To The Horizon

by dreamcastaway

The age of exploration has dawned upon the world of Arcadia but not all is well. Skies darkens as Valua's war engines expand outwards. In spite of this, brave adventurers set sail in search of untold treasure. And where there is treasure, there will be Air Pirates. This is my attempt to bring that gorgeous story to life with additional scenes and expanded lore.

25. Liberation

Fina wondered if she had said something wrong. She'd come to Moonstone Mountain on a modest if still bold excursion to save a handful of captives—chiefly the Ixa'takan high priest—but it became immediately clear to her that liberating one person or even three or five was not enough.

Who was she to prioritize any life over the other? How could she free one man but leave another caged?

The obvious truth was that she couldn't and that was good in sentiment but as soon as the words left her mouth, they sounded impossible. Between herself, Vyse and Aika, Drachma, and the Ixa'takans who joined in their mission, they numbered seven people. Hardly enough to get the job done.

And yet…

And yet…

And yet…

And yet…

If Vyse had concerns, he didn't show them. Of all the surprised faces staring at Fina, he was the first to relax and she watched as his lips curled slyly upwards into that familiar smirk she'd already associated inexorably with her friend. To her amazement and perhaps to the credit of Vyse's charisma, more smiles followed. Aika, forever the cat that got the cream, cut a grin ear to ear. Merida blinked only for a moment before understanding that the day she'd prayed for truly had arrived. Tika'tika with some mutual chip on his shoulder, assessed the situation with warrior's bemusement before deciding in near-unison that discretion hadn't worked too well for his people and simpered at the thought of a new kind of hunt. Tara hummed, taking heart at the notion that her sisters would see the skies again and hazarded a smirk.

The wind tasted of blood and freedom.

Drachma did not smile but he did not protest. His heart had been ensnared by a startling alteration that he could not entirely describe. His mind lingered back to Marama and the way in which Belleza so easily tempted him away from Vyse and the girls with even the vaguest whisper of Rhaknam's whereabouts. A question played in his thoughts for a moment: if Rhaknam was flying in the skies right outside Moonstone Mountain, would he rush to chase after him?

The old man suppressed a gasp as he realized that the answer was "no." There was another kind of evil here and it demanded a reckoning as sure as the arcwhale. That didn't mean his heart had outgrown the need to kill the beast—Rhaknam's death was the only sure thing to bring him any solace—but there were monsters here as well. The whale would die but that could wait until the cages were smashed.

"S'easier to say than do," the briney captain finally allowed. "Most'll tell ya is right daft."

"Daft's what we do," Vyse chimed in with a true pirate's confidence. "Not like we can let all this slide."

Tika'tika rubbed his chin in thought, the slightest crinkling sound of skin against stubble scratching upon the air. He was not so young as to simply dive into the fray without a plan and as their conversation bobbed through languages and intentions, the hunter was already scouting the mines before him.

He pointed down, finger bobbing to a variety of hallways with large metal gates half shut along their entrance. "If these close, there will be no way to escape."

Aika knelt at the Ixa'takan's side and looked down at the toil below. It proved hard not to dwell on the Valuans' crimes but her eyes quickly fixed on the half-shut gates. Each of them rested on an exitway on various levels of the mine's floors, which descended into the mountain like a spiral of rings.

Down and down like diving into the depths of a wasp hive.

The emergency shutters seemed similar to the heavy doors of a Valuan cruiser that fell down upon cargo holds. The Albatross ' crew usually resolved to a process of applying red moonstones upon the metal before a detonation of crystali crystals could quickly cool the metal until it was brittle and breakable. There'd be no such luck here; it was too long a process to deal with the doors in the event that they were shut. What was the solution?

There..

It didn't take more than a few moments for the young pirate to find an answer. She spied a length of wire extending from each doorway which invariably snaked to a point only a few layers down, the coils spiraling and crossing into a point not unlike the moonstone converter on the Little Jack . The gates were receiving power from one location either from a yellow moonstone focus or control console.

"They're linked," Aika indicated to the group. "If I could follow the lines to whatever's controlling the electricity, it'd be kiddy stuff to keep them open."

Vyse looked at his friend seriously. He was formulating a proper plan and clearly didn't like what he was about to ask. "If you went that way…"

"And you went searching for Isapa.." She was already catching on. "Yeah, I'd be fine but we don't even know where to find him; fella could be anywhere in the mountain."

Fina held a finger up.

"If I focus, I should be able to sense his aura," she said seriously. "Someone who has the power to weave old green magicks..."

It seemed better than scrambling in the dark but the suggestion brought a fresh concern. Vyse looked at Fina carefully, his gaze shifting between a worry that she might shatter and certainty that she was up to the task. He trusted her but also knew there would be pain. The apprehension seemed warranted; they'd all seen how the Silvite buckled upon entering the mines. Vyse couldn't imagine what his friend saw but understood it to be dire and painful.

"Will you be okay?" he asked. "Seems like everything hit hard before.."

Drachma scowled. "Wat're talkin' 'bout? How's she gunna find that Isapa fella?"

"I can explain later," Fina told the captain before nodding at Vyse. "It won't be fun but I can't see any other way for us to find him quickly."

Vyse returned his gaze to the rest of the group. There was only one more thing to ask and while it was no more dangerous than other jobs, he needed to propose something a bit more dramatic.

"All that's left is to start breaking locks," he concluded.

Merida took a breath before speaking. "I will do this," she boasted. "If I can free even one of my people, I will pay any price.

"There are more Ixa'takans in the mines than Ironheads," Tika'tika indicated.

The dancer nodded. "Opening these cages will be like unleashing a river's torrent."

"It'll be messy," Vyse insisted. "The Valuans will crack down quickly."

"I will go too," Tara said fervently. She wasn't asking Vyse or anyone else for permission.

The declaration flared a strange sense of protectiveness in Merida. There was no doubt that her old friend had grown into a true Ixa'ness warrior but the only images that played in her mind were of days passed. Playful swinging from trees and dancing around fires. Two young women entering the earliest parts of adult responsibility and finding incompatible life paths as they confronted what it would mean to serve their village. Deep down, Merida felt a swelling of protectiveness that was impossible to hold back.

"I did not ask for aid," she declared. It wasn't what she wanted to say but the words came without thought.

The response was a sharply pointed finger that hovered inches from Merida's nose. Tara glared at her fellow Ixa'takan with reckless indignation worthy of Necoc Yaotl himself. Her spite burned like a sun.

"My sisters are in those mines," the redhead said coldly. "A thousand of these soldiers could stand in my way and they would fall. I'm going and you can either keep pace or fall behind."

"Fall behind?! Who do you think you are talking to?"

Merida's anger shifted to playful familiarity, which might have been the greater slight judging from how Tara's glare grew more severe. The Ixa'ness scoffed at her former friend as if she was looking at a child.

"A pretender," she growled back. It was enough to sink Merida's gaze to the floor. She felt the fire in her heart quench if only for a moment.

Vyse raised a hand. Calm but filled with command. To their own amazement, both of the women paused and their anger settled as the pirate spoke.

"Settle this later," he insisted. "We need to focus."

Merida nodded. Far from being annoyed at Vyse's interjection, she found a fresh respect for the young man. Tara's assessment was less flattering. The idea of some outsider ordering an Ixa'ness around was insulting. But she could not deny the power swirling around Vyse or the pragmatism of his words.

Vyse looked at Fina. "Ready?"

The Silvite nodded. "Of course."

Fina closed her eyes, unconsciously leaning back until she found herself resting in Aika's arms. The world faded except for the warmth of her touch. A splatter of stars and universes played before her eyes and the pain returned. Wives and husbands yearning for their partners; their hearts close to snapping like tree branches bent back. A proud warrior with fresh discoloration to his starry light that signaled the mark of a whip against the body. The suppressed doubt of a lone Valuan who idly conspired against the empire that turned him into a monster but lacked the will to act. Her nerves were burning. Her mind was roiling. One thousand knives cut at her skin. One thousand more clubs smashed against her bones. More and more…

Fina's sojourn into soul space took far longer than the last. Fina walked and walked and wandered and wondered for years. Every star had a name and she asked each one until she knew them all. Then, a green explosion. Old magicks and idle prayer and a swirl of viridian power.

A snap of pain snuffed the stars. She opened her eyes and pointed one level down and towards a passage deeper into the mountain. In the distance, Isapa's hue flickered on the edge of her senses.

"Down there," Fina indicated. Her voice was softer than usual.

Despite her pain, the Silvite managed to pull away from Aika and assume her place amongst her peers. All was settled. The mine's security, Isapa's location, and the depths where their distraction would take place. For a moment, everyone was silent. The plan wasn't refined but that hardly mattered.

"Time to mosey," Vyse intoned playfully.

Merida and Tara were already off. The pair darted deeper into the honeycomb spiral of slaves and soldiers. They were part snake, part monkey. The higher levels lacked any guard and they ran freely until reaching the walkwa'ys edge and clambering down to the next level with a silent climb and hop.

"You and me, Birdy," Aika said to Tika'tika. He didn't seem to mind.

Vyse took a moment to lean in and place a hand on her shoulder. He was surprised to find an electric jolt strike his heart for a moment. Hah Aika's skin always been this soft?

"Head on a swivel, Spitfire," he whispered. Moons, keep her safe.

Aika offered a wink and slapped Tika'tika on the shoulder. The gesture elicited the slighted rooster's roiling from the hunter. They darted off with a speed surpassing even the Ixa'ness' warriors. Low and prowling but somehow swift as death until they also began a spiral following the moonstone wire's path.

"That leaves us," Vyse said with a smile. It might as well have been any ordinary day.

"Yes," Fina agreed with a nod. "I suppose we move very carefully…"

Drachma grunted negatively. "Not so lightly," he offered. "Any sod what step 'round t'our path will get a smashin' quick-like. No sneaksome fuss about it."

Vyse sighed but didn't disagree. "Suppose it's time to raise Hell then."

---

De Loco felt the cool air of his office blow through his mauve hair and took a moment to exhale. It wasn't the perfect habitat—nothing could compare to the cleanliness of his laboratory in Valua—but this was luxurious enough for a backwater lands across the skies. He'd sent the specifications ahead of his arrival; explanations for treating the metal walls and floors with the right sheen, the necessities of his unique yellow moonstone lights, how best to ventilate within the mountain, the mechanisms for sealing his door. The result was the only place in all of Ixa'taka that he could remove his suit helmet and breathe proper air.

It wasn't as if the air was overly crisp but it wasn't as heavily recycled as that within his suit. His ventilation system had filters but they were not as stifling. Many people took for granted that their day would be full of senses. They would feel the breeze and enjoy the touch of whatever was around them. They could eat easily and didn't need to partake of a highly controlled diet. They could touch each other.

These were the things that De Loco sacrificed years ago. This was the cost of chasing utopia. He refused to believe it was bad luck that turned him ill so many years ago. The world was something you could track and test. There had been a reason for his infirmity somewhere in all the noise of his childhood. Something about his blood that he'd inherited or a quirk of Valua's energies that affected him. The source remained unknown to him although he suspected something to do with his father's own work as a moonstone refiner. What irony if so. That the man who urged him to build the gift of his mind might've been the one to all but crippled him. De Loco held no spite over the matter though. There was no point.

In this room? He was free. In this box? He was emperor. Where there was tension in his body, Andrés De Loco relaxed. Where the workers in the mine were broken, he enjoyed sublime comforts.

There was only one problem: Vyse Dyne.

Their battle played in De Loco's mind again and again. He was certain his tactics were superior. The flame cannon had perfectly prevented that annoying fishing ship's harpoon from finding a target. The Chameleon 's superb specifications and moonstone engine kept the ship swift as ever. It couldn't have been anything he'd done. There was no way his movements were flawed or his technology lacking. What did that leave? A failure on his mechanic's part? Unexpected material warping in the new climate?

Unsure of the conditions of his defeat, De Loco had failed to find the perfect respite he craved. There was a crack in the armor that he could not ignore but similarly was unable to redress. That was enough to vex him but the greater concern was the possibility that the problem was Vyse Dyne himself.

His absorption broke as a red light flared at the door to his room and a crackle came over the nearby speaker. Annoyingly smug and precious voice preened perfectly. "It's me."

De Loco groaned before standing up and walking over to the speaker and pressing the button.

"Disinfected?"

"It's me," the voice repeated as if that settled the matter.

De Loco closed his eyes for a moment before pressing another button at the side of the door, which gave a compression-releasing sputter before slowly swinging inward. The admiral moved backwards a great distance from the doorway almost to the other side of his office and watched as the lily-white form of Alfonso sauntered in the room, silken blonde coiffed into a deliberate sweep.

"Are all of these safety 'procedures' truly necessary, Andrés?" he crooned vexatiously.

"Yes," De Loco replied immediately. "Now, remember: distancing."

"As you wish," Alfonso said as he entered the room. The door shut behind him with a hiss.

The two stood apart from each other for a moment and stared as if a duel might start. There was a tension between the two that signaled a simmering disdain for each other. If De Loco had a gun nearby, it would have taken all of his effort to not pick it up and demand his foppish compatriot leave the room. Somehow, this did not immediately lead to an outburst or a barked order. De Loco despised everything about Alfonso. He was a man of middling talents who earned everything by the fortune of his birth, holding only the slightest dint of insight. The exact sort of man De Loco hoped that Galcian could sweep away from power and ideally down some pit into the Deep Sky. But he did not turn the man away.

Alfonso noticed this curiosity with a smirk and raised his mellifluous voice. "Why do you let me in here?"

"Expedience," De Loco crowed back with venom. "Like it or not, we share the burden of command and it's far easier to talk like this than huddled over radios. And you've not broken my rules yet."

The inventor sat down in the chair nearest his desk and gestured to the lone metal spare near the door. Uncomfortable but even that was more than Alfonso deserved. "What's the matter at hand?"

"I hear you lost to the pirate," Alfonso preened with thickly affected worry.

"You ran from him," De Loco countered factually. "Is there a point here, Alfonso?"

"Only that we share a frustration," the blonde man responded. "I come with news that may help with that account and knock our annoying fly from the skies."

"You should have started with it," De Loco huffed. "Out with it."

"They've finished it."

That caught De Loco's attention. A grin halfway to madness sliced across his face and there was a fresh mirth that overtook the ache in his body. "Did they test fire?"

""It's not as strong as the one in Valua," Alfonos answered with the slightest hesitation.

"The Chameleon is a smaller ship," De Loco explained curtly. "I never expected the weapon to be as strong; only strong enough to deal with our obstacles."

"The pirate took it over the finish line," Alfonso elaborated.

"It's a pity that he wasn't born under the Yellow Moon," De Loco half-lamented. "Rogue or not, he's hardly an idiot."

"Does it sting your pride, Andrés, having some common rabble complete this version of the weapon?"

De Loco laughed like a cawing raven. "Hardly," he countered. "All that matters is that it is functional."

Alfonso paused for a moment, biting his lip in disappointment that his counterpart would not bristle at having some trash-dwelling pirate take his contraption over the finish line. He wouldn't deny De Loco's intelligence but it was baffling how he never seemed to care about anything other than results.

"And what of the Cygnus? " the blonde man asked with apprehension. "That's next…?"

"If needed," De Loco insisted. "I'd prefer we avoid staying in the lands overlong."

"Wouldn't it be better to have both ships equipped? To deal with our pests?"

"You should be thankful that Lord Galcian allowed you to keep the Cygnus at all."

"I.. But…"

De Loco took a moment to savor the look on Alfonso's face. There was something particularly enjoyable about watching a nobleman all but beg. If he were so inclined, he might drag out the process and make a grand show of his consideration. That was before his loss at Vyse's hands. Such pettiness seemed senseless; there was an active threat in their sky and a sleeping Gigas that might need to be dealt with in the worst scenario. He took only the sparsest moment before speaking. The small twist of the knife.

"You'll get your toy," the scientist crooned with a smirk. "But it will take some time to retrofit the Cygnus . Until then, why don't you be a good boy and worry about the mines while I handle the important matters?"

"If there's glory to be had," Alfonso began darkly. "It'll be mine."

The comment was dismissed with a lazy wave of De Loco's hand. "Whatever you say," he spat in playful disinterest. "Even if you do manage to shoot our pirate pest into the depths, you best remember that my weapons made it possible."

Alfonso rolled his eyes and suppressed an urge to retaliate with a mocking "buh it waz muh weapons made it possy-bull." Instead, he let his annoyance turn to their shared enemy. The raid on the Cygnus weeks ago had left his reputation in disgrace and the rescue in the capital spited the queen. Belleza had failed in Nasr and De Loco scurried away here in Ixa'taka. If anyone would end their current predicament, it would be him. If that meant working with De Loco, that was the price to pay but nothing would stand between his hands and Vyse Dyne's death. A smirk cut across his lips.

"You'll see," Alfonso replied smoothly. His voice reeked of an unearned confidence. "Very soon, I'll have my blade at the pirate's throat. You can congratulate me properly then."

If De Loco cared, he did not show it. If anything else, he found Alfonso's confidence amusing. Not that the two of them would need to wait too long before encountering Vyse again. As they exchanged barbs and loosely discussed their business, a few things were about to happen in the mines.

---

It would start with a knife.

As Merida and Tara slipped down the first layer of the mine's honeycomb interior, they found little resistance. The upper floors were reserved for a scant few docks for light vessels delivering prisoners and picking up supply shipments back to Valua's forward camps. The Ixa'ness pair leapt down two rings without any trouble; they didn't even encounter a lone guard sneaking off for a piss or spot even one lookout down the halls towards resupply points. Valuan arrogance—their self-assured sense of invulnerability—had left the door open and now all they needed to do was walk through.

Tara paused as the pair approached their next descent point. Below them, two guards chattered before a cage full of workers. The Ixa'ness peered closer in the hopes of spying her sisters but found no sign of their distinctive red hair or ritual garb. The cage held perhaps fifteen workers, many of whom pressed against the bars. A stray hand slipped towards the nearest guard in a desperate grab towards a key slinking near their hip but before it could reach the destination, the Valuan chanced a look.

"Heeey!" came the cry. The voice sounded aggrieved that anyone would dare seek their freedom instead of remaining in chains. Petulant and flicked with the high pitched twist of a schoolchild in the yard.

Then came the punishment. A grasp of the worker's hand that locked their arm outside the cage followed by the raising of a truncheon. The seized man cried out in protest but it was to no avail as the baton arced downward and cracked against forearm again and again with a horrid cracking. Merida grasped her knife.

"Wait," Tara whispered as Merida seemed to lean closer towards the edge, poised to jump below.

"They are within reach!" her compatriot protested. It was all she could do to hold back throwing her spear.

"Let them split up," Tara explained. "We will take them quietly and then open the gate."

Merida scowled but allowed Tara's command to stand. In spite of the whimpering below, the Ixa'ness warriors waited safely on the upper pathway and waited until the Valuan's split ways. The offending guard, perhaps eager for air after his casual violence, removed his armet and walked away from the cage towards an adjacent hallway. Merida sneered at how clean he looked compared to the wretches throughout the mine; untouched and unbothered by his deeds. The white haired woman nodded at her partner and slowly followed the guard from above, trailing his path on their own walkway until he turned down the hallway and vanished out of view.

It was now or never. Merida leapt down with Tara quickly following, the pair landing with all the noise of a mouse's footfall. She turned to see the Valuan leaning against the wall, looking the opposite way. Merida felt the knife in hand and her heart pound like a drum. She sensed Tara's gaze and desperately felt the need to prove right here and immediately that she was not a pretender. Once there was blood on the stones, there would be no argument. There would be no word that Tara could spit at her that could not be sidestepped with a casual gesture towards a Valuan corpse. This was the moment everything changed.

Merida darted forward like a panther, low to the ground and fast as a blink. She lurched in quickly and twisted behind the Valuan. He turned slightly but not quick enough as Merida's foot shot out to kick the back of his knee and drive him to the dirt all while her free hand covered the man's mouth to avoid any screams. Within a moment, her green moonstone knife rested at his throat. The soldier froze in fear as the tip pressed against his skin. His face was a monument to confusion.

This was the moment that Merida had prayed for. All she needed to do was…

"Wait." Tara's voice brought the dancer from the moment and she looked up from her would-be victim towards the other Ixa'takan with a look of abject shock on her face. Wait? Now?

Tara was frowning and try as she might Merida could not discern the cause of her discomfort. She couldn't have objected to the killing of one colonizer. Not when her sisters were somewhere in the mine's most hellish depths. Merida was about to speak when Tara beat her to the punch.

"Why did you leave?" A nervous question spoken at a most inopportune time.

Okay, maybe the knife would have to wait for a moment.

Merida kept the blade pressed against her captive's throat. "Are we doing this now? Here?!"

Tara chewed her lip. "I woke up one morning and my best friend was gone," she began before giving a quick snap for emphasis. "I'm owed an explanation."

The Valuan, perhaps sensing a chance to make a move, attempted to rise only for Merida's foot to ram once more into his leg and keep him knelt against the floor. She made a point of pressing her knife closer to his skin. This time, the tiniest trickle of blood began to form.

"I am busy," Merida insisted. "This is a very important moment! They will write songs about today!"

"I don't care if today is your birthday," Tara countered. She took a moment to poke the Valuan with her spear. "Tell me or I will rob you of the kill."

The final word left Merida at a loss for a moment. She had trained often for this moment but her daily life was that of a dancer offering spiritual succor and comfort. Her most practiced movements were the various steps and twists of dances that shifted upon circumstance. What she had learned of fighting in her youth was largely supplanted by her study of ritual and ceremony until she decided that there was no ignoring the Valuans any longer. But for all that fire, she had never killed a man. Tara clearly had.

So the knife paused once more. "I asked my father to take me," she explained. "On his final visit."

Tara was nonplussed. "You walked among our people, showered in our history and struggle… and you asked to be taken away from it all?"

"I did not want that life," Merida attempted to explain. "I wanted to see the world."

"Did not want to be a warrior? To be an Ixa'ness? No wonder your hand falters now."

It was the final insult and there was only one recourse. Pushing against her objections and drawing on years of rancor towards the Valuan oppressors, Merida set her gaze upon Tara and quickly drew her knife across her captive's throat. There was a half gasp that trailed to a gurgle and she let the man fall to the ground before exhaling heavily as she felt an unexplainable part of herself change forever.

"I did not object to being a warrior," she answered. "I did not want to be a mother. I did not want that forced on me. I did not want to sully myself with some stranger's touch. Men…"

There was nothing else to say and the admission did not come easy. Merida's chosen profession meant plenty of leers and suggestive comments even in the best of times but she'd made an art of closing herself off. There'd never been cause to talk about her discomfort and it hardly seemed like a topic elaborating about in the middle of a mineshaft full of dangerous enemies and wayward slaves. The Ixa'ness tribe only survived as they did thanks to various forays into the skies to find partners. It was the duty of any woman of the tribe to seek out a mate and have a child. In time, the father was dismissed and never seen again. But Merida had never wanted to seek out a man; that seemed completely at odds with her soul but no amount of explanation to her mother had ever mattered. So she ran away.

Tara paused for a moment to regard the fallen Vauan, kneeling after a time to grab the key on his belt. Merida had already turned and started walking towards the main shaft. Tara watched and saw her friend's shaking hands and suddenly they felt worlds apart. Merida's words would have done it as well; they called to mind memories of tree climbing and fireside chats full of confusion and unsaid things but Tara did not have words for what she was feeling now. It was anger mixed with understanding. Anger that anyone could leave the Ixa'ness and their ways. Understanding how remaining would have killed her friend.

"You did not want to have a child?" Tara asked, trailing after her companion.

"It is not for me," Meridia replied as she approached the cage they'd spied on before. "To give myself up in that way."

The pair stopped. "It is our duty," Tara attempted to explain before Merida cut her off.

"It is yours," she nearly spat. "I am myself and I will not betray myself because of a duty I never chose."

"You're so serious now," Tara countered. Merida made a gesture at their surroundings.

"We're surrounded by enemies," she offered as an explanation. "Of course I am serious."

"You're still completely unbearable," Tara insisted with a huff. "Now! The key…"

The warriors darted to the front of the cage, eliciting gasps of shock and spurts of chatter before Tara raised a commanding hand that silenced them. Eager eyes watched as the Ixa'ness brought up the key and worked it into the lock, jiggling a bit before the cage door opened with a creak that seemed to reverberate throughout the entire mineshaft. Those men and women who were able to rush out of their prison and gathered around their liberators. Merida smiled widely at them even as Tara remained stern.

The dancer took the lead. "We need to open as many cages as possible befo-"

BANG! BANG! VRWOOOOOOOO! VROOOOOOOO!

Her orders were drowned out by a flood of gunfire and alarm blaring. The group began to scatter, some running around the perimeter towards other captives and the more fearful darting within the opened cage for some semblance of cover. Merida twisted her head and saw the cause of their troubles.

The second guard had returned. Further around the pathway, near one of the halls out of the shaft, the armored soldier leveled his rifle and fired again and again. A panel behind him flickered with light as a red siren whirled. It only took a moment for additional guards to appear by his side. So much for stealth.

It took a moment for Merida to realize that Tara was no longer at her side. The chaos masked everything and it wasn't until she cast a second glance at the Valuans that Merida saw her friend rushing towards them with a spear aloft. Be it through sheer luck or honed training at the hands of her elders, the young Ixa'ness darted and bobbed through rifle fire like a wispy demon. Nothing could touch her and it took only a few blinks of the eye until she was upon the soldiers. Her spear twisted and turned and swept the Valuans off their feet. They clattered to the ground with metallic pings but before any of them could rise, Tara's spear slipped through the gaps in their armor and plunged further.

The Ixa'ness called back to Merida. "I'll take this side! You take the other and we'll meet below!"

Merida grinned, waving back to her fellow Ixa'takan. "Don't make me wait too long down there!"

Tara pulled her spear from one of the fallen soldiers. "I was about to tell you the same thing," she called back. "Now go and fight like you are in one of those songs you love!"

The white haired woman gripped the knife in her hand with anticipation. The first cage was broken and her first life had been taken. There was nothing in the world that could stop what was about to come.

BLAWWNG! BLAAWWNG!

A fresh sound whirred through the mineshaft and Merida made yet another double take to see the source of fresh troubles. Though they were not moving yet, the moonstone wires above the shaft entryways were starting to hum with galvanic energy. Perhaps she had thought too soon; if the doors did close, there would be nothing to stop the Valuans from locking every Ixa'takan within the mines.

Merida did not know if Quetya truly walked among her new allies but as she and the fresh torrent of escape slaves pressed onwards, leaping down to the next level in a mad scamper to free whoever they might reach, she uttered prayer: "Moon, protect them."

She left out the second half: Or we are all going to die here .

Drachma's metallic fist slammed into the nearest contraption with a thunderous report that reverberated through the hallway. Steel scraped on steel until the old pirate gave an extra push that sent his target right to the ground in a tangle of oil and sprockets. He heaved a tired breath and turned to help the boy and girl but found that they were no worse off. Vyse stood upon a tangled metal heap, pulling his cutlass out and shaking a drip of oil from the edge. Meanwhile, Fina had taken a step back from her foe. It stood blackened and sputtering from the after effects of a burst of magickal lightning.

It took a moment for the chaos to settle entirely. Soldiers were one thing but mechanical monstrosities were another entirely. Of all the things to expect in Ixa'taka, Vyse had never considered any kind of Valuan automaton. Sheathing his blades, the young pirate sauntered up to Fina's side and gave her a soft clap on the shoulder which elicited a hum of appreciation from her. Cupil meep'd at her side, form shifting from a small blade until he slithered back on her arm. Vyse cautiously regardied the drone she'd fried.

It was a strange device. Two flat-footed feet rested at the end of stubby legs leading up to a cylindrical body lacking arms; the body was connected to a "head" that was little more than a collection of drill bits perfect for cutting through Moonstone Mountain's thick stone. Vyse thought little of them at first until a lone Valuan at the end of the hall smacked a console that elicited a pulse of energy that turned the machines from laborers to weapons which turned and set themselves upon the nasty pirates who dared to intrude into the mines. They weren't necessarily hard to smash given their waddling speed but it had taken more than a few biting swings of his cutlass to pierce their sturdy exterior. In time, both their Valuan master and the automatons lay heaped on the ground. Still, the young pirate pondered.

"If they have these, why do they need workers?" he asked with some confusion.

"They're not magickal like the Old World machines," Fina noted with a nervous poke of her fingers against the automaton's steel exterior. "There's only a very small moonstone powering them."

"Cause they're cheaper than slaves," Drachma spat with disgust. "S'like making a ship. Ye gotta make them whirly parts and bash 'em together and fix 'em when they break."

"They dig out the paths and leave the rest to the Ixa'takans," Fina mused sadly. "Valua's so close to building great things that could help people and yet.."

"It's all so senseless," Vyse finished. "They got an entire city that glows and machines that can handle work but it's all smog and bullshit."

Drachma hobbled towards the fried automaton and gave it a push with his metallic arm that tipped it down to the dirt where it landed with a dull clang. "Ain't worth fussin' over," he declared. "Iff'n we slow down to be philossy, we ain't findin' that priest-like fella as quicksome as we should."

Fina closed her eyes and sought out Isapa's energy. Turning, she pointed further down the hallway. The dirt path rose upwards and resolved at an opening where the clacking sound of metal hammering and whirling rotors crash-banged. Percussive smacks and bangs rising upwards through the mountain.

"We're close."

The trio hurried up the path into the next chamber. Vyse expected more guards or even a clattering herd of automatons. Instead, he froze for a moment to look at his surroundings. The hall had opened up into a massive chamber extending high upwards and even further down. It immediately called attention to the strangest feature. The entire room was cross-crossed with steel mesh walkways spanning the wide traverse within. On each level, high and low, the paths cut about in patterns parallel and cross shaped.

Each of the walkways was connected near the center by various sturdy platforms bracing the walkways a loft. The paths above led to adjacent hallways and rooms, some clearing cutting back towards the central mineshaft. Vyse hazarded a glance below towards the source of most noise and found the faint outlines of battleships resting against shipyard docks where soldiers and engineers darted about. The sound of spinning rivets flew upwards and tell-tale signs of sparks from welding torches burning against ship hulls.

"How is this place bigger on the inside?" Vyse mused with some annoyance.

Drachma gave a huff of agreement. "Mines're bigg'n but damn rest's huge."

"Thankfully, all we need to do is cross," Fina said with a weak smile. "It's still faint but there's a tangle of green magicks on the other side."

Vyse nodded. "Hopefully none of the folks down below look up."

Fina was already moving. Her senses were focused entirely on Isapa's resonance. Each step brought an extra spark of brightness to the starlight haze at the edge of her vision. The green energy was extremely particular and gave a pulsing like a heartbeat and each pounding brought added resilience to the light. Not enough that it might lash out in a wider magickal display but enough that the priest's knowledge seemed as tangible as anything else in the world. A sign of the Old World.

They were halfway across when Fina felt her foot hit one of the central platforms. Before she had a chance to take in the firmness of the steel, all the weight beneath her feet vanished entirely as the metal snapped down like a swinging door. The Silvite started tumbling forward into what was now and open hole in the path with nothing beneath but a long fall to a terrible death. Instinctively, she twisted and tossed her hand out. Try as she could to reach Vyse, there was no spanning the distance. She started to fall.

"Fina!" Vyse immediately dove forward and hit the mesh walkway with a smack. With little more than moments to spare, he wrapped both his hands around her own. He grasped tighter than he'd ever held anything in his life. Not the riggings on a ship deck or the hilts of his cutlasses. His hands were sturdy as stone but even as he grasped his friend, Fina started to slip. Cupil slid off Fina's wrist and wrapped around both of their arms like a cable but even that began to give way.

The Silvite's eyes grew wide with fear and she called out: "Don't let go! Don't let go!"

"I got you!" Vyse cried. "I got…"

Drachma took a half-step towards the pair but froze as an echo danced in his mind and a thousand phantom pains and torrid sorrows shot through his body and mind. For a moment, he saw nothing but the Deep Sky and a fluttering of colorful feathers. His heart was ice and his body made of rust. Every fiber of his being, every sinew and bone, reverberated with a distant cry.

Don't let go…

"Cap'n!"

With a lighting-crash snap, the pain dissipated from Drachma's body and the world settled back into view. He saw Vyse and Fina—those damn kind-hearted kids—teetering on the precipice of the abyss and lurched forwards with a speed he thought long abated. His coldsteel hand grasped Vyse's arm and he gave a righteous pull that brought both the young pirate and his fair-tempered friend back into the walkway. Fina immediately buried herself in Vyse's embrace, fighting off icy-shocked tears as she settled back into herself and the urgency of her mission. Drachma could only watch and wonder what would have happened if he waited even two seconds longer. Would he have been able to live with failure twice over?

Vyse stood up slowly, guiding Fina to her feet. After a stolen moment where his hand ran through her blonde hair, he turned and nodded seriously at Drachma. "Thank you."

There was so much more to those two words than either of them could express or understand.

"Aye," the salty old dog replies quietly. "Ain't time to suss out the moment though.."

The young pair took a breath. Drachma was right; they didn't have the luxury of waiting on their mission and it took only a scattering of seconds for the mood to settle.

"They must've built in traps in case anyone tried to escape," Vyse noted with a nod at the gap in the mesh. "We should walk around any of these to be safe."

So it was that the rest of their crossing turned even more deliberate. Where they could not entirely pass the metallics plates, Vyse would cautiously tap them with his foot to determine the safe path. It did not take long to reach the other side even with this wariness and the trio soon found themselves in a long hallway lined with iron doors featuring only the smallest barred windows. Prison cells for confinement of particularly troublesome or important captives. Vyse scowled at the sight before realizing something odd: there were no guards on standby. In fact, the only Valuan in sight was rushing down the hall and further into the mines. It was a sign they needed to quickly find Isapa. A guard wouldn't only leave his post in an emergency and there was nothing greater than a riot amongst the slaves. Which meant Merida and Tara's work had started in earnest. A few odd seconds passed before the urgent blast of alarm blares echoed out in the halls as if to confirm Vyse's suspicion. No more time to waste.

"Fina, where is he?"

The mage jogged urgently down the hall with her companions in tow until she stopped before a cell with a half-rusted door and placed her hand upon it. For a moment, Vyse saw the color of her beryl eyes fade for a moment only to be replaced with a flash of silver radiance. She nodded wordlessly and Vyse drew his cutlass in preparation to bash the large lock sitting upon the door only for Drachma to reach out with his artificial arm and wrench the entire thing off its hinges and hurl it into the hallway.

"That works," Vyse said with a chuckle before walking into the room.

The small cell was little more than a box lined with metal sheeting. There was not even a proper bed; nothing but cold iron that had already started to gain some discoloration. In the middle of it all, bewildered but not fearful, was an older man perhaps near his fifties with a round face and frame. His dark skin bore some wrinkles but handled the years well and though his hair had long since vacated his head it was counterbalanced by a bushy beard upon the strap of his chin which bore an odd off-violet color.

His semblance offered a noble bearing which gave way as he released a hearty laugh from deep within his gut. His white robe, accented by a river-blue drape of fabric, held faint bloodstains that spoke of mistreatment but his temperament was far from bitter or worn down.

"Ohoho!" his laugh bounced like a honey bee as his brown eyes settled on Fina before scanning the grou entire. "Who might you be?"

Vyse couldn't hide his surprise. "You're Isapa?" he asked, having expected something more ascetic.

The Ixa'takan spread his arms wide. "The one and only."

"We were sent by King Cuitláhuac," the young pirate explained. "We're here to rescue you."

Isapa claps his hand. "My lord has done me a great service," he said happily, once again looking at Fina. "He even sent me a beautiful woman. Now, perhaps she and I might confer alone for a moment.."

There was a suggestive tone which mingled seriousness and more licentious sentiments in equal measure. For a moment, Vyse felt an urge to slap the man but that subsided as he took a breath and watched as Isapa approached Fina. The young woman tilted her head nervously.

"Esne Silvara?" he asked simply in words that Vyse could not understand. Fina's eyes went wide.

"Etiam sum Silvara," she replied before sliding back to the Ixa'takan tongue. She took a moment to truly look at Isapa, glancing at him up and down in confusion. "How do you know what I am?"

"I am very wise," Isapa teased with the slightest bow of his head. "Though your clothing makes it rather obvious."

"You've seen Silvite robes before?"

Isapa started to speak before stopping. A moment passed while he chose his words. "It is a complicated matter," he offered. "I am a keeper of Old World knowledge. Magicks, language."

"They said your king encountered Quetya in the mountains," Vyse started carefully. "When we arrived at Horteka, everyone was convinced that she was Quetya returned from wherever gods slumber."

"Understandable," Isapa offered with a deliberate stroke of his beard. She's not Quetya and yet she looks…"

Fina took a step towards the priest. "How do you know?"

"I'm also very observant," the high priest offered as deflection. "Even now I could weave a robe that perfectly fits all the curves of your body."

Vyse also took a step towards Isapa, a hand dangling near his cutlass as indignation flared in his chest.

"Keep those kinds of eyes off her," he said with a great deal of command. It was enough to turn the cheerful priest more serious. "We're getting you outta here so that you can help on our own mission."

"And what might that be…?"

Fina exhaled. "You king says that you can tell us where to find Rixis," she explained simply.

"To find the sacred stone," Isapa muttered darkly. "Who are you that Cuitláhuac would make this bargain?"

"Travelers from under a distant moon," Vyse explained. "I'm Vyse and this is Fina. The quiet grumpy-faced fella is Drachma. We can tell you more later but we really should skedaddle."

Drachma turned towards the open door where alarm sounds were bouncing throughout the hall and the distant sounds of battle and shouting were finally reverberating. "Trouble's started big-some."

Isapa didn't understand the man's words but the tone was clear enough. "It sounds like you brought friends," he noted. "Those alarms and Ironhead bootstomps are not for us."

"We're freeing as many as possible," Fina explained with a sly grin that belied her eagerness to see the Ixxa'takan's free. "Other friends and more of your peoples from different villages."

"You have set many things into motion" Isapa asked knowly. "We can talk about the truth of things later; for now what matters is that Quetya has come for her people."

"I'm not her." Fina protest. "You said so.."

"Stories are what they need to be in the moment," Isapa mused. "And it matter little what you are. Still… perhaps we should start running, yes?!"

Vyse didn't need to hear it twice. "Let's get outta here," he said. "If we're gonna find others then we gotta jet outta here." And with that, they ran deeper into the mines.

---

Aika didn't need to think twice the moment Mounstone Mountain's alarms kicked off. Be it through the carefree wheelings and dealings of her dear friends or the far more bloody antics of the unrestrained Ixa'takan's she didn't even bother to worry about the cause of the alarum before sprinting down the corridor with boomerang in hand and Tika'tika at her side. It was time to raise helll. Tika'tika was as good a companion as any; wherever a guard might rest they were either fallen by a choice arrow that seemed to slip into the slightest joint in Vauan armor or the thunderous crash of a boomerang against a helmet. Leave it to the others to exercise tact and judgment and strategy. For Aika? The best offense was… well, a good offense. It didn't matter how many guards were in a corridor or if the odds seemed stacked against her. With her twirling moonstone boomerang and Tika'tika's own near-miraculous aim, nothing could stand in their way.

It was almost comical. Aika hoped that she might encounter some type of amazing machina or trained assassin that she could take on in a duel meant for the ages. Instead, it was a lot of colonizers who didn't know any better who were entirely unprepared for the slightest hint of danger swinging their way. Such it was that while Vyse and the others made a sneaky way towards their target, Aika and Tika'tika raced long the length of moonstone wiring leading to the central control panel. It wasn't even a contest. The Valuans, fat on their comforts and assured of their invincibility, held no defense against the smacking of a moonstone boomerang against their skulls or the nigh-miraculous slip of an arrowhead into the most precise joints of their armor. It was a running battle, as much as it might even be called a battle, given urgency only by the distant alarm and the fresh yellow moonstone pulsing of the wires overhead signaliing that if the two warriors somehow didn't make good time, then entire central mineshaft would be some horrid tomb for the Ixa'takan worker within. Neither of the pair was going to let that happen.

It seemed a hit and run battle, one dash leading to a fallen soldier until slowly but surely there was nothing at all. It was quiet to the point of discomfort and Tika'tika readied his bow for a trap as he entered the central control room only to find something entirely out of the ordinary.

"Wait, wait!" an aged voice called in equal cheer and nervousness, his calloused hnds held aloft. "I surrender! Please do try not to shoot me in the neck! Or eyeball! Or groin!"

Tika'tika lowered his bow and shifted to broken common tongue. "Centime, the tinky-ror?"

It took a moment for Aika to catch up, Tika'tika's trained stepped more akin to gallops than runner's stride but she also paused as she looked at the many before her a white outfit covered with some grease although more clean than she expected. Hints of smudging on his thumbs from overwork and a hand where a small screwdriver spun in place. The man's face was older, perhaps older than Captain Dyne and verging into his mid-forties, but held a lot of cher all things considered. It took a moment for Aika to realize there was soem blood on the tool and she looked behind the old man to find a fallen Vauan soldier.

The man, as if to explain himself, rubbed his neck. "Ah, yes. That I can explain. See I needed to access this console and one this led to another and he disagreed and there's plenty of things you can do with a screwdriver if you're creative…"

The redhead walked towards the man in awe. "You're Centime the Tinker," she said. "Fought alongside Dyne and the rest of the Albatross."

Centime, graying hair scraggly, his face nodded before he shook the strands aside. He held up a spare finger. "From time to time," he said before noting both Aika darker skin and distinctive red hair. He frowned for a moment and memories of the past flickered and disappeared.

"You're Mikal's daughter?" he asked with a great deal of affection.

"Aika Nassar at your service." The young woman gave a bow.

"You look like him, and your mother too. She had red hair like that too. But… what are you doing here?"

Aika grinned wide and struck a bold pose. "Rescuing you, the king, and busting everyone outta here," she declared. "I'm here with Vyse and ain't no way we're letting Valua get away with this nonsense!"

Centime chuckled, moving to a nearby console and prying open a panel. "Well, if the goal was to make enough of a ruckus for everyone to know you're here, ya did a great job. Let's see…"

Aika drew closer to the panel and leaned in. "Mineshaft doors are on a moon circuit connected here," she noted. "I think it's that one down below. If it locks, our friends are screwed so let's give that…"

"A little cut, yeah," Centime nodded, swiping the screwdriver enough to snap wires and end both the pulsing moon coils and the ongoing alarm. "Presto!"

The younger woman leaned forward and pilfered Centime's screwdriver for a moment, giving a twisting jerk to the half-opened console as well that resounded with a snap-clang! "I ain't an expert but that should seal off some of the guard rooms and leave the rest open for us."

The old rogue whistled. "You've a true gear-head's spirit at heart," he noted before taking his tool again with one more twisting affectation. "Circuit here will open up solitary cells if able."

Aika chuckled. "Not too many folks there," she noticed. "But each but helps."

Centime gave his screwdriver a silly little twirl and winked at the younger mechanic. His grin shifted to a frown. "Opening my cell was easy enough," he admitted with some arrogance. "Though I didn't plan beyond that. Thought maybe I'd make it as far as some free cages, saved souls, and a good death."

Aika dared to clap Centime on the shoulder. "Wouldn't want to leave Hans waiting like that."

"You met my son?!"

That elicited a chuckle. "I think he's downright enamored with Vyse," she noted. "But we promised to save your keister… and now we're gettin' everyone else here too."

Tika'tika, who had somehow grasped enough of the conversation, spoke up. "Open cages, fallen soldiers, pathways to as many ships as we can seize."

The final part gave Centime pause as he ran a hand through his aged hair. "I… helped with De Loco's flagship. He's building a cannon that can fire a mass of moonstone energy."

Aika gasped. "He'd blow everything out of the sky!"

There was a pause as Centime held up a small but crucial metal pin in his hand and jangled it before Aika, like the most masterful thief in the land.

"He can try," the old rogue insisted. "Backfire'll be a bitch though. Funny how one little firing pin in a huge machine can make a world of difference. Take the right part and…"

In a shocking display of magnanimity, Aika leaned in and gave Centime a silly kiss on the cheek. " I see why Captain Dyne says you're one of four people he actually fears. Without the pin…"

Centime mimed an explosion. "You got it," he teased. "We get one very annoyed and slightly toasted admiral."

Outside the control room, the alarm continued to blare. Centime took a moment to lean and look over an adjacent console and give a good ripping at a tangle of alarm soon began to whimper and then hook out of existence until there was nothing left but a dull console, the weakest alarum, and a stuttering flicker on the moonstone wire trail. Aika, for her own measure, leaned in and twisted a tangle of wires together and capped the makeshift weave with a yellow moonstone pilfered from a fallen guard.

"If they tamper with it," she said to Centime with a grin. "Then…"

"Boom! Yeah, I see it," he offered with an equally mischievous smirk. "You really do take after your old man. He had a real knack for rigging Valuan ships with "surprises" too."

"You knew him well?"

"He was a dear friend," Centime said affectionately with a ruffle of Aika's hair. "If we weren't in the middle of a Valuan base? I'd have some damn good stories to share but alas…"

"Right, right!" Aika agreed. "Came to rescue you and found you free and up to trouble.. But if we are gonna get outta here in one piece we need to find the others."

"Dyne's lad?"

"He's the one that promised Hans we'd get you," Aika explained. "Now let's hurry back to everyone else, see what cages are smashed, and see if any of the Valuans have the good sense to surrender."

Centime chuckled warmly. "Don't count on it."

By this point Drachma huffed up. Even Tika'tika, not possessed of much grasp of "common" tongue, rolled his hands in eagerness. It wasn't as if they were suddenly averse to fighting now. There was only one way out and it meant a lot of toppled soldiers, scrapped consoles, busted ships, and associated mayhem

"We'll smash what're we might scamper into," the old captain said. "Slip the rest of the 'Takan's to ships."

Centime nodded, looking ten years younger. "Like old times," he said.

Tika'tika, pushing through and somehow finding the "common" tongue, spoke:

"It is.. Falling… apart … around them," he noted. "Let's… how are the wordings? Give them many Hells!"

Centime bowed to the Ixa'takan. "Honored to have you," he said. "Now: let's smash some Valuan crud."

Aika held up a finger! "Wait…. Onnnnne second!"

Deep within the control console, where the her moonstone was rigged to blow, the grease-monkey made a series of tugs and adjustments borne from years of raiding Valuan ships and an preternatual understanding of machines that was keen enough that even Centime was forced to watch in awe. A light on the console pulsed. Once, twice, and again as a radio frequency blurted out and the Air Pirate performed a deed so beyond the ken of her normal swashbuckling peers that it beggared belief.

"Did you…?" Centime could not hide his surprise. "Adjust the security settings without so much as a glance at the manual there, missy?

"Any of those funny automotons get in our way," Aika began with a dramatic pose. "Ain't gonna bother us at all. In fact, they might find a new appreciation for jabbing their drill into Valuan asses."

The older rogue laughed. "Rampaging air pirates, Ixa'takan rebels, and now a series of malfunctioning robots all at the Vauan's heel. What's not to love?"

Aika winked as if that captured the depth of her pride. "Now! Let's find the others!"

Tika'tika, broken common tongue taking shape, uttered: "We follow the screams and sword-clangs."

Centime frowned but turned to lead the way. "Another day in the life of a rogue, innit?"

---

Andrés De Loco had tricked himself into thinking that he might find renewed quiet when Alfonso left his quarters for a rudimentary inspection of the mines. It wasn't that he couldn't endure his fellow commander's presence; all you needed to do was offer Alfonso the barest attention and he seemed pleased enough. The larger issue was fatigue. De Loco had long learned to manage his ailment but there was something about being in the presence of that preening nitwit that sucked excess vigor from his bones. It was infuriating. Alfonso was not a complete moron. Did he have the tactical chops of Gregorio or Vigoro? Of course not. Was his mind as keen as Belleza? Not in the slightest. He was invariably dull.

Then from time to time, Alfonso would say something that warranted attention. Identifying the troublesome would-be insurrectionists in the mine or a spare suggestion at their fleet deployment that showed he was not entirely a student of textbooks. There was, if only for fleeting moments, more than met the eye when it came to Alfonso Aznar y Cabanas that, disgraced or not, showed that he did not earn his title entirely by virtue of his blood. Yes, his post was mostly a by-product of the right pedigree but De Loco wondered if Alfonso ever caught those moments of potential. The gap where the foppish nobleman met with a more dignified soldier. Whatever the case, it hardly mattered. De Loco finally had some quiet.

Then the alarm started blaring. A whoouuuring churn accompanied by the hint of red lights upon his nearby console and radio sputtering that held the smallest hints of words. The admiral dared to think it was a mishap down at the docks or even some Ixa'takan's desperate attempt to flee captivity. But if that was the case, the alarm would have come and gone. It hadn't. Instead, the claxon blared onward.

There was little warning when Alfonso entered into his chamber. No buzz at the door and no proper decontamination. Instead, the hatch swung open and Andrés rushed to the other side of the room like death itself was approaching. Distance maintained, he glared at Alfonso.

"Something the matter? Or are you trying to get me killed?!"

Alfonso entered the room with little care for distancing or De Loco's particularly weak immune system. Indeed, the blonde man's face was a mixture of smug impertinence and something more worrisome.

"Not that I wanted to interrupt one of your brainstorming sessions," the young man joked ruefully. "But you should know that we have a situation in the mines."

De Loco rolled his eyes. "Oh? What gave it away? Was it the alarm?!"

The moment hung on the air ever so briefly before Alfonso, showing more self-control than usual, rolled his eyes and looked at De Loco quite seriously. "Actually, that came after the cages in the central mines were opened and the slaves started rebelling."

A pause. "And after we lost track of the Tinker."

One more pause. "And after one of your pressure plate traps were triggered. So, it's a bit of a problem Andrés! A little more pressing than some stray runaway attempt or shipyard scuffle."

De Loco couldn't help but grin. "It's Vyse," he declared. "Let the soldiers and slaves clash all they want; it don't care if none are left standing if it means we take that snot-rat's head off his shoulders."

Alfonso grinned. "I already have a plan in place that will deal with all our troubles. A weapon of such great power that anyone whose stands in the way will be smashed into dust."

The senior admiral rolled his eyes at his blonde companion. "You don't mean…"

"That's right!" Alfonso declared. "Those pirates bested my war beast once before but Antonio was weak. This rabble will be no match for my latest breed of kantor: ANTONIA!"

De Loco sighed. "Do as you wish," he sneered. "While your trained bull bashes around the mines, I'll prepare something far more deadly. Until then…. Please get the hell out of my office."

Alfonso ran a hand through his blonde hair and smirked. "You'll see Andrés," he declared. "Pirate or slave, there's gonna be nothing left but smears of blood on the floor!

---

To describe the chaos unfolding within the mines, as cages cracked free and tools split chains into useless shards, would be akin to outlining how a swarm of ants gather upon a massive wasp and slowly suffocate the dangerous creature to death. If one or two or three ants tangled with a juicy wasp, they would be batted aside. Ten? That was an even enough fight. A hundred? Well, I expect that you've enough of an imagination to picture a once-deadly creature smothered into twitchy death throes. So it does little use to break down, beat for beat, the incredible speed with which Merida and Tara flung open the cages containing slaves and unleashed a torrest of Ixa'takan vengeance on the Valuans. No amount of armor or swords or rifles were enough to compare for the tide of bodies, rocks, pickaxes, shovels and fists that cashed on the oppressors. A rockslide or cave-in would have done less damage compared to the bitter rage of the Ixa'takans and left less blood. Revolution is not a clean affair. It is a hard thing through and through; perhaps there were those who were "following orders" or who didn't agree with the conduct in the mines. But a voice unraised is as deadly as a whip cracked. If history wanted to judge the sheer violence done against the Valuan's today, it would need to weigh it against the decade of brutality hoarded over the Ixa'takan people. And really, no one ever got made as someone to hurling a few good punches after having a boot on their neck for so long. So really gives a shit about the dying wasp?

What was more remarkable was the raw command that gripped Merida and Tara as they led their people deeper and deeper into the honeycomb spiral of the mountain. What started as a small crowd of the willing grew to a multitude before increasing to an army in and of itself. The pair had transformed into something beyond makeshift liberators. They were generals; they were heroes. The differences between them faded and their old-held shame and wounds faded in the face of their foe. Two Ixa'takan women, both born in the tradition of the Ixa'ness. One immersed in every aspect of the culture. Another who had forsaken it in hopes of seeing the skies and tending to the souls of her countrymen. Those distinctions were not unimportant but seemed to fade away as they led the charge. They had become heroes.

And so Merida's sword-red day came after all and it was everything she could have dreamed of.

It took some time for Merida and Tara to reach the deepest part of the mines and it was here that their preservation and blood and sweat were rewarded. As a fresh pair of Ironheads crashed to the ground, a small and wonderfully bright voice called from a cage.

"Sister! Sister! You came!"

Tara looked, heart wrenched with pain as she saw her younger sister Pera run to the cage. Her face bore bruises but she grinned nevertheless as another Ixa'ness rushed to her side. It was Lira, the youngest of the curiously named "Ixa'ness Demons." Only perhaps a year younger than Pera but remarkably unmarred nevertheless. Fresh-faced even if the horrors of imperial violence seeped into the pours where they would carve stress-lines ages from now. The two redheads, near perfect reflections of their older sister, leaned forward.

"Let us out," Pera asked with burning fire even greater than Tara's own righteousness. "They kept our weapons nearby like a buncha idiots! I wanna claim at least one of them before we're done!"

To her side, Lira shook nervously. "If I have my staff, I can help but…"

Tara leaned in and took her younger sister's hand. I have you," she said. "And Quetya-willing by the end of the day there will be no more cages under the Green Moon."

Merida moved in close and slammed the cage gate hard with the butt of her moonstone knife with enough force to completely upend the door from the hinge. "Prayers are good but smacking things is better, I think."

As the cage door tilted forward and hit the ground, the remaining Ixa'ness warriors circled Merida and began to ask a litany of questions that the dancer was not ready to answer. Was she returning to the people? Would she become an Ixa'ness again? Would they all be sisters once more?

Tara and Merida struggled to find an answer and might've offered reply when a tremendous roar burst through the mines and the trampling figure of an armored creature—one of those non-native bull creatures the Vauan's brought with them began to rampage through the throng of Ixa'takan's. Hooves crushed ribs and trampled those who could not flee. Horns skewered the unlucky and while countless fighters leapt upon the beast, they were bucked off and tossed into cold and uncaring cave walls.

Tara smiled at her sisters. "You two never would shut up about wanting a fight worth a song."

With a flurry of activity, Pera and Lira dashed out of their cell and over to the makeshift bin where their gear was collected. Pera, the mirror image of Tika'tika, took hold of a bow and quiver of arrows that while she did not know if she had enough to slaw the kantor, there were still barbs plenty enough to cause discomfort. Lira returned with a simple staff whose green moonstone tip somehow had not been taken. They gathered around their sister, ready for a battle plan only to find that Tara nodded at Merida.

Pera noticed the matter first. "You're the one who fled," she said coldly. "I was just old enough to remember. And we're meant to listen to you in a battle like this?"

Lira shifted nervously. "Can we, uh… get along? We sorta kinda really need to kill a big monster."

Merida felt Tara clap her shoulder. "This one has a keen sense worthy of an Ixa'ness," she offered by way of defending her friend. "She is as much a leader here as I am. Now! To the work!"

"We draw it to the side rooms," Merida declared with a grin. "They want the beast to cause chaos and disrupt the others. I will get it to chase me and you will all give chase. You have a spell to weaken it?"

"Chak Mol!" Lira's face lit up with a child-like delight.

Pera flicked her sister's nose. "If we can keep you out of the way long enough to cast it."

"My sister trains as a priestess," Tara explained. "Whereas Pera and I prefer the way of blood."

"It will do," Merida chuckled. "Now, follow me lead."

Merida walked over to a heap of fallen Valuan soldiers and picked up a pair of pistols and a loose rifle. She was not an expert of firearms but the years had made them less mysterious. Tara balked, looking both impressed and somehow disgusted. Her sisters looked even more aghast.

"You would use the tool of the enemy?" Tara asked darkly. As if it was one more step away from the values of the Ixa'ness that Merida had left behind.

The dancer turned warrior winked. "The bull does not care what I use to wound it," she said with a smirk. "This will be loud and anger it fiercely enough to give me chase. So long as you can keep pace.."

Tara lifted a finger and tugged Merida's ear. "I think I will manage," she said with affection.

That was all that needed to be said. Merida, casting aside the ceremony of her people, grabbed the Valuan's pistols with pragmatic grips and fired multiple fire pistol, yellow moonstone frame shimmering, blasted an electrically charged bullet that slammed into the kantor beast's armor and elicited a powerful surging of voltaic heat that led the beast to roar in rage and pivot to face her foe. Merida fired with the next gun, letting the first clatter to the ground and watching as another bullet embdeddd in the bull's makeshift armor eliciting a jolting of yellow magicks. Then came the rifle slung on her back, red moonstone inlay heating the next bullet full to bursting. Merida pulledthe trigger, rifle giving a tremendous kick, and bullet finding a powerful crashing smack against the kantor bull's left horn.

It shattered in a splintering of power and bone and marrow and anger. Then? The bull ran.

The Ixa'ness warriors did not need any signal to start their own breakneck run away from the creature and further from the gathered warriors and slaves in the mines. Tumbling twirls of red-headed warriors and their ashen-haired ally dipped and darted through the masses of Valuans and battling Ixa'takans. By some miracle, the women always stood a hair ahead of the snarling creature. In the fleeting moments, Pera would spin like the finest hunter and lose an arrow that slipped under armor plate but that seemed to do little more than draw a meager passing of blood and incur even more wrath. Merida didn't mind that last part; as they moved away from the honeycomb mine-ring and into a wider room the group finally gained the space needed for movement beyond desperate dives and sprints.

It was a central room connecting most of the paths up and down throughout the rest of the complex; for the time being it would need to serve a fresh purpose as a safe room to corral the beast until they could wear it down and land the killing blow. Tara and Merida spared no time, immediately turning to face the kantor bull. It lurched back in an attempt to stop them and Tara made the best of the moment to jab her spear upward into the monster's unarmored underside where a fresh roar signaled a clean strike. As the bull trampled in rage, Merida scampered atop it and slipped her green moonstone dagger, veridian glint shimmering, into a slot in the armor where upon she muttered a prayer to Quetya. The dagger glowed with light and a sweeping of noxi magicks leaked from the knife edge. A hint of poison.

But it wasn't enough and their greatest trump card was not Tara's vaunted Ixa'ness spearwork or Merida's long-practiced assassination motions. The secret to the beasts downfall was on the other end of the room. Lira, the youngest of them all and yet touched with the truest of magicks, kept a deep distance. She held her staff aloft, eyes closed in concentration in a desperate muttering of incantations. Old world phrases that mixed green and silver and life and death and energy and fatigue. Pera remained close, firing arrows at the kantor bull at every moment it even dared to look at her younger sister.

"I thought you were studying this stuff, Lira?!"

The young woman panted in exhaustion. 'In.. books and scrolls! This is different, ya dummy!"

In a different circumstance, Tara might've told her sisters to pipe down and focus but that was hard to do when a giant Valuan bull-beast was slamming into your side. The Ixa'ness tumbled on the ground, looking up to watch as Pera made to leave her sister's side. The elder warrior held up a hand to ward off the gesture and through her pain, she turned in time to see a giant bull hoof rise up high. But before it could slam down and splatter her skull, she felt warm and friendly arms around her waist and her body yanked to her feet. It was Merida, that damn fool who ran away from her duties and somehow was now her partner in liberation. The white-haired woman gave a playful wink before dashing beneath the kantor beast to slash and cut at its legs. In the harried commotion, Tara raised her spear and jabbed it hard into the creature's gut once more. It still held strength but the force was waning. And then…

"Chok! Mol!" Lira's voice bounced through the room with the strange reverberations of a master mage's weavings.

Green specks of light shimmered from her staff and darted around the room like so many butterflies before converging on the kantor beast and resting upon the massive hulk. The rivulating speckles pulsed on the beast, growing deeper and deeper in hue as they absorbed the very life energy from the creature. Green magicks were the realm of healing but they also held the horrid draw of poison and fatigue in a way more insidious than the esoteric enervations of yellow magick. The bull slumped over, fading into a sleep. If Lira had willed it, she could leave those poisonous butterfly conjurations upon the body until there was naught but rotten meat and bone. Instead, the young girl dismissed them once the beast collapsed.

Not that the mercy mattered too long in the grand scheme of things. Merida was not eager to allow the beast to suffer, taking her moonstone knife and walking softly towards the weakened beast. The fiery liberator had turned sullen in spite of the damage the kantor had wrought amongst her people. Her vermillion eyes gazed into the sagging bull's lids and she asked forgiveness before sliping the blade upwards to cut the once-proud creature's throat. It took only a moment for death to follow.

"Oh wow, we really got here at the wrong time," a playful voice called out from one of the entryways.

"Looks like we missed a lot of the fun," a teasing baritone matched.

The Ixa'ness warriors turned in preparation for another battle but only found their compatriots. Vyse and Aika looking somewhat scuffed and battle-worn. Fina, immaculate in her white robes and all too perfect a match for the high priest at her side. The old-timers, Drachma and a pirate Merida recalled from the outskirts of Ixa'taka, stood to the side. Whatever stray paths they had walked through the mountain had converged here in this final room only moments after one of Valua's grand beasts had fallen.

Merida glanced the group over and noted an absence. "Where is the hunter?"

Aika jerked a thumb back where they came from. "Broke off to lead a group down towards the docks to see what they could seize for themselves," she explained sneakily. "Bound to be leftover ships."

Drachma huffed. "Hells iff'n them 'Takans ken make 'em run without crashin…"

Vyse shrugged, smiling at the group. "Whatever comes next, we've done this much," he said warmly. Near the back of the room, Lira and Pera drifted closer with eyes dead-set on the strange warrior.

Aika put an end to their various mental wanderings with a cat-sharp glare before Fina spoke.

"The Valuans are fleeing the mines," she explained. "This is a place of bondage no more."

Merida dared to tuck into a twisting somersault that landed at the Silvite's feet. Tara offered the most meager and sarcastic clap as her friend spoke. "I do not know the truth about you," she told Fina. "But our people will never forget the power of this moment. To feel like our own masters again."

"Well, well. What a touching sentiment from a savage."

The room turned ice cold and contrary to all logic and all past behavior that painted Alfonso as a craven, the dapper Valuan strode into the room with his yellow moonstone rapier in hand and a tight encasement of alabaster-hued armor secured to his chest. He was not an intimidating figure even in this attire but for all his usual foppishness, the disgraced admiral walked towards the throng of pirates and Ixa'takans with something resembling dignity. Even if his face burned red in apprehension.

Vyse tilted his head in confusion. "Alfonso?"

"The Silvite was mistaken," the snobbish noble corrected. "Not all Valuans are fleeing."

Aika couldn't contain her laughter. "What are you gonna do? Faint on us?"

Alfonso took a deep breath and his mind drew in memories of many things he'd long discarded as useless. The pride of his family's name, the measure of manliness, the opinions of Galcian Abrantes Bardale and Andrés De Loco, the favor of his empress. And he held his sword at the ready.

"I ran from you once," Alfonso said, fair eyes set firmly on Vyse. "I cannot run again. I will not run again!"

The words hung in the air with little to no weight. Merida herself looked set to rush the Valuan down and slit his throat if only to be done with the theatrics. Tara and her sisters suppressed sniggers at the pitiful man, and even Centime raised a hand as if to caution the young lad to turn and flee.

Only Vyse seemed to take him seriously. "You know what this'll probably mean, right?"

The Valuan smirked. "As if a stray dog could ever harm a lion," he offered. "I ran once but no more. I am Alfonso Aznar y Cabanas and in the name of my Empress, I challenge you to a duel."

Aika cast Vyse a look. "I could throw my boomerang at his skull right now," she insisted. "Two seconds! One less jackass in the world."

Centime clicked his tongue. "Definitely Mikal's kid," he mused before looking at Vyse. "But you're the Blue Storm's son, so I suppose you're gonna want to do this properly."

"He's owed that much," Vyse said, eyes locked on Alfonso. In spite of it all, in spite of all the pain and cruelty, he would afford his enemy the dignity he could not find for his victims.

"Right then, let's be about this alr-"

A blur of motion. One cutlass slapped Alfonso's finical rapier aside, sending him off center as his over-practiced stance faltered. Vyse's second cutlass lurched up and cut. There was a spurt of blood and the clatter of Alfonso's rapier upon the floor as his hand reached up to cover his left eye, which had certainly seen better days if we can pardon the phrase. The nobleman toppled to the ground and twisted and turned in a thrashing that turned slowly into the heavy acceptance of a man on the edge of death.

"That's… not…. fair…" It was all Alfonso could repeat.

Vyse leaned down. "You took people from their homes and locked them like animals," the young man spat with an anger measured only by a cocksure swagger. "I'm a pirate and this is the best you get, Alfonso."

Indeed, that might have been the end of Alfonso Aznar y Cabanas' story. Merida had already begun to walk over, less charitable than Vyse in this matter and more than willing to make an example of an oppressor. What fate might've changed if her knife had drawn close enough for the kill. However, it was forestalled by an unlikely source. In an adjoining entryway, outside of view, Andrés De Loco was watching and he had decided to do something entirely irrational. By all counts, this was everything he wanted. A chance to see the pamper scion of a choked noble bloodline sputter on the ground. One less drop of poison in Valua's well and one less hindrance to Galcian's plans. It would be so easy to do nothing.

And yet, somehow in De Loco's heart (if he even truly had one these days) something froze. Call it a quirk of empathy or twinge of duty but as he watched the Ixa'takan draw closer to Alfonso, it became clear that he could not simply watch as his fellow Valuan was killed or else dragged away into squalor. Andrés De Loco hated Alfonso with all his being and even that was not enough to consign him to death. Not even if it meant sealing every door in the room and filling it to the brim with gas that would kill Vyse, his pirate ilk, the Ixa'takans, and the Silvite. It would have been so simple but even that was not acceptable.

So Andrés De Loco did something oddly heroic; he decided to save Alfonso's life even if the man didn't deserve the kindness. With a frenzied hurl of finely charged electrulen crystals, De Loco filled the room with a bang of light so bright as to blind anyone unprepared. Then, ignoring the fatigue of his body or Alfonso's thrashing, he lifted his fellow Valuan and leaned him upon his shoulder. As the electric magicks from the crystals faded, he dragged both himself and Alfonso through an open doorway and dropped a potent crystalen shard behind them which erupted into a sheer ice wall blocking off any pursuers.

At his side, De Loco could barely hear Alfonso's whimpers. "Why did you save me? Don't you hate me?"

De Loco grimaced before answering. "Yeah, I do… and I don't know…"

Back within the room with the gathered host, where Ixa'ness warriors mingled with pirates standing before a fallen beast and from hence two of Valua's most powerful men scampered off, Aika Nassar blinked.

"What the hell just happened?"

Fina managed a giggle. "I think we won," she said as Cupil slipped off her wrist to bob at Lira's side.

"A sword-red day," Merida said with a grin. "And a mountain with no more shackles."

Centime whistled. "Boy, my wife is gonna give me an earful when I get back to Horteka."

"Suppose we all have different business," Vyse said as he looked around the room. "There's plenty that needed to be tended to here…"

Tara grinned. "We Ixa'ness will assist," she insisted. "Doubtless Merida and that bird-like hunter will remain too so that we can treat the injured and see what is next for our people."

Vyse nodded. "If we could, I'd have everyone stay," he insisted. "But Valua being all scattered will mean they're gonna be desperate to find the moon crystal. Which means…"

"That you will need to head to Rixis," Isapa said sanguinely. "The location is not so simple as something marked on a map but I can help you find the way. If anything else…"

His eyes settled on Fina and the Silvite shifted nervously. "What is it?"

Isapa hummed curiously. "Stone or no stone," he said suggestively. "There is an echo in the mist that you need to see."

Fina asked cautiously. "What will I find there beside the stone?"

The High Priest sighed dramatically.

"Yourself.."