the face of the planet for four years and then turned out to be alive and well the entire time! Do you know how hard I looked for you?"

She blinked. "You thought I was dead?"

Alek gave a loud frustrated groan that caused Bovril to jump off the desk and dash across the room. "What else would I have thought!? After the war more than half of the people I had grown up with had disappeared. I lost countless numbers of acquaintances and family members. As for friends, I never had any. Now imagine what it would be like if your only friend was a soldier who stopped writing to you before the war had completely ended!"

Deryn had never looked at it that way. Glasgow had lost hundreds of boys to the war. Many of whom had been classmates of hers. Still, she hadn't lost any family or close friends as Alek had. It had never occurred to her that refusing to answer Alek's letters would cause such a commotion. Plus, if he had tried to look for her it would have been impossible to hunt her down. There was no such thing as Dylan Sharp.

"I'm….I'm sorry. I had no idea." She said, ashamed.

He took a deep breath and sighed. "It's alright. I didn't mean to scream at you. Probably not the best way to greet someone you haven't seen in years." He laughed a little and wiped a wandering tear from his face. "It's just that it's been so long, and to randomly discover that you were alive, well, it's a little more than a bit emotional for me."

There was a pause as she shuffled her feet. It wasn't every day that a young handsome man told her she had made him emotional. In fact it never happened. Deryn had had her fair share of boyfriends but never anything serious. Truthfully she had always wondered if Alek would show up in her life again. Before today she had considered it ridiculous but now….

"Well…besides that, how have you been?" She said, trying to change the subject.

He smiled at her. "All things aside I suppose I'm doing alright. That said I didn't come here just to talk to you. I actually have been in correspondence with Dr. Barlow. I've commissioned her to build a ship for me."

That surprised her. If Dr. Barlow had been asked to create a Darwinist ship for Alek, surely the boffin would have told her most trusted assistant?

Alek opened a briefcase she hadn't seen before to show her a pile of blueprints and sketches all in Dr. Barlow's handwriting. He carefully unwrapped them and showed Deryn the plans of an immense beastie that was larger than anything she had worked on before.

"What the hell?" She snatched a blueprint out of his hand. "Is this an airship? You're having Dr. Barlow create you a Darwinist airship?!"

He shook his head with a grin. "Not an airship, but a walker. See the legs? They're folded up in this diagram. It's basically a Darwinist creature with Clanker controls."

She noticed the piloting room of the beastie and how it contained levers and pedals exactly as she remembered the stormwalkers Alek had piloted in the past. Only these levers were made out of tendons and bone, not iron or steel.

"Blisters…."

"It's called the Draufganger. Dr. Barlow calls it the fabrication made for the Clanker Nations!"

He was absolutely thrilled with the thing. Before she could say 'beastie' he was busy unrolling all the papers and showing her every detail that made the creature tick. It was quite a contraption but Deryn couldn't understand why Alek would want such a thing.

"You're making fabrications now? Why?"

"You won't believe me but the Draufganger is a miracle in the process. It is going to save my Empire. It will take me a while to explain, but we should have plenty of time for that. The fabrication is already assembled and ready. All we need to do now is get it to Austria. You will be coming with me of course."

"Umm, excuse me? Coming with you?"

Alek nodded. "It was Dr. Barlow's idea. She's the reason I found you after so long. Although I find it strange that she never mentioned you were a girl. Anyways, I need a copilot to navigate the Draufganger across the English Channel and through France and Germany. You're the most capable pilot the Zoological Society has to offer. That and you have experience piloting walkers from before."

It was as if he and Dr. Barlow had been planning this for months. She should have been horrified of their secret plotting but on the contrary, Deryn couldn't think of anything she would rather be doing.

"I haven't piloted anything in ages." She admitted. "Seriously, I haven't been anywhere besides my house and this lab in weeks! I'd be honored to come with you but I don't think I'm your best choice."

"Nonsense, you'd be perfect! I can't imagine it any other way. I can't think of another person who would be more fitting for the position." With that he started putting away his papers. "Now hurry and pack your things. I'm afraid we don't have time to dawdle over this. I expect you to be ready for departure first thing tomorrow morning."

"I….I guess…"

"Not another word, Dylan. I have already agreed that you will be joining me."

She swallowed. "It's Deryn actually."

"Oh." He said, a faint blush coloring his cheeks. "Deryn, right. That will take some getting used to. Well, I should start preparing for the trip." He made for the door before turning around to look for Bovril. The loris had been watching them from the desk. When it noticed that Alek was starting to leave, Bovril leapt onto Deryn's shoulder and dug its claws so tightly into her jacket that she could feel the prickles of them through the fabric.

"Looks like Bovril missed me." She laughed. Alek paced over and they both tried to dislodge the loris from Deryn's shoulder. When it appeared that Bovril would not be letting go, Alek gave up with a small sigh. Then out of nowhere he pulled Deryn into a tight hug.

"I've missed you too." He said softly.

Deryn didn't get a chance to react because a second later Alek had left. Bovril remained on her shoulder slightly humming with happiness. She shushed the creature quickly before she started humming herself.

Blisters, she thought as she shivered from the hug. What in the hell have I gotten myself into?