Chapter 31

"Son of Ares"

Someone desperately shook her awake- no, shook her back online. She was left gasping for a breath that would not come, would never come, and scrabbled at her chest in hopes of expanding lungs that simply weren't there. She was drowning. She was drowning - again, like she had beneath the irradiated ice, upon the Arcology, beneath the might of the dragon. Her fear, her desperation, it all bubbled up with a weak, strangled cry - for help, maybe, or for something.

"Hawkmoon!" Cyberwarp blurted. She was above her, optics bright, panicked, urgent. Cyberwarp. Not Nadiya, not Eshla, not Vaudren.

Vaudren? Who was that? Was she the woman in her dreams? The woman-

No, it was definitely Cyberwarp who was above her. A Cybertronian. Not human. Not organic-based. Living without really living; existing on a cheat-code. Like her. Like she was doing now. Because she wasn't Adria. She wasn't Lennox-2. She was Hawkmoon. And with that revelation, it all came flooding back.

"What?" Hawkmoon rasped, systems jarring. Her own body was left utterly perplexed, unsure how to read the brief spell of mixed-signals sent by her not-brain. Brushing whisper-close to a DER. She shivered uncomfortably - and her body refused, refused to shiver, refused to so much as tremble even a little. Her servos moved and her wings shook, but that was it. Surface-level - not bone-deep. To shiver as a human did was to enact a natural instinct - one Cybertronians clearly lacked. As she managed to do was pitifully shallow imitation.

Cyberwarp gave her a terrified look. "The Hive are attacking."

Hawkmoon stared. And pushed her aside, leapt to her pedes and activated her combat protocols. "Scrap, we need-"

"Not here. Elsewhere." Cyberwarp hesitated. "Ikitri sent me to fetch you."

Hawkmoon powered down her weapons systems. She nodded, slowly. "Right, okay. Okay." She moved to the door, ducked out into the suite proper, and there he was, waiting with a grim look in his eyes. "I'm ready."

Ikitri blinked, surprised. "Good."

"Where are they?"

"Vahlu System. A true attack fleet, I'm told. It rests on the border between the Eecharik territories and the Ameursh feudal-states."

"A diversion," Hawkmoon instantly replied.

Ikitri frowned. Maybe. Understanding Tai expressions was hard. "How do you know?"

"Because they're fanatical, suicidal, but not stupid. They're testing you. Testing your defenses. How far in your Protectorate is this?"

"They've only needled a little ways into the Star-Web. Come - Admiral Oroses is departing within the local hour, and she has commissioned us both to accompany her."

"You?" Hawkmoon dubiously questioned. "No offense and all, but-"

"I command a ship," Ikitri declared self-consciously, standing taller. "What of you?"

"I've run sorties against these fraggers more times than I can count, but that's neither here nor there so..." Hawkmoon turned, to tell Nacelle and Cyberwarp to stay put, but paused upon seeing their hardened expressions, both of them prepared for an argument. "Do as I say," Hawkmoon grunted, displeased. "While you're with us, you do as I say exactly, and no arguments. Is that clear?"

They exchanged a look. "Crystal," Cyberwarp replied.

Nacelle nodded in acquiescence.

The scene they found outside their place, in the corridor beyond, was even more chaotic and rushed. Swiftsear and Sandstorm were having a heated talk with Northwind, who kept repeating "I'm going", and Skydive quickly approached her the exact moment he spotted Hawkmoon.

"The Dartwings and I were curious, you see," he nervously blurted. It sounded like a pre-emptive excuse. "We didn't mean to pry or anything, but all the Tai talking about their sun had us curious, a-and then Deciforge picked up on dark-matter particles, so-"

"I don't want to know," Hawkmoon grunted. She spared a glance back Northwind's way, who was flanked by a conspicuously silent Quell. "What's wrong?"

Skydive grimaced. "We're going with you. We don't want to, but we can't leave you to go to war alo-"

"Stay."

"No."

"Skydive."

"We're not abandoning you," Skydive continued, growing bolder. "We're not."

Hawkmoon sighed. Ikitri gave her a look that screamed hurry the frag up, so she just said, "Don't say I didn't try to warn you. If you're coming, do as I tell you and don't you dare give me any backchat."

"... O-okay. Okay."

"Okay." Hawkmoon clasped his pauldron tight. "I mean it. This is war, 'Dive. It's going to be hard."

He shuttered his optics. "I know."

"You're a good mech. I'm sorry you had to be here for all this." Northwind and Swiftsear's argument had fallen short. They were looking her way. "C'mon!" Hawkmoon said, louder. "Admiral shouldn't have to wait, and the Hive certainly won't!"

They took a shuttle offworld and boarded Ikitri's light cruiser, the End of Reservation, and gathered in the warship's helm - watching as it sped away from Tai Prime and linked up with Admiral Oroses' personal fleet. The attack group was larger than Jehennes' had been, with all of nine plateships, or as the Tai called them battle-plates, and with thrice that number in smaller, more physically robust arsenal-ships - of which the End of Reservation was among.

"Admiral Gabrien has already engaged the Foe in the Vahlu system," a hologram of Oroses declared across the fleet-wide channel. "I have been informed that the enemy has already achieved landfall on planet Osteor. Our mission is two-fold: to reinforce Admiral Gabrien's defense of the orbital arcologies and the star itself, while also fielding planet-strikes to burn the Foe out before they can dig in. The Emperor's blessing is with us; be brave. For the Protectorate. For the Sun. For the Emperor."

"For the Emperor," Ikitri softly echoed, bowing his head. He gestured sharply to a number of aides; they rushed to give the order to follow the rest of the fleet towards the swirling kaleidoscope of energy forming out in the void of space. The Raven Bridge.

It prickled at Hawkmoon, engaging a sense she'd almost forgotten she had. The Aperture Scrambler thrummed louder and louder the closer they got, inaudible to all but her while squirreled away in her chassis. It showed her everything - the coordinates of the space-bridge's link, how long it was going to last, and it gave her the option to shut it down. Hawkmoon abstained, afraid of what would happen.

In the wrong hands, it really could have been a superweapon.

The Hive would have loved it.

The Vahlu system was utter chaos. They emerged from the Raven Bridge to a scene of many, many distant fireworks - green and red and purple; soulfire and Solar and Void. The star system had many worlds and most of those had numerous moons, but only two were of any tactical value: Osteor and Ziin. The former was an Ameursh holding, and nearly overrun, while the latter belonged to an Eecharik queen-mother who, it was reported, was leading an commendable defense of her world and had actually managed to drive the Hive from her nests. There were lesser stations and arcologies orbiting the star and drifting around the inhabited worlds. Those around Ziin had already been obliterated in the initial attacks, while those over Osteor were being steadily broken apart by Hive warships and raining down on the planet as fiery debris. Admiral Gabrien had already set a fraction of his fleet towards emptying out the residential sectors of the orbital stations and Osteor both, evacuating as many civilians as was possible, but the scene down on the ground was a mess - one that direly needed fixing.

Oroses split her fleet into three - with herself to lead the strike against Hive's naval forces, a Myod Prefect to take charge of the reconquest of Osteor, and a skeleton element left behind to guard the star for one reason or another. Ikitri and his End of Reservation had been drafted into the admiral's subgroup.

"What about us?" Northwind wondered aloud.

Ikitri gave Hawkmoon a pointed look - and she presently ignored him, studying the holomap of both Osteor and the naval clash high above. Only a single warmoon was present, and it was both damaged by the bolts of battle-plate railguns and being held in reserve. The Hive weren't looking to break the planet, that was clear; they wanted to turn Osteor into a planet-sized slaughterhouse. To grow up what parts of their local armies survived the battle, give them some power, sharpen them into keener blades.

"These skirmishes are their growth-farms," Hawkmoon murmured. She glanced between all the opposing warships present - but none immediately jumped out at her as being a command ship. There was always the possibility that the local Hive warlord was in the warmoon drifting far out, but - no. No, Hive were predictable like that. If the warmoon had taken too much damage to risk entering the fight again, then their leader had probably run through a summoned rupture to another ship to lead the fight from there. "First thing's first - we need to cut off their head."

"Oroses's Verunlix navigator is reading the otherworld-waves," Ikitri offered. "They'll find the beast."

Hawkmoon nodded. "Alright. As soon as they do, update me immediately. Here - my comm codes." She electronically injected a datapacket into the holotable's terminal.

"Where are you going?" Ikitri inquired.

"Out," Hawkmoon grunted. "We'll run interference where we can, nip at their heels. Please don't shoot us."

"The Emperor's blessing is with you. I cannot presume to understand why, but it is."

"Uhuh." Hawkmoon spared the others a look. Swiftsear and Sandstorm were intensely staring at the holographic image, and only acknowledged her when nudged by Quell. Swiftsear gave her a quick nod, and Sandstorm simply bristled when their optics met, but she was beyond caring. With an urgent ping sent both the way of Northwind's and her own trine, Hawkmoon led the way out and towards the hangar - guided by a helpful Iurphin attendant.

They soared out into open space with combat protocols active and weapons configurations engaged. The Iurphin had loaned them the use of Tai-grade shield generators - flickering with a warm Solar heat and running over their entire frames. It had been a welcome gift, and more than liable to save their lives down the line.

Swiftsear took point, Sandstorm at his flank, and they directed the entire formation into a micro-jump that shot them right to the edge of the battle. Hawkmoon broke rank almost immediately, eliciting a groan and a curse from the leading pair, and her own trine instinctually followed suit. She took up position some ways behind a contingent of Tai foldfighters looping around the edge of the skirmish to flank a stray cryptship. Another formation - Hive Karves - swiveled on their own flight-path to run for interception, tailing behind the foldfighters and opening fire.

Hawkmoon sped up, locked onto the lead Karve scoutship and tore it apart with a quick barrage of molecular-sharp crystalline shards. The rest, finally taking note of the Seekers, scattered - and were summarily chased down by her trine and the vengeful Tai. One tried to turn around and hit her, but Hawkmoon boosted forth, transforming mid-flight and grasping out at it - snagging her digits on one of its bony wings and tearing it off in one savage motion. The rest of the ship tumbled away in fracturing pieces, spilling out soulsmoke that rapidly dispersed in the emptiness of the surrounding vacuum.

::Hawkmoon!::

::Now's not the time.:: She twisted about, darting out of the way of the next scoutship speeding towards her, and allowed the sparse volley of soulfire rounds to disintegrate on her shield as she closed in. Her talons raked down the length of its hull, cracking open the cockpit and slicing into the Hive morph within. An electronic ping came her way, from the foldfighters regathering themselves in their own formation.

::Thank you!:: the lead fighter crowed. ::We're-::

::I know, I know, get on with it.:: Hawkmoon checked her radar to ensure the other Karves were gone, transformed and shot off towards the scarred Cryptship. Her trine, Northwind's and the Tai foldfighters followed suit - and when she unloaded on the Hive warship, they did the same, tearing into its dark chitinous hull and cutting great swathes into its frame. Chunks of armour cracked off and thin, fading trails of greenish-black smoke billowed out.

Another series of blasts, not from them but a nearby arsenal-ship closing in fast, hammered the final nail in the vessel's coffin and reduced it to broken rubble.

Swiftsear and Sandstorm caught up - and they were furious. ::Hawkmoon, you-::

Another signal cut through. Personal, so... she just switched over, ignoring the other two. ::Hawkmoon speaking.::

::Ikitri here. We've found it. Seventh column, heavy warship, low orbit. Black striations along the hull.::

::I see it.:: Hawkmoon marked the distant ship on her formation's shared map. ::Frag it, it's a big one. Tombcarrier. Far in, too; it'll take some cutting to get close.::

::Oroses is already on it. The fleet is engaging as best as they can. Admiral Gabrien is running to engage as well. Omen Five-Five believes the commander plans to land down on the planet's northern hemisphere. :

::Could be to drop off enough wizards to kickstart a summoning ritual - or to burrow in deep and carve out spawning chambers.::

::Burn it up before that happens.:: Ikitri logged off.

Hawkmoon switched back to local comms. ::I've just targeted the Hive command ship. It's attempting a planet-strike; we need to bring it down before it does.::

::You can't-:: Sandstorm began, but Swiftsear must have told him to shut up, because the two of them went dead silent.

Hawkmoon continued. ::We're going to burn a path all the way towards it and take out its propulsion systems. It's locked in the gravity well, though, so the best we can hope for is to cripple it in time for the Tai to finish it off. If we're lucky, we might even snag the commander before he can jump ship. C'mon.:: She pinged the Tai foldfighters with an update of the situation. They conferred with their home-ship, then confirmed to her that they were good to follow. Hawkmoon shot off mere moments later - and they all soared after her.

The smart thing to do would've been to loop around the press and heat of battle, but the ships on the periphery were probably watching their flanks and it would probably have taken too much time. Hawkmoon didn't have any patience to play it safe, either; she scored through the maelstrom of violence in perfect radio-silence lest a witch was listening in, keeping her attention on all her sensors and making sure nothing was going to sneak up on them. At three different intervals Karves and Tombships tried to chase them down, but Swiftsear and Sandstorm begrudgingly went to lengths to dissuade that sort of behaviour, tearing apart every contingent of pursuers with extreme prejudice. The rest carried on, Tai and Seekers both, and as they closed in on the descending warship they masked their approach by darting through the field of destruction and debris left in its wake - finally sneaking around the burning carcass of one of its sister-ships and then darting out towards it as fast as they could.

The Tombcarrier opened fire. Hawkmoon alerted the others and swerved between the hailstorm of soulfire, and most of the others did the same, but foldfighters - despite being perhaps the most nimble craft she'd ever laid her optics on - were piloted by organic pilots, and that meant slower reaction times. A couple of Tai fighters were shredded apart, blink-quick, but most of the others rolled around the soulfire barrage with little issue.

::Take out those cannons!:: Hawkmoon snapped. Her own attention was squared on the Tombcarrier's primary gun - some ancient skull of a gargantuan beast, its agape jaws lined with glowing runes. It spat fire like the dragons of ancient myth (and some of the real ones), burning up whole regions of vacuum in corrosive green fumes. The firing chamber was built in the place where the monstrous animal's eyes had once been, manned by witches in ragged, bloodied robes. Hawkmoon fired first on the dark misted shielding around one of the empty eye sockets, then chipped at the bone surrounding it when it didn't give - cutting away at the runes keeping it up. No such luck.

She transformed, hit the edge of the socket and plunged her superheated blades into the ossified bone. Ivory began to slowly bubble and melt, and with a determined push, Hawkmoon began carving out a section of the skull to break through. The wizards within screamed, their cries carrying effortlessly out into the medium-absent realm of open space. They defied logic - or most logics, at least. When Hawkmoon finally punched through and shot the closest one dead with her shoulder cannon, it died easily enough - and that was one universal law most Hive couldn't avoid falling prey to. The others fired spells of sharpened Dark at her. Hawkmoon dipped back to avoid the flung antimatter-daggers. ::Anyone-::

::Got it!:: Nacelle fired a missile - and it wove right into the break in the skull, filling the chamber within with shrapnel and death. Some of the runes must have been hit, because the shielding buzzed and failed. The surviving Hive within were quickly cut down by the ensuing fire of strafing foldfighters.

A burst of enemy fire, though, scattered the Tai vessels and ran across Hawkmoon's back. Her shield took the brunt of it, and she leapt away from the giant skull to avoid the rest, transforming as she did and boosting off.

::Targeting spikes are planted!:: one of the Tai pilots cried out. ::Retreat for-:: His ship was caught in an abrupt stream of soulfire and disintegrated on the spot.

::Everyone away,:: Hawkmoon ordered. It didn't take long to figure out what the Tai had been talking about, because mere seconds after they cleared away from the Tombcarrier it was lanced through with not one, but two railshots from a pair of distant battle-plates. The entire thing buckled and slowly broke apart into two separate pieces, its centre a glowing hot mess of molten chitin and broken support struts. The skull-cannon's restraints snapped off, leaving it to float free of the Tombcarrier's remains - at rest at last.

::Ikitri?:: Hawkmoon prompted. ::Warship's hit. Is the commander dead?::

There was a long pause on the other end. For a moment, she was all but certain the End of Reservation had been destroyed, but a quick scan of the battle found it in one piece, smashing apart a pair of smaller Hive Cryptships.

::... zzzzssst- o! No, commander's alive! Omen Five-Five is reading him - injecting down onto the surface! He's... damn it, Omen says he must be searching for a cartography-station! He's searching for a reliquary!::

::A what?::

::A map!:: Ikitri blurted. A Star-Web map! The great Sun's own nervous-system!::

Frag. Hawkmoon dipped down towards the planet. Two plateships were already in the atmosphere, but they were above the brunt of the groundside fighting at the southern hemisphere, fielding armies of Myods and Tai where the Hive presence was strongest - sorting through the overrun cities and exterminating the invaders at will. There was still so much more planet for the Hive commander to take advantage of.

::Where?::

::I don't- No, this is Tai business, you can't-:: Ikitri started to say.

::Your fighters can't break through the atmosphere as fast we can!:: Hawkmoon shot back.

::Fine, I'll... I'm patching you in for the Admirals.::

There was a buzz as her connection was switched over, and two more voices - loud and clear - barreled into the channel. Oroses was one, and the other must have been Gabrien.

::-e have to demo the area immediately!:: Oroses snarled.

::It's a holy site! I will NOT commit sacrilege!:: Gabrien paused. ::Cybertronian, are you there? You have permission to engage - go, now!::

::The Emperor does not care for ancient relics!:: Oroses furiously continued. ::Not when the Protectorate itself is at risk!::

::I'll go,:: Hawkmoon snapped, just to speed things along. ::Where's-::

A third voice slid into the channel - and it wasn't Tai, that was evident by its panicked hissing voice. ::I'm sorry, I'm sorry, it's... I'm sensing abnormal energy patterns around the Addendal Station! It's there - it must be!::

A Verunlix, then. Omen Five-Five.

::Ground to orbit comms are shot,:: Oroses reluctantly added. ::We're not picking up on any distress signals. Visuals are... Sun preserve us, I'm being engaged by more carriers. Oroses out.::

::We can't hear them,:: Gabrien went on, ::and we won't be able to hear you when you get there. I'd already sent troops to guard the station an hour earlier, but I'll send more reinforcements as soon as I'm able. I'm sending coordinates now. Keep the reliquary out of their hands, Seeker.::

::Got it.:: Hawkmoon relayed what she'd been told to the others - and as one, they dove down.

Osteor was a verdant forest world, at least in the narrow equatorial corridor running between the advancing ice caps. Most of the settled areas were in the southern hemisphere, for no other reason than because of a strange Ameursh custom about settling rights, but the Addendal Station was an old Taishibethi temple, built twelve thousand years prior during a much earlier customary expansion of the Protectorate's borders. It was founded by a delta where a gushing mountain river met the sea, carved out of old stone and erected to honour the perceived sanctity of the Star-Web.

When they finally sighted it on the distant horizon, it was clear the Hive had gotten there first. There was a faint green glow around it, towers of smoke clambering up into the skies above, and the briefest flashes of gunfire.

And also a number of Tombships tearing through the air above, depositing more and more troops.

::Take them!:: Hawkmoon shouted over their shared comms. She propelled herself forwards as fast as she could manage - transforming in time to barrel through the closest Tombship and skid to a stop before the burnt-out entrance of the temple. Her servos switched out for weapons - blade and carbine, both of which she put to good use when the Hive rearguard swiveled about to face her. Cyberwarp landed beside her, plasma blasters flashing, and the rest crashed against the dark-shelled vessels above with righteous fury. Vengeance for Vale, Hawkmoon supposed. Well, she wasn't going to stop them.

Hawkmoon ran on, slicing aside a Knight and kicking her way through a throng of Thrall. Her size painted a bigger target, gave them more to shoot at - but the Tai shield was a resilient thing, and her body's monumental strength gave her the option to simply wade through the lesser morphs, weaving death and destruction with almost no effort. It was ridiculously easy to crush the lesser morphs underneath - comically so. Being a gargantuan Cybertronian definitely had its merits.

The pair of them broke through the temple's front, skittering Thrall hot on their heels. There was a statue within, of Úthaessel herself (or one of her predecessors) holding her hands up towards the stylized symbol of a radiant star, desecrated with viscera-painted alien glyphs. Dead Tai, Ameursh, and Hive littered the ground. Cyberwarp indicated towards the stairway on the left, ::I hear shouting!:: and took off, Hawkmoon close behind. Their pedes left the floor, both of them resorting to thrusters and wings only for want of sheer speed.

A pair of massive Knights barred the way up above, armed with Boomers, but the siege weapons proved useless in close-quarters - and that was exactly what it became when Hawkmoon boosted towards them, blades engaged, and reduced them to so many seared chunks of chitin and bone. She kicked the uppermost portion of a crested skull aside and powered on, firing at every three-eyed thing in their way.

Finally, finally, they emerged out onto the third floor, just of height with the statue-Úthaessel's head. A cluster of Knights and Wizards were grouped by where the wall gave way to balcony and bridge out towards an adjoining island-tower - shooting at something unseen. Just as Hawkmoon was watching, one of the Wizards was stripped of its shield and gunned down by the needle-thin beams of Tai-built rifles. One of the Knights, taking cover behind a summoned barrier, caught sight of them approaching from behind and roared furiously. Hawkmoon raised her carbine and sprayed until they all collapsed over on themselves, riddled with shards.

"Hello?!" something yelled from the balcony's way in Tai. Hawkmoon snuck up by the edge of the entrance, keeping by the wall, and indicated for Cyberwarp to follow suit. The din of fighting was still pouring in from above, but the third floor seemed clear.

"Friendly!" she shouted back. "Admiral Gabrien sent me!"

"What are you?!"

"Not Foe!"

"Show yourself!"

Hawkmoon reluctantly slipped out, reverting her servos back to mere hands, and she held them up in the air. There, at the other end of the bridge, was a single Tai sharpshooter flanked by four small, frightened Ameursh armed with flimsy little firearms. The Tai had a rebreather and bandolier on, but the Ameursh lacked pressure-suits entirely, garbed only in ripped, fragile uniforms. Civilian workers, not soldiers.

"Friendly," Hawkmoon repeated. "Both of us."

"Both of-" Cyberwarp stepped out into broad view. The Tai soldier worriedly glanced between them. "Are you... Cybertronians?"

"Yes," Cyberwarp tersely replied. "Your admirals sent us to secure a... a 'reliquary'?"

"We have it!" one of the Ameursh fearfully cried out. The Tai silenced it with a look.

"How do we know you're-" the sharpshooter started to ask, but then Cyberwarp yelped with fright.

"'Moon!"

Hawkmoon twirled around. For a moment, maybe, she was under the impression that all the spare Thrall had caught up - but no, it was a pack of much, much older and larger warrior-morphs. Knights bearing blades and Shredders and Boomers, led by a particularly massive specimen bearing twin cleavers. Blue armour, a gnarled helmet with no apparent visor and decorated with the ivory teeth of slain foes, rings of rusted iron looping through the edges of his pauldrons and cuirass, tattered ribbons of blood-red trailing from each steel link, and a great crimson cloak falling from his shoulders.

She knew him.

She'd killed him.

The Warpriest of Oryx tilted his head and pointed at her with one of his dark hadium swords. The Knights at his side and back stilled and awaited his order to strike. He spoke, then, to her in his twisted Ascendant Tongue - and the meaning of his words were branded into her mind, searing into her every thought, self-translating and leaving a haunting aftertaste in its wake. "You. You struck my ship. You defaced my totem. You stink of stolen worth and ill-earned favours."

"Ffffffrag," Hawkmoon hissed, optics wide. "Oh frag."

"Is that... the commander?" Cyberwarp whispered. "Oh scrap; he's almost as big as us! 'Moon, what-"

"Silence," the Warpriest spat. Cyberwarp shut right up - and that irked. Hawkmoon shot him for it.

The nucleon-charge round harmlessly splashed over his helmet.

Fan-fragging-tastic.

"Oh, you are bold," the Warpriest mused. "I think I shall make a gift of your wings to my noble King."

"You'll have to kill me first," Hawkmoon challenged, engaging her blades.

"Yes. I think I will." The Warpriest growled something to his lackeys - and pointed at her again. Said something along the lines of "that one is mine."

It was very demeaning. She was going to gut him for it.

"Shoot to kill," Hawkmoon snarled out in Tai. Cyberwarp and the Taishibeth opened fire, tearing through the lesser Knights. What rounds hit the Warpriest merely bounced right off, eliciting from him a deep, throaty chuckle that reverberated through the very stone of the bridge beneath. The other Knights either died or summoned temporary shields to take cover, unable to compete.

But the Warpriest just waded on, towards her, blades dragging behind him and scoring deep scars into the weathered old stone. Hawkmoon engaged her wrist-blades, filled them with heat and leapt forward - riding on a single rocketing boost of her thrusters, lancing both servos at the Hive warlord's head. The blow was swatted aside with a lazy slap of one of the Warpriest's swords, and the other swung in fast for a counterattack, but Hawkmoon darted back - out over the side of the bridge and into open air, boosting herself to keep her balance. She fired her shoulder cannon again and again, if not to hurt the beast-shaped-like-a-man, then to blind him with each flashing impact. She lunged for him a second time, with no better result - and barely came out of it unscathed.

The Warpriest swung his cleavers about with crushing weight and fierce power, fighting with a wild, hungry glee. His attendants didn't intercede; they focused on trading fire with the Tai and Ameursh, who Cyberwarp covered with her own shield generator and chassis.

"I have walked five paces!" the Warpriest bellowed, dragging Hawkmoon's focus back to him. He swung for her; she dove beneath the blow, sliding her own blades against his cuirass and only succeeding in drawing sparks. "Five entire paces I have walked! Five paces for my glory-king, godly Oryx!"

"Sounds like you do some cardio," Hawkmoon mocked

"Five paces!" the Warpriest went on. He tried to feint, to lock her into a false move that would've removed her helm from her shoulders - but Hawkmoon saw it coming a mile off, saw the telltale flex of his muscles beneath his timeworn chitin-plates. "For each pace, a world has crumbled in my own grasp! All for my beautiful, noble king!"

Hawkmoon dipped back from a particularly vicious swipe. She darted up and around, jamming a wrist-blade in under the Warpriest's neck, but even his bare neck was more resilient than mortal flesh had any right to be, and her blade just slid along, barely leaving so much as a scratch. There was a power to him, magic, a might borne of genocide. She backtracked, put off, but a sword was coming her way - and she kicked at the wrist wielding it, abrupt enough to jostle the weapon out of the Warpriest's grip. He kept going, though, grabbed the offending pede and tugged her back close enough to deliver a dazing headbutt. Hawkmoon lashed at his helmed face with a blade, but he caught the arm and crushed her wrist in his three-fingered grasp.

She screamed.

Hawkmoon pulled, tugging her servo away. The Warpriest let her do so, just watched her go - and then brought his other cleaver in. She tried to move, tried to boost out of the way, but it caught the front of her chassis and laid open her surface-level plating. She rocketed back, slamming against the floor of the bridge, and almost skidded off the structure entirely.

The Warpriest stomped towards her. Cyberwarp flashed past, shouting, and the Hive warlord caught her in the midst of her charge, grabbing her by her neck and raising his sword up. Hawkmoon yelled, thrusted towards them and crashed into himboth shoulder first, hard enough to impress a Titan. The Warpriest stumbled back, losing his grip, and swung out on instinct. Hawkmoon caught it on the wrist-blade of her intact arm - and the blade summarily snapped. The cleaver planted into the floor, having been deflected far enough to miss her entirely, but Hawkmoon still pushed Cyberwarp and herself back as quick as she could.

"For Oryx," the Warpriest rumbled, tugging his sword up.

Hawkmoon cradled her injured servo close to her damaged chassis and glared at him. She dragged herself back to her pedes, traded out her broken wrist-blade for a carbine and laid into him, firing nonstop. The Warpriest charged; Hawkmoon kicked past him, firing into his back, and bowled into the thinning ranks of Knights - savagely kneeing the first she happened upon in the face, reverting her servo back to normal to scoop up the creature's fallen cleaver. She swung around, smiting another two, and danced aside as the Warpriest slammed his own weapon down where she'd just been a split-second previous.

She flew right back, hoping to take advantage of his exposed flank, but the warlord swiveled about faster than she'd anticipated - blocking her first strike with his sword, then catching the second in the palm of his free hand. Skin split, chitin cracked, bones snapped, and the Warpriest held tight. And he laughed. Then brought his own knee up into her midriff, knocking her nonexistent breath from her conspicuously-absent lungs. He slammed the pommel of his own sword down on the back of her helm as she doubled over, and kicked her dazed self down onto her back.

Hawkmoon went to activate her thrusters to make a getaway - but then his sabaton suddenly planted on her chest, grounding her down on the floor and crunching through her already torn frontal plating some more.

"No!" Cyberwarp roared, darting in with her own blades, and they were easily slapped aside. The Warpriest tossed Hawkmoon's cleaver away, shot out with his mangled hand to snatch Cyberwarp's entire helm, and chuckled as she lashed with desperation at the arm responsible.

"First you," the Warpriest whispered. "Then we will see what trophies your mate will provide."

Hawkmoon fired up at him, which did absolutely nothing, and could only watch as-

No, wait, she had another-

She reached across to her injured arm, pulled the foldblade-hilt out of its internal compartment and flicked the bladed panels out, switching its power supply on in the same motion - and brought it right against the hand bearing the massive dark cleaver being aimed at Cyberwarp's own sparkchamber.

The shimmering Void-wreathed blade bit completely through the Warpriest's forelimb effortlessly. Like a superheated knife through half-melted butter. His hand and the cleaver clattered to the ground. The Hive creature sharply looked down at her, confused. "You are not-"

Hawkmoon brought the blade against the leg holding her down, nicking through the creature's tendons and cords, and shoved it off. The Warpriest lurched back, dropping Cyberwarp, and stumbled towards the shocked faces of his Knights. Hawkmoon followed him - a shark having tasted blood. She diced apart the two lesser morphs that threw themselves in her way, kicked away a third, and closed in. The Warpriest turned to her, tilting his head.

"I have lost this battle," he commented, not in pain or even with fear - but with thin amusement. "I do not understand. You are-"

Hawkmoon decapitated him.

His head hit the ground with a wet smack and rolled back to stare emptily at his retainers. She snapped her optics back the way of the remaining Knights and snarled, "Anyone else?!"

There was a long pause, even on the end of the Tai and Ameursh. Then the Knights threw themselves at her - egged on by hungry parasites.

She killed them all without even a moment's hesitation.

When, at last, the final warrior-morph had been put down, Hawkmoon turned around to the Tai - drenched in green blood streaked with odd blue of leaking energon - and said, "Was that convincing enough?"

The Tai sharpshooter said nothing, but the Ameursh began babbling as one. The farthest of them held up what looked like a datastick, likely full of tactically-vulnerable information. It didn't seem like much of a 'reliquary' to her, but hey, the Tai were weird like that.

Cyberwarp approached Hawkmoon, wiped away the gore across her front and inspected the damage. She made a sympathetic sound as she beheld the crushed wrist. "You'll need Quell to look at this."

"Later."

"I know, just..." Cyberwarp glanced back at the Tai. "Are there any others? Any other Tai nearby?"

The Tai hesitated. "My... squadron is dead," he lamely finished. "As is my flight-partner. I am the last."

"Flight-partner?" Hawkmoon repeated. "You're a pilot?"

"Yes."

"Where's your ship?"

The Tai indicated over to the side. Where one of the towers of smoke was emanating from. "Scuttled," he explained.

"Scrap." Hawkmoon turned about, inspecting the temple's interior for more Hive - but it seemed they were in luck. "We'll hold this place-"

::Frag, fragfragfrag!:: Nacelle shouted over comms. ::'Moon, one of their carriers has just dropped in!::

So much for their luck. ::What, in orbit?!::

::Yeah! They're diving now - diving quick! We've only got a breem or two!::

::What about those Tombships?!::

::We're almost... Okay, we're finished, Sandstorm just killed the last one. Coming back now!::

Hawkmoon spared the Tai another look. ::There's a problem. We've got civs here. Any Tai ships en route?::

::Not the living kinds,:: Northwind grimly reported.

Hawkmoon cursed.

"Wait!" Cyberwarp cried out. She peeked over the edge of the bridge. "We can reformat our alt-modes-"

"What?"

"Look, we'll scan a ship, get these guys on board and get out of here."

Hawkmoon hesitated. She eyed the Tai sharpshooter. "We're not large enough to carry a Taishibeth," she noted.

The sharpshooter stared at her some. Then he sighed. "It does not matter. My mission stands."

"Yeah, we're going to get the reliquary out, just hold-"

"My task was to hold this temple," the sharpshooter interrupted. He looked back at the Ameursh. "Evacuate the Ameursh, take the relic, return to the admirals. I'll see this through."

"You'll die," Cyberwarp pointed out, voice wavering.

The Tai held her gaze. "I will not abandon my station."

"But-"

Hawkmoon grabbed her arm. "C'mon."

"But we can't-"

"C'mon!" she said again, more urgently - to 'Warp and the Ameursh both. The little amphibian-reptile-people hobbled out from behind the Taishibeth and warily hopped through the remains of the Hive. Hawkmoon marched on ahead of them, half-dragging Cyberwarp behind her.

"Wait!" the Tai called out.

Hawkmoon slowed to a halt and steeled her nerves; second thoughts or no, they couldn't bring him with them. "Yeah?"

The bird tossed something to her. A pistol, the slim barrel wrapped in a beaded necklace.

"For my cousin," the Tai explained. "Please."

"What's your name?" Hawkmoon asked.

"Yiivren."

"And your cousin?"

"Ijutas."

"I'll see that it reaches them," Hawkmoon softly promised. "Good luck."

Yiivreni offered her a solemn, resigned look of grim acceptance. "Emperor's blessings be with you, Cybertronians."

They carried on and left him behind.

"Ameursh don't breathe the same atmosphere. Or endure the same atmospheric pressure," Hawkmoon remarked. They were standing by the almost-intact wreckage of a Tai foldfighter. It might have been the sharpshooter's, it might not have. It was larger than they were, but Cyberwarp had promised that that didn't much matter.

"We can moderate life-support systems however we want," Cyberwarp explained. "We just have to get them first."

A bright ray of light flew out of her optics, roving over the foldfighter's form. Only after a couple of seconds was she finished - and her frame began to change as a result. Not by much, but it was there, and most evident in the kibble-areas - like her wings and thrusters, adopting the Tai-crafted systems for her own. Cyberwarp finished it off with a full transformation, her rocket-esque alt-form replaced with a slimmer approximation of the very same foldfighter beside her - nimble and sharp.

"How do I...?" Hawkmoon asked.

Cyberwarp sent her a datapacket. The instructions were clear - and the files necessary were all there, in her processor, having gone previously untouched and ignored. It was... simple in practice, what with the tech already being installed in her frame, and remarkably intuitive as a system. Hawkmoon guided the activated scanner towards the foldfighter and felt the change overcome her from the inside out. Both of her sets of wings adopted the flexible, foldable style of the Tai vessels and her plating smoothened out - at least where it wasn't damaged.

::We might need one more!:: Cyberwarp said to the others.

Skydive swooped down and landed, spooking the Ameursh, and followed through the same procedure. He transformed into a modified foldfighter and opened up his glass canopy.

What followed was definitely one of, if not the weirdest thing Hawkmoon had ever been subjected to. One of the Ameursh, the one with the reliquary, hesitantly clambered into the cockpit of her own alt-mode's form. She almost jolted them out; it was... unnerving. Strange. Totally alien, both as a concept and in practice. To her mind, it was almost like a Worm interacting with Hive - just catching a ride in something bigger. Hawkmoon forced herself to ignore it, ignore her own subconsciousness's warnings that this just wasn't right, and double-checked that the pressurization and air-supply were working just fine before locking down her own canopy.

::Alright, let's be considerate for these people,:: Hawkmoon murmured. She rose slowly into the air; all three of them did. They set off at a pace that gradually sped up, with the others flocking around them to offer protection. Hawkmoon almost transformed to dislodge the foreign presence when the Ameursh nervously grabbed at the side of the cockpit for support; there was no way this was natural.

But she carried on all the same.

::Southern hemisphere is a warzone,:: Swiftsear observed. The fireworks were on display on the horizon. ::Unsecure.::

::I know,:: Hawkmoon replied. ::Let's get some altitude. See if we can break free of this jamming field and contact the fleet.::

They rose up, swiftly - but at an angle as opposed to straight up, for the sake of their passengers.

Passengers.

Oh, it was never going to stop being weird...

Their formation broke through the cloudbanks above - and were greeted with the sight of a colossal pitched battle far above, where Tombcarriers bodily crashed with arsenal-ships, and battle-plates swept through the chaos like city-sized giants, painting the exosphere with horrific streams of white-hot plasma fire. Their comms exploded with activity soon after; Hawkmoon was assailed with countless pings from when Ikitri, Oroses and Gabrien all had tried to contact her when she'd been in the jamming field.

::We're alive,:: she declared, ::and we have the reliquary. We're on our way.::

::The Foe has begun opening portals in the stratosphere!:: Gabrien reported. ::They're flooding Osteor with troop carriers. We're about to lose the world. Fly, as quick as you are able.::

::Is there anything we can-::

::You've done enough,:: Oroses told her. ::Get back to the End of Reservation immediately. We have three Myod supercarriers inbound; this battle will be ours.::

::The enemy commander is dead,:: Hawkmoon added. ::He tried to grab the relic, but we got there first. I killed him on our way out.::

::Are you sure?:: Gabrien asked.

::Pretty sure. I DID cut off his head.::

::No, are you sure it was the enemy commander?::

Hawkmoon paused. ::Yes,:: she said quietly, ::I'm certain of it.::

::That's good news,:: Oroses cut in. ::You've done good work. Get that relic out of this system and I'll even gift you a feather. Go.::

::On it.:: Hawkmoon switched channels. ::This is Hawkmoon, hailing End of Reservation. Does anyone read?::

::This is Captain Ikitri. I read you, Seeker.::

::We're en route, pulling out of Osteor.::

::Any company?::

::Maybe. If there is, they're not exactly keeping up. We've got a relic to extract from the system - Admiral Oroses wants it as far from the Hive as possible.::

::Understood,:: Ikitri replied. ::We'll hail the Raven Bridge. Do you have any wounded?::

::Myself and maybe Northwind. I think he took some light fire to his right horizontal stabilizer. And we've got civilians with us - Ameursh.::

::I'll prep some pressure bubbles. We're backing out of the battle now; can you see us?::

::Yep. Hightailing it now.:: Hawkmoon forced herself through the next few steps towards hitting escape velocity. ::We'll be with you in a couple of minutes. Hawkmoon out.::

The Ameursh disembarked not long after they'd landed, entering portable artificial bubbles of appropriate pressure and air-composition. Hawkmoon wanted to shiver, to do something when the sensation of it - bubble and small limbs passing over her frame - but her cold mechanical form refused. She transformed once the amphibian was out of the way and winced as her reforming chassis and arm twinged with sharp aches. Quell made his way over, looked the damage up and down, and remarked, "It must have been quite the fight."

Hawkmoon hummed and said nothing.

"It's too dangerous to let it settle on its own, but I can treat this. I warn you, though, it'll mean soldering."

"Do what you have to," Hawkmoon said with a grimace. She looked up as a Tai official approached and held up the datastick - pressed delicately between two talons. "Here's your relic."

The Taishibeth took it and bowed at the hip. "Thank you. Is there anything-"

"I'll need raw steel sheets or, failing that, some other preferably light alloy, and..." Quell looked up at the bird. "Are we due to return to Tai Prime soon?"

"Within the hour," the official confirmed.

"Splendid. Raw steel sheets and a blowtorch, please. And galvanizing agents too, if you have them."

"I'll have someone fetch them now. Thank you again!" The Tai left them be.

Nacelle walked over to them just as Quell was probing her damaged wrist with his digits. "You doing alright?" he asked.

Hawkmoon shrugged. "As well as can be expected."

"Cyberwarp seems spooked. I mean, we all are a little, but she's... yeah." They both glanced over at the femme, who was speaking animatedly with Northwind, Sandstorm and Swiftsear about something or other. Probably the fight on the temple-bridge.

"Yeah, that's probably reasonable," Hawkmoon muttered.

Nacelle frowned - then glanced her over. "Ouch. What happened to the other guy?"

Hawkmoon lifted a claw to her neck and drew it across.

"Yeah, that's about what I was expecting. Anything I should know?"

"The Warpriest is dead," Hawkmoon whispered.

"Is that who you killed? Title sounds a bit much if you ask-"

"He wasn't supposed to die now. Not for a long time. He... no, I remember..." Asking about him, about who he was, why he was important in the first place. After I'd killed him. A conqueror of four hundred and eighty-five worlds. Not just a measly FIVE.

"Is something the matter?" Nacelle asked, concerned and curious all at once.

"The Warpriest is dead," Hawkmoon repeated, optics widening. "History… it really isn't set in stone."

"So...?"

Hawkmoon found herself smiling. "Maybe we can make a change."

AN: As ever, massive thanks to Nomad Blue for editing!