22. Gone in Three Hundred Seconds

Fate was not in the best of situations. She and Nanoha had been heading towards Hayate's office, attempting to rescue their vulnerable friend and put their collective heads together to form some sort of defence strategy. Unfortunately, they had decided to take the maintenance corridors running through the station as a shortcut, hoping to circumvent the main assault, and in the process discovered that the invaders had had exactly the same idea.

Half a dozen Hellhounds and over a hundred daemons later, Nanoha was nowhere to be seen and Fate, cursing the central office's eternity of identical-looking passageways, was hopelessly lost. She wasn't terribly worried about her partner – if the resurrected Sankt Kaiser and an army of war robots weren't enough to stop her, then a bunch of horror-movie rejects were not likely to present much of a problem – but Nanoha's navigational magic would certainly have come in useful around now.

"Incoming call," Bardiche reported, and projected a holographic screen in front of her. Hayate was on the other end, looking about as calm, happy, and relaxed as one might expect given that monsters were rampaging through her workplace – which was to say, not very. A moment later, a second screen appeared, this time showing Nanoha's face. Though she wasn't aware of the purpose of the call, Fate was absurdly pleased to see both of them.

"Captain Testarossa-Harlaown reporting in," she said, attempting to retain her professionalism. "What are your orders, colonel?"

Nanoha giggled, and even Hayate cracked a smile.

"Captain Takamachi," the latter said sternly, "did you not receive my request that you attempt to remove the stick from your colleague's posterior?"

"Sorry, ma'am – I evaluated the situation, and deduced that it was well outside my operational capabilities. Should I call in reinforcements to assist?"

Fate rolled her eyes. "Are you two quite finished?"

Hayate laughed, but it didn't reach her eyes. "My apologies, Fate – with all that's going on, I thought I needed a little levity. Besides, you just make it so easy. I've got a mission for you – for both of you, in fact. Hence the conference call. Things are going well – as you can tell, we've re-established communications, and I think we're starting to push them back. There's a problem, though."

"There always is," Fate commented with resigned amusement.

"Tell me about it. Anyway, we have two big energy spikes near your respective positions – one in our main security centre, and the other in the Deck Five observatory."

"The observatory?" Fate asked, surprised. "That's not very close... to... the... oh, no. Look, there were the daemons... and all the fighting... and would it have killed them to put some signposts up on the junctions? Don't you dare say anything. Either of you."

"It's all right, Fate," Nanoha said innocently. "I'm sure nobody expected someone from Interstellar Navigation to have a sense of direction."

"Are you going to get back to discussing the mission, or am I going to have to mention those times when you were behaving in a manner very unexpected of a combat instructor?"

Her partner went bright red, and Hayate looked rather intrigued. "You kept the photos? Right. Ahem. Mission. Yes. Hayate, what can you tell us about the spikes?"

"Well, yours seems to be a reasonably powerful mage – double-A minimum, and likely packing a few other nasty tricks as well, knowing the enemy. They probably caused the failure of our security systems, and the fact that they haven't moved since implies that they are attempting to turn said systems against us. I'm sure I don't need to tell you how much of a problem that could cause."

"No, you most certainly don't. How much time do I have?"

"Some, but not much. I had Rein take a look at the relevant magical architecture, and the operative – whoever they are – is moving fast, almost like they have inside knowledge. What they've uploaded so far is worrying enough; I wouldn't like to give them too much more opportunity."

"A traitor?" Fate asked.

"Unlikely. All the mages of that ability in our vicinity are accounted for one way or another, and there weren't many of us to begin with. I would be interested to know how they're doing it, though; any intelligence we can gain on the enemy is worth its weight in the precious metal of your choosing. One last thing – quite a bit of the equipment in that centre is very expensive and difficult to replace. Try not to do your usual thing in there."

"Move fast, take them alive, and don't wreck the machinery. I can do that. Nanoha out."

Just before turning it off, she touched the holographic screen lightly, and Fate did the same, their illusionary fingers passing through each other. Without the proximity required for their traditional pre-mission hand-squeeze, it was the next best thing.

"What about my objective?" the remaining captain asked.

"It's the bigger of the two – a fixed dimensional disturbance rather than a living entity that emits a high-amplitude pulse every five minutes. Judging by its location, which has no strategic or tactical advantage beyond being a large, open space, and by its readings, which match those of similar phenomena we've found throughout the spire, it appears to be one of the gates through which they're summoning daemonic reinforcements. The pulses, therefore, would be waves of troops passing through."

"Sounds like it's employing a spell – I can deal with that. If possible, I'll need a floor-plan and a timer for the pulses."

"Not a problem. Downloading them to Bardiche... now. Incidentally, are you ever going to tell me about those photographs?"

Fate smiled. "Those? I deleted them months ago. As if I'd give them to you anyway, you dirty old woman."

Hayate shrugged. "Thought you'd say that. Couldn't hurt to ask, though. Good hunting, Fate, and let me know when you're done."

"Will do, Hayate. Keep an eye on Nanoha, won't you? We both know she pushes herself too hard sometimes."

"Of course." There was a flash of concern in the colonel's eyes, she saw. Is she hiding something?

The link died, and Fate ran forward, overlaying the map and the timer across her vision. The next pulse should happen about... now.

There was a distant howl and she accelerated, armoured boots clanging against the metal flooring. Left... right... right... left. She skidded around the last corner, the map orienting itself to the direction she was facing, and blasted the rapidly-approaching door off its tracks with a quick bolt of magic, not even bothering to use her Device.

Beyond was a wide, spacious hallway that traced along the inside of the station's hull. Rows of massive windows looked out on the jumbled, anarchic grey-white contours of the central office and the gently swirling dimensional sea beyond. Benches lined one side of the hall, presumably to allow bored personnel to sit back and admire the view, and the dark, bulbous mass of the observatory was dimly visible in the distance.

Or, at least, it would have been if the space had not been filled wall-to-wall with daemons, moving toward the combat mage's position like a swarm of locusts. A few of them noticed her, raising a vicious-looking assortment of exotic weaponry as they prepared to engage.

Fate was faster, though.

"Photon Lancer."

An array of yellow spheres formed around her, smacking into the advancing enemy with a string of small explosions. They didn't do much beyond slowing the daemons down and disrupting their charge, but then, Fate hadn't expected them to.

"Riot Blade," Bardiche announced, and folded outwards into a spindly T-shape. A huge blade of the same yellow energy shot from it, forming a bulky, single-edged sword somewhere between a broadsword and a cutlass.

"Overdrive," Fate whispered, her voice barely audible even by herself over the daemons' clamour. "True Sonic Form."

Light flared outwards, and the outer layers of her Barrier Jacket vanished, leaving her in what was essentially a functional black leotard with extras. Inwardly, she winced. This outfit might grant her unmatched speed, but it always left her feeling so... exposed. Not something you really wanted to be when you had a daemonic horde within spitting distance – especially when you knew exactly the sort of damage their saliva could do to solid metal, let alone flesh.

"Riot Zanber," her Intelligent Device responded, and she lifted her new sword, pulling it apart lengthwise. The end result was two of the same, connected by a ribbon of the same energy that comprised their blades. Funnily enough, this did not reduce their size – each was still about as big as she was. She twirled them experimentally, smiled a grim smile, and shot forward like a small, black-clad comet, a yellowish coma trailing around and behind her.

The swords, as with most products of Mid-type fighting styles, were non-lethal. Aside from the occasional rumour of some inventively nasty Ancient Belkan spell (and the fallen civilisation had been good at inventively nasty), it was a universally-accepted fact that you couldn't kill a living creature with a direct magical attack. Even building-levelling bombardment spells would only render those humans caught in their blast radius unconscious, which was why Ancient and Modern Belkan fighting styles, which relied on magically-augmented physical weaponry, were still so popular and dangerous. Fate's swords were designed to subdue particularly difficult foes, cutting through armour and sending whoever happened to be inside into the sort of 'sleep' from which they wouldn't wake up until they were safe and secure inside a TSAB holding cell with a raging headache.

That didn't stop them from being absolutely devastating against the daemons, though.

Unnatural monstrosities unravelled, exploded and/or simply vanished left, right and centre as she carved through their ranks, moving too fast for them to track, let alone land a blow on. She jinked madly from side to side, sometimes flying, sometimes running on the walls and ceiling, sometimes using the odd unfortunate daemon as a stepping-stone... whatever presented the path of least resistance.

A Hellhound rushed her, its helmet-gun firing, and she scissored her blades together, crushing its shield. It popped out from between them like a cork, quite thoroughly subdued, and she moved on, dropping a quick bind on it as she passed.

Four minutes.

She pirouetted, energy-swords extended, and cleared a space. The door to the observatory structure was scant metres away – or what was left of it, anyway. There was simply a ragged, blackened hole in the wall now, presumably the result of a Hellhound's grenades.

"Photon Lancer, Phalanx Shift."

More spheres this time – many more. They flew into the opening, briefly illuminating the darkness beyond. After a moment, Fate followed suit.

The TSAB central office was not just a military base or an administrative headquarters. It was a small city, home to over twenty thousand personnel at any one time, and most of those people needed something to do in their spare time. As a result, a fair number of clubs and societies had sprung up, dedicated to activities both commonplace and obscure. One of the smaller ones was the Ship-Watching Association, a small, furtive group who took inordinate delight in observing the hundreds of spacecraft that swarmed eternally around the vast space station.

They had taken over the Deck Five observatory within weeks of its opening, seeing in it a private haven in which they could relax, practice their hobby, and discuss pertinent topics ranging from ship manufacturers to esoteric skin conditions. The place Fate now found herself in was a clubroom of sorts, piled high with astronomy gear, mismatched tables, and even an Arcturan Megachess set. She'd been here before, mostly to drag some absentee technician or another back to Navigation.

This time, though, things were different.

None of the lights were on; in fact, the invaders had even gone so far as to smash any electronic or magical installations – the vending machines, for instance – that might emit some sort of glow. The only illumination came from the ruined doorway Fate had just come through, revealing little more than a tangle of disconcerting shadows. For a moment, all was still and silent... and then the shooting started again.

The violet muzzle-flares and carmine energy blasts were almost blinding against the darkness, but at least they provided some means by which she could orient herself. Metal spheres tumbled through the gloom, gleaming dully, and she hurled herself to one side, lifting off the ground and piling on the acceleration.

"Defenser!" Bardiche yelled, and a weak, flickering shield formed behind her just as the grenades detonated. It shattered, of course, as the shrapnel hit it, but she was well out of the lethal radius by then, and none of the cartwheeling metal shards reached her. A gust of hot air washed over her legs and she looked around, attempting to draw a bead on some sort of target. The darkness pressed in, kept at bay only by the steady glow of her energy blades.

It was then that she realised she'd gone right into a trap.

A curtain of fire shot across her path as the Hellhounds let rip with all their weaponry at once. Desperately, she tried to evade, but her own speed and momentum conspired against her, sending her hurtling straight into the thick of it. The grenades hadn't been intended to kill her, she realised – just to drive her out into the open.

There was no room to evade – the volume of fire was too intense. All she could do was use her feeble shields and the flats of her swords to deflect as much as she could. A crystal scraped across her upper left arm and she gasped in agony, falling to the ground. The pain was quite disproportionate to the size of the injury, as if the limb had been somehow dipped in hot lead. Her Device tumbled from her nerveless fingers, its glowing blades chewing into the floor.

She hit the carpet rolling, keeping her injured arm tucked in close and extending the other. Bardiche leapt into her open hand, reshaping itself as it went. She was relieved to see that it had had the good sense to return to its staff-form; useful as they were, the pair of enormous yellow swords were effectively a giant 'SHOOT ME!' poster in her current environment. Your weapon's showing better judgment than you are, Fate. Not a good sign.

Though rounds from the Hellhounds' splinter pistols still buzzed past, none came as close. Thanks to the clubroom's general untidiness, the cyborgs only knew her general location now, and no matter how exotic the design of the gun or how fancy the wielder's augmetics, there really wasn't a way to make solid-shot weaponry firing on full auto particularly accurate. It was one of the many reasons the Bureau employed combat mages.

Three minutes.

She took cover behind an overturned table, propping her staff against one of the legs and examining her injury. Though there wasn't much light to see by, and creating more was likely a terminally bad idea, she was pretty sure that her arm wasn't supposed to have a network of black-veined corruption spreading across it. Worse, she had no talent in healing magic with which to excise the poison. She undid one of her hair-ribbons, tying the supernaturally-tough material into a makeshift tourniquet and resolving to get it looked at by a professional as soon as possible.

In the meantime, she had bigger problems.

The daemon horde had turned around and were moving back the way they had come, advancing with a direct, murderous intent that suggested the darkness and clutter had absolutely no effect on their ability to detect her. She could see them clearly as well through the debris of the clubroom. It wasn't a matter of illumination; there was just something about them that caught the eye, their otherworldly forms standing out against the background of the real world.

Grabbing a bunch of cartridges from her bandoliers, she attempted to load Bardiche one-handed, which turned out to be a slow, frustrating process even with the Device's assistance. It didn't help that she was left-handed, either. The daemons came closer and closer, and soon projectiles were raining down worryingly close to her position. Alerted to her location, the Hellhounds joined in as well, crystalline splinters punching through the table.

The staff's cylinder snapped shut, and she held it in the crook of her useless arm, summoning a shield to ward off the incoming fire. Breathing in deeply, she extended the flat of her palm towards the daemons.

"Trident Smasher."

Energy gathered in her hand, enhanced by the magical cartridges. She released it and it forked out into three huge parallel beams, searing through the daemons, the furniture, and anything else in their path. They exited the doorway, inhuman howls indicating that they had found more prey outside.

No sooner had the triple blast left her fingers than Fate ducked and ran, keeping her body low to the ground. Moments later, there was a flash of reddish-purple light as the table she'd been using as a shelter was obliterated by the Hellhounds' magic.

Two minutes.

The next piece of cover was a haphazard pile of overflowing supply crates, which at least had the advantage of being bulkier than the last one. She began another awkward reload, trying to figure out a strategy as she did so. They're too coordinated at the moment. If I attack them directly, I'll be torn to shreds. I need to find a way to disrupt them.

She closed her eyes, feeling her consciousness drift outwards. It was a trick she hadn't always been very good at, mostly leaving it to Arf during her days as her mother's instrument, but the thirteen years she'd spent with the TSAB in general and Nanoha in particular had amended that quite thoroughly.

There was a great deal of interference, both from the assembled daemons and from some dark, unknown presence in the main viewing chamber beyond, but Fate could still detect the signatures of four moderately powerful mages. The cyborgs, I presume. Two were moving towards her position, their augmented senses serving them well, while the remaining pair stayed back to provide covering fire. She took careful note of their positions and vectors, marking them on her map of the room. Eyes still closed, she raised her staff, pointing it towards the ceiling.

"Plasma Lancer."

Eight yellow charging rings appeared to her sides, enormous arrowhead-shaped projectiles emerging from them a second later. They arced over the crates in pairs, homing in on the Hellhounds like living, predatory creatures. By the time she heard the explosions, the Bureau captain was already moving.

The first Hellhound was less than ten metres from her position, still reeling from the impacts. Bardiche had switched back to its Riot Zanber form, the single-bladed version comprising a double-tipped broadsword twice as long as she was tall. She swung it in a clumsy, one-handed slash, knocking the cyborg back into a still-sparking drinks machine.

The second was more lucid, meeting her charge with a blast of magic followed by a barrage of frenzied slashes with its forearm-blades. She parried the bolt, stepping smoothly to one side to avoid her opponent's weapons. One of the cuts managed to reach her sword, chopping the plane of yellow energy in half, but the Hellhound was still slowed by her previous spell and she managed to get behind it, repairing her weapon with a jolt of willpower and jabbing it towards its back.

The cyborg's neck was caught between the sword's forked tips, the bio-enhancements she had been given by her mother letting her lift it off the ground with ease. A flick of her wrist sent it flying into the crate-pile, only for it to become the subject of a heavy-duty bind as soon as it landed. From the combat logs she had received so far, Fate knew that there was no such thing as overkill for these creatures.

One minute.

The remaining Hellhounds opened fire, but with two of them down, they couldn't muster a proper suppression. There was just too much clutter, and Fate was just too fast. All it did was keep them visible. She closed the distance, weaving in and out of their line of sight, her fragile shields protecting her from the few stray rounds that came too close for comfort.

She held Bardiche out to one side, the massive sword as light as a feather. I hope the Ship-Watching Association won't make me pay for this...

"Jet Zanber."

The blade tripled in length, punching through everything in its way. She swept it in front of her in a lazy arc, creating a deceptively quick wave of destruction. Vending machines exploded, tables shattered, and the megachess set fell apart, its four tiers cut neatly in two.

She lowered the sword, letting it return to its normal length, and moved towards the door to the main viewing chamber, skimming over the field of wreckage she had created. Motion from the pile of debris caught her eye, and she threw a quick Photon Lancer towards it. A few more magical explosions, and the half-buried Hellhound ceased its feeble struggles. Whether it had been knocked out or simply received the message she wasn't sure, and she certainly didn't have time to check.

Her loose hair whipped around her and she shook her head, trying to make sure it didn't get caught in anything. She knew it was a liability in combat, and she'd always intended to get it cut someday, but had never quite had the heart to. Nanoha considered it one of her best features, after all. She smiled. I give that girl far too much leeway sometimes.

The viewing chamber door had suffered much the same treatment as the one to the clubroom, which was entirely to her advantage. She sped through the opening without even slightly slowing down, glancing left and right to take in her surroundings.

The chamber was lighter than the clubroom by some margin. The lights were still off, but the hemispherical bubble of windows that comprised the roof and ceiling provided a fair measure of illumination to compensate. Ever-shifting patterns of green and purple played across the room, outlining its grisly contents.

Four bodies were arranged around the chamber's centre, connected by a network of runes engraved in the floor. Each had died in a different way – one had been savagely hacked to pieces, one was mutated beyond physical tolerance and even description, another seemed to have been hit by several dozen different fatal and disfiguring diseases at once, and the last had no obvious injuries, though his face was distorted into an expression of desperate, agonised pleasure that chilled her soul.

All of them wore the tattered remains of TSAB uniforms, and she recognised at least two of them from her previous visits to the club. Were they having a meeting during the attack? She imagined bodies strewn, invisible, across the battleground that the clubroom had become, mangled irreparably by the fight between her and the invaders, and immediately wished that she hadn't.

Floating above the gruesome arrangement was the gateway, an irregular, vaguely circular portal that seemed to draw in the remaining light of the room, the brightly swirling colours in its centre not reaching even an inch outside. Like the daemons it summoned, it seemed superimposed on reality, hurting her eyes if she looked at it too long.

"Hurricane Thunderclap!"

She swiped the air with her Device as she approached, working out the abused muscles in her right arm as her left flopped behind her, useless as ever. The pain was extraordinary, but this was a distant fact, dulled out by the adrenaline that surged through her. Indigo lightning ran across the blade as she charged her attack, combining dispel and assault magic with flawless precision. Behind her, the remaining daemons from outside entered the chamber, moving cautiously.

Count zero. Time's up.

The gate bulged outwards, strange, amorphous forms appearing in its depths and resolving themselves into the familiar shapes of daemons. They poured outwards, a seething tide of madness and hate... and Fate struck.

The first blow was a horizontal slash, lightning arcing off it and burying itself in daemonic flesh. The portal buckled and the daemons recoiled, but she wasn't done yet.

"Sprite Zanber," Bardiche said quietly, a faint ripple of anger in its mechanical voice. Clearly, it hadn't been too pleased about seeing the sacrifices either.

She raised the sword high, its two tips almost scraping the ceiling, and brought it down in a mighty sweep, wincing at the fresh surge of pain from her injury. The gate shattered like glass, creating an explosion that cratered the floor and engulfed the poor, abused ship-watchers, searing them away into nothing. Nice to know that even supernatural pyrotechnics have some sense of mercy.

An invisible weight lifted from her shoulders as the Warp-powered spell dissipated, the lights in the room flickering weakly to life. Every daemon in the chamber disintegrated at once, pulled back screeching into the void from which they'd come.

"Hayate, this is Fate. I've eliminated the objective."

"My word, Fate, that was fast. I'm getting reports of something strange occurring with the daemons – anything to do with you?"

"Might be – all the ones over here vanished as soon as I destroyed the gate."

"Ah? Interesting. That certainly corroborates what I've heard so far – we didn't get all of them by any means, but now we know their weakness, and this banishment alone opened up several avenues of attack. Speaking of, I'd like you to report to the infirmary. We're assembling a strike-force there to take back the spirewards quarters, and having an S-ranked mage at the speartip would make things a whole lot easier."

Wait, which one were Erio and Caro in again? Ugh – I knew I should have checked the crew rosters one more time this morning. "Of course, Hayate. I may need some medical assistance first – one of the cyborgs shot me in the arm, and I really don't like the colour it's turning."

"The wound?"

"The arm."

"Ah. Right. Sounds like a spot of healing would definitely be a good idea. I'll let Shamal know you're coming, then. Will you be needing another map to get back?"

"Yes please. Oh, and don't let Nanoha hear about this, will you? It'll clean up with a bit of magic, certainly, but if she hears about it, she'll be worried sick. You know how she is."

Hayate smiled. "I know how both of you are. Don't worry, your secret's safe with me."

"Thanks, Hayate. Knew I could trust you. Captain Testarossa-Harlaown out."

She set off in the general direction of the headquarters, investing the remainder of her willpower in raw speed. Nanoha... I wonder how she's doing at the moment?


Author's Notes: (insert awesome piece of music by Nana Mizuki here).

From the bits of it seen in the series proper, I can imagine the TSAB central office being really difficult to navigate. Accident or design? Who knows?