Long chapter this time with lots happening :) Thank you so much for everyone's who reviewed so far! I was actually thinking of giving up some chapters ago because I thought no one was reading and there were so many good shipfics out there...but your reviews have convinced me to keep going. :)

The whirring of the cardiac monitor filled the hospital ward, an ominous constant humming that beeped every few seconds. Surveillance cameras silently focused on the sleeping patient in the central bed, relaying the data and information directly to the TSA itself. The leads from the monitor were connected directly to the chest of the comatose young woman, from which breathing tubes were hooked up to oxygen supplies and an IV dip stood feeding directly into her body.

With each breath, the teenage Nanoha showed no signs of waking up any time soon. Her life signs were weak, but constant and showing potential for recovery. But she would need the willpower to go on, the strength and support from her family and friends, and the long months of rehabilitation before she could stand again once more on her own two -

The Legion stepped through the door, one metal step against the floor, one silent human step. Its visual circuits scanned the room intensely, immediately sensing the cameras. Almost absent-mindedly, it reached out with its human hand and unplugged them from their sockets, sending the screens into darkness.

It moved forward into the ward until it was standing right beside the bed of Takamachi Nanoha. A young Nanoha, who had not long been training with the TSA before succumbing to her accident on that fateful mission. A lesson of recklessness. A reminder of mortality.

Yes, mortality, the Legion mused thoughtfully. For in the end, life must come to an end. No matter how long you try to extend your life force, you will inevitably only drive yourself closer to termination, whether by natural means or not.

The machine part of the Legion repeated the orders from the superior. Time was of the essence. They couldn't afford to hesitate now. The Legion consulted its human counterpart, the reasoning section of its mind. Asking the important questions: Is this necessary? Will this change the future? What are the consequences of such an action?

The Legion considered the answers to all the questions, then nodded in satisfaction and reached forward to remove the breathing tubes and leads completely.

"Nanoha!"

Fate held the brunette mage folded within her arms, cradling her as Nanoha's mouth opened wide in a silent scream. Her eyes were clamped tightly shut, her arms and legs slumped uselessly as if they were broken. There was a bulge in her throat, as if something was trying to get out, but then Fate realised that Nanoha was struggling to breathe. Quickly, she tried to give her room, give her air. What's going on? I can't help her! Something's seriously wrong with her and I...no, I'm not giving up! I'll do CPR if I have to!

Then Nanoha's eyes flicked upon to latch onto hers. To her horror, Fate saw that her lover's eyes were completely empty, as if they had been cut out completely. Her pupils were as black and hollow as that of a long-dead skull.

Petrified, Fate backed away a step in spit of herself, bringing a hand to her mouth. No. What has that...what has that creature done to you? It's the one doing it. It impersonated Hayate and it's killing you! I'm not going to -

The damage to Nanoha's body hadn't stopped with her eyes. As Fate watched in mounting terror, paralysed to the spot, the emptiness spread down the whole of the mage's body...down her neck, across the inside of her arms and legs, stretching across her breast and stomach, as if eating away at her from the inside...

This can't be happening. This has to be a nightmare. I want to wake up.

The shell of the body on the floor twitched once, and the outer skin disintegrated completely, vanishing into the air, like dust blown away by the wind. Nothing remained of Takamachi Nanoha anymore, nothing at all. It was as if she had just ceased to exist completely. No sign of even her body remained anymore.

"Nanoha..."

Fate knelt down, shaking so violently that she could barely put one step in front of the other. With the blood drained from her face, she slowly touched the floor here Nanoha had been just moments ago. Dying in her arms. Unconsciously calling for her as she struggled in the grip of some unseen force.

She found herself desperately scrabbling for anything, anything at all. A speck of dust. A footprint. Even fire left ashes behind. But the ground was undisturbed as if Nanoha had never stood upon it. Even her familiar scent was gone. Her hair, her comforting blue eyes as she...no...

In mounting horror, Fate realised that the image of Nanoha in her mind was vanishing as if by magic. Her memories of Nanoha were vanishing too.

NO!

"NANOHA!" she screamed.

The wall of air in front of her came to life and whipped at her face and hair, intertwining around Fate powerfully. Startled, the Enforcer reached for Bardiche to defend herself, but another tendril curved across her hand and knocked the device from her grasp, tossing it back towards the doorway.

A binding spell?! No...there was no incantation. This is something else...

Fate gasped for breath, struggling against her invisible bonds with all her might. Even without Bardiche, she was still an Ace among the Bureau. She felt the bindings bend under her strength, though they would not yield much further.

The reptilian creature who had impersonated Hayate came forward, its dark green eyes burning as it looked upon her. An animal-like hiss escaped its throat and it beat its wings once, twice, rising up above the floor. Without another word to her, it raised a scaly arm and balled it into a taloned fist. Powerful muscles rippled across the exterior as it ripped a large enough hole in the western wall, pushing its way out into the open air outside the building.

You won't escape, Fate vowed. Your binding spell can't hold me. You've taken Nanoha away from me and I'm coming for you.

Nanoha. The strength drained from her body as she pictured her love being torn away out of this world. No. That didn't happen. The reptile was lying. It took Nanoha away somewhere, somewhere away from me. She can't be dead. She can't be. She promised to be home with Vivio tonight. V-Vivio...

Her face damp with tears, Fate summoned up her hidden reserves of courage and called out achingly for Bardiche.

Hayate ran through the streets of past Mid-childa, searching for Rein. The unison device surely couldn't have gone very far, but so far Hayate had found no sign of her. Was she hiding? In a place and time like this? The worst thing that could happen now was to be separated from the only real ally she had right now who could grasp the situation.

"Rein!" she shouted into the night. "Where are you?"

There was no reply across the length and scale of the empty road. Hayate shivered, holding her arms tighter around her body to keep her warm. The crippling sense of loneliness that she had experienced only yesterday was beginning to affect her once more at the least favourable of times. Especially now, when she was stranded in a time ten years back which was not her own...

No. There has to be a way back. All I have to do is find it. But first I have to find Rein before it becomes too dark to see -

Hayate stopped dead in her tracks. Night? Had time passed that quickly? When she had been transported back in time – if she could call it that – it had been early afternoon. The sun high in the sky, a beautiful day for a walk, kids laughing in the park...but not anymore. A blackened sky loomed overhead, seeming all too familiar. Clouded shades lurked at the edges of the barrier -

A barrier?

Now she understood. Hayate had been too lost in her own thoughts, desperately trying to find Rein again, too much so to properly recognise the signs. Just because she wasn't in the present anymore didn't mean she could let her guard down. If there was a barrier here, then there was a mage in the area and fairly close by. She didn't think Rein would have cast it, wherever she was. Which meant...

"Reinforce," she murmured, holding her faithful device up from around her neck. "Set Up."

The transformation took only a moment, her black and gold cloak extending around her protectively, four black wings curving out from her back, and Reinforce in staff form ready in both her hands. Thus shielded, the cold didn't seem to affect her as much. Whatever was out there, she needed to be ready for it.

Swiftly, Hayate scanned the area, her aqua-blue eyes focusing on cutting through the shadows that obscured her vision. There didn't seem to be anyone there at all. That couldn't be right: magical barriers didn't set up by themselves.

She closed her eyes and concentrated, instantly detecting a faint aura of magical force not too far ahead of her. Further down the street, near to where her house was. It might be Rein, but it might not be.

Still with her eyes closed to prevent them from deceiving her anymore, Hayate walked further for a few minutes, feeling the magical aura increase in magnitude. The shadows hissed above her at the height of the barrier. They posed no threat to anyone, but their presence made her uncomfortable.

At last, Hayate trusted her instincts enough to open her eyes again, and took a step back in confusion when she saw where she was: she was standing in the front garden of her house. The exact point, in fact, where she had seemingly entered this time era.

The grass churned and bubbled underneath her feet unnaturally, as if it were lava flowing from the pit of a volcano. Quickly, Hayate took another step back, preparing herself. Illusion magic? No. This didn't feel like that. This was -

The entirety of the air shifted and changed around her, and something stepped out of it, shadows brimming across its face and body, coalescing into an indistinct form which was hard to focus on. Looking at it was like trying to look at too many things at once: it made your head hurt.

"You must be Yagami Hayate," the shadowy form whispered.

The air rippled again and the whirl of shadows around it vanished, although the barrier remained. And the person in front of Hayate soldified into a teenage girl with long black and green hair sweeping down her shoulders, possessing eyes that pierced through the night, a whirl of black vortexes stroking her fingertips.

The girl was clothed in a long black robe which covered her from the base of her neck all the way down to her feet. She appeared to be barefoot, although it wasn't apparent why. Various runes and constellations adorned her cloak. Her face was pleasant to look upon, but the smile she gave to Hayate was not that of friendship.

Hayate tightened her grip on Reinforce. "You're the mage who brought me here," she whispered.

The robed girl gave no reply, the cold smile fixed. There was no sign of a device or weapon anywhere in sight on her person, but that didn't mean she wasn't dangerous.

"You brought me back in time," Hayate said, slightly unnerved by the girl's attitude. "How...how can you do that? Who are you?"

The girl clasped her hands together, shifting her cloak off to one side for a moment as the shadowed light glistened across her dark hair.

"I am Exoria," she said calmly. "Time Mage and servant to Oguba." A disgusted expression flittered across her features. "You? You're the Hayate that I've heard so much about? I came all this way to meet you, and I feel like I've wasted my time!"

Unprepared for such a response, Hayate found herself speechless at first. "Wait..." She didn't know where to start. "Why are you - "

The smile had vanished with whichever semblance of goodwill had existed on there. "Save it, worthless human! You're just like the rest of them." Exoria clasped her hands tighter together, a blackened glow forming around them, vibrating intensely. "We have nothing more to say to each other!"

Hayate didn't understand, but the girl's hostility was all too evident. Defensively, she brought up her staff, wary of what Exoria was doing now. Was she casting a spell? "What are you doing?" she demanded. "Did you just come to insult me?"

"I came here to send you back, you idiot!" The black aura around the mage's hands was crackling with power, sending small spikes of energy around it in every direction.

"Back?" Hayate cried, relaxing for a moment. "Back to my own time?"

Exoria grinned in a twisted fashion. "No. Back to darkness! To the eternity and inevitability of death!" She pushed her palms forward, rippling powerfully. "Time Destruction!"

The pent-up energy was expelled towards Hayate at full power. Dazed, Hayate raised her own device in front of her, trying to solidify her own defenses against this unknown spell. But her specialities were long-range wide-area spells, not at such close combat -

"Frierenfesseln!" Rein screamed, flying in from the corner of her vision.

Torrents of water engulfed the robed girl all at once, freezing into an icy cage to entrap her. Exoria screamed in frustration as she was hemmed in all sides, smashing at the walls with her bare fists.

Hayate staggered to her feet, her own staff steaming slightly but otherwise okay. Whatever it was that had been fired at her, Rein's capture spell had gone through it and negated most of the effects it came with. It had hit Hayate with minimal power and only pushed her back a little.

"Rein!" she cried with relief. "I'm so glad you're okay!"

The unison device smiled back. "I'm sorry I ran away, Hayate..." She blushed and looked away for a moment, embarrassed. "I thought I'd lost you for good."

Hayate reached over and hugged her as best as she could. With a hand, at least. "You're back with me and that's good enough. Let's not talk about that now." She turned her attention to Exoria bashing on the ice cage. "We've got to do something. She's the one who sent us here."

"Okay. So..." Rein put a hand to her head, trying to think as quickly as possible. "If she brought us here, she can send us back."

"She's not going to send us back, Rein. She's trying to kill me." Even spoken out loud she didn't quite understand. If she wanted me dead all along, why didn't she just do it when she ambushed me in my office? Why would she want me dead in the past? Unless...

Unless something happens in the future.

"Okay, I've got a plan," Hayate said to Rein. She didn't know how much longer the ice cage would hold. "It'll take me some time for me to prepare a spell, and we don't want to kill her or we'll be stuck here forever. I need you to keep her in that cage so that I can - "

"Time Deformation!"

Pulsing waves of green and black energy slammed into the frozen cage from within. The cage shuddered, then began to evaporate into steam at an alarming rate. Exoria smashed her way out through what was left of the icy prison, enraged and panting from exertion.

Rein and Hayate exchanged glances.

"Let's forget that plan for now," Hayate said, bringing the Tome of the Night Sky in front of her, flipping through its pages at breakneck speed. "Rein, keep her busy! I need time!"

"Understood!" the unison device affirmed, and dived towards the robed mage tearing her way towards them.

Hayate withdrew a fair distance from the two of them, watching Rein cast spell upon spell at Exoria. They were mainly support and capture spells – without combining with an actual mage, Rein didn't have many attack spells of her own. But Exoria seemed to be exhausted by the few spells that she had used on them. Time Mage, she had called herself. If that kind of "time" magic could exist, and seeing as it put such a strain on her body...

Think, Hayate, she cautioned herself as she continued to leaf her way through the Tome in increasing desperation. You've got long-range wide-area spells. But you don't want to hit Rein, and you don't want to kill your opponent, because you need her alive. And you're running out of time.

She stopped at the page she wanted and began the incantation. This would have to do, and she would be taking a large gamble in doing this. She was betting on how Exoria would react to the spell. And she still might hit Rein...

"Approach from beyond, mistletoe branches," she cried forth, raising Reinforce towards the sky, "and become spears of the silver moon! Pierce it!"

The white triad of magical energy appeared beneath her, and six pulsating bolts were conjured up in the sky around her, awaiting her command. Ahead of her, Exoria stiffened at the presence of the spell, her eyes growing wide in fear. The robed mage clamped her hands togetheragain, sweat standing out on her forehead, forcing black energy from her fingertips.

"Stone spears," Hayate chanted, releasing the spell, "MISTELTEIN!"

Exoria initiated her own spell in a panic. "Chronological Time Switch!" she cried in desperation, whipping her hands forth through the shadows around her.

The petrifying spears began to rain down on the girl, but already the air was shimmering around Exoria, opening out into a portal for her. Hayate's eyes widened, rushing forward with her a telepathic shout to Rein for the pair of them to rush the mage at the same time. Exoria was trying to escape in the fastest way possible that she knew: through time.

Hayate ran for the portal as fast as she could, fearful that she gained too much distance when preparing the spell; Exoria was already halfway through it. Frantically she pulled the mage backwards by the back of her robes, hearing Exoria scream furiously at her. The portal began to close as the two of them struggled to get through the opening at the same time whilst preventing the other one from doing so.

Then Rein came down from above, flying into the midst of the struggle, throwing all three of them into the portal at the same time. The air shuddered with the effects of transporting more people than could be humanly allowed, and then closed permanently as the barrier over past Mid-childa vanished in their wake. Moments later, the darkness had disappeared from the town completely, leaving no trace at all.

It was complete and utter chaos when Subaru and Tiana finally arrived at the vaults. Mages and soldiers alike were fighting side-by-side, firing and casting spells at the monstrous creatures that were assaulting their defenses. Over a hundred bodies lay collapsed within the perimeter, although the majority were thankfully only wounded, with multiple sustained injuries from the attack.

Officers shouted commands to their squadrons which could barely be heard over the fighting as more and more of the creatures overwhelmed the perimeter. The monsters seemed to be some kind of mutation out of a nightmarish experiment. Some had the heads and bodies of lions, others had the faces of humans; some had grown wings and tails, others spat fire and acid upon their victims.

The cabinets of the Lost Logia were all open. Not smashed open by any of the monsters, but neatly unlocked and uncaged, released for any to use.

If Tiana had wanted action, it was not in short supply. For several minutes the two of them smashed their way through scores of mutants, reinforcing the defence line as other mages came forward to drive the creatures back. The creatures they fought were about twice as big any of them, but were easily defeated with Tiana's bullets or Subaru's fists. There were just so many of them. They seemed to be never-ending.

"Subaru, I don't like this," Tiana said. "You remember how Caro said she sensed a summoner was in the area?"

Subaru nodded. "You're thinking that these beasts were all summoned by them?"

"It's not just that. I'm sensing illusion magic too." Tiana raised her weapon to eye level to shoot down another monstrosity at the back that had been slowly creeping towards them. "I can't tell how much of it is being used, but it's definitely there."

The blue-haired mage sighed. "Conjurer and an illusionist? We've got our work cut out for us here, haven't we?"

There was a sudden almighty roar which drowned out all of the fighting at once and the mages and soldiers looked up in horror. Poised in front of the doors stood a mutation far bigger and mightier than any of the small fry at the perimeter. It drew itself up until it stood higher than the vault of any of the buildings in the Bureau, stamping down wicked claws the size of three mages. The walls crumbled beneath it. It's head and body was that of a lion, and an impressive wingspan brought it up to the ceiling until it had perched itself onto the roof. A deadly tail swung from its rear and impaled another soldier below, almost casually.

Subaru and Tiana stared at the monster open-mouthed for a moment.

"Is that an illusion?" Subaru said hopefully.

Tiana gritted her teeth and started to run for the entrance. They needed one of the Aces to take down that thing, but right now none of them were available.

"Subaru," she said decisively, "we've got to find who's summoning these creatures. Come on."

The creature which called itself Srethis made its escape across the skies upon escaping from Hayate's voice. It considered itself lucky to have got away so easily. After impersonating the mage and using her own authority and access to bring down the Bureau's internal defences from within, Srethis had known that very few of the organization would care whether or not if it returned at all. After all, this had been a suicide mission from the start.

Srethis getss all the dirty work, the reptile thought in disgust, swooping down towards the west. But Srethiss doesss it still. Srethiss hass no choice. The otherss, Legion, Grylmark, Exoria, they all have a choice, but -

"Blast Flare!"

Dragonfire tore out of the sky behind the reptile, taking it by surprise and tearing a savage burn in one of its wings. The creature howled in agony, losing altitude in the sky as it began to fall down to earth. Determinedly, it made an effort to fly with the other wing, but it was a futile effort. It wasn't going to stay airborne for much longer.

With a muttered curse, Srethis cursed its incompetence at letting its guard down within the perimeter. Leaving the blonde mage behind to grieve over her lover had obviously not been the last obstruction.

It managed to slow its fall with the other wing, enough so that it was able to land safely on the ground, right in front of the exit to the Bureau -

Erio and Caro hovered high above, on Friedrich, weapons and devices all armed.

So near and yet so far.

"Who are you?" Caro cried. "State your name and purpose within TSA grounds, or we will put you under arrest as mages of the Time-Space Administration Bureau."

The reptile's eyes gleamed as it looked back up at the mages aboard the dragon. Just kids. The dragon would be a problem, but Srethis had come so far now. It was so close to escape. The wing was all but useless, but the rest of its body could still fight.

"Srethis hass no business with you," it hissed, and took a step forward in challenge, claws extended.

"No," came a soft voice from behind it, full of pain, "but I have business with you."

Slowly, the reptile turned around in surprise, its eyes narrowing as it recognised her. Long blonde hair flowing down her shoulders with only her ribbon keeping it together, her white cloak rippling down the length of her body...and crimson eyes that blazed with emotion. The reptile had seen her only once before, but recognised her immediately.

"Zanber Form," Fate Testarossa said coldly, and Bardiche altered into the familiar sword of energy. "Impulse Form." Her Barrier Jacket flashed in front of her as she stared at the reptile for a moment, standing perfectly still. "Give...give Nanoha back to me."

I killed off the main character T_T I'm terrible.