11038 Continued

Rule by Ghrathryn

Ayana found herself humming happily as she sat down to the first proper breakfast she had had in her life (hospital food didn't count). Not only was she away from her psychotic uncle, bullying cousin and insane aunt, but she also had another, much nicer, aunt and a twin sister that she had never even known about until the week before.

That day had been something out of a story book for her. She had been rescued by a pair of strong women, one of whom looked like she might be a demon, who had put her uncle down hard when he tried to attack her; the other had saved her life later when one of the patients had turned into a monster. The girl hadn't even looked bothered as she turned the metal beast into scrap before anyone else had known what it was doing!

"Well someone's happy," her twin commented dryly from her side.

"Are you kidding?" Ayana asked. "I have family that actually cares about me and I got to meet some real life heroes," she squeed. "Inazuma took Uncle Vernon down without even breaking a sweat when he threatened me, and Megan was sooo cool when that monster showed up. It was like 'Rah, I'm going to eat everyone', and she was 'I thought I could smell demon stench' and killed it before it even finished transforming. I want to be able to do that."

"Calm down, sis," her twin laughed, "It's not like they're going to carry you off like a princess or something."

There was an amused sounding snort from near the door. "I think we've already done that in getting you hooked up with the other part of your family," Megan commented dryly as both girls turned to look at her. She made her way over to the table and took a seat on the other side. "I heard from Inazuma you had some sort of odd vision, Ayana?"

Ayana nodded. "It… It's weird, it's like I've got a game HUD in front of my eyes. I haven't done anything with it yet," she admitted.

Her twin blinked, turning sharply to look at her. "You've got that as well, Sis?"

Ayana nodded again, "uh huh." Then what Rhea said sunk in, causing her to turn to her twin. "You as well, Rhea?" she asked, getting a nod from Rhea.

"It started the day Anna and Ikazuchi appeared, but it was before they appeared and I'd gotten a bad headache the night before," Rhea admitted.

"That's when…"

"Dursley tried to murder you?" Megan asked gently when Ayana trailed off, getting a sob and a nod from the girl. Reaching over the table, she squeezed Ayana's hand gently. "He won't be doing that again," she promised, watching Rhea hug her sister.

"I-I'm alright," Ayana said, sniffling.

Megan shook her head. "You're probably going to be a while before you can say that truthfully," she said. "PTSD can get nasty, believe me, all of us can tell you stories about what we've been through and how it's knocked us about." She paused before looking at Rhea. "You think your aunt will mind me escorting you to the local park to see what's going on?"

Rhea frowned from where she was hugging Ayana. "I-I don't think so," she admitted.

"I don't need them for anything today, and it's the start of the summer holidays," Beth said as she entered the dining room. "Though we do need to take Ayana to the bank, St Mungo's and check what was supposed to happen with my brother and his wife's possessions." She frowned slightly as she placed the plates down. "I also need to find out what's going on with Sirius Black, the last I heard he had been placed in Azkaban, but he shouldn't even be alive right now if he was the one that betrayed my brother's family."

Megan scowled. "I think, once we're sure about things here, I'll see if Anna is up for a run on that hellhole. Maybe see if we can ensure that nothing there is likely to try joining Riddle and get Black out of there early."


Number 12 Grimmauld Place was in uproar. A horrible howling and loud barking had woken up everyone in residence at four o'clock in the morning, sending many tumbling out of their beds and rushing through the narrow corridors and rooms with wands drawn to try to find what sort of beast had entered. If that wasn't enough, the noise had set most of the owls and cats scurrying for cover while many dark creatures fled into the night. Even Buckbeak, the proud hippogriff was found at bay in the room he was living in.

"Down, Farkas," a voice sounded from the kitchen, cutting across the barking easily in spite of the fact that said barking was loud enough to shake pictures from walls and dust from the ceilings.

The residents of Number 12 crept into the room in the sudden silence, every breath and step seeming to echo around them.

"Now we've gotten your attentions," another person said, making several of them jump, sending spells into darkened corners. "We, that is, Naka, Iku, Kempenfelt, Hibiki and I, felt that you lot needed some sense knocked into your heads."

"Particularly regarding Harry Potter," a third female voice sounded from somewhere on the table, making Hermione look there and blink.

"That's a phone!" the teenager exclaimed.

There was an amused snort from the other end. "Congratulations, at least one of you can be taught. Miss Granger, I'm guessing," the second voice continued sarcastically, "and it's also a point to bring up. If you òraidean had any sense, you'd have already figured out alternatives to contacting Harry Potter, especially since, you know, anything could have happened to him by this point. Just from us, there's the phone, as you can see. Call his land line or buy a mobile for him and call that after sending it to him."

"Your 'guards' could pass on messages," the first voice pointed out.

"Da," a new female voice added, "I very much doubt magical morons such as the inbreed clod chewers would watch the mass network of the Royal Mail, which handles many hundreds of thousands of letters every day."

There was a snigger from the other end as everyone in the house started to talk, only to cut off when a growl echoed from the phone. "Thank you, Farkas," another voice said. "There's also, whatever methods Messers Mooney and Padfoot used in their school days."

"Email's becoming a thing, message him to hit up a library if they've got internet and talk there," yet another woman pointed out. "Well, once he's got an account and you've shared addresses."

"Or figure out a way to have paired diaries or something, write on one, it echoes on the other. I'm sure there's ways to do that," the second voice came back. "None of the above are things the Magic-Hating Ghoul-Wannabe Society would think of and it'd give him someone to talk to. Speaking of, you do know what Post Traumatic Stress Disorder is, or can find out, right Miss Granger?"

Hermione blinked at the question. "W-why are you asking that?"

"Because Mr Potter has four years of it stored up, this holiday has and hasn't helped and being cut off from you lot certainly hasn't," Voice Two responded. "As the name suggests, it's something that comes after trauma, and well… what he's told us is troll, night walk without a guardian into a monster lair, attempted murder and a bodge job of 'protections' followed with another attempted murder for the first year, second involved giant spiders, giant snakes – and since a friend of mine has two Norwegian Sea Basilisks, I can see that – attempted murders and attempted mind wipe at minimum, then third with the soul eaters and last with dragon, swimming in an icy lake, a maze full of nasty including a repeat on the spider and seeing an attempted murder, being kidnapped, assaulted and forced to fight or die." There was definite disproval in the woman's voice as she ticked off the points. "Oh, and let's not forget the box he sent Sirius from his work place, a place with a history you can probably find out if you don't know it."

"Had any unbearable nights lately, Granger?" Voice One asked. "I know there's one Winnie the Pooh knock off that was just dying to meet you and the ginger."

There were groans on both ends for that. "Kami, Kempenfelt, that was bad," one of the other voices commented. "But yes, as Blake said, there's a lot of issues stored up, meaning we are going to see about getting him to see a psychologist. It's mandatory for military and emergency services in several areas where we're from, I think volunteer rescuers also get counselling after dealing with things like avalanches, hurricanes, tidal waves, earthquakes and such, kami knows they need it."

"That's one reason why we had that time off after dealing with Harvey and the other storms," one of the others pointed out. "Though Zafiya dusting a number of people didn't give it a good start. Little shit that she was."

"In any case," Kempenfelt cut in. "That's hardly the end of it. Number 12, Grimmauld Place, London, N1 to NW1-something or another, around twenty minutes hike from King's Cross, St Pancreas on Euston Road, that's about a mile at normal walking speed." She paused, waiting as several people gasped. "Your spell stops people knowing one secret, which isn't the Black family townhouse in London's address, which, interestingly enough, was actually in the Yellow Pages. It's also the one property on that road that apparently never paid any of the standard bills since it was built after the First World War, and yes, that is on record as to what numbers were assigned, even if it seems to have gotten lost. If the Royal Navy can find the details, others probably can at least if they're military or secret service." She snorted in amusement. "Apparently the fact the Blacks hid the place didn't stop it being registered on the original purchase nor stopped it from being logged in address books."

There was a pause for a moment before the Russian woman said, "Something else, Black, order your elf to explain in detail what happened to your brother, da? It might shed light on why Riddle still exists. Also, maybe find out from the aurors who is in their charge. Maybe worth getting them to check for original trial and make appeal against judgement, execution order for skipping jail should be illegal, da? Particularly if you were illegally incarcerated," she added.

"That's it from us," Kempenfelt came back. "Big thing though, get in touch with Potter. Hell, take a bloody walk down his alley someday soon, before he decides to move on without you, or asks us to actually send Farkas over. Look up the amarok if you're wondering. Toodles." There was a click as the phone call cut off leaving a shocked group of people standing in the kitchen of the old townhouse.

"H-how could this happen?" Molly Weasley asked, not noticing that everyone else was lost in their thoughts.


Looking at the ruin of the portal, Akatsuki groaned, rubbing her nose. "Of course they go and run off without even checking things. I swear to the kami, I don't know who is worse, the twins or Javelin." She gave the gate a disgusted look.

"You know what this was?" Warspite asked, looking from the wreckage to the Sakuran destroyer. "Because I don't remember it, nor does anyone else I've spoken to about this building, and the C-class destroyers, Javelin, Z-23 and your sisters are all missing."

"It's an interdimensional portal," Kaga replied, casting a glance at the remaining Akatsukis. "I don't know the full story, but it was supposed to lead to another version of the city, in a world where this war was over and didn't have mixed nation fleets where Red Axis and Azur Lane alliances were mixed… unless a ship was captured or transferred before it started."

Hibiki nodded, but the sound of ringing prevented her from saying anything as she pulled a mobile phone from her pocket. "Hello, Hibiki speaking," she said, placing it to her ear. "Yes, yes, we found the portal. It's in a bad way," she continued, frowning slightly as she looked over the room, rubble scattered around that several other shipgirls were poking at and a cracked, half broken gate in the middle. "Wait… so the mirror sea? Kuso! Yes, I know Yuubari; do you think she can help? … Other science shipgirls? Well U-73 was trying to make training ammunition out of candy at one point, maybe her? Alright, I'll ask, right, bye Raven."

"Bad?" Akatsuki asked, looking over to see the scowl on her sister's face.

Hibiki nodded. "That was Raven, from the KanColle side of the gate," she said before taking a breath and letting it out. "From what she said, the back blast of some of their girls and some of ours going through simultaneously tore up the mirror sea to the point they lost several girls travelling to Devonport from Portsmouth there. She thinks it might spread and cause more trouble, possibly to the point of bits of land, including everything in the area at the time going missing… the way she described it…" she trailed off to swallow hard. "If it gets that bad, it's possible that people might end up being cut into pieces depending on where their bodies lie, as in maybe a limb or a head here, the rest somewhere else, or the reverse. Raven wants our science girls to start looking into things from here, so we need Akashi, Yuubari and probably U-73 at least, maybe others if anyone knows who might help."

"Did they… did they know where our sisters are?" Akatsuki asked worriedly.

Hibiki nodded again, causing Akatsuki to sigh, her shoulders slumping. "We can't get at them yet, because of how messed up the mirror sea is, but they're in what they're calling a Harry Potter world," Hibiki explained. "Their version of South Dakota said it looked like some sort of gender swapped, maybe a wrong boy who lived variant, though there was another aunt and the siblings were getting on. Apparently Inazuma stopped the one of them being killed." She looked over at Warspite. "Raven also said that Comet, Cygnet and Crescent are all safe in their Devonport. Vice Admiral Glenn asked the three of them to help out while they were stuck there."

Twitching her kitsune tails, Kaga scowled at the wall. "It'd probably be a good idea to at least get them to look into things, the sirens are bad enough, but Akatsuki's pranks can be near lethal and the last thing we need is trouble from worlds moving on us. I heard some of what happened with that Aye-Eye and its version of the mirror sea."

"'Her'," Akatsuki corrected, "and it was once, after you were a complete bitch. I don't know what had crawled under your tails and up your ass, but between that and trying to suffocate the C-class girls in literal shit a few loops before, I wasn't exactly in the mood for more the same for the rest of that loop, though I'm surprised you came out 'normal' for you the loop after the first time we encountered the Devonport girls considering I saw riots at Yokosuka after Inazuma stopped feeding people there."

Both Warspite and Kaga looked at Akatsuki, one in bemusement, the other with an edge of irritation.

Hibiki rolled her eyes at the three of them before grabbing her sister's collar. "Come on, Akatsuki, we'll be more use finding out if anyone is good at science and explaining what's happening than watching the gate." Nodding to the other pair, she turned and dragged her sister out of the room.

"Hibiki likely has a point, if you'll talk to the Sakuran girls, Kaga, I'll see if Bismarck can talk to the Iron Bloods," Warspite suggested.


The Ministry of Magic was in uproar, every Death Eater in Azkaban was dead, executed with two round holes in the front of their skulls or with their heads separate from their bodies, lists of their crimes, collaborators and informers typed up and pinned to their corpses. Not only that, but every Dementor at Azkaban had been destroyed, none of them had escaped and several guards and visiting Ministry officials had been killed as well, while two of the most notorious Death Eaters had vanished in the confusion, type-written notes in their cells listing every supposed crime along with evidence for and against – mostly against – them being Death Eaters, or at least willing ones, along with the declaration; 'Innocent'.

Unfortunately for Madam Amelia Bones, that wasn't even the worst thing about the event, or the thing that had Minister Fudge screaming. The fact it had been done by three people little more than a week after it was found out that Ayana Potter had been nearly murdered by her muggle relatives and was now with her squib aunt, that Delores Umbridge had been killed along with the Death Eaters and that there had been a message on the wall reading 'We are coming for Malfoy, those like him and those he bought,' wasn't helping.

The grey haired woman looked up at a knock on the door, followed by the stumping gait of Alastor Moody as he made his way to a chair opposite her desk. "Did you find anything useful at Azkaban, Moody?"

"Not enough," Moody replied gruffly, his eye flicking around. "There were three assailants, the first flew as some sort of giant raven or crow and was wearing full plate armour with a raven or crow motif. We're presuming that they were female for now, since both the others were; she used a sword and a gun and were the one to chase down the Dementors that attempted to fly away. The second also had a gun, but used a massive cleaver or something; she was definitely female, dressed like something out of Muggle London around the turn of the century, long leather coat, heavy boots, a scarf or something over her face and a hat. Apparently she can swim much better than any muggle since she came out of the ocean. The last was seen on the ocean, not swimming but gliding over it. She had some form of backpack and bits of equipment that looked like they were from a ship apparently, like the others, her face was covered and her clothes were non-descript. Most of the large scale damage was done by her, but she used a knife and a handgun up close.

"We don't know enough about any of them to know what they were doing; though one of the survivors said the knight was called 'Crow' or 'Karas', by a dementor. The latter of which might be reference to a Japanese legend about a guardian." He shifted, scowling as he dug into his robe and dumped a few pictures on the desk. "They knew what they were doing, knew where to strike, they even got things right at a time to be covered by the morning fog. One thing that's odd though, beyond everything else. Everyone lost a moment, it wasn't much, but it was enough for them to move, which is probably when they questioned people, though nobody remembers it. What's more, none of them seemed to be effected by the Dementors, they just cut down things we barely contain and got more out of the Death Eaters in a couple of hours than we have in years."

Amelia frowned, picking up the pictures and looking over the artist's renditions of the trio. "Do we know why they attacked the prison?"

Moody shrugged. "Our best guess at the moment is either revenge on the Death Eaters, destruction of the Dementors or both. It's well known that many Death Eaters were sent to Azkaban and that it's guarded by Dementors, it's possible, maybe even probable, that they were brought in by someone that lost family during the seventies and wanted revenge, maybe it took until now because there weren't any people brave or insane enough to attempt to break in to Azkaban."

"That doesn't explain why they took Black and LeStrange, though with Black, there is no record of a trial and LeStrange had to be silenced during hers as she spent most of her time ranting and rambling about the return of You-Know-Who," Amelia said, scowling behind her monocle. "Then there's this;" she rifled through a few folders to pull out a folder and dropped it on the desk between them. Flipping it open revealed several sheets of paper, the first detailing the locations of several founders' artefacts, many bearing the notation 'horcrux of Tom Riddle' next to them. "Whoever did this knows a lot, probably much more than we've been told."

Moody took the folder, scowling as he flicked through it. "So we're going to follow up on all of this?"

Amelia nodded grimly. "Everything there, everything found at Azkaban, and try to get someone near Miss Potter. I don't like the thought of someone managing to pull this much off as it is, it's possible that there's more we need to worry about."

"I'll get to it then, though… I might need that metamorph girl from Hogwarts, Tonks, I think her name is, rumour is that she wants to be an auror, maybe we can pass it off as an apprenticeship or something and it might be necessary to have some younger kids around to get in with the Potters, though if it looks like there might be trouble, I'm not going to let them go there." He looked up at his boss. "Could also be a good way for the kids to get to know one another before they officially start as well."

"Only if their parents agree and after you've checked things out, I don't want to put children in harm's way," Amelia stated, getting a nod from Moody before he left the office.


Taking a sip of her drink, Megan watched as Sally relieved Ikazuchi of her umbrella in slow motion and used it to tap the oni shipgirl on the head for the crowd that had gathered around them.

"What's she doing?" a German accented voice asked from the side, causing Megan to glance over at where Niimi was standing, wearing something much more appropriate for British weather.

"Showing the kids some bartitsu moves by the look of it," Megan replied. "Neither of us are anything like experts, but when you're practicing things over the course of a decade and a half, you tend to pick things up, particularly if they're things that might surprise someone. If you can turn household items or bits of clothing into weapons in a pinch, you're more likely to catch an opponent off guard long enough to hurt them badly enough that they're unlikely to come after you." She shrugged, shifting to lean against a convenient fence post.

Smirking slightly, she motioned at where her sister had turned, letting Ikazuchi pretend to be knocked down to block an attack from Inazuma, before throwing a flower at the blue haired girl and mock kicking her in the knee, letting Inazuma stumble before sweeping Javelin's spear aside, wrapping her stolen umbrella around Javelin's chest and flipping the lilac haired girl over her own back onto the ground, finishing Javelin off with a mock punch. "Imagine what that'd be like full speed, and pretty much everything is readily available items, bar Javelin's spear, more than likely in a proper attack in the streets it'd be another umbrella, a walking stick or something like a sharpened mop or broom handle. Of course, those four practiced most of this so they know what's likely to happen and it's going slow so the kids can see things."

"I know Javelin likes to use the spear and many of the others have swords, but what you said before, it's not as common for your group?" Niimi asked, looking up at Megan.

Megan frowned, scanning the area around them while Sally started getting the others to take some of the kids that seemed to be interested and running them through basic drills. "It's hit and miss, at Devonport pretty much all of us know how to fight hand to hand or with small arms because of how often we get into fights where big guns aren't good weapons to use, but outside it's rarer. I know at least some of the Japanese fleets have close combat styles, but I've not seen or heard much for the others outside general brawling." Shrugging, she narrowed her eyes slightly, spotting a faint shimmer in the air where there didn't appear to be anything.

"We've got company…" Anna's voice sounded from the ear bud Megan was wearing. "I count a score in bound, bearing 0-3-0 degrees, five hundred metres and closing. Black capes, white masks, most people seem to be ignoring them."

There was a click before Arei's voice sounded. "Eyes on 2-0 people description match, black cape and white skull mask, bearing 2-1-0 degrees, five hundred metres out and moving closer."

"Forty… more than I thought would attempt something this stupid," Megan muttered. "Niimi, circle round to meet with Anna, Arei, I'm joining you. Everyone else, protect the civilians. Be aware though, there's invisible watchers try to keep to 'normal' capabilities for humans, negative on rigging, there's too much chance of collateral," she ordered, getting a nod from Niimi and a series of clicks from everyone else.

Moving around to where Arei was watching over things from, she arrived just in time to see one of the robed wankers pull a twig from somewhere on their person and send a bolt of green light at one of the civilians, dropping the person where they stood. "Weapons free," Megan whispered, immediately blurring forwards to block two further bolts with her sword. A loud bang from behind her told her that Arei was getting involved, as did the fact one magical went down holding a ruined throat.


Tonks flinched again as another spell flashed overhead and was flat out ignored by the lilac haired girl who was busy removing a Death Eater from her spear. A moment later the girl sent the former Death Eater flying from that massive spear at the one that had cast a spell at her with enough force that she was sure the two pulped on impact with a horrible crunch of breaking bone.

Swallowing hard, she flinched again as two of the girls, the Potter girls, apparently, cheered when one of the group surrounding them gutted another Death Eater with what looked like some sort of meat cleaver, entrails spilling all over the ground as he practically fell apart from the blow.

She looked around again, trying to ignore the smell of spilt blood and voided bowels. In the space of five minutes since the first spell was cast, which had merely irritated one of the horned women, almost every Death Eater that had been attacking had been killed with brutal efficiency.

Moments later, it was over, a corpse collapsing to the ground littered with bodies signalling the end.

"Sound off!" one of the women with dark hair called.

"They still can't quiet this banshee."

"Yuudachi, poi! Everything good, poi!"

"Devonport Crow flying free," the other dark haired woman responded after the brunette and the blonde.

"Javelin won, yay!" called the bouncing, lilac haired girl.

"Inazuma is fine," the light blue haired girl responded a moment before her sister did.

"Ikazuchi here, all good."

"Niimi responding," the other blonde added, "no damage."

"That was awesome!" called one of the Potter girls, much to the shock of just about every other person in hearing distance.

The one that had called herself 'crow' chuckled, patting the girl on the head. "Calmly does it," she said, amusement tingeing her tone. "These were people, suicidal idiots that were part of a death cult granted, but still people."

Tonks blinked. Did this woman really not rate the Death Eaters as the huge threat they had been within her own life time?

"Besides," the other dark haired woman commented, "not all the other kids are that enthusiastic about seeing idiots come to grief." She turned to the other kids. "Sorry about that kiddos, we were worried that the same morons that attacked this pair's parents might decide to have a shot at finishing things if word got out about them. The police will be here soon to talk to you all about it, just tell them what you can and ask them about seeing someone for the nightmares." Her gaze swept the group. "I've been navy since I was younger than you kids, believe me, there's things you're going to need to talk to people about. This mess is one of them."

That… sounded like good advice to Tonks. She worried her lip, not noticing her hair changing colours. Honestly, if this was what aurors had to deal with, maybe she would be better off not going into that job.

She was so caught up in her worries that she didn't even notice the police and ambulances arrive.


That is a bloody big dog, the redhead thought as she approached the old pizzeria. Just on a look, it looked big enough to match a horse, maybe even something larger. What is something that large doing here? Is it magical? She blinked as a young woman in some type of uniform came out of the pizzeria with a massive bone that she gave to the dog.

"Hey," the woman called. "What brings you here?"

Susan blinked for a moment before realising she was being asked a question. "Oh… uh… I work here. I'm one of the waitresses. What about you?"

The woman shook her head. "Royal Navy," she replied. "There was an accident that resulted in me and a few others ending up here a few nights ago. We've been dealing with some other issues while we're here." She shrugged. "I'm Commander Helen Kerr and this is Farkas."

"Susan Bones," Susan introduced herself.

Helen frowned, "You wouldn't happen to be related to Amelia Bones, would you?"

Susan sighed but nodded, "she's my aunt."

"Huh, cool," Helen commented before pulling a notepad from her pocket and offering it to Susan. "I think she may find this interesting. She might also want to have a few words with Professor Dumbledore on some topics; I think he might be both a bit too invested in certain things and a bit too used to being the only one able to deal with things." She shrugged, giving Farkas a whistle once Susan took the book and starting away before pausing. "Oh, while I think about it, might be worth you having a wander around the area someday. Harry Potter doesn't live too far away, he's the night guard here, and I think Sally-Anne Perks is around as well, living with her cousin or something. It might be worth looking both of them up since they spend most holidays without friends from school." Giving Susan a friendly wave, she and Farkas left the car park, "Cheerio!"

It wasn't until she got into the building that she realised what the commander had said. "Wait… Harry Potter is the Invincible Guardsman? What?"


Green hair matted with sweat, Comet leaned against the wall of the house. "H-how… much…?" she managed around gasps.

"Usually a lot less running around and a lot more paperwork these days, but the Jones twins are pretty much in charge of two major departments," Robyn admitted with a shrug. Moving over to Comet, she hooked the girl's arm around her and helped the girl to the couch, letting her flop onto it before fetching them both drinks. "Most of the running around is to do with finding the girls and getting replacements on things we've got going."

"Please tell me we don't have much more…" Comet groaned, resting her elbows on her knees and leaning her head forwards. "I don't think I can handle running like that for too long."

Robyn chuckled, shaking her head. "Well, we know roughly where they are, we mostly need to get things smoothed out and get our gear functional again so we can get them back and let you girls get back as well." Taking a sip of her drink, she leaned back. "I'm honestly surprised you're this badly off though, from what I remember of some of Naka's – our Naka's – prep work, even practice for being an idol is a lot of hard work."

Her breathing finally slowing, Comet leaned back, closing her eyes as she pressed the drink can to her forehead. "It is, but you girls are a whole other level of fit, and I'm sure I've lost levels or limit breaks with some of the resets. I mean, we keep things, but there are times where we pretty much do nothing but sit around and it's not like we've got the same amount of time as you girls."

"I doubt most of the shipgirls around get as much of a workout as we do most weeks," Robyn commented dryly. "I mean, you saw the schedule, right?" She got a nod from Comet. "I doubt there's anywhere else that pulls that sort of mess in general, plus all the 'side jobs' we've got. More often than not it's normal humans doing most of the things not related to sailing or fighting directly, though there's definitely a number of shipgirls who are poking things that are probably best left unpoked." She paused for a moment before shrugging. "Well, and a growing number actually doing jobs not related to their ship roles. Honestly though, it's kind of odd how many that actually do command duties at a base are lighter craft."

"As long as I don't have to," Comet replied, finally cracking the can and having a drink. "Trying to start an idol career is plenty for me, someone else can deal with the rest… as long as it's not Ajax, she'd probably spend most of her time trying to make her underlings into living toys or furniture or something."

Robyn arched an eyebrow at the green haired girl, "Major taste for BDSM, huh?"

Comet nodded, "Like you wouldn't believe. I'm just glad we don't have some of the things you girls do, it'd give her more ideas we don't need. The way she calls some of the sailors 'piggies' makes my skin crawl."

Reaching over to pat Comet's shoulder, Robyn nodded slightly. "Well, things should be calming now, at least in what we've got to do, so you can probably get a bit of a break from everyone you usually deal with."


Watching her fellow cruiser humming a jaunty tune and wandering back through the halls of the pizzeria while avoiding the animatronics, who were acting as if they were in 4:20 mode, Hikaru shook her head. Even if she was doing much better than Tonks, who was with her in the security office, both because she knew the animatronics weren't actively hostile and had played the game enough to know their patterns – at least the ones the game had, which had held true so far, she didn't think she could be out there with them. "Blake, you're insane," she muttered.

"H-how?" Tonks asked, shivering at the sight of Blake deftly avoiding both Foxy and Chica. "How is she not scared out of her mind?"

Hikaru glanced over at Tonks, frowning slightly at the sweat running down the woman's face. "She's insane," she said, "but she's good."

There was a snort from the door as Blake slipped into the room, knocking the button to close the door just in time for Foxy to bounce off it. "It's called practice, Hikaru," she said, putting the drinks she had snagged from the kitchen down. "Besides, Devonport girl, you know, the port that has to regularly sweep for ghosts, has a farm full of cryptids attached and puts up with enough demon invasions we actually have it on a weekly schedule." She shrugged, checking the window with a torch before releasing the door. "Sure the first few times were hell, literally, but anything gets old hat after a while."

"In-fucking-sane," Hikaru reiterated.

"Says the girl who keeps trying to call people out just because they can sing better than you or have other claims to fame that you can't beat," Blake commented dryly. Ignoring the looks from Tonks and Harry, she smacked the door button again in time to stop Chica getting into the room. "Shouldn't you two be checking cameras and the other door?" she asked, cracking open a can of soda.

That got the pair moving, just in time to prevent Bonnie sneaking in while they were occupied. While the pair grumbled over the tablet, Blake checked her door and released it. "Besides," she continued over their radio, "I'm a near twenty k-ton cruiser armed with enough naval rifles to level a city block, these kids are hardly a threat to Kanae when she's got bugger all useful on land, let alone the rest of us." She chuckled at the raised middle finger she got for her troubles. "Also, Heavenly Host, Nicki's tamed murder ghosts, murder animatronics aren't much of a step up."

"I hate you… so, so much," Hikaru responded over the radio.


"She's military," Alastor Moody opined, indicating Blake in the memory as the adults of 12 Grimmauld Place watched Tonks' latest run at Freddy's. "Possibly special forces of some sort, she's watching her surroundings without watching them, that's why she's avoiding the animatronics so easily."

"I'm more worried about the fact she mentioned Devonport having enough breaches of the Statute of Secrecy that they actually have a schedule," Remus said, frowning as the memory Blake told the others in the security office that she was going to get a drink and proceeded to weave her way past animatronics seemingly without care. "Though it might explain why, when that group of girls called a tellingbone that someone snuck in here they mentioned something called traumatic post stress disorder."

"Post-traumatic stress disorder," Sirius corrected, "And I still want to know how they knew about Kreacher and that amulet."

Stroking his long white beard, Albus Dumbledore hummed thoughtfully. "Perhaps it is something we should ask them, along with everything else." He paused, watching as several members of the order shrieked when Foxy attempted to assault the girl getting drinks only to keep missing as she deftly avoided him, leading to him getting hit by Chica as the girl made her way back to the office.

Eventually the memory played itself out, mostly made up of attempted attacks from the animatronics, which seemed to faze neither other girl nor Harry one iota, the two girls spending a decent amount of their time snarking back and forth interspersed with hints about how to deal with the situation.

Once it was all finished though, Tonks spoke up by swinging her hands to the side. "Also, I'm done with that place! I am not going back there at all!"

As he sighed, Dumbledore nodded slightly saddened. "I suppose…"

A triumphant expression crossed Tonks' face only for it to be wiped off as Alastor chuckled. "Seems that Potter has more steel in him then you, a professional Auror does." He barely reacted as she slammed a hand onto the table and demanded to know what he meant by that. "Lass, Potter has been at that job for more than three weeks. It barely even bothers him anymore. Not to mention the other girls, that Blake lass in particular. I doubt she's been there, but she's obviously been around things as bad or worse." Taking a swing of his flask, he continued. "Though I will give you that might be a consequence of your current training…"

For a moment, Tonks blinked. "What do you mean by that?"

A chuckle escaped the grizzled old man as he shook his head. "They're teaching Aurors how to deal with short fights with criminals, fights that are over in minutes at best." Alastor's false eye then focused on her, and Tonks shivered as she was reminded of Foxy for some reason. "But back during the first war, there were times when you would be hopping from one fight to another. Some days and nights it was nearly non-stop. You and the other currently trained Aurors would likely not be able to keep up with something like that… Potter has likely dealt with something similar, so I have no doubt that if it came to it, he would be able to deal with what we had to in the first war." He paused for another sip from his flask. "Those girls too, they're definitely used to fighting, you can see it in how they move. If it were them in the first war, they'd probably handle things much better than most."

If he had been aiming for her to continue on, it worked. However, one the meeting broke up and she had left for her shift, Dumbledore shared a look with Moody Alastor as well as Sirius and Remus, both of whom stuck behind. "Alastor, I would prefer it if you would not egg on some of the members."

All he got in reply was Alastor snorting. "The rookie could use some toughening up, especially since we'll be dealing with a war soon enough." He took another swing of his flask. "She has the talent and the potential to go far, this will help her with that." Then he went silent and gave the few wizards around a look as he watched Molly check on the teens. "They know, Albus."

From where he sat, Remus frowned. "I don't think that he knows, Mad-Eye… I think that he suspects that she might be a witch though."

Sirius just waved him off. "Same thing with him really, sometimes I see James in him, but he does have Lily's ability to suspect things though."

"The girls know," Alastor repeated. "They probably knew before they called people out. They must have known that we'd send someone, that's why there are two of them dealing with things right there. They knew how we'd respond and set things up deliberately." He scowled at the carpet for a moment. "They're likely not Death Eaters, otherwise Potter would likely already be dead, but they obviously know things that we don't, things that could turn the war before it starts."


"You know," Kanae commented as she opened the door of the pizzeria to a rather young woman, probably a few years older than Harry, and absolutely soaked by the pounding rain outside, "you're lucky this place has a night watch, not many places around here are twenty-four hours."

"Uh… yeah, I kinda figured that from the 'closed' sign on the door," the young woman responded before sighing. "Can I come in and use your phone please? My car broke down not far away and I need to get a pick up from some friends."

Kanae gave her a grin, opening the door so she could get in. "Sure, not really like we're going to use it otherwise at this time of day," she said. While the storm tried to wrench the door away from her, she pretty much ignored it, pulling the door closed easily against the press of the wind once the young woman was safely inside. "Just so you're aware, there's seven others here tonight, along with one of the biggest wolves you'll likely ever see."

With a thankful sigh, the woman quickly came in before Kanae closed and secured the door. "Hey, thanks for that, I really appreciate you letting me use your phone."

Nodding, Kanae frowned at the sight of water running in streams off the woman's clothes. "Give me a minute," she said before popping into a nearby office and grabbing a large towel from her crew before returning. "Here, you look like you could do with drying off." Seeing the girl's look, she smirked. "Japanese Maritime Self Defence Force, I tend to spend a lot of time swimming so I got into the habit of keeping towels at hand."

"Ugh, thanks for that," the woman said, accepting the towel and using it to start drying herself off. A moment later she stopped for a moment and blinked before she slapped her forehead. "Right, sorry for that." The woman then held out one hand to Kanae. "Heh, I'm Michelle, Michelle Schmidt."

"Kanae Sakurai, petty officer in the Japanese Maritime Self Defence Force," Kanae returned. She shook off her rising libido at the sight of the pretty woman in wet clothes clinging to her form. "Waiting on a trip back home," she added, knowing people would ask about her being part of a foreign military otherwise. "What about you? You sound American."

"I'm studying here in the UK, but I was born here before my parents left for the U.S. where I grew up." Michelle gave Kanae a look. "So what are you doing here? Surely you can't be the night watchman of this place."

Kanae shrugged, "Some friends of mine and I were part of a group running a convoy to Britain when we got stuck here, we're currently waiting for a lift home." She frowned slightly as a particularly loud bit of music sounded from somewhere deeper into the pizzeria. "Unfortunately our local guides are a bit too interested in checking local legends or going ghost hunting and well… this place has some stories. We've been around for a bit though, decided it'd help us to keep a watch on things, particularly since the actual night watchman, a guy by the name of Harry Potter, has a couple of friends around tonight."

There was a silence as the two stood there in the hallway and stared at each other before Michelle cleared her throat. "So… um… about that phone…"

"Sure, it's just in here," Kanae replied, "You can use the phone there to call someone."

Still drying her hair, Michelle missed how most of the office looked as she walked in and spotted the phone. As she walked over to it, she called back over her shoulder. "Do I need to dial anything to an outside line?" After Kanae told her which number, she started to dial.

She brightened when she heard someone pick up. "Lisa! It's Michelle, look, my car broke down and I need a lift. What? What do you mean Erika has your car and won't be by until the storm calms down?! Aw, damnit…" Michelle then sighed as she ran a hand through her still damp hair. "Where am I? Some strip mall in Little Whinging. Which store? One second, let me ask the night watchman…" She then turned her head a little. "Which store is this?"

"Freddy Fazbear's Pizzeria," Kanae answered, "And I'm not the night watchman."

Nodding, Michelle turned back to the phone. "Freddy Fazbear's Pizzeria." In the next second, if Kanae could have seen it, her face turned from relaxed to horrified as the name registered. In fact, she barely answered her friend's next words. "Ye-yeah… I'll… Wait for you guys to pi-pick me up…"

Kanae frowned as she noticed that Michelle seemed to be shaking as she set the phone down so she got up from where she had been leaning against the desk. "Hey, you okay? You look like you're cold or something…"

She blinked though as she grabbed her and got up into her face. "Freddy… Fazbear's…" Kanae nodded and she brought her face closer to hers. "Freddy Fazbear's Pizzeria which has animatronics…" Once more, she nodded as Michelle brought her face close enough that they were nearly touching. "Animatronics… That kill night guards…"

"How do you know about that?" Kanae asked, finally having had enough of having her personal space invaded. Jeeze, does it feel like this for the others when I do it? She wondered briefly, pushing Michelle back a bit.

Slightly hyperventilating, Michelle searched her face as she gulped and whispered. "My-my dad worked here, back in the 70s, before they fired him. He had a lot of horror stories about this place."

Kanae gave her a look before moving to hug her. "You don't need to worry about the animatronics. For one, the thing that controlled them is destroyed, for another those two local friends I mentioned? They often deal with worse things, and the wolf… well, Farkas has to have Teflon coated three to four inch thick steel rods to play catch with because he can bite through anything thinner."

Seeing Michelle still spooked, Kanae gave her a gentle squeeze, mindful of her strength and led her through to the party room where her friends, Harry, the animatronics, Susan, Sally-Anne and Farkas were, the large amarok acting as guard for the two new girls.


"That," Ikazuchi commented, "is a lot of dice."

The seven shipgirls, karas and two preteen girls were making use of the lounge in the apartment Ayana and Rhea's aunt owned above her shop, in front of each was piled around a hundred dice, D20s split evenly between green and white.

Megan nodded, watching as some of the others shuffled their fingers through their pools. "It's something to do with how the girls' abilities work," she said, drawing the attentions of the others. "I only noticed it when Javelin mentioned things rattling around in her hold, but it looks like all ten of us are considered a 'party' in the RPG sense."

"A what sense?" Niimi asked, looking a bit confused.

"Role-Playing Game, Niimi," Inazuma replied, picking up one of the dice to show the German. "Play acting in a group with one person telling you what things are around you and playing everyone apart from the people the rest of you play." She frowned slightly. "It's got rules and most 'fights' are sorted out with dice rolls."

Rhea nodded, her dark red hair tickling at her sister's cheeks. "Aunt Beth has some downstairs, most of the more famous ones like Dungeons and Dragons, GURPS, Shadow Run or the like anyway. I've read a few of the adventures, but never played them, never really had anyone want to play those, so most of mine are on the computer or consoles."

Clearing her throat, Megan drew attention back to her. "We're probably going to be here a bit longer, so we can at least run an adventure or two, though as things stand I don't know why we're considered a party for whatever magic makes Ayana and Rhea see things like they've got permanent computer RPG interfaces across their vision, but whatever it is, it seems to do more than that. Between rescuing Ayana and getting her to Ms Potter and Rhea, dealing with a mikura at the hospital, the other hospital visit for Ayana, the trunks, new clothes, dealing with the rest of us setting up shop, clearing Azkaban and rescuing Sirius Black and his cousin and the fight in the park a few days ago we apparently managed to clear enough 'quests' to jump everyone to level 10 and these dice are rewards for both levelling and quests, hence why we all have them." She looked over at the other pair of twins. "Ayana, you read up on them, didn't you?"

Ayana blinked for a moment before sitting up. "Uh… yeah?" she paused and coughed. "I mean, yeah, yeah I did. The dice look like they're sort of representing rolls on a treasure table. Every time we level, as long as you're in a party with me or Rhea, you get five, which are one treasure table; every quest is between one and three on another table, depending on the quest requirements. There might be quests that give more later." She shifted, brushing her hair back. "Supposedly, depending on your Fate stat, a level up or quest reward die can mutate when rolled and there's supposed to be themed ones for certain quest lines, but presuming the die is the same type, if it lands on the same number, you'll get the same item, otherwise it's kinda like magic is running as a Games Master, but letting us see the treasure rolls."

"So we can get prizes when we roll these?" Javelin asked, picking up a couple of her dice. "Do we know what any of the prizes are?"

"Not without rolling them," Sally replied.

"Well, why don't we roll some of them then?" Javelin asked. Pushing her other dice aside, she put one of the pair she was holding down and went to roll the other on the floor.

Holding a hand up to stop Javelin, Anna frowned. "Hold up," she said, "Ayana mentioned Fate playing a part and that we've got a stat for it while we're here and in a party with them."

"Nine stats," Arei cut in. She frowned as she manipulated the air in front of her for a moment. "Strength, Agility, Vitality, Reflexes, Intelligence, Will Power, Charisma, Perception and Fate, with a hundred points to spend for me," she continued, frowning. "Looks like they're 'percentile', poi, but I've got… 'supernatural abilities' that might be because I'm Yuudachi, poi."

Niimi shook her head at the statement. "That is still bizarre," she muttered. "Yuudachi does not generally dress like that, and she has canine ears."

"Our Yuudachi, yes," Ikazuchi commented softly before frowning. After a bit of playing, she managed to bring up her own status screen to see that she had similar to Arei, though comparing stats through the party window, her Fate was lower. "Javelin, would you roll one of your dice?" she asked.

"Huh? Oh, sure, Ikazuchi," Javelin responded, blinking back to the present. "Here I go," she said, shaking the die she had in hand before tossing it into a clear space. "Uh… Fate came up 87 against 23. Guess I'm not getting something special," she said, watching the die tumble across the floor to land on 14. A few moments later the die started glowing white, shifting and blurring until it warped into a set of can-sized bottles proclaiming themselves 'stamina drinks, with cranberry flavour'.

As Javelin gathered the bottles, Ikazuchi and Inazuma shared a look. "Okay, putting ten points of my available into Fate," Inazuma said, moving a bit more smoothly than her sister had to bring her Fate score up. "Let me try one of the same type now." Picking up a white die, the blue haired oni rolled it on the floor near her. "Okay, Fate does change things, I got 34 against 37," she said, frowning as the die changed to orange before landing on 9, a moment later it bounced itself up into the air again, shifting colours to land on 14.

Moments later, like the die Javelin threw, this one glowed brilliant white, shifting into a new shape. Like before, the transformation took moments, leaving a box big enough to stack four or five wisdom cubes along each edge or about a hundred and twenty-five in the box and proclaiming it contained a Power Ranger costume inside, all inclusive.

The three shipgirls shared a look between themselves. "Definitely changes with Fate," Inazuma commented. "I probably should have had the same thing as Javelin."

"So… what do you girls think?" Arei asked, looking at Megan and Sally. "Should we roll the dice here, go to separate rooms, roll a few and keep the others or hold off completely?"

Sally frowned at her pile of dice. "We don't know when Aunt Lauren, Alex and the others are likely to get us a way home, or whether the dice will work away from this universe… we probably should roll them all while we've got the chance, but do it staggered so only a couple of us are rolling at once and keep a note of what we get with each roll." Biting the corner of her lip, she frowned. "We can still make use of our natures, so it'll be easy enough to store anything we get, and presuming they keep when we go back, we can give the other girls some things to play with possibly, depending on what comes up."

"Javelin, Inazuma, since you two have started, do you want to sort the 'level ups' you've got and roll your dice with Ikazuchi and Niimi watching, then you girls can swap. Tomorrow, Rhea and Ayana can go, then the rest of us following them," suggested Megan.

Javelin nodded enthusiastically while the oni twins shrugged and Niimi said, "I don't mind."


Purifier laughed as she shelled the fleet sent against her, a few dozen 'mass produced' models backing her up in the attack on the shipgirls. "You know," she called, "you could just turn over the brats and the crystals, you could save yourselves a lot of pain, right?"

She laughed again, moving to fire another volley only for something to hit her from behind.

Yipping, she jumped and spun, only to find nothing. Scowling, Purifier scanned the waters before dismissing it and turning back, ignoring an explosion as one of her fleet went up in flames.

Dodging a volley from the shipgirls, she grinned, only to yelp as something hit her hard on the ass. Spinning around again, she glared at her fleet. "What the hell, Observer? Did you program these things right?"

Getting no response, she eventually shrugged and turned back to shelling the Azur Lane before having to scoot aside. Unfortunately, the shell smashed one of the remote bits of her rigging to scrap. Scowling again, she launched a few volleys at the shipgirl that had managed to hit her rigging, smoke tickling her nose.

Before she could start chuckling again, something else hit her on the ass and exploded. Stumbling forwards in spite of being on water, she yelped only for another explosion to tear the shorts she wore off at the back.

Spinning around, one hand on her rear, she glared at the fleet again. "Alright, seriously, enough! If you can't even shoot straight, I'll deal with this myself!" she yelled, only to yelp as shells from the shipgirls hammered into her rigging, sparking fires and damaging equipment. "Argh! Fuck!" Dismissing the mass produced fleet, she turned back to the shipgirls again as they faded out, grunting as she flared her shield.

The barrage of shells hammered into her shield with enough force to drive her to her knees even if they didn't actually hurt her. That was when something grabbed and something else was forced into her.

She barely had the time to shriek in pain as she was violated before a fist driven by 25 thousand horsepower slammed into her gut with a loud clang. A moment later her gut exploded.

Crashing down on the water away from her rigging, she writhed in pain, barely able to make out the half-dozen or so shapes that emerged from beneath the waves. She tried to struggle as they grabbed her and forced her mouth open, forcing something into it and down her throat.

"You want the crystals we get from the other world?" A Japanese accented voice asked Purifier as she tried to throw off the girls holding her down. A knee came down on her stomach making her scream around whatever was gagging her. Watery eyes clearing enough to make out dark hair and a half demon mask. "You can have them," the girl said, hoisting a barrel up and pouring its contents into her mouth.

Unable to move or fight between the pain radiating from her stomach down and the dozen or more limpets holding her, Purifier could only cry as the barrel's contents, some liquid filled with hard bits that made her boilers run hotter than they should while feeling like her munitions stores were having minor explosions constantly into her mouth.

By the second barrel, carried by a white haired girl that looked similar to the first, Purifier was mentally begging as she cried, her boilers screaming, and the metal of her body starting to melt and warp.

By the third, this one carried by a lilac haired girl wearing a crown and a white sleeveless dress she was starting to see rainbow clouds and strange lines in the sky. Even the girls looked and sounded like something… other.

Purifier twitched, wriggled, whimpered and spasmed, almost falling into the ocean when the girls holding her suddenly became insubstantial, or was it her that faded out? She reached, trying to grab the shiny thing on one of the girls' heads only for her hand to pass through it. Ignoring the pain, she reached out to bat at lights only she could see, almost falling into the ocean again.

She didn't see the shipgirls leave her, or Observer Alpha retrieve her. She was far too busy with dancing lights to pay attention to what was said above her.

The lights were pretty. They were safe. They didn't hurt her.

The pretty lights were her friends.

They wouldn't leave her.

She could stay with the pretty lights.

Stay forever.


Most people around Devonport knew that there were things you just didn't want to get involved in. More often than not those things were to do with the shenanigans that the shipgirls got up to, or to do with the creatures several of them kept, or all the things they fought, or the strange machines that Raven kept. Normally if you were assigned to deal with the animals it was a punishment detail and the 'non-standard' groups handled their own issues, so for most of the marines, sailors and shore crews, seeing Raven hurling a piece of equipment hard enough that it flew to the trash pile where it landed with a loud crash was unusual.

"What'd that doohickey do to you, Alex?" the voice of Aderyn Caddell sounded from the direction of the building the contraption had come from.

"That, Monarch, was the control core for the goddamn gate," Alex responded harshly. "Whatever happened to cause everyone to get blasted sideways sent enough feedback through the system that I'm surprised we didn't get half of Devonport blown up!" The silver-haired girl growled, throwing her hands up. "I'm surprised they didn't wind up with more than just a building blown out on the other side as well. As it is, we might well need to cut dimensional travel off for anywhere up to a millennium!"

"You're welcome, as, likely, is Angela," a younger girl with neon blue hair and cat ears commented. "Though I think it was mentioned we needed to see if there were better materials for those things."

Alex sighed, pinching her nose. "Believe me, Lyrene, I know, but our best ideas at the moment need the starship girls to have enough infrastructure to make their materials in quantity. The only groups that I know of having gotten that infrastructure so far are the Halo girls, who are most focused on their Mars base, and the X girls, who are mostly using their plates to expand their infrastructure. The Homeworld girls mostly have things internal so gods know when we'll get a decent look at them."

"What about the Wilders?" Aderyn asked. "Weren't some of the science types muttering about the rock and crystal plorts for metal?" she asked before frowning. "Come to that, doesn't one of the destroyer girls have a Minecraft world as a pocket dimension?"

"That one was manyullyn, at least the hull," Alex admitted. "The electronics were fried that badly they started melting the case, short of managing some of the supposed 'super metals', which apparently need fusion reactors to get done in a reasonable period, there's not much more we can do." She ran a hand over her face and sighed. "Sorry girls, the gate was a pain in the ass to set up the first time and the surge about demolished it, and I think we need the gates up to start smoothing out the dimensional sea, or at least to get Comet, Crescent and Cygnet back home, fuck knows how long the others are going to be trapped away from home. That period we were stuck in games and such took a year to sort out, much less this."

Aderyn wrapped an arm around Alex's shoulders, giving her a hug. "At least this time we've got a lot less trapped and a lot more help getting them back," she said. "Knowing us though, we're probably going to be seeing other effects or they're going to have a tonne of 'souvenirs'."

Lyrene snorted in amusement. "Of course they will, and knowing Anna, Megan and Sally, they'll be screwing up the plans of a certain wraith where they ended up… and probably hunting those dementor things since they're in a world with them, if they haven't already."

"Thanks girls, I kinda need the break," Alex sighed, leaning against the battleship girl's side. "I just hope we can punch through to the Azur Lane universe quickly once we've got the gate running here."

"We will," Lyrene said confidently. "After all there's an established, if damaged tunnel, and an expert in dimensional physics here, even if she hasn't yet gotten the degree because of all the rest we deal with." She smiled at Alex. "I'll go give the Powers a nudge about things if you two are alright here." When Aedryn nodded, Lyrene gave them a wave before disappearing.